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Do You Become Accustomed To Low Oxygen Saturation Levels?

Low Oxygen Levels

 

 

You may hear that low oxygen saturation is nothing to worry about because your body “get’s use to it”.

Don’t buy into this argument!

The “oxy-hemoglobin dissociation curve” is a complicated phenomenon that your body creates in response to a life threatening crisis!

But it is NOT accurate to describe this change in arterial blood gases as “your body becoming accustomed to low blood oxygen saturation levels”.

Ignoring low oxygen levels is never in your best interest!

              

What Is Your Best Chance Of Recovering From Low Oxygen Level? Continue reading Do You Become Accustomed To Low Oxygen Saturation Levels?

Will Seeking Normal Blood Pressure Save Your Life?

Will Seeking Normal Blood Pressure Help Save Your Life?

The title of this article may be a bit curious for you.

You don’t seek a normal blood pressure so much as you keep watch for high blood pressure, wouldn’t you say?

From your doctor’s perspective, he/she wants an average that is “within normal limits”.

However, new research shows that drugging to keep a low blood pressure isn’t enough if the patient is still having blood pressure spikes of greater than 50 systolic!

There are many ways to drug blood pressure so if your drugs aren’t accomplishing a stable blood pressure WITHOUT wide variability you NEED to search for another drug AND a solution!

Since high blood pressure is “The Silent Killer”, you would be wise to educate yourself as to what high blood pressure IS and what you can do to prevent it!

Do you think that the secret to keeping your blood pressure down is to avoid fried foods and salt?

You don’t “Seek Normal Blood Pressure” because that sounds like bland boring food, right?

Wrong!

High blood pressure has as much to do with sugar and unprocessed emotion as it does with greasy-salty foods!

If you think the solution to high blood pressure is terrible food, you are likely to wait until your blood pressure shoots up and your doctor wants to drug you before you even give it a second thought.

There are MANY factors to be considered if you seek normal blood pressure, whether you do that BEFORE OR AFTER your doctor puts you on drugs.

Just remember that drugs come with side effects and side effects can get pretty miserable.

Drugging blood pressure may eventually cause you to suffer from Continue reading Will Seeking Normal Blood Pressure Save Your Life?

Are Sorrow And Unhappiness Symptoms Of Heart Disease?

Abe-Lincolns-birthday

Does heart disease kill happy people?

You can’t avoid heart disease by being happy can you?  Heart disease is killing all of us more than everything else.

“Come on now, happy people are dying just as much as sad people, right?”

It doesn’t seem possible that happiness could save you from symptoms of heart disease if your doctor can’t.

Cholesterol lowering medication is suppose to be heart disease prevention BUT it will NOT reduce your risk of DEATH!

 

Yet, over 50 years ago scientist studied a small town in Pennsylvania that did not die of heart disease.

They ate too much sugar and fat and didn’t exercise enough, but they still didn’t succumb to heart disease the way that neighboring towns and everybody else in the country was at the time.

Heart disease is STILL killing more than every other cause of death!

The reason the folks in this small community didn’t die of heart disease was because Continue reading Are Sorrow And Unhappiness Symptoms Of Heart Disease?

Are You Getting Into Action This First Monday Of Go Red?

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The American Heart Associations “Go Red” Campaign is off to a stellar start this year.

Women’s health issues don’t get enough attention and in recent years the Go Red Campaign has really been taken on by advocates for women’s health issues.

It seems rational that women’s health issues would be given as much attention as men’s health issues, but that is just not the case.

A woman presenting with chest pain in an emergency room is much more likely to be sent home without further testing than a man is.

So, awareness about this issue is certainly called for.

 

Do you know what actions Go Red Month should be inspiring YOU to take?

After all, heart disease awareness that makes a difference is the kind that causes you to take action and develop better habits.

 

What do you need to do? Continue reading Are You Getting Into Action This First Monday Of Go Red?

Is Food Grade Hydrogen Peroxide Dangerous?

food-grade-hydrogen-peroxide

Have you ever used hydrogen peroxide therapy?

As the “Life Breath Coach” I frequently recommend it.  There are always a LOT of questions before Life Breath Club Members will actually put that recommendation into action.  There seems to be a lot of fear over this safe and simple remedy.

In their defense, if you “Google it”, you might be afraid to go ahead and give food grade hydrogen peroxide a try, too!

The FDA warns of stomach ulcers and there seems to be evidence that hydrogen peroxide destroys “new cells”.

Better safe than sorry, right?  WRONG!

“But wait, if the FDA is warning me that hydrogen peroxide isn’t safe, perhaps I should just leave it alone.”

Is that what you are thinking?

Hold On A Minute.  Unless … Continue reading Is Food Grade Hydrogen Peroxide Dangerous?

Will Low Oxygen Saturation Prevent You From Recovering From Heart Failure?

Do you really understand what low oxygen saturation means for you?

Understand that when low oxygen levels become an issue for you, it inevitably leads to a weakened heart muscle because low blood oxygen levels deprive your muscles of oxygen and weaken them.

Your heart is your most important muscle. 

This is one reason that the world is suffering an epidemic of Heart Failure today. It can be difficult to identify and treat Low Oxygen Level (low blood oxygen saturation), but it’s the only way to prevent the oxygen starvation that will eventually weaken your heart.  

Oxygen is THAT important. 

The basic element of all life is Oxygen. Without oxygen life stops.

Is it hard to believe that most people are completely unaware and free of any significant concern while they experience extremely low oxygen levels?

How can you possibly be unaware of a life threatening condition?

When you feel short-of-breath, you are sensing the carbon-dioxide in your body. Oxygen does not effect you the same way. It seems like low oxygen should be accompanied by breathing problems, but it often isn’t until disastrous deterioration has occurred. Carbon dioxide is the culprit causing your anxiety. 

Pain, fatigue, short term memory loss, muscle loss and worsening eye sight are all caused by lack of oxygen.

All of these symptoms may be attributed to old age while your vital organs deteriorate due to low blood oxygen saturation. Your doctor might even give you a “clean bill of health”. Does your doctor even test your oxygen level? 

Over time, you may not even notice the weakening of your heart muscle. 

Feeling winded at the top of a flight of stairs?

Hard to catch your breath when you jump back in bed after a late night pee?

Do you have a frequent moist cough?

Acute Heart Failure doesn’t happen all of a sudden but it can be difficult to recognize early symptoms. 

Once you’ve suffered a bout of acute heart failure, you know your heart is weakened. The fluid in your lungs that make it so hard to breathe got there because your heart is too tired to do its job.  

You can’t breathe when you are drowning in your own fluid. Taking drugs to make you pee helps you breathe but it does not strengthen your heart muscle. If you are depending on pharmaceutical fluid balance, you should value oxygen therapy. 

You can expect low blood oxygen levels:

  • when you are exerting yourself
  • in the early morning hours
  • while sitting in a slouched position

You likely won’t be overly concerned when you first begin to experience symptoms. It’s a really good idea to keep self-checking your blood oxygen with your own personal oximeter (oxygen measuring device). You can’t avoid harm if you don’t recognize it. Just don’t expect this health draining issue to be easy to spot. It’s only easy to see low oxygen levels when you’ve ignored them too long. 

When you use an oximeter to check your blood oxygen level, be aware that the information the oximeter gives you is just one brief window of time AND it may or may not be correct. 

The oximeter is a wonderful diagnostic tool. It just has it’s limitations. Having said that, there are steps you can take to ensure that you are not over looking low oxygen levels. 

How to properly use an oximeter to discover low oxygen levels:

  1. Be patient.
  2. Check frequently, waiting for a steady consistent reading.
  3. Be as active as you feel capable of being (with your doctors permission.)
  4. Walk up a flight of stairs and check your oximetry readings before, during and after exerting yourself.
  5. Keep the monitor probe on your finger for several minutes after you feel completely recovered and without any distress. 

A struggling heart will experience significant low oxygen levels after very little excursion. 

If you have pitting edema at your ankles it’s easy to see that your heart is struggling. If you tend to store fluid in your belly, where it can hide itself a little better, it might be a little less obvious what’s causing your symptoms. 

Fluid in your belly and fluid at your ankles make sleeping a potentially harmful part of your life. Lying down allows the retained and accumulated fluid to creep up into your lungs. 

A struggling heart will experience low oxygen level at 3am when you get up to pee. 

Your doctor may not see low oxygen levels when you are sitting in his/her office, even though you experience dangerous low oxygen levels every time you exert yourself and routinely in the wee hours of the morning. Al the time you spend well oxygenated can’t save you when you are suffering oxygen starvation. 

The oximeter may not tell on you if you don’t use it when you are experiencing low oxygen levels, but the damage low blood oxygen  causes is unmistakable. The devastating consequences of low oxygen are not avoided without addressing the problem. 

Symptoms of chronic low oxygen

  • water retention (especially feet/ ankles)
  • shortness of breath/ difficulty breathing/ dyspnea
  • extreme fatigue
  • blue coloring around lips
  • mental confusion/short-term-memory loss
  • chronic cough of usually clear mucous
  • frequent bouts of pneumonia
  • frequent bacterial infections
  • muscle weakness
  • chest tightness
  • arrhythmia
  • acute heart failure
  • sudden cardiac arrest

Sudden cardiac arrest can occur when extremely low blood oxygen levels stimulate your vagus nerve. 

If you could feel low oxygen level it would be easier to avoid danger, but you can’t. All you can do is err on the side of caution. 

Not all doctors and nurses will be alarmed by oxygen levels that are low enough to be dangerous. Their lack of experience with the damage caused by chronic low oxygen levels causes them to minimize the significance of low oximetry readings. Perhaps supplemental oxygen in a home setting feels like over-kill to many health care professionals. 

Remember that oxygen can only do its job in your body if the pressure of oxygen is high enough to get where it’s going. 92% blood oxygen level is what is required to achieve enough pressure to send oxygen from your lungs, to your blood, to your cells, tissues, organs and organ systems.

Insurance Advice

Your insurance wants your oxygen level to drop to 88% before they are willing to pay for home-oxygen.

Ask your doctor to let you walk before checking you with an oximeter during medical appointments. You need your health care team to know what your normal daily need for oxygen is. Your oximetry reading during a short period of time when you are resting does not indicate how well you manage when you are up and moving around.

portable oxygen

The number “88” really doesn’t mean anything, as far as your health is concerned. It’s just a number that insurance companies require in order to pay for supplemental home oxygen.

Your oxygen level should be well above 92% at all times. If you live in the US you may have a difficult time getting a prescription for home oxygen use. Your health is more important than insurance company profit. It’s my hope that we will soon have single payer health care so we can take an honest look at how cost effective supplemental home oxygen really is. 

What is your situation? Is it difficult to access oxygen for home therapy use?

In order to best advocate for yourself, get your own personal and portable oximeter. They don’t cost a lot and they can allow you to keep an eye on an important indicator of your need to pay more attention to your health. With your own oximeter you know where your blood oxygen level is during your most challenging times.

Knowing about your low blood oxygen levels and doing something about it are two different things. Start by measuring your oxygen levels at least daily and recording them in your health log. Empower yourself to keep track of your health. 

Take a look at Oximeters On Amazon