Health Blog
Written by Dr. Heo Ji-young. Each piece takes a single symptom and follows what is actually happening in the body.
The Body Does Not Tilt All at Once
At a checkup, blood pressure is a little high, blood sugar is a little high, waist circumference is a little larger — and every single one gets called only "borderline." How should you read that? Looked at one at a time, everything seems ambiguous, but once several measures lean the same way, the story changes. You have to look at them side by side to see it. If your weight drops on its own, or thirst and urination increase noticeably, testing comes first.
A Time Comes When It Is Not Like Before
You eat the same amount, but your belly is getting bigger; eat even a little late and your hands shake; an hour after a meal you are too sleepy to function — has your habit gotten worse? What has changed is not the habit, but the margin the body allows for it. As muscle grows less responsive to insulin with age, what you eat starts taking a different path through the body. If your weight has dropped on its own, or thirst persists, testing comes first.
There Is a Range You Can Swing In
Two people with the same average on their checkup — one whose numbers were steady year after year, and one who arrived at that average after swinging widely up and down. Are they in the same state? The report makes them look identical, but the real question is how much they swung, and whether they returned to where they started. In records of more than 500,000 people, a difference remained even when the average was the same. If a number suddenly changed by a large amount, re-checking comes first.
Aching Like the Flu, the Morning After Drinking or a Bad Night's Sleep
There is no hint of a cold and nothing strenuous happened, so why does the whole body feel stiff and sore like the flu? Trace it back and there was usually drinking the night before, a long-skipped meal, or a restless night's sleep. On a day the metabolism has been shaken, muscle sometimes carries the cost. If fever comes with it, or urine turns the color of cola, that needs checking the same day.
Blood Pressure Rises for a Reason
When you are told your blood pressure is high, the conversation usually turns straight to what to cut back on. But there is a question to ask before that — why did the body raise the pressure in the first place? Blood pressure is the pressure that keeps the roads open so blood can reach where it needs to go, and when the reason to raise it stays in place, the body keeps it raised for as long as that reason remains. This is not a reason to stop blood pressure medication on your own — looking at the reason does not compete with the medication.
Losing Weight Is Not About Willpower
Eating less does make the weight come off — so why does it always stall and come back? What actually decides the outcome is not whether the weight comes off, but whether the body can bear the process while it does. What comes off in the first week is usually water, a body pushed too fast gives up muscle first, and gallstones showed up more often in the group that lost weight faster. If your weight has dropped on its own, without any effort, testing comes first.
When Meal Times Stay Misaligned
"I have never eaten breakfast, and nothing has ever happened. Why is it a problem now?" It is a good question. Skipping breakfast is not, in itself, a fault — what has changed is not the habit but the body that used to absorb it. The same meal is received differently by the body depending on when it is eaten. If your weight keeps dropping even though you are not skipping meals, testing comes first.
What the Body Does When It Eats Less — I Was Sceptical for a Long Time
I was sceptical about intermittent fasting for a long time, because in the consulting room I often see what happens when blood sugar swings. Then, studying the cell side, another layer came into view. The two accounts sit on different layers.
Sometimes Rising Blood Pressure Is an Effort
For most high blood pressure no single cause can be named. Yet look at the cases where a cause is known and one grain runs through them: when less blood reaches somewhere, the body raises the pressure to make that up.
The Body Does Not Hold an Exact Number
It is easy to think the body works to hold a number steady, but across so many cells an exact setting is not possible in the first place. So the body reads direction and speed rather than value. Both blood sugar and blood pressure have a device that reads the speed.
The Yellow Powder That Lowers Blood Sugar — Following Berberine All the Way Through
More and more people know the name berberine, and many now ask about it first in the clinic. In herbal medicine it is the bitter yellow compound in herbs like Coptis and Phellodendron, and today I want to follow it all the way through.
When your stomach rumbles and your hands and feet are cold, but the tests are normal
When your stomach makes loud noises, your hands and feet are cold, and your belly is hard, it may not be three symptoms but one state. Showing up on a test isn't the same as nothing being wrong. I look at the conditions that don't get captured in a photo.