The Pancreas

The Pancreas:

The pancreas is an organ (gland) that is situated near (behind) the stomach and produces some substances called enzymes and hormones. The pancreas sends these digestive hormones through its pancreatic duct into the beginning of the small intestine (the duodenum), and these digestive enzymes too help us to digest food in the intestines.

Of the four hormones it produces, the hormone known as “glucagon” increases the amount of the sugar glucose in the blood, and hormone known as “insulin” decreases the amount of sugar glucose in the blood. Insulin also helps the body to absorb amino acids and create proteins with them.

So, if our pancreas becomes weak, it may not produce these enzymes and hormones in correct proportion. We may have poor digestion, high blood sugar (diabetes), low blood sugar, poor ability to create proteins from amino acids, overweight from storing too much fat and so on. 

Body-system and Body-organs

Body-system and Body-organs

When you like to take care of your health mainly by yourself, some basic knowledge about these systems, organs and their functions etc in terms of modern science too will be much helpful. So, the following short notes (Continuing from this lesson) that I compiled using information from various sources will give you some such useful knowledge. So, if you are not too late about your health , paying some attention to this will be wiser than collecting information about the specialist doctor s, hospitals, miracle drugs and so on that has come into fashion nowadays.

In simple terms, the body organs are the parts of our body that do one more special jobs. The heart, lungs, stomach, brain etc are some of our important organs. The group of organs working together is called the body systems. Illness is caused when an organ fails to do its job due to some reasons.

The Liver and Gall Bladder:

The Liver and Gall Bladder:

Our liver is smooth cone shaped, red-brown and rubbery organ that is situated in the upper right part of the abdomen where it is partly protected by the rib cage. It is our largest and heaviest internal organ, weighing around 1.6 kilograms.

The liver does many important jobs for our body. It absorbs part of the food (constituents) digested by our digestive system and creates thousands of nutrients for the body each day. Most boy organs depend on the liver to create the nutrients that they need each day to be healthy. For examples (according to sources), the liver produces about 200 nutrients just for our eyes. It also removes certain type of poisons (toxins) and wastes from our body. So, the health of many organs of our body depends also on the health of the liver.

The liver can be called the main “chemical machine” in our body. It makes a substance called bile (“Pita” or “Pitta” according to Ayurveda, we hope to post many about Ayurveda), which helps digestion. Bile contains a mixture of chemicals and nutrients that the body (digestive system) uses to properly digest fats, oils, cholesterol and some other nutrients.

The gall bladder is a part of the liver and basically acts as a storage bag for bile. Bile is sent to the beginning of our small intestines (the duodenum) when the partially digested food is passed into the small intestines from the stomach. There, the bile mixes with the food to further help the process of digestion.

If our gall bladder gets too weak, practically any disease can eventually occur. This is because, when we have a weak liver, many poisons remain in our body, and not enough nutrients are produce to nourish the other body organs. Then these body organs too become weak allowing the disease easily attack our body.

Also when our gall bladder is unhealthy, it may become clogged with gallstones. A gallstone is a hard mass forming from minerals or hardened bile. The passage away through which bile passes into the small intestine (the duodenum) is called the bile duct. So, if a gallstone gets clogged in the bile duct, we have to suffer from a painful “gall bladder attack”. The picture shows you how the liver, gall bladder, pancreas etc situated in our body.

So it will be very much healthier for us know and take care about our own liver rather than thinking of the “mouth watering” livers of the innocent animals.

The Digestive System

The Digestive System:

The mouth, oesophagus (food pipe), stomach, small and large intestine are the main organs of the digestive system. These organs break down food into nutrients such as protein, vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates and fats, which the body needs for energy, growth , and repair. After food is chewed and swallowed, it goes down the food pipe and enters the stomach, where it is further broken down into a soup like mixture by powerful stomach acids and digestive juices. This process goes on for few hours and then from the stomach the food travels into the small intestine which is over twenty feet long. This where our food is broken down into nutrients that can enter the blood stream through tiny hair-like projection of the intestine. This process also takes more than five hours. Then the food goes into the large intestine (about five feet long) where water is absorbed and the excess food that the body does not need or cannot digest is turned into waste taking another few more hours and is removed from the body through the anus.

The Location of The Stomach

As mentioned last post, the stomach is one of our main digestive organs. Most of us think that we know the exact location of the stomach – that is inside our novel area. But what we actually have there are the intestines. Our stomach is situated a little below the heart towards the left side of the upper body. So, when we have a pain in our stomach, many of us worry that it is a pain in heart. When we feel pain in the novel (in the intestine), we suspect it is a stomach problem.