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Alcohol, Tobacco, Sleep, and a Healthy Lifestyle

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Alcohol, Tobacco, Sleep, and a Healthy Lifestyle

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In practice for over 40 years, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith is an internal medicine physician based in Waterbury, Connecticut. A graduate of Yale Medical School, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith advocates for a healthy lifestyle to stave off disease.

Here are three habits to eliminate for a more healthy lifestyle:

1) Tobacco use

Burning tobacco releases toxic chemicals. Once inhaled, these chemicals irritate lung tissues, causing inflammation and damage. Habitual smoking causes lung tissue scarring and has been linked to cancer of the kidney, mouth, throat, bladder, and respiratory system.

2) Alcohol consumption

Ethyl alcohol oxidizes numerous cells in the body, causing inflammation and cell death. It causes direct injury to various organs and has been linked to liver cirrhosis, alcoholic hepatitis, stomach cancer, and nervous system damage. Ethyl alcohol has also been linked to mental health disorders such as depression, hallucinations, delirium, and chronic anxiety.

3) Sleep deficiency

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends seven-plus hours of sleep each night. It is while sleeping that the body's tissues are rejuvenated, chemical balance is restored, and organ cells and blood vessel walls are cleansed. Sleep deficiency elevates blood pressure, accelerates aging, and weakens the nervous system.

Abstaining from tobacco and alcohol and getting proper sleep are three essentials to healthy living.

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An internal medicine physician, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith has served as a clinician-educator for over 30 years in three university medical centers. Now practicing at StayWell Health Center in Waterbury, Connecticut, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith focuses on the treatment of conditions such as hypertension.

If you have hypertension, making changes to your diet can do a great deal to lower your blood pressure. One change could be to adopt the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) diet. It basically involves eating more whole grains, fruits, and vegetables. Low-fat dairy products and lean proteins are also a good option.

You do not have to starve yourself to lower your blood pressure. In fact, the DASH diet emphasizes the opposite; eat enough to stay full. You can have three meals a day, all centered on fiber-rich vegetables with small portions of lean protein, and two snacks a day, basically seeds, nuts, and fresh fruit. Making these changes to your diet can lower your blood pressure by as much as 14 mm Hg.

As a general rule, you should also reduce your sodium intake to below 1,500 mg per day. Most of the sodium you consume comes from processed foods, since natural foods have very little sodium. Start reading food labels whenever you shop, always opt for low-sodium items, and try not to add any salt to your food. Instead, season dishes using herbs such as spicy cinnamon or garlic, both of which have been shown to lower blood pressure.

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The Negative Impact of Tobacco and Alcohol Use on Health

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The Negative Impact of Tobacco and Alcohol Use on Health

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Treating Hartford, Connecticut, patients, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith provides general medical treatment, rehab, and urgent care at skilled nursing facilities. Dr. Rex Mahnensmith emphasizes preventive care and encourages patients work toward healthy lifestyles that can help avoid conditions such as prediabetes and diabetes.

Tobacco use is a major issue, with a cocktail of toxic chemicals released when tobacco is burned. When these chemicals are inhaled, inflammatory tissue responses that damage tissues and progressively cause lung and bronchial scarring occur. In addition, a variety of tumors, ranging from kidney and gastrointestinal cancers to bladder cancer, can develop. The sheer variety of tobacco-use-associated chronic illnesses that can lead to death are a strong impetus for quitting smoking.

Another major issue is the overconsumption of alcohol, with ethyl alcohol associated with internal organ injuries. Most common among these is direct liver injury such as cirrhosis and alcoholic hepatitis. In addition, overconsumption of alcohol can cause ulcers, inflammation, and cancer involving the stomach and esophageal cells. With other effects of overconsumption including chronic anxiety, depression, and memory loss, Dr. Mahnensmith emphasizes that is imperative to limit daily alcohol ingestion.

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The Causes and Symptoms of Diabetes Mellitus

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The Causes and Symptoms of Diabetes Mellitus

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Dr. Rex Mahnensmith is a primary care physician who engages with Connecticut patients with conditions such as asthma and nutritional disorders. Emphasizing a holistic approach, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith also cares for patients with diabetes mellitus. A group of diseases that impacts the way the body processes blood sugar, diabetes is characterized by too much glucose within the blood.

Diabetes conditions that are chronic include type 1 and type 2, while prediabetes is potentially reversible. Its presence means that blood sugar levels are elevated, but not so much as to earn diabetes classification. Gestational diabetes may also develop in the womb during pregnancy, though this typically resolves after birth.

Symptoms of diabetes include extreme hunger, increased thirst, unexplained weight loss, and a feeling of needing to go to the bathroom. Symptoms also include general fatigue and sores that take a long time to heal. Within the urine, the presence of ketones is a signal that diabetes exists. This muscle-and-fat-breakdown byproduct occurs when not enough insulin is present in the body. In cases of suspected diabetes or prediabetes, it makes sense to schedule a diagnostics test with a specialized physician and identify whether the condition is present.

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Dr. Rex Mahnensmith - Experienced Clinician and Educator

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As a primary care internist and the chief medical officer at the Stay Well Health Center, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith builds on four decades of diverse practice experience. He began his career as an internal medicine resident at Yale-New Haven Medical Center, having received his doctor of medicine from the Yale School of Medicine.

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This entry was posted in Internal Medicine, Rex L. Mahnensmith MD, StayWell Health Center and tagged Connecticut, findatopdoc, findatopdoc.com, IAHCP, Internal Medicine, International Association of HealthCare Professionals, internist, Leading Physicians of the World, Rex L. Mahnensmith MD, Waterbury on by . Prior to his current endeavors, Rex L.

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I serve as a Primary Care Internist, aiming to provide health care that carefully considers the individual's burden of chronic illnesses, the acute health changes that they are experiencing, considering their various weaknesses and fears and their special needs.

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Rex L. Mahnensmith, MD - International Association of HealthCare Professionals

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Dr. Rex Mahnensmith | Yale University - Academia.edu

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Academia.edu is a place to share and follow research.

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What Are the Common Symptoms of Chronic Kidney Disease?

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What Are the Common Symptoms of Chronic Kidney Disease?

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A primary care doctor located in Connecticut, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith serves as the chief medical officer of StayWell Health Clinic. Dr. Rex Mahnensmith also spent considerable time at Yale, where he served as clinical director of nephrology and dedicated much of his time to caring for patients with chronic kidney disease. While chronic kidney disease often feels like a health problem that occurs overnight, it is actually a degenerative condition that develops and gets worse over time. In its earliest stages, the disease often has no symptoms.

Chronic kidney disease involves the progressive shutdown of nephrons, the individual units responsible for filtering blood in the kidney. At first, the remaining healthy nephrons can pick up the slack, but over time the need for filtration overwhelms the functional nephrons and unfiltered blood begins to make individuals ill.

As kidney function continues to decline, individuals may notice that they are urinating less and that they experience chronic fatigue. Many patients start to lose their appetite or experience sudden weight loss. In addition, nausea and vomiting are common. Severe itching, metallic tastes in the mouth, and headaches can also occur. People may also experience edema, which is the swelling from fluid buildup in body tissue.

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A Look at the Major Types of Acute Nephritis

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A Look at the Major Types of Acute Nephritis

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Dr. Rex Mahnensmith spent more than two decades at Yale, where he focused primarily on providing medical care to individuals with chronic kidney disease. At Yale, Dr. Rex Mahnensmith served as the clinical director of nephrology and medical director of dialysis. A serious condition of the kidney is acute nephritis, a swelling of the kidney that can have several causes. The causes of acute nephritis typically depend on the type of disease present.

Interstitial nephritis refers to inflammation in the spaces between the tubules in the kidney. This type of nephritis often results from allergic reactions to antibiotics or other medications, although low potassium and general kidney damage can also underlie the issue.

Pyelonephritis is caused by a bacterial infection. Typically, the infection begins in the bladder and then moves up the ureters and into the kidney. E. coli remains the most common bacteria associated with pyelonephritis. Pyelonephritis can also occur after surgery or because of kidney stones.

The third major form of acute nephritis is called glomerulonephritis because it involves inflammation of the glomeruli, clusters of blood vessels in the kidney. When these glomeruli become inflamed, they may inhibit normal blood filtration.