Prevention: The Cure For The Incurable
We all dread sitting in a doctor’s office, receiving a terrible diagnosis. Our darkest thoughts are invaded by what might happen to us, our families and the people we care about the most if our health is compromised by an incurable illness. At the very least it could impede and limit our quality of life or at worst it can take us from the ones we love or leave us to spend the rest of our lives in agonizing pain.
Medical science has come on leaps and bounds, even over the past decade or so. Just check out this article on cutting-edge oncology treatment for prostate cancer. But as incredible as the recent advances in medical science may be and as sunny as the future of modern medicine may be, it remains true that prevention is the best cure. While we all do our best to make healthy choices as often as we can, it’s an inescapable fact that our lifestyle (especially our addiction to convenience) is slowly killing us. Here we’ll look at some simple ways in which making a few lifestyle changes can prevent incurable diseases like cancer as well as extending, improving and enriching your life…
Let food be thy medicine
Hippocrates, the father of western medicine famously said: “Let food be thy medicine, and medicine is thy food”. A staggering 1 in 5 deaths around the world is attributed to poor diet. Our addiction to convenience has us living on fast food, heavily processed convenience foods and ready meals are leading us to inflict ourselves with completely preventable diseases from heart disease and diabetes to cancer. Studies show that eating more plants and less of everything else means that we massively reduce our saturated fat intake and get more of the vitamins and minerals that you need to stay alive and the phytonutrients that we need to maintain healthy immune function and keep the disease at bay.
Something feels wrong? Make an appointment- don’t self-diagnose
Living in the digital age is a truly wonderful thing. It gives us access to so much information that we have access to the sum total of all knowledge through a tiny glass rectangle that sits in our pockets. Unfortunately, however, we can become over-reliant upon the convenient access to this information. As a result, when we feel sick, our first instinct is to Google the symptoms rather than consult a trained medical professional.
Not only can self-diagnosis cause us a lot of unnecessary worry and distress it can also lead us to take inappropriate or even counterproductive measures. In some cases, a reticence to consult our doctors could lead to early-stage illnesses progressing and doing us more harm while becoming harder to treat.
Exercise is about more than appearance
Lots of people exercise to stay in shape and keep unsightly body fat at bay, but the benefits of exercise lie far beyond the cosmetic. Human beings have evolved to be active hunter-gatherers and our sedentary lifestyle is anathema to this. Spending our days sitting can do a lot of damage to our bodies. Getting plenty of exercise, even just a brisk walk every day, can keep our vital organs healthy and keep the disease at bay.
It doesn’t take much to make prevention an unbeatable cure.