Limit the Use of Antibiotics

Carelessness doctors or health workers in delivering antibiotics to treat various infectious diseases have made a lot of people with pneumonia resistant to antibiotics.In fact, in some cases in Indonesia, immunity has reached the final stage so that there was no medicine that can be used to heal.

Professor of Pulmonary and Respiratory Medicine Faculty of Medicine, University of Indonesia, Hadiarto Mangunnegoro in Jakarta, Saturday (12/11/2011), affirmed, not all diseases caused by bacteria require antibiotics for treatment.

Giving antibiotics should take into account the patient's disease history experienced before.Consumption of antibiotics patients should also be considered, such as type, dose, and time of administration of antibiotics. Antibiotics should be given based on laboratory tests are complete.

"Many antibiotics are given only on the basis of experience so often given antibiotics did not match the type of bacteria," said Chairman of the Association of Physicians Pulmonary Indonesia, Arifin M Nawas.Giving antibiotics carelessly done it many general practitioners. Consequently, when the disease progresses and specialist physicians treated, antibiotic immunity has occurred so that it becomes difficult to handle.The condition is exacerbated by poor understanding of the community in taking an antibiotic. They are often times not to take it to its conclusion because he felt the body's condition has improved. In addition, poor supervision of the sale of drugs would also create a society free to buy antibiotics.

Martahan Sitorus of the Sub-Acute Respiratory Infection Control, Ministry of Health, acknowledged the low ability of physicians, especially those served in centers, in complying with the rules of administration of antibiotics.

A number of health workers have received training in the use of antibiotics. However, because the control of health workers on local governments, many health workers have been trained to move its position was optimal training benefits.

Cause of death Pneumonia is one type of pneumonia can be caused by viruses, bacteria, or fungi.Because the cause is bacteria, the primary treatment need to use antibiotics. Symptoms of this disease are similar to normal influenza such as fever, headache, cough, chest pain, to muscle pain.This disease affects many children aged under five years old (toddlers) and the elderly. Pneumonia is also a lot of the comorbidities of heart disease, diabetes and some cancers.

Director General of Disease Control and Environmental Health, Ministry of Health, Tjandra Yoga Aditama said, pneumonia is the cause of death of 13.2 percent of children under five and 12.7 percent of children in Indonesia. Indonesia Health Profile 2010 put pneumonia as the cause of death inpatients in hospitals by 7.60 percent, much higher than deaths due to injury.

According Hadiarto, increasing the life expectancy of Indonesian society and the development of non-infectious disease that began attacking many productive age group make a number of patients with pneumonia continues to swell. Many groups of adults who suffer from pneumonia makes economic burden to be borne high.

"If antibiotics are administered properly, according to the dosage, type, and patterns of bacteria in each area, without the complications of pneumonia can be cured in just 5-7 days," he said.After three days post-antibiotic treatment, the physician should see the response given antibiotics. If appropriate, antibiotics lived completed next two to five days.

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How many times Must Drink Green Tea Every Day?

Many people still confuse about how much green tea that should be taken everyday to overcome their health benefit for us. Does a cup of green tea is enough? Or may be we need to take more? this articles is explaining about how much cups of green tea should we drink to get its beneficial effects. 

There are no side effects of drinking green tea. The only problem that might cause to our health will occur if green tea is taken over the daily recommended levels. Experts recommend at least 3 cups of green tea per day to effectively lose weight. Taking over 6 cups a day can cause palpitations (when you can hear your heart beating or irregular heart beating) due to caffeine overdose. 

The average cup of green tea contains anywhere from 8 to 20 mg of caffeine, while black tea contains at least twice that amount -- 40 to 60 mg. Soda contains between 40 to 60 mg and a cup of drip coffee has a nerve-jangling 90 to 150 mg, more than half the amount of caffeine that some people should consume in a whole day. Overdose (quantities more than 300 mg caffeine, more than 5 cups/day) can lead to negative effect on the CNS and irritation of the stomach. 

Most of the research showing the health benefits of green tea is based on the amount of green tea typically consumed in Asian countries-about 3 cups per day (which would provide 240-320 mg of polyphenols. A cup (200 mL) of green tea (Gun Powder, Hangzhou, China) contains about 142 mg EGCG, 65 mg EGC, 28 mg ECG, 17 mg EC, and 76 mg caffeine. 

Recent studies on 1003 subjects over age 70, comparing their green tea intake and mental sharpness, using a Mini-Mental State Examination, a well-accepted standardized test for measuring cognitive function. Drinking more than 2 cups a day of green tea slashed odds of cognitive impairment in elderly Japanese men and women by 64%! And a Japanese cup of green tea is much smaller than its American counterpart-only about 3.2 fluid ounces. 

And at every level of cognitive impairment-from minimal to severe-those drinking the most green tea experienced significantly less mental decline than those drinking the least. Compared with elderly Japanese who drank less than 3 cups a week, those drinking more than 2 cups a day had a 54% lower risk of age-related declines in memory, orientation ability to follow commands and attention. Those drinking 4 to 6 cups of green tea a week (1 cup a day) had a 38 lower risk of declines in brain function.

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Garlic, the sources of antiobiotic

Garlic is a broad spectrum antibiotic, killing a wide variety of bacteria. Many pharmaceutical antibiotics kill only a narrow range of these germs. Dr. Tariq Abdullah, a prominent garlic researcher stated in the August 1987 issue of Prevention: “Garlic has the broadest spectrum of any antimicrobial substance that we know of — it is antibacterial, antifungal, antiparasitic, antiprotozoan and antiviral.”  This property belongs to the garlic constituent allicin, which is released when you cut a garlic clove. This is the chemical that gives fresh garlic its strong biting flavor, and you need to use fresh garlic to get a reliable antibiotic effect. Commercial powders and other products will not work for direct applications. Garlic appears to have antibiotic activity whether taken internally or applied topically — researchers found that the urine and blood serum of human subjects taking garlic had activity against fungi

Some bacteria, viruses, fungi, mold, and parasites killed or inhibited by garlic or its constituents:

Acinetobacter calcoaceticus

Aspergillus flavus

Aspergillus fumigatus

Aspergillus parasiticus

Aspergillus niger

Bacillus cereus

Candida albicans

Candida lipolytica

Cryptococcus neoformans

Cryptosporidium

Debaryomyces hansenii

Escherichia coli

Hansenula anomala

Herpes simplex virus type 1

Herpes simplex virus type 2

Histoplasma capsulatum

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV)

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)

Human rhinovirus type 2

Influenza B

Kloeckera apiculata

Lodderomyces elongisporus

Parainfluenza virus type 3

Vaccinia virus

Vesicular stomatitis virus

Micrococcus luteus

Mycobacterium phlei

Mycobacterium tuberculosis

Paracoccidioides brasiliensis

Pneumocystis carinii

Proteus vulgaris

Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Rhodotorula rubra

Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Salmonella typhimurium

Salmonella typhimurium

Shigella dysenteriae

Shigella flexneri

Staphylococcus aureus

Streptococcus faecalis

Torulopsis glabrata

Toxoplasma gondii

Vibrio parahaemolyticus

(Sources: Adetumbi et al 1983, 1986; Anesini and Perez 1993; Appleton and Tansey 1975; Borukh et al 1974, 1975; Chen et al 1985; Conner and Beuchat 1984; Dankert et al 1979; Didry et al 1987; Fletcher et al 1974; Fliermans 1973; Fromtling and Bulmer 1978; Ghannoum 1990; Gonzales-Fandos et al 1994; Johnson and Vaughn 1969; Kabelik 1970; Kumar and Sharma 1982; Mahajan 1983; Moore and Atkins 1977; Sandhu et al 1980; Sharma et al 1977;Shashikanth et al 1984; Tynecka and Gos 1973, 1975)

 

Resistant bacteria

A major problem with pharmaceutical antibiotics is that they can promote the development of resistant strains of bacteria. Initially the antibiotic kills most of the bacteria being attacked. With repeated exposure, however, those few bacteria that by chance are genetically resistant to the antibiotic begin to multiply. Eventually a recurring infection becomes completely resistant to that antibiotic. After a half century of the massive use of antibiotics, and the indiscriminate over-prescription of them in North America, potentially serious medical problems exist from resistant strains of bacteria. Garlic does not seem to produce such resistant strains, and may be effective against strains that have become resistant to pharmaceutical antibiotics. European researchers in the late 1970s tested garlic juice against a group of ten different bacteria and yeasts (Moore and Atkins 1977). They found that garlic was effective against all of them, and also found a “complete absence of development of resistance.” In an Indian study of garlic for dysentery, the researchers specifically selected four bacterial strains that were resistant to multiple antibiotics (Chowdhury et al 1991).

Garlic is effective against specific bacteria that are notorious for developing resistant strains, such as staphylococcus, mycobacterium, salmonella, and species of Proteus.

 

Antiviral activity

A weakness of conventional antibiotics is that they are not effective against viral infections. That’s why they won’t work against the common cold or flu. They also won’t work against some serious viral infections like viral meningitis, viral pneumonia, or herpes infections. Garlic or its constituents will directly kill influenza, herpes, vaccinia (cowpox), vesicular stomatitis virus (responsible for cold sores), and human cytomegalovirus (a common source of secondary infection in AIDS.) Garlic will also cure or improve the symptoms of a variety of viral diseases in humans or animals. In one animal study, researchers first fed a garlic extract to mice. They then introduced the flu virus into the nasal passages of the animals. Those animals that had received the garlic were protected from the flu, while the untreated animals all got sick. The researchers postulated that garlic’s effect was due in part to direct antiviral effects of garlic, and in part to stimulation of the immune system (Adetumbi and Lau, 1983)

Parasites and fungi

The medical missionary Albert Schweitzer brought some fame to garlic earlier this century when he used it successfully to treat amoebic dysentery in his patients in equatorial Africa. Subsequent experiments have shown garlic to be effective not only against the parasitic amoebas that cause dysentery, but against other organisms such as toxoplasma, cryptosporidia, and pneumocystis, all of which cause disease in humans.

Parasitic infections are a common problem in AIDS patients. Dr. Subhuti Dharmananda, Director of the Immune Enhancement Project in Portland, Oregon, regularly treats AIDS patients with such opportunistic infections. The main antibiotic therapy he uses in garlic, at about nine cloves a day for active infections, and he finds it effective to prevent or treat these infections, even when conventional antibiotics have failed to do so. Note that he started out trying to use an encapsulated form of garlic standardized for its allicin content — one of the better products. He found, however, that even doses of twenty-seven capsules a day had no effect on the infections. When he switched to raw garlic at the same dose, he got the desired result (Dharmananda 1995). Recent research supports use for intestinal parasites in AIDS (AIDS Research Alliance 1996; Deshpande et al 1993).

 

Yeast infections

If you’ve ever had athlete’s foot, you know how stubborn a yeast or fungal infection can be. A garlic wash can be very effective against fungi externally, but garlic can also treat systemic fungal infections. Researchers from the University of New Mexico demonstrated that garlic was effective both in the test tube and in animals against infection with the fungus Cryptococcus neoformans. Chinese researchers also have shown that garlic as a intravenous extract can be effective against cryptococcal meningitis. The blood and cerebrospinal fluid of the patients in that trial was twice as effective against the fungus as before treatment with garlic.

How to use garlic

To use garlic as an antibiotic take it internally and, if appropriate, apply it directly to an infection. For internal use, try one of the following forms:

Garlic infused wine. Chop or crush garlic, cover with wine, and let it sit overnight.

Garlic vinegar. Same as above, but use vinegar instead of water.

Garlic honey. Same as above, but with honey. No added water is needed. This makes a great antibiotic cough syrup.

Garlic/carrot juice. Blend three cloves of garlic up in six ounces of carrot juice. Let it sit for four to six hours.

For external application, use caution putting crushed garlic directly against the skin, because it can cause burns. Here are some forms you can use for direct application of garlic as an antibiotic:

Blend up three cloves of garlic in a quart of water and apply as a wash. Make a larger amount of this mixture and use it as a sitz bath or foot bath for infections of the feet or pelvic area.

Crush garlic, and dilute the juice with ten part of water. Use it as nose drops or a gargle.

 

Garlic and the immune system

Although garlic attacks bacteria, viruses, and other microorganisms directly, it also stimulates the body’s natural defenses against these invaders. Garlic’s remarkable and legendary power against infectious diseases is due to a combination of both these properties.

Garlic or its constituents activate phagocytes, B-Cells, and T-cells — all three levels of the cellular immune system. For instance, diallyl trisulfide, a constituent of garlic, was found to activate natural killer cells and macrophages directly, and indirectly to increase B-cell activity to make antibodies. It did this in lab experiments at concentrations of as low as one microgram per ml — the equivalent of a tiny pinch of salt in about 30 gallons of water. The macrophages in this trial were then tested for their activity against cancer cells, and the diallyl-trisulfide-treated cells were more active than regular macrophages, indicating that not only their number but their activity was increased (Feng et al 1994). This same effect has been reproduced in other experiments.

This effect is not limited to trials in a test tube. Dr. Abdullah experimented with garlic in AIDS, giving the equivalent of two cloves a day of garlic to ten patients for six weeks, and the equivalent of four cloves for another six weeks. Three of the patients could not complete the trial, but of the seven who did, all showed normal natural killer cell activity by the end of the trial — activity which had been depressed at the start of the trial. The patients’ opportunistic infections — chronic diarrhea, candida infection, genital herpes, and a chronic sinus infection — all improved. The patient with the chronic sinus infection had gained no relief from antibiotics during more than a year of treatment before the garlic trial (Abdullah 1989).

 

In one trial, immune parameters of the blood were measured after subjects — elderly patients — took a garlic powder preparation for three months (Brosche and Platt, 1993, 1994). The dose was only 600 mg of the powder per day, the equivalent of less than one-third of a garlic clove. Blood tests showed an increase in phagocytosis of the white blood cells, and also increased numbers of lymphocytes, responsible for cell-mediated immunity. Other trials have shown that garlic can increase the activity of natural-killer cells in healthy volunteers

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Garlic and Cholesterol

Cholesterol - a white, waxy substance found in the blood plasma - is essential to life. However overly high cholesterol levels can have serious health implications on the cardiovascular system in particular leading toatherosclerosis. Excessive levels can be an indicator of increased risk of heart attack and/or stroke.

If you suspect that you have a cholesterol problem it is essential that you discuss it with your doctor.

Whilst all cholesterol was once considered harmful, it is now recognised that it comes in two distinct forms: one "good", the other "bad".

Good and Bad Cholesterol

HDL and LDL

Cholesterol comes in two forms: high-density lipoproteins (HDLs) and low-density lioproteins (LDLs). Of these, HDLs are generally called "good" cholesterol whilst LDLs are "bad". 

2005 UK recommendations (from the Joint British Societies - JBS2) are total cholesterol below 4.0mmol/l, "bad" cholesterol below 2.0 mmol/l. Obviously these are general guidelines which may not be appropriate for everyone.

The Possible Effect of Garlic on Cholesterol Levels

Garlic has been reputed to assist the heart for centuries and has been used in herbal medicines for all manner of conditions. Garlic & cholesterol reduction are frequently mentioned together.

Modern medical science suggests one reason garlic might reduce cholesterol: garlic is a proven anti-oxidant . This property might help to prevent LDLs from being oxidised. In this way the cholestrol build-up that clogs the arteries could perhaps be reduced by garlic.

In recent decades, numerous scientific studies have been conducted to test the claims that garlic can help lower cholesterol levels. These studies involve measuring the cholesterol and triglyceride levels of patients taking garlic supplements compared with a control group of patients taking a placebo. Unfortunately the results are not conclusive.

Some studies have shown a reduction in total cholesterol levels and/or LDL levels in those taking garlic. Other medical studies have shown no significant difference between the levels of those taking garlic and those taking a placebo. A study published in 2007  tested raw garlic and two popular garlic supplements (Garlicin and Kyolic). The study concluded that: "None of the forms of garlic used in this study, including raw garlic, when given at an approximate dose of a 4-g clove per day, 6 d/wk for 6 months, had statistically or clinically significant effects on LDL-C or other plasma lipid concentrations in adults with moderate hypercholesterolemia."

Cholesterol and Garlic: The Verdict

Can Garlic Lower Cholesterol Levels?

So, does it work? Whilst some individual studies have shown that garlic can be effective in reducing "bad" cholesterol (LDLs), the overall body of evidence is inconclusive. In particular the 2007 study appears to shed serious doubt on the reality behind garlic's reputation in this area. Thus it would be unwise to draw a definite conclusion that garlic can be used to combat "bad" cholesterol foods.

How then do we explain those studies that do show garlic works as a cholesterol treatment? Do we simply discard them as using flawed methodology? If - for the sake of argument - we assume there is some validity in those that found links, how do we explain the different findings? One possibility is that the efficacy of garlic in combatting cholesterol etc depends upon some other, unknown factor - for example the exact variety or manner of preparation of the garlic. Since this factor is unknown, it is not possible to design tests to eliminate it. Another possibility is that the reputed cholesterol lowering properties of garlic are effective only for specific subgroups of the population.

If you are concerned about elevated cholesterol levels then you should not turn to garlic as an alternative to medical treatment - get advice from your doctor. However if your doctor approves then you might like to consider eating more garlic as part of a balanced diet "just in case". If nothing else it's a tasty alternative to salt.

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