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Are you Listening to your Skin?

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skin doctor

The skin is your body’s largest organ and it plays so many roles when it comes to function and health. Obviously the skin’s primary job is to cover the body and contain the organs, bones and muscles of the body.

It also acts as a protective layer from ultraviolet radiation from the sun, prevents dehydration, and aids in temperature regulation of the body.

The skin also plays an important role in detoxification and excretion of wastes created by the body or toxins that have been ingested.

Taking a good look at the health of your skin can provide insight as to how your body is functioning on the inside.

dark under eye circles

Dark Under Eye Circles

Do you have dark lines under your eyes that make you look like you haven’t gotten a good night’s sleep in months?

As we age, our skin naturally becomes slightly thinner and more fragile, allowing for the dark circles to appear more predominantly.

But if you are a young, “healthy” woman, chances are those dark circles are trying to tell you something.

Dark circles could be caused by lack of hydration (it’s not just about how much water you are drinking. Remember that caffeine and alcohol work to reverse the benefits of drinking water. For every coffee or alcoholic beverage, you need to increase your water intake by at least 8 ounces).

Dark under eye circles could also be indicating that your diet is in need of some help. Focus on eating a diet that is high in nutrient dense fruits and vegetables and work on eliminating processed foods.

Finally, those dark circles could just be telling you to get to bed early and get a good night’s rest. Adults need between 7 and 9 hours of sleep each night to give the body a chance to rest and rejuvenate.

Click here to read, Ten Tricks To Get The Best Sleep EVER !

dry, cracked lips

Dry, Cracked Lips

During the winter months, most commonly, dry lips are caused by harsh weather conditions. However, if you find that your lips are dry year round it could be caused by a reaction to the lipgloss, lipstick or toothpaste you are using.

Conventional products contain harsh chemicals and toxins that can wreak havoc on your delicate lips. Instead, only purchase products from your local health food store that are free of chemicals and that are not drying to the lips.

Click here to read, Natural DIY Self Care Product Recipes .

skin irritation

Skin Irritation

The skin is also a very good indicator of food intolerances.

Skin conditions including eczema, psoriasis, rashes, acne, and chronically itchy skin may all be indicators that your body is not tolerating something in your diet.

With the increase in food additives, pesticide use, genetically modified organisms, and processing, food is not what it used to be.

The most common foods that are linked to skin irritation and intolerance are;

  • Dairy
  • Gluten-containing foods
  • Eggs
  • Soy
  • Alcohol
  • Sugar and artificial sweeteners
  • Caffeine
  • Chocolate

The best way to identify if one of these foods is the culprit of your skin irritation is to remove the items that you believe to be an issue from your diet for a period of three weeks. Then re-introduce the foods one at a time and watch for reactions. If a reaction occurs, eliminate that food from your diet permanently.

Click here to read, Do I Always Have to Buy Organic ?  Here’s What You NEED to Know !

5 Ways to Keep Your Brain Healthy

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Brain function

Brain function and brain health has become a popular subject in the last decade.  This is likely due to the noticeable rise in neurodegenerative disorders like dementia and Alzheimer’s.   As such, people’s interest in taking control of their cognitive health has also increased.

Brain health has also become a widely popular topic in the world of sports and recreation. Since concussions are now recognized to have significant short and long term impact on injured players.

The fact is, unless you have neurodegenerative disorders in your family or have experienced a head injury, you probably won’t start thinking about your brain’s health until you start noticing symptoms such as;

Here’s the thing, the longer you wait to take action, the worse the problem can become.

You really should start thinking about your brain’s health today!  Look at taking preventative measures rather than waiting for signs of cognitive decline to appear.

So, how exactly do you keep your brain healthy? There are many simple ways to improve brain function and keep your mind sharp. Some of which you may already be doing!

Ways To Keep Your Brain Healthy

5 Tips To Help Keep Your Brain Function In Tip-Top Shape

1. Exercise Daily

Exercise has a whole host of benefits for your mental and physical health. Endorphins released during exercise work wonders warding off depression and bolstering the immune system.

Physical fitness also has been shown to increase mental sharpness as people age. Especially past the age of 40. Daily exercise helps maintain acuity in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, which is responsible for judgement and decision making.

2. Try To Go Keto!

Yes, the foods we eat do have an impact on our mental and cognitive health. Research shows that consuming a diet high in healthy fats and low in carbohydrates (known as a ketogenic diet) helps promote brain health by pushing your body into a fat-burning state, creating what we call ketones as a by-product.

Ketones are a very efficient and sustainable source of fuel for the body and the brain. Burning mainly sugar (carbs) as fuel creates inflammation in the body and the brain while ketones are said to be a much “cleaner” fuel. A keto-adapted individual will experience less brain fog, less memory trouble and better focus.

Click here to read, “Keto For Dummies – Beginners Guide For Keto”.

3. Get Enough Sleep

The fog of exhaustion will cloud your mental ability. Our brains store daily memories while we sleep. You need rest in order to remember even mundane details of daily life. You might even consider taking a short nap after learning something new or important, to help store it in your long-term memory.

Sleeping less than six hours a night has been shown to decrease mental sharpness even after one night. I am sure if you have young kids, you know exactly what I am talking about. What’s more, good quality sleep has also been shown to help the brain detoxify, which is crucial for keeping the brain healthy and sharp.

4. Flex Your Mental Muscles

You can improve your logic, problem solving, mental orientation and corrective thought process by working on puzzles and doing difficult mental tasks. For instance, start doing crossword puzzles. Studies show that older people who do crossword puzzles have better scores on a variety of cognitive tests than those who don’t.

To be fair, researchers aren’t sure if the puzzles cause better mental ability or if people with better mental ability tend to do more crossword puzzles. Nonetheless it can’t hurt to try! Don’t like puzzles? Try memorizing your friends’ and family’s phone numbers and birthdays.

5. Express Yourself Creatively

Creativity has more than one advantage when it comes to keeping your mind sharp and keeping a positive attitude. Creativity forces you to think and flex your mental muscles!  The results of creative work have been shown to reinforce self-confidence and help individuals enjoy their daily life. Try your hand at;

  • Writing poetry
  • Sewing
  • Taking up a musical instrument
  • Gardening
  • Painting

If you don’t feel artistic or creative, baking or writing in a journal are other great ways to express yourself. Try applying creative approaches to daily tasks like shopping on a budget or creating a new recipe with limited ingredients. Keep a good attitude about your ability to find solutions in everyday situations.

Your brain is an extraordinary machine, and although there is still a great deal we do not know about it, it doesn’t stop us from wanting to expand its capabilities. Don’t blame age for declining cognitive abilities. Instead, test out some of the methods listed above and keep your brain sharp!

Cancer hates it when you know these facts…

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Cancer

There is an abundance of information all over the web with suggestions about how to eat, what to think, what herbs and supplements to take and not to take. It’s confusing especially if you or a loved one is now battling a life-threatening illness.

It’s not knowing exactly what to eat to fight disease or create healing that is important. It is knowing how and why to change where you are at currently, to a healthy eating plan, make it stress-free, and a lifestyle change that is sustainable forever. However, here are some vital facts that apply to health and healing that are absolutely necessary to know. These are absolute truths, and apply to anyone, at any age, at any stage of health or disease, regardless of what treatment that individual may be receiving.

There are thousands and thousands of nutritional products, plans, diets, and advice out there that are accessible to anyone if you search for them. However we do understand that there are indisputable truths that are pertinent when it comes to creating better health and healing from within. There are nutrients and factors that are absolutely necessary to improve immune system function prevent disease and allow the body to Flourish. 

We start our nutritional planning with one simple philosophical understanding: We don’t get sick because we have cancer,… We get cancer as a result of being sick.  

Cancer is simply an opportunistic disease. It is the body’s natural response to adapt to an unhealthy environment. Although there are genetic factors involved, it has been largely proven that lifestyle plays a much bigger role than previously thought and a much bigger role than genetic factors ever will.

Therefore since the body created the disease as a result of an unhealthy environment, our first response is to change the environment by making it healthier to therefore stop, or reverse the progression of the disease. 

We need to change the body’s metabolism from that of sugar burning for energy to a fat burning machine. This can be done completely with dietary changes. Cancer feeds on sugar. Sugar compromises a natural immune response. Fat cells are a storage locker for toxins.

Immune system function becomes week and damaged when the body’s environment remains in an acidic state. Our nutritional goals need to revolve around changing the pH of the body to that of alkalinity instead of acidity.

Most diseases proliferate in an environment that is lacking in oxygen. An effective plan should be designed to provide nutrients and decrease toxins that deprive the body of an oxygen-rich state.  

Over the years, myself and our team have been extremely successful in helping people that have been diagnosed with life-threatening illnesses achieve a much better state of health and success in beating those diseases and building a better quality of life.

No matter what medical or invasive procedures the patient may be experiencing or have undergone previously there is always a way to improve the body’s innate ability to heal through natural methods. 

When my sister was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 44, I immediately sat down and talked with her about improving her lifestyle choices. Her life up to this point was full of poor Nutrition, no exercise, and a great deal of stress. She had poor posture, and poor nervous system function because she never visited the Chiropractor.

She agreed that a change was necessary. Although she was very receptive, her and her husband made decisions to receive intense medical treatment including surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. Within two weeks of her first diagnosis she had surgery to insert a colostomy bag to her lower intestine. I know that fear was a major contributor to her decision.

Within weeks she was well into a process of radiation and eventually chemotherapy treatment. My sister became very ill as a result of the treatment and her quality of life went downhill very fast. She quickly lost her freedom and spent most of her days lying in a hospital bed.

I continued to watch my sister’s health decline rapidly and knew that we were losing hope. 

Within two years of her initial diagnosis my baby sister lost her fight passing away at the age of 46. I know in my heart that things could’ve been different and I know that some of the choices that she made in her lifestyle including the aggressive medical treatment that she received accelerated the process eventually leading to her death.

The question that you need to ask yourself now is “If I were diagnosed with Cancer tomorrow, what changes would I make in my diet and lifestyle to help overcome the illness and improve my function?”

If change is necessary, do it today before you get the diagnosis. Disease like Cancer needs to be attacked proactively not reactively.

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Guest Blog by Dr. Colin Elkin

Dr. Colin Elkin“Chiropractic is my life. The Principle of Chiropractic has changed the person who I used to be. The way I think, the way I care for myself, the way I care for my family, the way I eat, and the outlook that I approach every day with.

The major premise of Chiropractic states that there is a Universal Intelligence that exists in all matter. This is the basis on how I mange my life, my business, my patients, my wealth, and my future.

I love caring for my patients and sharing this principle with them. I have a deep desire to attract and care for those people afflicted with life threatening illness, especially Cancer diagnosis.

I have a beautiful, intelligent, and strong wife named Kim and 4 healthy, unsubluxated, unvaccinated boys, Austin, Carter, Harrison, and Curtis. My family has given me the privilege of becoming involved in many activities, sports, hobbies. When I am not in the office caring for patients, you can usually find me at the hockey arena playing or coaching, at the dirt bike track cheering on my son, or at home jamming on the guitar.

I owe Chiropractic my life. I suffered a near fatal motorcycle accident in 2013, that caused 4 severe cervical fractures. It was only by God’s grace that the surgeon who cared for me understood that the only reason I survived and had no permanent neurological injury was because my spine was in perfect alignment before the accident. The normal cervical curvature was able to withstand the impact and prevent any fractured bone from shifting and severing or damaging my spinal chord. Thank God for Chiropractic. Over the following year I have returned to full function and I am as strong as I have ever been and have my spine adjusted regularly…and yes, including my neck.

I am truly blessed to be part of Maximized Living. This is the future of health care in the world. My mission is to see this model gain world-wide acceptance during my lifetime.”

You can find Dr. Colin Elkin in Brantford, Ontario
https://www.facebook.com/elkinnaturalhealth/
(519) 751-1154
www.elkinnaturalhealth.com

Embracing Technology: For The Good Of Your Health?

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Embracing Technology

Over 80% of the population experiences significant back or neck pain at some point in their lives. In fact, it is the second highest reason for missed work days right behind the common cold and flu.

With back and neck pain at such epidemic levels, sadly, traditional medicine still has dismal success rates with treating the more difficult cases. Many patients have been through the gauntlet of medical and alternative therapies and have still not found a lasting solution.

If you are in this position, you are definitely not alone. The problem though is not medicine itself. It is the fact that the majority of back and neck pain has a physical cause. It requires the appropriately applied physical solution.

Mechanics of Back Pain

Through injury, and as the spine begins to age, some people begin to lose space between the spinal bones. This creates damaging pressure on the discs, joints, bones, nerves and other associated structures. This pressure creates swelling or “inflammation.”

Research is showing that the presence of this inflammation is the number one predictor of pain. If pressure and inflammation are the major reasons for pain, then the solution must focus on these factors. The logical solution becomes employing effective methods of directly removing the damaging pressure (or cause of inflammation) and directly removing the inflammation itself by enhancing circulation or flushing out of the affected area.

Focus On The Cause

There was no solution that focused on both causes of pain present in difficult back and neck pain patients, so at Spine Advanced, we set out to create it by concentrating on the cause.

This solution would combine Non-Surgical Spinal Decompression to reduce the physical pressure on the damaged structures and Class 4 Laser Therapy to increase circulation, clearing inflammation and reducing pain.

This simultaneous combination of therapies perfectly addresses both major components of back and neck pain systematically. It reduces both pressure and inflammation while stimulating healing. The Spine Specialist Laser Assisted Spinal Restoration (L.A.S.R.) system was born.

Technology is Progress

Technology is greatly enhancing doctors’ capabilities in every field of medicine. This is great news and it bears in mind that doctors must work hard to keep up with advancements to offer the best care available.

For you as a patient, it also means you have many more solutions for your pain than ever before. New treatment technologies are changing the face of healthcare and even evolving in their own spaces. The lasers of 10 years ago are obsolete technology in comparison to those released in the last 3 years. In the tech heavy world we live in it isn’t surprising that advancement moves so fast.

If you feel like you’ve tried everything for your pain look towards embracing new treatment technologies and seek out doctors that offer these advancements. From laser therapy to spinal decompression to the perfect combination of both on The Spine Specialist L.A.S.R. system, technology offers a solution for many patients that thought they just might have to live with their pain. Seek out treatment technology and NO PAIN WILL BE YOUR GAIN.

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Mark Jagger Head ShotBlog by Guest Author: Dr. Mark Jagger, (H) B.A.(Kin),DC
CEO Spine Advanced
Creator of the Spine Specialist

“Dr. Mark Jagger is a leader in medical therapeutic technology innovation.  He is the CEO of Spine Advanced Inc., the manufacturer of the world’s first and only patented treatment device combining automated laser and spinal decompression, The Spine Specialist LASR Treatment Table.  Dr. Jagger is also the active Clinical Director of Spine Advanced Clinical Headquarters in Mississauga, Ontario.  He has a passion for achieving the best possible patient outcomes and a special interest in work with difficult spinal conditions previously non-responsive to other therapies.  He is the founder of Laser Enhanced Spinal Decompression (L.E.S.D.), Laser Assisted Spinal Restoration (L.A.S.R.), and Laser Assisted Meniscal Decompression (L.A.M.D.); therapies aimed at enhancing patient results through the unique combination of technologically advanced treatment methods.  He received his Bachelors Degree in Kinesiology and Health Science from York University in 1998 and his Doctor of Chiropractic degree from New York Chiropractic College in 2002.  In addition to his medical device design endeavors, he has been in private practice since 2002 managing multiple clinical facilities and treating thousands of patients per year.”

For more information, visit http://spinespecialistglobal.com/for-patients/ and http://spineadvanced.com.

Join Us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/spinespecialistglobal

To See A Spine Specialist Treatment Explained:  https://youtu.be/AgyNRrTGdCo