Nutrition and Healing
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Nutrition & Healing is intended to provide cutting-edge health information.
Nothing on this site should be interpreted as personal medical advice. Always consult with your doctor before changing anything related to your healthcare.

Chip of the old block

Am I in a sci-fi film, or is this headline for real: “FDA approves implantable medical chip”? The size of a grain of rice, this small chip, called VeriChip, can be slipped under your skin and programmed to contain your vital medical statistics. And, of course, these chips will be read by the free scanners the chip makers will be giving to hospitals and doctors. It makes our fretting about HIPAA and other medical privacy issues seem like child’s play.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest that any possible health benefits of inserting this medically unnecessary foreign object under your skin are far outweighed by the potential negatives. You don’t have to let your imagination wander very far to come up with some chilling scenarios.

The most benign use is the one currently being touted. Emergency room doctors would instantly know your blood type if you are in a car accident and unconscious. Life-threatening allergies would be contained in the chip as well.

And if the FDA approved it, well, it must be safe, and thoroughly tested, and peer-reviewed by a panel of physicians not on the drug company take, right? All ethics issues have certainly gotten a good airing during the approval process and iron-clad safeguards put in place to protect us, haven’t they? C’mon. Do they really expect us to not blink an eye and just start lining up to get our very own microchip implant?

Reasonable people like you and me can’t forget that we live in a security-obsessed, post 9/11 world that is willing and eager to track people by any means necessary. In the name of terrorism, many of the civil liberties we have taken for granted have been quickly and easily usurped by a panic-driven Congress in dangerous times under the guise of the Patriot Act.

Understandable? Sure. Until you’re the one who comes under suspicion and spends months in a detention center without being charged with a crime or provided any legal representation.

If that all sounds a little Big Brother-ish to you — overly paranoid and impossible to imagine — then there’s an implantable chip-maker in Florida that would love to hear from you.

But if you’re interested in preserving not only your medical privacy, but all of your civil rights, I highly suggest you stick with the low-cost medical ID bracelet that indicates any must-know allergies or conditions in case of emergency, and a card in your wallet with your blood type.

The chip-maker, Applied Digital Solutions, assures that there’s no chance of involuntary tracking, or privacy infringement. But I know that’s just not a risk I’m willing to take.

The neuropathy-nixing nutrient

Q: A friend of mine has diabetes, and an old doctor (not his regular GP, mind you) told him he should take chromium picolinate to lower his sugar count, which he has, and it has. The doctor also told him to take liporic Acid which we haven’t heard of and can’t find. Do you know anything about this?

JVW: I believe the doctor was referring to alpha-lipoic acid — and he’s right. This would be important for your friend. Alpha-lipoic acid is a powerful antioxidant that can help prevent and treat a common complication of diabetes called diabetic neuropathy. This painful condition may be caused in part by free-radical damage to nerves resulting from poorly regulated blood sugar (glucose).

Alpha-lipoic acid also improves the glucose-lowering action of insulin. I include it as part of my recommendations for diabetes prevention as well as for people who already have diabetes. For diabetes prevention a dose of 100 milligrams daily should be fine. To prevent complications of diabetes I recommend 200 milligrams daily. And if you already have diabetic neuropathy, increase dose to 200 milligrams three times daily.

Of course, it is important to consult the doctor who is managing your care when you start taking anything that can affect your glucose levels to ensure proper management of your overall condition.

What is…alpha-lipoic acid?

Some say that the antioxidant qualities of alpha-lipoic acid put it right up there with vitamins C and E as an important defense against free radicals. It converts to dihydrolipoic acid in the body, and together, they fight peroxynitrate radicals especially dangerous free radicals that contain both oxygen and nitrogen.

Some researchers have started calling alpha-lipoic acid the “universal” antioxidant. Whereas vitamin C is only water-soluble, and vitamin E is only fat-soluble, alpha-lipoic acid neutralizes free radicals in both watery and fatty regions of cells. It also recycles and extends the metabolic lifespans of vitamin C, glutathione, and coenzyme 10 directly, and vitamin E indirectly — increasing their effectiveness.

Yours in good health,
Amanda Ross
Managing Editor
Nutrition & Healing

Sources:

Negrisanu G, Rosu M, et al. “Effects of 3-month treatment with the antioxidant alpha-lipoic acid in diabetic peripheral neuropathy.” Rom J Intern Med. 1999; 37(3): 297-306

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