By Mary Elizabeth Dallas, Medically reviewed by Farrokh
Sohrabi, MD
Ginger, peppermint, and cinnamon may do more than add flavor to
your food. These are just some of the natural remedies for gas relief, and
chances are they're already in your kitchen.
Although everyone experiences
gas, some people are troubled by it more than others. At times, excessive gas
can become uncomfortable or even painful. However, some simple changes to your
diet can help provide gas relief and also aid digestion. In addition to
over-the-counter gas relief remedies, some items commonly found in the kitchen
may double as natural gas relievers.
Herbs for Gas Relief
A number of
herbs in the carminative family may help ease gas and prevent bloating,
according to Angela Lemond, RDN, CSP, LD, a Texas-based dietitian and
nutritionist and a spokeswoman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
"The very definition of carminative," she says, "is a substance
that aids in the expulsion of gas."
One of the herbs shown to have
carminative effects to help break up and expel gas is ginger, the subject of a
study published in the European Journal of Gastroenterology & Hepatology in
2008. It found that ginger helps speed digestion, which is important because if
your stomach empties faster, gases can move more quickly into your small
intestine to relieve discomfort and bloating.
Other examples of herbs in the
carminative family that could help provide gas relief include:
- Chamomile
- Dill
- Fennel
- Basil
- Caraway
- Cinnamon
- Cumin
- Garlic
- Nutmeg
- Oregano
- Parsley
- Peppermint
- Spearmint
- Wintergreen
Lemond suggests trying
to gain the benefit of carminatives from the food you eat rather than by taking
herbal supplements, which she says should be taken with caution. "Some people
think of herbal supplements as natural or straight from the earth, so they may
be taken at will, but a lot of them have pharmaceutical effects and could
interact with medications," she says. "Always get approval from your
doctor before taking a supplement."
Probiotics for Gas and Bloating
Probiotics
may also help aid in digestion and reduce excessive gas. Probiotics are live
microorganisms, mostly "good" bacteria, similar to the bacteria found
in the human gut. They're available as dietary supplements, but Lemond says
that a number of foods also have natural probiotics, including:
- Yogurt
- Kefir
- Pickles
- Tempeh
- Kimchi
- Sauerkraut
- Buttermilk
- Miso
Research
published in the Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology in 2011 found that the
probiotics Lactobacillus Acidophilus and Bifidobacterium Lactis eased bloating
among the 60 participants with certain functional bowel disorders over the
course of eight weeks.
A separate study, published in the journal BMC
Gastroenterology in 2009, found that an over-the-counter probiotic was much
more effective than a placebo in providing otherwise healthy adults with relief
from intestinal gas.
The Link between Gas, Stress, and Probiotics
Gas can
be worsened by stress. "There are nerves up and down the GI tract,"
Lemond says. "People who have a tendency to be nervous can develop gas,
diarrhea, or constipation." When dietary changes aren't effective, other
treatments, such as relaxation therapy, may help.
More specifically, UCLA
researchers recently have drawn even more direct connections between the
stomach, brain, and probiotics. The scientists found that bacteria in food can
affect brain function in humans, according to a 2013 study published in the
journal “Gastroenterology.”
Life stress can cause spasms in the colon and
abdominal discomfort, according to the results of a 2008 review of research
published in journal Evidenced-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
The researchers also noted that progressive muscle relaxation, meditation,
yoga, counseling, or changes to daily stressful situations can help reduce
stress and have a positive effect on digestive health.
"Occasional excessive gas is normal," Lemond says.
But when gas continues to be a problem despite having made dietary adjustments
and trying home or over-the-counter gas remedies, it’s a good idea to see your
doctor.
Last Updated: 03/19/2014
This section was created and produced
exclusively by the editorial staff of EverydayHealth.com. © 2014
EverydayHealth.com; all rights reserved.
By Michelle Schoffro Cook
If you’re not getting fresh
lemons into your diet, you may want to reconsider after reading the many health
benefits of lemons, lemon juice, pith (the white part), or zest (skin).
Here
are 13 amazing healing powers of lemons:
Bowel-Cleansing: The bitter taste of lemon gives these fruit
the ability to increase peristalsis–a pumping-motion in the bowels–which helps
to eliminate waste from the bowels and improve regularity. Add the juice of one lemon to warm water and
drink first thing in the morning.
Cancer: Lemons contain 22 anti-cancer compounds, including limonene—a
naturally-occurring oil that slows or halts the growth of cancer tumors in
animals. Lemons also contain a substance
called flavonol glycosides which stop cell division in cancer cells.
Colds
and Flu: Lemons are rich in vitamin C
and flavonoids that work in conjunction for a serious punch against infection.
Liver: Fresh lemon juice added to a
large glass of water in the morning is a great liver detoxifier.
Nutrition: Lemons contain vitamin C, citric acid,
flavonoids, B-complex vitamins, calcium, copper, iron, magnesium, phosphorus,
potassium, and fiber.
Allergies: Lemons contain the phytonutrient hesperetin, which has been shown in
studies to alleviate allergic symptoms.
Brain and Nervous System
Disorders: Containing the potent
phytonutrient tangeretin in the peel, lemons have been proven to be effective
for brain disorders like Parkinson’s disease.
Eye Disorders: Rutin, found in lemons, has been shown in
research to improve the symptoms of eye disorders, including diabetic
retinopathy.
Anti-Viral: In addition to being effective against cold and flu viruses, terpene limonoids found in
lemons have proven anti-viral effects on other types of viruses.
Diabetes:
In addition to improving eye problems linked with diabetes, lemons contain
hesperetin which lowers blood sugar levels (when they are high).
Gall and
Kidney Stones: The citric acid found in lemon
juice helps to dissolve gallstones, calcium deposits, and kidney stones.
Anti-Aging: The vitamin C found in lemons helps to
neutralize free radicals linked to aging and most types of disease.
Balances Body Chemistry: While lemons are acidic they interact with the body’s metabolism to have an alkalizing effect on the bodily fluids helping to restore balance to the body’s pH.
Cook
with Lemon!
Adapted with permission from The Life Force Diet and The
Phytozyme Cure by Michelle Schoffro Cook, PhD.
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/13-healing-powers-of-lemons.html?page=2
Read more:
http://www.care2.com/greenliving/13-healing-powers-of-lemons.html#ixzz33yB3GWda
Read
more: ***http://www.care2.com/greenliving/13-healing-powers-of-lemons.html#ixzz33y9dUBNm
When Vernon Johnston was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate
cancer, his options were few. The standard treatment required him to submit to
bouts of chemotherapy and hope that the poisonous drugs that will be fed into
his body can kill off cancer cells faster that they can kill off healthy,
normal cells.
Chemotherapy represents a drastic measure that oncologists are
all too eager to recommend and an option patients dread with good reasons.
Often times, chemotherapy leaves the body drained and the immune system
damaged.
When it fails, and it does fail often, chemotherapy severely
reduces the chances of success of any subsequent treatment options. Yet 9 out
10 cancer patients turn to chemotherapy first.
In Vernon’s case, the
prostate cancer was already advanced and had metastasized to his bones.
Chemotherapy would have been long and expensive and there was no guarantee that
those drugs would work.
So, Vernon took matters into his own hands. On his
brother’s advice, Vernon decided to raise his body’s pH to combat the cancer
spreading in his body. To do this, he sought to obtain cesium chloride.
Cesium
therapy is a well-known treatment protocol in cancer therapy. And it is an
option doctors rarely give their cancer patients.
Treating cancer with
cesium has been shown to have a 50% cure rate. Compared to chemotherapy and
radiotherapy, cesium therapy produces better results. This cure rate is even
more impressive considering the fact that most cancer patients receiving cesium
have already undergone and failed to respond to chemotherapy, radiation therapy
and/or surgery.
Instead of trying his luck with these orthodox cancer
protocols, Vernon simply ordered cesium chloride.
Unfortunately, the cesium
never arrived. However, Vernon did not give up on raising his pH levels and
making his body too alkaline for cancer cells to spread. While searching for
alternatives, he happened on a cheap and commonly available alkalizing source:
baking soda.
This common household cooking item is commonly added to bubbly
drinks and also used as an antacid to neutralize stomach acid in the treatment
of ulcer and acid reflux.
The remedy Vernon found called for mixing baking
soda with maple syrup. With no maple syrup on hand, he mixed the baking soda
with molasses.
Vernon Johnston fought his cancer with ingredients taken from
his kitchen. His efforts and success are documented on his blog aptly described
as “dance with cancer”.
What is Baking Soda?
Baking soda is a white
crystalline solid that appears as fine powder. It is also called cooking soda,
bread soda and bicarbonate of soda. Its chemical name is sodium bicarbonate or
sodium hydrogen carbonate.
Baking soda is different from washing soda (sodium
carbonate) although they share the same slightly salty and alkaline taste.
This
widely used soda is commonly dissolved in mineral water and used as a leavening
agent in baking. It works as a leavening agent by neutralizing the acidic
components of batter. The neutralization releases carbon dioxide and leads to
the “raising” or expansion of baked foods.
Baking soda has also been used to
soften vegetable and to tenderize meat.
As a household chemical, baking soda
is used as a cleaning agent. It is included in toothpastes for similar reasons
where it serves as an antiseptic, acid-neutralizer, whitening agent and
plaque-removing agent as well as a cleaning agent.
Other common personal
hygiene products in which baking soda can be found include deodorants and
shampoos.
The Health Benefits of Baking Soda
The medical uses of baking
soda all involves raising the pH of the body by neutralizing acid. Therefore,
sodium bicarbonate is used as an antacid (to neutralize stomach acid and treat
ulcer, heartburn and acid indigestion) and to treat acidosis (raise the pH
level of the blood when it is close to 7.0).
Sodium bicarbonate can also be
used as a topical antiseptic agent to prevent blistering and scarring. Lastly,
it is also used to reduce itching caused by allergic skin reactions caused by
plants such as poison ivy.
Because sodium bicarbonate neutralizes stomach
acid, it can be used to treat the overdose of acidic drugs such as aspirin and
tricyclic antidepressants. Because it supplies more sodium to the body, it is
also used to treat hyperkalemia (high blood levels of potassium).
However,
excessive intake of baking soda can just as easily cause high sodium levels in
the body (hypernatremia) and hypertension. Other conditions that can be caused
by baking soda overload include metabolic alkalosis, congestive heart failure
and edema triggered by high blood levels of sodium.
How Baking Soda Can Help
“Cure” Cancer
Basically, malignant tumors represent masses of rapidly
growing cells. The rapid rate of growth experienced by these cells means that
cellular metabolism also proceeds at very high rates.
Therefore, cancer
cells are using a lot more carbohydrates and sugars to generate energy in the
form of ATP (adenosine triphosphate).
However, some of the compounds formed
from the energy production include lactic acid and pyruvic acid. Under normal
circumstances, these compounds are cleared and utilized as soon as they are
produced. But cancer cells are experiencing metabolism at a much faster
rate. Therefore, these organic acids
accumulate in the immediate environment of the tumor.
The high level of
extracellular acidity around the tumor is one of the chief driving forces
behind the metastasis of cancer tumors.
Basically, cancer cells need an
acidic environment to grow and spread rapidly.
Some cancer experts,
therefore, believe that by buffering the tumor microenvironment with an
alkalizing compound, the pH of tumors can be raised enough to starve them and
stop their growth and spread.
Curiously, this rather simple solution to
cancer has been proven right.
What is even more remarkable is that there is
no need to cook up some fancy synthetic drug to lower the acidity in the
immediate environment of the tumor. A simple, commonly obtained compound like
sodium bicarbonate will do.
Obviously, it is desirable to deliver the sodium
bicarbonate as close to the tumor as possible since its pH-raising effect is
needed in the microenvironment of the tumor. Therefore, directly injecting
sodium bicarbonate in the tumor site is considered a better solution than oral
administration. However, oral sodium bicarbonate is just safer and can be
readily used at home.
Clinical Evidence for the Efficacy of Baking Soda in
Cancer Therapy
Two Studies
A 2009 study published in the journal, Cancer
Research, is among the first to confirm that the alkalinizing effect of sodium
bicarbonate can indeed stop cancer.
By injecting sodium bicarbonate into a
group of mice, the authors of the study were able to determine how the growth
and spread of cancer tumors were affected by raising the pH of the organ
affected by the cancer.
The study results showed that baking soda indeed
raised the pH and reduced spontaneous metastases in mice induced with breast
cancer.
The researchers also determined that sodium bicarbonate works by
raising the pH outside cells and not within cells. This is an important finding,
because it suggests that sodium bicarbonate does not interfere with cellular
metabolism even as it makes the microenvironment unconducive for tumor growth.
Other findings from this study show that baking soda:
- Reduced the
involvement of the lymph node on the transport of cancer cells
- Does not
lower the levels of circulating tumor cells
- Reduced the involvement of the
liver and, therefore, the spread of tumor cells to other organs
- Inhibit the
colonization of other organs by circulating tumor cells
The researchers
noted that the injection of sodium bicarbonate in other animal models for
cancer showed that the compound can also inhibit the spread of prostate cancer
but not melanoma.
Building on these results, researchers are trying to
determine whether better results can be obtained by combining sodium carbonate
with cancer drugs.
In a 2011 study published in the journal, BMC Cancer, a
group of researchers investigated the effects of dichloroacetate and the
combination of dichloroacetate and a bicarbonate salt on a mouse model for
metastatic breast cancer.
Dichloroacetate is a selective cancer drug that
works similarly to sodium bicarbonate. It raises pH levels around cancer cells
by inhibiting the breakdown of sugars and the production of acidic
intermediates in these cells.
The study results showed that the combination
of the synthetic cancer drug, dichloroacetate, and the simple, proven household
remedy, oral bicarbonate, did not reduce metastasis or tumor size.
This
study showed that sodium bicarbonate is not only a safer, cheaper cancer remedy;
it is more effective than dichloroacetate.
The Use of Baking Soda in
Oncology
Even though most oncologists do not recommend sodium bicarbonate
for their patients, they actually use it for the same purposes in chemotherapy.
By combining this alkalinizing agent with chemotherapy drugs, it protects the
organs of the body from being destroyed by the poisonous effects of those
drugs.
Essentially, sodium bicarbonate raises the pH around these vital
organs and prevents the cancer from spreading there and chemotherapy drugs from
causing even greater destruction.
Dr. Mark Sircus, the Director of the
International Medical Veritas Association, detailed the link between cancer and
pH as well as the use of baking soda as an anticancer agent in his book, Sodium
Bicarbonate – Rich Man’s Poor Man’s Cancer Treatment.
Dr. Tullio Simoncini,
an Italian oncologist, regularly treats his cancer patients with baking soda.
In his experience, oral, intravenous and aerosol delivery of sodium bicarbonate
are effective in treatment of breast and prostate cancers as well as other types
of cancer except for brain cancer.
Although Dr. Simoncini believes oral
sodium bicarbonate is most appropriate for cancers affecting the digestive
tract, other oncologists and cancer patients such as Vernon have proven that
oral sodium bicarbonate can indeed effectively treat cancer affecting
deep-seated organs.
Dr. Sircus also recommends oral administration of baking
soda. Many of his patients debate whether to mix it with maple syrup, molasses,
honey, water or any other beverage. Since normal cells are starved in cancer
patients, the oncologist recommends healthy energy sources such as honey, black
strap molasses and maple syrup.
Dr. Simoncini, on the other hand, gives
glucose intravenously along with sodium bicarbonate for the same purpose.
The
Baking Soda Formula for Cancer
To make the baking soda natural cancer remedy
at home, you need maple syrup, molasses or honey to go along with the baking
soda.
In Dr. Sircus’ book, he documented how one patient used baking soda
and blackstrap molasses to fight the prostate cancer that had metastasized to
his bones. On the first day, the patient mixed 1 teaspoon of baking soda with 1
teaspoon of molasses in a cup of water.
He took this for another 3 days
after which his saliva pH read 7.0 and his urine pH read 7.5.
Encouraged by
these results, the patient took the solution 2 times on day 5 instead of once
daily. And from day 6 – 10, he took 2 teaspoons each of baking soda and
molasses twice daily.
By the 10th day, the patient’s pH had risen to 8.5 and
the only side effects experienced were headaches and night sweat (similar to
cesium therapy).
The next day, the patient had a bone scan and also other
medical tests. His results showed that his PSA (prostate-specific antigen, the
protein used to determine the severity of prostate enlargement and prostate
cancer) level was down from 22.3 at the point of diagnosis to 0.1.
Another
baking soda formula recommends mixing 90 teaspoons of maple syrup with 30
teaspoons of baking soda.
To do this, the maple syrup must be heated to
become less viscous. Then the baking soda is added and stirred for 5 minutes
until it is fully dissolved.
This preparation should provide about 10-day
worth of the baking soda remedy. 5 – 7 teaspoons per day is the recommended
dose for cancer patients.
Care should be taken when using the baking soda
remedy to treat cancer. This is because sustaining a high pH level can itself
cause metabolic alkalosis and electrolyte imbalance. These can result in edema
and also affect the heart and blood pressure.
Ideally, you should consult a
doctor before adopting the baking soda solution. An oncologist with a knowledge
of this cure would be most helpful.
Sources - http://www.progressivehealth.com/
http://phkillscancer.com/
http://www.naturalnews.com/027481_prostate_cancer_baking_soda.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19276390