Top 10 Proven Natural Home Remedies

Can you treat your medical condition naturally?  In this article, I share my top 10 proven natural home remedies.  Read on to learn how to "hack" your health.

1. Magnesium for Arrhythmias and Palpitations

As magnesium is found in nuts, seeds, and greens, is it any wonder that up to 89% of Americans are magnesium deficient?  The Standard American Diet is very low in magnesium.  Magnesium is critical for everything from DNA repair to keeping your heart beating normally.

Arrhythmias, or abnormal heart rhythms, are very common.  The main symptom of an arrhythmia is heart palpitations.

Studies show that one in four adults will experience the most common arrhythmia, atrial fibrillation.  Even palpitations from skipped beats (PVCs and PACs) are very common and trouble many people.

Besides living as healthy as possible, are there any proven natural home remedies?

Let me introduce you to magnesium.  As a cardiologist, I have seen countless patients benefit from either increasing the magnesium in their diets or from magnesium supplementation.  Unless you suffer from kidney disease, magnesium supplements are generally safe.

In a review of 17 medical studies involving 2,069 patients, magnesium supplementation was shown to decrease nearly all arrhythmias following surgery.  In particular, the risk of atrial fibrillation was decreased by 29% and ventricular arrhythmias by 48%.

In addition to calming the heart rhythm, studies also show that magnesium may help with constipation, headaches, anxiety, diabetes, depression, exercise performance, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure.  As with all of the proven natural home remedies that will be discussed in this article, check with your doctor first as there could be possible side effects and other dangers from any of these home remedies.

2. Cranberries for Bladder Infections

Bladder infections, or urinary tract infections, plague many people.  These infections can even be life-threatening.  Are there any alternatives to antibiotics?

Consider cranberry juice.

While cranberry juice isn’t the perfect treatment, studies show that it helps.  In a review of 10 studies involving 1,049 people, cranberry products were shown to decrease urinary tract infections by 35%.

Unfortunately, we don’t know which form (juice, whole fruit, or extract capsules) or which dose is best.    As with all proven natural home remedies, there can be side effects so check with your doctor first.  For example, cranberry juice may spike blood sugar in diabetics or it could interact with the blood thinner warfarin.

If you suffer from recurrent bladder infections, adding whole cranberries or unsweetened cranberry juice to your diet may be much safer than an antibiotic.

3. Cinnamon for Diabetes

Nearly half of all American adults now suffer from diabetes or pre-diabetes.  In addition to losing weight and exercising, cinnamon has been shown to be very effective for diabetes.

Indeed, medical studies show that cinnamon may reduce blood glucose by 25 mg/dL.  Fortunately, this natural blood sugar reduction generally does not cause hypoglycemia or low blood sugar in people not on diabetes medications.

However, if you are also on diabetes medications, then you could become very hypoglycemic with a big dose of cinnamon.  Thus, if you want to start eating more cinnamon, your doctor may need to reduce the dose of your diabetes medications.

In addition to lowering blood sugar, you can also drop your total cholesterol by 15 mg/dL and your triglycerides by 30 mg/dL with cinnamon.

Unless you suffer from liver failure, you probably can't eat too much cinnamon from foods.  The main side effect of cinnamon is that most people want to eat it with sweets.

Of course, adding cinnamon to sweets completely negates any possible blood sugar benefit.  Rather, put cinnamon on your steel cut oatmeal, mix it in with your unsweetened almond milk,