Primolut N is a hormonal drug occasionally used to treat endometriosis. It is also sometimes used to treat a variety of other conditions including abnormal uterine bleeding, amenorrhoea (absence of periods) and PMS (premenstrual syndrome).

Primolut N is a progestogen (synthetic progesterone) derived from the male hormone testosterone. Its chemical name is norethisterone. It is manufactured by Schering and sold in the form of white 5 milligram tablets.

How Primolut N works

It is thought that Primolut N eradicates endometrial implants by Ppressing ovulation and interfering with the growth of the misplaced endometrial cells, causing them to slowly waste away. Most women will stop ovulating and menstruating during their course of Primolut N.

Dosages of Primolut N generally used

Gynecologists usually recommend 5 to 20 milligrams of Primolut N per day (one to four tablets per day) for four to nine months.

Side effects of Primolut N

The more common side effects are depression, weight gain, malaise, lethargy and tiredness, acne, vaginal bleeding, decreased libido and nausea.

How effective is Primolut N

There are no reliable figures on the effectiveness of Primolut N for the treatment of endometriosis.

Primolut N, pregnancy and breastfeeding

Primolut N should not be used during pregnancy as progestogens derived from testosterone can cause abnormalities in the developing foetus.

The use of Primolut N while breastfeeding is not recommended, as small amounts of progestogens have been found in the milk of mothers taking them and the effect on the child is not known.

*42/41/5*

At one time people thought anorexia might be a form of schizophrenia. We know now, of course, that they are completely different disorders, although in rare cases a person may suffer from both at the same time. An anorexic doesn’t usually have the hallucinations commonly seen in schizophrenia. One primary anorexic symptom – feeling fat when actually being very thin – comes close to being a delusion. However, whereas an anorexic can usually see the difference between her body and that of someone who weighs two hundred pounds, a schizophrenic may not be able to make such a distinction.

About thirty years ago, doctors began treating anorexics with chlorpromazine, more commonly known as Thorazine, an antipsychotic drug used in the treatment of schizophrenia. Although these patients did gain a little more weight, their illness didn’t improve over the long term. What’s more, compared to a control group, a higher percentage of patients on Thorazine developed bulimia. It also took longer for their menstrual periods to return. Although some doctors continue to prescribe Thorazine, its popularity has dropped off substantially.

These medications may perhaps have some particular use for certain very small groups of patients: those who are extremely anxious or who are obsessive-compulsive. Another group may benefit from the drugs’ sedating effects, especially very restless patients who, because of their severe medical condition, must be confined to their beds.

Antipsychotics can cause weight gain, a side effect that, in anorexia anyway, is actually desirable. However, antipsychotic medicines have many drawbacks: lowered blood pressure, the risk of seizures, delayed return of menstruation. These drugs are notorious for causing long-term or even permanent neurologic damage, such as the involuntary muscle movements known as tardive dyskinesia.

*66/35/5*

After years of dieting, Leigh Anne Congdon finally took off—and kept off—30 pounds. She did it, she says, by learning how to think like a thin person.

As a teenager, Leigh Anne was unhappy with her body. She was only a few pounds overweight, but she saw herself as chunky and unattractive. She’d go on self-styled diets of less than 1,000 calories a day for a couple of weeks at a time, and she would lose a few pounds. But once she had returned to her normal eating habits, the weight would always come back.

This cycle of gaining, losing, and regaining continued through high school and college. Then, Leigh Anne made a decision that would turn her eating habits upside down. “When I graduated from college, I moved from Pennsylvania to Colorado with a group of friends,” she explains. “I thought that I could find a job out there, and I was excited about living in another part of the country. I needed the change.”

Away from home and living with her friends, Leigh Anne decided to enjoy herself. That meant not worrying all the time about what she was eating. She joined her friends in a steady diet of pizza, burgers, barbecued ribs, and other foods of which she had deprived herself for so long. Within a year, her weight climbed from 140 to 160 pounds—too heavy for her 5-foot-5-inch frame.

Once again, Leigh Anne decided that it was time for a fresh start. “It wasn’t only my weight,” she says. “It was the part-time jobs, the small apartments. I needed some direction in my life.”

She headed back East and enrolled in graduate school. And she committed to slimming down healthfully and permanently.

Remembering how dieting had failed her in the past, but not wanting to monitor every bite of food that she put in her mouth, Leigh Anne decided to change her mindset. “I had noticed that my friends who were thin didn’t constantly dwell on what they were eating,” she explains. “They ate when they were hungry and said, ‘No, thanks’ when they weren’t. I followed their example and tried to stop obsessing about food. I resolved to think like a thin person.”

Leigh Anne played the part of a thin person on a daily basis. “When I’d get up in the morning, I’d remind myself to think like a thin person,” she says. “I’d eat a little bit of something and then tell myself that I was full, because that’s what a thin person would do.” She ate healthier, too, replacing those burgers and ribs with meatless entrees and salads.

Leigh Anne also increased her activity level, believing that a thin person would be active. She took up hiking, and she rode her bike instead of driving her car.

With her new “thin” attitude, Leigh Anne was able to take off 30 pounds in about 9 months. Now age 42 and a resident of Lock

Haven, Pennsylvania, she has maintained her weight at a healthy 130 pounds ever since.

*120\89\8*

IRON

Functions: vital for a healthy immune system • part of the hemoglobin molecule that binds oxygen in the red blood cells. Deficiency signs and symptoms: weakness and fatigue. Iron’s enemies: lack of stomach acid • extreme diets in which only or mostly green vegetables are eaten • intestinal diseases which speed transit of food through intestines • poor absorption of dietary fat (leading to excess fat in intestine interfering with iron absorption).

MAGNESIUM

Functions: vital for a healthy immune system • involved with energy formation and transfer, carbohydrate metabolism, manufacture of protein, proper nutrition of the heart and neuromuscular transmission.

Deficiency signs and symptoms: personality changes • fatigue

• muscle weakness • heart irregularities • muscle spasms. Magnesium’s enemies: prolonged fasting • persistent vomiting

• chronic diarrhea • surgery • severe burns • alcohol • high-protein diets.

MANGANESE

Functions: vital for a healthy immune system • important for formation of the main thyroid hormone • necessary for proper utilization of vitamins C, Bj and biotin, and for production of acetylcholine, an important neurotransmitter.

Deficiency signs and symptoms: a deficiency in animals results in sterility in both sexes, skeletal abnormalities. Manganese’s enemies: refining of foods.

PHOSPHORUS

Functions: necessary for good bone and teeth structure and a healthy nervous system • helps stimulate muscle contractions

• plays a role in extracting energy from food. Deficiency signs-and symptoms: loss of appetite • nausea • fatigue • weakness • vague and persistent bone pains. Phosphorus’s enemies: excessive injestion of antacids.

*169\80\8*

When your mind receives a piece of information, it responds by sending a chemical message to the appropriate part of your body. For example, when your eyes see that the traffic light is turning red, the brain interprets that fact and sends a “hit the brake” message to your right foot.

The red light was only a fact. It didn’t “make” you step on the brake. It was your interpretation of the red light, combined with the knowledge that you were driving a car, and the light was so far away, and you were going so fast, etc., that persuaded you to brake. The red light was only one fact among many.

Remember that time, late at night, when you walked down a dark street in a not-so-nice part of town? As you looked into the shadows, and turned your head to see if anyone was behind you, your heart began to pound. You could feel your breath coming in short gasps as your muscles tensed and you began to sweat. Chemical fireworks were exploding inside of you, dilating your pupils for better vision, shutting down temporarily unnecessary actions like digestion, and rushing blood to your muscles, for example, to help you fight or run.

It took only a split second to turn you from a calm stroller into a frightened, highly charged person, ready to fight or run for his or her life. And what triggered this “fight or flight” response? Nothing but your thoughts. Nobody pulled a gun on you; nobody mugged you, nobody shouted at you or ran after you or made a threatening gesture. As a matter of fact, you never saw or heard anybody at all, because the street was deserted. You turned on the chemical fireworks with your thoughts.

*127\80\8*

TOMATO—YOGURT SALAD DRESSING

1 cup tomato puree 1 cup yogurt, plain, nonfat 1 tbl.

cider or wine vinegar 1 tbl. dry mustard 1 tsp. dill-weed 2 tsps. lemon juice

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor. Makes 3 cups.

FAIRFAX HOOP DRESSING

1/2 cup hoop cheese

1/2 cup buttermilk

1 scallion, chopped juice of 1 lemon

2 tsp. dill weed

1 garlic clove

1/2 tsp. thyme

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor. Makes 2 cups.

BLENDER BROCCOLI DRESSING

1 cup broccoli florets, steamed until tender 1/4 cup cider or wine vinegar 1/2tbl. tomato paste pinch of basil dash of dill weed dash of cumin dash of pepper

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor. Makes 2 cups.

NO OIL DRESSING

8 ozs. tomato sauce

2 tbls. tarragon vinegar

1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce

1 tsp. Angostura Bitters

1/2 tsp. dill weed, dried

1/2 tsp. basil, dried crushed

1 tbl. onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 1-inch long chili pepper, ground

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor until smooth.

Makes 2 cups.

TOMATO HERB DRESSING

8 ozs. tomato juice 1 1/2 tbls. lemon juice 1/2 tbl. vinegar 1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce 1 tsp. onion juice 2 cloves garlic, crushed 2 drops Tabasco sauce 1/2 tsp. dry mustard

1 tsp. herb mix (choose some or all: rosemary,

thyme, basil, coriander, cassia, mustard seed, oregano, fennel)

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor until smooth.

Makes 2 cups.

RUSSIAN DRESSING

1 cup cottage cheese, low-fat 1 tbl. vinegar or lemon juice

1/4 cup tomato juice

1/4 cup celery, finely chopped

Put cottage cheese, vinegar or lemon juice, and tomato juice in blender. Blend until smooth, adding more tomato juice if necessary. Stir in celery just before using.

Makes 2 cups.

YOGURT-GARLIC DRESSING

1 cup yogurt, plain, nonfat 11/2 tsps. cumin seeds, crushed 1/2 tsp. curry powder 1/2 clove garlic, pressed

Combine all ingredients and puree in blender or food processor. Makes 2 cups.

HEALTHY PUREE

1 cauliflower 1/2 cup yogurt, plain, nonfat 1/2 bunch fresh dill or cilantro, chopped

Steam cauliflower until tender; coursely chop. Puree with yogurt in blender. Mix in fresh dill or cilantro. Serve on baked tomatoes, cooked grains or fish.

Makes 2 to 3 cups.

*83\80\8*

Here are three foods you may not have thought were Super Foods: cantaloupes, papayas and peaches. These orange fruits contain large amounts of beta carotene; cantaloupes and papayas also contain quite a bit of vitamin C.

Nutrient
Cantaloupe
Papaya
Peaches
(per 1\2 oz)
(raw)
(raw)
(raw)
Beta Carotene
3,400.0 IU
1,750.0 IU
1,330.0 IU
Vitamin C
33.0 mg
56.0 mg
7.0 mg
Calcium
14.0 mg
20.0 mg
9.0 mg
Phosphorus
16.0 mg
16.0 mg
19.0 mg
Iron
.4 mg
.3 mg
.5 mg
Sodium
12.0 mg
3.0 mg
1.0 mg
Potassium
251.0 mg
234.0 mg
202.0 mg
Vitamin B2
.04 mg
.04 mg
.02 mg
Vitamin B2
.03 mg
.04 mg
.05 mg
Vitamin B3
.6 mg
.3 mg
1.0 mg
Papayas should be eaten when they’re soft but still firm. And cantaloupes should be eaten plain, without sugar. “But it won’t taste sweet without the sugar, Dr. Fox,” some of my patients have complained. We’ve gotten so used to dumping sugar on everything that we don’t realize how sweet some foods naturally are. So leave the sugar off. Your taste buds will tell you what a sweet-tasting melon it is all by itself.

*40\80\8*

Most people with food intolerance have symptoms that fluctuate from day to day, and there may be periods when they are worse for a while, or better. Changeable factors, such as stress, probably play a part in these fluctuations, by making the patient more or less susceptible to the foods they are eating.

Following an elimination diet, during which the offending foods are withdrawn for a week or more, the reaction time may speed up considerably. If a culprit food is eaten again after this period of avoidance, the reaction is likely to be both more prompt and more severe. In some people there is an almost immediate reaction, such as vomiting, flushing, itching or a sudden flow of mucus from the nose. (However, sudden severe swelling of the lips and tongue – the characteristic symptom of immediate reactions in food allergy -is not seen.)

More puzzling still, the symptoms that appear on testing are not necessarily the same ones that the patient had before. To orthodox doctors, this is a very dubious aspect of food intolerance, and one that puts the whole phenomenon in doubt – it is a fundamental part of the scientific approach to medicine that the same cause should always produce the same effect. However, the common observation with food-intolerant patients is that the symptoms really do vary in some people, especially after abstinence from the food. How this might be explained is not known at present. But given the fact that food intolerance is probably a result of many interacting factors (see Chapter Twelve) then changing symptoms may not be so implausible as they seem at first sight. If changes occur, following exclusion of the food, it may be because one cause of sensitivity is more easily ‘cured’ by avoidance than another. Not eating the food could alter the balance of causative factors, and thus produce a different type of symptom.

*127\180\8*

How wise it would be to interrupt this deteriorating condition in good time before it takes over one’s being, leading to the need for strong sleeping pills that can become addictive! People who feel overtired should decide to spend their holidays in the country, where they can go on easy excursions and for walks in the forest or woods and the hills or mountains, rather than choosing a travel programme that would involve great strain and effort. They need to breathe deeply in the fresh air, enabling them to feel naturally tired in the evening and so enjoy restful sleep once again. Anyone who thinks that he can get rid of overtiredness by sitting in an armchair all day is mistaken, because he needs more than rest: he needs sufficient exercise and deep-breathing. This will eliminate the tiredness and metabolic wastes from the body. Townsfolk would benefit more from their holidays if, instead of lying around, they helped the farmers make hay and went for short walks, besides eating and drinking well.

*1203/28/1*

In tropical countries there are many tiny parasites, such as mites, that penetrate the skin and cause cold or hot fevers. I myself once taught such an infection in the tropical jungle and only DDT was able to save my life. These tiny parasites are not visible to the naked eye. They stick to plants and when touched with bare arms or other parts of the body they attach themselves to the skin and enter through the pores. The resulting infection is referred to as ‘cold death’ because the body temperature progressively decreases until life ceases if no help is forthcoming in good time.

When you are roaming through the jungle, leeches may fall from the trees, drop onto you and attach themselves to your skin. These tropical bloodsuckers, however, are not harmless like their cousins in temperate zones, because they can cause blood poisoning. The mosquitoes in those areas are also dangerous and able to transmit malaria. This disease is rampant near the headwaters of the Amazon and no traveller there should dare to sleep without a mosquito net. Even so, these carriers of disease are equipped with a peculiar instinct that enables them to find every chink in a hut and tear in a net and so torment their victims. When I was visiting that area I often discovered some mosquitoes under my net in the morning and, on squashing them, would find them to be full of blood. It could have frightened me, but perhaps I am immune to malaria or the modest quantities of quinine I took to be on the safe side were enough to protect me. In Sri Lanka I came across another type of mosquito dreaded by everyone because it transmits the fateful disease called filariasis, or elephantiasis.

*1134/28/1*