The cost of health cartion passes, costs are likely to swell regardless as the baby boomer generation retires.  Incidences of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and cancer among others are projected to increase.  Though the news seems gloomy, scientific research and medicine provide avenues for hope.  Interestingly, the answer might actually be under the tip of your nose.

It is known and widely supported by many in the medical field that preventative care is probably the single best treatment for chronic disease and cancer.  Why?  By preemptively striking disease, one can delay or even prevent a debilitating condition.  Not only will health care costs be reduced, but a life may be saved from being cut short prematurely.

So what is preventative medicine and how do we know it works?  Preventative care at its core is living a healthy lifestyle, one which is embodied by being at peace in the mind, participating in physical activity and eating right.  There is an abundance of physiological evidence that supports such a belief, one which does not necessarily involve the use of pills.  I know being a pharmacologist that must sound odd, but in actuality most pills treat the symptoms of a disease or condition rather than target the root cause.

In studies utilizing a placebo, a fake pill usually made of sugar as a comparison to the actual drug tested, the data shows that a subset of the patients on the sugar pill will respond to that placebo as an effective treatment (without their knowledge as a fake pill).  This response, known as the placebo effect, is seen over and over again in clinical studies.

Anecdotal evidence indicates patients who are headstrong, positive and peaceful respond to placebo. Though the mechanism is not clearly elucidated, the idea is that the mind has a powerful effect on the physical well-being of the body.  Other studies have shown that this mind over body effect is prevalent in other areas.  Meditation, especially by Tibetan monks, has shown that heart rate can be decreased.  This is important as we look at resting heart rates of different animals with mice at about 500-600 bpm (beats per minute), dogs at 70-160 bpm, and humans at 70-100 bpm on average.  Mice live the shortest about 2-3 years, then dogs live about 10-15 years, and humans currently average around in the late 70s.  Athletes have low resting heart rates and are usually at the top of their shape in health.

The relationship here is a lower heart rate seems to be aligned with a longer life span.  To add even more evidence, countries such as Japan and some parts of Europe show a longer life span. The correlation there indicates a role for peaceful living with healthy, long life span.  There is more evidence, but the overwhelming theme is stress seems to cut into health and life span.

Physiologically, the stress response known as “fight or flight” in the short term is important for adapting to threats harmful to our well-being.  It is characterized by an increase in adrenaline (epinephrine), focused attention (norepinephrine activation in the brain) and shutting down of unnecessary biological processes most significantly, digestion and the immune system.  The biological pathway involved in the stress response is called the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis.  The general pathway goes through the following steps:  The mind becomes stressed and activates the hypothalamus in the brain to release CRH (corticotrophin-releasing hormone) onto the pituitary gland.  This in turn induces the release of ACTH (adrenocorticotropic hormone) that enters the bloodstream where it reaches its target in the adrenal glands.  Activation of the adrenals releases cortisol and epinephrine.

As stated previously, stress is important in our lives to keep us keen of critical events, but Western society has created an atmosphere that fosters prolonged stress which has detrimental effects.  The cortisol released has functions in a variety of biological processes, particularly the immune system and glucose metabolism where it weakens the immune response and counteracts insulin by inducing more sugar production (gluconeogenesis), respectively.  This has implications in fighting off colds and disease as well as diabetes.  The epinephrine released by the adrenals increases heart rate and blood pressure.

Prolonged secretion of this hormone causes remodeling of the heart which could lead to cardiovascular disease.  All these problems can be prevented through the inhibition of sustained stress response, and therefore strategies (e.g. sleep, meditation, spirituality, anger management, etc) to reduce tension should be considered not only for the sake of sanity, but more importantly health reasons.  In fact, sleep may prove vital to health as it has shown that people who have less sleep disruption have decreased incidence of obesity.  A healthy mind does promote a healthy body and evidence from science agrees with such notions.

Excercise

There are other ways to maintain a healthy body and one of particular interest is exercise, specifically moderate exercise.  Outside the benefits of losing weight and strengthening muscles, exercise can promote good health.  Athletes as aforementioned generally stay in good shape and health.  How come?

Exercise trains the heart to pump blood more efficiently and the increased heart rate paradoxically decreases resting heart rate.  This resting heart rate seems to result in longer life spans.  In addition, your white blood cells and immune factors circulate through the bloodstream much better.  This helps defend your body against a whole host of bacteria and viruses.  Exercise also induces the production of endorphins (natural endogenous opioids) that elevate mood.  It is no wonder why that stress can be relieved by physical activity.  Not only is exercise good for the body, but it helps the mind which altogether sustains good health.

Though not recognized (or maybe well advertised), exercise can prove to be a significant adjuvant therapy to those afflicted with type 2 diabetes.  In a normal person, insulin released from the pancreas binds to its receptor, the insulin receptor, to induce for example a muscle cell to intake glucose from the blood.  This signaling mechanism involves intracellular (i.e. in the cell) glucose transporter to come to (or become expressed on) the cell surface to facilitate transport of glucose into the cell.  In a type 2 diabetic, the insulin seems to be unable to activate the insulin receptor (i.e. insulin insensitivity).

The reasons for that are unclear but the answer may reside in overeating and obesity.  Despite that, the muscle has a separate way of reducing blood sugar.  To make use of this “backup” system, exercise is needed.  Researchers have found that exercise induces expression of the glucose transporter in the absence of insulin in muscle to uptake glucose from the blood to be used as energy.  Therefore, it is generally a good idea for any type 2 diabetic to start an exercise regimen to complement their pharmacologic therapy.  In normal people, exercise may just prevent diabetes formation along with healthy eating.

However, it is absolutely critical that exercise is kept to a moderate level (e.g. brisk walk of about 1000 steps per min for 30 min a day) because prolonged heavy exercise produces effects similar to sustained stress.  An increased level of adrenaline over time is harmful to the heart inducing changes such as enlargement that may increase chances of heart failure. Rigorous exercise over long periods also inhibits immune function, which leads to exhaustion, pain and inflammation.

Eating Right

Last but not the very least at all, eating right obviously helps one to live healthy.  Overeating, which is defined by eating past satiation (feeling full) alters the body’s metabolism.  It causes the body to store more fats and carbohydrates (glucose) because the body’s physiology is forced to believe that there is an abundance of food.  With storage of energy, the metabolism is slowed down and one’s weight balloons.

Increased weight causes the heart to pump more blood to supply the change in weight.  This increased load on the heart affects its physiology which may contribute to cardiac arrest.  Instead of overeating, medical professionals suggest that eating less and more often can reverse the slowing down of metabolism.  Though it seems paradoxical, smaller and less full meals forces the body it to use up its energy stores of carbohydrates and fats.  Over time coupled with exercise, weight loss happens and conditions such as diabetes, cardiovascular problems and obesity can be alleviated.

Eating right also means ingesting the foods that nurture the growth and sustenance of the body. Western society has concocted a wide variety of foods that are appealing to the sense of taste, but are actually harmful to the body’s physiology.  A few examples will be examined below.  New research indicates foods rich in MSG (monosodium glutamate) may promote obesity through an unclear mechanism that involves the brain.  Some foods that contain this molecule include chips and instant noodles.  Speaking of chips and expanding it to fried potatoes as a whole, frying with high heat can induce promotion of acrylamide (or acrylics).

This chemical has been shown to mutate DNA which can induce cancer.  Also promoting cancer are foods grilled over charcoal.  The benzene that is emitted and absorbed by meats cooked has been shown to be harmful.  There are many other examples, but the overarching message is that processed food containing chemical compounds (such as additives and preservatives) seem to be the most harmful.  The fresher the food is, the better it is for the body.

In line with that notion, there is a movement by many to be vegetarian or even vegan.  This would not be necessarily wise as meat products do provide some nutrients such as proteins and iron that fruits and vegetables cannot.  Actually, fish products have been shown to provide useful benefits for the heart with omega-3 acids.  Data show vegetarians/vegans have less dense bone mass which could more easily fracture in falls as compared to normal individuals.  Some may claim that vitamins and supplements may provide the missing nutrients, but a manufactured pill may contain additional unnatural ingredients that may affect the body or the nutrients may not be absorbed in that form.  It is better to get these ingredients fresh as possible.

In conclusion, I have presented to you a few ideas and physiological explanations to why healthy living may be your body’s best medicine against disease.  Scientific evidence stacks favorably in this mode of thinking.  I am not advocating that one use healthy living singly in times of physiological crisis because in those conditions, pharmacological treatment may be the best first line therapy.  However, if healthy living is utilized earlier in one’s life, the chances of disease may subside or prevented as one grows older.  It may also be used as an adjuvant to help recovery.  Healthy living involves stress relief, moderate exercise and eating right.  Preventative care is truly prudent advice and the side effect is reduction of health care costs.