Hello Healthy

The book based on the video series “12 Weeks to Wellness & Optimal Health” is now here.

Hello Healthy

As I work with clients in my office, by phone, or by Skype, and as I speak at health seminars or medical conferences, people often ask, “Of all the health strategies we’ve been discussing and learning about—which is the most important?”

Hello Healthy is a book about helping you get the synergy effect by applying all the strategies necessary to reach your full health and wellness potential. The twelve chapters of this book are a series of twelve sessions in a practical program that you can follow as you go about your daily routine. These are twelve major strategies that I specifically address with each patient, regardless of their health concerns or wellness goals. They provide the foundation that each of us can use to master our genetic risk by actually turning off disease- causing genes and turning on the genes that promote health.

As you come to better understand the principles we’ll be discussing—and incorporate them as part of your new lifestyle—you’ll be able to enjoy a higher level of health and wellness than you’ve ever thought possible.
Hello Healthy is how friends and family may soon be addressing you!

Wes Youngberg, DrPH, MPH, CNS, FACLM
Lifestyle Medicine Specialist & Clinical Nutritionist

There is no better description of this book than what others have said about “Hello Healthy”

“What you hold in your hand is nothing short of a health education masterpiece. In it Wes Youngberg weaves a tapestry of anecdotes that provide a powerful and compelling case for health-behavior change and adoption of a healthy lifestyle.  Wes provides a detailed rationale and very practical cutting-edge health advice that, if followed, will produce in the reader a reasonable approach to life transformation.  His easy going writing style is “smooth” yet so filled with up-to-date health counsel that it cannot be classified as casual reading.  Anyone can make improvements following his modern rendition of age-old principles that we use in our own Lifestyle Medicine practice at Wildwood.  This is must reading for the sick and required reading for the well!”

Zeno L. Charles-Marcel, MD
Vice President for Medical Affairs.
Wildwood Lifestyle Center and Hospital

“Once again, Wes Youngberg shares health strategies that transcend the usual medical dialogue. By giving each of us information that we can use personally, he has empowered health behaviors that can impact our enjoyment of life, our productivity, and our longevity. With a practitioner’s understanding of the difficulty of change, Wes gently encourages each of us to seek the best for ourselves.”

Richard Hart, MD, DrPH
President, Loma Linda University Health

“With U.S. healthcare spending having just crossed the $3 trillion dollar line, Dr. Wes Youngberg’s book couldn’t have come at a more crucial time. The topics covered in his book are the ones patients have been asking me for the past two decades when I worked at a medical group. Now that I’m back in an academic center, these are the very topics we are researching and teaching our public health graduate students, because these are the challenges they’ll face when they get out into the real wold. If you don’t have time for grad school, but care about your health and lifestyle medicine, this book will save you a lot of time, money, and improve the health and quality of life for you and your family.”

Ernie Medina, Jr., DrPH, CHFS
Assistant Professor-Preventative Care; Executive Director
Center for Nutrition, Healthy Lifestyle & Disease Prevention
Loma Linda University School of Public Health

“Dr. Youngberg does it again! He uses the latest research and real patient stories to teach us how we as individuals and as a society can transform our health. He shows that those with disease can still achieve optimal wellness. Following his plan form the beginning could help save our troubled Healthcare system by preventing disease from even starting. This book is for anyone wanting to live a long, prosperous healthy life.”

Eric Madrid, MD, ABIHM
Rancho Family Medical Group, Temecula California
Author of “Vitamin D Prescription,
The Healing Power of the Sun and
how it can save your life

“Heart disease has been the leading killer of Americans for the past 100 years and despite advances in medical therapy it shows no sign of relenting. It is clear that Americans are bringing this on themselves by the lifestyle choices they make. As a Cardiologist I see the effects of smoking and poor diet and sedentary lifestyle affecting younger and younger patients. It doesn’t have to be this way. Nearly 90% of Heart disease and other lifestyle diseases could be prevented by the principles articulated so well in Dr. Youngberg’s book. The principles of a healthy lifestyle are laid out in an easy to understand approach, along with compelling stories of real people who have made changes in their lifestyle and benefited from a more abundant life as a result. I highly recommend this book to anyone who desires to live a healthier and fulfilling life, free of lifestyle diseases.”

Brian Schwartz, MD
Director, Interventional Cardiology Fellowship Program
Kettering Medical Center, Dayton, Ohio.

“Poor health is the modern world’s ‘plague,’ literally destroying mankind’s potential to live a productive, satisfying life. This book explains in simple, practical terms how to reverse that plague and achieve optimal health. Read it. Live it. Share it. It just might be the best thing you’ll ever do.”

John Kelly, MD, MPH, Founding President American College of Lifestyle Medicine.

Esophageal Cancer Link Publicized after Dolly Parton’s Reported Surgery

The article below underscores the health risk associated with acid reflux. Unfortunately, conventional treatment, while partially helpful in healing ulcers, often makes the the underlying problem worse thus perpetuating the need for more PPI or acid reducing medications and creating a vicious cycle. The most common reason for poor digestion or acid reflux is not too much stomach acid production but rather excess gassy acids. Dysfunctional Parietal Cells in the stomach lining (due to food allergies, toxins, H.Pylori or other low grade infection, autoimmune stress, etc…) are unable to make adequate hydrochloric acid at meal time and therefore cannot activate the digestive enzymes. Undigested foods will then begin to decompose creating the acidic gas that causes bloating, pain, anxiety, and heartburn – to name a few symptoms. But most people with this problem do not experience symptoms and have “silent” reflux. With or without symptoms, poor digestion greatly increases our risk of any disease we are already predisposed to. Without good digestion we cannot properly heal or be truly healthy. Fixing digestion should always be one of the first priorities when treating any chronic condition. For this reason I dedicated an entire chapter on “Optimze Digestion” in my book Goodbye Diabetes. This book is for anyone who wants a comprehensive strategy to improve their health. There are many effective lifestyle and nutritional strategies for helping the body heal any digestive problem. Remember, treat the cause not just the symptom. WY

July 29, 2013 In the wake of media reports that Dolly Parton underwent surgery to address reflux disease, the nonprofit Esophageal Cancer Action Network issued a news release aimed at raising awareness of links between the disease and cancer.

The type of esophageal cancer caused by reflux disease has increased by more than 400 percent in the past 20 years in the United States, according to the network. Often, this cancer variety is deadly because it’s caught late. Patients too frequently think that heartburn is a benign condition.

Factors that may put people at risk of developing esophageal cancer:

-You have more than occasional heartburn symptoms.

-You have experienced heartburn in the past, but the symptoms have gone away.

-You have a family history of esophageal cancer or Barrett’s esophagus.

-You have pain or difficulty swallowing.

-You have a persistent, unexplained cough.

-You have been speaking with a hoarse voice over several weeks.

-You have a persistent, unexplained sore throat.

-You cough or choke when you lie down.

In a free, downloadable publication the network provides information to help people understand their risk and what they should do about it.

Parton’s surgery could not be independently confirmed.

Katy Muldoon
(c)2013 The Oregonian (Portland, Ore.)
Visit The Oregonian (Portland, Ore.) at www.oregonian.com
Distributed by MCT Information Services
Copyright Oregonian (Portland, OR) 2013

Prostate Cancer Options: Watchful Waiting or GEMINAL Therapy?

While all disease has a clear genetic foundation, this article best expresses how we have far more control over our genes than previously thought. The Human Genome project finished earlier this decade has enabled a transformed understanding of how our genes synergize with every thing we do, think and expose ourselves to.

Most disease promoting genes do NOT determine disease risk. It is the choices we make consciously or unconsciously that largely determine our future health. “Our fate, dear Brutus, lies not in the stars but in ourselves”. What a great opportunity we have – even to change our destiny. We have choices set before us whereby we may “be transformed by the renewing of our mind”.

Welcome to the journey of transformed health.

Wes Youngberg

(NaturalNews) Dr. Dean Ornish, head of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito, California, is a well-known author advocating lifestyle changes to improve health. Dr. Ornish is also affiliated with the University of California at San Francisco. He recently reported on the Gene Expression Modulation by Intervention with Nutrition and Lifestyle (GEMINAL) study. This study indicated that making positive changes in one’s diet, exercise, and stress management can affect more than a person’s weight.

Dr. Ornish’s study was published in the June 16, 2008 edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The study followed 30 men who had opted out of conventional treatment for low-risk prostate cancer. The men decided, before they were recruited to take part in the study, not to undergo treatments such as surgery, radiation, or hormone therapy normally advocated for the disease. The men were closely monitored for tumor progression through the duration of the study. 
Instead, for three months, they made changes in their lifestyle: They ate a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes and soy products. They exercised moderately, walking for half an hour a day. Each day they spent an hour practicing stress management methods such as meditation. Additionally, the men participated in support group sessions.

As the study progressed, the men lost weight, lowered their blood pressure and cholesterol, and generally saw improvements in their health.

Previous studies gave evidence of lowered prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels with dietary changes.

 Biopsies taken at the beginning and end of the study demonstrated some more significant changes. About 500 genes evidenced changes in activity at the end of the study. 48 disease preventing genes were turned on. 453 genes which promote disease, like breast and prostate cancers, were turned off.

Dr. Ornish expressed excitement over the results in a Reuters interview.

The implications of this study go beyond men and prostate cancer. People are not doomed by their genetics. They can make positive changes fairly quickly. In three months, genetic changes can be made through the choices we make in food, exercise, and the way we handle stress.
This is an area of study that merits further investigation, the researchers concluded.