Dear Friends,

We want to keep this our newsletter short this month…just a quick reminder to stay healthy during the holiday season.

Try not to gain those "Holiday Five” by binging on holiday food everyday from now until New Year's. And if you do, stay tuned for our brand new Health Makeover Detoxification Program that will be starting in January.

Click here to schedule an online appointment.

Have a happy and healthy month,

Jaunary is one of the best times to start a detoxification program. It's a new year filled with new resolutions, new ideas, new dreams and new goals. And . . . it's conveniently right after the holiday season, where many of us are ready to take a break from holiday eating.

We are creating a brand new detoxification protocol that we are very excited about and expect even better results with patients.

We have not settled on a cost of the program yet, but we are looking to make it even more affordable than our previous programs.

Stay tuned . . . this is a detox program that you won't want to miss!

What a wonderful time of year.

Good food, holiday cheer, spending time with family and friends, and . . . great music, which it turns out is actually healthy for our heart.

It’s been said that:

“Music speaks what cannot be expressed, heals the heart and makes it whole”.  

According to a recent study, this quote has some truth to it.  Instead of grabbing for a handful of statin drugs to protect our heart, perhaps we should be laughing more often and listening to our favorite CD.

The Study

Earlier this month at the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions, a study was reported showing cardiovascular benefits when listening to happy music.

The study was done here in my hometown of Baltimore, MD at the University School of Medicine. 

There were four phases to this study:

Phase I – Participants selected and listened to music that made them feel good and brought them a sense of joy

Phase II – Participants listened to music that made them feel anxious.

Phase III – Participants listened to “relaxation” CDs.

Phase IV – Participants watched videos designed to make them laugh.

In the first two phases, participants were asked to provide their own music, knowing that musical tastes vary and can invoke different responses in people.  In each of the phases, the volunteers were exposed to music, or a humorous video, for 30 minutes.

The Results

Researchers used “blood vessel dilation” as the marker indicating what type of effect music had on the participants.  Blood vessel dilation refers to how much an artery expands, or becomes wider, allowing more blood to flow through it.  Tighter blood vessels are associated with increased blood pressure and overall stress to the cardiovascular system.

Here’s what the researchers found with regard to blood vessel dilation:

As you can see, the joyful music increased blood vessel dilation by 26%, which is profound given what blood pressure medication tries to achieve. 

Conversely, music that made volunteers feel anxious caused slight blood vessel constriction, or tightening.

Universally, volunteers chose country music as what made them joyful, and heavy metal as music that made them anxious. 

For me, it would be Louis Armstrong.  For you, it might be something else.  It’s whatever makes you happy on the inside that matters.

Conclusion

During this otherwise stressful time of year and the uncertainty of our modern economy, perhaps it’s time we sit back with some friends, eat a little, laugh a lot, and listen to some good music that makes us smile on the inside and out.

Life is short.  Even if we live 110 years, it will probably still feel short at the end.  

And we never know just how short it will be, so try not taking life or yourself too seriously, and view the movie-of-life as a comedy rather than a drama. Try to live life with moderation and balance as if you’d live 100 years, but have the attitude that you could die tomorrow. Eat well, exercise, and play things smart. Don't hold grudges, get upset or worry too much about anything. Keep the important stuff important and let the rest figure itself out. 

Children in kindergarten laugh an average of 300 times a day, while adults only laugh about 17 times a day. Spend this season being jolly and your body will thank you for it.

Laughter improves:

1. Blood Sugar – A study from Japan showed that laughter helps regulate blood sugar levels.  They had people eat two identical meals, two days in a row, followed by either a monotonous lecture one day and being in the audience of a comedy club the second day.  Post-meal blood glucose levels were lower in all the patients following attending the comedy show. 


2. Cardiovascular health (all from the University of Maryland) –
1. Subjects that watched a funny movie experienced a 95% boost in blood flow from a dilation of blood vessels, while those who watched a sad movie had diminished blood flow.  The results of blood flow improvement were similar to those found with aerobic exercise.  
2. Based on a questionnaire involving how people would respond to certain life situations it was found that people with heart disease were 40% less likely to laugh at certain situations than people of the same age without heart disease.  
3. Another study found that laughter lowers blood pressure and they went on to even say that laughter can help prevent heart disease.  Wow.


3. Immune System – A study from Loma Linda University showed that laughter:
1. Increases the activity of T cells and natural killer cells
2. Increases IgA, IgG, gamma interferon, and endorphins
3. Decreases adrenaline and cortisol.


4. Fat-loss – A researcher found that laughing 200 times a day burns the same number of calories as 10 minutes on a rowing machine. 


5. Optimism – Researchers at Texas A&M found that people who watched a 15 minute comedy video had higher scores on a hopefulness questionnaire than those who didn’t watch the video.


6. Intelligence – Research at John Hopkins University gave biostatistics students two identical tests.  One with humorous instructions and the other with normal instructions.  The students with the funny instructions did better on their test. 


7. Relationships – Couples and families that laugh together had better relationships than those that didn’t.  Even when remembering times when they laughed together made them feel closer and created a stronger bond.


8. Longevity – Studies show that people with a good sense of humor live longer than those that don’t find life funny. Cancer patients with a good sense of humor have significantly greater life span than those that don’t.


9. Altruism – Studies show that people who just watched a funny video were more likely to do charitable things, like give someone money.


10. Breast Milk – Babies had a reduction in eczema symptoms from mothers that watched a funny video versus women who didn’t.

Dear Doctors,

The holidays fall right in the middle of my elimination diet. Is it ok to cheat during the holidays?  

Answer:

This is a common question we receive and there is no definitive answer.  If maintaining your elimination diet causes you undue stress or even social pressures, then by all means eat a way that makes you comfortable.

However, understand that certain foods for certain people actually cause damage to your body each time you eat it.  For example, someone with a gluten sensitivity might actually end up attacking and destroying small amounts of your brain or thyroid tissue each time you eat it.  This is why we ask certain patients, “What is more important to you, your pasta and bagel, or your thyroid?”  It is a legitimate question because you literally can destroy tissue by eating foods you are sensitive to.

In our household, we routinely avoid gluten, cow’s dairy and eggs as a rule.  However, when me go to a friend’s house, we prefer not to make the hosts uncomfortable by telling them we can’t eat anything they worked so hard to make.  So we eat it.  But we also don’t have any overt sensitivities that are causing us negative symptoms.  Rather, we avoid those things knowing they cause problems for many people.

Enjoy a happy and healthy month of September.

Dr. Julie Kniess 443-867-7619 julie@drjuliekniess.com	Dr. Bryan P. Walsh 443-458-8307 bryan@drbryanpwalsh.com