ABOUT SAFE HARBOR
Safe Harbor was founded in 1998 in the wake of growing public dissatisfaction with the unwanted effects of orthodox psychiatric treatments such as medication and shock therapy. Seeking to satisfy the desire for safer, more effective treatments, the Project is dedicated to educating the public, the medical profession, and government officials on research and treatments that, minimally, do no harm and, optimally, cure the causes of severe mental symptoms. Our primary thrust is education on the medical causes of severe mental symptoms and the use of nutritional and other natural treatments.
Contact info:
Safe Harbor
P.O. Box 37
Sunland, California 91041-0037
U.S.A.
(818) 890-1862
mail@alternativementalhealth.com
www.AlternativeMentalHealth.com
WE WELCOME YOUR DONATIONS. AS A NONPROFIT ORGANIZATION,SAFE HARBOR IS SUPPORTED SOLELY THROUGH THE GENEROSITY OF THE PUBLIC. DONATIONS CAN BE MAILED TO THE ABOVE ADDRESS.WE ALSO ACCEPT VISA/MASTERCARD BY PHONE. THANK YOU.
EDITOR’S COMMENT
Times they are a-changin’. Just a few years ago when we established AlternativeMentalHeatlh.com, the phrase “alternative mental health” was scarcely known. But now it seems to be an unstoppable juggernaut. In this month’s lead article we find that 1 in 5 people suffering from anxiety or depression now go to an alternative practitioner for help.
Additionally, we get regular reports of alternative physicians taking on the role of mental healers because so many people come to them looking for alternatives to the psychiatric medication they are taking. While compiling our internet directory of practitioners at AlternativeMentalHealth.com, we found that so many alternative physicians now receive children on Ritalin that taking kids off the medication has become a mini-industry in itself.
On May 3 of this year in Toronto, probably the continent’s largest gathering of alternative mental health advocates and practitioners will occur at the annual meeting of the International Society for Orthomolecular Medicine. (For more information, they can be reached at 416-733-2117.) I’ll be there. Along with a number of others who have called us. I believe the time is ripe to organize our forces and combine our strengths to speak as one voice and make our message known to the world. I’ll be there. Let’s talk.
ACCEPTANCE OF ALTERNATIVE MENTAL THERAPIES CONTINUES TO RISE
In the August 2000 issue of Alternative Mental Health News, we reported a trend toward broad acceptance of complementary and alternative mental therapies by the American public. New survey evidence shows that the trend is even more pronounced than before.
Common alternative therapies include oral medication, physical treatments, specific dietary changes, vitamin and mineral supplementation, exercise programs and the elimination of environmental stress factors. A growing number of complementary and alternative therapies are subject to insurance reimbursement and span a wide variety of such options.
In 1996, a Medical Expenditure Panel Survey of over 16,000 respondents found in 1996 that a total of 4.5% of those reporting a mental condition visited an alternative or complementary practitioner for treatment of the condition.
For a survey published in the February 2001 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry, data was collected from more than 2,000 respondents on 24 complementary and alternative therapies for specific chronic conditions. Among participants, more than 9 percent reported experiencing “anxiety attacks” in the past 12 months and 7.2 percent felt they suffered from “severe depression.”
A key finding of this study, say Harvard Medical School researchers, was the supplementation of conventional forms of treatment with the alternative methods. Investigators found that more than 65 percent of those seeing a conventional provider for anxiety attacks and 66.7 percent seeing a conventional practitioner for severe depression were also pursuing complementary and alternative methods of treatment.
It was found that 20 percent of those experiencing anxiety attacks and 19 percent of those severely depressed had sought a complementary or alternative therapist. This is 400% increase over the 4.5% in the 1996 study. Additionally, 34 to 37 percent of anxiety and depression groups used complementary and alternative treatments without visiting an alternative practitioner.
The researchers advised conventional providers to be up front in discussing alternative therapies with patients. According to the report’s authors, “Opening up lines of communication could help prevent adverse clinical effects, as well as maximize the usefulness of any complementary and alternative therapies subsequently proven to be effective.”
LESS TV, MORE HOBBIES PREVENTS ALZHEIMERS
Recent research reported by the BBC and USA Today reveals that people who lead inactive lives and watch more television are more likely to get Alzheimer’s disease.
The study, carried out by Dr. Robert Friedland of Case Western Reserve University and associates, showed that those who regularly participated in hobbies that were intellectually challenging during their younger adult years tended to be protected from Alzheimer’s disease. The finding supports other studies that show the “use or lose it” principle definitely applies to the intellect.
“Television watching is not protective and may even be a risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease,” said Friedland He and his team studied the leisure activities in young and middle adulthood of 193 Alzheimer’s patients and of 358 controls, people who did not have symptoms of the disease. The study participants were in their 70s when the survey was conducted.
The research was hailed by Dr. Zaven Khachaturian, senior medical adviser to the Alzheimer’s Association, who claims the study supports other research showing that the onset of Alzheimer’s is delayed by education and by intellectually demanding life activities.
The survey centered on three types of activities: Passive, intellectual, and physical. Passive included items such as watching television, talking on the phone or listening to music. Intellectual covered such things as reading, jigsaw or crossword puzzles, playing musical instruments, chess or other board games, knitting or woodwork. Physical included activities such as baseball, football or other sports, bike riding, swimming, walking or skating.
“The Alzheimer’s patients were less active in all these activities except for television watching,” said Friedland. He also noted that intellectual activities seemed particularly protective. Those who spent their leisure time on mentally stimulating hobbies were approximately 2.5 times less likely to develop Alzheimer’s.
ACTRESS MARGOT KIDDER BECOMES SAFE HARBOR NATL. SPOKESPERSON
The world will always know her as Lois Lane from the Superman movies. And indeed, she is a highly versatile actress with more than 40 feature films and 100 television shows to her credit. But those in the alternative mental health field recognize Ms. Kidder as one of the most courageous voices in America.
After curing herself of “manic depression” through personal research and nutrient therapy, Ms. Kidder has chosen not to take the easy road and stay silent. Instead, she has become a powerful advocate for the use of drug-free treatments in mental health, particularly through the use of full physical exams and nutritional therapy.
After years of personal struggles, she was shocked to discover that nutritional mental health treatments had been around for decades but none of her mainstream doctors ever told her about them. Unwilling to stand by and let others suffer needlessly, the vivacious actress has since lent her voice many times to the cause of drug-free alternative treatments.
In January of this year she received the Courage in Mental Health Award from the California Women’s Mental Health Policy Council in recognition of her work.
In February 2001, Ms. Kidder added her support as spokesperson for America’s fastest-growing alternative mental health organization: Safe Harbor and AlternativeMentalHealth.com.
More than just a pretty face, she is well-read and very articulate on the subject of nutritional brain chemistry, as can be seen by the new article she has contributed at www.AlternativeMentalHealth.com.
BIOCHEMICAL INDIVIDUALITY AND MENTAL HEALTH
Nutritional supplementation can be effective in treating mental conditions, but only to the degree that the unique biochemistry of each individual body is taken into account, explains William Walsh, Ph.D, chief scientist of the nonprofit Health Research Institute in Naperville, Illinois.
“I am amused by supplement manufacturers who attempt to develop the ideal combination of vitamins, minerals, and amino acids for the general population,” writes Walsh (http://www.hriptc.org/binres.htm). “This is a bit like trying to determine the ideal shoe size for the population.”
Shakespeare’s statement, “One man’s meat is another man’s poison,” was scientifically sound. Even siblings do not necessarily have the same biochemical balances and needs. In the genetic lottery, variables come from many ancestors on both sides of the family. An astonishing 42 million genetic combinations are possible in children of the same two parents.
A vegetarian diet is suitable for some, but not all, Walsh points out. Some persons can satisfy their nutritional needs by diet alone and others must have nutritional supplements to overcome genetic aberrations. But indiscriminate supplementation can be as bad as no supplementation. “After studying the biochemistry of 10,000 persons, I’ve learned that the greatest mischief is usually caused by nutrients that are stored in excessive amounts, rather than those at depleted levels. The most common nutrients in overload include copper, iron, folic acid, calcium, methionine, manganese, choline, and omega-6 fatty acids.”
The role of neurotransmitters in behavior and mood disorders is acknowledged, if not fully understood, by most of today’s practitioners. Genetically-aberrant levels of specific neurotransmitters may predispose individuals to such disorders.
Neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine used by the brain are built by the brain cells from available nutrients, including amino acids, vitamins, and minerals.
CALCIUM CUTS PMS SYMPTOMS IN HALF
Calcium carbonate — an inexpensive, widely available supplement — seems to lessen the symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS), according to a study by Susan Thys-Jacobs, M.D., funded by SmithKline Beecham, maker of Tums. As reported in the August 1998 issue of American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, the controlled study was conducted on 441 women, ages 18 to 45, at 12 health centers nationwide.
The women took either 1,200 mg chewable calcium supplements or placebo daily for three months and measured 17 symptoms including mood swings, irritability, water retention, food cravings, headache and cramping.
Thys-Jacobs and colleagues at Columbia University in New York studied 466 premenopausal women with moderate-to-severe PMS at 12 locations around the U.S. Each woman was randomly assigned to take either 600 mg of calcium carbonate or a calcium-free look-alike placebo twice a day for three menstrual cycles.
At the end of the study, the calcium group experienced an overall 48 percent reduction in symptom severity during the third cycle, while those taking the placebo had a 30 percent reduction.
Nearly all the symptoms improved significantly in the group taking the calcium supplement. Emotional symptoms dropped by 45 percent (vs. 28 percent for placebo), water retention by 36 percent (vs. 24 percent), food cravings by 54 percent (vs. 34 percent) and pain by 54 percent (vs. a 15 percent pain increase). The only symptoms that didn’t improve were insomnia and fatigue.
“The concept is that if you are not consuming enough calcium, the regulating hormones increase and go berserk,” says Thys-Jacobs, an endocrinologist. The elevated levels of calcium-regulating parathyroid hormone, as well as a form of vitamin B, interact with the hormones estrogen and progesterone, which are more abundant during the latter half of the menstrual cycle. This prompts PMS symptoms.
“It’s better to take calcium with meals,” she adds, “because it’s better absorbed and because there’s less risk of kidney stones.”
The study corroborates recent evidence that abnormal calcium regulation may be responsible for PMS.
NUTRITIONAL APPROACHES TO AUTISM
The term “autism” is used for a spectrum of mental disorders with a common set of symptoms. An estimated 400,000 children in the U.S. are affected, and figures just released by the California Department of Developmental Services (DDS) point to a 38% increase in professionally diagnosed autism cases entering the system over the last two years.
Unlike mental retardation and cerebral palsy, which are recognizable in infancy, autism strikes toddlers who were apparently normal infants. At one and a half to two years of age, developmental milestones cease to be met, and communication with parents becomes all but nonexistent. Autistic children may be prone to explosive tantrums or repetitive mechanical behavior, like rocking or shutting off all the lights in a room again and again.
While autism varies in severity, its key features are improper sensory integration, lack of subtlety of emotional expression (“flatness” can quickly give way to agitation) and limited communication ability. Autistic children are seldom able to lead independent lives.
No effective drug therapy for autism has been found. At best, medications can suppress some of the symptoms, and behavior modification techniques have met with mixed results. The early claims of autism pioneer Dr. Bernard Rimland — that autism could be substantially ameliorated with diet changes and nutrients — were met with skepticism by professionals.
A mainstay of Rimland’s approach was the elimination of sugar and artificial ingredients, coupled with supplementary nutrients, especially B6 and magnesium. To this he later added dimethylglycine (DMG) and treatment for candida (yeast) infection. There has been no shortage of anecdotal evidence, such as parents’ success stories, but not until recent developments in metabolic testing and the dissemination of standardized protocols did physicians begin to endorse the nutritional approach.
Researchers have long believed that autism was neurologically “hard-wired” into the brain circuitry of afflicted children. Most guessed that a complex tangle of mixed up switches in the brain were part of the genetic inheritance of autistic kids. But a new model is helping us understand how certain susceptible children may develop autism, why Dr. Rimland’s therapies seem to help some of them, and how we can extend hope and help to still others.
The model arises from medicine’s new understanding of the relationship between the nervous system and the immune system. Autistic children are thought to suffer from “sensory integration” problems. New findings suggest that their immune systems, too, may be suffering from overload. Increasingly, the nervous system and the immune system are viewed as components of a continuous network that senses and responds to stimuli. Perceptions of stress factors and other sensory input can have an immediate impact on the immune response. Immune system events such as allergic reactions or the fever accompanying an infection have an impact on concentration, level of fatigue, and moods.
Studies now reveal that autistic children, while not all alike, suffer from a wide array of immune system and metabolic abnormalities. The vast majority possess blood profiles that show a high state of immune system activation and dysregulation. Many show numerous food allergies, especially to wheat gluten and milk, and symptoms respond to elimination diets in such cases. In other cases, antibiotics or immunization shots, commonly laced with mercury, have triggered the onset of symptoms.
Immunologist Sudhir Gupta of the University of California at Irvine. infused willing subjects with intravenous gamma globulin, an immune-enhancing formula derived from donated blood plasma. Many of the children experienced profound improvements in mood, concentration, and speech. One child returned to regular classes and team sports. Few subjects failed to respond at least partially to this immune “fix,” and plans are underway for further testing at the University of California and Harvard Medical School.
U.N. REPORT: DEPRESSANTS OVERPRESCRIBED, ABUSED
International experts say developed countries are using too many prescription drugs, warned the UN International Narcotics Control Board in its 2000 report (BBC News Online, 21 February 2001).
The board examined the use of mood altering drugs like benzodiazepines (such as Xanax and Valium), a family of often addictive prescription sedatives or tranquilizers that suppress the symptoms of anxiety. (Side effects include drowsiness, dizziness, headache, nausea, impaired memory, hallucinations, and confusion.)
It said the drugs were often given for what amount to social problems, such as unemployment or relationship difficulties, in rapidly developing countries such as Malaysia and Singapore as well as established industrial powers.
A survey by the INCB found many patients were prescribed the mood-altering stimulants to treat mental and psychological disorders, even without a diagnosis of mental illness. Loose prescription regulations, aggressive marketing and unethical prescribing were cited as causes.
INCB president Professor Hamid Ghodse said an oversupply of drugs can be as big a problem as the under-supply of pain-relieving drugs to developing countries which last year’s report highlighted. “Up to 70% of long-term use of psychotrophic drugs is irrelevant and often prescribed for social reasons.”
Online trafficking of drugs on the internet was also cited as a growing problem by the board, which is urging governments to set up regulatory controls for online pharmacies.
YEAST, ADHD AND EAR INFECTIONS
According to William G. Crook, M.D., eliminating candida yeast and making dietary changes may offer the longest-lasting cure.
In an article published on healthwell.com, Crook analyzed the phenomenon that many young American children diagnosed as hyperactive are also troubled by recurrent middle ear infections called “otitis media with effusion,” or OME. (Otitis media means inflammation of the middle ear, while effusion denotes the escape of a fluid from its natural vessels into a body cavity.)
The usual treatments include broad-spectrum antibiotics — powerful enough to destroy many good bacteria along with the bad — and ear tubes. It may take weeks or even months of antibiotic treatment to stave off further infections. Small plastic ear tubes are inserted through the eardrum to ventilate the middle ear when fluid accumulations persist.
The connection between ear infections and hyperactivity was first suggested by a study by researchers from the University of Colorado and Yeshiva University (Hagerman & Falkenstein, Clinical Pediatrics, May 1987). The study of 67 children ages 6-13 who were failing in school showed that children with repeated ear infections are 3.5 times more apt to develop hyperactivity than other children.
In the group, 94% of those medicated for hyperactivity had a history of three or more otitis infections, as compared to 50% of the nonhyperactive children; 69% of the hyperactive children had had more than 10 ear infections, as compared to only 20% of the nonhyperactive ones.
Dr. Crook notes that when “friendly bacteria” in the gastrointestinal tract are killed by antibiotics, an overgrowth of candida albicans is a common consequence. The candida yeast release toxins that weaken the immune system and lead to repeated infections – and, in some cases, wide systemic and nervous system effects.
ABOUT AlternativeMentalHealth.com
AlternativeMentalHealth.com is the world’s largest web site devoted
exclusively to alternative mental health treatments. It includes a
directory of over 150 physicians, nutritionists, experts, organizations,
and facilities around the U.S. that offer or promote safe, alternative
treatments for severe mental symptoms. Many of the physicians listed do
in-depth examinations to find the physical causes behind mental
problems.
Also included on the site are an array of articles on topics ranging
from the medical causes of schizophrenia to the effects of toxic metals
on mental health.
A bookstore page lists top books that cover many areas of alternative
treatments with titles like Natural Healing for Schizophrenia and Other
Common Mental Disorders and No More Ritalin.
AlternativeMentalHealth.com has been created to educate the public,
practitioners, and government officials on the medical conditions that
create “mental illness” and the many safe resources available for
addressing and often curing severe mental symptoms.