Archive for the ‘RTE Guide’ Category
Screen Saver!
Saturday, February 25th, 2006
Medical thermography, a system which screens for breast cancer, has just been introduced to Ireland. It’s a system every woman in this country should know about, says Rory Hafford.
A lot of people hate surprises, particularly those that affect the rest of your life. Mary coleman got one such surprise not so long ago… a little report that revealed some pre-cancerous activity in her breast.
Like most women, she panicked a little.
Eventually she found her way to a special clinic in London that was offering a system called medical thermography.
“When I saw the images generated by the screening process, I felt I had got control of my life back again,” says Monaghan woman Mary.
That was about a year ago. At the time, Mary remembers thinking: “we should have a facility like this in Ireland”.
We didn’t, but now we do.
The Irish Centre of Integrated Medicine is based in Naas, Co. Kildare. It specialises in Medical Thermography.
Jean FitzGerald is one of the founders of the Centre, and is a big believer in the preventative potential of this system.
“This is a non-invasive form of breast-screening. It uses an infrared camera to detect early signs of breast cancers, up to 10 years before other procedures,” says Jean.
In effect, it’s a powerful early warning system.
When a cancer is forming it develops its own blood supply to feed its accelerated growth. Doctors call this process ‘malignant angiogenesis’.
Cells start this process a ling time before actually turning cancerous – and that’s the time to get them.
“A tumour must be at least the size of an olive for a mammogram (the standard breast tumour detection approach) to puck up,” says Jean FitzGerald. “but Medical Thermography can pick up tumours when they are as small as a pinhead. And can also determine if a tumour is benign or malignant.”
Mammogram screening is not recommended for women under the age of 50. This is because of the high levels of radiation emitted during the screening. For this reason, Thermography is a very useful alternative and preventative tool for women in their 20s and 30s.
If you would like to know more about the benefits of Medical Thermography, tune into the Sounds Good health radio programme on www.rte.ie/health you can also contact the Irish Centre of Integrated Medicine on 045-883224, or access their website on www.icim.ie.
Rory Hafford edits the RTE.ie multimedia health site at www.rte.ie/health.
Thermography fact file
- Medical Thermography is a non-invasive form of breast screening that uses an infrared camera to detect early signs of breast cancers
- It can do this up to 10 years before other procedures
- The camera takes a thermal image, which shows up areas of tissues abnormalities using thermal readings.
- Although it may sound like a new technology, thermography has been around since the 1950s.
- There are over 8,000 studies on the subject in medical literature.
Hope at last
Friday, March 11th, 2005
Many people suffer for years with chronic diseases and they never get to the bottom of them. Rory Hafford looks at a new clinic that could provide the answer to the long-term sufferer’s prayers…
Many people go through life suffering from a chronic ailment. They visit their GP; they go to specialist clinics; they check in and out of A & Es – and all to no avail. They never get to the root of their problem.
Now, it seems, however, there might well be a solution. And it all lies in a simple blood test!
A new clinic, the Irish Centre of Integrated Medicine, has just been set up in Co. Kildare and its stock in trade is blood analysis.
Using a high definition microscope, state of the art computer technology and just one drop of blood, the specialists in the clinic can determine the condition of your blood sample.
The integrated method is a highly effective means of analysing your current state of health at a deep cellular level.
As a live blood sample is used, you can actually see the cells moving across the screen. Normally, dead blood cells are analysed in standard hospital tests. The integrated method, however, is a highly effective means of analysing your current state of health at a deep cellular level.
This simple procedure can show up ancient problems that have dogged a patient for years – things like chronic digestive disorders, anaemia, heavy metal toxicity, chemical toxicity, dehydration. Parasite infection, bacterial infection, vitamin and mineral deficiencies, degenerative conditions, the list goes on.
After the test the centre conducts a comprehensive analysis and submits a detailed report to the patient’s doctor, to help speed up the diagnostic and treatment process.
A consultation can take one-and-a-half hours and costs in the region of 120.00. the Irish Centre of Integrated Medicine, St. John’s Grove, Johnstown, Naas, Co. Kildare. Tel: 045-844819. http://www.icim.ie/
Me and my body
Tuesday, January 11th, 2005
Unislim talks to RTE star Caroline Morahan, who presents The Fame Game and Off The Rails, about her eating habits and how she keeps looking so good.
My real belly
As for Caroline’s diet, she eats healthily but is not obsessed about it. “I don’t buy pre-packaged, microwaveable, ready in a minute foods. I can taste the preservatives in them. I buy organic when I can although it is very expensive. I am a big promoter of eating five fruit and vegetables per day, although I am not a purist, I am a real person with a real belly.”
When we speak Caroline is just finishing a strict three week detox diet, for health reasons rather than to lose weight. “It has been hellish,” she says. Caroline follows very good eating habits, has completely eliminated beer and bread from her diet, and is not a heavy drinker, and yet she was suffering from cold sores. So she went to see a homeopath at the Centre of Integrated Medicine in Naas where they checked her body for allergies and discovered that she had a build-up of yeast which was giving her immune system a hard time. Hence, the detox diet.
The diet was pretty strict - no sugar and no dairy products apart from sheep and goat’s milk and cheese, and when Caroline went out to eat she could only have a plain steak with nothing else. But it seems to have worked and she is fighting fit and ready for the new autumn series of Off the Rail.
“I love wine, but on this diet I was only allowed to drink vodka and gin. So I couldn’t drink champagne on my birthday even though all my friends were. “I love my food, probably a lot more than most people, and no-one has ever said that I should trim down but I do tend to put expectations on myself. Saying this, when I go on holidays I don’t worry about food and eat whatever I like. When I went to my sister’s wedding this summer in Italy I ate whatever I liked, and have a few extra pounds to show for it!
“I have a policy that I never deny myself anything on a permanent basis. Even if I’m on a very strict diet I always have Saturday to eat and drink what I want. I think that if someone says you can’t have something then you really want it. Eating habits should be a life change, a strict diet is like a jail sentence and you just want to break free.” Caroline is a real believer in complementary therapies such as reflexology and homeopathy. “I take milk thistle for a week after a big night out - 15 drops in a glass of water three times of day gets your body more quickly into recovery mode. I was taking liquorice drops as part of my detox diet, and Goldenseal kills off the bad bacteria in the gut. I don’t drink water out of the rap I always drink out of a water filter. Amazingly my homeopath was able to find metal in my body which is coming from my fillings. So I’m having those taken out soon and changed to white fillings.”
For further information please contact Irish Centre of Integrated Medicine , St. Johns Grove, Johnstown, Naas, Co. Kildare. Tel./Fax.: 00353 0 45 844819 or e-mail: info@icim.ie