Ross Walter Nutritionist and Naturopath health articles and blog

do you still need health insurance?

27/3/2019

Australia's Health Insurance companies having been told by the federal government that they can no longer offer rebates on natural therapy consultations after April 1 2019! And no, it's not an early April Fools joke!

This decision was based on a corrupt and biased report from a government committee which couldn't find more than a couple of research studies on each modality which showed how effective they are. I've read more studies on effective natural therapy treatments this week than they found in years... which seriously shows their incompetence! The committee's report supported their pre-conceived bias to get rid of government rebates on these natural therapies.

So the government wants to make it more difficult for you to obtain good, proven, safe and effective treatments from natural therapies, and use the already clogged, inaccessible, under-financed, under-staffed, inefficient and ineffective medical system instead. Don't they realise we take a huge load off their shoulders, and without what we do, the system will absolutely collapse?! Maybe that might be a good thing, so they can see the benefits we do actually bring to the health of most Australians...

Over 80% of Australians use some form of alternative therapies, from supplements, to herbals, and services like massage, acupuncture, chiropractic, naturopathy and nutrition, and more. The government are making this decision which will affect the rights of up to 80% of Australians to make their own choice as to what they use or who they see when they are not feeling well. And their decision will cost you more too.
In many countries around the world, their are campaigns by medical and pharmaceutical lobby groups against natural therapies, to make it more difficult for you to access alternative therapies and treatments. We should be able to work together to help you and your family to be well, but it is not in their financial interest for you to be healthy...

So what can you do about this?

1) Speak to or write a letter to your local, state and federal politician, to tell them that you are not in favour of the decision to remove health insurance rebates, especially when it was based on a corrupt process. Let them know that you will be voting for someone else if this decision goes ahead

2) Reconsider how much you are paying for your health insurance! You will be paying more from April 1 - so you will be paying MORE for LESS services! You should see what you can do with your health insurance to REDUCE your costs now! Phone your insurance company to reduce your costs.

3) Consider voting against the 3 major parties which are not interested in giving you alternative treatment options. The current federal government made this decision, the labor party want to inflict further pain on your wallets, by imposing GST on natural therapy consultations, to pay for the recently removed "tampon tax"! And the Greens have a doctor for their leader and who is against natural therapies...

4) Click on this link to have your say to the Federal health minister (Greg Hunt) on this issue, to try and save the health insurance rebates:
https://www.yourhealthyourchoice.com.au/save-rebates/

There is still time for your voice to be heard and for the health insurance rebate issue to be reversed! Please take a stand on this issue, or the government will remove all your rights to choose how and what or who you get health advice from. Your elected politician was voted to represent YOU, and they need to know how you feel and what you really want them to do.

If you do nothing, the government will walk all over you to take away your power bit by bit, so they remain in power. With enough support, people power will win over collusion and corruption in government. You can make a difference!

From April 1, I think the joke will be on the government and health insurance companies. What are you planning to do about your health insurance? Will you change how you get your health advice or treatments? Please let me know!

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Glandular fever and EBV can lead to ongoing health issues

25/3/2019

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I've been seeing a lot of people lately with ongoing complications of Glandular Fever, caused by the Epstein-Barr Virus (EBV).

Many people don't know they have had Glandular Fever, unless their doctor tests for it, as it presents just like a flu infection, but usually with a longer period of fatigue afterwards (called the "post-viral fatigue"). Symptoms include enlarged lymph glands in the neck and throat, enlarged spleen, jaundice (yellow skin colour, as the virus can infect the liver in some people), very sore throat and heavy cough, muscle aches, headaches, no appetite, fever, and more.

Glandular fever is sometimes called "the kissing disease" as it is transmitted by saliva! You don't need to kiss to transmit it, but can be from shared food, kitchenware, cups, or saliva on hands. The infection is most common in adolescents and young adults.

Natural treatments for Glandular Fever are the same as for most viral infections - rest and sleep, supporting the immune system to fight the infection, and antiviral nutrients or herbals to kill the virus, and more. There are no current traditional medical treatments for EBV, and you are usually just told to rest and keep fluids up. Not all that helpful...

There can be serious complications of the initial EBV infection, including inflammation of the heart muscle (causing irregular or abnormal heart beats), neurological problems (meningitis, seizures, facial and muscle paralysis), blood clotting disturbances, thyroid conditions, and chronic fatigue which can last for weeks or months afterwards.

Once you have recovered from the initial infection that may not be the end of it, as EBV has a tendency to hibernate when your immune system is fighting it. But when your immune defences are down (because you might not be looking after yourself), it comes out of hibernation again and again to cause havoc around your body. EBV can infect your infection-fighting white blood cells to cause them to multiply rapidly but also reduce their function. This is how EBV is linked to several types of blood cell cancers like lymphomas, and other types of cancers too, including cancer of the breast, stomach, and EBV is also linked to causing AIDS.

EBV is also lead to immune system dysfunction and autoimmune conditions such as Multiple Sclerosis, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Type 1 Diabetes, Coeliac Disease, Lupus (SLE), autoimmune thyroid conditions (Hashimoto's and Grave's Disease) and many more. EBV reactivation has also been linked to Lyme disease, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), Bartonella, Chlamydia, and other infections.

If you have had Glandular Fever and/or EBV confirmed in the past, the key is to look after your health so that your immune system remains strong and able to keep EBV at bay. If you aren't looking after yourself with lots of stress, poor diet, lack of sleep, poor lifestyle choices etc, then EBV can be reactivated and contributing to your health issues, including some very serious conditions as mentioned above.

If you have some of these health issues - thyroid conditions, liver and digestive problems, heart conditions, and you have had Glandular Fever or EBV confirmed, I can help with improving your immune system to fight the infection, to reduce symptoms, as well as prevent it reactivating. So you can kiss the EBV goodbye!

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Diabetes organisations and educators cause more diabetes

21/3/2019

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Today I attended an all-day seminar on "carbohydrate counting for health professionals" run by Diabetes Queensland". Except that I didn't quite last the whole day, as partly due to the idiotic information being given, but I had afternoon clients booked in to save me from listening to any more drivel!

I partly wanted to attend to see where Diabetes Qld are up to in relation to actually preventing or treating diabetes, and perhaps spare some of the attendees from the one-sided propaganda which they give. I found that Diabetes Qld are still stuck in 1960s nutrition science, and luckily there were not many attendees who needed saving.

Three of the 7 in total attendees were pharmacists, two dietitians of limited experience, and two rebels - myself and a low-carb advocate blogger friend who went along for similar reasons as myself. A pretty poor turnout really, but perhaps just as well!

The first thing which annoys me are diabetes educators - the diabetes association runs training courses to educate health professionals to advise and help people with diabetes, but this actually makes it all worse. There are limited health professionals who can take the diabetes educator training, and fewer who can actually get the qualification. Doctors are allowed to become DEs, as are pharmacists, nurses, physios, podiatrists and not a lot more. How many of these professionals have any nutritional medicine training or experience? NONE! Yet they are allowed to give nutrition advice on the fastest-growing nutrition-related chronic health condition in the world today! Dietitians can also become DEs, but at least they have *some* nutrition training, even if much of it is wrong. Nutritionists and Naturopaths (like me) cannot take the DE training, and we can't get the qualification or qualification, despite our more current nutrition science training and experience!

I'm still confused as to the meaning of the seminar! It was about "carb counting", but instead of (as I had hoped) counting carbs to LIMIT their intake, and thus reduce blood sugar levels and insulin response (which diabetics need to do), the purpose was to count carbs to INCREASE their intake - which is precisely the opposite of what should happen.

They introduced a new concept of "carbohydrate exchange", to attempt to simplify counting of carbohydrates in terms of grams or calories. They instead recommend counting carbs in blocks of 15gm as "1 exchange" of carbs, so 2 exchanges means 2 x 15gm = 30gm carbs. That was the only "new concept" but I'm still confused as to 1) why, or 2) how this will improve a diabetic's health?!

Some other gems I was told in the seminar:
1) Non-starchy vegetables and some fruit don't count as carbs at all. No need to count them!
2) Diet soft drinks and diet cordials are non-carbs too and are "fine", despite them being linked to actually causing weight gain, diabetes and cancer (which I pointed out)
3) Starchy foods - potato, rice, pasta etc are needed as they "fill you up more"! (Maybe, but not as filling as protein or healthy fats, which give a longer lasting energy)
4) 10% of your daily dietary intake as sugar is fine (12 tsp)
5) Your dietary intake of carbs must not fall below 130gm per day!
6) Dietary fat influences blood glucose levels! NO it doesn't!
7) I was told that alcoholic drinks shouldn't be included in counting carbohydrates! And alcohol can LOWER blood glucose overnight - no it doesn't! And alcohol is "potentially a low-GI snack before bed"! huh?!
8) Despite Diabetes Australia releasing a "position statement" on using a low-carb plan for treating type 2 diabetes, as there is a LOT of published science showing it works, they aren't ready to commit to this yet and they want more studies done
9) But in the next sentence, low carb was bad again, as our muscles and brain can only run on glucose (sugar) - complete BS! (I said this was wrong, but they didn't accept it)
10) Dietitians and DEs shouldn't tell people that they can't have this or that food!
11) Diabetics need to eat more carbs UP to their insulin requirements! (No, they need to reduce carbs to reduce insulin...)
12) "Fad diets are those that cut out certain foods or food groups" and are not recommended! I asked, "according to that definition, vegetarian and vegan diets are fad diets and should also be ignored?"!
13) Counting carbs with the new "exchange" method has been shown to reduce HbA1c (a diabetes pathology test marker) by up to 2% over a couple of month period. I said "I've reduced HbA1c in a type 2 diabetic client by 20% in 2 weeks using a low carb plan..." and they looked shocked and angrily reminded me that we are learning about "counting carbs" not "low carb", ok?!
14) There was a lot of contradictory information being given. And even simple little things like "fats and oils and protein don't have any carbs", meaning that they won't cause high blood sugars is ignored in their "treatment". They seem blind to the obvious
15) Saturated fats and cholesterol are still bad as they cause heart disease! No they don't! The two rebels put forward a few comments on this against the speaker who said "we will agree to disagree"...
16) In the past, diabetes was treated by doctors with a "NO CARB" diet! That was, until 1921 when insulin was discovered! After this, a "LOW CARB" diet was recommended for diabetics, and there was a much lower rate of diabetes! (Now we have an epidemic of diabetes as a result of people being advised to have a HIGH CARB diet instead! Why can't they see this connection? Is it from diabetic retinopathy?!)

Amusingly, there were lollies on the tables, we had to count carbs for a range of processed and packaged crap foods (breads, crackers, cereals etc), NONE of which I either buy or recommend to any clients, morning tea was a carb fest of bakery products and fruit (more carbs), and lunch was not much better. I hope I sowed a few seeds of doubt in the heads of those who attended, as they clearly had no idea about nutrition or how to actually help diabetics, which was why they were there.

It's also very sad and disturbing too, that a high profile health organisation is in complete denial about the causes of diabetes, and current evidence-based treatments. Sure I understand it's difficult to change your mind on an entrenched belief, but at some stage you need to bite the bullet and say "sorry, we got it wrong" and move on, to help people with their health. This is about peoples' lives that are at stake here, it's not just about sponsorship money. It's about real people, and their families. Wake the hell up Diabetes Queensland/Australia.

Treat diabetes with current scientific treatments - see an experienced Nutritionist and/or Naturopath instead.

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What does a naturopath do?

18/3/2019

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I'm still finding that some people, including new clients, do not know what a Clinical Nutritionist and Naturopath does! I thought I'd post this article to explain...

My philosophy in clinical practice is to:
1) Find the root causes of all health issues in a client
2) Treat all the root causes
3) Treat the whole body, on all aspects of health - physical, mental, emotional, spiritual and environmental.

To do this I need time - 90 minutes for the initial consultation, and 30-60 minutes for follow-up consultations. My consultations are much more detailed than the average 6 minutes your GP allocates to see you! The medical model is very different - mainly to prescribe medications which hide or suppress your symptoms, to make it look like there's nothing wrong. But the root causes are not identified or treated, the problem is still there, and actually will get worse over time or appear as symptoms or disease in another organ instead.

There's a LOT I need to find out about you, such as:
1) All of your current conditions or symptoms, when they started, how they affect you, their severity, what makes things better or worse, when and for how long the symptoms appear, and more
2) Detailed questioning and investigations into your stresses, energy, digestive function, sleep, hormones, lifestyle, and physical signs (skin, nails, posture, movement, tongue, eyes, and more)
3) Analysis of your weekly food diary, as our food choices (good or bad) contribute the most to how your body works and your health
4) Pathology results analysis, in a holistic and naturopathic way.

I use all this information to identify all the root causes, then design a personalised and prioritised treatment plan to treat all of the root causes. The treatment plan includes a range of holistic recommendations such as food and meal advice, nutritional and herbal supplements if needed, lifestyle advice, and further pathology testing or referral to other practitioners if more information is needed.

The advantage of being able to get to know clients, their health history and lifestyle in detail with longer consultation times, is that I can usually find many root causes which haven't been found or addressed previously. But this can come at a cost, in terms of the time required for clients in consultations, for me to put together this treatment plan, and the cost of these services. While Naturopathic services may seem to be expensive to some people, we are much cheaper than doctors, GPs, specialists, dentists, vets and other medical professionals for the time that we spend with you to work on improving your health!

I believe one of my best abilities is to identify all of the root causes of your health issues, and often find the causes when clients may not have had an answer (or successful treatment) in the past. I am very detailed and thorough in this!

In my next article I will introduce some exciting new services to my clinic!

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Are "Low GI" foods healthier?

6/3/2019

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I'm sure you have heard of the concept of "low GI", or "low Glycaemic Index" in relation to foods, and that allegedly "low GI" foods are a better choice... or are they?!

You have seen the useless Heart Foundation tick of approval logo on product packaging in the past, but was removed when people lost confidence in it as it was just a marketing sponsorship gimmick and nothing to do with how healthy a food was! Next came the useless Health Star Rating system, which is still being used by manufacturers, but being ignored by the public as it is a corrupt system that again does not accurately reflect how healthy a food is. Now there's a new "Low GI Certified" logo being applied to packaged foods that is destined to have the same fate of being entirely useless!

The Glycaemic Index (GI) of a food is a measure of how fast the food spikes your blood sugar levels and for how long. So a higher GI isn't ideal for anyone, especially for those with weight issues, diabetes, or any chronic disease really. This is because having a high blood glucose level causes these conditions, as well as heart disease, and also contributes to many other inflammatory conditions.

The problem with the GI concept is that it generally only applies to foods containing carbohydrates, as these foods have the highest impact on blood glucose levels. Carbohydrates in the form of sugar, starch, grains and cereals (whether they are whole grains or not), breads, bakery products and alcohol, all get digested into glucose to raise blood glucose levels. Different carbohydrates have different GI levels so some turn into blood glucose quickly, and some less quickly. But they all still turn into blood glucose regardless - it doesn't mean that a slower GI food is better, as it just prolongs the inflammatory damage of blood glucose for a LONGER period of time!

In addition, it is known in published studies that carbohydrates when metabolised behave differently in each person! And worse is that someone with insulin resistance, diabetes or other health issue, will have a MUCH stronger reaction to ANY carbohydrate than some one who is relatively healthy. Eating "Low GI" is not going to help improve or fix these health conditions, or prevent them developing in others.

Reducing and restricting any of the abovementioned carbohydrates really is the first step in reducing blood glucose levels in these conditions. Swapping one carbohydrate for another isn't going to work!

Ignore the "Low GI Certified" label! It is misleading at best, and is just another marketing gimmick which has no reflection on the nutrient content or healthiness of the food. If anything, because the label is applied to packaged foods, that alone should say how unhealthy the "food" is. It's not whole, fresh, or real food. Real food doesn't have or need a label to tell you how healthy it is!

Marketing = lies!

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do you still need health insurance?

Glandular fever and EBV can lead to ongoing health issues

Diabetes organisations and educators cause more diabetes

What does a naturopath do?

Are "Low GI" foods healthier?

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