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Wednesday, 3 July 2013

What That Food Label Really Means

July 2, 2013

Label WarningLet’s face it…food labels are confusing. You have to read them to know what you’re eating.
But do you know how to interpret them? That’s a different story.

Take “healthy” foods proudly claiming they’re “all natural.” What does that “all natural” designation really mean? For starters, organic and natural are not the same thing.

The Food and Drug Administration hasn’t even defined what “natural” means. As long as food doesn’t contain added colors, artificial flavors, or synthetic substances, food makers can slap an “all natural” label on it.1

For example, chicken.  The label may say that it’s “natural.” But it could have been injected with the “natural” ingredients sodium and water to increase its weight. Or it can even contain GMOs, antibiotics, and growth hormones. But hey, the color or flavor wasn’t altered.  So it’s still “natural.”

But the labels on these foods are not only misleading—they’re dangerous…

Grocery shopping tip: Shop the perimeter. When you enter a grocery store avoid going down the aisles. Most packaged and processed foods are in the middle. If you stay along the perimeter you will have access to fresh foods such as the produce section, the meat and seafood department, and the dairy case.

The household tea brand Celestial Seasons say they founded their company on the belief that all-natural herbal teas could help people live healthier lives.2 But earlier this year they came under fire.

It turned out that 91 percent of their teas tested contained an ingredient that’s far from “natural.”3
Eurofins Scientific—an independent testing company—analyzed 11 of Celestial Seasons’ most popular teas. Including the well-known Sleepytime. Ten out of the 11 tested had excess pesticides.

One of the more outrageous claims…Food manufacturers will go as far as to say a product with high fructose corn syrup is natural. How can they get away with it? Simple… They say it comes from corn. You should never eat foods with high fructose corn syrup.

The names they use are confusing too. When a product says zero trans-fat that doesn’t mean it actually contains zero. Manufacturers can label something as having no trans-fat as long as it contains less than 0.5 grams per serving.4 In the ingredients they are listed as hydrogenated oils and shortening.  And that’s not all…

Just like trans-fat, “cholesterol free” doesn’t actually mean no cholesterol. It just needs to have less than 2 mg per serving.5

Think light actually means light? There’s no set definition for that label either. Food manufacturers can call a product light if it has at least 50 percent less fat than the amount in comparable products.6 (Keep in mind, we are in no way recommending a low cholesterol or low fat diet. We’re just pointing out how badly these foods are represented.)

Another label that can be dangerous—especially for diabetics—is “no sugar added.” These products can still contain sugars. Sugar-free can mean it contains dangerous artificial sweeteners. And sugar goes by several names. Some of the hidden ones: sucrose, fructose, glucose, dextrose, galactose, lactose, maltose, corn syrup, and high-fructose corn syrup.7 Those are the ones you definitely want to stay away from.

When it comes to your diet, you need to be proactive. Learn to decipher what’s healthy and what products to stay far, far away from. Labels are not on food items to help you. They are on products to sell. Bottom line: avoid as many foods with labels as you can. Always eat whole foods where you know exactly what you are getting.

References:
1 http://health.com/health/gallery/0,,20599288_2,00.html
2 http://celestialseasonings.com/about
3 http://mnn.com/food/healthy-eating/blogs/are-teavana-and-celestial-seasonings-teas-safe-to-consume
4 http://mayoclinic.com/health/trans-fat/CL00032
5 http://nhlbi.nih.gov/health/public/heart/chol/fabc/table2.htm
6 http://health.com/health/gallery/0,,20599288_10,00.html
7 http://institutefornaturalhealing.com/2013/05/five-healthy-and-natural-sugar-alternatives/

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This Substance Can Make Antibiotics Up to 1000 Times More Effective

This exciting research shows how low doses of this largely ignored substance prevented mice from dying from lethal infections, and even made one resistant bacterium sensitive to antibiotics again. Could this be a solution to the frightening increase in antibiotic-resistant disease, even MRSA?

Research on Antibiotics Reveals Silver Acts as a Booster, While Mixing Certain Antibiotics with Statins Can Be Devastating

July 03, 2013                    

Antibiotics

Story at-a-glance

  • Antibiotic-resistant disease is a major threat to public health, and the primary cause for this man-made epidemic is the widespread misuse of antibiotics—both in medicine and agriculture
  • Researchers have discovered that gut viruses known as bacteriophages, a.k.a. “phages” are instrumental in conferring antibacterial resistance to bacteria
  • Under normal conditions, phages help you stay healthy by destroying harmful bacteria and encouraging beneficial bacteria to flourish in and on your body
  • According to a new study, low doses of silver can make antibiotics up to 1,000 times more effective, and may even allow an antibiotic to successfully combat otherwise antibiotic-resistant bacteria
  • Statin drug users should avoid the antibiotics clarithromycin and erythromycin, as these antibiotics inhibit the metabolism of statins, increasing your risk for muscle or kidney damage, and even death

By Dr. Mercola

The frivolous use of antibiotics, not just in medicine but also in food production, is the root cause of skyrocketing antibiotic resistance.  
Data from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control1 (ECDC) shows a significant rise of resistance to multiple antibiotics in Klebsiella pneumoniae and E. coli in just the last four years alone, affecting more than one-third of the EU, and the primary cause for this man-made epidemic is the widespread misuse of antibiotics.  
Between the years of 1993 and 2005, the number of Americans hospitalized due to the antibiotic-resistant “superbug” MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) skyrocketed from about 2,000 to 370,000.  
Currently, MRSA and other antibiotic-resistant infections kill about 60,000 Americans annually, and account for billions of dollars in health care costs.2 Antibiotic-resistant disease is not the only danger associated with the misuse of these drugs. Excessive exposure to antibiotics also takes a heavy toll on your gastrointestinal health, which can predispose you to virtually any disease.  
Abnormal gut flora may actually be a major contributing factor to the rise in a wide variety of childhood diseases and ailments, from bowel disorders and allergies to autism.
Agricultural uses of antibiotics account for about 80 percent of all antibiotic use in the US,3 so it's a MAJOR source of human antibiotic consumption. Animals are often fed antibiotics at low doses for disease prevention and growth promotion, and those antibiotics are transferred to you via meat, and even via the manure used as crop fertilizer.  
Protecting your gut health and reducing the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria are significant reasons for making sure you're only eating grass-fed, organically-raised meats and animal products.

Gut Viruses Confer Antibiotic-Resistance to Bacteria, New Research Shows 

When used properly, in the correct contexts and with responsibility, antibiotics can and do save lives that are threatened by bacterial infections. But there is one important variable that wasn't considered when the widespread use of these "miracle medicines" began, and that is that bacteria are highly adaptable.  
They are clearly capable of outsmarting antibiotics, and they are doing so with a vengeance. According to the CDC's National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System:4
"Antibiotics kill or inhibit the growth of susceptible bacteria. Sometimes one of the bacteria survives because it has the ability to neutralize or evade the effect of the antibiotic; that one bacteria can then multiply and replace all the bacteria that were killed off.
Exposure to antibiotics therefore provides selective pressure, which makes the surviving bacteria more likely to be resistant. In addition, bacteria that were at one time susceptible to an antibiotic can acquire resistance through mutation of their genetic material or by acquiring pieces of DNA that code for the resistance properties from other bacteria.
The DNA that codes for resistance can be grouped in a single easily transferable package. This means that bacteria can become resistant to many antimicrobial agents because of the transfer of one piece of DNA."
Interestingly, these bacteria have previously unknown allies that supply them with the antibiotic-resistant genes necessary for their survival. Researchers at the Wyss Institute have discovered that gut viruses known as bacteriophages, a.k.a. “phages” are actually instrumental in conferring antibacterial resistance to bacteria.5, 6 Most importantly:
“[Phage] deliver genes that help the bacteria to survive not just the antibiotic they've been exposed to, but other types of antibiotics as well...

That suggests that phages in the gut may be partly responsible for the emergence of dangerous superbugs that withstand multiple antibiotics, and that drug targeting of phages could offer a potential new path to mitigate development of antibiotic resistance,” the Institute’s press release7 states. 

 

Phages Are Actually an Important Part of Your Body’s Defense System 

More than 90 percent of the DNA in your body is not yours, but actually belongs to a wide variety of microbes, and these findings just go to show how intricately tied your health is to the microorganisms that live inside you. And, while the word “virus” brings to mind all things “bad” for you, this is not necessarily true.

Another recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences8 found that many of these viruses (phages) actually serve as immune helpers—not enemies—and form an important part of your body’s defense system.9
Wherever bacteria reside, you will also find phages, because phages depend on bacteria for their survival. Phages specialize in breaking open and killing certain kinds of bacteria, hijacking them in order to replicate.

Most phages have hollow heads, which store their DNA and RNA, and tunnel tails designed for binding to the surface of their bacterial targets. According to phages.org, once a phage has attached itself to a bacterium:
“The viral DNA is then injected through the tail into the host cell, where it directs the production of progeny phages, often over a hundred in half an hour. These 'young' phages burst from the host cell (killing it) and infect more bacteria.”
The researchers found evidence that these phages partner with animals and humans to stave off bacterial infections and control the composition of friendly microbes in your body. The researchers speculate that some phages might protect bacteria that benefit their hosts (i.e. you), while destroying those that cause harm.  
Which brings us back to the featured research, which suggests that these phages may also play a significant role in the rapid rise of antibiotic resistance... In essence, it would appear our zealous overuse of antibiotic drugs is causing these helpful viruses to boost the survivability of bacteria during the onslaught of a deadly foe—the antibiotic—only in this case, the end result is disastrous rather than helpful for the host... On the upside, these findings may confer new hope for effective treatments. According to Don Ingber, M.D., Ph.D., Founding Director of the Wyss Institute:10
"Antibiotic resistance is as pressing a global health problem as they come, and to fight it, it's critical to understand it. [These] novel findings offer a previously unknown way to approach this problem -- by targeting the phage that live in our intestine, rather than the pathogens themselves."  

 

Colloidal Silver Dramatically Boosts Effectiveness of Antibiotics 

The use of silver in the battle against pathogenic bacteria goes way back into antiquity. Hippocrates was one of the first to describe its antimicrobial properties in 400 B.C. Over the past few years, several studies have demonstrated the fact that silver is indeed one of the most effective agents in the battle against antibiotic-resistant super pathogens. Yet conventional medicine has largely dismissed such claims, relegating colloidal silver to the “woo-woo” section of medical myth.  
They may be inclined to change their tune however, in light of the latest research11, 12 which shows that low doses of silver can make antibiotics up to 1,000 times more effective, and may even allow an antibiotic to successfully combat otherwise antibiotic-resistant bacteria. As reported by Medical News Today:13
“...[N]ot only did silver boost the ability of a broad range of commonly used antibiotics so as to stop mice dying of otherwise lethal infections, but it made at least one resistant bacterium succumb to antibiotics again. The addition of silver also broadened the effect of vancomycin, an antibiotic that is usually only effective at killing Gram-positive bacteria like Staph and Strep; aided by silver it killed Gram-negative bacteria such as those that cause food poisoning and dangerous hospital-acquired infections.”
For example, by adding a small amount of silver to the antibiotic, a powerful synergism occurred, and a urinary tract infection caused by tetracycline-resistant E. coli was successfully eradicated. Silver also helped save the lives of 90 percent of mice suffering with a life-threatening abdominal inflammation by adding it to the antibiotic vanomycin. In the group receiving vanomycin only, a mere 10 percent survived. The researchers discovered two mechanisms that help explain how silver can boost the effectiveness of an antibiotic:
  • Silver interferes with the bacteria’s metabolism, increasing production of reactive oxygen species14 (ROS); products of normal oxygen consuming metabolic processes in your body that, in excess, can damage cell membranes and DNA. Many antibiotics are believed to kill bacteria by producing ROS compounds, and here, the researchers found that adding a small amount of silver boosted the antibiotic’s ability to kill anywhere from 10 and 1,000 times more bacteria
  • Silver makes the bacteria’s cell membrane more permeable. This may explain the beneficial effect of silver on gram-negative bacteria, the cells of which are often impenetrable to antibiotics due to the molecular size of the drugs

 

What About Potential Toxicity of Colloidal Silver? 

As for toxicity, the researchers found that the doses of silver required were far smaller than the dose needed to harm either mice or cultured human cells, suggesting that oral and injectable silver should be quite safe. That said, quality is extremely important, as misrepresentation of colloidal silver by less scrupulous manufacturers has in the past led to some of its more negative connotations. According to a Commercial Product Report15 by silver-colloids.com, a site that provides detailed laboratory analyses of colloidal silver products, there are three distinctly different types of silver products on the market that are all labeled and sold as “colloidal” silver:
  • True colloidal silver
  • Ionic silver
  • Silver protein: Due to the high concentration of large silver particles, silver protein products are known to cause argyria, which turns your skin blue-gray color.
When purchasing colloidal silver, it’s very important to avoid silver protein formulas. True colloidal silver seems to be the most recommended, but ionic silver could probably also be used. In the featured study, they used ionic silver (Ag) in a silver nitrate salt (AgNO3), which, again, was found to be quite non-toxic in animals and human cell cultures. Substantial antimicrobial activity was found at 30 microns (μM) against E. coli.  
If you take ionic silver products according to the manufacturer’s recommended dosage, ionic silver will not cause argyria. That said, since there are potential health risks involved if you select the wrong formula, I recommend you use colloidal silver only under the guidance and supervision of a qualified alternative health practitioner who can help you select a high-quality product. 

 

Statin Users Beware... Your Cholesterol Medication May Not Mix Well with Antibiotics! 

In related news, Canadian researchers16 warn that patients —especially the elderly—taking cholesterol-lowering drugs such as Lipitor, should avoid the antibiotics clarithromycin and erythromycin, as these antibiotics inhibit the metabolism of statins. Increased drug concentrations in your body may cause muscle or kidney damage, and even death. As reported by WebMD:17
"'These drugs do interact and cause difficulties for patients,' said lead researcher Dr. Amit Garg, a professor in the department of epidemiology and biostatistics at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario. These adverse reactions are rare, Garg added. 'Most people will be fine,' he said. 'But at a population level, hundreds of preventable hospitalizations are occurring.' For someone taking a statin, the study suggests that substituting a different antibiotic -- azithromycin -- is safer because it doesn't interfere with the metabolism of statins. Another strategy is to stop the statin until the antibiotic course is finished, Garg said."

 

What You Can Do to Help Stop the Spread of Antibiotic-Resistant Disease 

You can help yourself and your community by using antibiotics only when absolutely necessary and by purchasing organic, antibiotic-free meats and other foods. Even though the problem of antibiotic resistance needs to be stemmed through public policy on a nationwide level, the more people who get involved on a personal level to stop unnecessary antibiotic use the better. 
Remember, not every bacterial infection needs to be treated with a drug. First, as an all-around preventive measure, you’ll want to make sure your vitamin D level is optimized year-round, especially during pregnancy, along with vitamin K2. But there are also a number of natural compounds that can help boost your immune system function to help rid you of an infection, including:
  • Oregano (oil of oregano)
  • Garlic
  • Echinacea
  • Manuka honey (for topical application)
Last but not least, the use of silver compounds appears to bring new hope against antibiotic-resistant pathogens. Still, creating more potent antibiotics, regardless of how that’s achieved, will not help us in the long run unless we also address the root causes of antibiotic resistance, which is rampant overuse—in medicine, but perhaps even more importantly, in agriculture.  
If you live in the United States and want to get involved on a national level, Food Democracy Now! has created a petition against the overuse of antibiotics in livestock production.18 If you care about this issue, I suggest you use this petition to make your voice heard.
[-] Sources and References


http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/07/03/antibiotics-colloidal-silver.aspx
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Tuesday, 2 July 2013

Ketogenic Diet etc for Non-Toxic Cancer Treatment


Cancer's Natural Enemy, Actually Starves It to Death   Dagostino Cancer Research
You don't need drugs, you just need food. Select what you eat wisely and cancer cells in your body won't have the glucose they need to survive. What's more, you'll optimize your weight and can help prevent virtually all chronic degenerative diseases...



Ketogenic Diet in Combination with Calorie Restriction and Hyperbaric Treatment Offer New Hope in Quest for Non-Toxic Cancer Treatment

June 30, 2013
 

Story at-a-glance

  • A mounting body of research suggests most cancers are highly responsive to therapeutic ketosis—a natural physiologic state induced during prolonged states of decreased glucose—in combination with calorie restriction
  • One way to achieve this is to use a ketogenic diet that retains non-starchy vegetable carbohydrates, replacing them with high amounts of healthy fats and adequate amounts of high-quality protein
  • Healthy cells have the metabolic flexibility to adapt from using glucose to using ketone bodies. Cancer cells lack this metabolic flexibility, so when you eliminate carbs, which are metabolized to glucose, you effectively starve cancer of its primary fuel source.
  • Intermittent fasting, where you gradually restrict the window of time during which you eat food down to about six to eight hours per day aids in the transition from burning carbs to burning fat
  • The ketogenic diet by itself can extend survival in animal models of metastatic cancer, but recent research shows that when it’s combined with hyperbaric oxygen therapy three times per week, there is a significant additive effect

            
Download Interview Transcript

 

By Dr. Mercola

Cancer is now so common it affects about one of two of us and most will face it at some point in their lives, either personally or through a friend or relative. Compelling research indicates that the answer to our burgeoning cancer epidemic could be far closer than previously imagined, in the form of a ketogenic diet. 
Personally, I believe this is an absolutely crucial facet of cancer prevention and treatment, for whatever type of cancer you’re trying to address, and hopefully, some day it will be adopted as a first line of treatment by mainstream medicine.  
A ketogenic diet calls for eliminating all but non-starchy vegetable carbohydrates, and replacing them with high amounts of healthy fats and low to moderate amounts of high-quality protein.  
The premise is that since cancer cells need glucose to thrive, and carbohydrates turn into glucose in your body, then lowering the glucose level in your blood through carb and protein restriction literally starves the cancer cells to death. Additionally, low protein intake tends to minimize the mTOR pathway that accelerates cell proliferation and lowers the amount of one particular amino acid, glutamine, which is also known to drive certain cancers.  
This type of diet is what I recommend for everyone, whether you have cancer or not, because it will help you convert from carb burning mode to fat burning, which will help you optimize your weight and prevent virtually all chronic degenerative disease.

 

The Ketogenic Diet—An Excellent Approach to Cancer Prevention and Treatment

Dr. Dominic D’Agostino, PhD is an assistant professor at the University of South Florida College of Medicine.  
He teaches courses in molecular pharmacology and physiology, and maintains involvement in several studies researching metabolic treatments for neurological disorders such as seizures, Alzheimer’s, ALS, and cancer—all of which are metabolically linked.  
His entry in to this field began when, in 2007, the Office of Naval Research funded his study into seizures related to oxygen toxicity experienced by Navy SEAL divers using closed-circuit breathing apparatus. At this juncture, he came across the ketogenic diet, which has already been confirmed as an effective treatment for epilepsy and a variety of seizure disorders.
“I came across the work of Thomas Seyfried,” he says. “I found a large amount of evidence that suggested that cancer was metabolically unique. Genetically, it was very heterogeneous. There are a host of different genetic anomalies in the cancer cells, but one characteristic is that it had this ubiquitous metabolic phenotype, which was aerobic glycolysis.
Even in the presence of oxygen, it was shown that cancer cells continue to pump out lactate, suggesting that they’re fuelling their metabolism from excess glucose consumption.
From my perspective, the only reason cancer cells would be pumping out lactate and deriving energy from glucose at such a high rate would be because they are metabolically compromised with mitochondrial deficiency.”
A mounting body of evidence suggests cancer is responsive to therapeutic ketosis—a natural physiologic state induced during prolonged states of decreased glucose. Nutritional ketosis involves restricting carbohydrates in order to decrease the availability of glucose. Restricting carbs also increases production of ketone bodies from your liver. Nearly all of your normal cells have the flexibility to readily adapt to using ketone bodies for fuel in lieu of glucose, but cancer cells do not have this metabolic flexibility. Hence, they effectively starve to death while all your normal cells actually operate more efficiently than before.  

 

Another Key Component for Cancer Prevention and Treatment: Calorie Restriction

When you restrict carbohydrates, you prevent spikes in blood sugar, insulin and IGF-1 from occurring. These spikes are actually very pro-inflammatory, and can activate oncogenes (genes that contribute to the conversion of a normal cell into a cancerous cell), and enhance both cancer cell proliferation and the metastatic process.  
But here’s a key point: While carb restriction will reduce these spikes, it will not have a major impact on baseline levels of blood glucose, unless you also restrict your calorie and protein intake. So for cancer prevention and treatment, carb restriction must be combined with calorie restriction and moderate protein restriction in order to effectively “starve” cancer cells of their preferred fuel (glucose and glutamine).
“The ketogenic diet is, I think, a very good strategy to make calorie restriction tolerable,” Dr. D’Agostino says. “Because when your brain in particular is craving glucose, and, say, for example, you go on a calorie-restricted diet, but it’s a high-carbohydrate diet, you’re still getting fluctuations in blood glucose. Your brain goes through these intermittent periods of glucose deprivation and you get very hungry. It’s not a very comfortable feeling.
Nutritional ketosis, which occurs with carbohydrate restriction and is further enhanced with calorie restriction, forces the physiological shift from a glucose-based metabolism to a fatty acid and ketone metabolism. When your body is, shall we say, keto-adapted, your brain energy metabolism is more stable and your mood is more stable. It may take a few weeks to adapt physiologically to this. But nutritional ketosis can be maintained and sustained with carbohydrate restriction and is further enhanced with calorie restriction.
The total calories really need to be restricted, and also protein. Protein is gluconeogenic. There are gluconeogenic amino acids in protein. If protein is at, say, for example, two or three grams per kilogram per day that is probably going to feed in through the gluconeogenic pathway and contribute to glutaminolysis. It will be hard to deplete your glycogen stores, which is necessary to drive the ketogenesis in your liver.” 

 

How Much Protein Is Advisable?

So to summarize, in order to maintain and sustain nutritional ketosis, you need to decrease both carbohydrates and protein. But how much protein is enough, or too much?  
As Dr. D’Agostino mentions above, eating two to three grams of protein per kilogram of bodyweight—which translates to 100-300 grams of protein per day for some people—is an enormous overload. Many bodybuilders will consume this much though, and many non-athletes as well. The bodybuilding industry has fostered the idea that you need tons of protein to build muscle, but as Dr. D’Agostino explains, if you restrict protein, and replace both the lost protein and carbs with healthful fats, the elevation in your blood ketones will have a protein-sparing, or anti-catabolic, effect.
“It will help you preserve lean body mass and a physical performance during a calorie deficit. This is why the ketogenic diet is an effective strategy for losing weight and retaining muscle, especially if it’s complemented with resistance exercise or some kind of physical activity,” he says.
Your end goal needs to be taken into consideration here though. A bodybuilder’s purpose for embarking on a ketogenic diet will be different from someone with cancer or a seizure disorder. In the latter case, you’d need to be far more strict with reducing protein in order to achieve and maintain ketosis.  
Personally, I’m intrigued with the concept promoted by one of my mentors, Dr. Ron Rosedale, who advocates restricting protein to one gram per kilogram of lean body mass. Typically, for someone like myself, that amounts to about 50-70 grams of protein per day. The reason he promotes this so much is because of the stimulatory effect protein (branch-chained amino acids specifically) has on mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR)—a pathway that seems to be largely responsible for the pathology seen in cancer growth.  
When you reduce protein to just what your body needs, mTOR remains inhibited, which helps lessen your chances of cancer growth.
“I agree that mTOR is an important signal once you have cancer,” Dr. D’Agostino says. “The amino acid leucine is a powerful activator of the mTOR pathway, and stimulates skeletal muscle protein synthesis. Now, if a normal healthy person consumes boluses of leucine [a branch-chained amino acid], say five grams a couple of times a day, which a lot of bodybuilders and athletes do, can this enhance cancer growth?
This is an interesting question, and one that I’ve been researching. We’re about to set up a study where we give large doses of branch-chained amino acids in a metastatic model of cancer. My opinion is that branch-chained amino acids, which activate mTOR, in a normal healthy person are not counterproductive. They do not increase one’s susceptibility to cancer and may even prevent muscle wasting (e.g. cachexia) associated with cancer.”

 

The 'Meat' of the Ketogenic Diet—FATS

Most people who follow a ketogenic diet inadvertently restrict their calories without actually reaping the metabolic benefits of a calorie deficit, which include reductions in blood glucose, insulin, and triglycerides. The reason for this is that they don’t replace the carbs (and protein) they’ve eliminated with high enough amounts of healthy fats.
“Paradoxically, when you’re eating more fat, your blood fats will go down, due to a calorie deficit, and HDL [so-called ‘good’ cholesterol] goes up. Almost everyone that I see on these high-fat ketogenic diets has improved HDL levels,” Dr. D’Agostino says.
Now, when we say increase the fat, we’re not talking about the most common fat that people eat, which are primarily highly processed vegetable oils that are full of omega-6 fats, or trans fats found in French fries and doughnuts. We’re talking about high-quality fats like avocados, butter, coconut oil, macadamia nuts, and olives. These types of fats, which Dr. Rosedale believes are metabolically neutral because they don’t tend to trigger hormonal signaling events like leptin, insulin, and the mTOR pathway.
“I think a lot of the fats can be used in place of protein. And fats are very protein sparing, decreasing your need for protein,” Dr. D’Agostino says.
Bear in mind that while a traditional ketogenic diet calls for quite a bit of dairy products, dairy can actually be problematic and may prevent many of the health benefits that you can get from the ketogenic diet described by D’Agostino and Seyfried. Lactose is a sugar made from galactose and glucose that is found in milk, making up anywhere from two to eight percent of milk by weight. These extra sugars can be problematic when seeking to lose weight or treat cancer, even if from raw organic sources. Dairy fat is acceptable (e.g. sour cream, butter, etc.), but foods high in dairy protein or lactose should be minimized or avoided.

 

Why You’d Want to Become a Fat-Burner

Your body can burn two types of fuel: fat and carbs. In my estimation, I suspect about 99 percent of Americans are adapted to burning carbs as their primary fuel. It’s important to realize that when your body is adapted to burning carbs, you’re quite inflexible, metabolically speaking. Without fail, your body will be screaming for food about every two to three hours. These kinds of hunger pangs vanish once you become fat adapted, however. Then you can go all day and not be hungry, because you have far more fat in your body to burn than glucose. 
So how do you achieve this metabolic switch-over? 
In my experience, intermittent fasting, where you gradually restrict the window of time during which you eat food down to about six to eight hours, is one of the most effective ways to make this transition.
“I think from a practical standpoint, the important question is what’s a person going to follow? From my perspective, the biggest hurdle here is compliance; compliance to a dietary strategy that makes calorie restriction feasible and possible. And you know, carbohydrate restriction, high-fat diet, and intermittent fasting is one way to achieve that,” Dr. D’Agostino says.
“There are a lot of advantages to this pattern of intermittent fasting. I think that it is a good strategy to promote metabolic health and to maintain nutritional ketosis, if you can adapt to it. In some lifestyles, people cannot readily adapt to it. But I’ve found that most people can if they give it a try for at least several weeks. Most people are resistant. Even with people that are resistant- once they try it, they’re amazed at how much better they feel.”
It’s not an ideal course for everyone, however. As a general rule, intermittent fasting is contraindicated if you’re:
  • An elite athlete
  • Pregnant
  • Suffer with adrenal stress
  • Already at a low BMI (< 19)

 

Hyperbaric Treatment Works Synergistically with Ketogenic Diet Against Cancer   

Dr. D’Agostino recently published a paper in the journal PLoS One, titled “The Ketogenic Diet and Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy Prolong Survival in Mice with Systemic Metastatic Cancer1.” Most people who die of cancer die from the metastatic process, rather than from the tumor itself. There’s really no treatment or cure for metastatic cancer. Dr. D’Agostino’s team has demonstrated that the ketogenic diet by itself can extend survival in animal models of metastatic cancer, but when it’s combined with hyperbaric oxygen therapy three times per week, there is an additive effect2.
“You get a significant reduction in tumor growth, decrease in tumor size, and significant extension of life when the therapeutic ketosis achieved through the ketogenic diet is combined with hyperbaric oxygen,” he says.
“Tumors thrive in a low-oxygen environment. As a tumor grows, it exceeds its ability to supply oxygen to the center of the tumor. That low level of oxygen, called hypoxia, further activates the oncogenes; cancer promoting genes. It activates things like HIF-1-alpha and VEGF. IGF-1 signaling goes up. Hyperbaric oxygen can reverse tumor hypoxia intermittently. In doing that, it can actually turn off the oncogenes. There are published reports on this.
... [T]he tumor thrives in a low-oxygen environment, and it’s adapted to that low-oxygen environment. When you saturate a tumor with oxygen, because the mitochondria are damaged, it overproduces oxygen free radicals in the form of superoxide anion. This oxygen-induced increase in free radicals can actually cause the tumor to kill itself   

 

How to Determine if You’re in Ketosis 

To help you determine if you’re in ketosis, you can purchase a blood ketone and glucose meter, both of which are available in most drug stores. Amazon.com also sells them. Dr. D’Agostino recommends the Precision Xtra by Abbott Labs. Their ketone test strips are called Precision Xtra. Glucose meter strips typically sell for about 50 cents per strip, while ketone strips can range from $3-6 each.
 “Another option is the CardioChek meter. This is an interesting meter, because it can measure glucose, ketones, HDL, LDL, triglycerides, and a number of things.”
By testing your glucose and ketones, you can monitor your response to a nutritional intervention, and then adjust your calories and the macronutrient ratios to optimize your body to be in what Dr. D’Agostino calls the “metabolic zone.” The metabolic zone is defined as sustained hypoglycemia (55-75 mg/dl) with elevated blood ketones (>2 mM). 
“If you can produce sustained hypoglycemia with carbohydrate and calorie restriction and simultaneously elevate blood ketones, it actually makes the hypoglycemia tolerable,” he explains. “The ketones replace the glucose as the primary energy fuel for your brain. It basically keeps your brain metabolism optimized and prevents fluctuations in your mood and your energy levels, if you can sustain therapeutic ketosis with a properly balanced ketogenic diet.”
As you implement the ketogenic diet, you can just check your glucose and ketones once a week if you find the cost of the strips to be prohibitively expensive for more frequent testing. Typically, if your blood glucose stays at 75 or below with carbohydrate restriction, there’s a good chance that you’ll be in nutritional ketosis, which is where you want to be. 
If you’re in ketosis by evidence of ketones in your urine, you’re in a situation where you likely have depleted glycogen stores in your liver. This means you’re maintaining a low blood glucose, which is good. The driver for hepatic ketogenesis is low blood glucose and low glycogen levels in the liver, as this means your body is depleted of glycogen.  
Your body will not really make adequate ketones (>2 mM), and they won’t spill over in your urine, unless you’ve achieved that level of glycogen depletion. So remember, when your levels of blood ketones are 1-3 millimolar (mM) that’s a good biomarker of nutritional ketosis.

More Information  

While Dr. D’Agostino does not treat patients, he has plenty of resources to offer for anyone interested in learning more. If you have cancer, you could bring these resources to your oncologist for discussion. For everyone else, a ketogenic diet is an excellent way to optimize your health and prevent chronic diseases of all kinds. Helpful books and websites where you can learn more include:
  • KetogenicDietResource.com3. This site is maintained by a friend of Dr. D’Agostino. Here you can also find a ketogenic diet handbook for cancer patients called Fight Cancer with a Ketogenic Diet
  • Dr. D’Agostino’s website KetoNutrition.org4 contains a wide variety of therapy resources for patients
  • Miriam Kalamian, EdM, MS, CNS offers ketogenic diet consulting services for cancer patients. For information, see dietarytherapies.com5
  • The book, Cancer as a Metabolic Disease: On the Origin, Management, and Prevention of Cancer, by Thomas Seyfried
  • The book, The Cantin Ketogenic Diet: For Cancer, Type I Diabetes & Other Ailments, by Elaine Cantin, which specifically outlines a dairy-free ketogenic diet
Last but not least, ketoresearchchem.com6 is a resource for scientists interested in ketone research. Please note that the ketone supplements offered there are strictly for research only, and are NOT available for sale to cancer patients. 


The Ketogenic Diet for Optimal Health and Disease Prevention 

I firmly believe the ketogenic diet can be a tremendously beneficial strategy for optimizing your health and disease prevention and treatment plan, including cancer. It’s already a well-established first line of treatment against many seizure disorders. While most of your body’s cells have the metabolic flexibility to use either fat or sugar for fuel, cancer cells differ in that they cannot use fat (ketones) to survive—they need glucose, and a low-oxygen environment.  
Back in the 1930’s, Dr. Otto Warburg actually received a Nobel Prize for his discovery that sugar is the primary fuel substrate for cancer cells. The “Warburg effect” in cancer cells is the basis of positron emission tomography (18-FDG PET), a medical imaging technique to visualize cancer. Oncologists have ignored this vital information for over 80 years and don’t use it therapeutically, which in my view is just reprehensible malpractice... So many people suffer needlessly because they don’t have access to this simple nutritional therapeutic strategy, which, in a nutshell, takes advantage of this intrinsic metabolic differential between healthy and cancerous cells. 
Your body has a limited storage of sugar, stored in the form of glycogen, typically in your muscles and liver. These glycogen stores are depleted in about 12 hours or so, at which point your body has to switch to burning fat. This is part of what makes intermittent fasting so beneficial, because by not eating for 12-18 hours or longer each day, your body shifts into this fat-burning mode. While frequent hunger is a major issue for most people who are reliant on burning carbs for energy, fat-burners can go all day, or a number of days if necessary, without food, since most of us have plenty of fat to be used for fuel. 
While most people can still eat some carbs, along with moderate amounts of high-quality protein, those with cancer need to be far more strict. Cancer patients also need to combine a ketogenic diet with calorie restriction to achieve glucose depletion that will effectively starve the cancer cells. Recent research also shows that adding hyperbaric oxygen treatment will dramatically reduce cancer growth and shrink tumors. All in all, I can find no drawbacks to eating this way, which is why I highly recommend it for everyone.

[-] Sources and References


http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2013/06/30/dagostino-cancer-research.aspx


Also read: 
Starve Cancer to Death with the Ketogenic Diet
Explained by Thomas N. Seyfried, PhD, Boston College
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