atrial fibrillation, what can we do? Advise for a friend

[loreta]

My friend, she is a woman of my age, 54 with a lot of familial problems (a lot of stress) went yesterday to the hospital because she felt very bad. Her heart pulse was 150 and the doctor said to her she has "atrial fibrillation". The doctor told her to take aspirin and Emconcor 2.5 while waiting her appointment for cardiology. She knows that I am in this forum and asked me if you have any idea of what can she do?

Since many months I tell her to change her diet and specially to look another type of medication for her migraines. I copy and paste some articles from Sott about the ketogenic diet. Is that an help for her heart condition? I told her also to do some relaxation, some moths ago I told her about EE. I really don't know if she wants to take care of her health. Even if she is a little afraid about the secondary effects of the medication that the doctor gave to her, she will take them anyway. I am not an expert of anything, but I told her that inflammation it is a very important issue that touch the heart, also, so to stop to eat inflammatory food. Maybe someone knows about this condition and give me some advise for her? Thank you very much.

 

[Laura]

Sounds like you already told her the most important things.

I had AF for years until I cut out gluten and dairy and went low carb. Haven't had a flutter since August of 2008 when I changed my diet. The worst thing for your heart is grains and carbs. If you can't cut them out, might as well resign yourself to the slow death prescribed by the doctor.

 

[Gaby]

Hi loreta,

You can search at sott.net for "magnesium" and give her some articles about it. Under stress, we need much more magnesium and with AF, there is usually a lack of that mineral as well.

Avoiding coffee and inflammatory foods might eliminate the problem altogether. Hopefully she will feel encouraged to give it a try.

 

[Chu]

My friend, she is a woman of my age, 54 with a lot of familial problems (a lot of stress) went yesterday to the hospital because she felt very bad. Her heart pulse was 150 and the doctor said to her she has "atrial fibrillation". The doctor told her to take aspirin and Emconcor 2.5 while waiting her appointment for cardiology. She knows that I am in this forum and asked me if you have any idea of what can she do?

Since many months I tell her to change her diet and specially to look another type of medication for her migraines. I copy and paste some articles from Sott about the ketogenic diet. Is that an help for her heart condition? I told her also to do some relaxation, some moths ago I told her about EE. I really don't know if she wants to take care of her health. Even if she is a little afraid about the secondary effects of the medication that the doctor gave to her, she will take them anyway. I am not an expert of anything, but I told her that inflammation it is a very important issue that touch the heart, also, so to stop to eat inflammatory food. Maybe someone knows about this condition and give me some advise for her? Thank you very much.

It's a hard thing to do, because if she is not asking and is willing to follow orders, then there isn't much you can do. Maybe you have done all you could at this point, and it is her lesson to learn in her own way? No idea.

However, you might also want to tell her a bit more about the vagus nerve and EE, and maybe something easy to understand, like this article, might help. Dr.Lundell also wrote this book in which he has very clear explanations about inflammation and heart problems.

All the above can only be a simple explanation, but I think that she would have to be willing to follow a healthy diet, and be patient.

Finally, some supplements might not be a bad idea. Magnesium (oh, I saw Psyche posted about it as I was writing), and maybe CoQ10? For a healthy heart on someone on a healthy diet it's not necessary, but in her case it might help.

 

[Ellipse]

Based on Cayce reading, the Meridian Institute have found this :

With regard to the Cayce spiritual disciplines, during the various research programs at Meridian Institute it was observed that one of the standard protocols for assessing heart rate variability involved controlled breathing at about six breaths per minute (i.e., one breath every ten seconds). This pattern of respiration produced some of the strongest measurable effects on the pattern of heart rate variability. It was further noted that this rhythm of breathing closely matches that produced by some of the chants recommended in the Cayce readings. The time required to complete the chant and take the next breath is almost ideal for inducing an entrainment effect valued by some experts in this field.

http://www.meridianinstitute.com/newslet/Vol8-2/8-2.html

I haven't paid attention but this is perhaps the tempo of the pipe breathing too.

An another and easy accessible part of the treatment is massages to relax the body.

 

[loreta]

Thank you very much for your advises! I appreciate very much. And I am in the right road telling her to change her diet and also about magnesium. But as we can see in many people, if they think that medication is the most important thing, and doctors the most saviors of this planet, it is difficult to make them understand that health is something very personal, I mean, we have to take hands in our health. I gave her many links to Sott articles about keto diet, paleo, magnesium, cholesterol, EE. She asked me to asked you for advice. I will tell her what advise you told me, now it is to her to take a decision. I know I can't take the decision for her. I think she will continue to follow the "program" of the doctors because in a sense it is easier for her. Changing and wanting to be healthy is a big, enormous decision that demands courage and curiosity. I say this because I see how many problems she has with her young girl, and I can see how many problems she has with all her family, brothers and sisters. It seems to me that she took the role of a martyr, a victim. But a martyr specially. This is the backround. In health, she have migraines, arthritis, Fibromyalgia. I am often, but not very much, just when she puts the subject, talking about this forum and our diet and how this diet change our life, giving us control about our health, not just control but understanding about health and how this society perceives health.

Again, thank you in my name and her for your advises. She does not speak English so I will try to tell her what you told me that is very similar of what I told her. But maybe if it comes from you she will be more open? We will see. :)

 

[Ellipse]

Acupuncture seem to have good results too :

http://aim.bmj.com/content/early/2013/07/24/acupmed-2013-010380.abstract
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3312232/
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/739281
...

Perhaps the mos accessible for her but as always say, the challenge is to find a real TCM practitioner.

 

[loreta]

Based on Cayce reading, the Meridian Institute have found this :

With regard to the Cayce spiritual disciplines, during the various research programs at Meridian Institute it was observed that one of the standard protocols for assessing heart rate variability involved controlled breathing at about six breaths per minute (i.e., one breath every ten seconds). This pattern of respiration produced some of the strongest measurable effects on the pattern of heart rate variability. It was further noted that this rhythm of breathing closely matches that produced by some of the chants recommended in the Cayce readings. The time required to complete the chant and take the next breath is almost ideal for inducing an entrainment effect valued by some experts in this field.

http://www.meridianinstitute.com/newslet/Vol8-2/8-2.html

I haven't paid attention but this is perhaps the tempo of the pipe breathing too.

An another and easy accessible part of the treatment is massages to relax the body.

I also gave her some links to the EE web page, and another little video about breathing, something very similar of your quote. It was made by a group of cardiologists from Montreal.

Thanks for the link.

 

[SeekinTruth]

My mother has had atrial fibrillation since around 1999 or 2000. The things that have helped the most are those that were posted by others: diet (she's been on ketogenic diet since around March 2011 - she went gluten and dairy free for four months before that), breathing (pipe breathing and slow round breathing, which also helps her blood pressure which used to be high but is also mostly under control), magnesium - transdermal and oral (particularly magnesium taurate), taurine (usually 1000 mg), CoQ10, particularly Ubiquinol (a more bio-available form of CoQ10), fish oil for keeping the blood thin in addition to reducing inflammation and the other benefits of omega 3's/fish oil. She used to also take vitamin E, not so much anymore, but she gets plenty in her food and the fish oil supplements have mixed forms of E for preserving the delicate omega 3's.

Taurine has anti-convulsant properties and works with any kind of electrical misfiring type situations.

When it started, she was under pretty severe stress. Since the great improvement through diet and supplements, and also EE breathing for the last few years, she's eased off her medications. She still gets some minor episodes of arrhythmia / elevated heart rate (in the 90's) once in a while, but it's because she's got quite an anxious temperament and is also very sensitive to environmental factors such as weather changes and geomagnetic instability.

When it first started, she was rushed to the hospital from her workplace with a heart rate of 200. She also used to be a listen-to-the-doctors-and-take-your-drugs type. Not much anymore as she's seen over and over again that the only thing that worked to produce huge improvement were the diet and supplements and breathing. She would love to just take a prescription pill and have everything fixed, but it just doesn't work that way and she's finally come (begrudgingly) to accept that. Still, she doesn't readily want to make efforts consistently (like the breathing, she does it only if she has to, rather than making it a regular practice to also make her more relaxed and increase the whole benefits for her specific symptoms).

The combination of diet, supplements, and breathing techniques will make unbelievable improvements. Any additional alternative treatments may only add to them.