Peter's Health Blog: Environmental Pharmaceutical Polution

Everyone has heard about global warming and how it is going to "destroy" us all. However many people don't know about drugs that are supposed to help you can actually harm you. Humans consume 235 million doses of antibiotics each year. Most of those people never finish their subscription because they "feel" better. While taking the drugs for a limited amount of time may help a person feel better, the sickness might not actually be gone. So what these people do is take there left-overs and throw them in the toilet and flush it. Out of sight, out of mind right? Guess again. Those pills take a wonderful journey to the water treatment plants where they are basically spread throughout the entire water supply. This water is used for irrigation, watering plants, and/or drinking. These drugs in the water may cause no problems or very minor problems, but the next time you have a cold you will find out that cure-all pill is no longer as effective because your body has small amounts of it present all the time and adapted to it.
These drugs can and do impact the life of humans, vegetation, animals, and wildlife. As mentioned earlier the drugs may reduce effectiveness in humans. They may also cause mutations in vegetation and animals. Some drugs used as anti-depressants will change a persons serotonin levels, serotonin can also cause aquatic creatures such as frogs, fish, etc. to spawn early and could destroy the cycle of a frogs life and thus ruining wildlife.
In today's society more and more water tests in rivers, streams, and lakes are going positive for drug contamination. We need to stop this problem now before it is to late. For further reading on this subject you can go to these sources: http://www.sixwise.com/newsletters/06/02/16/pharmaceutical-pollution-what-it-is-and-how-pharmaceutical-pollution-threatens-your-health.htm or http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20000401/fob1.asp

Peter's Health Blog: Industrialized Farming

Hm...your hungry for that ham and cheese sandwich, or do you want that turkey and cheese...why not have a ham, turkey, and cheese sandwich? This is an example of people and when they are hungry they choose what they are hungry for. Easy right? WRONG! Without industrialized farming you get no choice, you eat what you have. So we all are starting to think industrialized farming a great idea gives us food so we don't go hungry doesn't it, a good thing right? WRONG AGAIN! Industrialized farming may produce more food and let less people have to be farmers, but is it all good?
Industrialized farm produce has fertilizers that are harmful to humans. Farmers try to kill the weeds and bugs and other such things that would harm crops. These fertilizers are dangerous for human consumption and may lead to death in some cases.
There are also chemicals used for animals. The more chemicals you use to make more animals, fatter animals, or bred animals quicker, the sooner you can make a profit. But most farms are based toward profit and don't care about the animals well being, some animals are crammed into 2 or 3 where there should only be one. There are chemicals that are fed or injected into the animals to make them grow bigger or quicker. The use of these chemicals can be inside the meat that is served to the public and could be harmful to health.
In my opinion there is only 1 solution that makes sense, first we need more farmers, then because we have more farmers we can cut down on the chemicals used in plant and cattle. After that the food will get healthier and then we can keep having more farmers. But this is just my opinion so there are most likely more ways to solve this problem.

Peter's Health Blog: Soy and its benefits

Soy is a food that has been blown way out of proportion. It is the food that is the definition of healthy....or so they say. Many people think that soy is good, good, good with no down sides. While soy may contain some great nutrients, you may get more than you wanted. There are new studies today that show that soy may not be the best choice. Some studies have raised questions about soy, such as whether or not it gives women a higher chance of breast cancer, affect the brain function in men, and even cause abnormalities in infants. The reason for these studies and questions are because of what is IN soy. Soy has great nutrients and protein, but also has a strange chemical that imitates estrogen (the female hormone). Some animal trials have shown that alter the sexual development, actually 2 glasses of soy milk a day for 1 month is enough to miss time a women's menstrual cycle.
Soy beans also include isoflavones, which are a group of phytochemicals. These isoflavounes are what the studies are about. They may be able to relieve certain menopausal symptoms, prevent cancer, slow or get rid of osteoporosis, and may even reduce the chance of heart disease.
Soy beans are not able to be eaten straight out from the wild. First they must be fermented, have extensive processing, have chemical extractions, and be heated to high temperatures. Then they may be suitable for digestion.
So to summarize this blog. Soy may have some great benefits and pluses, but it may have even more dangerous negatives. Soy may be a helpful food in the future but for now it is unreliable and best.
For further reading the information here was attained from this site: http://www.healingdaily.com/detoxification-diet/soy.htm

Peter's Health Blog: Conflict Resolution

A theory I found on the Internet is referred to as the Interest-Based Relational (IBR) Approach. This is a conflict resolution method that looks at peoples individual differences and helps avoid getting "stuck" or not solving the problem. The method has some simple rules to follow that will solve the conflict.
First make sure that having good relationships are the top concern, this means that you must act calm and collected while respecting the other person and try to build some mutual respect. You must remain aware and calm even under pressure. Second keep personal views and the conflict separate, sometimes people will see another person doing something "just to annoy them" when they may have a valid reason and their view of the person is coloring their thinking. Third pay attention to the interests involved in the conflict, this rule means to be quiet and see why the other person is doing what they are doing. Fourth listen and then talk, to follow this rule you must think about what it being said and why it is being said, then think about what you are saying and why you are saying it. Fifth observe the facts about the situation, establish a goal and look for things that might get in the way. Last explore options together, talk about your ideas and see that maybe a third option may exist that leaves both people happy.
These rules stop conflicts from going out of control and will help limit the effects of the outcome.
This method is effective but in my opinion would take some time to learn to a point where it may be usable. Also it seems like it would require lost of self-control which not all people have.
This method came from http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/newLDR_81.htm.

Peter's Health Blog: Making G.R.E.A.T decisions

There are many decision making models out in the world today. One we learned about in class is the G.R.E.A.T decision making model. GREAT is used for when people are in a pressured situation and want to make the "right" decision and don't know how choose or what said decision is. Some other ones that are also useful are the Seven Steps and SWOT. The Seven steps are more goal based and what you would like to achieve in blank amount of time, more information can be found at (http://www.decision-making-confidence.com/7-step-decision-making-model.html). SWOT (Strengths. Weaknesses. Opportunities. Threats.) is looking at what a person would want to do and what the best choice of getting there is for them, it is more of a personalized path to follow, more information is available at (http://www.decide-guide.com/swot.html).
These are all similar because they all are used in making a choice and following the choice to achieve something. But they are also based on different areas of choices that were mentioned earlier, like Seven Steps is for goal setting and achieving, SWOT is path planning and analyzing what path to take, GREAT is for peer pressure situations and what to decide and follow. GREAT is more of a general decision making model and not limited to only some areas of decision making. To get the most effective model out of these three I think that some situations are better thought through with different models, but if it is just a general view of effectiveness on decisions I would say that GREAT is the most effective because it is not just geared to one specific area of choices and decisions. That is why I think GREAT is more effective than the other models.

Peter's Health Blog: Trust me..it matters

Does the food you eat really matter to you? To answer this simply...yes. Food is not just an object that people eat for mundane (ordinary) reasons. People eat for many reasons such as boredom, depression, anxiety, etc. But suprisingly besides what people actually believe eating healthy is not the same as not eating. People think that to eat healthy or "diet" you need to not eat your favorite foods and only eat small amounts of food. In actuality what eating healthy includes is eating smart. Eating smart means choosing that vegetable sub over that greasy double cheese burger, choosing the small snack bag of pretzels rather that a whole bag of chips. Eating healthy is more about having more energy and staying healthy than losing those pounds. People always think of "diets" as the same thing, eat healthy, eat less, carbs are the enemy and so on. But some diets are different, some diets don't cut out your favorite foods but rather give suggestions for what to eat when your unsure, about having 2 pieces of pizza instead of the whole thing, some diets have guidelines but aren't so strict they don't allow you to have a snack every once and a while. Some healthy guide lines are very general and here is an example at http://www.helpguide.org/life/healthy_eating_diet.htm.
This guide line talks about limiting yourself so as to not eat unhealthy, the daily calories a person eats depends on their physical activity. The key part of any healthy life style is simple, drink lots of water!!! A human body is composed of about 75% water and water is used in the bodies system to remove waste. Most Americans actually go through life without enough water. The best advice that could be given for a person starting this diet is take it slow. Changing years and years of habit all at once is hard, so try just trying 1 new food each week and in no time at all your life will be healthier and you will have more energy. So to answer the question does the food you eat really matter to you? Well, i'll let you be the judge of that...