Thanks, Micro. You've ruined my life.

Good health is germ free health. Use the dispenser to keep hands clean. For everyone's sake.

I hate Microbiology. It's really ruined my life (note: I'm being somewhat sarcastic here) because I now fear bugs.  Bugs/germ/pathogens/bacteria/viruses/evil dudes are everywhere!  After learning all about microbes this past year, I know more than I care to know.  Sometimes I wish I were my old naive self, not knowing about the scary microbes all around me, living a more laissez-faire life.  Instead of this new microbe-fearing gal. :P

I saw this poster on the University of Toronto campus and it made me laugh (and cry) at the same time. I have mixed feelings towards its message.

It's true that there are some scary critters out there and that they can pose serious harm on your health, but this poster encourages a dramatic and exaggerated fear in those who read it. The poster also did well in the whole "fear me" department (it made me cry!).

Where I disagree: germ free health is not the pinnacle of health.  Today we actually do live fairly germ free due to our obsessive love of sanitizers, soaps, and cleaning agents... and this love has cause a whole plethora of other health complications (as hypothesized by the Hygiene Hypothesis) like asthma, allergies (food and airborne), eczema, autoimmune diseases, etc. Also, in our gut alone lives millions of microorganisms... and we most definitely need our gut micro flora for good health!  So, no poster, you are wrong, germ free health is not good health. 

What I do like about this poster is the "for everyone's sake" line.  It's true that public health is important.  This is why we are taught at a very young age to cover our mouths when we cough; it's not for our own safety, but for the health of those around us.  Remember that most microbes need human hosts; without somewhere to live, they can't survive. Thus when germs can't spread, they can't live.

Lastly, I am on the fence on the role of hand sanitizers.  I much prefer good 'ol hand washing to stay clean.  I worry that the sanitizers create super bugs by encouraging bacterial resistance.  I also think they promote a false sense of security: most hand sanitizers only kill bacteria (they are anti-bacterial), not viruses! 
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P.S. If you live in Ontario, please consider participating in the Ontario Health Study. You'll get a free $10 gift card for participating... and you'll support the greater good because public health research is so important!
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P.P.S. Final year-two grades were posted.  I successfully passed my courses.  Which means, onwards to year three!

Nature Doctors and Digestion.

Happy February First! Can you feel the love? It's unbelievable that January is now over, but thank goodness... soon enough it will be Spring.

Here are some brief bios of some people responsible for implementing naturopathic medicine in North American. I learned about these people after reading Nature Doctors (a book I had to read last semester about the history of naturopathic medicine).

Adolf Just thought that disease was the result of unnatural food entering the body. When it was not digested (because it was not natural and the body doesn't know how), it became "foreign matter", fermenting and then becoming the cause of disease and pain in the body.

Otis Carroll also believed that disease was due to an overload of toxins in the body and that toxins accumulated in the body because of poor digestion. Carroll was the first to identify and test people for food intolerances. He believed that in the 1940s, most people had food intolerances to grains, fruit, sugar, dairy, eggs, and potatoes. Carroll once said that health came from and was maintained by digested foods. He said that naturopathic doctors are capable of healing damaged bodies with supplements, but these supplements originally come from good food. He also stated that after a food is digested, it is converted to nutrition and is then used to support every organ, tissue, and cell in the body, and that no drug can reverse damage to the body done by poor digestion other than starting to practice good digestion.

Louisa Lust was the wife of another one of the fathers of naturopathic medicine, however she played a big role in the development of the nutrition modality. She once said that most Americans gradually starve to death on their diet of white flour, sugar, and butter (not in the weight sense of starving to death, but in the lack of nutrients). She said that it is possible to either lengthen or shorten life by eating. She also stated that one of the "greatest evils" was the act of overeating. She advocated the consumption of a simple, pure diet and wrote a cookbook called the Practical Naturopathic-Vegetarian Cookbook in 1907. She believed that eating minimally allowed the nervous system to spend more time on mental processes rather than digestive processes.

(Note the trend in the excerpts I included? They all believe that a key to good health is in good digestion. I couldn't agree more!)

The Philosophy Behind Naturopathic Medicine.

- The first guidelines for treatment in Naturopathic Medicine were:

1. The encouragement of patients to "Return to Nature" (i.e. live more naturally)
2. Elementary remedies (e.g. water, air, light)
3. Chemical remedies (e.g. botanicals, homeopathy)
4. Mechanical remedies (e.g. manipulations, massage)
5. Mental/spiritual remedies (e.g. positive thinking,meditation)

- If the common cold was the result of a viral infection alone, then coming in contact with this virus would instantly result in cold formation. If this were the case, then absolutely everyone should have the common cold right now. Whether or not one comes down with the common cold depends on his or her susceptibility, which depends on the strength of his or her immune system, sleep levels, energy levels, diet, mental/emotional state, etc.

- Naturopathic Doctors do not merely diagnose and treat disease in their patients, but they rather restore the health of their patients. NDs help facilitate their patients self-healing processes.

- In Naturopathy, a sick person is considered to be on a path from disturbance to recovery. As health can be disturbed by many things, the ND will work with the patient to identify these disturbances and work to reduce/remove them in order to remove illness.

- Naturopathic Doctors do not use synthetic drugs, except for drugs containing compounds that are a natural part of body tissues and are physiologically beneficial to the body in order for it to complete its processes.