ΥΓΕΙΑ health

Maria Dalamagka  Dental patients should not take prophylactic antibiotics simply because they have pacemakers or implanted defibrillators, according to a new statement from the American Heart Association (AHA). Although 2007 guidelines already exclude these patients from the list of those who need prophylactic antibiotics to prevent endocarditis, the AHA wanted to emphasize this point because many physicians are ignoring these guidelines, and because an increasing rate of infections related to the devices has raised concerns, said coauthor Peter Lockhart, DDS. A summary of the dental aspects of the new guidelines is published in the February issue of the Journal of the American Dental Association. The full statement, which offers guidance on managing these infections, was previously published in Circulation. Dr. Lockhart, chair of the Department of Oral Medicine at Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, estimates that dentists are unnecessarily prescribing antib...

Maria Dalamagka  Is the Institute of Medicine (IOM), which bills itself as the “advisor to the nation on health,” trying to make you sick? I wouldn’t blame you if you thought so… The U.S. and Canadian governments asked the IOM to look at its inadequate recommendation for vitamin D at 400 IU per day. So the IOM has just come out with its new recommendations. It says that “all North Americans are receiving enough vitamin D” from their diets and exposure to the sun. It also says there is “inconsistent and conflicting results” on whether or not vitamin D protects you from cancer and other diseases. Let’s set the record straight. There’s overwhelming evidence that increased vitamin D levels lower the risk of diabetes, cancer and heart disease. A four-year study conducted by researchers at Creighton University found that vitamin D and calcium supplementation can help prevent 17 types of cancer and lower your overall cancer risk by 77 percent.1 Another extensive study conducted on mo...

Maria Dalamagka  Reperfusion in acute ischemic stroke is often not happening quickly enough, a new study confirms. Even in "Get With the Guidelines" stroke hospitals, investigators report that less than a third of patients treated with intravenous tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) had door-to-needle times within the hour recommended by current guidelines. "It's alarming," Gregg Fonarow, MD, from the University of California at Los Angeles told reporters here yesterday at the International Stroke Conference. "It's time for a targeted national initiative to treat patients more quickly." During his presentation, Dr. Fonarow pointed out, "When we looked at door-to-needle time modeled as a continuous variable and after adjustment for patient and practice characteristics, we see that for every 15-minute reduction in door-to-needle time, it was associated with a 5% lower odds of in-hospital mortality, and this was highly statistically significant...

www.iator.gr Maria Dalamagka  Το 1976 ένας γιατρός σε ένα μικρό ερευνητικό Ινστιτούτο στο Menlo Park της Καλιφόρνια , μια κωμόπολη έξω από το Σαν Φρανσίσκο έκανε κάτι , που κανείς δεν είχε κάνει ποτέ πριν. Πήρε 100 ασθενείς , με επίσημη διάγνωση καρκίνου τελικού σταδίου και πρόσθεσε στη διατροφή τους 10 γραμμάρια μιας συστατικής ουσίας κάθε μέρα. Και έζησαν . Όχι μόνο για λίγες μέρες , ούτε για λίγους μήνες… Ο μέσος όρος ζωής τους ήταν περίπου ένα χρόνο. Ο γιατρός σύγκρινε αυτούς τους 100 ασθενείς με άλλους 1000 επίσης τελικού σταδίου καρκίνου . Ο μέσος όρος ζωής τους ήταν μόνο 38 ημέρες. Το όνομα του γιατρού ήταν Linus Pauling και η συστατική ουσία ήταν η βιταμίνη C . Ο Pauling και ο συνάδελφος του Dr. Ewan Cameron δημοσίευσαν τα αποτελέσματα τους στην Εθνική Ακαδημία των Επιστημών. Η βιταμίνη C είναι ένα αντιοξειδωτικό. Αφοπλίζει μόρια τα οποία ονομάζονται ελεύθερες ρίζες , οι οποίες επιτίθενται στα υγιή κύτταρα. Η βιταμίνη C απενεργοποιεί τις ελεύθερες ρίζες, πριν α...

Maria Dalamagka  When you’re young, your mind is sharp, you’re quick-thinking, you’ve got clarity and focus … you feel like you’re “on top” of every situation. When you get a little older, your mental functions decline … your thinking and reaction time slow. It’s probably natural. But is it unavoidable? As it turns out, you don’t have to become one of those slow-lane drivers just because you’re “getting older.” In fact, despite what you may have heard, cognitive decline is not inevitable. You can improve your memory, mental focus and clarity starting today, and I’m going to show you how. The good news is, it has little to do with genetics, and even less to do with drugs. You can boost your mental performance and have a sharper, more agile mind by doing two simple things: Exercising your brain and feeding your brain. Let me explain … When you were very small, you couldn’t do a whole lot of things. You couldn’t add numbers together, tie your shoes or even walk. But you had th...

Maria Dalamagka  Whether you’re 9 or 90, abundant evidence shows exercise can enhance your health and well-being. But for many people, sedentary pastimes, such as watching TV, surfing the Internet, or playing computer and video games, have replaced more active pursuits. Millions of Americans simply aren’t moving enough to meet the minimum threshold for good health — that is, burning at least 700 to 1,000 calories a week through physical pursuits. The benefits of exercise may sound too good to be true, but decades of solid science confirm that exercise improves health and can extend your life. Adding as little as half an hour of moderately intense physical activity to your day can help you avoid a host of serious ailments, including heart disease, diabetes, depression, and several types of cancer, particularly breast and colon cancers. Regular exercise can also help you sleep better, reduce stress, control your weight, brighten your mood, sharpen your mental functioning, and impro...

Maria Dalamagka  Early introduction of solid foods is linked to a risk for early childhood obesity, according to the results of a prospective prebirth cohort study reported online February 7 in Pediatrics. "Parental feeding practices during early infancy, such as the timing of solid food introduction, may be 1 key modifiable determinant of childhood obesity," write Susanna Y. Huh, MD, MPH, from the Division of Gastroenterology and Nutrition, Children's Hospital Boston in Boston, Massachusetts, and colleagues. "Data suggest that the introduction of solid foods earlier than 4 months of age is associated with increased body fat or weight in childhood or with greater weight gain during infancy, which itself predicts later adiposity. Other studies have found no association between the timing of solid food introduction and body fat or an association between delayed introduction of solid foods after 6 months and greater adiposity." The goal of the study was to evalua...