Welcome - Ask My RN Proactive Health Care

In this site you will find a wide variety of articles designed to introduce you to proactive health care. My primary goal is to give you the knowledge and working tools necessary to regain, improve, and maintain good health. For those who want to acquire and maintain good health for a long and happy life, two basic drives must be present; an innate desire to manage your own health, and the ability to think outside the box.

Where to Start?

This is a puzzling question, for some, the answer lies in what health problems they are presently dealing with, but for the purpose of this web site we must first ‘look over our shoulder, before we can look forward’. We need to know what got us here in the first place. If we look back a mere fifty years we can find our society just emerging from a great depression. Farming was family owned; there were only a hand full of industrial farms that were exclusive to dairy farming. The soil was still quite rich with nutrients and these nutrients were replaced at a high rate with sustained rotational farming. Produce was plentiful and even bread was baked daily and sold without added chemicals or preservatives. There were no microwave ovens, and ‘fast food’ was still in its infancy.

Fifty years ago we would depend solely on our family doctor to guide us in our personal health care. His wisdom and words were never questioned. We looked into the future with the promise of better life and health through science and technology, and charged headlong into that future. As we look back we can see the consequences of that charge we so blindly made. Science gave us cleaner water by adding fluoride, a chemical we know today to be a deadly toxin. Science gave us ‘safer food’ by pasteurization, not only of milk and its products but a wide variety of other products. This process is now seen as the devastation of the necessary health enhancing bacteria humans actually need to digest food and maintain a healthy natural immune system.

Science gave us industrial farms to ’feed the masses’. This resulted in the massive use of herbicides, pesticides, antibiotics and hormones for ‘higher produce yields’, which in turn destroyed the nutrient content of animals as well as produce. So now we can eat virtually nutrient free products, be they animal, fruit or vegetable, packed with synthetic vitamins, chemical preservatives, artificial color, artificial flavoring and artificial sugars, with the gentle residue of chemical herbicides, pesticides, and antibiotics, giving our bodies nothing it recognizes as food. Since the human body is unable to break down most of these chemical cocktails, they eventually wreak havoc on our basic body functions and slowly destroy the capabilities of the immune system; the human bodies only defense against disease.

The crowning blow to our overall health came in the form of ‘prevention’. Science gave us ‘new and highly effective’ drugs, to prevent a wide variety of diseases, and even more drugs to treat those new diseases caused by the ‘effective drugs’.

Today’s physicians practice health care by providing preventative medicine in the form of immunizations and the treatment of symptoms. Once the symptom is gone it is assumed that the illness is gone. It’s like throwing a blanket over a flame, the smoke is gone, but remove that blanket and the flame is still there.

We are bombarded with advertizing that promotes the use of pharmaceuticals which include prescription as well as non prescription drugs, and nutritional health additives. This is a poor attempt to educate us, by using bias information to influence your right to make an informed decision as a part of your personal proactive health management. But who are we to believe when the ‘experts’ cannot agree, when drugs have been tested, but results are unclear, when you can reduce your risk, but what is your risk?

There are several ways to compare the health changes that occurred during this span of time. I refer to those changes that caused some of the unfavorable and even damaging health problems we face today. Some of which include the unusual rise in heart disease, autism, Alzheimer’s disease, obesity, diabetes and various forms of cancer. But with any comparison there still is no true answer or ‘silver bullet’ that can act as a solution to our present situation. It will take all of us together to make changes that create innovative laws, new regulations, and effectively correct the various mistakes that got us here in the first place, and this takes time! In the meantime we as individuals must take control, and learn how to manage and maintain good basic health.

Now you ask; why doesn’t my doctor know this and manage my health? First of all, most physicians are never trained in nutrition, even though they study biochemistry which is the basis of all biologic functions. Somehow the two just never related during training. Yes! We rely on our doctors for answers and they in turn rely on whatever research they may do to find the answer. Unfortunately, most doctors today are so overwhelmed with increasing patient load and subsequent increasing health problems that they simply do not have the time to do their own research. So these doctors rely on medical journals and published studies or the information provided by the pharmaceutical industry, neither of which is, accurate or unbiased. And unless your doctor remembers all his biochemistry and can track the molecular action of a specific treatment or drug, then he may be getting only a partial or flawed view of the problem and its treatment.

As a patient today we enter our doctor’s office seeking not only treatment but the education that enables us to make our own proactive health decisions. Instead we are given a prescription and a pat on the back as we are walked out the door. It’s sad to say, but most doctors are reluctant to teach; rather they delegate the job to the nurse, whose job is dependent upon that doctor’s approval. As a result we learn only a small portion of limited information, or learn nothing at all. And finally, a doctor will never tell you that he was wrong or made a mistake in his diagnosis or treatment of you, the cost of that liability is far too high. Keep in mind that modern medicine for the most part, as we know it today, does not cure any disease. Rather, the education your doctor possesses is designed to treat and resolve the symptoms caused by illness, and not necessarily the root cause of that illness.

As a nurse of thirty years I have been a part of, as well as watched this history unfold. Through my research I have found many flawed studies, manipulated research, and outright lies from the pharmaceutical industry. I have also found that with a knowledge of basic biochemistry and persistent digging most of the answers can be found. I have also found that Integrative Medicine (the combination of modern medicine and alternative forms of medicine) is the direction this country must move in to acquire and maintain overall good health. Since alternative medicine looks for the root cause to resolve illness, rather than treating just the symptoms, and at the same time their treatments are usually natural in nature, rather than chemical. This brings together the best of both worlds.

In this web site you will find your own form of empowerment, to take control and play an active role in your own health. The articles provided in this website utilize all forms of available medical information, including recent studies from reputable researchers and physicians, recognized independent health care organizations and teaching facilities from around the world. I will cover basic health subjects that may make you stop and think about how you can change your own personal life and health. There may be some biology involved and even a little biochemistry. But I will keep it simple and easy to understand. So the next time your doctor asks you why you want that test or why you started that supplement, you can tell him.

Each month this site will grow, giving information on such subjects as the basics of nutrition, basic biologic function in connection to disease and the disease process, basic health fitness, vitamins and supplements, and the basics of your physical exam. Learn the basics and build from there. Each area contained in this site will give you different information. The titles are self-explanatory.

• My Nurse; The background history of the writer.
• New Articles and Letters; Learn the basics, in health and health science.
• The Library; Added articles of interest.
• My Favorites; Merchandise Catalog.

If you should have any special questions you may contact me through my contact info below. Please keep in mind that any special questions will be answered as quickly as possible, which means 2 to 3 weeks, if special research is needed it may take longer.

Contact Me:
askmyrn@aol.com