While there are some benefits to exposure to natural sunlight – like improving mood, increasing vitamin D levels, enhancing sleep, and slowing the aging process down – it is wise to be cautious in the sun to avoid the detrimental effects of its ultraviolet rays.

Ultraviolet light causes skin to lose elastin, which is a primary factor in the formation of wrinkles. Elastin fibers are what help skin maintain elasticity. Without it, time and gravity will take its toll on the skin, stretching it and creating a rough and wrinkly surface, giving a premature appearance of aging.

Prolonged exposure to the sun can also lead to precancerous lesions known as actinic keratoses. They occur frequently in lighter-skinned people with blond or red hair and blue eyes. These lesions can be worrisome, as, unlike the benign sebhoorric keratoses, they very often lead to malignant carcinomas.

Skin cancer is another major pitfall of exposure to the sun’s reckless ultrviolet rays. In areas where sunlight is prevalent, and people receive extensive exposure, especially as children and teens, squamas cell and basal cell carcinomas are more common. The risk of malignant melanomas is also quite high.

In rarer cases, there may be an adverse allergic reaction to sunlight which can produce blotchiness, rashes, or blemishes on skin. These types of reactions can be brought on or intensified by the use of certain prescriptions, including antidepressants, antibiotics and blood pressure medication.

Take precautions when going out into the sun, especially for prolonged periods of time. When choosing a sun screen, look at the Ultraviolet Protection Factor, or UPF. The higher the number, the better the UV protection. Wearing hats with a brim at least three inches wide can help protect your head, ears and neck from burning, as well as protecting your eyes.

There are so many diets out there in this world that you can choose to follow. Some claim that you could lose weight in a week, while others will take a little while longer. Some are geared toward lowering your cholesterol, while others look to help lower your blood sugar levels.

I am not well versed in all of these diets, but I recently heard about the RAVE diet, so I figured I would share this diet with this site’s readers. The RAVE diet has nothing to do with partying and dancing, as the name might suggest. You may want to do a little dance once you go through this diet because you feel so good about yourself, but that is not what I am here to write about.

Outlined by Mike Anderson in his book, The RAVE Diet & Lifestyle, the RAVE is a diet that promotes making people’s immune systems stronger and more efficient. In the book he urges people to understand that the cure for cancer already exists– it is the immune system.

By keeping your immune system in pristine health, you should be able to prevent and even reverse cancer. It has been done before, but somehow cancer patients do not often opt for the natural way. The RAVE diet stresses that plant-based diets are the only ones that strengthen the immune system. The animal-based diets feed cancer, while plants feed your immune system.

Here is what RAVE stands for:

• No Refined foods
• No Animal foods
• No Vegetable oils
• No Exceptions & Exercise

It’s simply an an old-fashioned, plant-based, whole foods diet based exclusively on whole fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts and seeds. Essentially, it’s a vegan diet, but it so much more than just that. There is a link between this type of diet and major diseases– particularly, cardiovascular disease.

Not only does the RAVE diet help support the immune system, but it also is used to simply lose weight.

As for credibility about Mike Anderson,  the RAVE diet website states, “Mike Anderson is a medical researcher, author and filmmaker whose mission to inform the public about how simple changes in diet and lifestyle can cure our biggest health problems.”

Living the healthiest life you possibly can and doing everything to remain cancer-free is all about taking care of yourself. Whether you develop cancer is not completely within your control, but you can do your part to ensure that you are healthy on the inside and the outside.

As many as one in three North Americans will develop one form of cancer or another in their lives. What many people are unaware of is that cancer can be prevented in many instances by living a healthy lifestyle. It has been estimated that 75 percent of the deaths that are cancer related could have been prevented. Here we offer some preventative measures for you.

Topping the list is smoking. If you smoke, quit, and if you don’t smoke, do not start! Besides lung cancer, smoking has been linked to other types of cancer, such as throat cancer and stomach cancer. In fact, avoid all types of tobacco and steer clear of second-hand smoke at every opportunity.

Engage in as much physical activity as you possibly can. Exercise alone, with a partner, or in a group. Exercise strengthens the body and also helps to keep extra pounds at bay. All of these things taken together lower your chances of developing cancer.

Eat as healthily as possible. Consume vegetables of all different colors. Choose foods that are abundant in their vitamin, mineral and antioxidant content. Include plenty of leafy green vegetables in your daily diet, such as broccoli, kale, bok choy and spinach. Eat whole grains, low fat dairy products, seafood and berries often. Reduce your consumption of saturated fats and trans fats, as well as fried and greasy foods.

Instead of brewing a cup of java in the morning or regular tea, drink green tea. Green tea is rich in ingredients that help to fight cancer, and it is also plentiful in terms of its antibacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. But don’t just drink it in the morning, any time of the day that you want a warm liquid treat, make yourself some green tea!

Get seven to eight hours sleep every night. Sleep often is not recognized as an important aspect of being healthy (and staying healthy), but it is significant. Sleep provides the body with the time it needs to rest and heal.

There are many forms of natural cancer treatment. Flax oil (which does not have the same aromatic appeal of lavender oil) happens to be one of them.

Canada is the country where an ancient blue-flowering crop is exclusively cultivated. The flax plant produces a fiber. From this fiber linen is woven. There is an edible seed and from this seed flax oil can be extracted. This seed contains heart healthy omega-3 fatty acids. The flax seed has alpha-linolenic acid which is not exactly the same as the omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil. The body however can convert alpha-linolenic acid from flaxseed oil to the same type of omega-3 fatty acids found in fish oil.

The flax plant contains mucilage gum which is a soluble fiber. It is similar to the fiber that is in oat bran. This mucilage gum is what lowers blood levels of cholesterol. Many research studies have indicated a reduction in the bad cholesterol called LDL. Triglyceride levels were also lowered. Decreasing these two lipid has a connection to lessen the risk of cardiovascular disease. Platelets may also become less sticky which would reduce the risk of a heart attack.

In the flax plant is a chemical called lignans. This is a plant estrogen that is believed to limit the bodies production of estrogen and testosterone. It has been shown that in some cases estrogen and testosterone can stimulate the growth of certain cancers such as cancer of the prostate and breast cancer. Before using flax oil or flax seed, breast cancer patients who are taking the drug tamoxifen should consult their physician.

Of course, it is prudent to ask your doctor about any supplement you plan on taking to discover if you have any health issues that would effect that choice. It has been found in animal studies that when flaxseed was given to pregnant rats the birth weight of their male babies was lowered.

Some of the risk factors correlated to breast cancer have been well defined and are within our control to minimize. The basis for protecting yourself from breast cancer is to keep estrogen at a normal level in the body. One way to do this is to maintain a normal weight, or lose weight if you are overweight. Fatty tissue produces estrogen even after menopause. Decrease dietary fats, sugars and processed food. Decrease or eliminate alcohol from your diet. Try to eat a high fiber diet, consisting of whole grains, fresh fruits and vegetable and bean or organic soy protein. Again, these are to keep the estrogen level low.

Exercise also decreases estrogen. Women who have a regular workout routine (such as using a Needak soft-bounce rebounder) not only feel better, but lower their risk factor for malignant breast tumors.

Avoid chemicals that are potential carcinogens. Most petroleum-based chemicals used today are estrogen analogs, which are suspected to cause breast cancer. Do not use pesticides, herbicides, and bug sprays or flea bombs. If possible buy organic produce because it is more nutritious, and organic foods will not have pesticides on them. The pesticides do not wash off with water from a SteriPEN Journey water purifier, and again are suspected to play a role in raising the estrogen level.

Awareness can be raised by wearing cancer bands.

Prostate cancer is the second most common type of cancer in men in the United States, after skin cancer. Of all the men who are diagnosed with cancer each year, more than one-fourth have prostate cancer. Prostate cancer affects the prostate, a gland in a man’s reproductive system that makes and stores seminal fluid. Prostate cancer is usually treatable if caught in time. Prostate cancer often has no symptoms. Sometimes, even when symptoms are present, men do not seek medical advice. However, if prostate cancer is found early, it can often be cured. The symptoms of prostate cancer are similar to those produced by a common disease of the prostate, benign prostatic hypertrophy (BPH), and include difficulty uninating and a frequent or urgent need to urinate.

Mesothelioma is an uncommon form of cancer, usually associated with prolonged exposure to asbestos, which affects the pleura, a sac which surrounds the lungs, the peritoneum, the lining of the abdominal cavity, or the pericardium, a sac which surrounds the heart. Mesothelioma is a rare form of cancer in which malignant (cancerous) cells are found in the mesothelium, a protective sac that covers most of the body’s internal organs. Most people who develop mesothelioma have worked on jobs where they inhaled asbestos particles, or have been exposed to asbestos dust and fibre in other ways, such as by washing the clothes of a family member who worked with asbestos, or by home renovation using asbestos cement products.

Mesothelioma (cancer of the mesothelium) is a disease in which cells of the mesothelium become abnormal and divide without control or order. They can invade and damage nearby tissues and organs. Cancer cells can also metastasize (spread) from their original site to other parts of the body. Most cases of mesothelioma begin in the pleura or peritoneum.

Breast Cancer chemotherapy is known as a therapy of brutalizing proportions. Highly toxic drugs are still given in high doses through chemotherapy but there is a difference. Fat coated droplets are released. These droplets must be heated to 102 degrees before the toxins can be released. The breast is gently warmed until the cell killing compounds are released only in the breast. This brutalizing treatment actually becomes relatively pleasant. Each year there are 215,000 cases and 40,000 deaths, but slowly, incrementally, new approaches for combating this cancer in a more humane way are being developed. One of the most important advances is gene profiling. Gene profiling determines what treatments will be effective based on the particular female patient’s genetic profile.

Genomic Health Inc. of Redwood City can assess 21 key genes in a tumor-tissue sample. A score is then developed from zero to 100. To determine the effectiveness of the drug taxmoxifen a score is given to that particular woman with a high score being a determent that taxmoxifen will not do the job alone. The cost is $3,400 which is high but not as high as the costs of chemotherapy.

Taxmoxifen has been the most successful drug to combat breast cancer but is not effective after five years of treatment. Disease free survival can now be extended by three aromatise inhibitors named Femara, Aromasin and Armidex. These are only effective in post menopausal women.

The one weapon with the most promise is one that will literally vaporize the tumor without surgery. Pilot studies are being done at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and Victoria General Hospital in British Columbia. Instead of surgically removing the cancerous breast tumors they are shot with radio frequency waves. This is useful for only small tumors in older women. Inserted in the breast is a radio probe that is guided to the tumor site by ultrasound. The power radio frequency waves are turned on and it literally shrivels and kills these small tumors.