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Celiac Disease
By: Patricia Valle
~Celiac Disease~
Celiac Disease is a disorder caused by an intolerance to gluten, or similar proteins in wheat, oats, barley and rye. It is estimated that celiac disease affects 20% of Americans. This digestive disease causes damage to the mucous lining of the intestine whenever food products are consumed that contain gluten. Celiac disease impairs the body's ability to absorb nutrients, which can cause serious problems because of the loss of vitamins and minerals, resulting in malnutrition. Diarrhea makes the problem even worse. Because of inadequate absorption, food allergies may appear. Celiac disease or celiac sprue often develops in childhood and may be inherited. It may also appear in adults in their thirties and forties. Emotional stress, surgery, a viral infection or trauma may trigger the onset of this disease.
Celiac disease affects both adults and children, and can appear at any age. The first signs of this disease are usually weight-loss, diarrhea, and anemia. Other symptoms may include foul-smelling stools, fatigue, poor appetite, gas, swelling of abdominal area, irritability, cramping sensation, and even vomiting. There may also be a rash on the skin and intense itching. Wheat products have a high potential for allergies, and range from mild to severe. Because the symptoms can be associated with irritable bowel syndrome or spastic colon, it's difficult to diagnose as gluten intolerance.
It's very important to read labels when purchasing food, drugs, or vitamins, and checking for binders, fillers and natural flavorings. There may be hidden sources of gluten, such as hydrolyzed vegetable protein, textured vegetable protein and hydrolyzed plant protein (all derivatives of wheat, rye, barley and oats), including some soy sources, modified food starch and malt. Some of the most common food sources that may cause allergies, must be omitted and replaced with millet, amaranth, quinoa, lentils, beans, peas, fruits such as raspberries, strawberries and blackberries. Corn and rice, can be eaten by most people who suffer from celiac disease. People with celiac disease need lots of fiber and foods that are rich in iron and B-vitamins. Eating cultures foods such as yogurt or kefir, adds friendly bacteria to the digestive tract that may heal sensitive intestines. In some cases, it may be necessary to omit milk products from the diet because of a lactose deficiency, except for yogurt. Rice Dream or Soy Milk may be used instead.
About the Author
Patricia is a Nutrition Consultant in the Los Angeles area, and has written many articles on health, nutrition, herbs, and alternative healing.
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How to Benefit from the Mind-Body Connection
(excerpt)
You are about to gain insight into the
mind-body connection. The number of
people who truly understand these principles on our
planet are relatively few.
There is an undeniable connection between our minds and
bodies, you can learn
to use this fact to your benefit.
Dr. Bernie Siegel, author of "Love, Medicine and
Miracles" was once a
distraught cancer surgeon until he
began to understand the greater principles
of the mind-
body connection. He felt dragged down by the artificial
barriers
that existed between patient and doctor, and the
helplessness he often felt as
a result of his inability
to effectively serve those patients. Eventually, those
barriers
were disintegrated by Dr. Siegel's recognition
and growing understanding of the
mind-body connection and
how it could serve his patients and himself.
Dr. Siegel, or Bernie as he began to have his patients
refer to him, had some
startling realizations as a cancer surgeon. He found that
there were actually
quite a few people in the world that successfully beat
the statistics on cancer
survival. He began to recognize that a patient's ability
to defeat something as
serious as cancer had to do with the patient's mind and
attitude about their
disease.
If you would like to see the rest of
this article, please go here:
http://www.tobeinformed.com/repository/mind-body.html
copyright 2004 - David Snape
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