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Immunity-enhancing nutritional supplements
Vitamins & MineralsBiotin is a B vitamin which is essential for the metabolism of fats and proteins. It is believed to play some role in preventing candida from converting into its invasive form. Yamaguchi and colleagues have found that taking 300 mgs of Biotin three times daily and two teaspoons of green olive oil three times a day prevents the conversion of yeast to fungal form. At least six months are required to get a good result. Balanced free-form amino acids. Antioxidants such as Vitamin E, A, balanced B, I-Lysine and Pantothenic acid. Vitamins A and C help with the infection resulting from fungal micropunctures made into the intestinal walls. Copper and zinc work together. Imbalanced copper levels directly tie to Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) and candida. Copper serves as a natural antifungal. People with candida, parasites or Epstein-Barr virus commonly have an excess of copper and mercury in their body. Japanese scientist, Asai, found that an intake of 100-300 mgs per day of germanium improved many illnesses including candida. Research shows organic germanium increases tissue oxygenation. One theory states that a deficiency of ionic calcium (and other alkalizing minerals) is at the root of candida and juvenile diabetes. Acidosis ensues and degenerative disease develops without these minerals. Years ago I read in NW Walker books that cooking calcium-containing foods renders the calcium 'inorganic' and this clogs up the organs, joints and tissues. He advocates foods high in organic sodium like celery and zucchini to help remove the pile-up of inorganic calcium. Rich Anderson of Arise & Shine company feels that organic goat whey is the best source of organic sodium. Selenium deficiencies limit cellular immunity against yeast. Phagocytes (cells active in cell-mediated immunity) require selenium for the enzyme glutathione peroxidase function. Peroxidase activity in phagocytes is higher than in most other tissues (approximately twice that in red blood cells), and this is reflected in a higher need for selenium. The glutathione peroxidase system is an antioxidant enzyme system and is especially critical for phagocytic cell function. It has been experimentally demonstrated that selenium deficiency selectively causes a predisposition to yeast infection (4). Food and chemically sensitive patients should start with very low doses of selenium - according to a “selenium titration program” developed by Dr. Alfred Zamm, M.D. and Dr. Stephen A. Levine
Essential and Short-Chain Fatty AcidsGamma-Linoleic Acid (GLA) is an essential fatty acid (EFA) which is often extracted from evening primrose flowers. It is also found in cold-pressed oils such as olive, flax, sesame and borage seed oils. Increasing dietary GLA helps prevent candida from becoming systemically invasive. GLA is also known to have other beneficial effects on immune regulation. Other therapeutic EFA's are found in hemp, black current and billberry and in trace amounts in nuts and seeds, avocados and coconuts. One source says that olive oil keeps yeast from converting to a fungus. Short-chain fatty acids (SCFA) are essential for the integrity of the intestinal mucosa. Butter is known to be highest in the most essential of SCFA's, butyric acid. Udo Erasmus in Fats That Heal, Fats That Kill is the expert to read. Very often a person with candida will have to make friends with eating more 'healing' fats in their diet and restricting starches. Others might find their fat metabolism has been jeopardized and they can use supplemental fats and not so much dietary fat. Each case is unique. Fats Dr. Igram, among several other books, also wrote, with Judy K. Gray, M.S., "Eat Right to Live Long", published by Literary Visions, Inc. (800)243-5242, with a dedication "For Those Who Think". It's a detailed, informative book, with explanations from the author's experience as a practicing physician, that includes lists of food categories, and some recipes. The copy text below his table of percentage of calories from fat in natural foods and spices, notes,"that many natural foods which have been downgraded nutritionally, such as eggs, meats, cheese, ...contain no more fat than many processed foods..... Natural foods are always better, whether they are high in fat, sugar, or starch.... Now you can become familiar with how tasty, how appetizing, how nutritious a high-natural fat diet really is -- bon appetit!" Stay away from hydrogenated vegetable oils! An article on the June 2006 www.newscientist.com website discusses how hydrogenated vegetable oils such as those used in fast foods are unhealthy. Recommended foods:Apple cider vinegar Coconut oil Sauerkraut is a very healthy food for several reasons. Cabbage is very high in calcium and boron which acts synergistically with calcium. So it's very assimilable. It also has lactobacillus bifidus and acidophilus which help to replenish the friendly flora in the intestines. Overall, it's excellent for the digestive system and helpful for candida, too.' Foods to avoid:Chile peppers are a food item found nearly ubiquitously in many Mesoamerican cultures (44). Their use may reflect more than a desire to flavor foods. Many essential nutrients, such as vitamin C, provitamins A and E, and several B vitamins, are found in chiles (27). A terpenoid constituent, capsaicin, has a wide range of biological activities in humans, affecting the nervous, cardiovascular, and digestive systems (236) as well as finding use as an analgesic (47). The evidence for its antimicrobial activity is mixed. Recently, Cichewicz and Thorpe (42) found that capsaicin might enhance the growth of Candida albicans but that it clearly inhibited various bacteria to differing extents. Although possibly detrimental to the human gastric mucosa, capsaicin is also bactericidal to Helicobacter pylori (106). Another hot-tasting diterpene, aframodial, from a Cameroonian spice, is a broad-spectrum antifungal (18). Candida Diet Books:The Blood Type Diet by Dr Peter D'Adamo is outlined is his book Eat Right For Your Type. The premise is that people fall into dietary needs classes in line with their blood types. Ann Louise Gittleman, M.S. famous for her book "Guess What Came to Dinner: Parasites and Your Health, has written a newer book, with James Templeton and Candelora Cersace, called "Your Body Knows Best", published in March of 1996, by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, N.Y. 10020, in which she speaks of personalized nutrition, and also states that it is not a new concept. She states emphatically that there is no universal diet suitable for everyone, and that to find out what is right for an individual, it's necessary to start with ancestry and hereditary as a modifying factor, among others. The idea of biological/biochemical uniqueness has been around for thousands and thousands of years, all the way back to ancient Chinese writings and early Egyptian and Greek physicians, and Hippocrates himself. This is virtually ignored by most modern day nutritionists. Another modifying factor she discusses is based on the work of Dr. George Watson, and other researchers, such as Dr. Paul Eck, Dr. David Watts, and Dr. Rick Malter, with an explanation of the importance of the metabolic rate -- whether a person has either a fast or slow oxidative rate, and its effect on dietary needs and psychological problems. She explains that the fast burner suffers on low-fat diets, and do better on heavier protein and fat, low in complex carbohydrates. Nucleoproteins, which should be avoided by the slow burner, are preferable for the fast burner -- purine-rich proteins, such as red meats, anchovies, herring, caviar, sardines, organ meats such as liver, kidneys, sweetbreads. Author Gittleman states, "...Although these may be unpopular foods today, they have been standard throughout our history.... ...It has only been ...when the misguided cholesterol propaganda came into vogue that these foods have been banished from the American home. Ancestrally speaking, organ meats were often considered to be the prize of a successful hunt." Another modifying factor, according to Ann Louise Gittleman, in personalizing one's diet, is blood type. She explains how blood types A, B, AB, and O appeared at different times throughout the progression of generations throughout the world, and how these blood types connect us to our past. According to her report on the work of Dr. James D'Adamo, and his son, Peter, also a physician, in their extensive research of blood groups as relates to biochemistry, diet, and disease, (scientific documentation listed in her References) Dr. James D'Adamo, in his book oriented for the lay reader, "The D'Adamo Diet" published by McGraw-Hill, 1989), found that Blood type A people did well on a vegetarian or near-vegetarian diet, and so did those with the very rare type AB, but type B people need more animal protein, whereas type O finds it almost impossible to remain healthy on a vegetarian diet. Type O's, according to the D'Adamo's research, have been found to have a much greater genetic need for animal protein and fat. The first blood type that researchers in this field have been able to determine is type O. Animal meat was the primary source of food on a daily basis, supplemented with roots, leaves, wild grains, and plant foods, and since dairy products were unheard of, present day type O's, would, more than likely, have difficulty in digesting dairy products. Applying this reasoning to the idea that it takes millions of years for humankind to evolve, moving through time and place in search of food, that since sugar has only been available to us in its refined state over the last 150 years, it's theorized that that's why so many people have such trouble with it. Further, Type O's according to this research, "have a greater predisposition to celiac/sprue disease, which is caused by a genetically inherited metabolic inability to digest foods that contain gluten, specifically, wheat, rye, oats, barley..." -- the "new foods" that were introduced long after the appearance of type O. Dr. Richard Kunin, an orthomolecular physician from San Francisco, is quoted in "Your Body Knows Best", "Grains are really Johnny-come-latelies on the nutritional scene. Meats, fruits, beans, seeds, nuts, and vegetables have had a considerably longer historical alliance with the human gut." Ann Louise Gittleman carries this theme further by stating, "Grains and grain products are associated with a whole range of problems, including carbohydrate addiction and yeast infections, or candidiasis." She explains that sensitivity to gluten can be the cause of diarrhea, anemia, cramps, muscle spasms, and can lead to serious malabsorption problems that result in chronic deficiencies that can be the cause of depression, fatigue, disorders of the glands, alcoholism, and has also been implicated in rheumatoid arthritis, schizophrenia, and multiple sclerosis. Discussing the detrimental effects of trans fatty acids and the process of oxidation that makes these highly processed and unnatural fats dangerous, she makes a strong statement in the book, after referring to Dr. Weston Price's statement, in his landmark book "Nutrition and Physical Degeneration", "that butter is essential for proper growth and development of bone structure is "This information about trans fats, which I've discussed in more detail in "Beyond Pritikin" and "Super Nutrition for Women", flies in the face of current nutritional propaganda, which points to meat and animal fat as the dietary culprits responsible for heart disease, obesity, and cancer. Now we know that the artificial and manipulated fats in margarine and hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated vegetable oils are far more dangerous to the human body than the natural fats found in animal meat.... ...unnatural trans fats that are biochemically incompatible with the human body...have no business being used as food." Elsewhere she states, "Incidence of heart attacks in America has not gone down even though consumption of saturated fats and cholesterol levels have." She stresses balance and the difficult path in trying to understand the difference between spiritual beliefs and the biological needs of the human body, based on blood type, ancestry, and primarily, whether you are a fast or a slow oxidizer. Two other books along these lines: Ann Louis Gittleman makes several references in her book to Mary G. Enig, Ph.D., who, along with Pat Connolly and, in the book "Nourishing Traditions" by Sally Fallon, published by ProMotion Publishing, 3368 F Governor Drive, Suite 144,l San Diego, California, 92122, (800) 231-1776, again with mention of the work of Dr. Weston Price, in the preface, where the authors state, "The premise of this book is that modern food choices and preparation techniques constitute a radical change from the way man has nourished himself for thousands of years, and, from the perspective of history, represent a fad that not only has severely compromised his health and vitality, but may well destroy him; and that the culinary traditions of our ancestors, ...should serve as the model for contemporary eating habits...." The book is filled with history and recipes. The sub-title gives a taste of what the book contains: "The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats". The authors give historical data and instructions, including how to make natural ferments. They teach us how to simulate the foods of our ancestors to the degree that is possible in our modern society with rich and enriching details in support of the authors' thesis that animal foods and saturated fats have, for the most part, always been included in humankind's heritage. Of course the work of Dr. Robert Atkins is widely known. He is known to the the first to write of insulin resistance, as he does again in "Dr. Atkins' New Diet Revolution", published by M. Evans & Company, Inc., New York, which he claims is "the hidden force behind many major illnesses, from diabetes to heart disease."
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