Think Before You Medicate

It is understandable when someone who is in pain reaches for medication to get relief. It is a mistake to believe that relief does not come with a price, and it is worthwhile to take a little extra effort to treat the pain naturally. Natural health care does not have side effects. Practitioners of natural health care seek to find and eliminate the cause of the pain and often get very good results.

Researchers in the Netherlands found that some migraine medications cause the coronary arteries (the blood vessels feeding the heart) to contract. Narrowing of the coronary arteries caused by heart disease may result in chest pain or even heart attacks in an individual taking certain migraine medications.

The research, published in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association (July 7, 1998) studied arteries from organ donors, measuring each artery's ability to contract and relax. They then tested each drug's effect on the arteries. The drugs tested included older drugs such as ergotamine, dihydroergotamine, methysergide and its metabolite methylergometrine as well as newer drugs such as sumatriptan, naratriptan, zolmitriptan and rizatriptan. The drugs cause constriction of arteries in the head, to stop the headache. Unfortunately, the drugs also cause the coronary arteries to constrict.

People who used either acetaminophen or aspirin regularly were 2.5 times more likely to be diagnosed with chronic renal failure, compared with individuals who did not use these painkillers. The risk rose in with the amount of either drug taken over a lifetime, the investigators found. This is supported by an article in the New England Journal of Medicine (December 20, 2001;345:1801-1808). An article published in the New York Times (January 29, 2002) covers concern of NBA players over the regular use of these medications. This is in the wake of Alanzo Mourning of the Miami Heat developing a kidney disorder and Sean Elliot needing a kidney transplant. To quote the article, “Many doctors say that if someone uses anti-inflammatory medicines in excessive amounts over long periods of time - as some N.B.A. players apparently have, taking three or four times the recommended dose - it can affect kidney function.”

According to a recent survey of nearly 700 children and adolescents, more than one in five were overusing over-the-counter pain medications to relieve headaches. Often parents weren’t aware their kids were using pain relievers. Of the children participating in the survey, 41% had migraines, 28% experienced tension headaches.

Overuse of pain medications was defined by the researchers as using these drugs more than three times a week for longer than six weeks. That standard was met by 22% of the children surveyed. The results of the survey mirrored similar studies done on adults.

Other research links pain medications to high blood pressure, kidney failure, heart failure, ulceration of the GI tract, and some drugs even interfere with bone repair. These drugs also break down cartilage. One study found that in 2,000 arthritic patients, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug use (NSAID) increased ulcer risk 10-fold. Almost 25% of NSAID users have ulcers, most of which are without symptoms.

There are so many effective natural approaches that drugs should be used as a last resort. There is a CD available from Whole Health America that will educate your patients about natural ways to relieve pain.

For more information, visit: www.wholehealthamerica.com

Dr. Paul G. Varnas graduated from the National College of Chiropractic (currently called the National University of Health Sciences) and has been in private practice in the Chicago area for over 20 years. Dr. Varnas has been a faculty member at the National University of Health Sciences, teaching clinical nutrition. He is a Diplomate of the American Clinical Board of Nutrition and is the author of several books, a diagnostic computer program and many journal articles. Last year Dr. Varnas founded Whole Health America, a service dedicated to educating both lay people and practitioners about natural health.

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