Always Get a Second and Third Opinion!

I co-hosted and co-produced Atlanta's award winning Your Health Today TV show for three years before moving to live in the western North Carolina mountains. I would weekly interview the top medically related authors and invariably they would recommend people pursuing second and third opinions before electing costly surgery. Most of my guests were involved in alternative health and recommended looking into alternative remedies besides surgery and drugs.

Back in the 1960s when I was working for Post Newsweek TV I had never even heard of alternative health remedies except those recommended by our elderly grandparents. Today many of those remedies are the subject of best selling books! My first exposure to alternative health care was in 1978 and I have never looked back! So far because of the alternative health care regime I follow with drug free natural vitamins and minerals I have not had to begin taking all those drugs my friends are taking at 60! And I will assure you that they will be the last resort!

So the first area you want to consider for second and third opinions is your health care program. If you have been or could be diagnosed in the future with a deadly disease, don't take it as a death sentence! Physicians today are learning to be more careful with giving death sentences. If your physician is of the old school of thinking, get rid of him/her fast! It use to be "you are what you think" was relegated to those New Age loonies. Not any longer. Medical research has shown that they were right. If you think you are going to die from the disease then you most likely will.

Let me share with you a moving and to some people unbelievable story. While in Atlanta I had the pleasure of meeting Gerald Stacey, who was at the time the longest living AIDS patient. Do you remember when AIDS was considered a death sentence? First, AIDS was not what was killing the people diagnosed with AIDS – it was the complications from contracting AIDS.

Well, Gerald had beat the odds of dying from the complications of AIDS and being the inquisitive reporter that I am I wanted to know why he thought this had happened. He told me that when he was diagnosed with AIDS he had shared this with his family. His father who hated Gerald for being gay, told him that his death would be the best thing for their family and society! I can't even imagine a father or mother saying this to their child even if they don't approve of their lifestyle! Gerald told me that when his father said that he determined right then and there to outlive the SOB! He had a reason for living even though it might be considered negative to some people.

The person that I had succeeded as co-host for the TV show had been a cancer survivor and one of the founders of the cancer survivor's organization now with chapters in every state in the USA and even foreign ones. These are people that were given death sentences that did not give up just like Gerald. They also had sought second and third opinions and most had not undergone either chemo or radiation therapy. They had used their positive affirmations daily and a regime of natural remedies. Fortunately today physicians are realizing that chemo and radiation therapy are not the only answers.

And don't limit second and third opinions to just health related areas. Pursue them in all areas of your life. As I mentioned in a previous article dealing with those costly extended warranties and guarante , make sure to check out a second or third source for the product or service you're looking to purchase. Find out what others' experiences have been with the product or service through sites like eOpinions, chat rooms and forums. Also make sure and check out Consumer Reports magazine both off-line and online.

Also visit my new blog at http://consumershockjock.blogspot.com but beware it is not tame!

Hugh Simpson, is a former consumer investigative reporter for Post Newsweek TV and currently co-founder of http://www.usprepared.com an emergency preparedness consulting company. You can download his FR** Ebook Emergency Preparedness Guide for the Third Millennium at the site. He can also be contacted at hugh@usprepared.com.