Integrative medicine最新文献

Congenital hypothyroidism (CHT) is a condition that, if left untreated, has severe consequences. In this case we report the resolution of hypothyroidism in a newborn with nutritional and alternative treatments. In evidence-based medicine, clinical expertise, research, and patient preference are an important triad used to make clinical decisions; in this case the patient's parents preferred to begin with nutritional and alternative treatments.

We report on 6 patients in our care who were harboring atherosclerotic plaque in the carotid arteries. This condition poses a risk of acute ischemic stroke and indicates potential atherosclerosis elsewhere in the vascular system. The plaque was revealed by routine ultrasound measurement of carotid intima-medial thickness (CIMT) defined as the distance between the lumen-intima interface and the media-adventitia interface. Recent improvements in image resolution and edge detection algorithms have resulted in improved reliability and clinical usefulness of the technology. The patients were enrolled in a systems-based functional medicine program of cardiology prevention to address root causes. The program provided personalized interventions that included drug therapy, dietary supplements, and lifestyle modification. The 6 patients followed the integrative regimen, which successfully managed existing cardiovascular symptoms and risk factors while keeping various biomarkers under control. However, they continued to exhibit carotid plaque with no improvement. A novel dietary supplement that targets endothelial glycocalyx regeneration was added to the personalized intervention programs. The supplement contains a proprietary extract of rhamnan sulfate from the green seaweed Monostroma nitidum. The 6 participants consumed the supplement daily, and their plaque burden was measured after 6 months using the same CIMT technology. In every case, the total plaque burden was reduced, with an average reduction in the 6 patients of 5.55 mm, which is statistically significant. Significant reductions in maximum carotid plaque thickness were also observed at the end of the 6 months. The study suggests that rhamnan sulfate from Monostroma nitidum may provide a safe and effective intervention for reducing atherosclerotic plaque, and should be evaluated as an adjunct therapy for prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease.

Fluorocarbons are fluorinated organic molecules widely used in industry and commerce. Nomenclature has changed over the years, with PFAS becoming the accepted umbrella term. The environment is heavily polluted with these toxins. Worldwide research shows that they contribute to almost every chronic disease. The primary source of human contamination is food packaging. There are significant concerns that the available research has not adequately addressed ultrashort-chain PFAS, which are breakdown products of longer-chain versions and accumulate in the environment at almost 100 times higher concentrations than the longer-chain versions.

Chronic conditions, sometimes referred to as functional somatic disorders, such as myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), and more recently, long COVID (LC), affect millions of people worldwide. Yet, after decades of research and testing, the etiology and treatment for many of these diseases is still unclear. Recently, a consortium of clinicians and researchers have proposed that while many different chronic conditions exist, the root cause of each may be a similar brain-body connection, as the brain responds to perceived biological threats and transmits danger signals to the body that manifest as somatic symptoms. This hypothesis suggests that treating chronic conditions requires an approach that addresses the neural networks involved. One such method, known as Amygdala and Insula Retraining (AIR), otherwise known as The Gupta Program, has shown promise in recent years for treating such conditions, including ME/CFS, FM, and LC. The present study aimed to demonstrate that AIR could be an effective approach for numerous other chronic illnesses (e.g., Lyme disease, mold illness, mast cell activation syndrome [MCAS]) and others. This novel and exploratory research examined self-reported health and functioning levels before and after using AIR. A series of paired-sample t tests with Bonferroni correction demonstrated that after 3+ months of using AIR (the minimum recommended time for the intervention), participants experienced a significant increase in overall health and functioning for 14 of 16 conditions tested (P < .001 for all but one, which was P = .001) and approached significance for the remaining two conditions (P = .039 and P = .005). Of the 14 signficant findings, 11 had a large effect size and three had a medium effect size. Naturally, this study has limitations. It was a cross-sectional design with a small convenience sample and self-reported data. Future research with larger samples and randomized controlled trials is needed to provide further evidence of AIR's effectiveness. Nonetheless, these preliminary findings suggest that AIR is a viable method for improving the health of people suffering from chronic conditions, and clinicians and researchers might consider incorporating AIR into their protocols for these patients.

The epidemiological association between various dietary patterns and the risk for chronic diseases is reasonably well established, including those for autoimmune and immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs). However, when population data used to develop these associations for particular groups are used to predict risk in specific individuals, other complicating factors often affect the risk assessment. Additionally, understanding which components of any given dietary pattern are responsible for or protect against the risk of a specific health/disease outcome is complicated and hotly debated. This is especially true for autoimmune disorders and IMIDs. Furthermore, when these dietary associations are tested as preventative or interventional therapies in clinical trials, the results are often equivocal or difficult to interpret. Predictably, guideline recommendations for dietary intervention (for IMIDs and other chronic diseases) are limited and are often ignored in clinical practice, an oversight that prevents patients with IMIDs from realizing lasting remission and tissue healing. Emerging data on the mechanisms connecting dietary intake with changes in the gut microbiome, intestinal permeability, and dysfunctional immune reactivity have shed light on the role of dietary intervention as adjunctive therapies for IMIDs. However, leveraging this emerging data involves personalized dietary assessments and recommendations, often requiring the services of a nutritional specialist trained to understand the complexity of food-driven systemic inflammation. This paper summarizes the published data connecting diet patterns, individual dietary assessment, and dietary interventions for specific IMIDs. When personalized and implemented with other lifestyle interventions (e.g., stress reduction, movement, etc.), nutritional interventions should be considered foundational therapy for chronic immune-mediated inflammation.