by Dr. Paul S. Inselman
According to The World Health Organization, in 2003, 303 million people worldwide suffered with migrane headaches. Millions of others suffer with other types of headaches ranging from tension to cluster headaches every single day.
Headaches account for a tremendous amount of time lost from work as well as huge sums of money paid for either OTC or Prescription medications. A much overlooked area in the treatment and prevention of headaches lies in the field of nutrition.
Most people who suffer with headaches inherently know that certain foods often trigger their headache. It is well known and documented that red wine, hard cheese, fine chocolate and pork products are often headache precipitators.
What I would like to look at today is the role that digestion plays in the prevention of headaches. When we eat we are supposed to eat a diet rich in raw foods. Raw foods contain an abundance of essential nutrients called food enzymes. Due to cooking, processing, microwaving, using antibiotics and pesticides, in our food, the enzymes are destroyed. What this leads to is incomplete complete digestion and the formation of circulating immune complexes (CIC).
CIC's are read as foreign bodies by the immune system and stress the body. If the body is stressed for a long enough period of time, it will start to show symptoms.
I don't want to bore you with a long-winded biochemistry lesson, but I do want to show one connection that nutrition can play with regard to headaches. Let's go back to our CIC's.
CIC's are attacked by our immune system. The immune system is made up of white blood cells which are produced in the bone marrow along with the red blood cells and platelets. Red blood cells are used primarily to bring oxygen to our cells and platelets are primarily used to clot our blood. If we have an onslaught of CIC's due to undigested food, the bone marrow begins to produce more white blood cells to fight the foreign invaders. If the bone marrow is producing more white blood cells then it will reduce the production of red blood cells in order to meet the higher demand for white blood cells. If we now have fewer red blood cells being produced, we will have less oxygen going to our cells. If we get less oxygen (hypoxia) to our cells a symptom of a headache can ensue.
If you are suffering with headaches or if you want to improve your health, and digestion and look to prevent headaches here are some steps that you can take:
If you would like to schedule an appointment with Dr. Inselman, please contact our office at anytime at: 954-757-4256.