BERKSON
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HEALTH
Hormones
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BERKSON HEALTH
One of my favorite times of day is sitting with my cup of Joe and looking over the science and pondering a blog and writing it. For me it’s a lot of fun wordsmithing together my life knowledge with what’s new. Having been in functional medicine, nutrition and practice now, yikes, for almost 43 years, I have a perspective that has, what we would say about a wine, ‘legs’.
Enjoy! Let me know what you think [email protected]
My mother died 4 years ago and 3 things I remember so strikingly about her were that she was a people person, very svelte and lean, and a born-again chocolaholic. She would eat one of the largest size Hershey bars, the ones on steroids, daily, all the while I was growing up. Yet everyone noted and commented about how fit and thin she was. Was chocolate her secret weapon? A recent study out of the University of California, San Diego, has rocked our world. For years science has acknowledged the beneficial role of chocolate in many aspects of health, from blood [...]
Estrogen’s a real complex and intriguing hormone. Medicine and science have been confused about estrogen for a long time now. Estrogen is sultry and ancient. She was the first hormone that existed on earth. She’s been around longer than most other signaling molecules (much of life inside the human body occurs with one cell sending an email to another; this is a signaling system). Estrogen is critical for many life processes and in most life forms. The estrogen emailing system in the fruit fly, gorilla, men and women and boys and girls is all the same. Each of us needs estrogen [...]
The media leaped onto headline news about a week ago that increasing levels of fish-type oils in the blood might significantly increase the risk of prostate cancer, especially aggressive cancers. At first blush this appeared credible and horrible news both at the same time. It was published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and run by investigators from the prestigious Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, WA. Worn out patients, tired of yo-yoing research might understandably moan, “Oh no, now what?” But if you look deeper into what the study assessed and what was reported, it’s actually a pretty fishy story. [...]
The media leaped onto headline news about a week ago that increasing levels of fish-type oils in the blood might significantly increase the risk of prostate cancer, especially aggressive cancers. At first blush this appeared credible and horrible news both at the same time. It was published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and run by investigators from the prestigious Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, WA. Worn out patients, tired of yo-yoing research might understandably moan, “Oh no, now what?” But if you look deeper into what the study assessed and what was reported, it’s actually a pretty [...]
When I tell folks I specialize in hormone health, many agonizing times they say, “Hey, do you know the old joke about how to make a whore moan?” The long-standing answer used to be, “Well, just don’t pay her.” But there’s a new answer. And it has pertinence to us all. “The most up-to-date way to make a whore moan is to block her ability to work.” This is the new hormone resistance. Many of us think that hormones, either self-made or taken as hormone replacement or during teenage-hood or pregnancy, simply function as they’re supposed to. Once in the blood [...]
I had a patient in the last year that suffered a severe bout with a herniated disc. One of the natural protocols that acts nicely to tamp down all that inflammatory painful storm inside the disc is high dose glucosamine added to a few other disc healing nutrients. About a month later this patient went in for their regular eye visit to their ophthalmologist. The ophthalmologist sat back and said, "Now, don't freak out, but I have to tell you that you have glaucoma." Were the two things, glucosamine supplementation and the onset of this eye disease, glaucoma, related? Read on. [...]
Often people get a diagnosis of a disease and they are told they will have this disease for life and the only choices are medications and learning to live with the situation. But this is not necessarily so. Hormones, along with other novel therapies, including diet, may hold promising answers for improvement and possibly even remission for some individuals. Your own physician may not know about these therapies, but search around for those who work with alternative therapies such as these to at least consider other options. They are often inexpensive and have a high safety profile so you have nothing [...]
What is a bigger addiction than alcohol or cigarettes? Carbs. Many Americans are, in fact, ‘carbaholics’. Dr. Jerome Block, who hosts the well-known radio show ‘All Things Medical’ that I often co-host with him, refers to this phenomenon as ‘A nation of craphaholics’. Dr. Block considers many of the carbs that we overeat—bread, cookies, cakes, bagels, pizza, and white pasta—as ‘crap’. Why? These are dangerous foods. At a recent lipid symposium in Philadelphia where 40 top heart and internal physicians gathered, the number one killer food that the convention agreed hurt heart health the most, was not fatty foods. No. The [...]
For years many of us have used this food as a small thoughtless garnish on top of other foods, without realizing the pharmaceutical actions and magic that lay within its tasty cells? It’s difficult to believe that the lowly parsley holds such amazing benefits. Parsley is one of the highest food sources of an amazing flavonoid called apigenin. Celery and chamomile are also other common sources of apigenin, but parsley contains the highest amount of this compound. Apigenin is turning out to be an easy to eat and inexpensive protector against cancer. Here’s the back copy. One way that cancer cells [...]
I have many patients who upon discovering that they carry a BRCA gene mutation consider bilateral breast mastectomies. But the BRCA genes also carry increased risk of multiple cancers, from pancreatic to melanoma, and other diseases, so you can’t have a total body-ectomy. But you can put your baby to your breast. Two studies support that breastfeeding protects against breast cancer if the mother has BRCA1, but not if she has BRCA2, in fact having children increases the risk in women with the BRCA2 genetic mutation. The lack of protection for carriers of the BRCA2 mutation suggests that the biological pathway [...]
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Medical Disclaimer: The information contained in this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Lindsey Berkson and the experts who have contributed to the field of research. You are encouraged to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional of your choosing.
