Cancer Articles (Dr. S.N White)

What are the functions of antioxidants? Antioxidants protect various compounds in the body from damage by some very active forms of oxygen, produced by various chemical reactions necessary to maintain body functions. Antioxidants protect cells exposed to toxic environmental factors, such as cigarette smoke, that cause cell damage, damage that can, in turn, contribute to the onset or progression of many diseases, including heart disease and cancer. Should I take vitamin E to protect my heart? In nature’s design, this vitamin is actually a group of substances called tocopherols. They are found in abundance in plant foods high in the good fats almonds, wheat germ, whole grains, nuts, seeds, peanut butter, and in cold pressed or minimally processed vegetableoils . Vitamin E and other tocopherols are powerful antioxidants, as well as vitamins. Like other antioxidants, they protect unsaturated fats from being damaged by oxygen. In humans, they help to protect against cell damage an...

It makes sense that the more risk factors present, the worse the risk. But risk factors are thought to be more than just cumulative; when several are present in your life, it is believed that they can actually multiply the risk of heart disease. Research studies are still attempting to quantify the elements of risk. It is very difficult to isolate the value of each risk factor, since people who smoke, for example, often have high blood pressure, too. And people with high blood pressure are often stressed and get little exercise. Fortunately for all of us, protective factors are more than cumulative as well: combine good food choices with exercise and weight control, and their benefits add up to more than the sum of the individual factors. Trying to rank risk factors can be risky in itself. Doing so can lead to underestimating the importance of any of the single factors. But if we had to choose a couple of risks to put at the top of the list, they would have to be high blood cholester...

I was told that I have coronary heart disease; what risks does this pose? Frequently, if untreated, coronary heart disease leads to a “heart attack,” also known as a myocardial infarction (an MI), or coronary thrombosis, which is fatal in about 30 percent of cases. About 1.5 million heart attacks occur each year. Hearts damaged by an MI, especially if accompanied by high blood pressure (which is usually called hypertension), can also result in weakened heart muscles and a condition known as congestive heart failure, or CHE Although CHF causes about 50,000 deaths per year, CHD deaths are much more frequent about 500,000 per year. The coronary heart disease and congestive heart failure varieties of heart disease make up over 95 percent of all the heart disease in the United States. The good news is that both diagnosis and treatment have improved dramatically over the past forty years, and a diagnosis of heart disease is no longer a reason to drop everything and put your affairs in o...