Dear Health Conscious Friend,

Blood clots are bad. In fact, they're deadly. So pop some blood thinning medication and you'll be ok. Won't you? Not so much. The number of people who die from traumatic injuries while taking this medication is double that of those who don't.

Christine O'Brien reveals the facts and the alternatives...

In the name of good health,

Taryn Strugnell
Managing Editor of Nutrition & Healing

P.S. The weather is definitely heating up (although after the last week or so of not-so-warm temperatures, I'm beginning to doubt this) and I've noticed people are ditching their boots for summer sandals. What do you do if you have thick, discoloured toenails? Dr Wright tells us!

Blood thinners could increase death risk!
Christine O’Brien
Contributor to Nutrition and Healing

How many patients do you need in a study before you take it seriously?

100? 1,000? 100,000?

How about 1.23 million?

Think that's enough to finally knock down a widely used (and very dangerous) drug?

I hate to be a pessimist, but I doubt it.

After looking at data from 1.23 million patients, researchers have confirmed what the Nutrition & Healing team has been warning against for years - that warfarin significantly increases the risk of dying from a traumatic injury. In fact, the death rate for traumatic injuries is more than double for patients on warfarin.

The research, put forward at the American College of Surgeons 2009 Clinical Congress, shows the increase in risk in both elderly and younger patients. And that warfarin therapy brings even more risk for people under 65.

Think about it - if you're younger, you have more of a chance of surviving trauma. So warfarin can have an even bigger effect on your chances of making it through alive.

None of this is really surprising for a drug that got its start as rat poison (that's right, rat poison).

But it gets worse. The researchers had felt they were seeing more and more patients on warfarin among their trauma patients and they were right. In fact, warfarin use in general has been climbing since 2002.

So, more and more people are dosing up with a drug that doubles your risk of dying from a traumatic injury. And there's no end in sight. Sure, there's a lot of talk of adding this information to the “risk profile” for warfarin, but absolutely no talk of pulling it from the market.

This is ridiculous, considering there are safe alternatives. In fact, Dr. Wright's been using one in his practice for over 30 years with great success: Fish oil. Fish oil works by making platelet’s so slippery that they can't stick together easily to form a clot.

It tastes pretty bad, but it does the trick (and you can mix it with rice or almond milk if you have trouble choking it down). For blood-thinning purposes, Dr. Wright recommends two to three tablespoons of cod liver oil each day along with 800-1,000IU of vitamin E.

So if you're popping pills to avoid clotting, why not give Dr Wright's remedy a shot... you have nothing to lose... except maybe the deadly side-effects.

Dealing with discoloured nails

Q: I don't know what's going on with my toenails. They're very thick and have started to become discoloured. What can I do about this?

Dr. Wright: While I can't say for sure without seeing your nails, it sounds like a case of toenail fungus. Check with your doctor to be sure. If it turns out that fungus is the culprit behind your problem, there are several things you could try.

While there are some over-the-counter drugs and prescriptions that can clear up the problem, these remedies can adversely affect liver function.

Instead, try rubbing in oregano oil, geranium oil or tea tree oil, all over and around the toenail. Then immediately rub in DMSO, which will 'carry' the oil right through the nail and start inhibiting the fungus. It does take a while to clear up toenail fungus with this method - sometimes eight or nine months or more. It'll even take three to four months before you start seeing any results. But most of the drugs take that long too and this is a much safer alternative.

Oregano oil is too strong for some people, especially blondes and redheads. If you start getting persistently red and irritated, quit until the reaction goes away and then switch to one of the other oils.