Dr John Briffa's blog, A Good Look at Good Health — writing on food, cholesterol, weight, energy and the science behind everyday health, from the drbriffa.com archive. Filter by topic, browse by category, or search the library.
Healthy Eating
While in conventional medicine skin conditions are generally seen as a problem in the, err, skin, in natural medicine they are generally seen a sign of something deeper within the body. Eczema, for instance, is often found to be related to internal imbalances which may include factors such as food sensitivity and a lack of […]
Healthy Eating
While some doubt the benefits of controlling carbohydrate intake, the fact of the matter is that there is now abundant scientific evidence that this approach is generally effective for the purposes of weight loss, while at the same time helping to improve biochemical markers of chronic disease such as blood sugar levels and levels of […]
Diabetes/Metabolic Syndrome
My latest book The True You Diet posits that the best diet for us is essentially one based on the foods that we’ve been eating the longest in terms of our evolution ” after all, these are the foods we are going to be best adapted to. A ‘primal’ diet is one that is devoid […]
Specific conditions
Cranberry has been held up as a herbal remedy for cystitis (urinary tract infections or ‘UTIs’) for as long as I can remember. Cranberry is believed to contain substances that inhibit the adherence of unwanted organisms such as the bacterium E. coli tothe inside of the bladder. This help prevent infecting organisms setting up camp […]
Food and Medical Politics
The practice of adding fluoride to water started some 60 years ago, and is widely held by dentists and public health experts to have been a major factor in the improvement in dental health seen in individuals living in areas where water fluoridation is practiced. However, as I have written before, the science shows that […]
Brain and Behaviour
While the practice of yoga goes back donkey’s years, it has in more recent times enjoyed quite an upsurge in popularity. I have dabbled in yoga myself, and will often recommend it to individuals who are looking for a generally safe way of enhancing physical and mental wellbeing either as part of a class, or […]
Healthy Eating
Rhinitis (or ‘runny nose’ in normal language) is a common problem in children. In natural medicine, it is often seen a potential manifestation of ‘food intolerance’. Food intolerance has the ability to cause a myriad of other unwanted conditions or symptoms too, including asthma. So, it’s not uncommon for naturally-oriented practitioners who see children with […]
Nutrients and Supplements
In previous posts I have written about the health benefits of sunlight and the vitamin D derived from it, including a reduced risk of many forms of cancer. In a recent post, I wrote about research linking higher vitamin D levels in the body with lower blood pressure ” something that would be expected to […]
Cholesterol and Statins
Driving this morning I was listening to the radio and learned that the British Egg Information Service has been banned from resurrecting the ‘go to work on an egg’ ad campaign to celebrate the 50 year anniversary of the ‘British Lion’ mark that adorns eggs here in the UK. Apparently, the Broadcasting Advertising Clearance Centre […]
Brain and Behaviour
The raw materials to make a newborn baby come almost exclusively from what its mother ate during pregnancy. It is perhaps no surprise therefore that there has been a fair amount of scientific interest on the relationship between the maternal diet during pregnancy and the health and wellbeing the subsequent child. Perhaps the most obvious […]