How can you use natural methods to decrease your chances of atherosclerosis? The modern Western diet tends to involve eating what most people consider abnormal amounts of fatty foods. Whether it is in the form of fast food or high-fat meats that we cooked home, more and more people face a diagnosis of arteriosclerotic vascular disease, or ASVD.

This syndrome involves thickening of the arterial walls due in taking fatty substances. As the artery walls continue to increase, the amount of blood able to circulate throughout decreases. This thickening can eventually lead to blood clots and aneurysms. Many people suffer heart attacks because of them.

One of the best ways to decrease your chances of atherosclerosis is to reduce the amount of fatty foods that you take in. As a counterbalance to that, you need to increase the amount of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains that you eat as well.

This change in diet will lower the amount of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol that is a leading cause of the disease. It also helps to increase the amount of antioxidants and nutrients in the body to fight off the free radicals that cause additional damage to arterial walls.

Another way to decrease your chances of atherosclerosis is to increase the amount of exercise that you get. Living a sedentary lifestyle is a leading indicator for people to develop thick arterial walls later in life. A sedentary lifestyle keeps the amount of oxygen pumped into the muscles and tendons lower than for people who live a more active lifestyle.

Oxygen is one of the leading ways to keep the body able to fight off the low-density lipoprotein that such a contributor to the disease. Exercise also helps move toxins and harmful substances out of the body quicker since the blood is pumping faster with great regularity.

What else can you do to decrease your chances of atherosclerosis? A lot of people make changes to their diet. A lot of people take up exercise. However, that is not always the only way to fight off arterial disease. There are varieties of natural ingredients that help naturally lower the amount of cholesterol in the body.

There are also ingredients that help increase arterial health. You can find supplements that contain these ingredients on the market today. In addition to the diet and exercise changes, taking a good supplement can help keep the disease at bay or prevented altogether.

Pain from heartburn and acid reflux affects millions of Americans each and every day. You obviously are one of them otherwise you probably would not have searched this topic. Most heartburn sufferers are their own worst enemy and I will try to help you discover what it is that you may or may not be doing to cause it.

Recently, a patient of mine said to me, “Doc, lately my stomach has really been KILLING ME.” I said, “Well…you probably started it! It’s just fighting back.” How about you? Are you killing your stomach and GI tract? Well, let’s find out. Do you have chronic heartburn and indigestion? What about frequent constipation (anything less than 2 BM’s a day) or diarrhea? Do you suffer from allergies, food or airborne? What about sinusitis or asthma?

If you answered yes to any of the above conditions, I am sorry to say but you ARE KILLING your stomach and digestive tract. Within the normal intestinal tract reside approximately 1 trillion bacteria. These are needed not only to keep your GI tract intact and functioning normally, but 80% of your body’s immune system tissue(known as Gut Associated Lymphatic Tissue or GALT) is also located here. Sure signs that your “good” bacteria and normal flora are depleted or are out of balance are allergies and/or sinus problems.

How did this happen? The #1 cause is taking medications, especially antibiotics. Antibiotics are great at killing the so called “bad” bacteria but it is non-selective and kills off the good ones as well. Once the good flora is compromised it sets the stage for bad bacteria and Candida yeast to take over and exponentially multiply. Candida yeast alone has over 79 known toxins that are released during their normal life cycle. Yeast infections have been implicated in strange illnesses that are undiagnosable, auto-immune diseases and even emotional and psychological disorders since one of Candida’s toxins is a neurotoxin.

Now that your good bacteria are over-run by the bad bacteria and yeast, your GALT tissue has now become over-excited and is “looking for a fight”. The battle ground can be any target tissue and often is in the ears, nose and throat. These tissues will over react in response to things like pet dander, dust, fumes, molds, etc. In the case of the stomach and intestinal linings they will now over react to certain foods. Typical offenders are grains or gluten, dairy, shellfish and peanuts. Before the GALT “uprising”, these things would not have likely bothered your stomach or your immune system.

What can you do to relieve your heartburn and improve this situation? First, you must address re-colonizing the good bacteria back to normal levels. Next, try to avoid the now “offensive” substances or antigens that your body is over reacting to and, finally, allow your stomach and intestinal linings time to heal. The worst thing you could do is merely treat the symptoms with antacids, antibiotics, allergy and sinus medications and the like. These will just mask the symptoms, will continue to kill your stomach and basically fuel the fire of the true cause of your stomach problems.

Ever think that maybe there is a better way to enjoy life without the sensation of your esophagus burning its way through your chest cavity? There is a way to avoid the familiar sting of heartburn.

#1 – The first thing to do is something you should be doing anyway, for a variety of other reasons: Exercise. Exercise is beneficial for heartburn People who exercise regularly rarely have heartburn. Even mild exercise such as walking daily can help relieve digestive problems. However, avoid exercising immediately after a meal.

#2 – Everyone has heartburn triggers – figure out what yours are. Nicotine irritates the valve both esophageal and stomach lining. As a result, smokers tend to have more acidity. What else could it be?

#3 – Of course, you can always take meds. If you notice that after applying all the remedies and recommendations mentioned above, the acidity continues, it is important to see a doctor as it could be a symptom of major illness such as hiatal hernia.

You wouldn’t want to rely on medications all by themselves. It could put additional pressure be causing the acid into the esophagus. But let the doctor determine the possibilities in and of themselves.

Those medications are really just your last line of defense when nothing else works. But the real solution is a change in the style of life that you live.

Eating proper types and portions of food, engaging in useful exercises and getting enough sleep during the night are all manners of getting your own acid reflux under control. Overall, the more in shape you are, the less likely you are to suffer.

Think about these simple tips and you will see how easy it can be to cut those bouts of acid reflux out of your life altogether.