Aspirin- part 1

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

For many years, doctors have been prescribing aspirin therapy as a cheap, effective way to reduce cardiovascular events and improve survival after a heart attack. Neither of these is true.

Chewing two aspirin during a heart attack event has been shown to be very effective in reducing damage to the heart.  You must chew them, and it must be during the event.  That is not what we are talking about here.

Even low dose aspirin therapy has serious side effects that, just like statin drugs for cholesterol, overshadow any supposed benefit. The evidence in support of aspirin has always been weak, and over the last decade it has become even weaker.

The benefit purported by medicine for taking aspirin is that of its antiplatelet activity. They say that it helps save lives by reducing deaths from heart attacks.

Healing Laser Therapy

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

Have you heard about the latest advance in pain relief?  It is called Class IV high power cold laser therapy.  Let’s take a look at the history of light therapy, what laser therapy is, what physiologic changes occur, what conditions benefit from its use and its safety and effectiveness.

Laser is an acronym.  It stands for Light Amplified by Stimulated Light Emission of Radiation.  It was theorized by Albert Einstein in 1916, invented by Theodore Maiman in 1960.  In 1967 Endre Mester discovered the bio stimulatory properties of laser light.

Peptic Ulcers or something else?

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

Is that pain in your abdomen just a belly ache, or could it be reflux or a peptic ulcer? How do you know?

A short term ache in the upper abdomen is usually just that, an upset stomach that passes quickly.

Pain in the upper abdomen that burns up into the chest and throat is most likely a reflux condition, actually caused by too little stomach acid. (See my website for an article on reflux on June 28, 2012.)

Peptic ulcers are a whole different problem. About seven percent of Americans are diagnosed with ulcers, some 16 million in total, and 500,000 new cases each year.

Obviously the stomach is at the bottom end of the esophagus. After the stomach, the upper part of the small intestine is next, called the duodenum. It is about 12 inches long. Glands inside the stomach produce acid and pepsin. The stomach also produces mucus to protect the stomach lining from the acid.