Courtesy of:
John H. Keefe III, D.C.
(918) 663-1111
IN THE NEWS: SIDE EFFECTS FROM ADHD DRUGS MAY BE WORSE THAN ADHD The side effects from ADHD medications are often far worse than the condition itself. These drugs actually rival illegal street drugs in terms of their dangerous risks to health, which include: Permanent brain damage, Cardio toxicity and liver damage, Cancer, Changes in personality, depression, and/or hallucinations, Heart attack and stroke, Sudden death and suicide. This is a more than 400 percent increase in ER visits due to adverse reactions to such drugs in a mere six years! Drugs prescribed for ADHD are not "mild" by any means. These are hard-core, "class 2" narcotics, regulated by the Drug Enforcement Agency as a controlled substance because they can lead to dependence. The majority of kids diagnosed with ADHD will be prescribed these potentially dangerous drugs, the most common being Ritalin. By definition, Ritalin stimulates your central nervous system and may certainly interfere with the delicate and complex workings of your brain and personality.
WELLNESS: SLEEP HELPS DETOX THE BRAIN We’ve known for some time that sleep is essential for forming and consolidating memories and that it plays a central role in the formation of new neuronal connections and the pruning of old ones. But that hardly seems enough to risk death-by-leopard-in-the-night. “If sleep was just to remember what you did yesterday, that wouldn’t be important enough,” Dr. Nedergaard explains. In a series of new studies, published this fall in the journal Science, the Nedergaard lab may at last be shedding light on just what it is that would be important enough. Sleep, it turns out, may play a crucial role in our brain’s physiological maintenance. As your body sleeps, your brain is quite actively playing the part of mental janitor: It’s clearing out all of the junk that has accumulated as a result of your daily thinking. In a series of new studies on mice, her team discovered exactly that: When the mouse brain is sleeping or under anesthesia, it’s busy cleaning out the waste that accumulated while it was awake. On average, we’re getting one to two hours less sleep a night than we did 50 to 100 years ago and 38 minutes less on weeknights than we did as little as 10 years ago. At the extreme end, the result could be the acceleration of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
CHIROPRACTIC: ADJUSTMENTS HAVE A POSITIVE EFFECT ON THE BRAIN A study presented at the International Research And Philosophy Symposium held at Sherman College of Straight Chiropractic finds that Chiropractic adjustments have a positive effect on the Central Nervous System (CNS), specifically on the four primary frequencies of brain function. Brain function is measured on four primary frequencies: Beta, Alpha, Theta and Delta. Alpha waves reflect the meditative, relaxing healing mode. Beta waves represent the active, busy brain. Theta waves reflect light sleep, relaxation and conceptual development. Delta waves represent the brain activity during deep sleep, repair mode and energy storage. After receiving a chiropractic adjustment, post EEG scans revealed improvement in all areas of the volunteer’s brain function. Particularly, the researchers noticed an increase in the meditative Alpha brainwave patterns that are associated with a greater degree of relaxation, health and healing. Visit our web site: keefeclinic.com or facebook/keefeclinic.com