Drinking alcohol makes your heart race

Don't listen to anything I say after this. If your heart is racing and can tolerate it then it would be pumping more oxygenated blood. Which would seem to be useful for our brains that have been starved of oxygen. What is your doctors solution to get more oxygenated blood to your brain? Or is your doctor doing nothing and letting even more neurons die? You should charge your doctor $1000 per neuron that dies due to her/his inaction.
https://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=184642&CultureCode=en

16 March 2018 European Society of Cardiology (ESC)

• Under embargo until 18 March 2018 10:00 GMT

The more alcohol you drink, the higher your heart rate gets, according to research presented today at EHRA 2018 Congress1, organized by the European Society of Cardiology.
Binge drinking has been linked with atrial fibrillation, a phenomenon called “the holiday heart syndrome”.2 The connection was initially based on small studies and anecdotal evidence from the late 1970s.
The Munich Beer Related Electrocardiogram Workup (MunichBREW) study was conducted by researchers from the LMU University Hospital Munich Department of Cardiology, supported by the German Cardiovascular Research Centre (DZHK) and the European Commission. It was the first assessment of the acute effects of alcohol on electrocardiogram (ECG) readings. The study included more than 3,000 people attending the 2015 Munich Oktoberfest.
ECG readings were taken and breath alcohol concentrations were measured. Age, sex, heart disease, heart medications, and smoking status were recorded. Participants were, on average, 35 years old and 30% were women. The average breath alcohol concentration was 0.85 g/kg. Increasing breath alcohol concentration was significantly associated with sinus tachycardia of more than 100 beats per minute in 25.9% of the cohort.3
The current analysis of the MunichBREW study looked in more detail at the quantitative ECG measurements in 3,012 participants. The researchers investigated the association between blood alcohol concentration and four ECG parameters: excitation (heart rate), conduction (PR interval, QRS complex), and repolarisation (QT interval).
Increased heart rate was associated with higher breath alcohol concentration, confirming the initial results of the MunichBREW study. The association was linear, with no threshold. Alcohol consumption had no effect on the other three parameters.
“The more alcohol you drink, the higher your heart rate gets,” said Dr Stefan Brunner, a cardiologist at the University Hospital Munich, Munich, Germany, who is one of the lead authors.
The researchers are currently investigating whether the increase in heart rate with alcohol consumption could lead to heart rhythm disorders in the longer-term.
Dr Moritz Sinner, another lead author, said: “We cannot yet conclude that a higher heart rate induced by alcohol is harmful. But people with heart conditions already have a higher heart rate, which in many cases triggers arrhythmias, including atrial fibrillation. So it is plausible that the higher heart rate following alcohol consumption could lead to arrhythmias.”
He added, “Most people in our study were young and healthy. If we conducted the same study in older people or heart patients we might have found an association between drinking alcohol and arrhythmias.”
The authors speculated that alcohol creates an imbalance between the sympathetic (fight or flight) and parasympathetic (rest and digest) nervous systems. They are currently investigating how it does this.
https://www.escardio.org/The-ESC/Press-Office/Press-releases/drinking-alcohol-makes-your-heart-race?hit=wireag

• Full bibliographic informationThe abstract ‘Acute alcohol consumption and effects on cardiac excitation, conduction, and repolarization. Results from the MunichBREW Study’ will be presented during the session Arrhythmias general - The unusual and unexpected which takes place on 18 March from 11:00 to 12:30 in the Agora – Poster Area.

Study Connects Chronic Cannabis Use to Oxygen Changes in Brain

Higher cerebral blood flow and better oxygen uptake sounds like it would be good for our damaged brains. But we will never know since no research will ever be done on this.

My 13 reasons for marijuana use post-stroke.  

But don't listen to me, I have absolutely no medical training,

http://neurosciencenews.com/oxygen-cannabis-brain-7296/
Summary: According to UT Dallas researchers, chronic cannabis users extract more oxygen from brain blood flow and have higher cerebral blood flow than nonusers.
Source: UT Dallas.
New research from the Center for BrainHealth at The University of Texas at Dallas reveals that levels of THC, the psychoactive ingredient in cannabis that leaves a euphoric feeling, directly correlate to changes in how the brain utilizes oxygen.
Dr. Francesca Filbey, director of Cognitive Neuroscience Research in Addictive Disorders at the Center for BrainHealth, led the team that found chronic cannabis users have higher cerebral blood flow and extract more oxygen from brain blood flow than nonusers. The rate at which oxygen is metabolized in the brain was found to be higher in users as well.
While THC is known to relax blood vessels and alter blood flow in the brain, the study focused on how prolonged THC use might affect the brain by analyzing the differences in regional brain blood oxygenation and metabolism in chronic cannabis users.
Due to the prospective nature of the study, published in the journal Neuropsychopharmacology, researchers cannot say whether cannabis use directly causes the observed changes, or whether other underlying conditions also may be at play.
While the reason for the brain changes related to chronic marijuana use is unclear, Filbey said that these changes may reflect underlying differences in brain tissue metabolic rate.
“Past marijuana research has shown changes in cognitive functions such as memory and executive functioning. Our study seeks to understand the possible neurophysiological mechanisms that may drive these cognitive changes,” said Filbey, who is also Bert Moore Chair in BrainHealth and head of the cognitive neuroscience program in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences.
The study consisted of 74 cannabis users and 101 nonusers matched for age and IQ. All users reported at least 5,000 usages over their lifetime and daily use for 60 days leading up to the study. Participants were required to refrain from cannabis for 72 hours before the study to eliminate acute effects of the drug. Participants underwent magnetic resonance imaging, and THC metabolite levels were measured using urinalysis.

Increased blood flow in the putamen may either reflect the capacity of THC to dilate blood vessels or the development of additional circulatory pathways. NeuroscienceNews.com image is in the public domain.

Filbey and her team found that cannabis users showed higher global oxygen extraction fraction and cerebral metabolic rate of oxygen compared to nonusers. Also, blood flow in the putamen — an area of the brain associated with reward learning and habit formation — was found to be greater in users than nonusers.
Increased blood flow in the putamen may either reflect the capacity of THC to dilate blood vessels or the development of additional circulatory pathways.
“Currently, cannabis is the most widely used illicit drug. As it becomes more widely legalized, understanding neurophysiological alterations and its effects on the brain’s health and performance are becoming increasingly relevant,” Filbey said.

About this neuroscience research article

Source: Emily Bywaters – UT Dallas
Image Source: NeuroscienceNews.com image is in the public domain.
Original Research: The study will appear in Neuropsychopharmacology.

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UT Dallas “Study Connects Chronic Cannabis Use to Oxygen Changes in Brain.” NeuroscienceNews. NeuroscienceNews, 14 August 2017.
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"Beeting" high altitude acclimatization with beet juice

Is our stroke strategy going to be updated to see if beet juice can precondition us to survive a stroke better?  If it can acclimatize us to high altitude then maybe it can mimic the altitudes necessary for preconditioning without having to live there. Or maybe you'd rather go to high altitudes for Training the Brain to Survive Stroke.
This would seem to be so much easier and faster than HBOT but we'll never know since our stroke associations will fail once again in even answering simple questions like this.
When will we have a stroke protocol that has natural foods delivering nitric oxide to us to increase the oxygen carrying capacity of our blood? This sounds extremely fucking important. Do not do this on your own.

"Beeting" high altitude acclimatization with beet juice

Ever since human beings first began climbing the world’s tallest mountains, they have struggled with a basic problem: altitude sickness, caused by lower air pressures which affect the ability of our bodies to take up oxygen.
Or, as actor Jason Clarke says in his role as the climbing guide Rob Hall in the recently released movie, Everest, “Human beings simply aren’t built to function at the cruising altitude of a 747.”
How well humans tolerate high altitudes is highly variable, but the best way to minimize the risk of developing acute mountain sickness (AMS) is acclimatization, or simply spending enough time up high to allow the body to make adjustments to lower oxygen levels.
But what if you could help your body acclimatize more quickly and thoroughly with the help of a natural substance – like beet juice? A team of Norwegian and Swedish researchers decided to see how nitrate-rich beet juice might affect acclimatization on a 39-day expedition to Kathmandu and at 3700 metres in the Rolwaling Valley, Nepal.
Nitric oxide key
One aspect of successful acclimatization is that the blood vessels are able to deliver enough oxygen throughout the body. But normal blood vessel function depends on the body’s ability to naturally produce a compound called nitric oxide (NO).
In healthy people at sea level, production of adequate amounts of NO is not a problem, but with the reduced oxygen availability at high altitude it is a challenge, simply because natural NO production requires oxygen.
But the body has a “back-up system” for NO production at altitude, and it is here that beet juice can help. The secret ingredient in beet juice is high levels of nitrate, which the body can then convert to NO.
Blood vessels work better
Previous research has shown that blood vessels tend to contract at high altitude, so researchers decided to see if they could improve blood vessel function at high altitude simply by having test subjects drink beet juice. They measured blood vessel function with a standard test of arterial endothelial function, a flow-mediated dilatation test (FMD) that uses ultrasound.
In a study recently published in Nitric Oxide: Biology and Chemistry, the researchers showed that consumption of organic nitrate-rich beet juice restored reduced blood vessel function at high altitude.
The researchers behind the study are from the K.G. Jebsen Center for Exercise in Medicine – Cardiac Exercise Research Group (CERG) at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and the Environmental Physiology Group at Mid-Sweden University in Östersund, Sweden.
First-ever study
The researchers’ project is the first time anyone has studied if consumption of a nitrate-rich juice could have positive effects on blood vessel function at high altitude.
Both men and women were studied with ultrasound to check their blood vessel function, before and during the high altitude expedition. As expected, high altitude made blood vessels contract.
To test if beet juice could make the blood vessels relax again, the test subjects were investigated after drinking two types of beet juice with a 24-hour break between tests.
One of the juices contained high amounts of nitrate while the other type had no nitrate in it (placebo). Neither the study participants nor the researchers knew what type of beet juice each person drank before blood vessel function was measured, and the juices (nitrate-rich versus placebo) were given in a random order.
The study showed that beet juice with high amounts of nitrate made the blood vessels relax and return to normal function, while beet juice with no nitrate (the placebo) did not have any effect.
“Next time you plan a trip at high altitude, maybe it is worth carrying a bottle of beet juice in your backpack,” said the study’s corresponding author, Svein Erik Gaustad, from NTNU’s CERG. “It may be the extra boost your body needs to deliver enough oxygen to your tired muscles and keep you healthy when you are climbing a high mountain.”
http://gemini.no/en/2015/10/beeting-high-altitude-sickness-with-beet-juice/

Sesquiterpenes, a natural compound found in essential oils of Vetiver, Patchouli, Cedarwood, Sandalwood and Frankincense, can increase levels of oxygen in the brain by up to 28 percent

I've seen this in numerous natural, health and alternative places but not a single one points directly to the research article.  Can't find it in Google scholar.

Vienna and Berlin Universities, researchers discovered that sesquiterpenes, a natural compound found in essential oils of Vetiver, Patchouli, Cedarwood, Sandalwood and Frankincense, can increase levels of oxygen in the brain by up to 28 percent (Nasel, 1992).

This would seem to be extremely important post-stroke if this is true, much faster and better than HBOT. Tell your doctor to find and evaluate this immediately. Before your next stroke.

Oxygen uptake response to cycle ergometry in post-acute stroke patients with different severity of hemiparesis

Finally some specific demonstrated knowledge about stroke damage.
What is your doctor doing about this?
http://www.kjms-online.com/article/S1607-551X%2813%2900125-3/abstract

Abstract 

This study evaluated the impact of severity of hemiparesis on oxygen uptake response in post-acute stroke patients. Sixty-four patients with a mean poststroke interval of 8.6 ± 3.8 days underwent a ramp cardiopulmonary exercise test on a cycling ergometer to volitional termination. Mean peak and work efficiency were measured by open-circuit spirometry during standard upright ergometer cycling. Severity of the hemiparetic lower limb was assessed by Brunnstrom's motor recovery stages lower extremity (BMRSL). was 10% lower in hemiparetic leg with BMRSL V than in that with BMRSL VI, 20% lower in BMRSL IV, and 50% lower in BMRSL III. was higher for the group with increased BMRSL. The relations were consistent after adjustment for age, sex, body mass index, stroke type, hemiparetic side, modified Ashworth Scale, time poststroke, comorbidities, and medications. Our findings revealed that O_2peak is dependent on the severity of hemiparesis in leg, and along with ΔO₂/ΔWR closely related to the severity of hemiparesis in post-acute stroke patients, regardless of the types and locations of lesion after stroke, as well as the differences in comorbidities and medications.