Preventive Medicine Center

Exercise most days

Mix aerobic workouts with resistance training.
Eat whole and unprocessed food

Eat high fiber, low fat meals of of grains, vegetables, beans (G-V-B) and fruit - at the 90% plus
Breathe clean air

Don't smoke.
Drink clean water

Drink water and weak herb tea. If you wish, have occassional wine or high-quality beer.
Limit wishing and hoping

You are in charge. Things don’t just “happen” to you.

The Preventive Medicine Center (PMC) is an IRS recognized 501(c)(3) nonprofit charitable and tax-deductible educational organization. The PMC is dedicated to promoting a realistic, supportive, and holistic approach to health: achieving disease prevention and reversal, where
possible, through a combination of innovative, traditional, and alternative methods. We offer extensive information on the 5 Basics, including nutrition as a Liv-it and not a die-t, exercise, and an optimistic/stress reducing outlook that gives you the freedom to be healthy, happy, and to pursue your chosen goals in life as very best as possible.

We are genetically strong and designed to be well, not ill. Mistakes of living break down these natural strengths. The philosophy of the PMC is based on the question of what is natural or correct for our human biology. The PMC gives voice to the insight that most diseases have the same common denominators. Certain common and natural methods can be used to prevent and reverse those conditions. We all have the opportunity to change, improve, and even reverse those conditions. This is the ability and offering of the Preventive Medicine Center.

Everything on this site is an “invitation to consider…”

H. Robert Silverstein MD
Fellow of the American College of Cardiology
Fellow of the American College of Preventive Medicine

Medical.Director
Preventive Medicine Center
1000 Asylum Avenue # 2109
Hartford, CT 06105
(860) 549-3444 or (800)789-PREV

This is available as a printable document (pdf)

The Needs of Our Human Biology (How Virtually All Diseases Occur)

Simply put, virtually all the diseases that we know, all the high blood pressure, all the high cholesterol, diabetes, gall stones, cancers of the colon-prostate-breast, all the body malfunctions have specific, and for the most part, known causes. There are disorders for which the causes are not yet known, but we do know the causes, treatments, and even prevention for polio, TB, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and many cancers, etc.

Each person is especially susceptible to certain diseases when compared to others, but each person is also more resistant to certain diseases when compared to others. In that sense, each person has particular genetic strengths and weaknesses.

When people do certain things they should not (errors), these behaviors plus one's genetic weaknesses result in abnormalities called diseases. If they never "did" certain things, these weaknesses would never generate the diseases listed above and many more.

This is how virtually all diseases occur: because of the 5 BASIC ERRORS of behavior interacting with each person's genetic traits or weaknesses:

1. Breathing: smoking, being in dust, fumes from fireplaces and engines. Our air should be clean.

2. Drinking: drinking other than water or weak herb teas. Our water should be clean.

3. Eating: our dietary goals should be VERY HIGH FIBER, whole and unprocessed foods/LOW FAT with the occasional minimally refined or processed foods: ideally whole grains/cooked fresh vegetables/beans (G-V-B) “foods exactly as they grow up and out of the ground and in the field” with a little bit of anything else: This is a "Liv-it," not a die-t (a little fun always).

4. Exercise: walk 3 miles a day, 5 days per week, 50 weeks a year: the 5-5’s program. Do so in 100 foot sections or all at once. Do Pilates, yoga, swimming, the Shaun T 5 exercises, or any exercise machine or activity. Exercise to having clear lines of definition/demarcation (ideally about 11-22% body fat for men, 15-27% for women): CLOD/D.

5. Unrealistic Expectations: refusing to accept the difficulties of reality--even gratefully. We must deal with problems as best possible, accepting failure, but remaining independent, determined, and optimistic.

Virtually all diseases occur because of errors 1-4 above, but too many blame their diseases on "stress" (mostly a disorder of unrealistic expectations). Stress is the worry or anxiety we feel concerning a situation that seems difficult or impossible. Stress is the tension we feel when we hope and wish for things to be different from what they are. We should accept the world the way it is without wishing for it to be different. Accepting this does not minimize our problems but rather reduces our stress; Perseverance is Everything.
Here is a printable (pdf) version of How Virtually All Diseases Occur.

H. Robert Silverstein, MD