Subtitle: “Facebook is not the appropriate place to get advice on serious health matters.”
Obviously, I recommend eating a BALi® diet, exercising, taking supplements, and maintaining optimal hormone levels. I recommend natural remedies when they are appropriate. Conventional therapies are overused; HOWEVER, sometimes conventional is the way to go.
At the time of the writing of this article, several Facebook pages have popped up as self-help options, and many more have been added since. These can be great for minor issues and nutritional recommendations. However, Facebook is not the appropriate place to get advice on serious health matters. The following is a list of some symptoms that require seeing a qualified healthcare professional:
1) Slurred speech accompanied by limb weakness. Slurred speech by itself, without loss of strength of limbs on one side, is usually Bells Palsy, a benign condition. If weak limbs accompany, this signals a stroke. These are usually caused by blood clots in the brain. These clots shut off circulation to the area of the brain controlling speech and limb muscles. The longer the brain is without circulation the less likely full recovery is. If these patients got to us early enough in the ER, we could give medicine to dissolve the clot and they would return to normal.
2) Bleeding not due to an accident. Bleeding or any fluid coming from the ears is a serious sign requiring immediate medical attention. Bleeding from the nose could signal high blood pressure. Vomiting blood is indicative of bleeding in the stomach possibly from an ulcer. This is common in people taking drugs like Advil/ibuprofen. Coughing up blood can be due to a lung infection. In smokers, it is often the first sign of lung cancer. I would see a person come in with that symptom at least once a month. Usually, they had just quit smoking that day. The X-ray would show a typical spot indicating lung cancer. By the time we can see it on X-ray it is too late.
Rectal bleeding can be bright red or dark and tarry in your stool or on toilet paper. Bright red indicates the bleeding is in the lower GI tract. This could be from hemorrhoids (internal or external) or it could be the first sign of colon cancer. If colon cancer is caught early, it is very curable with conventional means. The opposite is true if it spreads beyond the colon. Black tarry stool usually means the bleeding is from higher up. This could also be cancer, although more often it is from an ulcer.
Blood in the urine accompanied by frequent and/or uncomfortable urination is usually a bladder infection. This usually responds to D-mannose or cranberry juice and hydration. If there is pain in the back and/or fever, this usually means the infection has gotten into the kidneys. This requires antibiotics. Blood in the urine can also be a sign of bladder cancer. Again, smokers are at high risk. This is another cancer that responds well to conventional treatment if caught early.
Vaginal bleeding is usually benign and responds to thyroid/progesterone hormone replacement or sometimes simply vitamin A. Uterine fibroids can cause vaginal bleeding. Vaginal bleeding can also reflect pelvic cancers (cervical and uterine). Hysterectomies are usually unnecessary to control vaginal bleeding.
3) Rash accompanied by fever. There are more germs in and on us than we have human cells. Thyroid hormone, the immune system, and natural barriers normally keep these bugs from causing problems. The skin is one of those natural barriers. If the skin is opened by a cut abrasion puncture wound, etc., it leaves an open door for germs that normally live on the skin. Staphylococcus is one of those germs. Staph infections are very common in the hospital because staph normally can only grow in people with weakened immune systems. We have overused antibiotics in agriculture and medicine to the point that we have created staph bacteria that are resistant to most antibiotics.
Methicillin-resistant staph (MRSA) gets a lot of press but the reality is that the list of antibiotics these germs are resistant to is quite long. A red rash, such as one accompanied by swelling and fever, requires immediate medical attention.
4) Chest pain. I could tell a man who was having an actual “heart attack” usually just by looking at him. He would have a big belly, his hand over his chest, and be short of breath and sweating. He may also have pain that went to the jaw, neck, and left arm.
Like a stroke, “heart attacks” are caused by a blood clot — not by a build-up of cholesterol. Blood vessels are quite different from drainpipes. I have often seen these clots clear with simple administration of two chewed aspirin. It’s reflected on the monitors by a drop in blood pressure and pain relief. As with the brain, the longer the heart goes without oxygen the less likely the muscle is to recover. A weak heart muscle does not keep blood flowing efficiently. This can lead to swelling in the legs that can work its way up into the lungs. The result is a condition called “congestive heart failure” which can cause a person to drown in their own fluids. The stents currently used by cardiologists are a bad idea.
“Heart attacks” in women are much more subtle because the clots occur in smaller blood vessels. Stomach/back pain, nausea, and shortness of breath are common in women. Know your risk factors. If you have high blood pressure, are overweight, are a current or former smoker, have a hemoglobin A1C above 5.0, have low thyroid, or have high cholesterol, take these symptoms seriously if they come on suddenly.
5) Sudden changes in vision. The eyes are a direct extension of the brain. If there is swelling or something growing in the brain, vision changes may occur. Undetected diabetes can be a cause of blurred vision. Sudden blindness can mean a detached retina. This is a medical emergency that must be treated by an ophthalmologist.
6) “The worst headache I ever had in my life!” When I would hear this, it usually meant there was a brain tumor or bleeding in the brain. This is a medical emergency.
7) Feeling your “heartbeat” in your stomach. There is a large artery that runs from your heart down to your pelvis which then branches off to deliver blood to your legs and feet. It’s called the aorta. The wall of this blood vessel can get so thin that it bulges out like a hernia or what we would call a “boot” in our bike tires when I was a kid. Like that tire, the result can be a “blowout.” Because of the size of the aorta, if it blows, you won’t live to tell about it. The “boot” is called an aneurysm. As it gets bigger it can be felt in the stomach with each heartbeat. Skinny smokers are the ones I would usually see with them. If they get to a certain size these must be surgically repaired.
8) More frequent urination, the urgency to urinate, reduced pressure of urine stream, increased urination after going to sleep. These are symptoms of prostate enlargement. The usual cause is benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH). This is the result of a yeast infection in the prostate and is easily reversed with diet changes. Big belly = big prostate.
Prostate cancer can also cause these symptoms. This is another cancer that is very curable with conventional therapies if it’s caught early. However, it’s also been proven by Dean Ornish M.D., and myself that these cancers are reversed with diet changes and other natural therapies.
9) Lump in the breast or under the arm. I DO NOT recommend mammograms for screening as they cause cancer. However, if you detect a lump a mammogram or better an MRI is reasonable. Caught early, breast cancer can be cured by surgical removal of the lump. Breast lumps are common in menstruating women. If lumps come and go with your cycle and are tender this is most likely a fibrocystic breast – a precancerous condition relieved by diet changes and iodine replacement. Any fluid or blood from the nipple also mandates investigation.
10) Childhood asthma. This condition is always reversible, but few are aware of it least of all doctors. Asthma is a very common cause of sudden death in children – especially African American and Latino children. Medications can prevent deadly attacks. Even if measures are taken to subdue the yeast overgrowth that causes asthma, such as diet changes and thyroid replacement, it’s a good idea to have a rescue inhaler during the transition.
WebMD.com and the Mayo Clinic websites are reasonable places to get medical advice off the web. If you have enough science education to understand journal articles, PubMed is an excellent resource. For breastfeeding moms, there is an iPhone app by Texas Tech professor Thomas Hale Ph.D. that will answer all your questions about what is safe to take during pregnancy.
Lastly, if you are giving medical advice that you are unqualified to give, you are doing a disservice however good your intentions may be.
This article contains the expert medical opinions of the late Roby Mitchell, M.D. All copyrighted works, as well as the use of Dr. Mitchell’s name, image and likeness are the property of Dr. Fitt, LLC. This article was edited for clarity and is published by permission from Dr. Fitt, LLC
Original Article by ROBY Mitchell MD (aka Dr. Fitt®) originally published 2012.
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