Six home remedies that really work: these safe, fast, and effective fixes will relieve what ails you, says MSNBC.

Over the past century, Americans have embraced modern pharmaceutical science and the lifesaving medicines it has produced. In the process, we’ve relegated to folklore the cures our grandparents relied on. As it turns out, that trove is rich with effective remedies. In fact, even modern medicine relies on plants more than many of us realize, says Catherine Ulbricht, PharmD, senior attending pharmacist at Massachusetts General Hospital and chief editor of publications for the Natural Standard Research Collaboration, which evaluates scientific data on herbs.

“Practically all of the most widely used drugs have an herbal origin,” Ulbricht says. “The number one OTC medication, aspirin, is a synthetic version of a compound found in the willow tree. Many statins are based on fungi; and Tamiflu originated from Chinese star anise.”

Following, you’ll find a host of age-old remedies whose remarkable effectiveness has been confirmed by new research. Because botanical medicines can interact with other drugs, tell your doctor when you’re taking them. The exceptions are the common food items — onions, parsley, and cayenne — when consumed in natural form and conventional amounts. Read more

The standard American diet is deadly. Too many Americans are both fat and malnourished. Losing weight is simple: eat less and exercise more, but the basics of nutrition are a mystery to many. Margaret Durst gives three ways to compensate for the nutritional deficiencies of the standard American diet.

Just the basics of nutrition are a concern to many. I find that some very basic nutritional supplements help almost everybody.

A good multivitamin is the first basic. What makes a multivitamin good is the quality of the contents along with the technology used to encapsulate or tablet the contents. The better vitamins do not have pharmaceutical glaze, artificial coloring, several kinds of cellulose, nor do they contain synthetic vitamins such as synthetic E or dl-alpha tocopherol. Read your labels. Read more

Vitamin D is crucial to the fending off of infections, claims new research.

The so-called sunshine vitamin, which can be obtained from food or manufactured by human skin exposed to the sun, plays a key role in boosting the immune system, researchers believe.

In particular it triggers and arms the body’s T cells, the cells in the body that seek out and destroy any invading bacteria and viruses.

Scientists at the University of Copenhagen have discovered that Vitamin D is crucial to activating our immune defences and that without sufficient intake of the vitamin, the killer cells of the immune system – T cells – will not be able to react to and fight off serious infections in the body. Read more

Coconut oil has been used for centuries as a vital source of food for health and general well-being in traditional communities of tropical regions. Recent research verifies traditional beliefs that the coconut palm is “The Tropical Magic Potion.” What are some of the health benefits of coconut oil?

The health benefits of coconut oil include hair care, skin care, stress relief, maintaining cholesterol levels, weight loss, increased immunity, proper digestion and metabolism, relief from kidney problems, heart diseases, high blood pressure, diabetes, HIV and cancer, dental care, and bone strength. These benefits of coconut oil can be attributed to the presence of lauric acid, capric acid and caprylic acid, and its properties such as antimicrobial, antioxidant, antifungal, antibacterial, soothing, etc.

How is Lauric Acid Used by our body?
The human body converts lauric acid into monolaurin which is claimed to help in dealing with viruses and bacteria causing diseases such as herpes, influenza, cytomegalovirus, and even HIV. It helps in fighting harmful bacteria such as listeria monocytogenes and heliobacter pylori, and harmful protozoa such as giardia lamblia. As a result of these various health benefits of coconut oil, though its exact mechanism of action was unknown, it has been extensively used in Ayurveda, the traditional Indian medicinal system. Read more

More Americans (20 to 30 percent) claim some form of allergy — and a Chinese herbal treatment may offer hope.

… Dr. Xiu-Min Li, the director of Mount Sinai Hospital’s federally funded Center for Chinese Herbal Therapy for Allergy and Asthma in Manhattan, has had success treating asthma with traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) — using an herbal therapy of her own devising. About 10 years ago, Li began wondering whether TCM might also be applied to food allergies since allergic asthma and allergic reactions to food have similar immunological blueprints. While there’s no actual mention of food allergy in traditional Chinese medicine, a complete medical system in which the taste of an herb helps determine its therapeutic function, there is talk of symptoms like those experienced during an allergic reaction.

“I found information about one formula in particular,” says Li. “It dealt with parasites and was used when people got stomach problems, vomited, and lost sensation after eating. It sounded like what we now call anaphylaxis.” The formula, called Wu Mei Wan, dates back nearly 2,000 years and was recorded in the Shang Han Lun, one of the classic tomes of traditional Chinese medicine and a basis for all of its future pharmacology. Li and her team of chemists, biologists and researchers modified this original formula by adding to its preexisting mixture of 10 botanical ingredients, an 11th called Ling Zhi, or, “wooden mushroom,” so-called for its ligneous appearance. Read more

Can’t find time to exercise? Physical Therapy Assistant Schools describes 80 effective exercises that you can do at your desk.

The U.S. surgeon general recommends at least 30 minutes of moderate activity five days a week for adults. Yet with a significant percentage of Americans at the overweight or obese point, it doesn’t seem as if we have the time. So we do what we can, when we can.

Because so many of us spend eight hours or more a day at our desks or cubicles, why not find 30 minutes there? We have gathered 80 effective exercises you can do at your desk to help. Take a look and have your co-workers envying you in no time.

Effective Aerobic Exercises You Can Do At Your Desk

Get your heart pumping and calories burning with the help of the below. Read more

Even people who prefer natural remedies often still use conventional toothpaste and mouthwash, but natural dental products are available.

I’ve been a fan of Tooth Soap for years. This is the product that replaces the usual toothpaste products with far more natural, gentle teeth-washing ingredients. That’s why, along with Dental Miracle (www.DentalMiracle.com), it has remained among my top-recommended products for oral health. (Many other products are mentioned below…)

Because let’s face it: You don’t actually need to “scrub” your teeth with sand, chemical preservatives and sweeteners. Most toothpaste products are truly a joke — they’re loaded with synthetic chemicals that simply can’t be considered safe for human consumption by any reasonable person. Cleaning your teeth only requires a type of soap, some water and some brushing action. You don’t need dyes, sweeteners, sand and other nonsense ingredients. Read more

Culinary herbs enhance our daily meals, but they also have medicinal properties that have been all but forgotten. The herbs and spices that you already have in your kitchen cabinet can help you feel better.

… Kelly M. Shattuck, a Certified Herbalist based in North Carolina, says before health food stores made specific herbs such as valerian root readily available for medicinal healing, individuals relied on their culinary herbs to play a very important pharmaceutical role.

“The great thing about culinary herbs,” said Shattuck, “is that a lot people already have them in their kitchen for seasoning, which makes the whole process less intimidating.” She also says using kitchen herbs is typically less expensive, and doesn’t require a lot of herbal knowledge or monetary investment. “Anyone can successfully use herbs as they were meant to be used, to heal and regenerate the body,” said Shattuck. “It’s just a matter of reading material, taking what you already have on your spice rack, and putting what you read into practice.” Read more

You can save yourself from ten common surgical procedures through dietary supplements, says Bill Sardi.

The most recent data available shows there were 46 million inpatient and 53.3 million outpatient surgical procedures performed in the U.S. in 2006, representing about a third of the total population that lines up for operations annually, not counting dental procedures.

Often there is little effort made to avert surgery. The rush to the operating room is what is most financially rewarding for physicians. Patients facing surgery for chronic or even urgent conditions may be able to forestall or avoid surgery altogether with the judicious use of dietary supplements. Ten such conditions that warrant surgery, which may be alleviated with dietary supplements, are presented below. Read more

Melatonin is a hormone secreted by the pineal gland that helps regulate other hormones and maintains the body’s circadian rhythm. For some people, melatonin seems to help improve sleep. It also may be the safest remedy for anxiety.

… Melatonin may be the best remedy for people suffering from anxiety disorders. Also, you don’t have to suffer from an anxiety disorder to use melatonin.

All of us experience anxiety occasionally when faced with or stressing over a challenging situation and melatonin can be used for that as well.

As it is also a sleep aid, it can be used for white-knuckled fliers trembling at the thought of boarding an airplane. Read more

Victoria Lambert reveals the medicinal properties of ten seasonal plants.

From the holly and the ivy to mistletoe and myrrh, it wouldn’t be the festive season without traditional plants. But increasingly doctors think they could offer practical benefits year round.

James Wong, an ethnobotanist and presenter of this week’s festive edition of BBC Two’s Grow Your Own Drugs, says: “The natural benefits of our favourite Christmas plants are being uncovered all the time. But we can learn a lot from the past, too. Cherokee Indians, for instance, used to drink an infusion of spruce needles to help them stave off scurvy and keep the airways open.”

However, you need to be careful when building a festive apothecary – mistletoe, for instance, is highly poisonous to humans. “You might want to stick to mince pies,” says Wong. “You can’t go far wrong with a dose of nutmeg and cinnamon.” Read more

Champagne made with black grapes shares the benefits of red wine for heart and blood circulation, scientists have found.

Fizz made with black grapes shares benefits of red wine for heart and blood circulation, scientists find

Scientists are delivering some unexpected cheer this Christmas. They have found that a couple of glasses of champagne a day are good for your heart and blood circulation.

Nor, they believe, are the benefits limited to expensive fizz: cheaper alternatives such as cava and prosecco may offer similar effects. Read more

Homeopathy is a 200-year-old medical system whose theories conflict with those of regular medicine. Patients are treated with tinctures that carry an “energetic imprint” of substances that provoke the very symptoms they’re suffering from. The rising profile of homeopathy has produced something of a dilemma in the world of medicine: how does homeopathic medicine work?

It is commonly assumed that homeopathic medicines are composed of extremely small doses of medicinal substances. And yet, does anyone refer to an atomic bomb as an extremely small dose of a bomb? In actual fact, there is a power, a very real power, in having atoms smash against each other.

Homeopathic medicines are made through a specific pharmacological process of dilution and vigorous shaking. However, when skeptics say that there is nothing but water in homeopathic medicine, they are proving their ignorance, despite the incredible arrogance in which they make these assertions. Dr. Martin Chaplin, a respected British professor who is one of the world’s experts on water, has verified that “homeopathic water” and “regular water” are not the same, and his review of almost 2,000 references to the scientific literature on water (!) confirm this fact (Chaplin, 2009). Read more

It’s no secret that unprocessed honey, straight from the hive, has been used worldwide for millennia to promote healing. Below are eight health benefits of raw, organic, locally grown honey.

Perhaps your parents failed to mention it when they discussed the birds and the bees with you. But, honey has a long history of healing, too.

Really, it’s been used for centuries for its healing properties, as well as its sweetness. People use it to bake with. It requires you to use less heat. Its tasty flavor is one reason many people prefer it over table sugar. Besides that, honey is much sweeter than regular table sugar and better for you.

It’s best if you buy locally grown organic raw honey whenever you can. Locally grown because it’s produced by bees which are from the environment in which you live. It is always best to grow or consume foods from the area in which you live as they contain the immune stimulating properties needed for your body to adapt to its environment. Fresh raw honey will also be tastier, and more potent. And, when you buy from local independent farmers you help keep them in business, which is good for your economy.

Eight Health Benefits of Honey Read more

Can’t lose weight? Don’t blame your metabolism. It’s easy to say it’s your body’s fault you’re chubby, but, it’s a big fat lie, says Dr. Susan Roberts.

For those who struggle to lose weight, it has always made sense to blame a slow metabolism.

In my work as a diet doctor and nutritionist, I hear this excuse all the time to explain away everything from middle-age spread to the fact that their best friend eats twice as much, but stays effortlessly slim.

It’s not that they are overeating, they insist, it’s because their body doesn’t burn up calories as efficiently.

But what is the real truth about the link between your metabolic rate - that is, the amount of energy used up by your body just to keep your heart beating, your blood pumping and so on - and weight gain?

Does a slow metabolism automatically mean you will end up overweight? To find out, I have tackled seven of the most common myths about metabolism. Read more

For those of you who have cancer or know of someone with cancer, hypnosis may offer hope in helping the body to heal. We all know about the “placebo” effect, as in taking a sugar pill unknowingly, and tricking the mind into believing that we actually are taking a medicated pill. It’s proven to work in many case studies. Hypnotherapy is basically just that. We bypass (fool) the conscious mind and get into the subconscious where the real healing takes place.

Research made in the last decade shows that hypnosis can cure many medical problems with no side effect. Hypnosis is now successfully used in different areas such as quitting smoking, weight loss, stress reduction, stopping negative thoughts, anger management, pain control and so on. Also the latest experiences show that hypnosis can have positive effect on different aspects of cancer treatment.

There are different therapies for cancer including drugs, hypnosis, radiation, reiki, special diet, surgery, emotional healing, ozone treatment, fruit juice treatment, chemotherapy and so on. Unfortunately, most cancers can not still be cured even with the help of modern science. So, there is a need for a different approach to cancer treatment. Cancer specialist DR D. W. Smithers writes that “Like other names used in science, cancer is just a shortened way of saying something that cannot be simply defined - cancer is no more a disease of cells than a traffic jam is a disease of cars. A lifetime of study of the internal combustion engine would not help anyone to understand our traffic problems. Cancer is a disease of organization, not a disease of cells.” Yes, we need a complex approach to find the treatment of cancer through mind-body connection. Read more

A new study suggests that fellatio may significantly decrease the risk of breast cancer in women, but you have to swallow. (I wonder how many of the researchers were male.) For women who don’t like the taste of semen and can’t bring themselves to swallow, Svetlana Ivanova of Sex Secrets has a post 7 Tips for Swallowing Semen that may help you enjoy the benefits of breast cancer prevention while pleasing your man in the process.

Women who perform the act of fellatio and swallow semen on a regular basis, one to two times a week, may reduce their risk of breast cancer by up to 40 percent, a North Carolina State University study found.

Doctors had never suspected a link between the act of fellatio and breast cancer, but new research being performed at North Carolina State University is starting to suggest that there could be an important link between the two. Read more

Gabriella Filippi interviews Dr. Udo Erasmus to find out what is better for the flu than flu shots.

I had the pleasure of conducting an interview with Dr. Erasmus. His research has been primarily in the areas of fats, digestion, and energy. Dr. Erasmus seeks to clarify information in the literature in these areas, and presents a great point: what does a picture of health look like? While diseases and sick cells are classified and organized, there exists no sensible categorization for health. Here Dr. Erasmus educates us on how to stay healthy during flu season, and answers the question, what is better for the flu than flu shots.

Dr. Erasmus asks, so what would it look like if everything was functioning well? And what would it take to get there? He further purports the importance of the appropriate use of food, water, and air (that is what the body is made from) and the minimization of pesticides, plastics, chemicals, pharmaceutical drugs, and food molecules that are broken down by processing or by food preparation.

Dr. Udo Erasmus finds the following most helpful for health: Read more

Medicinal mushrooms like reishi and maitake can help fight cancer. Natural News has assembled a unique collection of supporting statements about medicinal mushrooms and cancer.

The cure for cancer already exists. But it wasn’t created in a lab, and it wasn’t funded by pink-ribbon products or walkathons. It was created for free by Mother Nature, and it exists as a collection of literally thousands of powerful anti-cancer phytonutrients found in medicinal mushrooms.

Medicinal mushrooms contain some of the most potent medicine in the world. They are living pharmaceutical factories, but they file no patents and ask for no royalties. They just mind their own business, manufacturing healing medicines day by day, and waiting for someone wise and humble enough to come along and pick them.

Here, we’ve assembled a unique collection of supporting statements about medicinal mushrooms and cancer from some of the top authors in the industry. If you (or someone you know) suffers from any form of cancer, make sure to send them this information so they can learn what their conventional cancer doctor won’t dare tell them… that medicinal mushrooms make chemotherapy virtually obsolete! Read more

Anyone who’s had any kind of sex life knows that breathing is an intrinsic part of the sexual experience. In general, during the human sexual response cycle normal breathing speeds up, builds to a rapid pace, the breath is held for a few moments before/during a climax, after the climax there is a long exhale, then the breath slows down and gradually returns to normal. Suzie Heumann explains the connection between breathing and orgasm.

Breathing doesn’t seem very sexy but it’s the key to orgasmic pleasure and self-empowerment for women and to lasting longer for men. The benefits of learning new, simple ways of breathing are extraordinary and have direct health benefits, too. Breathing deeply into your belly increases relaxation, decreases tension and stress, helps women focus on pleasure and puts more oxygen into your blood stream. Oxygen is what delivers the ‘O’ in Orgasm. Read more