Healthy Life Newsletter, September 2025
Patient of the Month: Madison Charap
are very few practitioners out there that can create the miracles he
I came to Khalsa Chiropractic initially for an auto accident/whiplash (almost 20 years ago!). My lawyer sent me to someone who was not sufficient, so my massage therapist referred me to Dr. Mha Atma. From my first visit I found his office warm and welcoming.
Few people have “the touch” that Dr. Mha Atma has—I felt the other doctors were more just going through the motions. I love Dr. Mha Atma and everything about being a patient here. I love the family practice vibe, the office coziness and the doctor’s kindness and the way he handles patients.
I’ve been a chiropractic patient for over 30 years and I’m one of the few people I know in my profession—I’m a dental hygienist—that have held up pain free for so many decades.
Besides his hands-on chiropractic treatment, Dr. Mha Atma has given me many wellness tips over the years, from stretching to supplements. All have helped tremendously.
I have continued with chiropractic for most of my life because, along with stretching, working out and acupuncture, it’s the only way I know, to prevent injury and maintain my workload. Chiropractic care has helped me stay flexible and continue to work pain free! Chiropractic has also helped my son, who is a Division One fencer at Ohio State. It has helped him as an athlete to prevent injury and stay flexible.
I tell everyone about the benefits of chiropractic! I tell them that aging takes a toll on our bodies and that self-care, including chiropractic, is a must to maintain a great quality of life. And for those who begin chiropractic care, I tell them to keep going, and to believe in the body’s ability to heal!
Looking back on my chiropractic experience, I feel that I can’t live without it. Dr. Mha Atma is the best! There are very few practitioners out there that can create the miracles he does.
Three Reasons to Choose Chiropractic
When you’re suffering low back pain, shoulder pain or any number of similar musculoskeletal conditions, who gets the call: your medical doctor or your doctor of chiropractic? Your choice of health care provider in those situations could make a big difference, and research is continuing to prove it.
According to the latest study, chiropractic care is at least as effective as medical care for certain musculoskeletal conditions, while reducing health care costs and leaving patients more satisfied with the results.
The authors of the study, published in the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics (JMPT), went so far as to state that for certain musculoskeletal conditions, visiting an MD first instead of a DC may actually be a mistake:
“The findings of this study support first-contact care provided by DCs as an alternative to first-contact care provided by MDs for a select number of musculoskeletal conditions. Restrictive models of care in which patients are required to contact a medical provider before consulting a chiropractic provider may be counterproductive for patients experiencing the musculoskeletal conditions investigated and possibly others.”
The study sample included 403 patients who saw medical doctors and 316 patients who saw doctors of chiropractic as the initial health care providers for their spinal, hip or shoulder pain complaint. Four months following care, all patients completed a questionnaire that evaluated pain on that day and four months earlier (11-point scale); satisfaction with care received and the results of that care (5-point scale from “very satisfied” to “very unsatisfied”); and other variables. The researchers evaluated related costs of care by reviewing an insurance claims database.
“Patients initially consulting MDs had significantly less reduction in their numerical pain rating score and were significantly less likely to be satisfied with the care received and the outcome of care.” What’s more average per-patient costs over the four-month period were significantly lower in patients who initially consulted DCs ($368 difference compared to MD care).
JMPT Editor-in-Chief Claire Johnson, DC, MEd, emphasized the importance of the latest findings: “Comparative studies – in other words, research that compares the outcomes between two different providers or modalities – are rare for chiropractic care,” she said. “Thus, this study … is especially important if payers and policy-makers are to better understand the ‘triple aim’ as it relates to chiropractic. Specifically, this study helps us better understand what type of care provides better patient satisfaction, is more cost effective, and improves population health.”
The answer, suggests an increasing body of research, is chiropractic care.
Scientists Fed One Group of People Ultraprocessed Foods and Another Group Whole Foods, and the Difference in What Happened to Them Was Wild
Can You Guess?
As the industrial food system pushes ultraprocessed foods to every corner of the globe, new research shows that even seemingly healthy packaged meals may fall short of the benefits offered by whole, minimally processed foods.
A fascinating new study published in Nature Medicine dove into the real-world effects ultraprocessed foods have on the human body. Following a six-month clinical trial involving 55 volunteers, researchers at the University College London found that eating minimally processed foods was not only potent fuel for weight loss, but quickly led to healthier biomedical readings across the board — a grim indictment of what’s inexorably become the norm in global eating.
To run the experiment, the team of over 20 researchers split the participants into two groups, each of which followed a strict diet for eight weeks. One group was assigned to eat only minimally processed whole foods, while the other was given the task of eating mainly hyper-processed slop. After the first diet was finished, the volunteers took a four-week break, then switched to the other chow.
Given the direct comparison, the findings are noteworthy. Participants on the non-processed food regimen burned more fat, had lower systolic blood pressure, and lower levels of glycated hemoglobin — bloodsugar, essentially — compared to the processed one.
And zooming in a bit, the researchers found that losses in fat mass, body fat percentage, visceral fat rating and total body water mass were “significantly lower” on the whole food diet, but not the ultraprocessed one. Participants on the processed diet also reported a greater number of “adverse events,” like constipation, acid reflux, fatigue, and infections.
Volunteers surveyed said that both diets were equally satisfying, likely because both tended toward “healthier”-seeming foods — both diets followed UK government dietary guidelines — though they reported having an easier time controlling their cravings on the non-processed diet, as noted by Gizmodo.
Comparing the two menus is fascinating on its own. Participants on the non-processed diet enjoyed meals like breakfast cinnamon and apple overnight oats, sticky BBQ ribs with smoky rice and fruit, and salmon with herbed new potatoes and mixed vegetables. Their snacks were stuff like like blueberry, oat, nut and seed muffins, and pasta salad.
Alarmingly, the ultraprocessed group were treated to foods that, on a surface level, looked comparable: commercial breakfast oat and fruit bars, premade ribs and rice with fruit snacks, and boxed salmon with potatoes and corn, and snacks made up of meal-replacement drinks, plant-based yogurt, and packaged wrapped oat bars.
Though definitions vary, ultraprocessed food is typically identified as containing foodstuff rarely, if ever used in kitchens — like high-fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oil — or which have been pumped full of synthetic additives like flavoring, dyes, sweeteners, or emulsifiers.
Studies have shown that ultraprocessed food makes up over half of the dietary energy consumed in high-income countries like the US and the UK, the latter of which is where the clinical trial was run. Meanwhile, the ultraprocessed food market is projected to grow by an astonishing $856 billion over the next four years.
It’s not just about individual choices at the grocery store or restaurant, either: the class differences in diets are stark, with poor people forced to consume far more cheap ultraprocessed junk than their more affluent peers, meaning that to meaningfully improve health outcomes, the food supply needs to be restructured at a basic level.
Is Pain Relief Worth Dying For?
When you’re in pain, you can feel overwhelmed. Nothing else seems to matter except finding a remedy to make the pain even a little less severe. The problem is, pharmaceutical companies have used the media and medical doctors to push pain-relief medications onto patients as the sole solution, to the tune of 259 million prescriptions annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The problem with that strategy, of course, is twofold: First, relieving pain is important, but it rarely gets to the root of the problem. That means the pain will keep coming back – and you’ll need to keep taking pain-relieving medications to keep it at bay.
Second, evidence suggests pain relievers might take away the pain in a permanent manner (and not in a good way) – by relieving the sufferer of their ability to feel pain or anything else, for that matter. We’re talking about death by painkiller, and the CDC estimates that 46 people die every day from a painkiller overdose. That’s nearly 17,000 Americans a year who seek pain relief – and end up dying for it.
If you’re in pain, don’t just turn to the medicine cabinet or a doctor’s prescription. Get a thorough evaluation to determine the source of the pain, and then ask about nondrug alternatives like chiropractic care. Pain relief is important – but it’s not worth dying for.
Fish Oil for Migraines
The statistics regarding migraines are sobering: more than 39 million adults and children in the U.S. alone suffer; the worldwide impact is a shocking 1 billion. In fact, according to the Migraine Research Foundation, migraine is the third most common illness globally. The symptoms experienced by migraine sufferers are no less concerning: intense, throbbing pain, sensitivity to light and sound, and potential nausea and vomiting – definitely not your average headache that makes your day less than ideal. Migraines can be debilitating and life-changing.
Believe it or not, food may be the answer for migraine sufferers. We’re talking about particular foods supported by research as helpful in reducing migraine frequency and intensity. New research published in the British Medical Journal suggests a diet high in fish oil (instead of vegetable oil) may be the key.
Among adults experiencing frequent migraines (more than 16 per month at the start of the study), consuming a diet higher in fatty fish and lower in vegetable oil resulted in a 30-40 percent reduction in total headache hours per day, severe headache hours per day, and overall headache days per month compared to adults who maintained their regular diet.
With migraines contributing to reduced quality of life, lost workdays and pain / frustration, any news is good news. If you suffer from migraines, talk to your doctor about your current diet and whether upping your fatty fish intake (or taking a fish oil supplement) is advisable. Also note that, independent of this study, numerous other research investigations suggest the cardiovascular benefits of regular fish oil consumption. That’s a win-win for your health.
(Comment by Dr. Mha Atma: Migraines have also been shown, in some cases, to improve with chiropractic adjustments. And also to improve with other dietary changes including cutting way down on refined sugar, products made from refined flour, and chocolate. Maybe best to try all of these things together!)
It Only Takes a Little
If you haven’t realized how important sleep is to your overall health, you haven’t been reading To Your Health for very long, much less witnessing how you feel – for better or worse – depending on how much / how little sleep you get. The latest research is for women specifically, suggesting that those who get even a little less sleep have an elevated risk of developing type 2 diabetes.
How much is “a little less”? Researchers discovered that restricting women’s sleep to approximately six hours per night reduced insulin sensitivity and increased plasma insulin (two risk factors for diabetes) compared with women who slept 7-9 hours a night. The changes were seen after only six weeks. The researchers believe, based on their findings, that chronic sleep restriction (which too many women and men experience) could accelerate the process that leads to type 2 diabetes.
Published in Diabetes Care, the study involved a wide age range of women: 20 to 75 years. As such, these findings are applicable to women young and old who want to reduce their diabetes risk – or even help manage it without drugs if they are already suffering from type 2 diabetes.
How many hours do you sleep on an average night? And how do you feel when you wake up – refreshed and rejuvenated, or tired and sluggish?
Bad for Baby
Expectant mothers everywhere, think a little marijuana during your pregnancy won’t harm your baby, especially since marijuana has been decriminalized in a number of states over the past few years? Think again.
Here’s why you should consider it as dangerous as alcohol to the health of your soon-to-be-born child.
In utero marijuana exposure significantly increases adverse neonatal outcomes; that means your baby is at higher risk of experiencing not one, but any of the following seven health issues, according to research:
Lower birth weight
Small for gestational age
Preterm delivery (prior to 37 weeks)
Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) admission
Lower Apgar score at one minute
Birth weight less than 2,500 grams (5.5 pounds)
Reduced head circumference
In other words, marijuana is bad for baby! This review study, published in JAMA Network Open, included 16 previously conducted investigations involving nearly 60,000 babies, so the risks noted above are worth taking seriously. Whether you’re pregnant or considering becoming pregnant, review the do’s and don’ts of a healthy pregnancy with your health care team - and make sure you discuss these study findings.
Lose Weight by Eating More in the Morning
Written by Michael Greger M.D. FACLM
A calorie is not a calorie. It isn’t only what you eat, but when you eat.
Recommendations for weight management often include advice to limit nighttime food consumption, but this was largely anecdotal until it was first studied experimentally in 2013. Researchers instructed a group of young men not to eat after 7:00 pm for two weeks. Compared to a control period during which they continued their regular habits, they ended up about two pounds lighter after the night-eating restriction. This is not surprising, given that dietary records show the study participants inadvertently ate fewer calories during that time. To see if timing has metabolic effects beyond just foreclosing eating opportunities, you’d have to force people to eat the same amount of the same food, but at different times of the day. The U.S. Army stepped forward to carry out just such an investigation.
In their first set of experiments, Army researchers had people eat a single meal a day either as breakfast or dinner. The results clearly showed the breakfast group lost more weight.. When study participants ate only once a day at dinner, their weight didn’t change much, but when they ate once a day at breakfast, they lost about two pounds a week.
The Army scientists repeated the experiment, but this time, they had the participants eat exactly 2,000 calories either as breakfast or as dinner, taking appetite out of the picture. The subjects weren’t allowed to exercise either. Same number of calories, so the same change in weight, right? No. The breakfast-only group still lost about two pounds a week compared to the dinner-only group. Two pounds of weight loss eating the same number of calories. That’s why this concept of chronobiology, meal timing—when to eat—is so important.
This article is an excerpt. Read the whole thing at nutritionfacts.org
New Research Demonstrates a Safe & Natural Way to Reduce Menstrual Pain Intensity
For millions of women, menstruation comes with more than inconvenience, it brings disabling pain. Known as primary dysmenorrhea, this monthly struggle often begins in adolescence and can persist into adulthood, affecting school, work, and quality of life.
While NSAIDs (like ibuprofen) are commonly used to manage pain, they don’t work for everyone—and long-term use isn’t ideal. That’s why this new 12-week randomized controlled trial, (Kumari et al. 2025), offers promising news: a natural, side-effect-free way to manage menstrual pain through a combination of targeted nutrition and movement.
Importantly, this research aligns with a growing body of evidence showing that nutrients like vitamin D also play a critical role in menstrual cycle health, hormone balance, and fertility. Learn more!
What Did the Study Do?
Researchers in Kanpur, India, recruited 72 young women aged 18–25 who experienced significant monthly period pain. Participants were randomly divided into four groups:
Control – No changes
Exercise only – 45 minutes of aerobic exercise, 5 days per week
Omega-3 only – 800 mg EPA/DHA, 5 days per week
Combined – Exercise plus omega-3
At the end of the 12 weeks, the researchers measured:
Pain intensity using the Visual Analog Scale (VAS)
Inflammatory markers including CRP, ESR, and WBC
Blood parameters to ensure safety
Pain reduction:
All three intervention groups experienced a meaningful reduction in pain, but the combined group had the greatest relief, more than a 25% drop in pain scores (p = 0.023). This suggests a synergistic effect when omega-3s and exercise are used together.
Inflammation lowered:
CRP levels dropped significantly (p = 0.016), especially in the exercise and combined groups.
WBC and ESR also showed positive trends, reflecting reduced systemic inflammation.
No adverse effects:
Important safety markers—such as hemoglobin, platelets, and other blood counts—remained stable, affirming that these strategies are safe and non-invasive.
To read this entire article go to grassrootshealth.net
Poor Sleep Leads to Chronic Pain
Not getting enough sleep – or not enough quality sleep that leaves you refreshed and ready to take on the day, rather than fatigued, irritable and ready to crawl right back into bed? A major health issue could be in your future: chronic pain. In fact, your odds of suffering chronic pain due to poor quality and/or quantity of sleep may increase by a factor of two or three compared to people who experience better sleep.
A large multi-national review of 16 studies spanning 10 countries and involving 61,000 participants arrived at this disturbing conclusion, with the lead study author even declaring that the impact of sleep on pain may be more significant than the impact of pain on sleep – often regarded as a major contributor to poor sleep.
And that wasn’t the only finding: Poor sleep also was associated with impaired responses to bacteria, viruses and other foreign substances, poor physical functioning, increased inflammation, higher cortisol levels, and other markers of pain, fatigue and overall compromised health.
Chronic pain isn’t something to mess with, but you don’t have to, thanks to your doctor of chiropractic. Discuss any pain you’re experiencing and don’t forget to mention any sleep issues. Whether poor sleep is causing your pain, or pain is causing poor sleep, your chiropractor can help determine the cause and correct it. Now that’s called a win-win.