Rachel's Blogs
*NEW* Advanced Thyroid Training Coming Soon!
I've spent the best part of about 4 months recording my *NEW* Advanced Thyroid Assessment training. I told my team this would be easy and quick, given it was to be based on a great little 2-part, 2hr updated presentation I delivered just last year for ACNEM!! Sixteen...
Keeping Things Real & Representative
Any pathology test is only of value if the result produced is 'real', or, representative of that individual, right? So the timing of the test is a major pivot point then: do I tell my patient to present for the test, or collect the sample themselves, on their...
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Jacka & Jerome – Naturopathic trailblazers
A few years ago I heard Felice Jacka, Associate Professor (Deakin University), speak about her research linking mental health to certain Western dietary patterns and possibly many of you have already heard me rave about her work. This year I had the pleasure of...
An Iodine Revolution?
Also presenting at the Science of Nutrition in Medicine Conference this year was Professor Eastman who is a world-renowned Australian endocrinologist with a primary interest in global iodine deficiency. He is also Deputy Chairman elect of the International Council for...
Fenech on Folate
A key speaker every year at the Science of Nutrition in Medicine Conference is Professor Michael Fenech, who is a research group leader at the CSIRO. He’s internationally regarded as an expert in understanding the relationship between DNA damage and nutrition. If...
Highlights from Science of Nutrition in Medicine Conference 2014
What an absolute pleasure to attend this conference this weekend just gone, where the presenters were researchers, most of them internationally acclaimed in their respective area and to find what they had to say SO clinically relevant and to find the presenters...
Dear Doctor …
As most of you know, I’m a big fan of establishing good communication with the other practitioners (GPs, psychologists, osteopaths, specialists etc.) also caring for my patients and what began as occasional letters that I found exasperatingly difficult & time...
Gluten-Intolerance-Intolerance
In the Byron shire we have a fabulous local comedian called Mandy Nolan who makes a lot of fun of the health and food fads that regularly sweep this area and one of her favourite catch-cries is “I’m gluten intolerant-intolerant, if I meet another person who tells me...
Young White Men & Missed Mental Health Diagnoses
We’ve all heard about the higher incidence of mood disorders (depression, anxiety etc.) in women and chances are we’ve all seen this reflected in the dominance of female clients who present seeking help but what’s this really telling us? Many of us are aware that men...
Hold the Date
2014 is well and truly zipping along & we wanted to let you know Rachel is lined up for some great seminars and webinars this year. Here are the next few off the rank so you can join us in anticipation and set aside the dates: Biomedica N-Acetyl-Cysteine Webinar...
The Problem with Fish Oils in Mental Health
About a decade ago there was a lot of excitement about using fish oils in the management of mental health, so much so even the American Psychiatric Association developed recommendations suggesting that people with mood, impulse control & psychotic disorders should...
The Selenium Mercury Relationship
Do you still eat & recommend fish as part of a healthy diet? I do. Of course these recommendations have now become species-specific and include other key criteria such as ‘wild not farmed’ and ‘local not imported’ in response to increasing concerns about...
What a difference a Doctor makes!
Be warned…whinge ahead! One of the things I’m asked most often by naturopaths is about my experiences & interactions with doctors regarding shared care of patients. The question typically arises because they’ve been on the receiving end of less than ideal...
Keep an eye out for high prolactin
Seeing female patients with anxiety/depression, irregular menstrual cycles and perhaps marked PMS? How about male clients with decreased libido, low measurable testosterone and perhaps even impotence or infertility? All of these signs and symptoms could actually be...
Why aren’t they doing what I told them to?
Our patients are faced by more health & nutrition messages via multiple mediums than ever before yet escalating rates of obesity & lifestyle related disease highlight the failure of these. It would seem behavioural psychologists are right when they assert that...
Rachel’s range of zinc related material
As Rachel says in this month's From My Desk to Yours, "I had to do it sooner or later, we have to talk about Zinc." Rachel has been talking about Zinc for years. Here are some of the items you might like to catch up on to brush up your background on this important...
What’s a little Zinc between friends?
Ok – I’m excited!! A recent meta-analysis of seventeen epidemiological studies (n=1,643 depressed individuals and 804 controls) investigating zinc levels and depression found that depressed individuals had lower plasma/serum zinc levels than non –depressed people...
PPIs and broadening adverse events
The last two decades have seen the introduction and rapid rise in popularity of the proton pump inhibitors (PPI) for GORD & gastric ulcers. While clinical trials prior to their approval and release didn’t reveal much in terms of adverse reactions, being not...
By popular demand
Many of you have been asking if we could make my presentations available for download instead of on CD. You can now do both! The Rachel Arthur Nutrition (RAN) store on the website now has downloadable audio and CD-audio sections where you can buy my presentations. You...
Visit our facebook page
We have finally taken the step into the brave new world of social media with the Rachel Arthur Nutrition facebook page. The first step is to reflect the posts that we add to this site and our newsletter. We will let you guide us as to what you would like to see us do...
No change in 25(OH) D levels in spite of supplementation?
Scenario: Patient presents with low baseline 25(OH)D levels, let’s say 40 nmol/L and you prescribe a high dose (e.g. 5000IU/day) bioavailable vitamin D supplement and retest in 3 months but the 25(OH)D levels haven’t improved…what do you do now? Sound familiar? It...
Have you checked the children?
Over the last year, I’ve seen paediatric patients with various presentations (alopecia, behavioural issues etc.) whose thyroid results have seemed out of whack e.g. TSH values in the 3s and 4s. I noticed as well that each pathology company provided a slightly altered...
Looking into Dis-ease in Women
This week, care of Health Masters, I am delivering the first part of a 3 part webinar called ‘Clinical Case Analyses in Women with Anxiety’. I originally wanted to call this brand new seminar series Dis-ease. The idea was in response to the large number of female...