Nobody likes medicine, but everyone likes to eat, so maybe food is the answer. There's certainly no shortage of experts telling us what not to eat because it will make us too fat, too tired, and too unhealthy. And of course there is a great deal of truth to much of this. So, eating right can help us to maintain a healthy body. But food can be used to do much more than just maintain ahealthy body. It can also be used to improve a body, cure a body, and perhaps even prevent a body from becoming deathly ill. Here are just a few examples.

If you suffer from high blood pressure, or congestive hear failure, then retaining water within your body further complicates these maladies. By eating a diet that is low in salt, the body will hold less water, andalleviate somewhat these conditions.

Patients who suffer from chronic liver or kidney disease will be able to ease their suffering with a low protein diet. The amount of protein waste in body tissue is reduced, thus significantly reducing tissuedamage.

A diet rich in high fiber can help in a number of ways. It can reduce the possibility of colon infection, lessen the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, and most likely lower your cholesterol.

A way of maintaining bone density (especially as you age) would be to consume a diet high in calcium. Some experts suggest, that it can also reduce high blood pressure, andreduce the risk of colon cancer.

A cancer reducing diet, is of course the big one everyone seems interested in these days. There aren't too many surprises in this list. Fruits and vegetables often contain antioxidants that inhibit the activity of free radicals. Dietary fiber has long been believed to keep cells from becoming cancer cells. While bacteria in your stomach digests the fiber, fatty acids are produced that combat cancer cells. The American Cancer Society Advisory Committee on diet, Nutrition, and Cancer Prevention proclaimed a few guidelines for cancer prevention. In a nutshell they are: Choose most of the foods you eat from plant sources. Limit your intake of high fats foods, particularly from animalsources. Be physically active. Limit consumption of alcohol beverages.

And of course, the most important food cure is chicken soup for the common cold. Dr Marvin Sackler of Mount Sinai Medical center in Miami scientifically proved that patients with colds that ate chicken soup recovered faster then those who didn't. Several later studies have in fact backed him up.