July 13, 2007 10:17 am
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By Libby Cluett
lcluett@mineralwellsindex.com
While few of his hospital patients remember him after he treats them, Palo Pinto General Hospital Anesthesiologist Edgar Lockett studies and practices much more than how to put people to sleep.
He has many beliefs and perspectives on modern health care, but underlying them all is an effort to help people learn to take some responsibility for their health care.
Lockett says he loves his work as an anesthesiologist, where he does not have the same time constraints, administrative paperwork, late night calls, and patients checking themselves out of the hospital as many of his PPGH colleagues.
However, helping empower people to become healthier gives Lockett his Òraise your hand and say ÔyesÕ moments.Ó
ÒDoing holistic medicine is probably a high life-satisfaction event [a term he uses conversely to high stress events].Ó
Lockett sees many issues related to American health care that have arisen over the past decades and seems bold to assert his perspective on several concerns and their relationship to individualÕs health.
ÒWe spend the most money on health care and are 37th in overall quality of health care,Ó he cites a World Health Organization study.
Additionally, he said, Ò[Doctors] have lost control of our specialty. Medicine has been taken over by third party payers and the pharmaceutical industry.Ó
ÒThere are two drug lobbyists for every representative of Congress.
ÒLobbyists wrote and pushed for the Medicare Prescription [Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003]. They pushed it through with coercive pressure on representatives,Ó he said.
According to Lockett, the pharmaceutical industry creates diseases. He said that conditions that were not considered diseases years ago, are now treated with medication Ð like insomnia, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, cholesterol and anxiety.
Lockett maintains, ÒMost medications are toxic to the body and most are palliative [reducing the severity of disease symptoms, rather than providing a cure].Ó
But to Lockett, these conditions, and many others, can be resolved through nutrition and supplements and people can start taking control of their health in small ways.
ÒItÕs your body, who should be more interested and persnickety Ð you. We usually delegate this [responsibility to a third party],Ó said Lockett.
Step one: Get nutritional status stabilized by consuming quality raw foods and supplements.
To Lockett, eating a poor diet is Òlike building a house out of faulty materials.Ó
He equates Òeat good, raw materialsÓ to using Ògood wood.Ó
Lockett recommends supplementing diets with Omega-3 fatty acids and cutting out what he calls Òfunny fatsÓ Ð pervasive in American diets, yet unrecognizable to the body.
ÒNeurons and cell membranes are made of fats, but they need the correct type of fat or the body gets confused,Ó said Lockett of Omega-3 fatty acids.
To Lockett, Òimmune system fitnessÓ is another goal when considering what foods and vitamins people take into their mouths and said that weak immune systems have contributed to the rise in cancers. When cancer invades the body, Òthe immune system has failed to recognize budding cancer cells,Ó he said.
Ò[The immune system] is a complex and efficient system, but like anything, it needs raw materials,Ó said Lockett.
Lockett focuses on eating and encouraging others to eat quality raw foods. He said there are many foods in the general food supply that are not the same quality as they were decades ago.
Locket maintains that while vegetables may look good, they are grown in soils stripped of nutrients. One example of quality diversity is the vast difference between homegrown and many vegetables purchased in supermarkets.
ÒFood is about money,Ó he cites.
As an illustration, Lockett mentions eating a tomato Ð some home or locally grown tomatoes are juicy and delicious while others taste like cardboard and need salt to be palatable.
Supplements, in the form of vitamins, minerals, probiotics and enzymes, are also critical to stabilizing oneÕs nutritional status.
ÒMinerals are a major deficiency,Ó said Lockett of modern diets.
For instance, today, Òyou would have to eat 10 servings of spinach [to consume] the same amount of iron in one serving of spinach [grown in] in 1963,Ó Lockett explained, who points to soils that have been stripped of minerals as one cause.
ÒYou have to supplement with minerals unless you grow your own food,Ó he added also citing that those who grow their own must practice good soil management.
ÒLand husbandry is a lost art,Ó he shares, citing that nitrates used on soils since the end of World War II have adversely affected soils.
Lockett also warns that people need to be smart consumers when they purchase vitamins. ÒThere are seven manufacturers of vitamins in the world Ð they make synthetic vitamins. Synthetic vitamins have a different chemical structure and they donÕt look the same to the body,Ó he said.
ÒYou can manufacture Vitamin C from sheepÕs wool,Ó he added.
ÒKnow the source and find whole-food-based vitamins: 1) as nature made them, and 2) vitamins do not exist in isolated or mega-doses in nature.
When people eat an orange, they Òget a whole system of things. We can only make ascorbic acid Ð one part of the system,Ó explained Lockett
Lockett also is cautious about the process used to make vitamin into pill form and calls pressed-pill vitamins Òbed pan vitaminsÓ because they do not dissolve in the body. One test he suggests is putting one tablet into warm vinegar (that resembles stomach acid).
ÒIf it hasnÕt dissolved in 30 minutes you donÕt want to take it.
ÒYou just never know what you are putting into your mouth these days,Ó added Lockett.
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Lockett is passionate about making a difference in peopleÕs awareness of their health.
ÒMaking a difference goes way above making money,Ó he said.
Lockett presents lectures for groups and at PPGH for WomenÕs Health Month, MenÕs Health Month and on topics related to heart health and diabetes awareness.
When Lockett gives lectures at PPGH for WomenÕs Health Month, he said he notices that, Òwomen come in droves.Ó For MenÕs Health Month, ÒSome come because their wives bring them Ð [the wives] donÕt want to be widows.Ó
Locket has a message for men and their approach to health care.
ÒWe [men] have an amazing blind spot, [saying] ÔI know whatÕs best for me,ÕÓ he said.
ÒWomen are better because they are not reluctant to see a physician; men are immortal.Ó
He cites that for every 100 women who die from the age bracket of age 45-64, 170 men will die.
ÒThese are not post-retirement ages,Ó he points out.
This summer, he said he is working on a fall lecture series Òdedicated to the application of biblical health principals in modern times.Ó He said he would talk to organizations for one lecture or a short series of lectures.
Lockett suggests the Life Extension Foundation, at www.lef.org, that Ògives information you need to take care of your life.Ó He said the information is written for lay people and the foundation has great products, too.
Overall, Lockett hopes to help Òempower people to take responsibility of taking care of their own health.Ó
ÒA mind expanded by a new concept rarely retreats to the same size,Ó he said.
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Photos
Dr. Edgar Lockett