Prostate Biopsies Can Result in Dangerous Infections

    Barton Chiropractic in Concord is constantly reviewing the latest healthcare research so that     we can provide you with the best possible health care. Recently I ran across this article so I thought I would share it.

The prostate-specific antigen test (PSA test), analyzes your blood for prostate-specific antigen (PSA), a substance produced by your prostate gland.  When higher-than-normal levels of PSA are detected, it is believed that cancer is present.

 PSA test has been criticized as useless

 PSA test has been criticized as useless for a number of years now. For example, back in     2004, Stanford University News reported: 

"The most commonly used screening tool for detecting prostate cancer – the PSA test – is virtually worthless for predicting men's risk of contracting the disease, medical school researchers have determined. Stanford scientists studied prostate tissues collected in the 20 years since a high PSA test result became the standard for prostate removal. They concluded that as a screen, the test indicates nothing more than the size of the prostate gland."

 Today, many experts agree that PSA testing is unreliable at best and useless at worst for accurately diagnosing prostate cancer. Many also agree that routine PSA blood tests often lead to over-diagnosis of prostate cancer, resulting in unnecessary treatments. Similar to mammograms, the PSA screen has become little more than an up-sell technique. The false positive rate is high, and the bulk of the harm is a result of subsequent unnecessary treatments.

According to the American Cancer Society:

 "There can be different reasons for an elevated PSA level, including prostate cancer, benign prostate enlargement, inflammation, infection, age, and race," all factors that make PSA test results confusing, leading to potential for unnecessary treatment and suffering when tests are elevated.  Getting a PSA test reduces your lifetime risk of dying from prostate cancer from three percent to just 2.4 percent, so the difference is negligible.

Prostate Biopsies Can Result in Dangerous Infections

A positive PSA test will typically lead to a biopsy—which has also come under increasing scrutiny and criticism in recent years. On the one hand, the procedure itself may cause acute or long-term harm, and on the other, the rate of false negatives is high.

There are over one million prostate cancer tissue biopsy procedures performed annually in the U.S. Approximately 25 percent of these tissue biopsies are reported "positive," indicating the presence of prostate cancer. The remaining 75 percent are reported "negative." One-third of the men with initial "negative" results for prostate cancer actually do have prostate cancer that was missed by the biopsy.

A prostate biopsy involves inserting fine needles into the prostate gland. But specialists have begun to worry about a recent, significant increase in the risk of complications from the procedure. In particular, they are concerned about hard-to-treat bloodstream infections that can require weeks of treatment. Over the past decade, the rate of hospital admissions in Ontario, Canada, for serious infections caused by prostate biopsy increased four-fold.

Prostate biopsies inherently pose a risk for infection because:

• The needles that collect a tiny piece of prostate tissue can transport bacteria through your rectal wall into the prostate and bloodstream, and/or
• The needles can spread harmful bacteria present in your gut into your bloodstream

   Chiropractors

Chiropractors have always maintained that surgery should be a last resort. This is another case of drugs and surgery taking the place of a healthy lifestyle. Drugs and surgery are an industry.

There is way more money to be made on our laziness than prevention. For more information, click: Concord Chiropractic . Or call 925 685-2002 to schedule a free consultation to see how Chiropractic can help you take charge of your health.

Since there are NO Absolutely Safe Drugs, Who is Really Responsible for Your Health?

         Barton Chiropractic in Concord is constantly reviewing the latest healthcare research so that     we can provide you with the best possible health care. You should share it!   If you answer, "I am," then I'm glad—you're getting it.

You are the only one who can be fully responsible for your health. You can choose to believe that this responsibility rests on someone else's shoulders, but at the end of the day, you are the one who has to live with the consequences, for better or worse. 

Unfortunately, a majority of people have been successfully brainwashed into thinking that FDA-approved drugs are both safe and effective. This is a tragedy of epic proportions because nothing could be further from the truth.

It's important to understand that even if a drug has gone through unbiased, stringent, long-term testing—which most do NOT undergo prior to approval—you may still experience harmful effects. The drug may interact badly with another drug you're taking or with a food you're eating. Your genetic makeup, metabolism, or the state of your immune system can also cause it to have an unpredictable impact. All Drugs Have Side Effects!

Sadly, studies are frequently biased, results are skewed, and drugs are put on a fast-track to be approved long before anyone knows whether they're safe. In essence, taking a drug is a gamble, and there are NO 100 percent safe drugs—not even over-the-counter versions.

Unfortunately, doctors are not likely to change their prescription habits any time soon because that's what they're trained to do. In many cases, writing prescriptions is ALL they do! So as a patient, you have to take it upon yourself to question the drugs prescribed to you.

Some of the most common-sense questions you need to ask before you take any drug include:

• Do I really need it? I mean really need it.
• Is it prescribed appropriately, or is it being prescribed for an off-label use?
• What are the side effects? (Both common and uncommon side effects)
• Is it addictive?
• Is it known to interact with any other drugs, supplements, or foods that I'm taking?

Subluxation  

If you have a vertebra that is out of place, it can put pressure on a nerve and cause it to not    function 100%. If the nerve supply to the organ is not 100% how can the organ function 100%?

The Doctors as Barton Chiropractic in Concord offer free consultations to determine if patients may have vertebral subluxations. 

Chiropractors remove nervous system interference allowing your body to regulate it self and heal itself naturally, without drugs or surgery.

It makes total sense to me, that if you do not want more drugs and surgery, you need Barton Chiropractic!

For more information, click: Concord Chiropractic . Or call 925 685-2002 to schedule a free consultation to see how Chiropractic can help you take charge of your health.

More Drugs For Women

          Barton Chiropractic in Concord is constantly reviewing the latest healthcare research so that     we can provide you with the best possible health care. Recently I ran across this article so I thought I would share it.

While it's important to pay greater attention to the differing healthcare needs between men and women, this is probably not the primary incentive behind the huge increase in drugs being developed specifically for women.

Prescription statistics show that American women use nearly 65 percent more drugs, on average, than men—making them a more lucrative market for the drug companies... According to the featured report, drug- and biotech companies are currently testing or awaiting FDA approval for more than 850 different drugs for diseases that "disproportionately affect American women."

Really? Do you really want more drugs? The whole idea of covering up the symptoms so that you can die more comfortably seems really crazy to me. Don't you just want to feel better? 

One of the greatest things about Barton Chiropractic in Concord is we allow your body to heal from the inside out. What? 

Think about this: Your body loses about 2.5 million cells every single min. All that dust around the house, ya that is mostly dead skin. Your entire body is replaced once a year through cellular regeneration. Your brain controls all of this. Every single movement of your body, every organ function, every sensation, yep your brain and nervous system control it! 

Now what if we took the nerve that goes from your brain to one of your organs and put enough pressure on that nerve so that it did not function 100%. What do you think would happen to that organ? DO you think it would function 100%? Nope!

If you have a vertebra that is out of place, it can put pressure on a nerve and cause it to not    function 100%. If the nerve supply to the organ is not 100% how can the organ function 100%?

          

 Chiropractors

Barton Chiropractic in Concord will gently adjust your spine to remove pressure off of your nervous system, allowing your body to heal itself. No drugs. No surgery. Chiropractors have always maintained that surgery should be a last resort. 

It makes total sense to me, that if you do not want more drugs and surgery, you need Barton Chiropractic!

For more information, click: Concord Chiropractic . Or call 925 685-2002 to schedule a free consultation to see how Chiropractic can help you take charge of your health.

Biopsies Clearly Carry Risk

          Barton Chiropractic in Concord is constantly reviewing the latest healthcare research so that     we can provide you with the best possible health care. Recently I ran across this article so I thought I would share it.

Writing in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, researchers stated:¹

“A better representation of the risks and benefits of research biopsies in study protocols and informed consents is needed.”

This was their conclusion after finding that more than 5 percent of biopsies in cancer drug trials may cause complications, but the informed consent documents did not adequately explain this. In fact, on average the consent documents had only 39 words addressing risks from invasive biopsies – less than the number of words used to address risks for simple blood draws.

Of the 745 tumor biopsies reviewed for the study, 39 resulted in complications, including lung air leaks, bleeding and other major effects that required hospitalization or surgery.

Whether you’re participating in a drug trial, or considering a biopsy for another medical reason, you should know that while biopsy risks are rarely discussed, there are risks, indeed.

           Chiropractors

Chiropractors have always maintained that surgery should be a last resort. This is another case of drugs and surgery taking the place of a healthy lifestyle. Drugs and surgery are an industry.

There is way more money to be made on our laziness than prevention. For more information, click: Concord Chiropractic . Or call 925 685-2002 to schedule a free consultation to see how Chiropractic can help you take charge of your health.

Diabetes? Overweight? You Need Surgery!

Barton Chiropractic in Concord is constantly reviewing the latest healthcare research so that we can provide you with the best possible health care. Recently I ran across this article so I thought I would share it.

 Cleveland Medical Clinic recently published its "Top 10 Medical Inventions for 2013" list”. Doctors and researchers at the Clinic voted for what they thought were the most significant inventions out of 250 submitted ideas.

 Your not going to believe this, but shockingly, and really almost unbelievably, topping the list at number one; using stomach bypass surgery for the treatment of type 2 diabetes. What?

 Basically they cut up your stomach shrinking it and rearrange your digestive tract so that food enters the small intestine at a later point than usual so that you can no longer get all the nutrients out of the little bit of food that you are able to eat! Stomach bypass surgery is the most invasive and costly (not to mention risky) intervention possible for a problem that is firmly rooted in a faulty diet and lack of exercise...

This is not just the opinion of your Concord Chiropractor. It is a fact!

  According to Cleveland Medical Clinic

 “For years, doctors performing weight-loss operations found that the surgical procedure would rid patients of Type 2 diabetes, oftentimes before the patient left the hospital.” Huh? That’s what they say. But they did research.

 Here is what the research looked like: 150 patients with Type 2 diabetes and obesity were enrolled in a study in 2007. 50 patients had stomach bypass surgery surgery which reduces the stomach from the size of a football to a golf ball size; 50 had a sleeve gastrectomy which reduces it to the size of a banana, and 50 were offered nutritional counseling and exercise while they continued taking their diabetes medication. That’s right, one study! By closing off most of the stomach to food, people who received surgery ate less and, therefore, lost about five times as much weight on average as those only taking bloodsugar-lowering medications. That is no surprise.

  Insurance will pay for it. Let’s do it!

According to the hospital "Bariatric surgery has been around for a while. The reason it was chosen as the top innovation is because now Medicare will pay for it, and a lot of the other (private) insurance companies started covering it to. The criteria that insurers use to cover the surgery has been broadened because of its effectiveness in controlling Type 2 diabetes."

 Stomach bypass surgery is the most invasive and costly (not to mention risky) intervention possible for a problem that is firmly rooted in a faulty diet and lack of exercise... It's totally clear that it topped the list because Medicare (i.e. your tax dollars) and insurance will now pay for it, NOT because it's been proven safe and effective.

On the contrary, they appear to base their opinion on the results from a singular study consisting of 150 patients. This is probably bad. In the case of weight loss surgery, there are already a number of studies showing both bariatric surgery and gastric banding are very risky procedures that produce poor long-term outcomes!

  Chiropractors

Chiropractors have always maintained that surgery should be a last resort. This is a problem that is the result of consuming more calories than you burn. This is another case of drugs and surgery taking the place of a healthy lifestyle. Drugs and surgery are an industry.

There is way more money to be made on our laziness than prevention. For more information, click: Concord Chiropractic . Or call 925 685-2002 to schedule a free consultation to see how Chiropractic can help you take charge of your health.

Chiropractic helps Fibromyalgia and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome

We often think of Chiropractic Doctors as treating back pain. Don't get me wrong, a great Chiropractor can do wonders for relieving back pain. But that is not what Chiropractic is about. Chiropractic used properly can be amazing. When you start to think about your body and the fact that every single thing it does is controlled by your nervous system, it's not hard to imagine that a vertebra that is out of place can put pressure on a nerve.

 Now if that same nerve goes to your stomach you can see how the normal function of your stomach could become effected. Pressure on the nervous system can create all types of symptoms, even fibromyalgia. That is why research has shown that over 92% of patients under chiropractic care got relief from thier fibromyalgia symptoms. I enclosed a research article for those of you that like to see the facts.

Upper cervical management of primary fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome cases. Amalu WC. Today's Chiropractic May/June 2000 Pp.76-86. This is a paper of 23 successive cases (5 male, 18 female from 11 to 76 years of age) of primary fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome suffering from 2 to 35 years. Total care visits ranged from 20 to 48. All patients reported maintaining their improvements at 1 to 1 ½ years or more of follow up. After care every patient was ale to resume normal activities including full time work. The author writes "Improvement in symptoms of 92-100% was achieved in both these syndromes subsequent to corrections of aberrant arthrokinematic function of the occipito-atlanto-axial complex…A causal relationship between biomechanical faults in the upper cervical spine, abnormal central neurophysiologic processing and subsequent peripheral neuropathophysiology, is suggested as the possible genesis of these two syndromes." 

 If you or someone you love is suffering from fibromyalgia, call 925 685-2002 or visit us at Concord Chiropractic to schedule a free consultation.

Why Should I Go Barton Chiropractic in Concord After A Car Accident?

A car accident settlement is often sought after if someone has been injured in a car accident. Often times, however, people are not able to get the compensation they deserve because they do not have enough evidence. Since lack of evidence is often the problem, you might be wondering if you should go to the chiropractor to gather evidence for your case.

 Without the correct documentation, it can be impossible to prove that you were ever injured. If you have experienced an injury because of a car accident, you will be able to not only gather proof by seeing on of the doctors at Barton Chiropractic in Concord, but more importantly, get the care that you need. If your injuries feel small, it is still a good idea to go see the chiropractor. At Barton Chiropractic we always perform a detailed examination as well as take any x-rays that might be needed. Car accident injury evaluation is something the doctors at Barton Chiropractic in Concord are well trained in. We have helped hundreds, if not thousands, of injuries that have been caused by car accidents. If you want to make your case stand more solidly in court we are the expert for you.

 A report from one of our experts is going to strengthen your case and most likely you will be able to get more compensation than you would have been able to get. If you are thinking of hiring an attorney, you need to ensure they are a qualified professional that will be able to get the job done. You want to find someone that specializes in car accident law instead of a general lawyer. Although we will not give you a specific attorney to work with, we have several that we have worked with over the years that we trust. The size of your settlement often depends on the severity of your injury. If you have a very bad injury, you are going to get a bigger settlement than if you were dealing with an injury that was minor. Hiring an attorney will enable you to get the right amount of compensation.

 If you have been in a car accident and would like to speak with one of our doctors, you can schedule a free consultation at 925 685-2002.