Archive for the ‘Medicine Tips’ Category
15 Foods High in Folic Acid
Its important to get adequate amounts of folic acid in the diet for a variety of health reasons, both physical and mental, but mostly for cellular growth and regeneration. In fact, a recent article from the New York Times named folic acid one of the most luscious micronutrients found in foods, and multiple studies suggest that a lack of folic acid may lead to mental conditions such as depression.
Physiologically, consuming enough folic acid allows the body to perform many of its essential functions, including nucleotide biosynthesis in cells, DNA synthesis and repair, red blood cell creation, and also helps to prevent anemia.
Mark Bittman Corrects Fact-Resistant Food Policy Analysts…Such As Mark Bittman
Thanks to Katherine Mangu-Ward’s recent Washington Post op-ed piece about the folly of government efforts to reshape our diets, I noticed a strikingly oblivious Mark Bittman column from last month. “Is Junk Food Really Cheaper?” the headline asks. The short answer: No, it isn’t. The longer version:
The “fact” that junk food is cheaper than real food has become a reflexive part of how we explain why so many Americans are overweight, particularly those with lower incomes. I frequently read confident statements like, “when a bag of chips is cheaper than a head of broccoli…” or “it’s more affordable to feed a family of four at McDonald’s than to cook a healthy meal for them at home.”
This is just plain wrong. In
Meditation and allergies
Meditation has been extolled for being able to reduce stress and bring inner peace but can it also reduce your allergies, strengthen your immune system and keep you healthier? A growing body of evidence suggests that yes it can. Meditation can be many things, including breathing exercises, mantra repetition, guided imagery, relaxation techniques and more. All of these are designed to promote a relaxed state of being which can be beneficial if you have a medical condition, such as allergies, that is worsened by stress. A growing body of evidence suggests that meditation may help reduce inflammation which can benefit such conditions as: allergies, anxiety disorders, asthma, binge eating, cancer, depression, fatigue, heart disease, high blood pressure, pain, sleep problems and substance abuse. Read full post…
How Stress Affects Your Health
We all get stressed from time to time. Weve also probably all heard how stress can be hard on the human body, but many of us are unaware of the fact that many commonly-experienced imbalances in health may actually be our bodys way of responding to physical and mental stress.
Recent scientific studies have indicated that the human bodys reaction to stress could be one of the main causes of many life-threatening diseases, including heart disease and cancer.
Thousands of years ago, our ancestors needed the stress response as a fight-or-flight reaction to very real and approaching dangers, such as ravenous wolves or tumbling boulders.
Today, humans are, for the most part, free from the danger of being eaten by a sabre-toothed tiger, and yet our bodies respond as if an attack was imminent.
Up Vitamin D
Getting enough Vitamin D may be one way to prevent colds this fall and winter, according to researchers. Many of us dont get enough of this crucial vitamin essential for helping out bodies fight infection. Vitamin D is important because it activates your bodys immune defense from T-cells that otherwise lie dormant and allow bacteria to invade the body. Vitamin D may help prevent colds, flu, osteoporosis, hypertension, cancer and autoimmune disorders. Some experts believe that up to 77 percent of Americans are Vitamin D deficient (defined as having blood levels of less than 30 nanograms per milliliter). From fall to spring, individuals who live at latitudes about 37 degrees north in the U.S. Read full post…
If Traffic Deaths Were Rising, Would the Los Angeles Times Be Less Alarmed?
The Los Angeles Times reports that “drug deaths now outnumber traffic fatalities in the United States,” the first time that has happened since the CDC began tracking drug-related deaths in 1979. The Times says drugs killed 37,485 people in 2009, compared to 36,284 who died in traffic accidents. One reason drugs are winning is that “traffic fatalities have dropped by more than a third since the early 1970s,” even as the number of miles driven has more than doubled. (The number of deaths per 100 million miles driven fell dramatically between 1970 and 2009, from more than five to about one.) By contrast, drug deaths have been rising during the last decade, mainly due to prescription drug overdoses or fatal combinations.
Over all, these dual trends represent a decided improvement, since many people die in car crashes through no fault of their own, as passengers, pedestrians, or nonculpable drivers. By