The birth control pill or oral contraceptive pill

The oral contraceptives contain different levels of estrogens and progesterone or progesterone alone. It is prescribed by the family doctor after considering the family history and medical records of the woman. These pills stop the ovaries from releasing eggs every month. They also make the lining of the uterus thinner so that the fertilized egg could not attach there.

The disadvantages are that the pill must be taken everyday without any break. Even if you have vomiting or diarrhoea the effect of the pill is gone and you can become pregnant. If you forget to take the pill for a day then also the risk of pregnancy is there. Every year you need three months interval for the regeneration of the hormone household of your body, otherwise infertility may be the result. There are many side effects from these hormone pills.

Side effects:

If you have the following symptoms, go to your doctor and talk to him. These include severe headache, severe vomiting, speech problems, dizziness, faintness, weakness or numbness of arms or legs, coughing up blood, shortness of breath, crushing chest pain or chest heaviness, double vision, partial or complete loss of vision, bulging eyes, pain, warmth or heaviness in the back of the lower leg, severe stomach pain, jaundice, loss of appetite, extreme tiredness, weakness or lack of energy, fever, dark urine, pale stool, swelling of the hands, feet, joints and lower legs, mood changes and depression, unusual bleeding, skin rash and menstrual bleeding which is unusually heavy or that lasts more than 7 days in a row.

The other side effects are nausea, vomiting, stomach cramps or bloating, diarrhoea, constipation, swelling of the gum, increased or decreased appetite, brown or black skin patches, acne, hair growth in unusual places, white vaginal discharge, swelling, redness, irritation, burning or itching of the vagina, breast tenderness, enlargement or discharge, painful or missed menstruation, changes in menstrual flow, bleeding or spotting between menstrual periods, weight gain or weight loss and difficulty in wearing contact lenses.

Oral contraceptives may increase the risk of developing liver tumours and breast or liver cancer. The risk of getting a heart attack, a stroke or a serious blood clot may also be increased. Consult with your doctor about these serious effects.

Cigarette smoking increases the risk of serious side effects from oral contraceptives, including heart attacks, blood clots and strokes. If you are older than 35 years or smoke 15 or more cigarettes per day, then the risk is higher. If you take birth control pills, you should not smoke.

Caution:

Oral contraceptives will work only as long as they are taken regularly. You may need to use a backup method of birth control if you vomit or have diarrhoea when you are taking this drug. You can consult your doctor to choose the correct backup method and for other advices.

The women who have family histories of diabetes, high blood pressure, migraines, blood clots and breast cancer should not take this. It is same with the progesterone-only pill also. Although both pills are 99% effective if taken properly these are not suitable for women who change their partners often because they give no protection from HIV virus and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

The patch - it is a big plaster with hormones of the combined pill oestrogen and progesterone and is applied on the skin. The hormones reach the blood through the skin. Apart from the side effects of the birth control pill here is the possibility of red skin and rash are there.

The advantages and disadvantages are the same as the birth control pill. The same precaution should also be taken as the oral pills.

This a prescription drug, but in India…..

Breast Cancer, Risk Factors and Symptoms

Risk Factors

Risk Factors are several conditions which makes it likely to get a particular disease. Always remember that having one or even more risk factors does not necessarily mean one will develop breast cancer. At the same time many women with breast cancer have no known risk factors. That means we do not know now many risk factors yet and we must look critically everything which may cause breast cancer.

The known Risk Factors include:

• Inherited genes which increase cancer risk – certain gene mutations, the most common genes are BRCA1 and BACR2.
• A personal history – if you have in one breast the chance of getting in the other breast is very high.
• A family history – if mother, sister or daughter has breast cancer the risk is more. But remember many of the diseased have no family history of breast cancer.
• Increasing age – risk of breast cancer increases with age.
• Late first pregnancy – if one gives birth her first baby after 35 years, the chances of developing breast cancer may increase.
• Overweight and Obesity – these increase the risk of breast cancer
• Early puberty and menstruation - getting first menstruation till 12 is considered a breast cancer risk.
• Late menopause – if the beginning of menopause is after 55 years, this increases the risk of developing breast cancer.
• Postmenopausal hormone therapy – women who take the combination therapy with estrogen and progesterone to treat the symptoms of menopause have an increased risk of breast cancer.
• Oral contraceptives – women with many known risk factors must avoid the anti baby pills with hormones.
• Radiation exposure – if you receive radiation therapy or taken X-rays at any time in your life, later it is a risk factor for breast cancer. Electricity power lines, all radiation sources including cell phones and above all the cell phone towers radiate much and women with risk factor must avoid this. In these cases a plausible scientific analysis is possible after many decades and therefore it is better to avoid.
• Food habit – it plays an important role. One must eat what her/his metabolism needs.
• Alcohol – avoid too much of alcohol
• Smoking
• Being a woman – it is the biggest risk factor. If you understand everything it is a manageable risk for many.


Symptoms of breast cancer

• A lump or thickening in the breast which feels different from the surrounding breast tissues
• Discharge from the nipple
• Inverted nipple
• Flaking or peeling of the nipple skin
• Change in the shape or size of the breast
• Changes in the breast skin
• The breast skin becomes red or orange

In many women the recent mammogram may be normal; even then, if you have the symptoms go to the doctor immediately.
If we diagnose earlier there are many good treatments to heal you.

Risk factors one can control

They include:

• Diet
• Weight
• Alcohol consumption
• Smoking
• Exposure to estrogens, the female hormones, without break as in hormone replacement therapy in post menopause for many years including xeno-estrogens
• Oral contraceptives – it is big business. There are many alternative methods
• Anxiety
• Stress
• Exercise

Learn to avoid these by changing one’s lifestyle. This is worth doing for your health.
Here I have written everything in a very simple way so that everybody could read and understand. I do counseling in this field also to give you tailor-made proposals for everything including metabolism based individual diet plan and environmental assessment. In the coming days there will be separate pages for the counseling information in my web site. Visit www.aaronverlag.com

Our motto is your good Health…

Drinking Water

Drinking water is an essential food to live. 50% to 70% is the water content of the body and blood contains 95%, liver 90%, bone 22% and fat has 14% water. Women have 5% less water than men.

Water helps to get rid of wastes, regulates temperature and provides a medium for biological reactions in the body. If one doesn’t drink enough water, he could become dehydrated. The symptoms of dehydration include confusion, restless behaviour, absence of tears, dry and warm skin, dark yellow urine, weakness, cramping in the arms and legs and headache. The symptoms of moderate to severe dehydration includes low blood pressure, dry eyes, convulsions, severe muscle contractions in the arms, legs, stomach and back, bloating, rapid or weak pulse and heart failure. 5% drop in body fluids will cause 25 to 30% energy loss and 15% drop causes death. 80% of world’s population suffers energy loss because of mild dehydration.

Healthy adults need between 3 l to 4 l water in a day. Hot weather and physical activity increases the need for more water, 4 l to 6 l. If the colour of the urine is pale straw the fluid intake is normally fine. If it is dark yellow, one has to drink more. Coffee, tea and fruit juices intake could be counted with water intake. Vitamin B2 makes the urine dark yellow.

Health risks can arise from drinking of water contaminated with bacteria, virus, toxic chemicals including environmental poisons and radioactive compounds. It contributes diseases in developing and in developed countries. Water helps to metabolize fat and helps weight reduction. Boiling water can kill most of the bacteria and virus. Chlorine can react with chemicals to form toxic substances.

Recent studies in USA and UK show that a number of pharmaceuticals including antibiotics, anti-epileptics, mood stabilizers and female sex hormones are found in drinking water. The found concentrations are very low – in parts per billion or trillion – which are far below the dose of medical dose. The water industry says that their water is safe. But the presence of so many drugs, prescription as well as over-the-counter medicines may have cumulative negative effects of long-term consequences to human health. We have to think of the mostly used drugs like paracetamol and ibuprofen. These can come from human excretions like urine or faeces and do not forget many throw the medicines in the toilets also. From the recycled or ground water these residues come to our drinking water.

The problems with hormones from the oral contraceptives are well known in Western countries.

The filters what we buy to purify our tap water are useless to filter these residues. Two things could help – the purifiers with reverse osmosis technique and the other one is simply distilling water. Rain water after 30 minutes of rain beginning is the most pure water if there is no industrial chimney in that area. The easiest, best and cheap method of purifying water from drugs and medicines is the distillation of water. Young scientists! Develop cheap distilling system which could be used in every house in this world. The cost of this should be distributed in such a way that the industry must subsidise this water distilling units to every home in our world.

If you have kidney problems or undergoing dialysis ask your doctor to know the amount of water to drink.