This book is dedicated to physicians', dieticians, educators', mothers, fathers, young women and men for the art of realization and mastery how to stay healthy. The greatest gift in our time for all of manhood is to be healthy and maintain this gift through the entire life. In order to maintain this gift it takes desire, imagination, knowledge, understanding, continuous awareness, and dedication to maintain this priceless gift. This book in a simple form, gives you an understanding of what food is; Why we need food; How food is absorbed; What form it is absorbed in; How food is used in our body to do continuous repair; Finally why it is important to choose proper food to avoid diseases, pain and maintain ones health.
The Future of Mankind
As Related to Food ChemistryBy John KayvanfariUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2012 John Kayvanfar, MD
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4759-1131-2 Contents
Introduction.............................................................1Chapter One Disease Central: Where We Are Today..........................3Chapter Two The Root Of The Problems.....................................15Chapter Three Why Treatments Are Not Working.............................57Chapter Four How You Can Take Control Of Your Health.....................69About The Author.........................................................91References...............................................................95
Chapter One
Disease Central: Where We Are Today
How It All Started
A few years into my practice, about twenty-two years ago, one of my patients walked in to be seen. After the usual greetings, she stated, "Doctor, I am here because the numbness and pain in my hand are back and are getting worse." She reminded me, I performed carpal tunnel surgery on her wrist three years earlier. She stated was doing fine until a year ago. After taking her history and examining her neck and upper extremities, including the hands, her complaint was confirmed.
I scratched my head and told her that in orthopedic books, carpal tunnel syndrome is generally considered to be a compression neuropathy. In other words, the pain is caused by direct pressure on the nerve. Since her surgery would have relieved that pressure, I had no other recommendation for her at the time. Therefore, I made the following suggestion: I asked my patient to give me three weeks to come up with an idea for her and get to the bottom of the problem. Maybe then we could come with answers to solve her problem or problems.
The next three weeks became a project for me to solve her problem.
My analysis went as follows: Compression neuropathy by definition means a nerve is pressed on by external forces—in this case, deep transverse carpal ligament or tendons within the carpal tunnel space, which is not an expandable space. Since she already under went carpal tunnel surgery, her problem could not be considered just a compression neuropathy anymore. This meant either the nerve had developed edema and was pressing against the ligament or tendons, which are harder structures than the nerve is; or the ligament had developed edema or inflammation and was pressing against the nerve, the softer structure. Or perhaps both had happened, with problems in both the nerve and tendons, which caused both inflammation and edema. Either way, something was swelling or was inflamed. There could be no other scenario.
This meant we were dealing with neuropathy and not solely compression neuropathy. Probably other components were involved (meaning the nerve was not able to do its job right because of other factor or factors). My goal became to determine what was the cause of inflammation or edema. In this case, another surgery would not do her any good.
Since the first two scenarios were old and surgery should have helped permanently, the fact that her problem was coming back meant the theory of compression neuropathy was no longer viable. Therefore only the third theory (internal problem/ neuropathy) was plausible.
I went back to basics and reviewed the literature, looking for all possible causes of neuropathy. The most common problems that cause carpal tunnel syndrome are thyroid problems, diabetes, and autoimmune disorders. After putting the list together, I designed a series of blood tests to detect those conditions.
When my patient came back for follow-up, I discussed my plan with her. She told me she had been to four other doctors and no one had any ideas for her. She agreed with the plan, stating, "At least you have a plan that might work." She agreed to go ahead and have the blood tests that I had chosen to be done.
After the test results came back, the results were discussed with her. Surprisingly all her results were normal according to the lab standard. To test for thyroid problems, you check for thyroid-stimulating hormone, T3 and T4 (T3 and T4 are different components of thyroid hormones). Her TSH was 5.0, which according to the lab standard was normal (normal was between 0.3 and 5.5). Could it be that the guidelines were incorrect? After obtaining more careful history and examination of the patient again, I found she had other aches and pain. She said, "Those are routine pains, and I am getting used to them." I also noticed she had some tender tendons. With that in mind, I analyzed hormone values cannot really have such a wide range of normality. My experience from medical school days and looking at the results of TSH in normal people showed that a normal value was always below 2.0. The scenario was discussed with her, and she agreed to try thyroid medication to bring the TSH to below 2.0.
Four weeks later, she was seen again. Her hand pain and numbness were much improved, but some numbness was persisting. Lab testing was done again for TSH, which was 1.6. After two months had passed, the numbness was still there and not improving to normal level.
Could it be that there was some sort of deficiency going on? We reviewed her diet, which was an average American diet. Then we did blood tests on vitamins that could cause neuropathy. Again the results came back normal, but at the lower limit of normal on B6, B12, and folic acid. I suggested to her to take small but specific doses of vitamins (B6 = 50mg, B12 = 500mcg, and folic acid = 800mcg/day).
A month later, she came in smiling and stated her numbness was going away and she felt normal again.
Since then, I have cut down on surgery for carpal tunnel syndrome from five or six per week to two or three per year. Almost all of my patients are being treated with medicines (without surgery) after finding the underlying problems. Patients recover to normal without residual problems. The only patients who need surgery are the ones whose problems have been going on for a few years without any treatment for the underlying cause, and thus they have developed muscle atrophy.
I wondered if the normal values could be wrong for some other tests too. Normal values are decided by getting a group of people together and, through questionnaires, asking if anything is wrong with them. If not, then their values are decided to be normal according to a bell-shaped curve. Were the normal numbers wrong, or was something else going on?
Since for years people were doing well, all the lab values could not be wrong. Could it be that for some reasons, the threshold for developing problems was changing because something was causing the body not be able to do proper repair processing? Or is there something wrong with food, which is preventing proper repair process?
With the above in mind, I kept seeing this kind of problem more and more as time went on.
Once I even saw a patient with AVN (avascular necrosis, where the ball of the hip joint becomes a dead tissue in the body, which causes arthritis and hip pain) with severe hypothyroidism (TSH of 25). After treatment of hypothyroidism, the avascular necrosis stopped and the pain stopped. An X-ray showed that the hip condition had improved. That told me a bit more about the function of the thyroid in the body. This meant it also works on the capillary endothelial wall of arteriole blood vessels (the smallest blood vessels, which are very small pipes, which take blood to the tissues). It also improves the blood flow to tissues all over the body...
