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Thursday, December 27, 2012
Robert Lustig
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
Prepare for a harsh flu season
http://www.wtop.com/1055/3143128/Harsh-flu-season-ahead-How-to-quickly-treat
Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Tuesday, November 20, 2012
Sunday, November 18, 2012
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Sunday, September 30, 2012
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
People who are predisposed to storing fat are different from people who aren't.
The comments that he made at 55 minutes I found interesting ...
What if it's All Been a Big Fat Lie
I found the first 25 minutes interesting about the bad science that led to the nutritional advice that we got over the last 40 years.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQuB9pcptk0&feature=related
Why We Get Fat
The speaker gets to the meat of the matter 57 minutes into the lecture. I recommend skipping the first 57 minutes. Even so, he waffles on whether all carbohydrates make us fat or if it is just sugar.
Monday, September 17, 2012
Monday, September 10, 2012
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Generic Antifungal Is Effective Against Cancer
http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/generic-antifungal-is-effective-against-cancer/81247216/
Saturday, August 18, 2012
Friday, August 10, 2012
Thursday, August 2, 2012
Monday, July 16, 2012
Fructose metabolism
Metabolism
Excess fructose consumption has been hypothesized to be a cause of insulin resistance, obesity,[41] elevated LDL cholesterol and triglycerides, leading to metabolic syndrome.[42] In preliminary research, fructose consumption was correlated with obesity.[43][44] A study in mice showed that a high fructose intake may increase adiposity.[45]
One study concluded that fructose "produced significantly higher fasting plasma triacylglycerol values than did the glucose diet in men" and "...if plasma triacylglycerols are a risk factor for cardiovascular disease, then diets high in fructose may be undesirable".[50]
Fructose is a reducing sugar, as are all monosaccharides. The spontaneous chemical reaction of simple sugar molecules binding to proteins is known as glycation. Showing potential cause of skin and bone damage in a rat model of diabetes, investigators suggested "that long-term fructose consumption negatively affects the aging process."[51]
Liver function
While a few other tissues (e.g., sperm cells[59] and some intestinal cells) do use fructose directly, fructose is metabolized primarily in the liver.[60]
Compared with consumption of high glucose beverages, drinking high fructose beverages with meals results in lower circulating insulin and leptin levels, and higher ghrelin levels after the meal.[61] Since leptin and insulin decrease appetite and ghrelin increases appetite, some researchers suspect that eating large amounts of fructose increases the likelihood of weight gain.[62]
Excessive fructose consumption may contribute to the development of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.[63]
Gout
A 2008 study found a substantial risk of incident gout associated with the consumption of fructose or fructose rich foods.[64] Cases of gout have risen in recent years, despite commonly being thought of as a Victorian disease, and it is suspected that the fructose found in soft drinks (e.g., carbonated beverages) and other sweetened drinks is the reason for this.[65][66]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructose#Potential_health_effects
Friday, July 13, 2012
Sunday, July 1, 2012
Fwd: Calories, Carbs, Fats
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Fwd: How to Cover Pre-existing conditions
From: larry.r.troutThis is a thorough discussion of how to insure Pre-existing conditions
http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/how-to-cover-pre-existing-conditions
Here is a must-read sample:
'Moreover, in 1996, Congress provided an important protection to workers by making it unlawful for employer-sponsored plans to impose exclusions on pre-existing conditions for workers in continuous group insurance coverage. This means that if a person stays covered by job-based plans long enough (usually six months), he can move from one job to another without fear of losing insurance protection, or of having to wait longer than other new hires before gaining coverage for ailments he may have developed. If a new hire maintained insurance in his old job, his new employer's plan must cover him — even if the worker has developed an expensive medical condition.
In theory, this law — called the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (or HIPAA) — also provided "portability" rights to people moving from job-based plans to individually owned coverage. The law gave state governments a few options for meeting this mandate: They could establish high-risk pools (which, as discussed below, is the approach most states have followed); they could require that all individual-market health insurers within their states offer insurance to all eligible individuals, without any limits on coverage of pre-existing medical conditions; or they could use their regulatory powers to create a mix of rules that would have similar results. But unfortunately, none of these approaches has worked well enough, and today many people still end up falling through the cracks.
The problem starts with HIPAA's requirement that a worker first exhaust his right to temporary continuous coverage under his former employer's plan (through a federal program called COBRA, which lets workers keep buying into their employers' insurance plans, generally for up to 18 months after leaving their jobs) before he can enter the individual insurance market without a pre-existing condition exclusion. Many workers are not aware of this requirement (though employers must advise them of it in a written notice); even if they are, the premiums required to stay in an employer's plan through COBRA are often too high for them to pay. This is because COBRA premiums must cover both the employer and employee share of costs, and generally provide more expensive comprehensive benefits than individual-market alternatives. And unlike premiums paid in employer-based plans, these COBRA premiums do not receive any tax advantage — making them more expensive still. As a result, many workers facing this fully loaded "sticker shock" price choose not to pay the premiums, simply hoping for the best until they can find new jobs (and new coverage). In so doing, they inadvertently waive their HIPAA rights — leaving themselves vulnerable to exclusions and high costs for pre-existing conditions when they try to buy insurance on their own.
But even if a sick person abides by HIPAA's requirements and remains continuously insured — thereby protecting himself from pre-existing condition exclusions in the individual market — nothing in current federal law prevents insurers from charging him more than they charge healthy people. Insurers are prohibited only from denying coverage for a pre-existing condition altogether; it is quite permissible, however, for insurance providers to charge unaffordable premiums (unless an individual state's laws happen to prevent or restrict the practice), thus achieving essentially the same outcome.
Likewise, current law and regulations provide no premium protections for persons moving between individual insurance policies. A healthy worker who leaves an employer plan for the individual market might find an affordable plan at first — but if he ever wanted to switch insurers (or was forced to by, say, moving to a new state), he would fac e the risk of having his premium recalculated based on a new assessment of his health.
Of course, the fact that the problem of pre-existing condition coverage is limited almost entirely to the individual market does not mean that it pervades that market. In 2008, at the request of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, health economists Mark Pauly and Bradley Herring examined how people with chronic health conditions, and thus high anticipated health-care expenses, actually fared when seeking insurance in the individual market. Pauly and Herring found little, if any, evidence that enrollees in poor health generally paid higher premiums for individual insurance. Nor did they find that the onset of chronic conditions is necessarily associated with increased premiums in subsequent years. Existing "guaranteed renewability" requirements in federal and state law already prevent insurers from continuously reclassifying people (and the premiums they pay) based on health risks. And most private insurers already provided such protection as standard business practice before they were legally required to do so.
But even if the exclusions and prohibitive premiums caused by pre-existing conditions are not a universal problem in the individual insurance market, they clearly affect many Americans. Estimates range from 2 to 4 million, out of a total population of about 260 million people under the age of 65. More important than the sheer number, however, is the fact that many Americans know someone who has faced this situation directly, and fear that they could find themselves in the same boat — which explains the strong public support for changing the way insurance companies treat pre-existing conditions.'
Monday, June 18, 2012
cancer
'In a significant step forward for the development of a potential new cancer treatment, scientists have found how a common cold virus can kill tumors and trigger an immune response, like a vaccine, when injected into the blood stream.
Researchers from Britain's Leeds University and the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) said by hitching a ride on blood cells, the virus was protected from antibodies in the blood stream that might otherwise neutralize its cancer-fighting abilities.
The findings suggest viral therapies like this, called reovirus, could be injected into the blood stream at routine outpatient appointments - like standard chemotherapy - making them potentially suitable for treating a range of cancers.
The study, part-funded by the charity Cancer Research UK and conducted on 10 patients with advanced bowel cancer, confirmed that reovirus attacks on two fronts - killing cancer cells directly and triggering an immune response that helps eliminate leftover cancer cells.'
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/13/us-cancer-cold-virus-idUSBRE85C19P20120613
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Monday, June 4, 2012
Take this with a grain of salt
'THE first time I questioned the conventional wisdom on the nature of a healthy diet, I was in my salad days, almost 40 years ago, and the subject was salt. Researchers were claiming that salt supplementation was unnecessary after strenuous exercise, and this advice was being passed on by health reporters. All I knew was that I had played high school football in suburban Maryland, sweating profusely through double sessions in the swamplike 90-degree days of August. Without salt pills, I couldn't make it through a two-hour practice; I couldn't walk across the parking lot afterward without cramping.
While sports nutritionists have since come around to recommend that we should indeed replenish salt when we sweat it out in physical activity, the message that we should avoid salt at all other times remains strong. Salt consumption is said to raise blood pressure, cause hypertension and increase the risk of premature death. This is why the Department of Agriculture's dietary guidelines still consider salt Public Enemy No. 1, coming before fats, sugars and alcohol. It's why the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has suggested that reducing salt consumption is as critical to long-term health as quitting cigarettes.
And yet, this eat-less-salt argument has been surprisingly controversial — and difficult to defend. Not because the food industry opposes it, but because the actual evidence to support it has always been so weak.
When I spent the better part of a year researching the state of the salt science back in 1998 — already a quarter century into the eat-less-salt recommendations — journal editors and public health administrators were still remarkably candid in their assessment of how flimsy the evidence was implicating salt as the cause of hypertension.
"You can say without any shadow of a doubt," as I was told then by Drummond Rennie, an editor for The Journal of the American Medical Association, that the authorities pushing the eat-less-salt message had "made a commitment to salt education that goes way beyond the scientific facts."
While, back then, the evidence merely failed to demonstrate that salt was harmful, the evidence from studies published over the past two years actually suggests that restricting how much salt we eat can increase our likelihood of dying prematurely. Put simply, the possibility has been raised that if we were to eat as little salt as the U.S.D.A. and the C.D.C. recommend, we'd be harming rather than helping ourselves.
WHY have we been told that salt is so deadly? Well, the advice has always sounded reasonable. It has what nutritionists like to call "biological plausibility." Eat more salt and your body retains water to maintain a stable concentration of sodium in your blood. This is why eating salty food tends to make us thirsty: we drink more; we retain water. The result can be a temporary increase in blood pressure, which will persist until our kidneys eliminate both salt and water.'
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/03/opinion/sunday/we-only-think-we-know-the-truth-about-salt.html
I have read that we should only be concerned about salt if we are salt sensitive or have high blood pressure.
However, the two Carl's Junior burritos I ate yesterday had almost 2 grams of salt each. I might have to cut back on burritos.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Friday, June 1, 2012
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
negative-side-effects-of-maltitol
http://www.livestrong.com/article/250589-negative-side-effects-of-maltitol/
Maybe because I take probiotics, I seem to tolerate maltitol well.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Coffee Drinkers are a Little More Likely to Live Longer, Study Finds
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/health/2012/05/17/coffee-drinkers-are-little-more-likely-to-live-longer-study-finds/
Antibiotic linked to deaths; raising HDL may not help heart
http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/healthyperspective/post/2012-05-17/z-pak-antibiotic-deaths-hdl-heart-disease-link-autism-sign-ipod-implant/695521/1
Your Days Are Numbered: The maths of death
Check out this video on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIuUJNcYprc&feature=youtube_gdata_player
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIuUJNcYprc&feature=youtube_gdata_player
This is your brain on sugar: UCLA study shows high-fructose diet sabotages learning, memory
My concern is that the way the study is described, it doesn’t mention a control group that did not take sugar. Maybe there was one but it was not mentioned in the article, which is a typical omission. If there was not a control group for sugar, then the only thing they proved is that omega-3 fatty acids are good for learning.
The article quoted below implies that we should not eat more than 3 grams of
omega-3 fatty acids per day, which makes me wonder how much is in canola oil? From: Trout, Larry
I was about to say college students live on Fructose and Caffeine, but the first paragraph of the article already stole my joke…
Omega 3 risks…
Noncardiac health risks
In a letter published October 31, 2000,[89] the United States Food and Drug Administration Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, Office of Nutritional Products, Labeling, and Dietary Supplements noted that known or suspected risks of EPA and DHA consumed in excess of 3 grams per day may include the possibility of:
Increased incidence of bleeding
Hemorrhagic stroke
Oxidation of omega-3 fatty acids, forming biologically active oxidation products
Increased levels of low-density lipoproteins (LDL) cholesterol or apoproteins associated with LDL cholesterol among diabetics and hyperlipidemics
Reduced glycemic control among diabetics
Subsequent advice from the FDA and national counterparts have permitted health claims associated with heart health.
Cardiac risk
Persons with congestive heart failure, chronic recurrent angina pectoris, or evidence that their heart is receiving insufficient blood flow are advised to talk to their doctors before taking n−3 fatty acids.[90]
In a recent large study, n−3 fatty acids on top of standard heart failure therapy produced a small but statistically significant benefit in terms of mortality and hospitalization.[91] In congestive heart failure, cells that only barely receive enough blood flow become electrically hyperexcitable. This can lead to increased risk of irregular heartbeats, which, in turn, can cause sudden cardiac death. Certain n−3 fatty acids seem to stabilize the rhythm of the heart by effectively preventing these hyperexcitable cells from functioning, thereby reducing the likelihood of sudden cardiac death. For most people, this is beneficial and could account for most of the large reduction in the likelihood of sudden cardiac death. Nevertheless, for people with congestive heart failure, the heart is barely pumping blood well enough to keep them alive. In these patients, n−3 fatty acids may eliminate enough of these few pumping cells that the heart would no longer be able to pump sufficient blood to live, causing an increased, rather than decreased, risk of cardiac death.[90]
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
This is your brain on sugar: UCLA study shows high-fructose diet sabotages learning, memory
http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/this-is-your-brain-on-sugar-ucla-233992.aspx
My concern is that the way the study is described, it doesn’t mention a control group that did not take sugar. Maybe there was one but it was not mentioned in the article, which is a typical omission. If there was not a control group for sugar, then the only thing they proved is that omega-3 fatty acids are good for learning.
http://www.mnn.com/food/healthy-eating/stories/sugar-can-make-you-dumb-scientists-warn
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Is Joint Discomfort a Thing of the Past?
This is an advertisement, but interesting.
http://www.smarterlifestyles.com/2008/01/29/is-joint-pain-a-thing-of-the-past/?fc_id=18855&fc_app_id=3302
http://www.smarterlifestyles.com/2008/01/29/is-joint-pain-a-thing-of-the-past/?fc_id=18855&fc_app_id=3302
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
georgia-student-fighting-life-flesh-eating-infection
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/Wellness/georgia-student-fighting-life-flesh-eating-infection/story?id=16311568#.T6q6oixYLNQ
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Breast cancer classifying promises better therapies
http://www.bostonherald.com/business/healthcare/view.bg?articleid=1061125651&srvc=business&position=recent
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
daily-physical-activity-protects-against-alzheimers-even-in-adults-over-80
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-57415964-10391704/daily-physical-activity-protects-against-alzheimers-even-in-adults-over-80/
How much sugar is in Soda and other drinks?
http://www.sugarstacks.com/beverages.htmhttp://www.sugarstacks.com/beverages.htm
Friday, April 13, 2012
Fwd: dichotomy
From: <larry.r.trout
'FDA: Stop Giving Antibiotics to Animals'
http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/article/252246/6/FDA-Stop-Giving-Antibiotics-to-Animals
'Antibiotic-resistant bacteria found in ancient cave'
http://www.ctv.ca/CTVNews/Health/20120412/antibiotic-resistant-bacteria-120412/
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Friday, April 6, 2012
Snacking on Chocolate Linked to Low BMI
Previous studies suggest dark chocolate can lower blood pressure, bad cholesterol and even the risk of diabetes.
How could a treat filled with sugar and fat fight weight gain? It might be due to the high concentration of epicatechin, a flavonoid found in cocoa, tea, blueberries and grapes.
“Best is dark chocolate, and best is to keep it to about an ounce per day. That amounts to only about 150 calories — a lot less than any pastry they’d eat.”
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/health/2012/03/26/snacking-on-chocolate-linked-to-low-bmi/
- Note that the study from 2 years ago said that an ounce per day was counterproductive because of the sugar intake, and instead recommended half an ounce per day. (Also note that a few dark chocolates are low in sugar but also are slightly bitter.)
- I am wondering if it is better to eat blueberries, grapes and drink tea?
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
americans-may-be-much-fatter-than-we-think-study-says
http://healthland.time.com/2012/04/03/americans-may-be-much-fatter-than-we-think-study-says/?iid=gs-main-mostpop2
Friday, March 23, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Aspirin-a-wonder-drug-studies-show-it-may-prevent-cancer
From: Trout, Larry R
This study doesn’t appear to explain why aspirin helps, but just establishes a correlation.
I would assume the reduction of inflammation helps the body respond to cancer and heart disease.
From: Coffey, John R
One thing that troubles me about this is that I don’t think that we get cancer because we have an aspirin deficiency. If I am correct, then I wonder what else is deficient in our diet that makes us need aspirin to keep us healthy?
From: Robert
I started taking those baby aspirins 81mg about a year or more ago.
From: Coffey, John
http://healthland.time.com/2012/03/21/aspirin-a-wonder-drug-studies-show-it-may-prevent-cancer/
aspirin-a-wonder-drug-studies-show-it-may-prevent-cancer
http://healthland.time.com/2012/03/21/aspirin-a-wonder-drug-studies-show-it-may-prevent-cancer/
Friday, March 9, 2012
Coke, Pepsi changing their caramel
In other words, you have a reason to be nervous? - John
From: Trout, Larry R
‘The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said at the time it was reviewing the group's petition but stressed that the drinks were still safe. An FDA spokesman said a person would have to drink "well over a thousand cans of soda a day to reach the doses administered in the studies that have shown links to cancer in rodents".’
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/09/us-coke-pepsi-idUSBRE82814V20120309
Coke, Pepsi changing their caramel
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-coke-pepsi-changing-their-caramel-20120309,0,6389104.story
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Contagion
Contagion, like “Titanic”, is a movie where you think that you already know the story: A pandemic infects hundreds of millions of people. What you don’t know is how well that story is told and how interesting some of the characters are. If you aren’t at least a slight germaphobe before watching the movie, you will be afterwards. The movie constantly reminds us of the different ways that disease can spread. In a world with SARS and H1N1, the movie is very relevant.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Mending Scarred Hearts
http://www.dailyfinance.com/2012/02/15/stem-cell-stocks-mending-scarred-hearts/
Counterfeits of cancer drug Avastin found in U.S.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/15/us-counterfeits-cancer-drug-avastin-foun-idUSTRE81E1TK20120215
Tuesday, January 31, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
Sugar Dangers - Dr. Richard Johnson Lecture (Part 2 of 3)
This is an interesting video about high blood pressure, salt, uric acid, weight gain, and sugar.
In part three he mentions that Vitamin C neutralizes uric acid's effects.
Saturday, January 14, 2012
The Skin Gun - this is real
Check out this video on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Y5H9Sasq5U&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Extraversion and introversion
The relative importance of nature versus environment in determining the level of extraversion is controversial and the focus of many studies. Twin studies find a genetic component of 39% to 58%. In terms of the environmental component, the shared family environment appears to be far less important than individual environmental factors that are not shared between siblings.
Eysenck proposed that extraversion was caused by variability in cortical arousal. He hypothesized that introverts are characterized by higher levels of activity than extraverts and so are chronically more cortically aroused than extraverts. The fact that extraverts require more external stimulation than introverts has been interpreted as evidence for this hypothesis. Other evidence of the "stimulation" hypothesis is that introverts salivate more than extraverts in response to a drop of lemon juice.
Extraversion has been linked to higher sensitivity of the mesolimbic dopamine system to potentially rewarding stimuli. This in part explains the high levels of positive affect found in extraverts, since they will more intensely feel the excitement of a potential reward. One consequence of this is that extraverts can more easily learn the contingencies for positive reinforcement, since the reward itself is experienced as greater.
One study found that introverts have more blood flow in the frontal lobes of their brain and the anterior or frontal thalamus, which are areas dealing with internal processing, such as planning and problem solving. Extraverts have more blood flow in the anterior cingulate gyrus, temporal lobes, and posterior thalamus, which are involved in sensory and emotional experience. This study and other research indicates that introversion-extraversion is related to individual differences in brain function.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraversion_and_introversion#Causes
Monday, January 9, 2012
Pills recalled, living to 110, red wine benefits
http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/healthyperspective/post/2012-01-09/pills-recalled-longevity-clues-stem-cell-fraud-red-wine-benefits-and-alcohol-limits/598993/1
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