This is a tragedy of huge proportions -- but not a particularly surprising one, at least to me. I followed population, health and environmental issues in the Soviet Union for decades, and more recently, I have reported on diseases such as the HIV/AIDS epidemic ravaging the Russian population. I've visited Russia more than 50 times over the years, so I can say from firsthand experience that this national calamity isn't happening suddenly. It's happening inexorably.
According to U.N. figures, the average life expectancy for a Russian man is 59 years -- putting the country at about 166th place in the world longevity sweepstakes, one notch above Gambia. For women, the picture is somewhat rosier: They can expect to live, on average, 73 years, barely beating out the Moldovans. But there are still some 126 countries where they could expect to live longer. And the gap between expected longevity for men and for women -- 14 years -- is the largest in the developed world.
Imagine that your arteries are pipes that carry blood from your heart to the rest of your body. High blood pressure (also called hypertension) occurs when your blood moves through your arteries at a higher pressure than normal.
If there's one thing geeks and non-geeks alike all share, it's an aversion to exercise. No matter how much you'd like to slim your waistline and lose the belly, it's difficult to find a workout routine that not only works, but one that fits your needs and is easy to stick to. Over the years we've covered several fitness plans along with free and cheap technology to help you get in shape and stick to a training plan, and I've used many of these tools to help run two marathons. Read on for a look at the most simple yet effective plans we've covered—along with the best tech tools to help you get and stay in shape. Photo by luiginter.
The idea behind loading up on preworkout protein (Stout recommends 10 to 20 grams) is that once you begin taxing your muscles, they're already swimming in aminos. Take anything that is comfortable for you to train on, such as half a protein bar (Grow! or Premier Eight), a few slices of turkey, a cup of yogurt or a large glass of milk.
Simply enter your bodyweight and the average time you spend during one of the exercises/activities and click on Compute Calories Burned. The number of calories burned for the time you specified will be calculated for each exercise/activity.
of a structure in your inner ear called the labyrinth. You have a labyrinth in your inner ears, deep in the bone at the base of your skull. It contains the delicate structures that control your hearing and balance.
Each labyrinth is a maze of inter-connected channels filled with fluid. These channels are at different angles. When your head moves, the rolling of the fluid tells your
brain
how far, how fast and in what direction your head is moving. This information allows your body to balance properly. Part of the labyrinth, called the cochlea, also sends information about sounds to your
brain
. This is how you hear.
If the organs that control balance of your infected ear are inflamed, then the information they send to your
brain
will be different from the information sent from your unaffected ear and from your eyes. This difference can make you feel dizzy, or you may feel you are moving when you are still (vertigo). If the hearing portion of the labyrinth is inflamed then your hearing can be affected.
Labyrinthitis is usually caused by a viral infection. Less commonly, it can be caused by a bacterial infection. It is usually a mild condition that passes within a few weeks, although some cases are more serious and can do permanent damage to your hearing and balance. Labyrinthitis can affect people of any age, but it is rare in children.
Silent cerebral infarction (SCI), or "silent stroke," is a brain injury likely caused by a blood clot interrupting blood flow in the brain. It's a risk factor for future strokes and a sign of progressive brain damage that may result in long-term dementia.
You folks should try potentiating Kratom by using the health supplement DL-Phenylalanine (DLPA), a 50/50 mixture of the D- and L-forms of the amino acid Phenylalanine.
DLPA is known to enhance the brain's production of endorphins, dopamine and adrenaline and has been shown repeatedly in studies to potentiate Opiates.
Knowing this I preload on 1-3 grams of DL-Phenylalanine a half hour to an hour or more before my usual dose of Kratom. I find my resulting Kratom buzz stronger and more stimulating.
I also preload on Tagamet or Grapefruit juice and Tums tablets prior to my dose of Kratom.
I recall reading somewhere that Rhodiola affects Opioid systems too so it might also work as a Kratom potentiator...
novel electronic device designed to "zap" away migraine pain before it starts has proven to be the next form of relief for those suffering from the debilitating disease, according to a study conducted at The Ohio State University Medical Center.
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Results of the study, to be presented Friday (6/27) at the annual American Headache Society meeting in Boston, found that the experimental device is safe and effective in eliminating headaches when administered during the onset of the migraine.
With one in eight Americans suffering from chronic migraines, Dr. Yousef Mohammad, a neurologist and principal investigator of the study at Ohio State's Medical Center, says the study's results are promising given that only 50 to 60 percent of migraine patients respond to traditional migraine drug treatments.
The noninvasive transcranial magnetic stimulator (TMS) device interrupts the aura phase of the migraine, often described as electrical storms in the brain, before they lead to headaches. Migraine sufferers often describe "seeing" showers of shooting stars, zigzagging lines and flashing lights, and experiencing loss of vision, weakness, tingling or confusion, followed by intense throbbing head pain, nausea and vomiting.
Yes, television is enjoyable! In modern world, TV is one of the main sources of entertainment. Watching television is an experience shared by the vast majority of children and adults. It is convenient, inexpensive, available, and attractive.
It may be hard to believe that watching TV can damage our health, especially the health of kids, and disturb daily life, but there are many reasons that this is true. A number of studies have demonstrated negative effects of long TV hours.
A new pilot study shows that eating right, exercising and reducing stress may help keep chronic diseases at bay by switching on beneficial genes, including tumor-fighters, and silencing those that trigger malignancies and other ills.
"We found that simple changes have a powerful impact on gene expression," Dean Ornish, founder and president of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute and clinical professor at the University of California, San Francisco (U.C.S.F.), said during a news conference. "People say, 'Oh, it's all in my genes, what can I do?' That's what I call genetic nihilism. This may be an antidote to that. Genes may be our predisposition, but they are not our fate."
Australians more obese than Americans, study finds
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Australia has a higher proportion of obese people than the United States, with the health system facing a "fat bomb" unless action is taken, a study warned Thursday.
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The report from the Baker Heart Institute found that 70 percent of men and 60 percent of women aged 45-65 had a body mass index of 25 or more, meaning they were overweight or obese.
Titled "Australia's Future Fat Bomb," the study compiled the results of height and weight checks carried out on 14,000 adult Australians in 2005.
The institute's head of preventative cardiology professor Simon Stewart said the results meant Australia probably had the highest rate of obesity in the world, outweighing even the United States.
"As we send our athletes off to the Olympics let's reflect on the fact that we would win the gold medal problem now in the world fat Olympics if there was such a thing," he said.
Stewart said obesity was the major threat to Australia's future health, with an estimated nine million of the 21 million population obese or overweight.
"That is a whole million more obese adults than we had thought," he said.
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The study predicted there would be an extra 700,000 heart-related hospital admissions in the next 20 years due to obesity and almost 125,000 people would die because of the condition in that period.
The report calls for a national weightloss strategy on the scale of smoking and skin cancer campaigns, including subsidising gym memberships and personal training sessions.
It suggested hospital waiting lists could be prioritised on the basis of weightloss, to give obese people incentive to slim down.
"These are some of the controversial things we need to deal with because the healthcare system is going to be overwhelmed by weight-related hospitalisations from knee replacements through to heart attacks and strokes," Stewart said.
The report was submitted to a federal government inquiry into obesity.
Ongoing study continues to show that extra sleep improves athletic performance
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Getting extra sleep over an extended period of time improves athletic performance, mood and alertness, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Monday at the SLEEP 2008 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS) in Baltimore, Md.
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Participants in this ongoing study were five healthy students on the Stanford University men's and women's swimming teams. For the first two weeks of the study, the students maintained their usual sleep-wake pattern. The athletes then extended their sleep to 10 hours per day for six to seven weeks.
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Athletic performance was assessed after each regularly scheduled swim practice. After obtaining extra sleep, athletes swam a 15-meter meter sprint 0.51 seconds faster, reacted 0.15 seconds quicker off the blocks, improved turn time by 0.10 seconds and increased kick strokes by 5.0 kicks.
"These results begin to elucidate the importance of sleep on athletic performance and, more specifically, how sleep is a significant factor in achieving peak athletic performance," said lead author Cheri Mah of the Stanford Sleep Disorders Clinic and Research Laboratory. "While this study focuses specifically on collegiate swimmers, it agrees with data from my other studies of different sports and suggests that athletes across all sports can greatly benefit from extra sleep and gain the additional competitive edge to perform at their highest level."
New study: Coffee drinkers have slightly lower death rates than people who do not drink coffee
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A new study published today in Annals of Internal Medicine has good news for coffee drinkers: Regular coffee drinking (up to 6 cups per day) is not associated with increased deaths in either men or women. In fact, both caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee consumption is associated with a somewhat smaller rate of death from heart disease.
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"Coffee consumption has been linked to various beneficial and detrimental health effects, but data on its relation with death were lacking," says Esther Lopez-Garcia, PhD, the study's lead author. "Coffee consumption was not associated with a higher risk of mortality in middle-aged men and women. The possibility of a modest benefit of coffee consumption on heart disease, cancer, and other causes of death needs to be further investigated."
Women consuming two to three cups of caffeinated coffee per day had a 25 percent lower risk of death from heart disease during the follow-up period (which lasted from 1980 to 2004 and involved 84,214 women) as compared with non-consumers, and an 18 percent lower risk of death caused by something other than cancer or heart disease as compared with non-consumers during follow-up. For men, this level of consumption was associated with neither a higher nor a lower risk of death during the follow-up period (which lasted from 1986 to 2004 and involved 41,736 men).
A self-help program delivered online can improve insomnia in adults
WESTCHESTER, Ill. – A cognitive behavioral intervention for insomnia delivered via the Internet can significantly improve insomnia in adults, according to a research abstract that will be presented on Wednesday at SLEEP 2008, the 22nd Annual Meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies (APSS).
The study, authored by Lee Ritterband, PhD, of the University of Virginia, focused on 44 participants (mostly female) with an average age of 45 years. The participants were randomly selected to either the cognitive behavioral intervention for insomnia via the Internet or a wait list control. Measures of sleep, mood, cost, and cognitive functioning were collected at pre- and post-treatment, while additional measures of sleep were collected throughout treatment.
According to the results, sleep improved significantly for those who received a cognitive behavioral intervention for insomnia via the Internet over the six-week intervention, whereas control participants showed no change during the treatment period. Sleep efficiency also significantly improved for the experimental group from pre- to post- assessment, with no change for the controls. The experimental group increased total sleep time by 80 minutes and the control group increased by nine minutes.
“We believe these types of Web-based treatment programs have the potential to impact countless individuals around the world,” said Dr. Ritterband. “Specifically related to insomnia, the availability of non-pharmacological help is significantly lacking. The Internet has already become a critical source of health-care and medical information. The Internet may prove an effective tool to more broadly disseminate cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia.”
Insomnia is a classification of sleep disorders in which a person has trouble falling asleep, staying asleep or waking up too early. It is the most commonly reported sleep disorder. About 30 percent of adults have symptoms of insomnia. It is more co
