Here are a few interesting things that I've found whilst cruising the net lately. It looks like there's some threat felt our there in meds-ville, as they're launching new, scary lists of the big, bad herbs that will kill you, or at least cause you to spend less on prescriptions. The first two are about herbs and heart health. Here's one from the CNN front organization called health.com. This helpful piece is entitled: Heart Trouble? 30 Herbal Remedies to Avoid. They sure do cover the gamut - from garlic and saw palmetto to echinacea and green tea. Evidently, many of these herbs will cause blood thinning, which may interfere with anticoagulants like Warfarin (derived from rat poison, BTW). Seems to me that one may be able to skip the Warfarin and use garlic and the like instead. Is all that garlic one reason why the Mediterranean diet loving Europeans have a lower rate of heart disease than Americans? Oh, one more thing. While you're looking at the pretty pictures of the evil botanicals, try not to get distracted by all the banner ads for Lipitor.
The same kind of list is given in an article that appeared in Medscape Today. Can't give you the direct link, as its a password protected site for subscribers, and I'm not about to give out my password. Sorry (<- that's actually my password! Just kidding). The paper was publishsed in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, by Dr AraTachjian, et al. (Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN). Mayo? Big guns!
Moving on to some better news, there's been a recent study published saying that Omega-3 fatty acids may prevent the transition from a subthreshold psychotic state to full-blown psychosis in adolescents and young adults. And the benefits were sustained at follow-up a year later (only 5% of the experimental group developed psychosis, compared to 27% of the placebo group). This article was also posted in Medscape Today, so the site doesn't publish only the anti-alternative stuff, bless them. Omega-3 fatty acids have been shown in other studies to assist with mood modulation in Bipolar Disorder, so the extension of benefits to psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia is really promising.
Finally, in the I-don't-know-whether- this-is-worth-being-freaked-out-about department, it seems that there has been a bill introduced in the Senate (by none other than John McCain, my friends) that looks like it may restrict our access to some supplements. I'm really not sure whether this is the intent of the bill, but some people are up in arms about it. You can get an overview of he situation here. A word to the wise: It seem like every year or so, some story, bill, or meeting is alleged to be about to destroy our freedom to get the supplements we need, so read and assess this situation accordingly.
Bye for now. I'm off to scour the net (and my mind) for the exciting, the weird, etc. All those things that make our lives Stranger Every Day.
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