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There is evidence that acupuncture is effective in treating a range of conditions including spinal injuries, infertility and the side effects of chemotherapy, and that its effects aren't entirely due to the placebo effect. However, despite extensive research, the mechanism of this ancient healing art remains unknown.

“Quality of Life; Treatment of pain and other problems physical, psychosocial and spiritual; Prevention and relief of suffering;  Patients and their families facing problems associated with life-threatening illness;”

These areas represent the core medical focus of any general practice physician. They also represent the specific focus of the competently trained and properly accredited Naturopathic doctor.  From this definition one can reason that palliative care treats the life of the whole person and their support network.  It neither treats nor cures biophysical disease. What is a life-threatening illness?  Is it an incurable disease? Does it result in immediate death, eventual death, pain that cannot be masked or removed?

Several vital questions pertinent to the nature of how we might practice scientific inquiry stem from this topic.

The first concerns measuring outcomes of palliative care.

• How might quantitative methods demonstrate efficacy?
• Are researchers limited to qualitative assessments to describe treatment impacts?
• Is money saved a valid index for assessing benefits to the whole person, the larger system or an indication of what is reasonable to expect?

The second concerns understanding what is actually happening in palliative care.

• Does the patient experience healthier state?
• Is the patient more responsive to disease focused treatments?
• Can a bio-physiological process be implicated to describe or track the course of care?

A third focus of inquiry concerns how medicine and health care are predominately practiced.

• Is palliative care the legacy of every physician?
• Is palliative care inherent in the nature of any physician-patient interaction?
• Is the consequence of palliative care healing or quackery?
• Does palliative care affect change in a patient’s state of health?

A fourth area of inquiry concerns the domain of palliative care.

• Are other types of health care such as complementary or alternative medicine palliative?
• Is palliative care another term for placebo or psycho-somatic treatment?
• Does an emphasis on “physical, psychosocial or spiritual” aspects of well-being have a place in the prevailing understanding of science-based medicine?
• Does or can the practice of medicine legitimately include currently intangible if not intellectually unscientific processes?
• Do we need an expanded healthcare paradigm to meet the global human need for access to meaningful care and treatment?

There are no simple or easy answers to these concerns, yet the prevailing technology based model for reaching the more than half of the world’s suffering human beings is too expensive, too toxic and unsustainable. Integrating the best of what we have with what most reliably relieves pain and suffering provides a way toward better healthcare and increased healing on a broad scale.

William F. Balistreri, MD , Professor of Medicine, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine indicates, “lifestyle changes (ie, weight loss through diet and exercise) are the only strategies proven to be effective,” (for patients with fatty liver disease), but that recent evidence suggests, “Moderate consumption of coffee may be a useful, benign adjunct — but hold the cream and sugar!”

The recommendations published in the article can be summarized:

Recommendation 1: Systematic monitoring of successful entry into HIV care is recommended for all individuals diagnosed with HIV (II A).

Recommendation 2: Systematic monitoring of retention in HIV care is recommended for all patients (II A).

Recommendation 3: Brief, strengths-based case management for individuals with a new HIV diagnosis is recommended (II B).

Recommendation 4: Intensive outreach for individuals not engaged in medical care within 6 months of a new HIV diagnosis may be considered (III C).

Recommendation 5: Use of peer or paraprofessional patient navigators may be considered (III C).

For more detail and rationale for these recommendations please consult the article.

Ingested calcium and Vitamin D levels were not controlled in this study.  A mechanism for the biophysiological mechanism that involves dietary calcium and fat metabolism was also not described.  The authors point to this omission as a fundamental drawback of these findings.

“While it is clear that nutrition and public health recommendations demand consistency of observation from a variety of study designs, the inclusion of mechanistic pathways in such investigations is essential in cementing the biological plausibility of the outcomes.”

Whenever one encounters phenomenon that point to modulation, rebalancing, placebo or unexplained healing one bumps up against this “shortcoming.” Can outcomes research credibly stand with a reasonably safe and useful role for patients and their care providers?

By taking into account the larger picture of our health development goals, I think so!

Dietary Vitamin D is readily found in cold water fatty fish, green leafy vegetables, and diary products.

Several United Nations agencies are publishing similar messages. A report released March 6, 2012 states, “One in seven people globally are undernourished, and many more suffer from the ‘hidden hunger’ of micronutrient deficiency, while 1.3 billion are overweight or obese.” Inadequate nourishment and obesity are underlying factors contribute to the progression of several chronic diseases. Taking nutritional supplements to poor food supply have not been proven to remedy such states of disease. Besides, they are way beyond anything sustainably accessible or affordable to all but the world’s most affluent.

Consuming junk foods whether they be processed in a factory and restaurant or in a central preparation/distribution point for a fast-food outlet leads to obesity, diabetes and a host of non-infectious diseases for which there is not “fast acting medicine.” In fact this category of health disorders is the fastest growing and largest challenge facing people around the globe.

Any food that is covered with plastic or metal, contains preservatives, additives or industrially manufactured chemicals , has traveled farther than you can drive in a day, or has been harvested before it was ripe has been processed in some way.

The choice of what you put into your body truly matters. This is a multi-beneficial place to  work at being mindful. What and how you eat is what you become wherever you live.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4MnpzG5Sqc