Find out what your nails are telling you about your health in this important video tutorial. These nail problems reveal underlying causes that need to be corrected – and are usually simple to fix –…
What Is Atherosclerosis?A therosclerosis is a disease of arteries involving the buildup of fatty material called plaque along the walls of medium and large arteries characterized by patchy subintimal thickening, hardening, and loss of elasticity of blood vessels.
The intima is the innermost layer of an artery, having contact with blood. The subintima is beneath it.
Q: What happens when arteries become narrowed and less flexible?
A: Narrowing of the inside diameter of blood vessels and hardening of their walls reduce or obstruct blood flow through them which impairs their ability to supply tissues of the body with oxygen and nourishment.
When tissues are deprived of oxygen, pain and dysfunction results such as angina pectoris involving heart muscle because the heart continually needs oxygen never being able to rest.
It is thought that atherosclerosis develops from 1) epithelial cell dysfunction of the intima, and 2) lipid (fat) accumulation in smooth muscle cells and in foam cells, causing buildup of fatty deposits on the inside walls progressing to fibrous plaque formation. That is, intimal smooth muscle cells are surrounded by connective tissue and intracellular and extracellular lipids (fat build-up inside and outside of these cells).
E cchymosis, or easy bruising, is a feature of impaired secondary hemostasis (blood clotting) characterized by subcutaneous bleeding (under the skin) in response to light trauma.
Q: What causes easy bruising?
A: Easy bruising is the direct result of vitamin K deficiency that develops from inadequate diet, malabsorption, dysbiosis, and vitamin K depleting medications.
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What Is Reversible Hypertension?R eversible hypertension is a pressure disorder of arteries associated with increased systemic (body wide) blood vessel resistance to blood flow due to endothelial (cell) dysfunction of arterial blood vessels that can improve with nutritional treatment.
Hypertension itself is defined as a systolic blood pressure (SBP) of 140 mm Hg (mercury) or greater and/or diastolic blood pressure (DBP) of 90 mm Hg or greater.
Q: What is blood vessel (vascular) resistance to blood flow?
A: Vascular resistance to blood flow means the arteries carrying blood away from the heart cannot relax or dilate when needed to lower blood pressure but stay constricted, which in turn, keeps the pressure high.
Here’s an analogy: if you replace your garden hose having a one inch inside diameter with one that has a smaller half inch diameter and open the water valve as usual, the result would be water shooting out with more force.
What Is Cardiomegaly?C ardiomegaly is a non-inflammatory disorder of the myocardium (heart muscle) causing the heart to enlarge.
Q: What happens when the heart enlarges?
A:The heart enlarges because excessive growth of muscle tissue (hypertrophy) thickens the heart walls which in turn reduces the size of the lower chambers (ventricles) and impairs the filling of the heart chambers with blood. In consequence, the heartbeat quickens.
Also, the enlarging heart encroaches on lung space which impairs their ability to expand with inspiration of air.
Cardiomegaly can result in heart failure because of inability to pump sufficient blood for the needs of the body and ventricular arrhythmias (irregular or missed beats) that can stop the heart. An echocardiogram, which is a test that uses sound waves to produce a picture of the heart, is used to detect and diagnose cardiomegaly.