Holiday travel can be tough on your body.  Whether driving a few hours to visit the in-laws or flying cross-country for a week-long holiday excursion, you can hardly make the most of your time if the trip leaves you tired, stressed, stiff and sore.

“We all know that sitting for extended periods of time should be avoided,” Dr. Andrew Cohen, a chiropractor with ProActive Chiropractic of San Francisco, says.  Long flights will decrease circulation, increase fatigue and cause muscles to stiffen and in rare cases cause blood clots that can be life-threatening, like deep vein thrombosis.

The American Chiropractic Association recommends the following in-flight exercises to help travelers avoid muscle tension and stiffness:

Foot Pumps

Start with both heels on the floor and point your feet upward as high as you can.  Return both feet flat on the floor. Then, lift your heels high, keeping balls of feet on the floor.  Repeat the three stages in a continuous motion and in 30-second intervals.

Ankle Circles

Lift one foot off the floor. Draw a circle with your toes 10 times in a clockwise rotation, then 10 times counter-clockwise. Relax. Repeat with the other foot.

Knee Lifts

While in a seated position –with your back straight and feet flat on the floor –lift the right foot a few inches off the floor while keeping the knee bent at 90 degrees.  Alternate legs.  Repeat 20 to 30 times for each leg.

Shoulder Rolls

Gently roll your shoulders forward, up, back and down. Repeat in the reverse direction. Repeat several times.

Neck Rolls

With your shoulders relaxed, drop one ear to your shoulder and gently roll your neck forward and back, holding each position about five seconds.  Repeat five times.

In addition, keep your blood flowing by walking up and down the aisle periodically, when permitted by aircraft personnel; keep your legs uncrossed; wear comfortable clothing; and drink plenty of water.

Dr. Cohen knows this first hand because last year during the holidays, he and his  wife flew to Sri Lanka for their destination wedding.  He followed this advice and learned first hand that travel can be stressful and difficult on your body (especially pre-wedding, but TSA itself is stressful).  He recommends getting adjusted after a long flight (anything over 5 hours) because the seats on a plane are “awful ergonomically” and a chiropractor can help restore the balance.  “Also make sure you drink at least one large cup of water an hour because the recycled air on the plane will quickly dehydrate you, and make sure you take frequent stretch breaks.  Sitting on a Backvitalizer, an unstable surface that helps strengthen the muscles also prevents some of the normal wear and tear. ”

(A safari photo from our honeymoon, also in Sri Lanka.)

Contributions from the American Chiropractic Association, the nation’s leading chiropractic organization.

The decision whether to get a flu shot is a difficult one. I read a variety of medical journals and articles supporting both sides. I see patients who swear by their yearly flu shot and those who tell me they’ll never do one or about how they got sick after a previous injection that changed their outlook. I make no recommendation either way, other than that you should explore your options fully and focus on bolstering the overall immune response through a variety of diet, hygiene, exercise, chiropractic, etc.

To make matters even more confusing recent research indicates that the flu vaccine does not reduce risk of death in the elderly as commonly proposed.  “The results of this study suggest that many previous observational studies have overestimated the mortality benefits of influenza vaccination due to difficult-to-correct confounding attributable to the ‘healthy-user’ effect.”

But there are those individuals who are not good candidates for the vaccine, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics and it’s important to point out this section of the population.

The publication To Your Health indicates in an article questioning whether a flu shot is right for you:

The AAP provides guidelines for circumstances under which patients should not be vaccinated with the flu shot or nasal spray. According to the AAP, a patient should not get vaccinated if any of the following applies (whether restriction applies to flu shot, nasal spray or both is noted in parentheses):

• Less than 6 months of age (flu shot); less than 5 or older than 49 (nasal spray)
• Moderate to severe febrile (fever) illness (both)
• History of Guillain-Barre syndrome (both)
• Hypersensitivity, including anaphylaxis, to eggs, to any influenza vaccine dose, or to any of its components (both)
• Asthma, reactive airway disease, or other chronic disorders of the lungs or cardiovascular systems (nasal spray)
• Have underlying medical conditions including metabolic diseases, such as diabetes, renal dysfunction, and hemoglobinopathies
• Received other live vaccines within the past four weeks (nasal spray)
• Known or suspected immunodeficiency disease, or receiving immunosuppressive therapies (nasal spray)
• Take aspirin (nasal spray)

Once again, I focus on this part of the article because I rarely hear the media or the CDC for that matter talk about those who should NOT get the shot. This is from a reputable medical source as well, the AAP.

The Huffington Post states there are 3 Sure-Fire Ways to prevent the swine flu (or H1N1)

Hygiene, Chiropractic, and Masks.

The media has not done a great job of covering the immunoprotective benefits of chiropractic care despite the research.

The Huffington Post states:

2. Chiropractic- One of the most important studies was performed by Ronald Pero, Ph.D., chief of cancer prevention research at New York’s Preventive Medicine Institute and professor of medicine at New York University. It showed the positive effect that chiropractic care can have on the immune system and general health.

Dr. Pero measured the immune systems of people under chiropractic care as compared to those in the general population and those with cancer and other serious diseases. His initial three-year study was of 107 individuals who had been under chiropractic care for five years or more. The chiropractic patients were found to have a 200% greater immune competence than those people who had not received chiropractic care, and they had 400% greater immune competence than those people with cancer and other serious diseases. The immune system superiority of those under chiropractic care did not appear to diminish with age. Dr. Pero stated:

When applied in a clinical framework, I have never seen a group other than this chiropractic group to experience a 200% increase over the normal patients. This is why it is so dramatically important. We have never seen such a positive improvement in a group. [3]

Another study from Patricia Brennan, Ph.D., leading a team of researchers, conducted a study that found improved immune response in her test subjects following chiropractic treatment. The study specifically demonstrated the “phagocytic respiratory burst of polymorphonuclear neutrophils (PMN) and monocytes were enhanced in adults that had been adjusted by chiropractors.” [4]

Life Chiropractic University produced an incredible study from the Sid Williams Research Center in 1994. The researchers took a group of HIV positive patients and adjusted them over a six-month period. What they found was that the “patients that were adjusted had a forty-eight percent (48%) increase in the number CD4 cells (an important immune system component).” These measurements were taken at the patients’ independent medical center, where they were under medical supervision for the condition. The control group (the patients that were not adjusted) did not demonstrate this dramatic increase in immune function, but actually experienced a 7.96% decrease in CD4 cell counts over the same period. [5]

The immune system is affected by the nerve system through the connections with the endocrine and the autonomic nervous system. And chiropractic care improves the function of the nerve system through improving the movement of the spinal bones that encase and protect the spinal cord.

Stressful conditions lead to altered measures of immune function, and altered susceptibility to a variety of diseases. Many stimuli, which primarily act on the central nervous system, can profoundly alter immune responses. The two routes available to the central nervous system are neuro-endocrine channels and autonomic nerve channels. [6]

Read more at their site.

With all of the discussion on health care, it’s important to look at different options and determine what is cost effective and safest for the patient.

A new study about chiropractic care states that “89 percent of the Wellmark members treated in the pilot reported a greater than 30 percent improvement in 30 days. In addition, Wellmark claims data for members who received care from chiropractors or physical therapists was compared with data for a member population with similar demographics (including health) who did not receive such services. The comparison showed that those who received chiropractic or physical therapy care were less likely to have surgery and experienced lower total health care costs.”

Not too shabby considering Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield looked at 5,500 members over a year with this study.

I am volunteering in the health tent for the next 3 days at the San Francisco Breast Cancer Susan G Komen 60 mile walk for the cure.  I felt it was fitting to cover a few easy tips to cut your risk.  These walkers, mostly women but not all, are amazing.  They walk 20 miles a day for 3 days; it’s an amazing athletic feat and often an emotional journey for those walkers who have personally been affected by breast cancer.

Most of us have been affected by breast cancer therefore there should always be a focus on ways to reduce the risk.

The largest ever review of the research by the American Institute for Cancer Research/World Cancer Research Fund (AICR/WCRF) project looked at the evidence on the links between breast cancer and diet, body weight and physical activity.

Key Points:

• be as lean as possible without becoming underweight, Because of the link between excess body fat and cancer.
• 30 minutes of physical activity every day (at a minimum).
• limit consumption to two drinks a day for a man and one for a woman, if you drink at all.
• mothers should breastfeed exclusively for up to six months and then add other liquids and foods. Evidence is convincing that mothers who breastfeed reduce their risk for breast cancer. There is also probable evidence that children who are breastfed have a lower risk of gaining excess weight as they grow.

In an interview with the NYT, one of the authors stated “to reduce the risk of cancer generally, diets should be mostly plant-based, emphasizing fruits, vegetables, beans and whole grains and limiting red meat”.

I like these holistic tips because they help your whole body and don’t just target one specific type of cancer.