Homemade skin bleaching concoctions have used natural acids for a hundred years. Cosmetic lightening products take it to the next level. The concept is the same. Natural, gentle acids bleach skin. Don’t let the word “acid” scare you. We eat acids all the time. We get citric acid from oranges and lemons and limes. Some nuts have acid.

Homemade Skin Bleaching Creams

You might think “some nuts” use nuts for skin bleaching. Years ago it was state-of-the-art. They made a paste out of almonds, and smeared it on their skin. They hoped the acid in the nuts was a lightener.

Almond paste is now sold to smear on crackers. ‘Nuff said.

People used to put lemon juice in their hair at the beach. They swore it sped up the sun’s bleaching effect.
The thinking was, why not make a home bleaching cream with lemon juice? It’s citric acid, so it’s safe.
•But lemon juice applied directly to the skin dries it out. That’s basically how it worked. Dry skin flaked off. New skin was lighter. Temporarily.
•Lemon juice stings like crazy on any cut or pimple.
•So they added lotion or cream. Now the lemon acid was so diluted it didn’t do much.

In the 40s and 50s, women used peroxide to lighten hair. The term “peroxide blond” was born. Once again, the thinking was, “why not use it on skin?”

And they did. And it was not good. Hydrogen peroxide on tissue is an irritant. Absorbed into skin it is toxic. So they cut it down, by adding lotion to make a home bleaching cream. It merely took longer to irritate and be absorbed. Hydrogen peroxide was a bad idea.

But the skin bleaching “pioneers” were on to something when they tried to harness natural acid to lighten skin. Chemists ran with it.

Cosmetic Lightening Products

Scientists identified natural acids that worked in cosmetic lightening products.

1. Kojic acid-a natural substance used as an all-purpose health supplement in Asia. It’s in plants and rice.
2. Arbutin, a natural substance found in the leaves of a bush.
3. Ascorbic Acid, which is from Vitamin C.
4. Azelaic acid, which is found in wheat, rye and barley.

They also found vitamins that helped with skin bleaching.

1. Derivatives of Vitamin A, also known as retinoids
2. Niacinamide, a form of Vitamin B-3

Why do these natural acids and vitamins work for skin lightening? They inhibit melanin production. Melanin gives skin color. They also slow the growth of existing pigmented cells. Color fades as dark cells are replaced with new skin. Some gentle exfoliation helps speed things along.

Products with Alpha Arbutin and Kojic Acid are easy to buy and are affordable.

I supposed you could make your own kojic acid. Make the rice wine saki in your kitchen. Build a homemade still and distill the rice juice. You could save the malt that’s left over. Then, if you could figure out how to extract the acid, you’d have your own supply of kojic acid.

Better yet, get out of the kitchen and into a cosmetic lightening product. This will save you time, and frustration.

The three top skin bleaching tips are:

1. Stick with natural products.
2. Just say no to chemicals.
3. Give skin lightening time.

What You Really Need to Know About Skin Lightening

Skin bleaching has to inhibit melanin. This is the pigment that makes skin darker.

1. Natural products

People in Asia were taking an herbal medicine called arbutin. They took it for general good health. Much to their surprise, they discovered it lightened their tone.

Doctors in Japan wanted to know why. They performed two different tests of Alpha Arbutin, which is a form of the herb. (You might see it called by its scientific name, 4-hydroxyphenyl alpha-glucopyranoside).

•In the first study, it reduced pigmentation in cells by 25 percent.
•In the follow-up test, they knew more about how to apply it. This time they got a 40% reduction in melanin. That means the cells were nearly half as dark.
•Alpha Arbutin got a safety stamp of approval. Cells grew with less melanin. But they otherwise grew normally.

Another natural ingredient to look for is kojic acid. It’s very gentle and safe. It comes from rice. Combined with alpha arbutin it becomes a one-two punch of natural skin lightening.

2. Just say no to chemicals.

1. The worst is hydroquinone. It comes from benzene, which is cancer-causing.
2. Animals developed cancer when scientists put hydroquinone cream on them.
3. Hydroquinone is unsafe in products left on the skin. Yet skin lightening takes repeated use over significant periods of time.
4. There’s a really scary side effect. It may cause ochronosis. The skin becomes dark and thick.
5. You can’t buy it in The European Union or Japan. It’s banned because it’s dangerous. In the US, only doctors know how to use it safely. But it’s still sold in do-it-yourself creams for skin bleaching.

Another chemical to watch out for is mercury. It’s in bleaching products made overseas. Mercury poisoning is known to cause neurological and kidney damage and may also lead to psychiatric disorders.

Remember, you have to leave this stuff on your skin a long time for it to work. Your pores are soaking up mercury, or hydroquinone.

3. Give it time

Our final skin bleaching tip logically springs from the first two tips. You must use any skin-lightener daily, consistently, and for many weeks or months. That’s why you want to know what’s in it. That’s why you want to stick with natural products and refuse to use chemicals.

A rule of thumb:

You eat it. You smear it. It’s safe.

Some kojic acid comes from rice. It’s left over when the Japanese make saki. It’s all-natural. It’s totally safe. You can eat it. It’s also found in a plant and extracted.

Alpha arbutin comes from the leaves of the Bearberry plant. Bears eat it. Herbalists use the juice. Years ago they began to notice that when they smeared it on a wound to keep it moist, the skin around the wound lightened. Bear in mind wounds absorb anything. But there are no side effects to arbutin.

“They are beginning to call medical care health care,” said Dr. Mervyn Hardinge, Dean of Loma Linda’s School of Public Health in the late 1970’s. Today it’s a done deal-we call it Healthcare Reform, though medical care has little to do with healthcare; it’s about the diagnosis and treatment of disease, usually with drugs. The legislation is about how to make medical care and prescription drugs available to all.

This sounds like a good thing, but we forget

1. The body is designed for self-healing and we can reverse most disease processes if we know how to cooperate with the body’s healing mechanism. We need to understand true health care.

2. Usually the things that help prevent disease also help the body overcome disease, so prevention is also curative in nature if we do it right. An ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure today.

3. Prescription drugs do not usually cure disease, but tend to control symptoms or conditions like cholesterol, blood sugar or blood pressure. If they cured you, you wouldn’t need another Rx.

4. Doctors take the Hippocratic Oath, but forget what Hippocrates said: “Nature cures, not the physician…Let your food be your medicine.” The body recognizes food as being in harmony with nature, but drugs are chemicals that sooner or later will cause toxicity problems.

5. So when we get “headache, diarrhea or abdominal pain” later, we are used to our medicines and don’t think they could cause our problem, and we seek another prescription for headache. Now we are on a slippery slope that can take us down fast, because it is dangerous to cover up the signs of drug toxicity with a second prescription while we continue the cause of our trouble.

6. Multiply this by a million, you have the approximate number of people who die each year from adverse drug reactions. And if you multiply it be 300 million, you have the approximate number who are made sick enough by a prescription to see the doctor about it. This equals our popula-tion. Some people are made sick more than once a year, offsetting those who don’t take drugs.

Every nation practicing western medicine is on the brink of bankruptcy because there are few cures and with drugs engendering ill effects later, the costs continue to rise.

The New Year is a good time for a NEW START: Nutrition, Exercise, Water, Sunlight, Temperance, Air, Rest and Trust in Nature/God. For most of our lives, it doesn’t seem to matter-we enjoy health, even if we abuse our health. But payback time comes when feeling good matters most to us.

Be true to your teeth or they will be false to you” is an expression that fits our abuses of other organs as well. There is nothing like the original equipment. Heart or liver transplants don’t last and cancer risk from high steroids to suppress organ rejection by the body makes life no picnic.

We should leave DuPont with its slogan, Better Living Through Chemistry and limit the trillions we spend on drug research while abusing our farmers and pouring chemicals into our soil so it can be used more than a few years, not to mention the herbicides, pesticides and GMO foods.

For many reasons today, a move to the country and a serious interest in gardening could be life-saving to millions, if we had only given the bailout money to the people who wanted to move out.

Inhaled steroids soothe the airways and, in the correct dose, should do you no harm, but use them sparingly. Used regularly, inhaled steroids can retard a child’s growth and some studies have shown that in adults even low doses of inhaled steroids reduce bone formation. Taken in larger than normal doses, steroids will turn off the body’s production of its own natural steroids in the adrenal gland.

This increases the body’s vulnerability to infection. In children taking steroids, illnesses such as measles and chickenpox may be more serious. In an emergency the adrenal glands normally release a surge of steroids to cope. This will not happen if you are taking high dose steroids. It is vital to carry a steroid warning card at all times for at least two years after you have stopped taking steroids.

Over activity of the adrenal glands and the taking of high dose steroids over a period produces Cushing syndrome. Typical symptoms are a red face, fat abdomen, buffalo hump on the back of the neck, muscle weakness and high blood pressure. You may also gain weight. Your skin may become thinner and you may develop stretch marks and acne.

Women may become increasingly hairy. All these symptoms disappear when you stop taking the medication. Inhaled steroids may make you hoarse and give you oral thrush. You can combat hoarseness by brushing your teeth after you have used preventer and rinsing your mouth thoroughly. Eating live yoghurt, also called bioactive yoghurt, daily may help to prevent thrush. Drugs may be essential to control your condition as they may even be life savers. But inevitably they have side effects, so it is important to monitor your medication carefully.

Complementary medicine can certainly help people with asthma and allergies. Some therapies help reduce stress and anxiety. Others may boost your energy levels by working along the meridians using fine needles or finger pressure, or you may drink a herbal tincture or take a homeopathic remedy. With all of them you will be taking control and thus taking responsibility for your own health.

Instead of being the patient taking medication from your doctor and hoping that the symptoms will go away so that you can get on with your life, you will become aware of your own needs, both physical and mental. For many people, non orthodox medicine offers hope and a way of living with whatever it is that afflicts them. It may even offer a cure. Equally important, it also builds self confidence.

Some complementary therapies deal with chronic diseases extremely well and do so without harmful side effects. Through complementary medicine you can learn how to harness your energy by relaxing, eating the right foods, breathing properly and increasing your mental and spiritual well being. It means looking at the cause of your illness in addition to the symptoms.

An acupuncturist would call this energy chi and tell you that it flows along an invisible network of pathways called meridians. A yoga teacher would say that energy passes through invisible holes in the body, called chakras. While conventional medicine can cure killer diseases, it is not good at dealing with chronic conditions as ailments that go on and on because there is no drug to cure them. Asthma and most allergies come into this category, along with many types of back pain, migraine, and irritable bowel syndrome and chronic fatigue.

Understanding Your Panic Attack Medication

Once you become familiar with your panic attack symptoms, you are probably ready to deal with the consequences and find the best treatment options for you.

Of course, your doctor has probably introduced the idea of taking some sort of panic attack medication.

It’s important to understand the different options that are available to you so you can make the most informed decision possible.

Medications used to treat anxiety and panic disorders fall into five categories.

First, you have those classified as SSRI’s or selective seratonin reuptake inhibitors. These include classic medications like Prozac, Paxil and Zoloft. These are the safest types to take on a long term basis.

Next are SNRI’s or seratonin and norepenephrine reuptake inhibitors such as Cymbalta and Effexor. These are similar to SSRI’s but have an added component.

Going down the line, you will see TCA’s or trycyclic antidepressants including Trofanil. These can be a very effective panic attack medication, but also pose some serious side effects, including heart problems.

After that there are Benzodiazpines, which are actually mild sedatives. One common one is Xanax. These can be addicting, both physically and mentally with the risk increasing the long you take them.

Finally, the hardest core drugs are under the category of MAOI’s or monoamine oxidase inhibitors. These drugs have such serious side effects that they are rarely prescribed. It’s impossible to take these without seriously altering your diet in order to avoid life threatening complications.

While there are safer options, the nature of taking a pharmaceutical drug is that there are always potential side effects. You can certainly take a SSRI for a longer period of time and probably do just fine. However, you never know what side-effects and sensitivities you may develop.

It’s always a good idea to ask if you can try natural or alternative treatment first.

Herbs such as Valerian root and St. John’s Wort can provide relief for many patients. Use caution with herbal treatments due to the many unknowns on how it reacts to other environmental factors in your life.

Also, you can learn to relax your body, avoid stress and triggers and even seek out cognitive or talk therapy. All of these options work in harmony with your natural body rhythms and you can expect relief without risking harmful or annoying side effects from a panic attack medication.

If you do decide to try panic attack medication, it’s always a good idea to ask your doctor if you can only use it as a temporary or emergency measure.

In the mean time, you should be looking for ways to naturally manage your symptoms.

By trying other safer natural methods first, you may well find that you are able to gain relief without ever having to refill that prescription.

P.S. Always consult with your doctor before discontinuing or not refilling a prescription, particularly the ones listed above.

Few drugs are without side effects, but your doctor will probably feel that the risks associated with some medications are worth the benefits you will gain. If you are concerned about long term use of some of these drugs, consult your doctor. By relaxing the tiny tubes in the lungs, these drugs provide immediate relief during an attack when the tubes constrict, producing shortness of breath and wheezing.

However, regular overuse of beta agonists can make your lungs worse, not better. Overuse interferes with the smooth lining of the airways, affecting the breakdown of magnesium, which prevents the airways from tightening. This makes them even more sensitive. The more you use your bronchodilator, the greater the dosage you will need to achieve the same effect.

If you stop taking your medication your asthma will be worse than before. Some doctors believe that over prescription of asthma drugs has contributed to the enormous rise in people suffering from asthma. Researches in New Zealand found that an asthma epidemic and a number of asthma deaths in the 1980s were caused by the high dose bronchodilator fenoterol. They calculated that someone with severe asthma using the drug was 13 times more likely to die than someone using a low dose reliever, because the drug stimulated the heart as well as the lungs.

Similarly, a study carried out in a number of medical schools in the United States shows that use of the drugs fenoterol and salbutamol, taken by a metered dose inhaler, was linked with an increased risk of death and near death. These risks are linked with very high doses. So it is important to use your bronchodilator only when you really need it. Doctor recommends that you do not use it more than once a day. It is vital always to follow your doctor’s instructions.

Amphetamine Dextroamphetamine is the generic name for the central nervous system stimulant, Adderall. As we all know, the brain is the master of all activities. It also includes hyper activity and impulse control. To perform these functions, some chemicals play a vital role. If those chemicals malfunction, it leads to Narcolepsy and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Adderall is being used to treat those disorders.

Some things which you need to keep in mind before taking this medicine are:

• Take this medicine only when it is prescribed.
• Do not take in excess as it can affect your heart.
• Adderall comes in a capsule form to ensure that it enters into your body slowly. You should not break or open. If you do so, all the drugs will act at the same time which is not advisable.
• Store your medicine away from moisture, light and heat.
• Being a drug of abuse, you may get addicted to it. So, keep track of your dosage. Ensure that nobody else is taking it.
• Drink lot of water when you take this medicine.

Adderall is strictly banned to heart patients. MAO inhibitors should not be present in your body when you take this medicine. Your body needs almost 2 weeks for clearing all the inhibitors such as Marplan, Parnate, Nardil, Azilect, Emsam and so on. One who suffers from the following diseases should completely avoid this medicine. Do you have?

• Arteriosclerosis, a disease characterised by hardened blood arteries.
• Hypertension
• Overactive thyroid
• Glaucoma

In case, if you take it will lead to sudden death. Also one who has a history of drug addiction should avoid this medicine. Long term usage of this medicine should be prohibited especially for children. This may affect the growth of the children. Also during pregnancy, mother should not take. It will affect the unborn baby and it may cause premature birth, low birth weight and so on. It is strictly prohibited for breast feeding mothers because adderall may pass through breast milk.

If you forget to take the medicine, just skip it. Do not take extra to compensate for that which people normally does. But overdose if adderall is fatal.

Even though you take this medicine with these precautionary measures, it may cause side effects which every medicine does. But its impact is stronger than others which include:

• Fast, pounding, or uneven heartbeats
• Feeling light-headed, fainting
• Increased blood pressure
• Severe headache
• Blurred vision
• Trouble concentrating
• Chest pain
• Numbness
• Tremor
• Restlessness
• Hallucinations
• Motor tics (muscle twitches)
• Headache or dizziness
• Sleep problems (insomnia)
• Dry mouth or an unpleasant taste in your mouth
• Diarrhoea, constipation
• Loss of appetite, weight loss; or
• Loss of interest in sex, impotence

Overall, do not take this medicine unless it is mandate.

The title seems like quite a mouthful so let’s break this down into the components and look at just what minimally invasive mitral surgery actually is.

The mitral valve connects the left atrium to the left ventricle and it has the job of controlling the flow of blood, so it cannot flow back into the atrium when the lower ventricle contracts to expel the blood from the heart, and send it on its journey back around your body. The mitral valve itself is comprised of a connection between the two chambers which is open when blood flows from the atrium into the ventricle, but which must be closed when the ventricle then contracts. The opening is closed by means of two, parachute like leaflets which are attached to the inner wall of the heart by means of cords (known as chordata) – the force of blood being compressed and looking for a way out of the heart forces the leaflets to deploy and block the mitral valve opening.

If the mitral valve fails to operate properly, blood can flow back into the atrium and this is known as “mitral regurgitation” which may result in pooling of blood in the heart, leading to the formation of blood clots. Blood clots are the cause of strokes and may also lead to other serious cardiac episodes, both of which may be fatal.

In addition, the mitral valve may become thickened and restrict the supply of blood or enflamed which affects the structures allowing the valve to operate. This is known as “mitral stenosis”.

Mitral valve disease may result due to bacterial infection or other underlying cardiac disease but the majority of patients who suffer the condition acquire it as a result of hereditary factors and it is common to find the disease running in families.

Traditionally, surgery was open heart which involves a large scar due to the chest incision and “rib cracking”; the spreading of the ribs to expose the heart to allow the surgeon to operate. This procedure results in considerable pain levels, extended stays in hospital and post-operative recovery periods though the surgery has extremely high levels of success in both immediate results and long term prevention of the recurrence of the disease.

Medical advances in technique and technology have led to the development of minimally invasive surgery. By minimally invasive, we mean that there is less cutting and internal intervention; in simple terms it means smaller incisions and less intrusion into the chest cavity while seeking to handle only those organs and tissues which need the surgeon’s attention. Some techniques involve the use of robotically assisted instruments to provide for greater precision and control when handling the specific tissue and structures which are the subject of the surgery.

Minimally invasive techniques require a much higher degree of surgical skill and expertise and there are additional risks associated with using these techniques though the success rates are still very high. In addition, there are benefits to using the procedures because they result in reduced pain for the patient and much shorter stays in hospital and recovering from the surgery. There is also much less scarring and incisions are made at other locations on the body which result in operation scars being far less visible which makes for a far better cosmetic effect.

Minimally invasive mitral valve repair is a modern surgical technique which avoids the need for major open-heart surgery. The mitral valve is located between the left atrium and left ventricle and it has the function of controlling the flow of blood as it is pumped from the left atrium into the left ventricle prior to being expelled from the heart as it commences its journey around the body once more.

Mitral valve disease is not a fatal condition but there are issues which lead sufferers to face significantly higher risks of experiencing a major stroke or a major cardiac episode, both of which can be fatal. Mitral valve disease can be contracted due to hereditary predisposition and the majority of patients with the condition present a family history of the condition. In addition, the tissues and structures of the mitral valve can become diseased due to bacterial infection or other underlying cardiac disease which impairs the function of the valve itself.

Traditionally, the surgical option has been to perform open heart surgery where other non-invasive medical intervention has proven unsuccessful. This requires a heart bypass and major surgery which is highly successful but also results in high levels of pain and cosmetic impairment from the scars. Due to medical advances, minimally invasive mitral valve surgery has become practical and delivers significant benefits to patients.

Minimally invasive mitral valve repair entails making small incisions (as opposed to opening the chest cavity) and typically this is effected by making incisions of only 2 to 4 inches compared to up to 8 inches for traditional surgery. In addition, robotically assisted surgery allows for much greater control and precision for certain types of keyhole surgery which is also known as “port access”.

Minimally invasive mitral valve surgery delivers significant benefits which include the following:

Lessened pain;

Reduced loss of blood;

A lower infection risk;

Faster recovery times;

Shorter stay in hospital; and

Improved cosmetic appearance post-operation due to smaller and less apparent scars.

Minimally invasive surgery on the mitral valve is much more demanding of the surgeon and medical facility, requiring higher levels of skill though there is a higher risk associated with using minimally invasive techniques compared to the traditional open-heart procedure. Nevertheless, success rates are very high for this operation and more importantly, there is a very high success rate for preventing any recurrence of the mitral valve condition which warrants the surgery in the first instance.

There are three main surgical operations conducted using minimally invasive techniques:

Mitral valve surgery using a right mini-thoracotomy;

Mitral valve surgery using a partial upper sternotomy; and

Robotically assisted endoscopic valve repair.

All three procedures provide excellent cosmetic results because the operative scars are much reduced and are located in areas of the body where they are not readily discernible. Traditional open heart surgery requires a chest incision of up to 8 inches and spreading of the ribs; this results in unsightly scarring and considerable post-operative pain whereas minimally invasive techniques do not require “chest cracking” and incisions are made elsewhere on the body to gain access to the mitral valve and the heart.