Total Health Online continues to share with readers the
precepts of “self-managed natural health.” From the basics to
the cutting-edge, we present nutrition through diet and supplementation,
coupled with a regular exercise program, a positive
mental attitude and an active philosophical commitment as
the keys to achieving optimum health, natural healing and a
productive lifestyle. While each ingredient in the proactive prescription
for natural health is integral, nutritional supplementation
is at its core. As total health science adviser Parris Kidd,
Ph.D. States: “Vitamins aren’t a luxury or an invention of the
vitamin industry. Vitamins are substances the body must have
to survive. Taking vitamins is not a choice for humans. The
only question is, how much vitamins should we take?
“This is important for the health conscious consumer to
grasp, as week by week science demonstrates that vitamins
and other nutrients are not just safer to take but can actually
work better than do many drug treatments.
“Most of the vitamin supplementation over and above
what we get from our diet is necessary, since the ‘Standard
American Diet’ (SAD) fails to provide amounts sufficient for us
to derive the maximum benefits to our health that vitamins can
provide. Hence the rationale for developing a personal vitamin
program, one crafted as carefully as a career development plan
or an investment planning program.”
Dr. Kidd presents a compelling case for incorporating
nutritional supplements in our daily diet to counteract the
insidious impact of environmental toxicity on our systems.
He states, “We live in a toxic world. Wherever we reside,
wherever we work, wherever we play, wherever our kids go to
school, our bodies encounter substances that can damage us,
make us sick, even kill us. So many of the things in our lives
that we take for granted—the food we eat, the water we drink,
the air we breathe—can betray our health. Other things we
read warnings about—prescription drugs, recreational drugs,
lawn and garden chemicals—turn out to be more toxic than we
would have guessed. Toxic substances poison our organs,
drain our energy and cause cancer and other killer diseases.”
Dr Kidd also explains that in addition to supplying the
basic nutrients necessary to sustain life and combat environmental
insults, supplements as nutraceuticals and immunoceuticals
play an important role in avoiding disease.
The term “nutraceutical” refers to a nutrient that can be
taken by mouth to treat a disease condition. For instance,
nutraceutical therapies are used in conjunction with other therapies
as part of a truly integrative strategy for cancer management.
The excellent benefit-risk profile characteristic of the
nutraceutical now makes possible a truly integrative strategy
for cancer management. In some cancer cases nutaceuticals
would be used as stand-alone treatment, while in others nutraceuticals
would be used in combination with surgery, chemotherapy,
radiation, heat treatment, psychosocial intervention
and other treatment strategies.
Nutrients are now in the process of being transformed
from fringe curiosities to center stage players in the medical
management of cancer and other killer diseases. In many
countries nutraceutical medicine already is in the mainstream
people’s medicine. Now in North America, a great reintegration
of people’s medicine with modern high-tech medicine is a
foot, with all of us likely to benefit. We must each do our part to
hasten this much-needed transformation while steadfastly protecting
the rights of the health consumer.
Immunoceuticals are nutraceuticals which can potentiate
the immune system to move from the defense mode into the
offensive mode to go after the cancer cells and kill them.
The immune system is the body’s major defense against
any and all agents that threaten its survival. The healthy
immune system is a highly integrated network of single cells,
cells grouped together in tight coordination. Acting as sentries
for the system are macrophages, single cells which are distributed
throughout the tissues. The macrophages are trained to
detect mutated or other abnormal cells as the pop-up on the
radar, then immediately alert the other immune system warrior
cells to go on the attack against these cells and eliminate them.
The immune system, if damaged, weak or misdirected, is likely
to be poorly self-regulating and hampered in its efforts to eliminate
cancer foci, whereas if potentiated by immunoceuticals,
it could attack more aggressively and buy time for the body to
further mobilize against the cancer.
By potentiating the immune system, that is raising its
functioning to a higher level, immunoceuticals can help the
body mobilize a lifesaving response against cancer. The driving
force of immunoceuticals is helping the body’s immune system
to help itself: The Chinese traditional healers called this
Fu-Zheng therapy. The best immunoceuticals help the immune
system to attack cancers, as well as to re-build and re-mobilize
following chemotherapy or radiation therapy, interventions
which are immunotoxic and damage immunity.
With nutritional supplementation being recognized as an
imperative to establishing and maintaining optimum health,
as effective and fortifying the immune system against disease,
it is also being proven as a viable, intelligent alternative to
many conventional medical and pharmaceutical therapies.