Vitamin C Might Protect Lungs On High-Pollution Days

An antioxidant-rich diet could do your lungs a favor when exposed to air pollution, according to a small new study.

 
Researchers from Imperial College London found that asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients were more likely to be admitted to the hospital on days when there were high particulate matter levels outside, Environmental Health News reported. Particulate matter is a pollutant that causes oxidative stress in the body (raising the risk of health problems like heart attack).

However, the researchers found that people who had higher levels of vitamin C in their blood were less likely than those with low vitamin C levels to go to the hospital on these high-pollution days, MyHealthNewsDaily reported.

The findings add to "a small but growing body of evidence that the effects of air pollution might be modified by antioxidants," Michael Brauer, an environmental health scientist at the University of British Columbia who was not involved in the study, told MyHealthNewsDaily.

The study, published in the journal Epidemiology, included 209 people who were admitted to London hospitals. While researchers did find a link between vitamin C levels and hospital admission, they did not find as strong of a link for uric acid and vitamin E levels. They found no link between vitamin A levels and hospital admission, according to the study.

Previously, Cornell University researchers found that a diet rich in antioxidants could help to preserve lung function, the Cornell Chronicle reported. That study, presented at a meeting of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology in 2008, showed protective benefits of selenium and vitamins C and E in particular.

Plus, in 2001, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers found that vitamin C supplements seemed to protect lungs against ozone, WebMD reported.

And humans aren't the only ones who can benefit from vitamin C. University of California, Riverside, researchers found that even plants can get some help defending against harmful effects of ozone when they are engineered to have increased vitamin C levels in their leaves. 

Source : Huffingtonpost

Maria Sharapova launches Sugarpova

Maria Sharapova, the leading name upabout tennis signal, offers introduced Sugarpova, her very own chocolate brand containing twelve sweet as well as sour flavours with brands for example Sporty, Cheeky and also A little wild.

The particular launch is the results of the experience she acquired by means of supports having companies for example Tag Heuer, Tiffany & Corp, Straight talk Electronics and Nike, based on Sharapova.

"I have discovered so much from different manufacturers, whether it's advertising or even marketing," Sharapova mentioned. "Their own knowledge kind of came together during my human mental faculties also it had been which ideas that brought myself here," the lady extra.

With revenue from endorsements regarding $Twenty two thousand in the year via 06, Sharapova is the earth's highest-paid female sportsperson, in accordance with Forbes newspaper.

Mysterious New AIDS-Like Disease Affects Asians

Researchers have identified a mysterious new disease that has left scores of people in Asia and some in the United States with AIDS-like symptoms even though they are not infected with HIV.

 

The patients� immune systems become damaged, leaving them unable to fend off germs as healthy people do. What triggers this isn�t known, but the disease does not seem to be contagious.

This is another kind of acquired immune deficiency that is not inherited and occurs in adults, but doesn�t spread the way AIDS does through a virus, said Dr. Sarah Browne, a scientist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

She helped lead the study with researchers in Thailand and Taiwan where most of the cases have been found since 2004. Their report is in Thursday�s New England Journal of Medicine.

�This is absolutely fascinating. I�ve seen probably at least three patients in the last 10 years or so� who might have had this, said Dr. Dennis Maki, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

It�s still possible that an infection of some sort could trigger the disease, even though the disease itself doesn�t seem to spread person-to-person, he said.

The disease develops around age 50 on average but does not run in families, which makes it unlikely that a single gene is responsible, Browne said. Some patients have died of overwhelming infections, including some Asians now living in the U.S., although Browne could not estimate how many.

Kim Nguyen, 62, a seamstress from Vietnam who has lived in Tennessee since 1975, was gravely ill when she sought help for a persistent fever, infections throughout her bones and other bizarre symptoms in 2009. She had been sick off and on for several years and had visited Vietnam in 1995 and again in early 2009.

�She was wasting away from this systemic infection� that at first seemed like tuberculosis but wasn�t, said Dr. Carlton Hays Jr., a family physician at the Jackson Clinic in Jackson, Tenn. �She�s a small woman to begin with, but when I first saw her, her weight was 91 pounds, and she lost down to 69 pounds.�

Nguyen (pronounced �when�) was referred to specialists at the National Institutes of Health who had been tracking similar cases. She spent nearly a year at an NIH hospital in Bethesda, Md., and is there now for monitoring and further treatment.

�I feel great now,� she said Wednesday. But when she was sick, �I felt dizzy, headaches, almost fell down,� she said. �I could not eat anything.�

AIDS is a specific disease, and it stands for acquired immune deficiency syndrome. That means the immune system becomes impaired during someone�s lifetime, rather than from inherited gene defects like the �bubble babies� who are born unable to fight off germs.


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Mysterious New AIDS-Like Disease Affects Asians
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Researchers have identified a mysterious new disease that has left scores of people in Asia and some in the United States with AIDS-like symptoms even though they are not infected with HIV.

The patients� immune systems become damaged, leaving them unable to fend off germs as healthy people do. What triggers this isn�t known, but the disease does not seem to be contagious.

This is another kind of acquired immune deficiency that is not inherited and occurs in adults, but doesn�t spread the way AIDS does through a virus, said Dr. Sarah Browne, a scientist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

She helped lead the study with researchers in Thailand and Taiwan where most of the cases have been found since 2004. Their report is in Thursday�s New England Journal of Medicine.

�This is absolutely fascinating. I�ve seen probably at least three patients in the last 10 years or so� who might have had this, said Dr. Dennis Maki, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

It�s still possible that an infection of some sort could trigger the disease, even though the disease itself doesn�t seem to spread person-to-person, he said.

(MORE: How the Global War on Drugs Drives HIV and AIDS)

The disease develops around age 50 on average but does not run in families, which makes it unlikely that a single gene is responsible, Browne said. Some patients have died of overwhelming infections, including some Asians now living in the U.S., although Browne could not estimate how many.

Kim Nguyen, 62, a seamstress from Vietnam who has lived in Tennessee since 1975, was gravely ill when she sought help for a persistent fever, infections throughout her bones and other bizarre symptoms in 2009. She had been sick off and on for several years and had visited Vietnam in 1995 and again in early 2009.

�She was wasting away from this systemic infection� that at first seemed like tuberculosis but wasn�t, said Dr. Carlton Hays Jr., a family physician at the Jackson Clinic in Jackson, Tenn. �She�s a small woman to begin with, but when I first saw her, her weight was 91 pounds, and she lost down to 69 pounds.�

Nguyen (pronounced �when�) was referred to specialists at the National Institutes of Health who had been tracking similar cases. She spent nearly a year at an NIH hospital in Bethesda, Md., and is there now for monitoring and further treatment.

�I feel great now,� she said Wednesday. But when she was sick, �I felt dizzy, headaches, almost fell down,� she said. �I could not eat anything.�

AIDS is a specific disease, and it stands for acquired immune deficiency syndrome. That means the immune system becomes impaired during someone�s lifetime, rather than from inherited gene defects like the �bubble babies� who are born unable to fight off germs.

(MORE: H1N1's Death Toll: 15 Times Higher than Previously Thought)

The virus that causes AIDS � HIV � destroys T-cells, key soldiers of the immune system that fight germs. The new disease doesn�t affect those cells, but causes a different kind of damage. Browne�s study of more than 200 people in Taiwan and Thailand found that most of those with the disease make substances called autoantibodies that block interferon-gamma, a chemical signal that helps the body clear infections.

Blocking that signal leaves people like those with AIDS � vulnerable to viruses, fungal infections and parasites, but especially micobacteria, a group of germs similar to tuberculosis that can cause severe lung damage. Researchers are calling this new disease an �adult-onset� immunodeficiency syndrome because it develops later in life and they don�t know why or how.

�Fundamentally, we do not know what�s causing them to make these antibodies,� Browne said.

Antibiotics aren�t always effective, so doctors have tried a variety of other approaches, including a cancer drug that helps suppress production of antibodies. The disease quiets in some patients once the infections are tamed, but the faulty immune system is likely a chronic condition, researchers believe.

The fact that nearly all the patients so far have been Asian or Asian-born people living elsewhere suggests that genetic factors and something in the environment such as an infection may trigger the disease, researchers conclude.

The first cases turned up in 2004 and Browne�s study enrolled about 100 people in six months.

�We know there are many others out there,� including many cases mistaken as tuberculosis in some countries, she said.

Source : http://healthland.time.com/2012/08/22/mysterious-new-aids-like-disease-affects-in-asians/

AHS11 Talk Posted

After a one-year delay, my talk from the 2011 Ancestral Health Symposium is online with slides synched.  The talk is titled "Obesity: Old Solutions for a New Problem", and it's an overview of some of the research linking food reward to food intake and body fatness.  This is the talk that introduced a fundamentally new idea to the ancestral community: not only does the chemical composition of food matter, but also its sensory qualities-- in fact, the sensory qualities of food are among the primary determinants of food intake.  I didn't come up with the idea of course, I simply translated the research for a more general audience and put my own evolutionary spin on it.

The talk would be a bit different if I were to give it today, as my understanding of the subject has expanded, and my speaking skills have improved.  However, the central message remains as true today as it was a year ago.  You can find the talk here.

The slide synching was done by an extremely generous man named Ben Fury.  As you can see in the video, he did an excellent job.  Without Ben, this video would have remained in internet limbo forever.

Below, I've published a message from Ben explaining the interesting work that he does.  Please contact him if you think it's interesting.

A Message from Ben Fury

I was writing a book on health, fitness and diet in 2009 when my house burned down in the Station Fire, along with 165,000 acres of my beloved Angeles National Forest. Since then, I've had a series of people needing help come through my life, that have upgraded and morphed my talents...

Seniors with chronic pain, falls, brittle bones, and stiff shrunken muscles.
Diabetics with out of control blood sugars, going blind, and having limbs lopped off.
Neurologically challenged people with spastic limbs and foggy brains.
Fat, listless, unhappy people with no idea how they got that way, seeing no way out of the darkness.
Each of them needing help in different ways, but all with an underlying theme of what works to help heal our conditions:

•     Remove flour, sugar, beans, and heavily processed oils from our diet. Eat real food.
•     Get strong.
•     Get flexible.
•     Stop ceding health responsibility to outside forces, and take charge of our own wellness.
•     Only use truly evidence based medicine. Don't just pop the latest pill or get the latest surgery all the other people are doing. Be wary of the disease mongers in both the conventional and alternative camps.
•     Find our "happy thoughts." Use the simple restoratives of sleep, play, and reflection, to let go of pain, find inner peace, and let in joy and purposeful outer direction.

The methods to accomplish these goals are varied, and I have both non-profit and for-profit ventures to share them.
Their websites are currently in development.
The for-profit is BenFury.com
The non-profit is PainRelieversUSA.org , whose mission statement is:

To move beyond pain management...
and learn to live pain free.

Feel free to write to me  at: ben [at] benfury dot com

How to treat spider bites

Along with the warm days of summer comes the influx of insect bites. Although mosquitoes garnish a lot of attention with their sting, the spider can pack an even meaner bite.

Spiders don't hunt down human flesh for dinner like mosquitoes but the creepy crawly arachnids will bite if provoked or if their nest is disturbed. Read on for spider bite symptoms, types of poisonous spiders and how best to treat a spider bite. 

Spider bite symptoms
Among the 50,000 different species of spiders, most are harmless. However, some do produce venom that is expelled through their hollow fangs and injected into the victim. Fortunately, most spider fangs are too small or not strong enough to penetrate human skin. But, some spider bites will leave a small painful puncture that becomes red, itchy and swollen. The toxin produced by a spider's venom can cause headache, rash, painful joints and muscles, spasms, nausea, vomiting, fever and chills. Although potentially painful, bites from non-venomous spiders are not dangerous. The danger of poisonous spiders depends on the type of spider.

Most common poisonous spiders
The United States is home to three types of poisonous spiders: black widow, brown recluse and tarantula. A black widow spider's venom is classified as a neurotoxin, which means it is poisonous to the nervous system whereas the venom of a brown recluse spider causes necrosis � essentially a breakdown of skin and tissue. The tarantula injects venom into its prey through the hair on its body and legs, causing a severe allergic reaction that sometimes leads to anaphylactic shock.
 

Black widow spider
The black widow spider is easy to identify because of its black shiny body with red- to orange-colored markings visible on its underside. This spider lives in dark places such as trash cans, attics, closets, and woodpiles and is found in parts of California and southern parts of Canada. Black widows have also been known to hitch a ride with shipments of fresh fruit and make an appearance in other states and other Canadian destinations.

Although death via a black widow spider bite is uncommon, its bite can be serious. Once bitten, the victim will notice a painful pale area of skin surrounded by a red ring. Within the first few hours, severe cramping may occur in the shoulders, back, abdomen and thighs. In addition, the spider's bite may cause itching, sweating, headache, weakness, nausea, vomiting, increased blood pressure and breathing difficulties. Although most reactions to a black widow spider bite are not severe, medical attention is paramount if breathing is compromised and muscle cramps develop. Young children, the elderly and individuals with high blood pressure are more prone to develop severe adverse reactions to a black widow bite.

Brown recluse spider
The brown recluse spider is also feared for its painful bite and subsequent physical reactions. This spider is native to Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas and Mississippi but can surface anywhere thanks to modern transportation. The brown recluse spider prefers dark, quiet surroundings and doesn't venture out into open areas very often. It grows to a half-inch in length and its body is light brown in color. It's often referred to as the violin or fiddleneck spider because the markings on its back resemble a violin. Unlike other spiders, the recluse has six eyes instead of eight and the lower part of its body has no markings.

A brown recluse spider's bite will leave a wound resembling a bull's eye; a red ring with a blister in the center. The blister will break giving way to an ulcer type sore that will scab over. In some cases, the ulcer will get larger and affect the underlying skin and muscle tissue and be accompanied by severe pain. Within 24 to 48 hours, an itchy, red rash will appear and may be accompanied by chills, fever, muscle aches, nausea and vomiting. In some instances, hemolytic anemia, which is a condition where red blood cells are destroyed, may occur.

Tarantula
Tarantulas are native to the southern United States and are noted for their large size and hairy body. Once the victim has been injected with thousands of tiny hairs from the tarantula, redness and localized pain will commence and itchy bumps will surface that can last up to several weeks.

Treatment of spider bites
The first rule to treating a spider bite is to clean the bite, apply ice immediately and elevate the bite area. Bites from any of these three spiders should be evaluated by a medical professional.

If the bite is mild, treatment includes analgesics, antihistamines and antibiotics and Antivenin. A black widow bite may require a muscle relaxant introduced through intravenous or high blood pressure medication to guard against elevated blood pressure caused by the venom.

A brown recluse spider bite may require hospitalization if hemolysis (the destruction of red blood cells leading to the release of hemoglobin into the blood plasma) occurs and the tissue surrounding the bite starts to die. A tarantula's bite can be treated with antihistamines or glucocorticoids to ease the adverse symptoms. With all spider bites, a tetanus shot is recommended.

Take precautions and avoid getting a spider bite
Prevention is the key to avoiding a painful spider bite. Avoid areas in which spiders dwell and if your path crosses a spider's web, be careful not to disturb it or provoke the spider. Be extra cautious when using an outhouse � spiders often find refuge in the lowly outdoor commode.

Source : sheknows.com

Alternatives for Cellulite Reduction

Are there any cellulite reduction alternatives besides liposuction? Of course, liposuction is not considered medically necessary.

 

The decision is up to you whether or not to undergo liposuction. You may decide that it is not right for you. And you can make that determination right up to the point of actually having the procedure.

Liposuction Alternatives

• Exercise. 
• Accept your body and appearance as it is.
• Change your diet to lose some excess body fat.
• Use clothing or makeup to downplay or emphasize body or facial features.
• Try some of the other methods such as topicals or body wrapping.

Whatever method you select for cellulite reduction make certain that you have done your due diligence and select the most suitable method with the least amount of risk to obtain the results you desire.

Source : mydailymoment.com

Healthy eating for children, Best Nutrition

Although their growth is slower than in infancy, school-aged children still have high nutritional needs but fairly small appetites. So it's crucial all meals and snacks continue to be rich in nutrients and energy. The food choices children make during the crucial years of development can influence their future health risk and can also influence food habits in later life.

A structured eating plan with regular meals and snacks is important to establish good eating habits. Ensure there's also plenty of variety - burgers and chips are fine occasionally, but not for every meal.

A limited number of foods makes it difficult to obtain the full range of nutrients. Make sure your child has a range of foods based on each of the main food groups.
 

Energy

School children still have a high energy requirement for growth and activity, but increasing numbers are becoming overweight. This is because they�re eating too many calories and not being active enough to use up the extra energy they�ve eaten.

If you think your child is putting on too much weight, don't make a big issue of it. Instead, encourage physical activity in whatever form (football, netball, walking the dog, cycling, swimming and so on).

Base meals and snacks on the five main food groups, but limit fatty and sugary snacks.

An overweight child still needs a nutrient-packed diet that provides all the essential building blocks for growth and development. Encouraging healthy eating should ensure children maintain a healthy weight. Make sure the whole family is eating healthily to provide good role models.
 

Calcium

This mineral is important for healthy bone development. Good sources include dairy products such as milk, cheese, yoghurt and fromage frais, as well as fortified orange juice, green leafy vegetables, cereals, sesame seeds and tofu.

Your child should ideally aim for three servings of calcium-rich food a day - for example, a 150ml glass of milk, a small pot of yoghurt and a small matchbox-sized piece of cheese.
 

Folate

This vitamin is important for growth, but intake is low in some children, especially those who skip breakfast because fortified cereals are a good source of folate. Other sources include bread, green leafy vegetables and pulses.
 

Iron

This mineral helps to keep red blood cells healthy. Insufficient iron intake can lead to iron-deficiency anaemia, but this is much less common in primary school�aged children than their younger and older siblings.

Good sources of iron include red meat, liver, fortified breakfast cereals, beans and pulses.

To help absorb the iron more effectively from non-meat sources, combine it with vitamin C-rich foods such as citrus fruits and fruit juice.
 

Fatty and sugary foods

This group includes spreading fats (such as butter), cooking oils, sugar, biscuits, cakes, crisps, sweets, cream and ice cream, chocolate and sugary drinks. These foods shouldn't be eaten too often and, when they are, should only be consumed in small amounts.

They're loaded with calories, fat and sugar, and don't necessarily contain many vitamins and minerals. Also, sugary foods and drinks (including fruit juice) can increase the risk of dental decay.

Limit the amount of sugar and sweets eaten, and offer them at the end of meals, rather than in-between.

Some sugar-free or diet drinks can also cause decay because of their acidity. Milk or water is the best drink between meals.

Source : bbc