Xtend-Life Blog

An Insider's View of the Supplement Manufacturing Process Part 3.

Xtend-Life — Wed, 16 May 2012 00:02:00 GMT

Following on from Part 2, we will now go through the process of preparing the approved ingredients. I will show you how we 'blend' them and then make them into tablets and prepare them for enteric coating (in the case of Total Balance and some of our other products).

Before the manufacture of any product can commence, we must have a BMR which is short for ‘Batch Manufacturing Record’. This is quite an extensive group of documents relating to each batch. Without such a record there can be no guarantee that the end product will meet the specifications laid out for that formula.

The BMR covers every step of the process and is designed to pick up any potential errors along the way and spells out clearly the instructions that have to be completed at every stage and ensures full traceability with regards to the technicians, ingredients, equipment etc.

Examples of BMR

OK, we start by collecting the ingredients from the approved ingredient storage area in the factory.

Ingredients Being Selected Using the Pallet Truck

We now come to a critical part of the process, dispensing of the ingredients prior to blending. Under GMP rules this process has to be performed by two technicians so that each ingredient can be independently verified. There is no room for error with this process. Now, it is often stated that dietary supplements are safe, and so they are if the correct ingredients are used in the right amounts.

Some manufacturers have been quite critical of the requirement to have two people carrying out this process as it effectively doubles the labour cost of this process, but, that criticism is not warranted because without this requirement mistakes could be made due to human error.

For example, a formula may contain both Manganese Citrate and Magnesium Citrate. Magnesium Citrate is harmless and used in large amounts in many formulas. Manganese on the other hand is an important mineral which must only be used in minute amounts. There is a potential for the names of the two ingredients to be confused with each other. That would be a serious mistake which would mean that the product could not be released. Therefore, every ingredient is given a unique code in addition to the ingredient name. Both of these are always checked by the second operator and by QC at a later stage.

So, the rules are justified and should be followed meticulously!

The Dispensing Process

When the ingredients are dispensed, we do things a little differently at Xtend-Life, particularly when we are manufacturing our complex formulations such as Total Balance.

Instead of putting all the ingredients together we have a complex protocol for blending which takes several hours longer per batch than ‘conventional blending processes’. We group various ingredients together and for the very low dose ones we blend them separately with some of the other low dose ingredients. These ‘pre-blends’ are then added to the main blend as per a protocol which we have developed for each product.

How that is done is by doing test blends with specific markers at various ‘doses’ and then taking samples and sending to a lab to check the uniformity of the markers in the blend. This provides valuable information on the effectiveness of the blending protocol, allowing adjustment to be made if required.

Grouping of Low Dose Ingredients

After all the ingredients have been weighed out and put together in their respective groups we pass all of them through a sieve so we can view all the powders to ensure that they are free flowing.

Passing the Group Through the Sieve

The next step is to start the blending process. As I mentioned earlier, this is a complex process and one which we have developed and refined over the years. It is crucially important to the end product because if this step is not done correctly you will end up with a substandard product due to uneven distribution of ingredients.

This is one of the reasons why when some manufacturers products are tested by third parties that they sometimes find that there may be too little of some ingredients or too much of another. It is possible they put the correct amount of the ingredient in but it hasn’t been blended evenly. This is very common when a manufacturer uses a ribbon blender which is the type widely used in the industry. The problem with this type of blender is that the ingredients ‘stratify’ which means heavier particles settle to the bottom.

It is often a problem with products that are produced by contract manufacturers who produce a wide range of products and may not have had the time or the margins on a particular batch are too slim to establish proper blending protocols for that particular product.

To overcome the problem of stratification we had built a special ‘3D’ blender which has a rather odd motion but is the most effective means of blending powders. It doesn’t have baffles but rather uses gravity to do the mixing.

Here is a short video of it in motion:

At the presentation at A4M when I showed this blender, I suggested it was a good unit to wash cats or dogs! Some attendees enjoyed that, but some didn’t! Don’t worry, I don’t wash my dog in it!

That will do for this post. Next week I will explain what we have to do to ensure that the tablets we produce from the blend meet required specification.

When Your Skin Starts To Age

Xtend-Life — Tue, 15 May 2012 04:55:54 GMT

With the aging process, changes occur in the body. When it comes to the skin, these changes can be internal and external. External changes are associated with the skin's appearance while internal changes occur beneath the skin’s surface on a cellular level.

As you may know. the skin has three layers:

The Epidermis (Outermost layer)
The Dermis (Middle layer)
The Subcutaneous layer (Below the Dermis)

As we age, the epidermis begins to thin and melanocytes start decreasing in number...giving the skin a pale appearance.

As we age, our skin also loses its suppleness, texture and strength. This is associated with the Five Main Causes Of Aging...resulting in sagging appearances, wrinkles, fine lines and other visible signs of aging.

Here is the progression of the visible signs of aging characterized by age group:

Age 20-25: Vertical wrinkles start appearing on one's forehead and even lines between the eyebrows may already be visible. Fine lines at the external edges of the eyes are not yet noticeable...however, a history of heavy smoking, drinking and/or excessive exposure to the sun may result in these signs of premature aging starting to appear early in life.

Age 25-40: In the epidermis, wrinkles begin to deepen and more fine lines start appearing. Wrinkles are less than 0.0005 mm in depth and are usually caused by the superficial drying out of one's skin, damage and loss of collagen in the skin, as well as the slowing down of cellular renewal.

Age 40-50: Fine lines start appearing around the lips, crow's feet around the eyes, lines parallel to the nose and the line separating the eyebrows are all beginning to deepen and widen. The skin is now losing more of its natural strength and elasticity while shape of the face starts changing as the skin begins to sag...resulting in less defined facial contours.

Age 50 and over: Hormonal changes associated with menopause in women and the conversion of testosterone into estrogen in men accelerates the aging process. The skin's surface now shows clear and distinct signs of aging...these signs are only exacerbated by lifestyle factors like smoking, drinking, environmental elements, excessive junk food etc.

Regardless of your age, your skin needs a healthy foundation and the best way to nourish this foundation is through natural effective skincare products as well as dietary supplements formulated to contain ingredients that have proven efficacy when it comes to supporting skin health.

This one-two-punch combination is a great way to ensure your skin is getting the best nourishment it can.

Fight the Five Main Causes of Aging with the Xtend-Life skincare range. We have a women’s and a men’s range of products specifically formulated to suit the specific skin physiology and differences between the two genders.

Complementing this with products like the Total Balance range to nourish your skin from the inside out with Omega 3 / DHA Fish Oil Premium. You’ll be building the ideal foundation on which youthful, healthy skin can be built…regardless of your current age.

It’s never too late to start a complete skincare regime so why not give your skin the health and appearance it deserves by visiting the Xtend-Life skincare and Total Balance pages right now!

An Insider's View of the Supplement Manufacturing Process Part 2.

Xtend-Life — Thu, 10 May 2012 03:31:00 GMT

Step 1. Ingredient selection and testing.

A product is only as good as the ingredients that are selected. This in my opinion is where many products sometimes fall short of the mark with regard to efficacy. Part of the reason for this is that most consumers are blissfully unaware of the significant differences that there can be between ingredients that seem to be the same!

I’ll try and explain this statement a little better. Let’s say you are looking at a product and it has grape seed extract in it. Let’s also assume that both manufacturers are labelling their products in accordance with US FDA. The label would read “Grape seed extract (Vitis vinifera species – xxmgs”. That is all the label has to say. But, there can be a world of difference between them!

One grape seed extract could be an ethanol extract from *China and may have quite high levels of heavy metals depending upon the extraction method. On the other hand the other grape seed extract may be a water extract from grapes grown and harvested in New Zealand. They both sound the same but the difference is chalk to cheese in the levels of efficacy and purity, (we use only the water based one from New Zealand. *This should not be taken that all ingredients out of China are substandard. That is not the case. As in any other country there are some very good ones, but there are some very bad ones as well. You get what you pay for!)

However, the manufacturer has the ability to decide on the specifications of the ingredient they select. They are permitted to use the lower quality ingredient if they wish, which by the way could be 1/10th of the cost of the more effective ingredient. This may use twice as much which looks good for the consumer but still is only a 1/5th of the cost of the more effective product.

To perhaps illustrate this point even better let’s consider Red Grape Skin extract. Normal red grape skin which is full of valuable nutrients is normally produced after the red grapes have been fermented. The skins are white at that stage because the color has been leached out as part of the wine making process and the skins are a by-product.

There are around 20 actives in red grape skin but most red grape skin extracts only contain about 4 actives. Usually an ethanol extract is used.

In contrast the red grape skin extract that we use in our products is a water extracted New Zealand red grape skin which is NOT fermented and is a deep purple color. On analysis the extract is found to contain the exact same active profile as the raw red grape skin (i.e. around 20 actives).

BUT…on the label it reads exactly the same as one of the red grape skin extracts which can be sourced for a fraction of the price. The consumer never knows, and neither do most of the marketers of dietary supplements as they use contract manufacturers and they simply specify an amount of red grape skin extract and they don’t appreciate the differences. The contract manufacturers who have to bid for the business use the cheapest material they can.

But it is legal and within FDA GMP guidelines. No one can specify a particular quality of an ingredient in a dietary supplement, just like car manufacturers cannot be forced to make every car to the same quality as a Rolls Royce. At the end of the day it is up to the manufacturer as to what standard they set for their products even though they know most of their customers may never know what their policy is.

OK…I hope I have explained this issue adequately.

So, having determined the quality of the ingredient you want, then the manufacturer under cGMP is required to prove that the ingredient that they are using is indeed the same as the specification that they have determined should be used in that particular product.

This requires a specification to be prepared for each ingredient. I have posted a copy below of a typical spec. (Natural Products (NZ) Ltd is part of the Xtend-Life group and is our manufacturing operation.)

INGREDIENT SPECIFICATION

You will see the specification covers not only the microbiological and heavy metal tests but also full identification and assay testing. We also specify the carrier to be used in the extract…and all these ingredients do have carriers.

Oh, here are some photographs of our QA (Quality Assurance) office with some of our staff.

When the raw ingredients arrive at the factory the storeman logs them in, delivery documents are checked against the purchase order and the containers labeled with quarantine stickers and stored in the warehouse quarantine area.

PHOTO OF THE RAW INGREDIENTS BEING WHEELED INTO THE TESTING AREA

Next a technician from the QA dept takes samples of each ingredient in the sampling booth. The container of ingredient then stored remains in the secure quarantine area and cannot be used until it passes all the following steps.

PHOTO OF A STAFF MEMBER TAKING THE SAMPLES

Multiple samples are then sent to specialist accredited labs:

Micro testing for possible contaminants
Another for heavy metal testing
Another for identity and assay testing to confirm potency and purity

We also retain another two samples, one for retention and another which we use for own ‘in house’ ID testing below.

PHOTO OF THE SAMPLES

This is the machine we use when doing some of our ‘in house’ testing

PHOTO OF THE FTIR MACHINE

This is what the print out for the ingredient ID looks like.

The following are examples of the microbiological test, heavy metal tests and assay tests.

MICRO REPORT - BUTCHER'S BROOM

HEAVY METAL REPORT - BUTCHER'S BROOM

ASSAY TEST REPORT - BUTCHER'S BROOM

The above explains the process that each ingredient goes through before it can be released into the production process.

In the next post I will go through the next step which prepares the blend for tableting.

Why don't we have Consumer Lab test our products?

Xtend-Life — Wed, 09 May 2012 03:32:00 GMT

Over the years this question has constantly come up. Just yesterday it was raised on the Blog by a reader/customer. This is what was asked:

"Hi, I noticed your products are not covered or reviewed by ConsumerLab.com (the most famous/trusted provider of independent test results and information to help consumers and healthcare professionals evaluate health, wellness, and nutrition products) May I know, is there any specific reason? I emailed ConsumerLab.com and they requested I suggest to you that your company participate in ConsumerLab.com's testing. Thanks."

Because it is a question in many customer’s minds I thought that I would put the time into giving a detailed explanation to clarify the situation.

So, the following is our response to this question:

Yes, we would like to do something with Consumer Lab but it is not practical to do so as I will explain further. I would make the comment though that the assertion that Consumer Lab is ‘the most famous/trusted provider…’, is somewhat off the mark and they have been very controversial over the years. Some of the work they do is very good…but, quite a bit is questionable.

Consumer Lab is a very effective marketing business, and they are there for a single reason…profit!! They are not a consumer organization as it seems at first glance. In fact, they are not actually a laboratory at all.

We understand that their lab work is contracted out to various laboratories but a list is not supplied identifying whom these labs are and as such it is not known if those labs are GMP compliant. Consumer Lab provides services to manufacturers for a fee and they also sell information to consumers on the basis that it is independent. It is unclear if many consumers are aware of this. In other words they have a business model which creates revenue from consumers and industry alike and as such there sometimes appears to be some bias in what they do.

There have been many complaints by industry that if they do not pay to have their products reviewed that they may find they get a negative one if selected for testing, but if they do pay and Consumer Lab gets a negative finding that they are not published. I have no first hand info about these issues and I make them as an observer from reading many news articles about Consumer Lab over the years.

I actually met Ted Cooperman the President and Founder of Consumer Lab about 8 years ago in Washington and discussed the possibility of having Consumer Lab do testing of our products. I was told that this could have been done for a fee which at that time was around $35,000 for just one product. However we did not pursue this with Consumer Lab for several reasons which I will allude to shortly.

The random tests that Consumer Lab conduct on a regular basis and publish to consumers on a subscription basis, are usually only for a very small number of actives in each product and this is generally done without each manufacturer being involved in the validation of the test methods. Because of this, the results can sometimes be suspect and this does from time to time trigger off legal action because of the damage it can do to the affected company. There is much more to testing a supplement product than just purchasing a product off the shelf and sending it to a lab and asking for an analysis of certain ingredients. Let me give you some background…

You are probably aware that we are compliant with the FDA cGMP code for Dietary Supplements, and we are members of the Natural Products Association of the US. We also have a HACCP program which is audited by the NZ Food Safety Authority, part of the NZ Ministry of Health. We work with a range of GMP labs in New Zealand, Australia and the USA. In reality it generally costs between about $5000 - $15000 to do the method development and validation for each marker (ingredient) in the case of the complex products which Xtend-Life produces.

The reason for this is that the marker has to be identified and quantified based on an active compound within anywhere between 30 – 90 other ingredients, all of which have the potential to either mask or magnify the test results. This means that a test method that works for an ingredient in one product may not work for the same ingredient in a different product. In the case of some ingredients it is impossible to test for them in a complex finished product. This is one of the reasons that Consumer Lab can have problems with manufacturers as it is sometimes impossible to get an accurate result unless the expensive method development and validation steps are first carried out.

So, to put our Xtend-Life’s situation into perspective if it was possible to do this with every ingredient and Consumer Lab was to develop a protocol for all 85 ingredients in our Total Balance mix the costs to them would be in the order of around $750,000. An accurate analysis simply could not be done for $35,000. We have had to invest heavily in developing the protocols for ingredients but it would not be commercially sensible to share this info with others.

One of the many reasons that we test the activity of every raw material we purchase along with using detailed SOP’s (standard operating procedures) is to control every process and every step of production, and there are dozens of pages of paperwork that follow every batch through production, with every step being signed and then checked and signed off by QC & QA staff.

Finished product testing is important, and we do it not only for our own satisfaction but also to comply with our GMP program, but, it is only through following the rigorous procedures that I mentioned that we can be completely certain that every product is true to label. End product testing can never give a 100% reliable and accurate result.

Our processes how we achieve this will become more apparent to you as the posts explaining how we make our supplements are made over the next week or two.

An Insider's View of the Supplement Manufacturing Process Part 1.

Xtend-Life — Thu, 03 May 2012 01:56:00 GMT

As I mentioned in an earlier blog posting, I would give readers a simplified summary of how we make our supplements. To save time I have copied the main points out of a presentation that I did about three years ago to the A4M Anti-aging Conference in Bangkok where I was a guest speaker.

This will be a series of blog postings in which using that presentation I will outline some regulatory background, the QA process and then the manufacturing steps through to when the product is dispatched to our customers.

Before I start, the photo that you see is where we are based in Christchurch New Zealand.

This photo was taken before the series of earthquakes which started in Sept 2010 with the most severe one last February. The city skyline is a bit different now in that the high rise buildings that you see in the background have all now being demolished along with another 1000 buildings in the CBD. Some of the houses you seen in the foreground are no longer there as large pieces of the cliff ‘shaved off’ in the last big shake last June.

Fortunately the quakes have now settled down and with a bit of luck will be stable for the next 1000 years or so. As I have mentioned in earlier blog posts, we were lucky in that our factory, offices and warehouse although damaged were all repairable so we had minimal disruption.

OK, let’s start!

The objective of the A4M presentation was:

"To present an overview of how supplements are manufactured"

This will consist of the following:

1. Regulatory Overview

Overview of GMP
Myths about the US FDA

2. Manufacturing: A Step By Step Process

Regulatory Overview

Some countries have strict regulations, some don’t. Those Countries with clear cut rules and enforcement are: Australia, Canada, USA.

New Zealand has regulations and subject supplement companies to standards and audits. However, some of the regulations are somewhat dated and new regulations have been prepared and are currently going through the select committee process before being submitted to Parliament.

Because the majority of our customers are in the USA we operate under USA FDA guidelines (cGMP).

Some background about US GMP

When it was first proposed some years ago there was a lot of opposition from manufacturers because of the extra costs it would impose.
The GMP code is very comprehensive and in our opinion reasonable and necessary.
On the 28th June, 2010 every company wanting to sell products in the US or to the US market should be GMP compliant. Sadly as at 2011 apparently about 70% of US manufacturers will still not compliant.
US FDA started visits to inspect foreign manufacturers facility as from October 1, 2010

Is a US FDA registered facility GMP compliant?

There is a lot of misunderstanding about what an FDA registered facility is. Here are the key points:

The US FDA does not approve any facility. The only time that a supplement manufacturing facility may get an ‘indirect approval’ is if the FDA does a surprise audit and the facility if found compliant in all respects and no rectification notices are issues. That does still not amount to approval but rather that the facility was compliant at the time of audit.
As such there is no list of FDA approved facilities
There is however a list of FDA registered facilities which we are on
There is not a list of GMP compliant facilities
The FDA Registration of facilities came about as part of the “Bioterrorism Act of 2002”

I felt it was important that the above was made clear as there is a lot of misinformation about GMP and regulations, particularly on the internet. Also, contrary to what some media and others may say the US FDA is very active in policing the GMP regulations. We receive copies of notifications of non-compliance and rarely does a week go by where a manufacturer is not issue a non-compliance notice with a demand for rectification.

This will be enough for today. My next post will start on the manufacturing process. There are three vital components needed to ensure that supplements are of high quality and effective.

1.   The Formulation. This is a very complex process and will not be addressed at this stage as the methods that we follow are commercially sensitive.
2.   The selection of ingredients. This is critical and will make or break a supplement. I will explain not so much as to how they are selected but rather what is done to ensure that what is selected is what we get and use.
3.   The manufacturing process itself which guarantees that the supplement contains what is says on the label.

NEXT post: The first step…

Learning From Our Kids

Xtend-Life — Wed, 02 May 2012 01:43:25 GMT

Watching my 16-month old son is more entertainment (and education) than anyone could ever want. I'm constantly blown away by how the little things he's fascinated by, I generally take for granted.

Besides sports, cars, birds, planes and the ocean waves, my son’s other favorite nuances have only recently given me a stark slap of reality and the sudden realization of how ‘perfect’ we are as babies and toddlers...and yet, we as human beings simply throw it all away as we age.

Posture: Watch a toddler stand or sit...most of the time, they do it with a straight back and seemingly effortless stance. Now, watch the line of adults standing in a queue at the bank, DMV or airport lounge. Quite a difference isn’t it! But why? How can we lose the ‘skills’ we’re born with so quickly?

Lifting: Most toddlers have this weird built-in awareness mechanism that prompts them to know how to lift an object off the floor easily and without damaging their joints...starting with the knees and NOT the back. Millions of people worldwide need to be aware of this before they do unnecessary damage to their lower backs

Learning: You’re never too old to learn. At the ripe old age of 31, I’ve realized that despite my own stubborn nature...I’m still learning new things on a daily basis. The sheer pace and wide range of skills, words and gestures that my son is learning may be normal for a kid his age...but for adults, it’s nearly impossible. He already understands both English (the language which I speak to him in) and Portuguese (the language which my wife speaks to him in)...and yet, he can still learn another four or five languages at his age. Why? Toddlers’ brains are more fascinating than those of even the most intelligent adults. Toddlers don’t have any pre-conceived notions or self-generated hurdles that prevent them from forming opinions or questions about who/what/where/how/when/why...

It’s always good to ask these questions but when it comes to learning something new...it’s best to simply open your mind to it and embrace it with minimum fuss and stress. A great way to experiment this is to try throwing a ball or writing with your less-dominant arm/hand. By visualizing the movement/action with your dominant hand and carrying this through via some practice strokes with your less dominant hand, you’ll surprise yourself at how quickly you can become ambidextrous.

Explore the world: Some may say it’s a genuine human trait, others may say it’s something that we cannot ignore. When it comes to exploration...I say we’re already doing it as children, so why stop!? Exploration generates knowledge and this knowledge can benefit every aspect of how lives. My son exploring the garden yields new sights, smells, sounds, touches (and unfortunately, some bad tastes too) for him on a daily basis. These experiences will stay with him for life and help paint a picture of the world in which he lives. The same can be applied to us adults. Exploring new territories, cultures, foods, lifestyles and beliefs makes us remember that we share this world with over 7 billion people. Exploration leads to knowledge and this knowledge leads to respect for our fellow man.

Sugar is Evil: A birthday party where too much sugar-laced sweets and drinks were given resulted in a miserable, over-stimulated child that wasn’t the one I was used to. More proof that sugar should be avoided at all costs...from birth to adulthood.

All You Need Is Love: The Beatles summed this up perfectly in their 1967 hit tune. When I get home late, tired and weary from a long busy day, my son’s beaming smile and tight little hug not only take away any stress I was feeling...more importantly, it makes me realize what’s real and what’s really important in life.

These are just some of the things I’ve learnt from my 16-month old son and I thought that I’d share these with you to help you apply them to every day experiences you may encounter on a daily basis.

How do we make our supplements?

Xtend-Life — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 22:08:19 GMT

With regular news items about this or that supplement being found to either have contaminants or not contain what the label claims, it is natural that we sometimes have customers questioning us about our manufacturing processes and quality control.

So, I thought that it would be sensible to put together a series of blog articles which goes through the various steps that we take to ensure that we only supply you with the highest possible quality products and why they are ‘true to label’.

These articles will start next week and will include photographs and copies of documents which will give you a better understanding of what it takes to make a quality supplement. It will also enable readers to ask questions about the process at any step of the way.

We won’t at this stage deal with the rationale which goes behind the formulas and why certain ingredients are selected. The focus will be on the process itself.

Until next week...

Why Skin Care For Men?

Xtend-Life — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 22:34:00 GMT

Skin care may seem like a scary topic to some guys, especially a few years ago. However these days, more and more men are realizing the importance of looking after their skin. Men tend to have a slightly oilier skin than women which also makes them prone to clogged pores and skin conditions like acne, pimples and blackheads.

Imagine if men didn’t wash their faces with natural effective facial cleansers! In this day and age, you’ll find many men follow some form of skin routine and it almost always starts with a cleanser. Unfortunately, many cleansers contain harsh chemicals and ingredients that may cause more damage to the skin than actually clean it.

This is why using Xtend-Life’s Foaming Facial Cleanser has become so popular with our male customers. It’s a product that they can identify with and it deep cleanses the skin with its synergistic formula of natural ingredients.

Now moving onto shaving. What a mission! I loathe shaving and wish I could grow a beard instead. However, my wife won’t let me into the house if I did, hence why I have to shave every day.

Like most men who shave frequently, my skin can get dehydrated quite easily. This is why using a moisturizing cream like Xtend-Life’s Men’s Age Defense Active Facial Fluid as an aftershave as well as a general facial moisturizer is brilliant for the skin...as opposed to alcohol-based aftershaves and other moisturizers containing chemicals or parabens.

You don’t want to be adding harsh chemical-based products to your skin...especially after a bout of shaving when your skin is vulnerable.

It’s also important to nourish your skin from the inside out. Using Omega 3 / DHA Fish Oil Premium is a great way to lay the foundation for better skin health and appearance from the very cells that make the skin what it is.

This one-two punch approach to skincare is something that many men will benefit from. Coupled with maintaining their health and wellbeing through nutritional supplements like Total Balance Men’s and ensuring better digestion with the help of Kiwi-Klenz (digestion can play a key role in the health and appearance of the skin), you too can get the kind of skin that makes you look how you feel...younger, healthier and full of life!

Digesten-K becomes Kiwi-Klenz

Xtend-Life — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 23:02:43 GMT

Apart from our Omega 3 fish oil range and our Total Balance range, our most popular product is definitely Digesten-K. This product has been responsible for helping thousands of our customers improve their digestive system.

I personally use it every day. I confess, I take 2 caps a day as opposed to the standard dose rate of 1 per day. I find that I get best results if I take the extra one in the evening or after the evening meal. Sometimes I may take two caps at that time or even just before I go to bed.

Anyway, the point of this blog post is to let you know that we have just changed the name of this product. The reason for this is that as we expand our global operations we have to deal with more regulatory authorities for product registrations. We have come across some countries in Asia who will not allow us to use the name Digesten-K as they consider it to be too close to the word ‘Digestion’.

So, we figured that rather than ‘fight’ the system that we would change the name of the product to something that still reflects what it does as well as indicating what it is. We came up with the name of Kiwi-Klenz which is line with its primary function of helping to ‘clean out’, balance, restore and support digestive health!

There is no change to the formula at all, it is the same as the ‘old’ Digesten-K, so if you are re-ordering you will still get the same product with the same benefits.

Malnourished with fruit and veges

Xtend-Life — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 03:08:14 GMT

The blog article that Caramia wrote yesterday prompted me to 'reprint' an article I wrote almost ten years ago. It is still in the archives of 'Xtend-Your-Life' on the newsletter page of our website.

As the content is still appropriate today given the situation has not improved but rather has continued to deteriorate, I thought you may find it interesting.

Malnourished…with fruit and veges? This will shock you!

Published on the 21st August 2002

This is a concept that you may have difficulty in accepting. Nonetheless it is one that I have been ‘preaching’ for years and has now been confirmed by studies showing people in the US, Canada and the UK are amongst the most malnourished in the world. This is the case in spite of obesity reaching epidemic proportions in the US. Malnourishment is without doubt a leading factor in a wide variety of health problems including cancers.

Does this mean that overweight people are eating all the food to the detriment of the rest of the population? Not at all! In fact, obese people figure prominently amongst those people who are malnourished.

I can sense you thinking... ”That’s a crazy statement”. After all, when you think of someone being malnourished your mind flashes to pictures which you have seen on TV of starving children in Africa. How can an overweight person be malnourished?

Much easier than you think... please read on and I will explain.

The Problem is in the Food!

A recent analysis of a range of staple foods in Canada including potatoes, tomatoes, bananas, apples, onion, broccoli etc, etc was commissioned by The Globe and Mail and CTV news.

The results were predictable to some and a shock to others. Let’s use potatoes as an example. This is what the analysis found:

Over the last 50 years the potato has lost:

•   100% of its Vitamin A
•   57% of its Vitamin C and iron
•   28% of its Calcium
•   50% of its riboflavin

• 18% of its thiamine

Of the seven nutrients analyzed only niacin levels had increased. The results were similar for all the 25 fruits and vegetables tested. One of the worst results was from broccoli in which ALL nutrients had declined measurably including niacin with Calcium down 63%.

The Globe and Mail and CTV used comparative figures from government researchers for the years 1951, 1972 and 1999. These earlier figures had been published in various scientific journals in the UK including the British Food journal. Release of this data in the US has been limited to a few alternative health journals.

Tim Lang a professor at the centre for Food Policy in England says as a further example of how our food has been degraded is that you would now have to eat eight oranges today to get the same amount of Vitamin A that your grandparents got from eating just one orange.

What’s gone wrong?

That’s simple to explain. Consumer demand for cheaper and ‘good looking’ food has over recent decades changed traditional farming methods as well as distribution. A farmer used to rotate his crops to suit his land and maximized his yields through natural methods and then supplied his fresh produce to his local market for distribution.

Regrettably that is largely the way of the past. Now, the emphasis is on production, appearance, storability and transportability. Nutritional value of fruits and vegetables is of virtually no concern. As Dr Phil Warman, an agronomist and professor of agricultural sciences at Nova Scotia Agricultural College points out, “crops are bred to produce higher yields, to be resistant to disease and to produce more visually attractive fruits or vegetables, but little or no emphasis is placed on their vitamin and mineral content.”

Unfortunately the situation is getting worse as more Corporations become more vertically integrated and control the entire food process from supplying the seeds through all the production stages, and distribution. Because of these controls some farmers have become little more than modern day serfs with almost no options left to them other than contract to these major conglomerates and conform to their ‘corporate’ farming methods.

Add to this the increasing foothold of GE engineered crops where nutritional value is way down on the priority list and this problem is going to become much, much more serious and will I believe flow on to an elevation of health problems such as cancer and brain disease which may well reach epidemic proportions over the next couple of decades unless the public wake up to what is happening.

Do foods that have low nutritional values play a part in obesity?

Absolutely! I believe this is a major factor in the current epidemic of obesity. If you are lacking in essential nutrients it will have a serious flow-on effect in your body. First of all you will never really feel ‘well’, you will lack energy which means you exercise less, and you will have a tendency to seek out ‘comfort’ foods which generally contain sugars and thus the cycle continues and it gets worse and worse and ultimately ends up in obesity and ill health.

What can be done about this problem?

Try to eat organic fruit and vegetables wherever possible.
Avoid processed foods! If you think the loss of nutrient value in fresh fruit and vegetables is bad enough, I can assure you that it is nothing compared to the nutritional emptiness of processed foods... and to add insult to injury they are full of transfats due to the hydrogenated processing methods that are used.
Take a QUALITY multi NUTRIENT supplement. A multi vitamin/mineral tablet is not adequate for a number of reasons. The prime one is that most ‘multi vitamin’ supplements use synthetic ingredients with both questionable efficacy and bio-availability and they lack other important nutrients. Unfortunately this is an area in which many consumers are being mislead. It’s a complex subject and as such I may devote a newsletter to this very important subject in the not to distant future.

It was interesting to see that even some mainstream physicians are beginning to recognize this problem as evidenced by a recent article in JAMA which advocated people take quality supplements for preventative measures.

Overweight but Undernourished?

Xtend-Life — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 04:44:40 GMT

"Obesity is extremely common and it is probably the most widespread form of malnutrition," said Health researcher Gary Taubes in 1967

"Americans are overfed and undernourished," says Functional medical pioneer Dr Mark Hyman today (ref 1)

How can such apparently opposite states co-exist? How can nutrient deficiency contribute to the growing global prevalence of being overweight and obese. And why?

How Can We Be Overweight and Undernourished?

We totally agree with Dr Mark Hyman who explains it like this: “The mistake is to think that if you eat an abundance of calories, your diet automatically delivers all the nutrients your body needs. But the opposite is true. The more processed food you eat, the more vitamins you need.

That’s because vitamins and minerals lubricate the wheels of our metabolism, helping the chemical reactions in our bodies run properly. Among those biochemical processes greased by nutrients is the regulation of sugar and burning of fat. The problem is that the standard American diet (SAD) is energy dense (too many calories) but nutrient poor (not enough vitamins and minerals). Too many “empty calories” confuse the metabolism and pack on the pounds.”

Staggering Stats

Let’s look at the USA for example... more than of 30 % of American diets fall short of such common plant-derived nutrients as magnesium, vitamin C, vitamin E, and vitamin A. More than 80 % of Americans are running low on vitamin D And 9 out of 10 people are deficient in omega-3 fats, which are critical for staving off inflammation and controlling blood sugar levels (ref 2)

This is hardly surprising when we know that the top 9 foods consumed by Americans are (ref 3):

Whole cow's milk
2% milk
Processed American cheese
White bread
White flour
White rolls
Refined sugars
Cola
Ground beef

We might think that dairy foods are a good thing. Well, they can be when eaten raw and unprocessed. But pasteurised, homogenized and chemically, hormone laden dairy is a different matter entirely!

In fact, the Federal Trade Commission asked the USDA (ref 4) to look into the scientific basis of the claims made in the’ milk mustache’ ads about cow’s milk. Their panel of scientists stated the truth clearly: Cow’s milk does not enhance sports performance; there is no evidence that it is good for your bones or even that it prevents osteoporosis (and in fact, the animal protein in milk may cause bone loss); and it is linked to prostate cancer and heart disease, not to mention the digestive problems experienced by 75% of the population who are lactose intolerant.

After dairy, the most consumed foods all contain forms of refined sugar which fuel the epidemic of insulin resistance. Lastly, there is ground beef, very high in hormones, antibiotics and xenobiotics as well as the occasional toxigenic E. coli!

These foods have a very low NCR, or nutrient to calorie ratio. In other words, they are nutritionally empty calories.

Yet we gorge on them!

Indeed, according to a 2010 IASO/IOTF analysis (ref 5), I was staggered to discover that there are approximately 1.0 billion over weight adults globally (BMI 25-29.9 Kg/m²), and a further 475 million are obese. And the March 2012 Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA ref 6) describes how between 1984 and 1997, there was more than a 15% increase in the average daily calorie intake per person in the United States. Goodness knows how much that will have increased today!

Another startling fact: by 2000, Americans spent $110 billion on fast food. This exceeds the amount spent on higher education, computers or new cars. On any given day, about 25% of Americans visit a fast food outlet and the typical American eats three burgers a week from one of 30,000 fast food outlets.

If these figures don’t give you indigestion I don’t know what will! No wonder over 85% of Americans have one or more degenerative diseases by the time they turn 65.

Given that many of us are now part of nutritionally deficient culture where we eat too much, but are starving; when we’re always busy, yet we get nothing done; where we have access to innumerable communication tools, yet we’re longing for meaningful social connections. What can we do?

What can we do?

Listen to Hippocrates

“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food”. We need to understand how nutrition can create health or disease; how a vital, well functioning body comes from eating vital food - food with life.

Despite the "conflicting" scientific studies and media reports designed to confound rather than enlighten, there is no confusion about what constitutes good nutrition.

If we want healthy bodies, we must put the right raw materials into our bodies: real, whole, local, fresh, unadulterated, unprocessed, and chemical, hormone, and antibiotic free foods. They come naturally ‘packaged’ with a vast array of nutrients that work synergistically to optimize health. This means that they synergistically reduce inflammation, boost detoxification, balance hormones, provide powerful antioxidant protection while vanquishing malnutrition and repairing the underlying causes of disease.

Listen to your body

Perhaps the best barometer of what you need is how you feel. When you eat properly for your genetic constitution and metabolism your weight will normalise, your energy will improve and often many seemingly unrelated physical complaints will disappear. In short, you will feel great. If you don’t, you won’t!

Think about it: your body can only operate with the quality of food you provide it. In other words: "junk in, junk out. Vital, living food = vitality".

The Starbucks Soap Opera... Fussing About The Wrong Thing?

Xtend-Life — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 04:38:12 GMT

Starbucks recently made news headlines across the world after it was revealed that the company used cochineal extract to give its popular Strawberry & Crème Frappuccino the rosy pink color many customers like.

What’s cochineal extract? Well, it’s derived from grinding up the dried bodies of cochineal bugs, found mostly in Mexico and South America and a coloring method that’s been going on since the 15th century.

Besides the expected negative reaction from vegetarians who were unaware of the ‘hidden’ ingredient, I’m baffled as to why so many people who aren’t vegetarians reacted the same way to the news.

In many cultures, insects are used for many various applications...mostly in food. Considering their sheer vast numbers, I really think there’s little concern for many of the commonly used species becoming extinct.

Sure, it may not be everyone’s idea of the ideal ingredient...but believe me, there’s more to be worried about this pink-colored drink than a few crushed beetles.

Just visit the Starbucks website and take a look at the Strawberry & Crème Frappuccino page...no matter what size you choose or whether you want whipped cream or not, the minimum amount of sugar you’re likely to be ingesting with every drink is staggering!

It’s absolutely incredible that some people kick up a fuss about cochineal extract yet they’re more than willing to open themselves up to type-2 diabetes and several other health ailments directly related to regular excessive intakes of sugar.

If Starbucks could reduce the large amount of sugar in this drink and cut out the milk - which is hardly a healthy component of any beverage - they could actually have a reasonably healthy drink.

Instead of using artificial coloring, they’re using a natural harmless source. Even though it may not sound like pleasant to some people, I’m sure logic would prevail if you considered the chemical and synthetic alternatives.

Aspirin Back In The News...

Xtend-Life — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 03:25:33 GMT

Aspirin, the world's most well-known drug is back in the news. This time, there are claims that it prevents cancer. This is just one of many apparent benefits of this so-called 'wonder drug'. The medical fraternity and media...as seen in this recent article on the Time website...will probably have you believe that aspirin also removes carpet stains, mildew and who knows what other miracles.

Okay, so maybe I was over-doing it a little, but it doesn’t deter from the fact that despite whatever significant medical treatments and preventions are associated with aspirin, not everyone should be taking it. In fact, it’s a drug by definition which means no one should actually be taking it unless its absolutely necessary.

What really blows my mind is that the overall perception created by this drug’s hype points to the suggestion that everyone should be taking it daily. Even those people who may need to address a few conditions or ailments need to think about any form of treatment with a clear head...regardless if it’s a cheap everyday drug like aspirin or some multi-million dollar pharmaceutical ‘wonder cure’.

Unless I’ve missed it, I cannot find any references or suggestions of following a healthy lifestyle, exercising regularly, drinking enough water and ensuring you’re getting enough of the right nutrients.

The problem with news reports like this is that the some people tend to believe that they can continue living their current lifestyles (regardless of how unhealthy they may be) and that by simply taking an aspirin daily, their chances of getting cancer or any other disease will be virtually zero.

This article looks at the common reason why aspirin is given to high-risk cardiac patients as it helps to prevent heart attacks by preventing blood clots from forming, which can impede blood flow to the heart and brain.

However, the following excerpt reveals the side of aspirin many people may not know about:

“The new study in Archives is the largest of its kind to date. It includes nine clinical trials which together involve more than 100,000 study participants from a number of developed countries. In each of the nine trials, participants were randomly assigned either to take a daily aspirin or to take a placebo. On average, the aspirin-takers took their pills for six years.

“The analysis finds that, on average among the trials, one cardiovascular disease event was averted for every 120 people who took a daily aspirin. But there was one “nontrivial bleeding event” for every 73 people on the daily aspirin regimen. And the researchers found no significant difference in mortality between the aspirin groups and the placebo groups.”

The media needs to demonstrate responsibility when report on any story associated with pharmaceutical drugs...highlighting both potential treatments as well as the side effects and risks associated with them.

Aspirin has been around for many decades and may have helped contribute to some people addressing some ailments but it’s hardly a ‘miracle wonder drug’. In my opinion, there’s no such thing.

Following a pipe-dream where a pill can solve any health condition that is directly the result of a person’s unhealthy lifestyle and diet, is never the best solution. It may treat one or two conditions but without a holistic approach to health and wellbeing, you’ll be fighting a losing battle.

Footnote from Warren: The above posting was done by Dean one of our contributing editors. I thought I should just add something.

In the article that Dean refers to reference is made to a 15 – 37% reduction in the risk of dying from cancer for those people taking aspirin. That sounds impressive but in reality it is not as spectacular as it may appear when it is put into perspective. I’ll explain.

Let’s take the average figures of death caused by cancer of all types across all races. It is about 5.4 people per 1,000. So, if there is a reduction of 15 – 37% in death rates then the mortality rate goes from 5.4 people per 1,000 to between 4.59 – 3.6 per 1,000. In other words, about 1 – 2 people per 1,000 or, overall about 0.001 – 0.002%! Not so significant when you look at it this way! Then there could be many other factors which even generated that result such as the percentage of those people who were taking aspirin being more health conscious in many other ways! These results of some of these studies have to be considered from multiple angles.

Take Your Pick Guys... Dysfunction or Good Hair?

Xtend-Life — Thu, 29 Mar 2012 03:12:55 GMT

You'd be amazed at the choice that some men would prefer... especially in light of the hair-loss drug called finasteride. According to this article, some of the potential side effects are low libido and the inability to orgasm in men using the drug.

Worse still, these symptoms may still occur for many years after stopping the drug! The following excerpt from the article looks at the study published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine...the results may shock you:

“...the new survey of 76 men aged 21 to 46 found that sexual problems including erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation lasted at least three months after men stopped taking the pill.

“Among the study participants, some of whom had taken finasteride for just a few days, 94% said they experienced low sexual desire, 92% reported low sexual arousal, 92% developed erectile dysfunction and 69% had trouble having orgasm.

“Participants had taken finasteride for 28 months on average, and reported sexual problems for an average 40 months, but the study author said that 10% of the surveyed men had used the drug for less than a month.”

However, as scary as these side effects are, some men still take hair-loss and baldness so seriously, they may ignore these risks and use this drug or other expensive and potentially dangerous hair-loss ‘cures’.

Male pattern baldness is caused by various factors such as genetics, aging and nutrient deficiencies. Some men find that by taking a daily nutriment supplement like Total Balance, their rate of hair-loss reduces and according to one Xtend-Life customer, his grey hair even returned to its natural dark color.

Now although this is just one person’s experience there are definitely benefits from taking a supplement like Total Balance which targets two of the above mentioned causes of baldness...aging and nutrient deficiency.

Although, some men still go bald no matter how healthy they are or what their age is. I’ll put myself into this category. Even though I’m healthy, reasonably fit and 31 years old, I’ve got way more forehead than I used to have when I was 16!

Nevertheless, I’m comfortable with my receding hairline. By keeping it really short, it’s one less thing to worry before stepping out the house. I’ve embraced my baldness and accepted that it’s my genetic make-up that caused the hair-loss. Best of all, my wife loves my current appearance so that’s an added bonus.

Some men on the other hand prefer to have a full head of hair and there are safe methods out there which men can choose to get a head of full, thick natural hair that’s actually their own follicles.

Some of these treatments are expensive but they can be effective...unlike pharmaceutical drugs and ‘miracle hair-loss treatment creams’ currently on the market which come with a list of potential side effects.

Whatever your preference is, I’d encourage you to weigh up all your options before thinking about any hair-loss drug.

We’ll be featuring an in-depth article on male pattern baldness as well as the causes and treatments available in the June issue of the Xtend-Your-Life, so be sure to look out for it from the middle of May.

Is a supplement still a supplement if it prevents, treats or cures?

Xtend-Life — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 02:40:00 GMT

This was a question put to the audience at a recent industry conference at Anaheim, California (March 2012) by one of the invited speakers Bill Sardi. The rationale for his question arose from the fact that the FDA and most other authorities throughout the world do not allow claims that a supplement or natural ingredient will prevent, treat or cure a disease or illness.

So, what happens if there is irrefutable evidence that a supplement ingredient does those things? Frequently new evidence comes up somewhere that supports this or that ingredient does prevent, treat or cure illnesses! Some of the evidence has been around for a long time…for example, we all know that Vitamin C prevents scurvy but it would be illegal to make a claim to that effect as that would make Vitamin C a drug!

Bill Sardi is known in the dietary supplement industry for his well-researched writings on a variety of subjects and the promotion of a brand of resveratrol supplements. He raised this matter at the conference because he was frustrated from being prevented by the FDA to carry out a clinical study on resveratrol with Duke University. The main focus of the study was to consider the efficacy of resveratrol on aged macular degeneration. However, because it was essentially a disease prevention study the FDA refused approval for it to proceed!

This creates somewhat of a quandary for manufactures/developers of dietary supplements who want to prove the efficacy of a product or ingredient. We have started investigating ways in which a clinical study could be designed to help prove the efficacy of Total Balance. It is not an easy thing to do as there are many barriers to overcome such as the one which Bill Sardi has experienced…but, it will happen…although it won’t be any time soon.

Dry Labbing...

Xtend-Life — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 03:29:25 GMT

Rather an odd 'heading' which I hadn’t heard of until a couple of days ago. Apparently this is the term used by some people to describe the practice in which some laboratories doing testing for dietary supplement companies don’t actually do the tests at all!

Instead they claim they have the correct equipment for the testing and provide a report saying that the ingredient being tested meets the specification, even when they haven’t done the test. In some cases this is done in collaboration with the manufacturer, sometimes not.

This was to be the theme of “Dateline NBC” in a story about the dietary supplement industry which was to have aired last Sunday the 18th March. Not sure if it did go to air as we have not had any feedback as yet.

It is a real shame that some companies stoop to such low levels which brings the entire industry into disrepute. The cost of testing is not that great relative to the overall cost of producing a product so there is no excuse for a manufacturer not doing proper testing…

With regard to labs that indulge in this practice, and manufacturers that knowingly participate they are nothing short of fraudulent enterprises! Over time these companies will be weeded out as a good auditor will discover these practices.

Finding good labs, as with finding good manufacturers is a time consuming business. We spent many months researching reliable qualified labs. We need multiple labs because we conduct many specialised tests and no one lab can do all of them as they require different equipment, or, in some cases they may have the equipment but they have not developed the validated methods to carry out specific tests. This accreditation is either from a government agency, such as the FDA in the USA or Medsafe (Department of Health) in New Zealand or organizations like IANZ (International Accreditation New Zealand) or ANSI-ASQ National Accreditation Board/ACLASS in the USA who audit the Laboratories compliance with GLP’s (Good Laboratory Practice’s) and ISO standards.

In other words you may have a government approved lab (or in the case of one of the labs we use, a government owned lab) but it may not be setup to do certain tests. We use seven labs. Three in New Zealand, three in the USA, and one in Australia. They have all proven to be reliable, ethical and accurate. They are as follows:

Asure Quality - New Zealand
Cawthron - New Zealand
Hills Laboratories - New Zealand
Venture Laboratories - USA
Intertek/AAC Laboratories - USA
Alkemists Laboratories - USA
Southern Cross University – Australia

How can you be sure I am telling the truth about these labs when you can’t call them and ask them if Xtend-Life is a customer due to their confidentiality policies? If you have any concerns you can ask us and we can give you documented copies of recent tests they have carried out on our behalf.

Bottom line…you can rest assured that we do not cut any corners when it comes to testing (and we can prove it). In fact, one of our QA staff spends most of his time taking samples, and couriering them to the labs and collating the results before the ingredient is released from quarantine providing it has passed all tests.

Think Before You Get The Ink...

Xtend-Life — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 03:49:00 GMT

Tattoos are almost as common as clothes, cars and art. Millions of people around the world have at least one tattoo. I’ve got nothing against them...in fact, many of my friends and a few family members have been ‘inked’ with an emblem or design that means something special.

The tattoo industry has also cleaned up its act and some tattoo parlors are now regarded by some tattoo fans as being more hygienic than most hospitals! I can understand how some may believe this is true as many tattoo artists not only take pride in their design and work, but also their hygiene standards.

So what is the point of this blog entry?

Well, this article by Dr Glenn Braunstein featured on the Huffington Post website discusses tattoos and balances the good and bad between getting inked and leaving your skin ink free.

I must be honest, I initially thought that the article was going to heavily criticize tattoos but I was rather surprised by Dr Braunstein’s well-argued comments and justified statements. Like me, he doesn’t seem to have anything against tattoos and the industry...however, he does warn the reader to do some research into various chemicals found in tattoo ink.

Consider the following excerpt from the article:

“Tattooing can require injections of substantial amounts of black ink, meaning large amounts of chemicals shot into and under the skin; many of these chemicals -- such as benzo(a)pyrene, a carcinogen found to cause skin cancer in animal tests -- are toxic, so some advocates have called for further scrutiny and oversight of tattoo inks."

“The study also suggests that the substances in black tattoo inks -- materials known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) -- migrate into subjects' lymph nodes, which aid an individual's body in filtering out disease-causing organisms."

“The FDA's National Center for Toxicological Research is investigating tattoo inks and whether their movement in the body has health consequences. Tattoo pigments are subject to U.S. Food and Drug Administration regulation, but the agency's website says that, ‘because of other public health priorities and a previous lack of evidence of safety concerns, FDA has not traditionally regulated tattoo inks or the pigments used in them.’"

“While some tattoo inks contain pigments that are FDA-approved, others use materials more typically associated with automotive and industrial paints. A study in the Archives of Dermatology examined samples of 30 tattoo inks and identified aluminum, oxygen, titanium and carbon as the most common elements in them, with researchers concluding components vary vastly.”

Braunstein suggests at the end of his article that those contemplating on getting a tattoo should think about how they would feel about the tattoo in 10 or even 20 years. Considering how skin ages and subsequently appears on various parts of the body as fine lines, wrinkles etc...the design and artwork of the tattoo may deteriorate prompting the person to consider having it removed.

Nevertheless, the article is no doubt one of many discussing tattoos and the potential health risks associated with them.

Like most things in life, there are good and bad aspects to practically everything we do, eat, drink or use as transport...the key is to get as much information as possible and therefore make informed decisions based on your own judgment and choice.

Laws of Biology VS Conventional Medicine

Xtend-Life — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 02:31:15 GMT

Conventional medicine is designed to treat disease with medication or surgery. For sure, when it comes to emergency interventions, it is one of the best most efficient ‘medicines’ in the world.

But for chronic long term illness, like diabetes, cancer and immune disorders, this approach simply doesn’t work. Here’s why……

Why Conventional Medicine Defies the Laws of Nature

Most Conventional medicine is based on clear-cut, yes-or-no diagnoses that often miss the underlying causes and more subtle manifestations of illness. Doctors are taught that you have a disease or you don’t. There are no gray areas. Similarly, medical diagnostics are designed to identify black and white indicators: You are either ‘positive’ or ‘negative’.

Then, to compound the problem, doctors are rewarded by a health care system which incentivizes them to treat the symptoms rather than address the underlying cause. Imagine, if someone could lower their cholesterol by changing their diet and exercising (which they can). Where’s the money in that? But put them on Lipitor and you’ve made the drug company rep and doctor a little bit richer.

Practicing medicine this way is misguided because it misses two of the most fundamental laws of Nature, Physiology, Biology, and disease: The Continuum and Cellular Environment Laws.

There is a continuum from optimal health, to hidden imbalance, to serious dysfunction to disease. Anywhere along that continuum, we can intervene and reverse the process. The sooner we address it, the better.

Similarly, chronic diseases and disorders do not result from the malfunctioning of just one organ. They do result from fundamental cellular imbalances which have developed over years of poor lifestyle habits. The cellular environment needs to be viewed and treated as an integrated system. Whereas Conventional medicine views and treats the ‘parts’ not the integrated whole.

That’s why when you go to the Doc and get a medication for ‘X’, you may well experience negative side effects to ‘Y’.

As an example let’s look at diabetes…..Most doctors just consider blood sugar, which actually rises very late in the disease process. If your blood sugar is 90 or 110, you don’t have diabetes. If it’s over 126, you do have diabetes.

But these distinctions are completely arbitrary, and they do nothing to help treat impending problems. I remember a friend telling me that her doc had identified her mildly elevated blood sugar. Apparently the doc told her: “Let’s wait and see until your blood sugar is more elevated, and then we’ll treat you with diabetes medication.”

This attitude is harmful given that we know how to prevent full blown diabetes with lifestyle changes before it gets out of hand.

Moreover, this Conventional approach completely ignores more subtle clues from symptoms and signs of disease, which may highlight underlying metabolic imbalances, especially when complemented by further testing.

These imbalances may be remedied by the appropriate treatment. Treatment that is not focused on a disease ‘label’, but instead addresses fundamental cellular weaknesses and imbalances by natural means.

We need to rebalance the integrated system, not treat the symptoms. We need to treat the whole patient not the disease ‘label’.

Let’s go back to the emergency room for a minute…..For that critically ill or damaged person, identifying what caused the damage isn’t likely to make the difference between life and death. The symptom(s) must be treated immediately if they are to survive.

For the chronically sick, hitting the nail with a hammer doesn’t work. ‘Rewiring’ the whole system by addressing cellular (and electrical) malfunctioning does.

We have two different paradigms for two different conditions. It’s time that Conventional medicine takes its financially coloured blinkers off and ‘sees’ the clearly lit distinction.

The End of Illness-Throw away your Vitamins Part 3. Conclusion

Xtend-Life — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 20:50:00 GMT

So what did I think of this book overall?

I was disappointed. I was really hoping to learn something new and constructive, and I didn’t! Oh, maybe I should expand on that a little. I did learn something new but it is of little use to any of us at the moment, but it may have an application say 10 years down the track.

I am referring to work which Dr Argus is involved in with his lab which is the study of proteins. He believes that genes are of little value when it comes to prevention of disease and that they only play a very minor role in your future good health. I go along with that as there is plenty of evidence to suggest that lifestyle plays a much greater role that what genes you were born with. Obviously there are exceptions to that in the instances of obvious genetic defects, but as a general rule that is the case.

The work that Dr Argus is doing on proteins appears to have promise in that the type of proteins that you have in your blood may be an indicator of what may be degenerating in your body and provide advance warning so you can do something about it. But, it would seem that it would be many years away before this system becomes viable…then of course there will be the matter of what to do with that information when you have it.

Hopefully Dr Argus will by the time he has perfected this system have spent some time studying supplementation and come to the realisation that drug intervention is not the way to go but rather nourishing the cells through professional supplementation is! Maybe he will ultimately team up with a specialist in this field and can when the time comes provide some advice which will really help.

It was interesting to note in his book his views about the importance of gut health and the role this plays in preventing degenerative disease. He points out that the bacteria in our body outnumber the total sum of our body’s cells. The balance of good and bad bacteria is crucial in the body and the strains of these are numerous…much greater than that in a probiotic. This is one of the reasons why we never developed a probiotic which has been the craze for the last few years. They only deal with a small part of gut health.

This is why we developed our natural Kiwi fruit supplement Digesten-K which amongst other things helps normalise the digestive system. Good health starts in the gut, no question about that.

Should you read the book? I can’t give a recommendation either way. I can say though that if you are expecting to see a blue print as to how you can ‘end all illness’ you will be disappointed. I bought the Kindle edition from Amazon so it doesn’t cost much to find out for yourself if you are interested.

Good luck, and good health.

Click here to read part 1 >>
Click here to read part 2 >>

The End of Illness-Throw away your Vitamins Part 2.

Xtend-Life — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 20:47:00 GMT

Dr Argus suggests that Vitamin C could promote cancer! We agree with that as well which is why for the last 12 years we have never promoted high doses of Vitamin C. Our argument for not promoting high doses of Vitamin C is that there is credible evidence that in daily doses in excess of 500mgs that Vitamin C could become a pro-oxidant. Of course there are those that argue the contrary but we tend to be conservative unless there is clear non contradictory evidence supporting a specific position.

There can however be exceptions to high doses of Vitamin C and that is in cases of serious illness where Vitamin C can be administered intravenously in large doses, often with remarkable results. This is a totally different action to oral Vitamin C.

He also mentions some negative studies on Vitamin E but does not tell his readers the reason why they were negative. You should never take Vitamin E on its own! Most Vitamin E supplements are made of alpha tocopherol which is only one component of the vitamin which is referred to as Vitamin E. You should only ingest a vitamin E supplement that contains not only tocopherols but also the rest of the vitamin E family…tocotrienols. Then you are getting as close to nature as possible. That is why we always use the full spectrum in our supplements. Unfortunately tocotrienols are still not commonly used even though we have been using them for almost 12 years…the reason, probably because of the high cost of tocotrienols.

Dr Argus’s case against vitamins and supplementation seem to revolve around these three vitamins… Vitamin D, Vitamin C and Vitamin E. This is a far cry from professional supplementation as practiced by many knowledgeable Doctors and other health professionals and as such is most misleading to readers of his book.

Agreed, it is still what the majority of consumers think about when they talk about supplementation. But, most informed consumers (still in the minority unfortunately) now understand that these three vitamins are only a small piece of the supplement puzzle which involves hundreds of nutrients, very few of which are used in isolation. The objective is to do the best to mimic nature, and that doesn’t come from mega doses of a few popular isolated vitamins.

Dr Argus goes on the lament the fact that the prescribing of vitamins used to be the preserve of the Doctors but that is now changed…and subtly suggests that this is wrong because those who are recommending them don’t know what they are doing. Sure, that is the case with some, but then there are a lot of Doctors who prescribe drugs without the faintest idea of the damage they are doing to their patients and they are conducting a trial and error process in which their patient is the ‘guinea pig’.

Dr Argus would have done well to explain why this situation has come about. It is quite simple really! The modern curriculum for Doctors has been hijacked by big corporate interests…pharmaceutical companies and manufacturers of medical devices. As a result prevention of degenerative diseases is not taught in medical schools. Less than a day of the years that Doctors spend in their years of training is devoted to nutrition or prevention of illness.

So, how can Doctors prescribe vitamins, supplements or nutrients when they know nothing about them? Those Doctors who do know about them are the enlightened ones who have made the effort in their own time to learn about them…because they certainly weren’t given that information in medical school! Unfortunately they are still in the minority, but the situation is improving. There is a lot of corporate money invested in focusing on medical intervention! This money would be put at risk if Doctors were able to teach people how to avoid being sick in the first place.

The emphasis is on industrialising the medical industry and prescribing intervention measures to supress the symptoms by looking up the condition in the data base and relying on a diagnosis which is frequently wrong.

In that regard Dr Argus is on the right path when he preaches the path of prevention…but, he should do it without knocking the supplement industry whilst at the same time promoting the drug lobby.

He also jumps on the old bandwagon of claiming that the supplement industry is unregulated, which is total nonsense. There are tough regulations in place now and they have been for some years now. Of course there are irresponsible manufacturers out there but they are in the minority. Of more concern are marketers of some supplements who will make outrageous claims as they have nothing invested in the industry…no infrastructure, no factory etc, etc. They will make claims, sell a bunch of product and then move on and taint the industry in the process.

One should also keep in mind that the pharmaceutical companies are not lily white either…not just relating to claims but also manufacturing quality. Over the years I am aware of a number of factories that have been shut down by the FDA for poor hygienic practices…but, the media never makes a fuss about them.

So, what are my conclusions about this book that has enjoyed quite extensive coverage! I will tell you tomorrow in Part 3.

Click here to read part 1 >>
Click here to read part 3 >>

The End of Illness-Throw away your Vitamins Part 1.

Xtend-Life — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 20:39:00 GMT

In January this year, a book was released called "The End of Illness" by Dr David Argus. A customer brought this book to my attention as a result of an article which I have attached here. Within the article the good Doctor attacks the use of vitamins but promotes the use of statin drugs and aspirin.

Dr Argus is quite a well-known oncologist and as such his book got a lot of ‘coverage’ largely because he told the medical fraternity that they had ‘got it wrong’. No argument there!

He believes that the body is a system and that there is no one cause of either good or ill health as there are so many multiple factors which collectively contribute to the end result. I am 100% with him on this point as well. He also continues within his book to talk about the importance of exercise, regular sleep, and eating quality fresh non processed food. Once again I am with him!

BUT…then he spoils the entire concept of the book by ‘lumping’ all vitamins and supplements into basically the same barrel and promoting the use of statins and aspirin. In fact, he suggests that if you are over 50 years of age you should demand your Doctor to explain why you are not on a statin drug!

Why? Because statins can reduce inflammation in the body which is the cause of many degenerative diseases! It is the anti-inflammatory properties that help give statins heart protective properties…in some people! In others the side effects more than offset any benefits. Unfortunately he ignores two important factors, one that statins have significant side effects in many people and two that there are simple ways to get similar anti-inflammatory effects, the simplest being Omega 3 fish oils.

He also ignores the studies that have proven the negative aspects of aspirin as well. Ironically he promotes the off label use of drugs but insists on the need for large double blind placebo studies for supplements. Somewhat of a double standard!

Anyway, back to the issue of vitamins. He does demonstrate a general lack of understanding of supplementation as he focuses instead on those people and Companies who promote mega doses of single vitamins. He spends a lot of time discussing Vitamin D and the difficulty of determining what is the correct levels of this vitamin in the body. He points out that no one really knows what they should be as there are so many variables from person to person.

He says correctly that whereas you cannot overdose with Vitamin D from the sun, you can with supplements and indeed high regular doses can be toxic. Maybe this toxicity may not be apparent in the short term but it would nonetheless be affecting the overall ‘system’ (the body) in time…perhaps even by feeding cancer tumours! Once again, I agree with him which is why we have resisted ‘getting on the bandwagon’ like other companies when it has come to promoting Vitamin D supplements.

We strongly believe that Vitamin D should only be ingested in small quantities as part of a range of other vitamins and nutrients, and you should get the bulk of your Vitamin D from the sunshine. When the body is exposed to sunshine it also makes other essential components of which Vitamin D is only one. Science is still trying to figure out what they are.

He also criticises high doses of other vitamins as well such as Vitamin C as it could promote cancer! More tomorrow in Part 2!. In the meantime if you wish to read the article that prompted these blog entries please click here.

Click here to read part 2 >>
Click here to read part 3 >>

Is Your Fashion Sense Slowly Killing You?

Xtend-Life — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 03:30:39 GMT

It could be! If the gist of this article is anything to go by. As a subscriber to The Wall Street Journal, I recently came across this article and thought that beneath the somewhat candid topic, the dark reality was something to discuss.

Fashion and clothing serve two purposes in our society... to hide our birthday suits from the general public and to keep us warm during winter. That’s pretty much it. However, over the centuries, fashion and style trends may have gone a bit too far...to the point of actually making us suffer as opposed to simply looking good.

It’s been said that “high fashion comes at a price” and when it comes to health conditions, this claim isn’t far off the mark.

Take a look at the following list of ‘suspects’...you may be wearing one (or more) of them right now:

Tight jeans - ‘tight pants syndrome’ is a term coined by Dr Octavio Bessa of Stamford, Conn after seeing one too many patients with an abdominal girth bigger than their trousers. Skinny jeans are just bad...blamed for various conditions like increased risk of yeast infections in women and infertility in men. Wearing tight underwear is also not a good idea for men looking to conceive.

Compression wear and ties - ‘Tights’ that compress the chest and abdomen are particularly bad as they may interfere with breathing patterns. Neck ties and tight collars not only reduce the circulation of blood to the brain, some health experts warn that their effect on the body may lead to increased risk of glaucoma.

Undergarments - The ‘little black number’ you received from your husband for Valentine’s Day may look nice and worth a couple of hundred dollars, but if the bra doesn’t fit properly, it could leave you feeling more discomfort and pain than anything else. In fact, some lingerie experts say 75% of women wear the wrong size bra.

Shoes - My favorite subject...and not from a fashion perspective either. If you’ve been following this blog, you’ll know what my feelings are when it comes to shoes and over-exaggerated footwear. Bunions, hammer toes, stress fractures, ankle sprains and shortened Achilles tendons are just some of the conditions associated with years of wearing high heels. The supportive sole is another ‘fashion/health’ trend that seems to have brainwashed society into believing they actually need special shoes. Besides protecting your feet from the cold, as well as broken glass, sharp objects and other potential hazards on the ground, shoes serve no other purpose. If you pronate or supinate, no orthotic insert is going to correct your stance or gait. The problem almost always originates in the hips (maybe even as a result of wearing high heels and other footwear) and by addressing any hip alignment issues and a conditioning a few muscles here and there, you’ll be able to effectively treat these common conditions.

The article discusses a few other cases where fashion (even fashion accessories like piercings etc) may be causing more harm than style. What’s your fashion crime and is your health suffering as a result?

FDA recognises some of the dangerous effects of Statin Drugs...

Xtend-Life — Thu, 08 Mar 2012 03:01:37 GMT

The US FDA now requires the manufacturers of cholesterol lowering drugs known as statins to add warning to their labels. This will affect the popular brands such as Lipitor, Crestor and Zocor as well as the generics.

The reason! The FDA has finally officially recognised what has been known for years…statin drugs can cause memory loss and more recently that they may raise levels of blood sugar and thus promote diabetes. Some analyst’s suggest that they could contribute to around 100,000 extra cases of diabetes a year.

The FDA does warn patients not to be scared into stopping taking their drugs “because they have been shown to significantly reduce the risk of heart attack or heart disease”. ‘Significant’ is a debatable point as there are many groups of people who receive no benefit from these drugs at all.

Recent studies have indicated that any benefit that may be derived from the statin drugs does not come from their ability to lower cholesterol but rather the beneficial effect on inflammation in the blood as measured by C-Reactive Protein. Interestingly for years we have argued that C-Reactive Protein is a more important marker for heart disease than cholesterol. This is now being gradually accepted by mainstream medicine as a fact.

However, you can reduce the inflammation in the body by using high quality Omega 3 fish oils along with a quality multi-nutrient supplement such as our Total Balance. My own levels of C-Reactive Protein is testimony to that. They are at the levels of a healthy child not a 65 year old man.

Back to the statin drugs…I wonder when the FDA will require manufacturers to put a warning on the label about the potential of impotence in men which is also common with users of this drug!

There is some more info about this on a Reuters article which you can access by clicking here.

Running From Zombies...The Latest Exercise Trend?

Xtend-Life — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 02:33:00 GMT

As strange as it sounds, there's no need to panic. Zombies still only exist in horror movies even if you may feel like the 'walking dead' the next time you're low on nutrients, vitamins and energy.

Nevertheless, it seems that according to this article on the Time website, zombies have become the inspiration to help get lazy gamers and other couch potatoes off their butts and onto their feet.

'Zombies, RUN!' is an iPhone app that puts an exercise aspect to what is essentially a zombie game. Users have to complete various audio missions by listening to clues and stories through their headphones, running around to collect supplies and ultimately avoiding brain-eating zombies.

Because everything is audio, there's no need to look at the app, meaning you don’t have to worry about running into obstacles like the neighbor’s cat or worse...oncoming traffic. The zombies app records all sorts of data like time, speed, calories burned and total distance.

The exercise app is proving to be rather popular with people who either haven’t exercised before or those who have hit a plateau in their training regime and would like to try something different and fun, yet still effective.

I personally can’t see myself using this app as I prefer to run and exercise without any external distractions. I’ve got a habit of thinking too much...especially in social situations, so I try to do most of my thinking while exercising.

Some people can’t handle the ‘mental silence’ and use music to either help motivate them through their exercise regime, or simply to get into their own headspace and mental state while exercising.

I do however acknowledge the need for an app like ‘Zombies RUN!’ as it can give a fun twist on something that many people are unmotivated by and often dread and avoid at all costs...physical activity. Basically, if it gets more people moving, exercising and generally having fun while boosting their health, then it certainly gets my stamp of approval.

The Wrong Approach to Disease Prevention

Xtend-Life — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:24:53 GMT

I recently read an article in the New York Times by H.Gilbert Welch a professor of medicine at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice who is also the author of "Overdiagnosed: Making People Sick in the Pursuit of Health". The article is reproduced below.

I thought that it was a well written article which raises some issues that we should all be thinking about, particularly when we talk about prevention of disease.

Different people think about prevention in different ways. For example, many of us think that prevention is all about ensuring that we eat a nutrient dense diet, avoid processed foods wherever possible, use high quality supplements, exercise regularly, have good sleeping habits and avoid damaging lifestyles such as smoking or excessive alcohol consumption.

Then other people think that prevention is all about going to the Doctor regularly and having check-ups and screening for early signs of potential diseases, even though that they are feeling OK at the time.

Mr Welch's article outlines his concerns about relying on the latter approach. He feels with justification that the medical profession has to a large degree moved towards taking people who are well and often making them sick as a result of intervention from diagnosis screening…which can often be wrong. What is interesting and why he is against this increase in screening is that at the end of the day it seems to provide minimal benefits and has the capacity to do harm and the energy of the profession seems to be moving more to making healthy people sick rather than the other way around.

He cites a report by the National Cancer Institute in which it was established that early screening for prostate cancer did not improve mortality rates, but in the process of treatment many men suffered incontinence or impotence for little upside.

It may be that you don’t agree with everything that he says, but one point he makes is indisputable, and that is we cannot look to the medical profession to make us healthy…that is the individual responsibility of each of us.

Here is the article.

If You Feel O.K., Maybe You Are O.K.

By H. GILBERT WELCH Published: February 27, 2012

EARLY diagnosis has become one of the most fundamental precepts of modern medicine. It goes something like this: The best way to keep people healthy is to find out if they have (pick one) heart disease, autism, glaucoma, diabetes, vascular problems, osteoporosis or, of course, cancer — early. And the way to find these conditions early is through screening.

It is a precept that resonates with the intuition of the general public: obviously it’s better to catch and deal with problems as soon as possible. A study published with much fanfare in The New England Journal of Medicine last week contained what researchers called the best evidence yet that colonoscopies reduce deaths from colon cancer.

Recently, however, there have been rumblings within the medical profession that suggest that the enthusiasm for early diagnosis may be waning. Most prominent are recommendations against prostate cancer screening for healthy men and for reducing the frequency of breast and cervical cancer screening. Some experts even cautioned against the recent colonoscopy results, pointing out that the study participants were probably much healthier than the general population, which would make them less likely to die of colon cancer. In addition there is a concern about too much detection and treatment of early diabetes, a growing appreciation that autism has been too broadly defined and skepticism toward new guidelines for universal cholesterol screening of children.

The basic strategy behind early diagnosis is to encourage the well to get examined — to determine if they are not, in fact, sick. But is looking hard for things to be wrong a good way to promote health? The truth is, the fastest way to get heart disease, autism, glaucoma, diabetes, vascular problems, osteoporosis or cancer ... is to be screened for it. In other words, the problem is over-diagnosis and overtreatment.

Screening the apparently healthy potentially saves a few lives (although the National Cancer Institute couldn’t find any evidence for this in its recent large studies of prostate and ovarian cancer screening). But it definitely drags many others into the system needlessly — into needless appointments, needless tests, needless drugs and needless operations (not to mention all the accompanying needless insurance forms).

This process doesn’t promote health; it promotes disease. People suffer from more anxiety about their health, from drug side effects, from complications of surgery. A few die. And remember: these people felt fine when they entered the health care system.

It wasn’t always like this. In the past, doctors made diagnoses and initiated therapy only in patients who were experiencing problems. Of course, we still do that today. But increasingly we also operate under the early diagnosis precept: seeking diagnosis and initiating therapy in people who are not experiencing problems. That’s a huge change in approach, from one that focused on the sick to one that focuses on the well.

Think about it this way: in the past, you went to the doctor because you had a problem and you wanted to learn what to do about it. Now you go to the doctor because you want to stay well and you learn instead that you have a problem.

How did we get here? Or perhaps, more to the point: Who is to blame? One answer is the health care industry: By turning people into patients, screening makes a lot of money for pharmaceutical companies, hospitals and doctors. The chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society once pointed out that his hospital could make around $5,000 from each free prostate cancer screening, thanks to the ensuing biopsies, treatments and follow-up care.

A more glib response to the question of blame is: Richard Nixon. It was Nixon who said, “we need to work out a system that includes a greater emphasis on preventive care.” Preventive care was central to his administration’s promotion of health maintenance organizations and the war on cancer. But because the promotion of genuine health — largely dependent upon a healthy diet, exercise and not smoking — did not fit well in the biomedical culture, preventive care was transformed into a high-tech search for early disease.

Some doctors have long recognized that the approach is a distraction for the medical community. It’s easier to transform people into new patients than it is to treat the truly sick. It’s easier to develop new ways of testing than it is to develop better treatments. And it’s a lot easier to measure how many healthy people get tested than it is to determine how well doctors manage the chronically ill.

But the precept of early diagnosis was too intuitive, too appealing, too hard to challenge and too easy to support. The rumblings show that that’s beginning to change.

Let me be clear: early diagnosis is not always wrong. Doctors would rather see patients early in the course of their heart attack than wait until they develop low blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat. And we’d rather see women with small breast lumps than wait until they develop large breast masses. The question is how often and how far we should get ahead of symptoms.

For years now, people have been encouraged to look to medical care as the way to make them healthy. But that’s your job — you can’t contract that out. Doctors might be able to help, but so might an author of a good cookbook, a personal trainer, a cleric or a good friend. We would all be better off if the medical system got a little closer to its original mission of helping sick patients, and let the healthy be.

5 Ways Hospitals may be overcharging you

Xtend-Life — Tue, 28 Feb 2012 20:50:00 GMT

Hospitals... most of us have been to one, either to visit a close friend or relative, or to get administered as a patient. Either way, they're not exactly the kind of place one gets excited about considering the reason why you're there in the first place.

Nevertheless, regardless of what happens to the patient, high hospital costs seem to occur more often than not.

Sure, hardly anything is free in this world, but when it comes to exorbitant hospital bills, not everything may be as it seems...the hospital could either be deliberately or accidentally overcharging you.

The worst thing about this is that most people never know that they may be paying more than they actually should. The mindset seems to be one of “But I don’t know anything about the medical industry...how do I know what needs to be charged or not”.

I understand that this is a common perception among many people but like your local mechanic, you owe it to yourself to check that the ‘work’ you’re being charged for is not only legit, but also that it actually happened.

Regardless of whether hospitals are intending to overcharge you or not, the fact of the matter still remains...you could very well be getting ripped off by the hospital.

This article on the Daily Finance website, looks at the “5 Signs You're Getting Robbed at the Hospital”:

Double Billing - Like any big business, hospitals have many different departments, specialists and people who may bridge the professional gap between different departments. Getting charged by a hospital department as well as the specialist in that field is wrong. It may just be accidental oversight by the hospital but it’s up to you check your bank account doesn’t get a double side-effect from this charge.
Charged For Services Not Rendered - If you can’t check that you’re getting charged for services you’re actually receiving, then designate someone to do this for you. Got charged for an extra dose of treatment you never received? Take it up with the hospital accounts department.
Worse Case Scenario Treatment - So you’ve gone into the hospital to have some tests done but you’re being charged for over-the-top scenarios/tests that just don’t make sense? If you’ve got the flu (and just the flu), you don’t exactly need the treatment required for bronchitis, so why charge for it in the first place!
Overcharging Just Because - Excessive bill charges for seemingly unjustified procedures. Don’t know what the going rate is? Simply check out the fee schedule search tool on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services website to help you out.
Out-Of-Network Doctors - Okay, this isn’t an easy one, especially in emergency situations. However, if you have the time and right frame of mind to ask, check that the doctor treating isn’t an out-of-network healthcare professional.

Hospitals are stressful environments, even in the accounts department so mistakes happen. Simply follow up the discrepancy with the accounts staff and they’ll ensure you receive the most accurate bill you can get.

Disclosure of the Deals Between Doctors and the Drug Companies

Xtend-Life — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 20:45:27 GMT

It's been a long time coming but soon the US government will force drug companies to reveal the various payments they make to doctors for various 'services' including research, consulting, speaking, travel and entertainment.

This article in the New York Times explains this new health care law in more detail...a standard that will no doubt see better decisions made by doctors where only the best interests of their patients will be considered...not whether the doctor’s luxury SUV should be black or silver.

I’m sorry for sounding a bit cynical but I truly believe that when a medical practitioner takes the Hippocratic Oath, he/she dedicates themselves to practice medicine ethically. The following excerpt from the article highlights the bad apples that apparently lurk in the medical fraternity:

“Large numbers of doctors receive payments from drug and device companies every year - sometimes into the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars - in exchange for providing advice and giving lectures. Analyses by The New York Times and others have found that about a quarter of doctors take cash payments from drug or device makers and that nearly two-thirds accept routine gifts of food, including lunch for staff members and dinner for themselves. The Times has found that doctors who take money from drug makers often practice medicine differently from those who do not and that they are more willing to prescribe drugs in risky and unapproved ways, such as prescribing powerful antipsychotic medicines for children.”

Under the new law, drug companies must disclose all payments made to doctors...regardless of whether the payment is for the promotion of new products or if a sales rep from a drug company brings lunch to a doctor’s office for a 'meeting'.

All the disclosed data will then be put on a web site for the public to see. Those drug companies who fail to report their payments will be heavily fined, with the top senior executives being held liable for the accuracy of each payment report.

Patients deserve to know whether the advice they’re getting from their doctor is based on actual medical fact or financial favors and other monetary benefits.

As expected, some people in the medical fraternity are opposed to the new bill. According to his article on the Wall Street Journal website, Dr Thomas P. Stossel, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, the new law is “a stimulus plan for critics of the pharmaceutical and medical-device industries.”

Here’s what Dr Stossel thinks of the new law:

“There will be the questions of how to identify which physicians are being paid for what - such as how to account for $25 worth of bagels brought into a group-practice office when it's unclear who actually ate the bagels. Who doesn't care? Consumers. Few patients have the time, interest or competence to interpret the disclosures. Even if they did, most survey data indicate that patients have few concerns about physicians' industry relationships.”

You can read both sides of the argument by clicking on the two links above...they certainly make for interesting reading.

What do you think?

Warning! The Following May Shock You

Xtend-Life — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 02:55:00 GMT

I just recently received a link to an article that I unfortunately read whilst eating my lunch. As someone who has a 'cast-iron' stomach, even this article made me feel a little nauseous.

It’s written by a member of the Yahoo News team, Eric Pfeiffer, who went with the following headline: “McDonald’s confirms that it’s no longer using ‘pink slime’ chemical in hamburgers”

The fast food company has announced that it has stopped using ammonium hydroxide in the production of its hamburgers. ‘That seems quite nice of them’, one would think...until you realize what ammonium hydroxide is also used for.

This chemical is found in fertilizers, cleaning detergents and believe it or not...even homemade explosives! Why was it in the hamburger meat to begin with?! Apparently, this chemical acts as an anti-microbial agent in meat.

Again, it’s hard to use the words ‘chemical’ and ‘meat’ in the same sentence.

Pfeiffer’s article also lists six other chemicals found in our foods. However, some of them are OK and in that regard the author is over dramatizing, but the ammonium dioxide is a problem considering why it is used.

The rest of the article contains a video where a popular UK chef shows the process of how this chemical is used in meat. To say that it shocked me is an understatement, yet at the same time I’m not really that surprised either.

However, one must remember that junk food, like all other processed food, will inevitably contain some form of chemicals. You have the choice to either consume it or follow a healthier diet and lifestyle.

The fact that the abovementioned fast food company has stopped using ammonium hydroxide in its hamburgers is hardly worth the argument. This is what the company had to say on its website:

"At McDonald’s, the quality and safety of the food we serve our customers is a top priority. At the beginning of 2011, we made a decision to discontinue the use of ammonia-treated beef in our hamburgers. This product has been out of our supply chain since August of last year. This decision was a result of our efforts to align our global standards for how we source beef around the world. We are always reviewing and evolving our standards to ensure we continue to serve safe, high quality food to our customers."

---Todd Bacon, PhD, Senior Director of Quality Systems, Supply Chain Management McDonald’s USA

So based on the above statement, could one assume that the company’s priority of serving their customers safe quality food only began in August last year?!

I personally don’t think the word ‘quality’ or ‘safe’ should be used to describe junk food but that’s just a personal opinion. As I mentioned earlier, we live in a free world where people are free to make their own lifestyle choices.

However, it’s important to understand that free will comes with a cause-effect tag. The lifestyle that you choose to live (including the food you eat) will eventually result in an outcome based on how you’ve treated your body. Whether it’s a good or bad outcome is entirely up to you...not the fast food companies.

Fish Oil Sustainability

Xtend-Life — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 22:16:00 GMT

A customer recently raised the following point: on the Xtend-Life website under "Buyer's Guide" sustainability section, it states "The tuna oil does not have any impact on tuna stocks as it is a by-product of the tuna caught for food." Can you expand on this?

Our response:

The reason that our tuna oil has no impact on Tuna stocks is that the oil is a by-product of the fish which is caught for food. To clarify further! After the fish is filleted, fish meal is produced from the remainder, and oil is produced as part of the process of making the fish meal. Around 90 – 95%% of that oil is used for agriculture and industrial purposes.

Ironically a significant proportion of the fish meal is used for rearing fish on fish farms which actually puts more pressure on wild stocks as about 5kgs of fish meal is used to produce 1kg of salmon in a fish farm. Actually the oil from tuna (and hoki) is more conservation friendly than much of the other oil which is mainly produced from anchovies for converting into industrial fish meal as opposed to tuna which are caught for their food value.

We certainly accept that tuna is suffering from overfishing and believe that there should be more international controls to curb this overfishing. However, using the oil from tuna is not contributing to the pressure on the tuna fish stocks.

Fortunately the Hoki fishery in New Zealand is healthy, thanks to the tight controls kept on the allowable catches by the NZ Government.

How to Blast Belly Fat

Xtend-Life — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 22:05:00 GMT

So who hasn't overindulged these past festive weeks? Wherever I look, 'big bellies' seem even bigger than usual! What can be done? Especially as both Dean and I point out, zillions of sit ups and the conventional low fat diet will make little difference.

To blast belly fat permanently, you need to understand the Real underlying causes.

Key Belly Fat Causes

In essence, belly fat signifies hormonal and metabolic imbalances characterised by inflammation, estrogen dominance and insulin resistance. Let's start with inflammation.

Inflammation

You saw in an earlier blog how inflammation results from toxins, oxidative stress, free radicals, injury, infections, lack of exercise, heredity and especially diet.

Regarding diet, it’s mainly the imbalance of fatty acids and oils, with focus on Omega 6 rather than Omega 3 which leads to the metabolization of chemicals causing chronic inflammation. This imbalance is starkly seen when we compare our prehistoric ancestors’ omega-6 to omega-3 ratio with ours. Theirs was 1:1, our ratio is anywhere between 10:1 and 25:1.

If you are at a plateau with your weight loss or stuck in a body that just seems to ignore diets, fix your Omega 3and essential fatty acid levels first with our pure Omega 3QH Ultra fish oil and our ‘whole food’ Green Lipped Mussel Powder respectively.

Additionally, to boost key anti-inflammatory nutrients like alpha lipoic acid, carnosine, tumeic, glutathione and resveratrol and more, please select the right Total Balance product for you.

Next comes estrogen dominance

Estrogen Dominance

For both sexes, balanced hormonal levels enable estrogen to provide anti-inflammatory properties. However, an imbalance or excess of estrogen and xenoestrogens (chemicals in the environment that mimic the effects of estrogen) prompts the conversion of estrogen to "Estrone". This leads to both hormonal and antioxidant imbalances and to estrogen dominance.

Estrogen dominance has many symptoms, but the most typical are increased weight and belly fat.

Fortunately this can be addressed naturally with a combination of Bio-identical hormones, the right supplements and diet. This diet needs to be focused on building your antioxidant defence. So a ‘rainbow diet’ with lots of fruits and veggies, and especially Cruciferous vegetables (broccoli, brocolini, cauliflower, kale etc) is best.

Cruciferous vegetables are especially good at promoting healthy estrogen metabolism because they contain Indole-3-Carbinol (I3C). When I3C combines with stomach acid it creates 3-Diindolylmethane, or DIM. The metabolism of DIM promotes healthy estrogen metabolism leading to a favorable ratio of 2-hydroxy to 16-hydroxy. 16-hydroxy is known to be carcinogenic, while 2-hydroxy has beneficial effects. Research shows that levels of the 16-hydroxy metabolite are high in cases of breast, ovarian, cervix, uterine and other hormone-sensitive cancers.

Hormonal balance can also be optimised with our Male Rejuvenators and Female Rejuvenators. Both formulations use potent doses of high active ingredients believed to help hormonal balance, libido and sexual arousal.

Another advantage of the Rejuvenators, especially when used with our Total Balance and Diabet-Eze ranges, is that they help to regulate key belly fat storing hormones: cortisol and insulin, and to reduce insulin resistance.

Insulin Resistance

Insulin resistance results when a prolonged excess of processed, and especially sugary foods, causes the body to over-produce insulin which disables the fat burning hormone, glucagon. This results in more belly fat, and more sugary cravings, even though one isn’t really hungry.

You now know how hormonal and metabolic imbalances characterized by inflammation, estrogen dominance and insulin resistance are the key causes of belly fat.

But there’s more. There's more to belly fat than your size.

Location Location Location

Not all fat is the same. As Carol Shively PhD says “It behaves differently in different places, and its behaviour is the key to what your fat is doing to you”. People store most of their fat in two ways:

Subcutaneous fat is visible just under the skin in the thighs, hips, buttocks, and abdomen.
Visceral fat is invisible because it’s deeper inside, around the vital organs (heart, lungs, digestive tract, liver, etc.) in the chest, pelvis, and especially the abdomen

Research by the Mayo clinic and Harvard Medical School shows that it’s the hidden visceral fat in people of any size, even ‘skinny’ people, that may pose the bigger threat.

This is largely because as endocrinologist Dr Kristen Hairston says, “Fat doesn't just sit idle. It acts like an organ that secretes lots of nasty substances which can be absorbed by neighbouring organs”. For instance, visceral fat cells release inflammatory compounds that can lead to insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, dementia, and breast, colon, and endometrium cancer.

So for the ‘apples’ and ‘pears’ amongst us (!) be assured that you can blast belly fat IF you address all of the underlying and inter-related causes.

Top Five Regrets Of The Dying

Xtend-Life — Mon, 13 Feb 2012 22:02:00 GMT

There has been an email doing the rounds lately about an Australian nurse called Bronnie Ware who has put together a book based on her experiences caring terminally ill patients with 12 weeks or less to live.

The book - titled ‘The Top Five Regrets of the Dying’ - discusses a very poignant point...regret. At the ripe age of 31, I find myself saying “I wish I knew what I know now when I was younger” more and more every day.

This ‘wish’ pales in comparison to the many ‘wishes’ uttered by those in Ware’s book.

If you haven’t received the email or read the various news clips about top five regrets she encountered, here they are:

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

You often hear the cliche... “Live a life without regrets” but how many of us actually follow through on this?

We all know our time on this earth is limited to a specific number of years...actually how much is unknown. However, you can certainly help improve the probability of living a longer, more productive life without regret by putting a few things in front of your queue of priorities.

Here’s my ‘Top Five Ways To Avoid Dying With Regret’:

Good health is vital: The best way to ensure you do all the things you want to do is to live longer so you have the time to do them. Considering many degenerative diseases are preventable, you owe it to yourself and your loved ones to prioritize your health.
Love and be loved: Human beings are social creatures and family, friends and interpersonal relationships stimulate our emotional wellbeing to the point that it gives us a sense of being, self-worth and fulfillment. If you’ve been too busy lately to enjoy those people close to you, stop whatever you’re doing and interact with the people who put a smile on your face.
Work and Play: The age-old saying that ‘good honest work never hurt anyone’ is true...it gets you moving, thinking and doing stuff your body was made for. Like relationships, it also gives you the sense of self-worth...regardless of what you’re actually doing. The same goes for recreation and doing things you love doing. A bit of work and play everyday is a fine blend of the right stuff you need to enjoy life and avoid lying on your deathbed riddled with regret.
Stand up for yourself, for your beliefs and what’s right: At the end of the day, speaking your mind in a respectful, honest and confident manner is by far one of the best things you can do for yourself. I truly believe this. Society and the ‘PC police’ have unfortunately minced away from this basic human right, depriving people of their own internal voices and forcing their silence with fear and shame.
Be a teacher and a student throughout your life: You’re never too young to dispense advice and you’re never too old to learn something knew...it’s all up to you and how you choose to give or take the lesson.

Remove regret from your life today by making a list of everything you regretful about and start making them right...the clock is ticking and there’s still so much living to be done!

How To Age Less & Live More

Xtend-Life — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 02:38:00 GMT

How about this for inspiration. Author, blogger and Super Centenarian Bernando LaPallo will be 111 this year, and feels on top of the world: "As I move into my 111th year of life, I still feel great and am grateful for my good health which allows me to stay active both physically and mentally. I have never been sick in my life."

Bernando walks briskly or runs at least a mile daily, reads and writes voraciously, looks half his age, and is called daily by people worldwide eager to hear how he's done it.

How Has He ‘Done It’?

Simplicity, humility and natural living: “You don't need a recipe book or health guide to age less and live more” he says.

According to Bernando what you do need is to "Eat properly and get your rest as stress is a killer."

Specifically, eat: raw fresh veggies, super-foods, raw nuts and berries, extra virgin olive oil, raw honey, cinnamon, fresh garlic, dark chocolate , barley soup, fresh coconut and plentiful alkaline water.

He especially stresses the value of the following fresh foods since: “Cooking your foods kills the nutrients...”

Fresh organic fruit and veggies: for low calorie, high fibre and nutrient rich vitamins, minerals, enzymes, phyto-nutrients and antioxidants boosting vitality and balanced health. He’s a big fan of juiced fruits and veggies.

High quality, organic, cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil: use on the skin as lotion, in foods and salad dressing to lessen the risk of colon cancer and heart disease.

Dark, organic chocolate: to lower blood pressure, cholesterol, stress and depression.

Organic garlic considered nature's antibiotic which helps to fight coughs and colds, and aids digestion and intestinal health.

Organic cinnamon: antibacterial and antifungal; reduces leukemia and lymphoma cancer cells.

Organic honey: has antioxidant and antibacterial properties and boosts energy and weight loss.

...all "to be eaten in moderation, slowly, and only at certain times of the day. Ensure you sit down to eat and relax afterwards, as opposed to eat on the go like fastfood drive thru’s".

Bernando credits his health and longevity to his father, a doctor, who lived to be 98. "I can remember things my father told me when I was 8 years old....He told me not to eat processed red meat...He said lamb is OK but red meat, stay away from it. Hot dogs, French fries and all those things don't eat it."

His father also encouraged his culinary interest resulting in Bernando studying cooking at the Sorbonne School of Culinary Arts in the 1920’s. “We had to learn about the origins of food like barley, coconut and the like and their uses which is something that is not taught in America today.”

Indeed!

Another healthy habit gleaned from his dad is, he says: "treating his body as a temple. It’s important to clean out the colon on a regular basis and to look after your feet and clean them regularly. If our inner vital organs can do the jobs as they were designed, then we should stay healthy and live a long life. Use olive oil rubbed into the skin of the feet and also on your body and face... Then you'll never rust."

Clearly, despite Bernando’s simple life and attitude, his father inspired him to have a rich life worth living.

"He taught me how to live, how to eat and to have faith in God and he would take care of me," smiled LaPallo. "And so far it has happened. Amen."