Health & WellnessS


Arrow Up

Bad sleep may boost cancer


FOX news
Tue, 28 Jan 2014 08:18 UTC
Sleep Deprivation
© Twin Design / Shutterstock
Poor quality of sleep marked by frequent waking can speed cancer growth and increase the disease's aggressiveness, according to new research.

Failing to get a good night's rest may actually have some serious health consequences.
Read More...
Pills

Beta-blockers killed 800,000 in 5 years - "good medicine" as mass murder

Dr. Mercola
mercola.com
Wed, 29 Jan 2014 05:30 UTC
Image
© UnknownEuropean doctors may have caused as many as 800,000 deaths in five years by following a guideline to use beta-blockers in non-cardiac surgery patients—a guideline based largely on discredited science. The discredited researcher, who was fired for scientific misconduct in 2011, was also the chairman of the committee that drafted the European treatment guideline.
Most people assume that scientific integrity is somehow assured; that there are safeguards along the way, preventing fraudulent research from harming patients.

Unfortunately, scientific misconduct has become a very serious and widespread problem that threatens the entire paradigm of science-based medicine - unless changes are made.

Again and again, papers assessing the prevalence of scientific fraud and/or the impact this is having shows that the situation is dire and getting worse. In short, we have lost scientific integrity, and without it, "science-based medicine" is just a term without substance.

Conflict of interest is another pervasive problem within the research field, and the featured article highlights a case that contains both.

Beta-blockers are drugs commonly used in the treatment of high blood pressure and congestive heart failure. They work primarily by blocking the neurotransmitters norepinephrine and epinephrine (adrenaline) from binding to beta receptors, thereby dilating blood vessels, which reduces your heart rate and blood pressure.

Until recently, the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) also recommended using beta-blockers in patients undergoing non-cardiac surgery.

A recent article in Forbes Magazine1 highlights how medical guidelines based on questionable science may have resulted in the death of hundreds of thousands of patients in just a few years:

Comment: More food for thought:

The Truth Wears Off

Read More...
Alarm Clock

Finally, justification for taking a nap! Here is scientific proof that siestas are beneficial

Katy Winter
Daily Mail
Tue, 28 Jan 2014 11:19 UTC
Image
© Getty ImagesNapping for the wrong length of time could actually leave you feeling temporarily worse
Sleeping for short periods in the day helps memory and cognitive function. But napping for 30mins or an hour can leave you with a sleep hangover. This is because you wake yourself during periods of deep sleep. Instead nap for 10-20mins for a quick refresh
Or sleep 90mins for a full sleep cycle, with no grogginess when you wake

We have long known that naps have an important function in refreshing and reviving a tired mind.

Some of the greatest thinkers of recent times have been avid nappers - Winston Churchill reportedly relied on regular short naps to help him lead the country through the war.

And yet there remains a cruel stigma against those of us who wish to pop back into bed during daylight hours for a quick shut eye.

But now, in a round-up of scientific research, there is evidence not only proving the real benefits of a kip, but detailed findings that show how varying lengths of snooze have different beneficial effects on the brain.

If you want to wake up from your nap feeling immediately rested then either brief a snooze of 10-20 minutes or a longer 90 minute sleep are your best options.
Read More...
Alarm Clock

Later school start times improve sleep and daytime functioning in adolescents

Jeremy Dean
PsyBlog
Tue, 28 Jan 2014 00:00 UTC
sleepy school children
© Dan Woods
How much extra sleep can make a difference to adolescent depression?

A new study finds a link between later start times at school and improved mood and sleep in teenagers.The study, published in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics, delayed the waking up time of adolescents at a boarding school by just 25 minutes (Boergers et al., 2013). They found that afterwards the number of students getting more than 8 hours sleep a night jumped from 18% to 44%.
Read More...
Evil Rays

Flashback 34 scientific studies showing adverse biological effects + damage from Wi-Fi


Stop Smart Meters
Wed, 30 Oct 2013 00:00 UTC
warning wifi
Here is a collection of scientific papers finding adverse biological effects or damage to health from Wi-Fi signals, Wi-Fi-enabled devices or Wi-Fi frequencies (2.4 or 5 GHz), complied by campaign group WiFi In Schools. The papers listed are only those where exposures were 16V/m or below. Someone using a Wi-Fi-enabled tablet computer can be exposed to electromagnetic fields up to 16V/m. Papers are in alphabetical order. A file of first pages, for printing, can be found here.

If you feel like sending a copy of this collection to the local schools in your area, you can search for them here [UK only] http://schoolsfinder.direct.gov.uk/schoolsfinder and either print out this article to post or email the link.
Read More...
Pills

Guideline based on discredited research may have caused 800,000 deaths in Europe over the last 5 years

Larry Husten
Forbes
Sun, 19 Jan 2014 13:30 UTC
emergency
Last summer British researchers provoked concern when they published a paper raising the possibility that by following an established guideline UK doctors may have caused as many as 10,000 deaths each year. Now they have gone a step further and published an estimate that the same guideline may have led to the deaths of as many as 800,00 people in Europe over the last five years. The finding, they write, "is so large that the only context in the last 50 years comes from the largest scale professional failures in the political sphere." The 800,000 deaths are comparable in size to the worst cases of genocide and mass murder in recent history.

In their new article published in the European Heart Journal, Graham Cole and Darrel Francis continue to explore the extent and implications of the damage caused by the Don Poldermans research misconduct case. [Update: the EHJ article has been removed from the EHJ website. For more on this see the bottom of the story.]

The earlier paper demonstrated the potentially large and lethal consequences of the current European Society of Cardiology guideline recommending the liberal use of beta-blockers to protect the heart during surgery for people undergoing non cardiac surgery. The guideline was flawed because it was partly based on unreliable research performed by the disgraced Poldermans (who also served as the chairman of the guideline committee). This may seem like a highly technical question but it effects many millions of people and may, as Francis and his colleagues have demonstrated, led to many thousands of unnecessary deaths.
Read More...
Apple Red

School ditches rules and loses bullies


TVNZ.co.nz
Sun, 26 Jan 2014 19:42 UTC
Image
© ONE NewsUnidentifiable child on playground
Ripping up the playground rulebook is having incredible effects on children at an Auckland school.

Chaos may reign at Swanson Primary School with children climbing trees, riding skateboards and playing bullrush during playtime, but surprisingly the students don't cause bedlam, the principal says.

The school is actually seeing a drop in bullying, serious injuries and vandalism, while concentration levels in class are increasing.

Principal Bruce McLachlan rid the school of playtime rules as part of a successful university experiment.
Read More...
Bulb

Infections damage our ability to form spatial memories

Meera Senthilingam
Wellcome Trust
Fri, 24 Jan 2014 13:02 UTC
Increased inflammation following an infection impairs the brain's ability to form spatial memories - according to new research. The impairment results from a decrease in glucose metabolism in the brain's memory centre, disrupting the neural circuits involved in learning and memory.

Inflammation has long been linked to disorders of memory like Alzheimer's disease. Severe infections can also impair cognitive function in healthy elderly individuals. The new findings published in the journal Biological Psychiatry help explain why inflammation impairs memory and could spur the development of new drugs targeting the immune system to treat dementia.

In the first trial to image how inflammation impairs human memory, the team at Brighton and Sussex Medical School scanned 20 participants before and after either a benign salty water injection or typhoid vaccination, used to induce inflammation. Positron emission tomography (PET) was used to measure the effects of inflammation on the consumption of glucose in the brain and after each scan participants tested their spatial memory by performing a series of tasks in a virtual reality.
Read More...
Smoking

E-cigarettes are a calming vapor for inmates

Timothy Williams
The New York Times
Thu, 23 Jan 2014 10:15 UTC
e-cig smoker
© Christopher Berkey/NYTLogan Smith with his e-cig
As city governments and schools across the country move to ban or restrict the use of electronic cigarettes, one place increasingly welcomes the devices: the rural county jail.

Though traditional cigarettes are prohibited from most prisons and jails because of fire hazards and secondhand smoke, a growing number of sheriffs say they are selling e-cigarettes to inmates to help control the mood swings of those in need of a smoke, as well as address budget shortfalls, which in some jails have meant that guards are earning little more than fast-food workers.

Inmates are addicted to cigarettes and pay what the market bears to get their fix. Prisons and jails earn a little extra money to pay their guards and provide a safer environment for inmates. Everybody wins. It is obviously not a utopia, but this system logically seems to be one where everyone is relatively content with the outcome.

The trend stands in contrast to restrictions on e-cigarettes approved in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and other big cities. County jails in at least seven states have permitted the sale of a limited selection of flavors of e-cigarettes to inmates. They have quickly become one of the most sought-after items in jail commissaries. And although federal prisons ban e-cigarettes, the inmate market has so much potential that Chinese and American manufacturers now produce "jail-safe" versions made of plastic instead of metal.

Comment: A good example of the benefits of smoking on mood. Here's more:

5 Health Benefits of Smoking

Health Benefits of Smoking Tobacco

'World No Tobacco Day'? Let's All Light Up!

Read More...
Sun

Heat the body, heal the mind

Julie Huynh
The Daily Wildcat
Wed, 22 Jan 2014 22:24 UTC
FIR for depression
© Charles RaisonA participant lies in a tent that elevates his core body temperature using infrared heat. Preliminary data suggests that the treatment is effective at reducing symptoms of depression.
University of Arizona researchers are using heat to treat depression.

The ongoing study, led by UA psychiatry professor Charles Raison, is examining the effectiveness of a technique known as whole-body hyperthermia as a treatment for depression. Early results show that the technique works, Raison said.

"This is one of the first studies of depression treatment that is not directly targeting the brain itself," said Clemens Janssen, one of Raison's graduate students at the UA's John and Doris Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences.

Raison's interest in the link between body temperature and mood was inspired by Tummo meditation techniques, used by Tibetan Buddhists to reach a euphoric state by increasing their body temperature.

Comment: For more on the benefits of infrared heat see: Use Infrared Heat for Pain Relief and Other Health Benefits

Read More...