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Most Dangerous Holiday Traffic Day
 The most dangerous holiday to drive is New Year's Eve, right? Wrong! According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration the most dangerous holiday to take to the road is Thanksgiving. So be sure to drive safe this week. It seems that Thanksgiving is a perfect storm of event: long distance travel, packed roads, long days of drinking wine and beer, sleepy drivers from the turkey and general stress. Independence Day is the second most dangerous day, followed by Memorial Day and Labor Day. New Year's Eve doesn't show up until number five. The best advice they recommend is to stay home, which isn't an option or most, or to fly. If you must drive, then wear a seatbelt, make a plan for getting home if you're going to be drinking and don't speed. Labels: advice, health, holidays, study
Are You Really Eating Worse Than You Think?
 Sometimes we made food choices thinking we're doing something good for ourselves, or at least picking the less of two food evils. It may be surprising to some that some standard and popular lunchtime fare is really a pound-packing health bomb. For example, I don't think a reasonable person would say that a Triple Whopper from Burger King is a healthy lunch, but who would expect that the fat equivalent is like like eating 10 slices of Papa John's cheese pizza! Or how about a Hardee's 2/3-lb Monster Thickburger? The saturated fat in this heart attack between two buns is the same as eating 43 strips of Oscar Mayer bacon. Or how about the Wild Buffalo Chicken Strip Basket at The Dairy Queen; that contains the same amount of sodium as 14 large orders of McDonald's French fries. Whoa! So before you place your next lunch order, be sure to read the nutrition sheet to see what you're really consuming. To read a more complete list of food items, click here. Labels: commentary, food, health
Alzheimer's and Parkinson's Linked to Environmental Threats
 A new report by the Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility and the Science and Environmental Health Network says that environmental factors such as lead, air pollution, and pesticides can lead to health risks and cognitive disease. Co-author of the repot, Jill Stein, MD says, "As we explored origins and patterns of chronic degenerative diseases, we discovered a web of conditions in the environment--including nutritional, chemical, physical and social factors--that have a direct influence on the risk of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and related chronic diseases. It is clear from these findings that our activities in the areas of food and agriculture, energy, chemical use, and social organization are key drivers in the abnormal loss of neurological function in older people throughout the modern world." In diet, saturated fat intake was found to greatly increase the risk of dementia. What's frightening is that the report suggests these diseases are being driven by dramatic alterations over the past 50 to 100 years in the U.S. food supply, an increasingly sedentary lifestyle, and exposure to toxic chemicals. Labels: food, health, study
ADHD Kids Strain Marriages
 It's not surprising that kids can affect and put strain on a marriage, but this stat is high. According to a study by State University of New York-Buffalo, parents of children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are almost twice as likely as other parents to divorce by the time their child is 8 years old. The authors of the study say, however, that if you and your spouse can survive the eighth birthday, the rate of divorce stops climbing. Further adding to the stress is the fact that ADHD is hereditary and mothers with ADHD children are are 24 times more likely than other mothers to have it while fathers are five times more likely. Meaning, while trying to deal with a child, one of the parents is very likely to also have ADHD, which can be a point of conflict on its own. Some good news came out of this article from USA Today, researchers in Canada found no difference in divorce rate of parents with ADHD children. Do you have a child who's been diagnosed with ADHD; and has that affected your marriage? Labels: advice, health, kids, parenting, study
"Honey, It's Time for a Diet"
 Belittling a loved one about being too fat and then undermining efforts to lose weight are common mistakes among couples according to experts in this article from MSNBC. For example, making jokes about your spouse's weight, then when they do start losing the pounds, bring home a thing of cookies. In this article, this scenario happened and the couple eventually got divorced. So how do you tell your spouse that they're gaining a little too much weight and you're worried about them? Here are a few tips: 1. Don't nag 2. Be loving 3. Don't judge 4. Help solve problems 5. Don't sabotage 6. Be a role model 7. Don't play cop 8. Be a role model To get more in-depth explanations on these steps, click here. Do you think you're spouse needs to lose weight? Talk about it on our forum. Labels: advice, food, health
Fan in Baby's Room May Prevent SIDS
 A study from Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine says babies who slept in a room with a fan were 72% less likely to die from SIDS (sudden infant death syndrome). The study included interviews with the mothers of 185 infants who died from SIDS and the mothers of 312 other babies. In addition to fans, the simple act of opening a window also seemed to reduce the risk of SIDS. According to the this article from USA Today, doctors don't know exactly why fans seem to help, author De-Kun Li, a reproductive and perinatal epidemiologist with Kaiser Permanente's research division says that perhaps the improved air circulation, preventing infants from rebreathing exhaled carbon dioxide, which can pool up in the gap between a baby's face and the mattress is the reason. The good news is that deaths from SIDS has dropped in half since 1992 according to this article. Other things parents should do to help protect their babies are putting them on their back to sleep and don't put the baby in your bed and sleep with them. Labels: health, kids, parenting, study
Dying of a Broken Heart
 Have you ever noticed that when half of a longtime couple passes away, the other partner passes soon after? Researchers at the University of Glasgow found that widows and widowers were at least 30 percent more likely to die of any cause in the first six months following a spouse's death than those who hadn't lost a partner. They followed over 4,000 couples. Many experts in this article from MSNBC say that context matters, meaning older couples with deteriorating health are at higher risk. More amazing is what Rollin McCraty, research director at the Institute of HeartMath in Boulder Creek, Calif., found after he studied six longtime couples' hearts while they slept. While they were sleeping beside each other their heart rhythms fell into sync, rising and falling at the same time. Their EKG printouts looked virtually identical. So imagine sleeping in perfect harmony with your spouse for 50 years and having that ripped away. "Is it possible to die of a broken heart?" asks Dr. Hope Wechkin, the medical director of Evergreen Hospice in Kirkland, Wash. "Absolutely." Labels: health, real people, romance, study
Husband Sues Wife for Giving Him Herpes
 A Manhattan lawyer is suing his wife after discovering she was having an affair when he found her herpes-treatment prescription in their medicine cabinet. He's also suing her lover and her father--a doctor who prescribed the medicine and he claims withheld the affair and knowledge of the infection. The father claims he prescribed the medicine to cure a sore on his daughter's lip. The husband has since also contracted genital herpes, which is treatable, but not curable. The lawyer in the suit also claims that the wife and father violated NY state law requiring people knowingly infected with venereal disease to tell their sexual partner. It's also not surprising that he submitted another file to the courts--for a divorce. Click here to read the complete article from the NY Post. What would you have done? Labels: health, news, real people, sex
Did Your Nose Pick Your Spouse?
 New research suggests that it might have been your nose, not your heart that first attracted you to your husband or wife. Researchers at Switzerland's University of Lausanne have noticed a connection between scent and picking a mate. They've observed mice, rats, sand lizards and fish pick mates with immune system genes unlike their own based on scent. This would then produce offspring that had stronger immune systems than their own. Similar tests have been conducted with humans with women picking based on sweaty t-shirts. The results were similar. It's not cut and dry however. Social influences, for example, can override this natural impulse to follow your nose. More studies are sure to follow. To read the entire article, click here. Labels: health, men, study, women
Reasons to Have Sex
 If you're not feeling motivated to have sex, AOL has put together a list of 34 reasons to have sex. For example, according to a study at Queens University in Belfast, men who have sex three or more times a week can cut their risk of heart attack in half and will also reduce risks of stroke. Another reason to have sex according to the article is that 30 minutes of sex will burn roughly 200 calories. With the winter flu just around the corner, you'd also like to know that sex twice a week will boost your immune system by 30 percent. To read the complete list, click here. Labels: health, sex, study
Eating Nuts Presents Danger for Pregnant Women
 Dutch researchers say that pregnant women who eat nuts or nut products like peanut butter daily raise the risk their children will develop asthma by 50 percent. According to the findings, moderate amounts don't seem to have any effect. This Reuters article says "scientists do not exactly know why some children develop asthma, although some believe that allergies can trigger the disease that causes a narrowing of the bronchial tubes." While seafood is another food that contains allergens, the Dutch researchers only found a link between peanuts and asthma. The study questioned 4,000 pregnant women on their dietary habits. Their conclusion was that moderate consumption doesn't seem to pose an issue. Labels: health, pregnancy, study
The Value of Your Life has Dropped Nearly $1 Million
 The Environmental Protection Agency dropped the "value of a statistical life" to $6.9 million -- a drop of $900,000 from five years ago. So why would the U.S. government devalue the life of Americans? The AP summates that "government agencies put a value on human life and then weigh the costs versus the lifesaving benefits of a proposed rule. The less a life is worth to the government, the less the need for a regulation, such as tighter restrictions on pollution." The article also goes on to say that "the value based on what people are willing to pay to avoid certain risks, and on how much extra employers pay their workers to take on additional risks. Most of the data is drawn from payroll statistics; some comes from opinion surveys. If you had to put a price tag on your life and where you are today compared to five years ago, would you be worth more? Labels: health, money, study
Married Couples Still Healthiest
 It's long been reported that married people are healthier than non-marrieds, but a new report says that the gap is closing. In the September issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior it "found that the self-reported health status of never-married adults increased significantly over time. At the same time, the self-reported health status of married women also increased, so the gap between married and never-married women's health stayed about the same. However, never-married men narrowed the health gap between themselves and married men." So why are married people healthier? There are two theories. One is that being married gives you more access to social support and economic resources. The other is that being divorced or widowed hurts health, according to this article from the Washington Post. For more information about the health effects of marriage, visit the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.Labels: health, resource, study
Train Like an Olympian
 In case you haven't seen a newspaper, TV or been on the web recently, today is the start of the Beijing Olympics. When you're watching those finely tuned athletes perform swifter, higher and stronger and realize that you'll never be able to do that, it doesn't mean that you can't train like an Olympian. Best Life magazine interviewed a few Olympic coaches to get training tips for us non-Olympians. Larry Nicholson, assistant coach for USA Boxing says to get quick nimble feet, place eight cones three feet apart in a line, and then do three sets of each of the following exercises: Weave through them at a sprint, weave through them while high stepping, jump over them with your feet together, and weave through them while facing sideways. Bob Bowman, coach to Michael Phelps says the key to Phelps success is his long swim stroke. To get you own gold-medal stroke consciously extend your arms. Bowman says, "It will feel awkward at first, like you're exaggerating each stroke, but once you start hitting those longer strokes at your previous short-stroke speed, you'll be faster, stronger, and fitter." To read the advice of all the coaches, click here. Labels: advice, event, health
Do Self Breast Exams Work?
 According to Cochrane Collaboration, there is no evidence that monthly self exams reduce breast cancer deaths. This article in U.S. News & World Report then asks the question: What should you do then? While checking yourself regularly may not help according to the new findings, experts say if you do feel something unusual, get it checked out. The report also is not suggesting that self exams are bad, just that it's not correcting the breast cancer problem. It's not surprising, however, that some doctors still feel that self breast exams are helpful. The bottom line according to the article is that if you are currently conduction your own regular exams, you don't need to stop, but know it might not be as effective as once thought. And if you're not a regular self-examiner, you don't have to feel guilty about it. Labels: advice, health, study, women
Let the Wife Rule the Home
 That's the key to a happy marriage according to a new study by Iowa State University. The response they got from 72 couples was that the wife's opinion took precedence over what the husband said or thought. "The women were communicating more powerful messages and men were responding to those messages by agreeing or giving in," says David Vogel, one of the leaders of the study and an associate professor of psychology. The couples questioned had been married an average of seven years and had identified themselves as having a happy marriage. The study of these couples also showed that not only was the wife's opinion the one that mattered, but the husbands were happy to accept the opinion of the wife without objection. Who rules your roost? Labels: health, real people, study
A Bad Marriage Can Kill You
 This sounds like the punch line to a joke, but it's not. Canada.com posted an article about the strain a bad marriage can have on one's health. The article cites: increased risk for heart attack, high blood pressure, stroke, depression, eating disorders; not to mention it could affect the body's immune system, reducing the ability to fight off disease. The article also says, however, that 55 percent of couples who seek help are able to salvage their marriage. This is definitely good news, but we say why not focus on your marriage all the time. Take the approach of living well and striving to maintain a healthy marriage all the time, rather than trying to bandage something that you neglect and then it becomes broken. We're not saying you shouldn't seek help when you need it, but problems are a lot easier to resolve the sooner you address them. Labels: health, news
Hospitals Do Poorly on Breast-feeding Support
 The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention gave U.S. hospitals an average score of 63 out of 100 for their support of breast feeding. The report says the states in New England and the West Coast had the highest scores, while hospitals in the South recorded the lowest scores. Of those states, Vermont and New Hampshire were tops, both with a score of 81, while Arkansas sat at the bottom with a 48. The MSNBC article says: Breast-feeding is considered beneficial to both mothers and their babies. Breast milk contains antibodies that can protect newborns from infections, and studies have found breast-fed babies are less likely to become overweight than those fed with formula. Have you had a recent experience like this? How would you grade your hospital's breast-feeding support? Labels: health, parenting, pregnancy, study
4 Parents Sue Baby Bottle Makers
 Four Ohio parents have filed a federal lawsuit against Evenflo, Avent America, Handicraft, Playtex Products and Gerber Novartis claiming the bottles were made from a harmful chemical and that the companies knew that a chemical were associated with health problems but didn't disclose the risk. The chemical, bisphenol A (BPA) was identified by the U.S. National Toxicology Program in April showing "some concern" that the chemical caused changes in behavior and the brain, early puberty and possibly precancerous changes in the prostate and breast. This report prompted Wal-Mart to stop selling bottles with BPA by early next year and Toys R Us has said it will purge its shelves of BPA-containing bottles by year's end. Saying all that, here's what the article from the Washington Post says: Many of the studies that have reported higher levels were conducted under unrealistic conditions, said Dr. Norris Alderson, the Food and Drug Administration's associate commissioner for science.
"Although our review is ongoing, there's no reason to recommend consumers stop using products" with BPA, he said. Labels: health, parenting, study
Coffee May Be Better For Health Than You Think
 A new report by the Harvard School of Public Health says that coffee is loaded with antioxidants and that helps with heart disease. The study is based on the coffee drinking habits of 41,736 men and 86,216 women with no history of cardiovascular disease over 18 years for men and 24 years for women. The results showed that women who drank two to three cups a day had a whopping 25 percent drop in heart disease compared to non coffee drinkers. The authors of the study say, however, that more research is necessary to suggest people should drink coffee for their health. Saying that, the evidence is piling up that drinking coffee does have its benefits. From the USA Today article: In 2000, researchers at the Mayo Clinic found that coffee intake was linked with decreased rates of Parkinson's disease. In 2004, Harvard researchers reported that it significantly reduced the risk of developing type 2 diabetes. And a 2005 study found that coffee could help prevent the most common type of liver cancer, according to the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Now that's eye opening. Labels: food, health, study
Happy Marriage Means Better Sleep for Women
 Wendy M. Troxel, a psychologist at the University of Pittsburgh has found that women in happy marriages get 10 percent better sleep than women in unhappy marriages. The question that Troxel asks now is, which comes first -- does the unhappy marriage lead to poor sleep, or does poor sleep contribute to a bad marriage? Troxel and her colleagues reviewed data on about 2,000 married women who participated in the Study of Women's Health Across the Nation. The women were an average age of 46 years. This just seems to offer one more reason to never go to be angry. Read more here.Labels: health, study, women
Not Smoking is Contagious
 A team of researchers at the Harvard Medical School has found that while the urge to smoke is contagious, so is the act of not smoking. These researchers also showed the same type of connection in the past to obesity. In addition, smokers who don't stop smoking while the rest of their group does increasingly find themselves pushed to the edge of their social circles. If this is the findings for general social behavior, it would only seem logical that couples who both smoke would find better success if they both quit at the same time? Do you have any experience with this? Read the complete article here.Labels: advice, health, study
Study Says IUDs Can Reduce Cancer Risk
 A report presented to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists in New Orleans says that women who used IUDs experienced a 40 percent reduction in the risk of endometrial cancer. Dr. David Grimes of Family Health International in Chapel Hill, North Carolina says "the IUD is underutilized as a contraceptive in the United States. Research is showing that it has health benefits far beyond preventing pregnancy." This is good new. Unfortunately, only 2 percent of women use IUDs according to Grimes. This article from MSNBC also says that women who take contraceptive pills also have a lower risk of this disease. Labels: health, sex, study, women
Fathers' Depression Stunts Kid Development
 There have been previous studies that have mentioned that mothers suffering from depression hamper the academic performance of their children. A new study says the same goes for fathers who are depressed. Furthermore, fathers of 9-month-olds are about twice as likely as other men their age to show symptoms of major depression. As a result, depressed fathers read less to their kids and the children know slightly fewer words by age 2. The study interviewed over 4,500 fathers and was presented at the American Psychiatric Association meeting in Washington D.C. Read the full article here.Labels: health, kids, men, parenting, study
New Book Explains to Child Why Mom's In Bandages
 Have you heard about the new book by plastic surgeon, Dr. Michael Salzhauer called " Beautiful Mommy"? It's only 21 pages and it's aimed at 4 to 7 year olds to help explain why mommy has a bandage over her nose. There's a Business Week article that discusses this book and mentions there's been a 60 percent increase in cosmetic surgery in the U.S. since 2000. Dr. Salzhauer says he thought his book would help explain to kids why their mom is wrapped in bandages after they've had rhinoplasty or a tummy tuck. In the article he says, "You might roll your eyes, but this is a reality for hundreds of thousands of families. It's not going to go away." What do you think? Labels: book, health, news
Exercises Built for Your Gender
 We've written about it many times before and it's definitely not an original opinion: Men and women are different! As such, researchers have begun to unravel the physical differences between men and women during exercise. For example, lung function is different, energy metabolism is different and much more. Earl Noble, director of the school of kinesiology at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario, Canada sums things up best when he says exercise is like a drug "that needs to be given in the appropriate dose and intensity and should be varied for sex differences." Part of this newfound discrepancy is because until recently, exercise tests were typically only conducted on men. One tidbit that may make some women feel better in what they already know, is that the new research coming out shows that it is in fact harder for women to lose weight through exercise than men. Be sure to let your husband know this is now a scientific fact! Women's bodies go into a survival mode and try to hold onto the fat, according to this article from MSNBC. One expert even says that women may have to do more exercise at a higher intensity compared to men to lose weight. Ultimately, researchers believe sometime in the future, individual will receive "exercise prescriptions" based on their age, sex, overall health and fitness level. Labels: health, men, study, women
Man Surgery
 Can you guess what the fastest growing cosmetic surgery for men is? Here's a hint, the number of surgeries has increased by 225 percent of the last five years for men, while it's only increased by 2.5 percent for women. According to the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery it's the removal of varicose and spider veins. An article in Business Week magazine attributes the rise to the rising pressure on men to age gracefully. Really? Do you feel this way? Here's an article we wrote on wives who want their men to be more "metro" (click here). Labels: health, men, study
Big Belly Linked to Alzheimer's
 If you're in your 40s and have a big belly, you're more likely to get Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia, according to a new study by Kaiser Permanente. They studied more than 6,000 men. Those who had the most expansive midsections faced more than twice the risk of the leanest. This article from the Washington Post reports that the connection was made between bellies and Alzheimer's, even if the the person wasn't obese. There's a whole bunch of explanation about how fat cells in the belly are worse than fat cells elsewhere because of the proximity to the major organs, but we'll let you read about the fatty details yourself. If you feel a little squishy around the mid-section, maybe you should check out our "health" column.Labels: health, study
Snoring, Bad for Your Health
 Is your spouse a snorer? Well, you can tell them that cutting those logs in the middle of the night could be the cause of high blood pressure. Yep. The American Board of Internal Medicine estimates that 50 to 60 percent of habitual loud snorers suffer from sleep apnea. This is when you stop breathing repeatedly throughout the night, which can cause some people to wake up, up to 100 times. This means that the body has to work harder to breath, which puts pressure on the heart, hence high blood pressure. If that were all you might ignore this news, but The Journal of Sleep found that those who snore have 34 percent greater odds of having a heart attack and a 67 percent greater chance of having a stroke. Yikes. Read the complete article here from Newsweek.Labels: health, study
Good Marriage Equals Good Blood Pressure
 Julianne Holt-Lunstad, an assistant psychology professor at Brigham Young University conducted a study of 204 married people and 99 single adults. Most were white, and it's not clear whether the same results would apply to other ethnic groups. The end results, however, revealed that the more marital satisfaction and adjustment spouses reported, the lower their average blood pressure was. Conversely, couples who were not in good marriages had bad higher blood pressure than single people, who scored lower than the happy married couples. Other studies have shown that marriage is typically beneficial to a person's health, but this study points to the fact that being in a happy relationship is what really matters most. Labels: health, study
Cell Phones Stump Fertility?
 Preliminary studies suggest that cell phone use by men could harm their fertility. The study was done on 361 men under 40 who were being evaluated for infertility at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation; men whose personal or family history might explain a low count or other sperm abnormalities were excluded. Long story short, those who talked more than four hours a day had lower counts and more poor "swimmers" and abnormally formed sperm. Before you hang up your cell phone fellas, the authors of the study did concede that their could be hundreds of other variables that could have contributed to their findings. Click here to read the full article.Labels: health, pregnancy, study
Coffee May Boost Miscarriage Risk
 A team of researchers working at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, Calif. concluded that a daily habit of drinking 200 milligrams of caffeine--about two cups of coffee--significantly increases the risk of miscarriage. It's about the caffeine more than it's about the coffee. The researchers say it didn't matter what the source of caffeine was: sodas, tea or coffee; just that once pregnant women crossed the 200 mg threshold, their pregnancy became in danger. The following two paragraphs are from the story which appeared on MSNBC: In the study, published in Monday’s issue of the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Li's team interviewed 1,063 women in the San Francisco area who became pregnant between 1996 and 1998 about their caffeine intake. While 164 of the women drank 200 mg of caffeine or more daily, 635 consumed some caffeine but less than 200 mg. The remaining 264 women said they didn’t consume any caffeine.
Overall, 172 of the women suffered a miscarriage. The risk of a miscarriage was more than double in women who consumed 200 mg or more of caffeine, with 25 percent suffering a miscarriage compared to just 12 percent of women who didn't consume caffeine. The low-caffeine drinkers also appeared to have an elevated risk of miscarriage, but this trend wasn't statistically significant, meaning the researchers could not rule out that it was merely due to chance. Click here to read the full article. Labels: food, health, parenting, study
Eat Your Way to a Better Sex Life
 Self magazine has put out an article which lists various foods that will boost your libido in the bedroom. A rule of thumb according to Lynn Edlen-Nezin, Ph.D., a clinical health psychologist who co-wrote "Great Food, Great Sex," suggests what's good for the heart is good for the genitals. This is a really great article with lots of scientific explanation as to why certain foods affect your sex life, but we'll cut to the chase. Some of the food listed include: almonds, walnuts, salmon, cod, halibut, tomatoes, red peppers, garlic, spinach, broccoli, beets, berries, red grapes and much more. To read the full article, click here.Labels: advice, book, health, sex
Husband Tries to Understand Wife's Anorexia by Not Eating
 Glamour magazine has published a very heartfelt essay from husband, Tom Cramer, and his struggle in dealing with his wife's anorexia. The essay tells a story of the perfect couple and then quickly whittles down to the ugliness of the disease. As an engineer, Tom wanted to fix the situation, but he didn't know how. Tom decided--without telling anyone--that he would starve himself to help better understand the demons his wife, Meg, was facing. Tom only lasted a few days, but he became enlightened. Meg ended up in the hospital and has since recovered. Tom and Meg continue to deal with the disease on a daily basis, but it brought out a new level of honesty in their relationship, not just between them, but also with their friends and family. This is definitely an article you should read. Click here. Labels: health, real people
Milk Linked to Cancer?
 The American Journal of Epidemiology says the consumption of low-fat or nonfat milk may increase the risk of the malignancy. Dr. Song-Yi Park, from the University of Hawaii in Honolulu, and colleagues, analyzed data from subjects enrolled in the Multiethnic Cohort Study. This study included adults between 45 and 75 years old over a 9-year peried, and were primarily from five different ethnic or racial groups, living in California or Hawaii. A total of 82,483 men from the study completed a quantitative food frequency questionnaire and various factors, such as weight, smoking status, and education levels were also noted, Park's group said. During an average follow-up period of 8 years, 4,404 men developed prostate cancer. There was no evidence that calcium or vitamin D from any source increased the risk of prostate cancer. This held true across all racial and ethnic groups. In the article from AOL it says that low-fat or nonfat milk did increase the risk of localized tumors or non-aggressive tumors, while whole milk decreased this risk. Saying all this, the article quotes Park's team which says, "Our findings do not provide strong support for the hypothesis that calcium and dairy foods increase the risk of prostate cancer. The results from other large...studies, with adequate numbers of advanced and fatal prostate cancers, may shed further light on this question." To read the full article with more details, click here. Labels: health, study
Why Flu In the Winter?
 It's a question that's plagued scientists forever. Well, according to this article in the New York Times, researchers in New York believe they've discovered the reason why. You wanna know? Okay, we'll tell you. They say it has to do with the virus itself, saying it's more stable and stays in the air longer when air is cold and dry, the exact conditions for much of the flu season. Yep, sounds like winter to us. Flu viruses are more stable in cold air, and low humidity also helps the virus particles remain in the air. That is because the viruses float in the air in little respiratory droplets, says Dr. Peter Palese, a flu researcher who is professor and chairman of the microbiology department at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and the lead author of the flu study. When the air is humid, those droplets pick up water, grow larger and fall to the ground. To read the full NY Times article, click here.Labels: health, study
The Orgasmic Diet
 I know, I thought it was a daily dose of In-N-Out Double Doubles, animal style (it's a west coast thing), but it's not. Marrena Lindberg is a diet & fitness coach on AOL and also the author of "The Orgasmic Diet," a nutrition and exercise program designed to regulate a woman's brain chemistry and body functioning and bring her to mind-blowing orgasm. Here's a little taste of what her book has to offer: Women on a typical high-carb, high-fat diet are literally starving for dopamine, the "feel good" neurotransmitter, hormone and key to all things sensual. Now you're thinking, How do I get my hands on that stuff? Fish oil supplements. Take 500 mg or more with the omega-3 fatty acids EPA and DHA daily.
...Researchers have shown that women who eat a small amount of high-quality dark chocolate every day have better sex lives. Dark chocolate contains chemical compounds that mimic the chemistry produced by that I'm-in-love feeling. That was a nice little tidbit. So what do you think? If your body only performs as well as the fuel you put into it, it makes sense that it would affect your sex drive. Do you have a "sexual" diet you adhere when trying to get in the mood or improve performance? Labels: advice, food, health, sex
Breast Milk Boosts IQ
 Two new studies reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that say babies who are breast fed and carry a particular gene get an IQ boost. The two studies of breast-fed infants involved more than 3,000 children in Britain and New Zealand. The average increase was nearly 7 IQ points if the children had a particular version of a gene called FADS2. "Our findings support the idea that the nutritional content of breast milk accounts for the differences seen in human IQ," said Terrie Moffitt, a professor of psychological and brain sciences in Duke University's Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy. "But it's not a simple all-or-none connection: it depends to some extent on the genetic makeup of each infant." In the end, the study says that the argument of nature versus nurture has a result that both benefit the growth of children. Labels: health, kids, parenting, study
Processed Meat Boosts Cancer Risk
 A five year report by the American Institute for Cancer Research and the World Cancer Research Fund conducted by an international panel of experts reviewing more than 7,000 subjects found that excess body fat increases the risk of cancer of the colon, kidney, pancreas, esophagus and uterus as well as postmenopausal breast cancer. Moreover, the report linked processed meat to cancer. Particularly, every 1.7 ounces of processed meat consumed a day increases the risk of colorectal cancer by 21%. The article from USA Today suggests there could be several reasons why processed meats may increase cancer risk. Carcinogens have been linked to smoked meat and the nitrates and excess salt in processed meats. Basically they recommend that you don't eat hot dogs or pepperoni pizza every day, but that the occasional steak won't kill you. The full report can be found at www.dietandcancerreport.orgLabels: food, health, study
Marriage Makes You Fat
 Obesity researcher, Penny Gordon-Larsen says that recently married men and women in their late teens and early 20s gain more weight on average over five years than their single counterparts in the same age group. A typical married man packs on 30 pounds during that period, compared to the 24 pounds by non-marrieds. Married women add 24 pounds, compared to the 15 pounds of their single counterparts. Nearly 8,000 married couples were surveyed. Experts in Canada's Times Colonist say that the reason for the added pounds is because of changed routines--bigger meals, less time to exercise, etc. It also says that we typically bond with others who have similar habits, so we you plump up, you can bet your spouse will too. Labels: food, health, study
Put Some Broccoli On
 It was something that you were always told to do. But few, if any, of us did. Researches have discovered that broccoli, among many other great things that vegetables do, can help reduce the redness and inflammation caused by sun damage and reduce the risk of skin cancer. In the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, lead study author Dr. Paul Talalay said the extract of the broccoli sprout boosts the protective systems of the cell to counteract the damage caused by ultraviolet radiation. The extract showed a 37 percent reduction in redness and inflammation caused by UV rays and |
