Friday 26 December 2014

Adjust Up Your Health

Adjust Up Your Health.
The inventorying of suspected benefits is long: It can soothe infants and adults alike, trigger memories, reduce pain, help sleep and make the heart beat faster or slower. "It," of course, is music. A growing body of probe has been making such suggestions for years. Just why music seems to have these effects, though, remains elusive.

There's a lot to learn, said Robert Zatorre, a professor at McGill University in Montreal, where he studies the keynote at the Montreal Neurological Institute. Music has been shown to assist with such things as pain and memory, he said, but "we don't recollect for sure that it does improve our (overall) health".

And though there are some indications that music can touch both the body and the mind, "whether it translates to health benefits is still being studied," Zatorre said. In one study, Zatorre and his colleagues found that multitude who rated music they listened to as pleasurable were more likely to surface emotional arousal than those who didn't like the music they were listening to. Those findings were published in October in PLoS One.

From the scientists' standpoint, he explained, "it's one aspect if people say, 'When I also harken to this music, I love it.' But it doesn't barrow what's happening with their body." Researchers need to prove that music not only has an effect, but that the effect translates to well-being benefits long-term, he said.

One question to be answered is whether emotions that are stirred up by music extraordinarily affect people physiologically, said Dr. Michael Miller, a professor of medicine and commander of the Center for Preventive Cardiology at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore.

For instance, Miller said he's found that listening to self-selected cheerful music can improve blood flow and possibly promote vascular health. So, if it calms someone and improves their blood flow, will that move to fewer heart attacks? "That's yet to be studied," he said.

Monday 15 December 2014

Hairdressers Against AIDS

Hairdressers Against AIDS.
Could the inhibiting of HIV infection and AIDS be a comb, fuzz ball and blow-dry away? That's the idea behind an innovative new national outreach effort, Hairdressers Against AIDS, which got its fling Tuesday at the United Nations in New York City, up ahead of Dec 1, 2010, World AIDS Day. The initiative - described as "one of the largest HIV/AIDS mobilization campaigns in US history" - has tresses mind giant L'Oreal joining forces with nonprofits such as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and the Global Business Coalition on HIV/AIDS, TB and Malaria (GBC). The object is to empower America's 500000-plus locks stylists to use the relationships they have with millions of clients for salon-based chats on the how, why and what of HIV.

So "Today there is no vaccine," distinguished GBC president and CEO John Tedstrom, speaking to 500 hairdressers who'd gathered at the UN for the launch. "There is no cure. We're getting there. But today there is only information. The more we talk, the more we educate, the more we stave off the plate of this epidemic," Tedstrom explained.

And "You'll dream of millions of people hearing about HIV from community that they know," he said. "They'll be hearing effective time-tested messages about HIV prevention, and they'll be able to embezzle those messages back to their personal relationships. And then whether it's a mom talking to her daughter or a girlfriend talking to her boyfriend, it doesn't matter. We'll be able to have an matured conversation about HIV and erotic health".

Using hair-care professionals to get health messages out to the masses isn't a novel idea. Recent studies have shown, for example, that swart men can be motivated by barbershop messages to improve their blood lean on or get educated about their risk for prostate cancer. And the US launch of Hairdressers Against AIDS is just the up-to-date extension of a global HIV awareness effort that's already in place in 30 countries throughout the world.

Sunday 14 December 2014

Overweight Has Become The Norm For American Women

Overweight Has Become The Norm For American Women.
Almost one-quarter of green women who are overweight in reality perceive themselves as being normal weight, while a sizable minority (16 percent) of women at conformist body weight actually fret that they're too fat, according to a young study. The study found these misperceptions to be often correlated with race: Black and Hispanic women were much more indubitably to play down their overweight status compared with whites, who were more apt to worry that they weighed too much, even when they didn't. Although the boning up looked mostly at low-income women attending public-health clinics in Texas, the findings do reflection other studies in different populations, including a recent Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll.

That appraisal found that 30 percent of adult Americans in the "overweight" class believed they were actually normal size, while 70 percent of those classified as tubby felt they were simply overweight. Among the heaviest group, the morbidly obese, 39 percent considered themselves fundamentally overweight. The problem, according to office lead author Mahbubur Rahman, is the "fattening of America," meaning that for some women, being overweight has become the norm.

And "If you go somewhere, you associate with all the overweight people that think they are normal even though they're overweight," said Rahman, who is helpmeet professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Women's Health, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston (UTMBG). In fact, "they may even be overweight or normal-weight and consider they are totally small compared to others," added study senior writer Dr Abbey Berenson, director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Women's Health at UTMBG.

The further findings are published in the December issue of Obstetrics & Gynecology. The bone up looked at more than 2200 women who had arrived at a public-health clinic for reproductive assistance, such as obtaining contraceptives. According to the burn the midnight oil authors, more than half of these reproductive-age women (20 to 39 years), who were the issue of this trial, were above a normal body mass index (BMI). An even higher proportion of black Americans (82 percent) and Mexican Americans (75 percent) were overweight or obese.

Sunday 7 December 2014

Americans With Excess Weight Trust Doctors Too With Excess Weight More

Americans With Excess Weight Trust Doctors Too With Excess Weight More.
Overweight and chubby patients espouse getting advice on weight loss from doctors who are also overweight or obese, a novel study shows June 2013. "In general, heavier patients assign their doctors, but they more strongly trust dietary advice from overweight doctors," said cramming leader Sara Bleich, an associate professor of health policy and management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, in Baltimore. The check out is published online in the June circulation of the journal Preventive Medicine.

Bleich and her team surveyed 600 overweight and abdominous patients in April 2012. Patients reported their height and weight, and described their primary mind doctor as normal weight, overweight or obese. About 69 percent of adult Americans are overweight or obese, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The patients - about half of whom were between 40 and 64 years preceding - rated the bulldoze of overall trust they had in their doctors on a mount of 0 to 10, with 10 being the highest. They also rated their trust in their doctors' diet advice on the same scale, and reported whether they felt judged by their practise medicine about their weight. Patients all reported a relatively high care level, regardless of their doctors' weight.

Normal-weight doctors averaged a score of 8,6, overweight 8,3 and pudgy 8,2. When it came to trusting diet advice, however, the doctors' weight repute mattered. Although 77 percent of those seeing a normal-weight doctor trusted the diet advice, 87 percent of those whereas an overweight doctor trusted the advice, as did 82 percent of those conjunctio in view of an obese doctor.

Patients, however, were more than twice as likely to feel judged about their weight issues when their drug was obese compared to normal weight: 32 percent of those who saw an obese doctor said they felt judged, while just 17 percent of those who gnome an overweight doctor and 14 percent of those since a normal-weight doctor felt judged. Bleich's findings follow a report published last month in which researchers found that portly patients often "doctor shop" because, they said, they were made to feel uncomfortable about their heaviness during office visits.

Friday 5 December 2014

Migraine May Increase The Risk Of Heart Attacks And Strokes

Migraine May Increase The Risk Of Heart Attacks And Strokes.
Women who let from migraines with visual crap called aura may face an increased imperil for heart attacks, strokes and blood clots, new studies find. Only enormous blood pressure was a more powerful predictor of cardiovascular trouble, the researchers said. There are things women with this genus of migraine can do to reduce that risk, they added: lower blood strength and cholesterol levels, avoid smoking, eat healthfully and exercise. "Other studies have found that this type of migraine has been associated with the risk of stroke, and may be associated with any cardiovascular disease," said lead designer Dr Tobias Kurth, from the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research in Bordeaux and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

So "We on migraine with aura is a quite conclusive contributor to major cardiovascular disease. It is one of the top two risk factors". Other studies have found the jeopardy for cardiovascular disease for people who suffer from migraines with aura is roughly two-ply that of people without the condition, Kurth noted. People who suffer from migraines with aura see flickering lights or other visual clobber just before the headache kicks in, he explained.

The findings are to be presented in March at the American Academy of Neurology annual meet in San Diego. For the study, Kurth's crew collected data on nearly 28000 women who took part in the Women's Health Study. Among these women, more than 1400 suffered from migraines with aura.

During 15 years of follow-up, more than 1000 women had a focus attack, accomplishment or died from cardiovascular causes, the researchers found. After height blood pressure, migraine with aura was the strongest predictor for having a heart spasm or stroke among these women. The risk was even more pronounced than that associated with diabetes, smoking, plumpness and a family history of heart disease, the investigators noted.

Whether controlling migraines reduces the hazard for heart disease isn't known, Kurth said. The study found a link between migraines with character and cardiovascular trouble, but it didn't prove cause-and-effect. Although women who have migraine with atmosphere seem to have this increased risk, it doesn't doom everyone who has migraines with aura to have a heart attack or stroke, Kurth noted.

Thursday 25 September 2014

Increased Levels Of Vitamin B6 In The Blood Reduces The Risk Of Developing Lung Cancer

Increased Levels Of Vitamin B6 In The Blood Reduces The Risk Of Developing Lung Cancer.
A unheard of work shows that populate with high levels of a B vitamin are half as likely as others to develop lung cancer. But while the reduction in jeopardize is significant, this doesn't mean that smokers should hit the vitamin aisle a substitute of quitting. While the study links vitamin B6, as well as one amino acid, to fewer cases of lung cancer, it doesn't conclude that consuming the nutrients will let up the risk. Future fact-finding is needed to confirm that there's a cause-and-effect relationship at work, not just an association, researchers said.

The analysis "may lead to important new discoveries. But people should not think that they can soft drink a few vitamins and be safe smoking," stressed Dr Norman Edelman, the American Lung Association's most important medical officer. The findings appear in the June 16 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The researchers examined a go into of almost 520000 Europeans who were recruited between 1992 and 2000. They compared 899 who developed lung cancer by 2006 to 1,770 similarly matched clan who hadn't developed the disease. The researchers found that those with the highest levels of vitamin B6 in their blood were 56 percent less credible to have developed lung cancer than those with the lowest levels. There was a nearly the same characteristic - a 48 percent decline - for those with the highest levels of methionine, an amino acid, compared to those with the lowest concentrations.

The reductions in danger held up for both smokers and non-smokers, said look co-author Paul Brennan, a researcher with the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France. Normally, as many as 15 percent of lifetime smokers will expatiate lung cancer, but fewer than 1 percent of those who never smoke do, Brennan said.

The reduction in jeopardy is arousing and it could be a step forward toward greater understanding of how food and medications may prevent lung cancer, said the ALA's Edelman. "That's a unharmed new field, and it's just beginning to become something that's truly being studied," he said. Both vitamin B6 and methionine are important to correct health and available in supplement form.

Wednesday 27 August 2014

Lymphedema Does Not Appear Because Of The Strength Exercises After The Removal Of Breast Cancer

Lymphedema Does Not Appear Because Of The Strength Exercises After The Removal Of Breast Cancer.
Contrary to common wisdom, lifting weights doesn't cause bust cancer survivors to bare the painful, arm-swelling condition known as lymphedema, green research suggests. There's a hint that weight-lifting might even help prevent lymphedema, but more on is needed to say that for sure, the researchers said. Breast cancer-related lymphedema is caused by an increase of lymph fluid after surgical removal of the lymph nodes and/or radiation. It is a dour condition that may cause arm swelling, awkwardness and discomfort.

And "Lymphedema is something women at the end of the day fear after breast cancer, and the guidance has been not to lift anything heavier even than a purse," said Kathryn H Schmitz, steer author of the study to be presented Wednesday at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium. "But to effect women to not use that affected arm without giving them a prescription for a personal valet is an absurdist principle," she added.

A former study done by the same team of researchers found that exercise actually stabilized symptoms to each women who already had lymphedema. "We really wanted to put the last stamp on this to say, 'Hey, it is not only proper but may actually be good for their arms," said Schmitz, who is an associate professor of forebears medicine and community health at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and a member of the Abramson Cancer Center in Philadelphia.

And "It's almost similarly to a paradigm shift," said Lee Jones, meticulous director of the Duke Cancer Institute's Center for Cancer Survivorship in Durham, NC "Low-volume rebelliousness training does not exacerbate lymphedema". To see if a slowly progressive rehabilitation program using weights would aid the arm, 134 breast cancer survivors with at least two lymph nodes removed but no cartouche of lymphedema who had been diagnosed one to five years before entry in the study were randomly selected to participate in one of two groups.

Thursday 21 August 2014

Medical Insurance Acts

Medical Insurance Acts.
The Obama Administration on Tuesday once again extended the deadline for commonality to measure for health insurance coverage on healthcare dot gov. The restored extension follows on a 24-hour "grace period" that was granted on Monday - beyond the original deadline of Monday 11:59 pm - for benefits that would rebound in on Jan 1, 2014. In an blog Tuesday on the healthcare stipple gov website, the Obama Administration said that tribe who could prove that trouble on the healthcare dot gov website had hindered them from signing up would be granted an extension. "Even though we have passed the Dec 23, 2013 enrollment deadline for coverage starting Jan 1, 2014, we don't want you to oversight out if you've been tough to enroll," the administration said in the blog.

And "Sometimes ignoring your best efforts, you might have run into delays caused by heavy traffic to healthcare jot gov, maintenance periods, or other issues with our systems that prevented you from finishing the process on time. If this happened to you, don't worry, we still may be able to assistant you get covered as soon as Jan 1, 2014," the report added. There was a record amount of traffic on healthcare dot gov on Monday, the The New York Times reported, and healthfulness officials wanted to make sure that forebears who are looking for coverage can get it.

In most states, Monday, Dec 23, 2013 had been the deadline for selecting a system that would take effect on the first day of the new year. "We would really animate people to start now. Don't wait until the deadline to enroll," Cheryl Fish-Parcham, emissary director of health policy at Families USA in Washington, DC, said last week. People necessary to leave themselves enough time to gather the information they need to complete an insurance application, tiptop a health plan and pay the premium by the health plan's deadline.

The pre-Christmas track to buy health insurance is another consequence of the troubled launch of the Affordable Care Act's healthcare bespeckle gov website and website difficulties in a number of state-run health insurance exchanges. Since the October discharge of the health exchanges, sign-up and premium-payment deadlines have been extended to give masses more time to enroll for coverage, but the new cut-offs come amid the holiday rush. Many race aren't aware of the various deadlines under the law, sometimes called Obamacare.

What's more, the deadlines may modify by state and by health insurer, health insurance agents and brokers said. "There is a lot of confusion," said Anna Causey, villainy president of Combined Insurance Services Inc, a Pensacola, Fla-based benefits broker. Some mortals mistakenly believe they have until Dec 31, 2013 to enroll in a drawing that takes effect on Jan 1, 2014. Others don't recognize they could pay a federal tax penalty if they don't have health insurance in place by March 31.

Tuesday 19 August 2014

The Level Of Occurrence Of Serious Complications After Weight-Loss Surgery

The Level Of Occurrence Of Serious Complications After Weight-Loss Surgery.
Weight-loss surgery, also known as bariatric surgery, in the assert of Michigan has a less indecent rate of serious complications, a new study suggests. The lowest rates of complications are associated with surgeons and hospitals that do the highest or slue of bariatric surgeries, according to the report published in the July 28 son of the Journal of the American Medical Association. Rates of bariatric surgery have risen over the history decade and it is now the second most common abdominal operation in the country.

Despite declining death rates for the procedures, some groups persist concerned about the risks of the surgery and uneven levels of quality amongst hospitals, researchers at the University of Michigan pointed out in a news release from the journal's publisher. In the creative study, Nancy Birkmeyer of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and colleagues analyzed evidence from 15275 patients who underwent one of three common bariatric procedures between 2006 and 2009. The operations were performed by 62 surgeons at 25 hospitals in Michigan.

Overall, 7,3 percent of patients expert one or more complications during surgery, most of which were pain problems and other minor complications. Serious complications were most garden-variety after gastric bypass (3,6 percent), sleeve gastrectomy (2,2 percent), and laparoscopic adjustable gastric corps (0,9 percent) procedures, the investigators found. Rates of precarious complications at hospitals varied from 1,6 percent to 3,5 percent.

Wednesday 23 July 2014

H1N1 Flu Is A Serious Threat For Children In The 2010-2011 Influenza Season

H1N1 Flu Is A Serious Threat For Children In The 2010-2011 Influenza Season.
Among children hospitalized with the pandemic H1N1 flu most recent year in California, more than one-fourth ended up in thorough concern units or died, California Department of Public Health researchers report. "While hospitalization for 2009 H1N1 influenza in children appeared to happen at comparable rates as with seasonal influenza, this study provides further demonstrate that children, especially those with high-risk conditions, can be very ill with H1N1," said lead researcher Dr Janice K Louie. "Fortunately, not many children died. Those that did had many underlying conditions. Antiviral medication given inappropriate seems to have lessened the bet of severe illness," she added.

Young people were hit hard by H1N1 flu, with 10- to 18-year-olds accounting for 40 percent of cases, the researchers noted. This was most apt to due to a dearth of immunity, which older people acquired through repeated flu vaccinations of numerous strains of H1N1 or exposure to other H1N1 strains, the experts pointed out.

Flu experts don't preclude the H1N1 flu will pose a serious threat in the 2010-2011 flu season, but the review authors say doctors should promptly treat children with underlying risk factors, especially infants, who get the flu. "My compassionate is that we are over the hump," said Dr Marc Siegel, an associate professor of medicament at New York University in New York City. "I am expecting this to be share of the seasonal flu this year, unless it mutates," he said.

The many people exposed to the H1N1 flu and the sizable tons vaccinated against it have created a large herd immunity, which should blunt this flu strain, Siegel said. In addition, the coeval seasonal flu vaccine, which is recommended for each and every one 6 months old and up, contains protection from H1N1 flu, he noted.