Tag Archives: Vitamin D

Brittle bones and blocked blood vessels: a cautionary tale

The current pharmaceutical standard of care for management of bone loss is supplemental calcium and the bisphosphonate drug class. The generics for the latter have the name formula of : ”XYZ – dronate”. Currently there are six versions on the market, and they are prescribed more than 25 million times per year. Obviously, brittle and broken bones are not only a…

Breast Cancer: Early detection versus prevention

From time to time I’ll hear some well-intentioned advice reminding women to “prevent breast cancer with regular screening”, usually referring to getting a mammogram.  While we would probably all agree that with any health disorder an early detection of the problem is half the cure; early detection only allows effective treatment after the fact, not prevention of the problem itself. Which…

Planning a critical care hospital stay? I thought not…but then again…

  …most of us do not plan a serious hospitalization in advance.  But emergencies do happen, and if you already have a serious medical problem, your odds of an eventual and significant hospital stay are not trivial.  So, it might be a good idea to think ahead about how you could reduce the time you might have to spend there.  Through…

Inflammation and the problem of chronic pain

Current studies suggest that up to 100 million of us here in the US have some form of chronic pain.  This doesn’t always mean that the pain is there all the time, but rather that it is an ongoing problem for the person.  The lasting results of trauma, episodic bouts of gout or migraine, low back, hip or knee arthritis, irritable…