Health A-Z

5 health benefits of mint leaves (pudina)

Mint, scientifically known as ‘mentha’ is a herb that has been used since long for its different health benefits.

It is an indispensable element of most of the Indian cuisines and also Thai platter. The modest mint leaves can be used in a variety of things like one can crush them and add in tea, one can use it in salads etc.

Here are a few health benefits of mint:

Pudina is loaded with antioxidants and phytonurients and hence helps keep stomach cramps and acidity at bay. -Mint leaves has anti-inflammatory properties. It helps soothe skin infections. Mint juice acts as an excellent skin cleanser.

-Since pudina has a very strong aroma, it gets to stimulate your brain functioning and helps cure nausea. Further, applying fresh mint leaves on the forehead relieves headache.

-Mint leaves are a great remedy to relieve the pain caused during menstrual cramps. -Mint leaves has anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory properties and so it fights against tooth decay and bad breath and is widely used in mouth fresheners.

Source: Zee news

 

High Blood Pressure Can Quietly Damage Kidneys

I thought I was a healthy 40-year-old until I was diagnosed with high blood pressure. My doctor began treating it as a stand-alone condition, without considering that high blood pressure is a major risk factor for kidney disease.

At first, I wasn’t even tested for kidney disease. But eventually, he gave me a urine test, and it was discovered that I had protein in my urine — one of the earliest signs of kidney damage. Apparently, my high blood pressure had damaged my kidneys.

Healthy kidneys filter out wastes and toxins, but my kidneys’ ability to do so began to decrease at an alarming rate. I continued to manage my blood pressure with medication and decided to make a few lifestyle changes, as well, that helped me avoid the progression of kidney disease to kidney failure.

I limited my salt intake, started eating more fruits, vegetables and whole grains, decreased the amount of meat I was eating and began swimming every day. I began to feel better, and when I went to the doctor, it turned out my kidney function had stabilized.

Please tell your readers that if they have high blood pressure they should be proactive and ask their doctor to check their kidneys. Early detection and lifestyle change can make a major impact on your health, as I have learned. — DUANE SUNWOLD, SPOKANE, WASH.

DEAR DUANE: It is generous of you to share your medical history in an effort to caution my readers. The National Kidney Foundation urges everyone to learn about these vital organs and whether they might be at risk.

The three major risk factors for kidney disease are: high blood pressure, diabetes and a family history of kidney failure. People who have these risk factors should ask their doctor to check their kidney function with a simple blood and urine test.

Readers, March is National Kidney Month, and March 13 is World Kidney Day. If you are at risk, schedule an appointment with your doctor. For anyone who needs more information, the National Kidney Foundation’s website is kidney.org.

DEAR ABBY: I’m a member of the clergy who enjoys studying for my ministry and doctoral work at a local coffee shop. Three men who go there every day have found out that I’m a minister, and they each want to talk with me while I’m there. Although all three are members of the same religion, none of them is affiliated with a church.

I have invited them to visit my worship services, as well as call the office and set up an appointment with me. I have also tried to diplomatically explain that I go to the coffee shop to study. One of them ignores it, another appears hurt and the third one gets offended. When they’re not around, I am productive. When they show up, they want me to be their chaplain.

Because of where I live, finding another coffee shop is not a viable option. How can I set a boundary with them and still do my studying there? Thank you. — Reverend in New York

Source:The Mercury

 

WHO-proposed sugar recommendation comes to less than a soda per day

The World Health Organization wants you to stop eating so much sugar. Seriously. In draft guidelines proposed this week, WHO is encouraging people to consume less than 5% of their total daily calories from sugars. The organization’s current guidelines, published in 2002, recommend eating less than 10% of your total daily calories from sugars.

Most Americans still consume much more. Our sweet tooth increased 39% between 1950 and 2000, according to the USDA. The average American now consumes about three pounds of sugar each week. “There is increasing concern that consumption of free sugars, particularly in the form of sugar-sweetened beverages, may result in … an increase in total caloric intake, leading to an unhealthy diet, weight gain and increased risk of noncommunicable diseases,” WHO said in a statement.

Of particular concern, WHO said, is the role sugar plays in causing dental diseases worldwide. For an adult at a normal body mass index, or BMI, eating 5% would be around 25 grams of sugar — or six teaspoons. That’s less than is typically found in a single can of regular soda, which contains about 40 grams of sugar.

To find the amount of calories from sugar in a product, multiply the grams by 4. For example, a product containing 15 grams of sugar has 60 calories from sugar per serving, according to the American Heart Association. If you eat 2,000 calories a day, that’s 3%.

WHO’s proposed guidelines apply to sugars added to foods by manufacturers, as well as those found naturally in honey, syrups, fruit juices and fruit concentrates. They do not apply to those found in fresh produce.

“Much of the sugars consumed today are ‘hidden’ in processed foods that are not usually seen as sweets,” the WHO website states.

Did you know sugar is often added to your frozen pizza? How about your bread, soup, yogurt and mayonnaise? As consumers became more concerned about the amount of fat in their food, manufacturers went out of their way to make low-fat items — often substituting sugar to preserve the taste.

Choosing foods with fewer added sugars at the grocery story may soon get a little easier. The Food and Drug Administration has proposed several changes to the nutrition labels you see on packaged foods and beverages.

The proposed labels would also note how much added sugar is in a product. Right now, it’s hard to know what is naturally occurring sugar and what has been added by the manufacturer.

The WHO guidelines will be open for public comment until March 31. Then WHO will finalize and publish its recommendations.

Source: CNN news

Traffic pollution may alter structure of the heart; promote heart failure

Traffic air pollution has been linked to poor health in the past – with wheezing, coughing, and watery eyes just the tip of the iceberg. Later studies have also established a relationship between pollution and a host of heart problems, including left ventricular hypertrophy and heart failure, among others. However, a new study, from the University of Washington’s Medical Center in Seattle, has now found that air pollution emitted from traffic sources also changes the structure of the heart’s right ventricle – further increasing the risk of heart failure for residents’ of pollution-dense areas.

“Although the link between traffic-related air pollution and left ventricular hypertrophy, heart failure, and cardiovascular death is established, the effects of traffic-related air pollution on the right ventricle have not been well studied,” said the study’s lead author Peter Leary, MD, MS, of the UW Medical Center in a press release. “Using exposure to nitrogen dioxide as a surrogate for exposure to traffic-related air pollution, we were able to demonstrate for the first time that higher levels of exposure were associated with greater right ventricular mass and larger right ventricular end-diastolic volume. Greater right ventricular mass is also associated with increased risk for heart failure and cardiovascular death.”

The study observed the health patterns of 3,896 individuals who participated in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis, each of whom had no prior history of cardiac disruption or disease. All of the test subjects had previously undertaken magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans, with authors observing their levels of exposure to pollutant nitrogen oxide in the year leading up to the scan.

On average, the study found that a higher incidence of exposure to nitrogen oxide coincided with a five percent increase (around one gram) in right ventricular mass and a three percent increase (4.1 mL) in right ventricular end-diastolic volume. The researchers combed through a range of differentiating factors that could have skewed the data before confirming their findings, including variations in lung disease, socioeconomic standing, inflammation, and left ventricular mass and volume.

“The morphologic changes in the right ventricle of the heart that we found with increased exposure to nitrogen dioxide add to the body of evidence supporting a connection between traffic-related air pollution and cardiovascular disease,” said Leary. “The many adverse effects of air pollution on human health support continued efforts to reduce this burden.”

It should be noted, however, that while increased exposure to nitrogen oxide led to a notable change in the heart’s structure, the findings have not definitively been linked to traffic air pollution. However, the researchers are confident that these recent findings are aligned with previous studies on the matter, and serve to strengthen beliefs that traffic air pollution is detrimental to cardiovascular health.

The study was published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Source: Tech Times

Is microwaving food safe? 7 nutrition myths debunked

Microwave ovens became a common feature of Australian kitchens around the same time as lime green benchtops and burnt orange stoneware.

But while modern microwaves have shed the wood veneer panelling, some people still have concerns about food safety.

So what happens when you nuke your food in a microwave oven? Well, for a start you’re not nuking it: you’re actually heating it with low frequency electromagnetic energy, the energy is lower than light, another form of electromagnetic energy, says Bob Steele from Food Science Australia.

Microwaves penetrate more deeply than light, and heat food by rapidly vibrating water molecules. When a microwave oven is turned off, there are no microwaves left behind in either the oven or the food.

Unlike ionising radiation from nuclear energy, low frequency electromagnetic energy (microwave ovens use a frequency of around 2,450 Mhz) has “little or no ability to break strong chemical bonds,” Steele says.

For this reason, there is not any substantiated evidence it causes undue chemical changes in food and creates toxins, he says.

But what about nutrition? The majority of research suggests microwave cooking is just as nutritious as other methods and may have some benefits.

“In general, because you are able to heat food much more rapidly, retention of vitamins is higher,” Steele says. And nutrient retention, especially for the water soluble vitamins B and C, is better than other cooking methods such as boiling where the water soluble vitamins are often thrown out with the water.

In fact, microwave heating has been used to improve extraction of nutrients from foods. Work at CSIRO has shown better bio-accessability of anti-oxidants in microwave heated foods.

As foods cooked in microwaves don’t brown, microwave cooking also helps to retain amino acids such as lysine, he says.

Microwave warnings

There are, however, some things you should watch out for.

One of these is the use of non-approved plastics to hold hot food. The main concern is that some plastics, such as those used as yoghurt containers, can melt, potentially resulting in serious burns, says Steele.

Non-food approved plastics should never be used. Look for containers with the international food-safe symbol (see pic below). While, in the past there has been some concern with non-food approved plastics like PVC contaminating food, this is unlikely to happen with food-approved plastics that are clearly marked with the words “microwave safe”.

These plastics are designed to withstand high temperatures. However, even these can fail in a microwave oven, so never heat cooking oil in plastic containers as the temperatures can easily exceed the melting point of the plastic and potentially cause serious burns.

Uneven heating can be another major problem – not only can it allow the growth of micro-organisms, it can also cause scalding.

Domestic microwave ovens should never be used to sterilise foods. Low temperatures and uneven heating mean you can not be guaranteed that pathogenic spores have been inactivated, he explains.

Safety tips

Steele’s top tips for safe microwave cooking are:

  • always read the instructions on the packet
  • never reheat food more than two minutes (because of the risk of scalds)
  • never heat fats or cooking oils in a microwave oven – the temperatures can easily become excessive and may melt even the most resistant plastic container
  • always allow one to two minutes standing time to allow heat to even out
  • always use plastics approved for food use in a microwave oven. These are marked with the international food contact symbol (see left) and the phrase ‘microwave safe’.
  • always be careful – use a glove to remove the container from the oven.
  • And while independent testing of microwaves indicates that radiation leakage is uncommon for new models, older models could be a health hazard if the door is damaged or doesn’t fit properly.

So even though retro is back, it might be time for that old microwave to go.

Source: abc news

How to manage your cholesterol

Excess bad cholesterol can lead to heart disease or stroke, so take into account a few steps to manage your cholesterol levels.

Superfruits: Following recent nutritional studies, several fruits have been labelled ‘superfoods’ due to their ability to combat harmful fats and reduce bad cholesterol. For instance, it was recently revealed that strawberries have the ability to reduce LDL (low-density lipoprotein), the harmful form of cholesterol, by nearly 14 per cent, according to research carried out by Universita Politecnica Delle Marche in Italy.

* Unsaturated fats: Consuming omega-3 essential fatty acids, found in unsaturated fats, will help to lower the levels of bad cholesterol in the blood. Unsaturated fats include oily fish, nuts and seeds, ground flax seeds, olive oil and certain vegetables and fruits such as avocado.

* Fibre: Beans, pulses, vegetables, cereal and whole grain breads all have a high fermentable fibre content and are therefore difficult for the gut to digest so they attach to bad cholesterol and then remove it from the body via waste.

* Red wine: Red wine contains a plant compound called saponin which blocks the body’s absorption of bad cholesterol, LDL. This news is not an excuse to drink large quantities of red wine and I do not recommend adding red wine to your diet purely for health reasons since alcohol consumption can lead to further health complications such as high blood pressure and liver disease.

Source: the hindu

Healthy diet lowers dementia risk later in life

A new study suggests that healthy dietary choices in midlife may prevent dementia in later years.

The results showed that those who ate the healthiest diet at the average age of 50 had an almost 90 percent lower risk of dementia in a 14-year follow-up study than those whose diet was the least healthy.

The study was the first in the world to investigate the relationship between a healthy diet as early as in midlife and the risk of developing dementia later on.

The researchers assessed the link between diet and dementia using a healthy diet index based on the consumption of a variety of foods. Vegetables, berries and fruits, fish and unsaturated fats from milk products and spreads were some of the healthy components, whereas sausages, eggs, sweets, sugary drinks, salty fish and saturated fats from milk products and spreads were indicated as unhealthy.

Previous studies on diet and dementia have mainly focused on the impact of single dietary components.

“But nobody’s diet is based on one single food, and there may be interactions between nutrients, so it makes more sense to look at the entire dietary pattern,” Marjo Eskelinen, MSc, who presented the results in her doctoral thesis in the field of neurology, said.

Higher intake of saturated fats linked to poorer cognitive functions and increased risk of dementia

The doctoral thesis, published at the University of Eastern Finland, was based on the population-based Finnish Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Ageing and Incidence of Dementia (CAIDE) study.

Source: zee news

Removing playground benches may help parents be more active

Getting adults to be more active on visits to children’s playgrounds could be as simple as removing the temptation to sit, a small new study suggests.

Inspired during his daily lunchtime walks by the sight of parents sitting on playground benches, a U.S. researcher has shown that moving the seating away from the area increased the amount of exercise that parents and caregivers got as they watched their kids.

“For such an easy and inexpensive change, we were able to shift many adults from sitting to standing and that alone promotes health,” said lead author James Roemmich, a supervisory research physiologist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Grand Forks, North Dakota.

The study, published in the journal Preventive Medicine, focused on a single playground in Grand Forks, where parents tended to congregate at eight picnic tables with benches and watch their children. The researchers observed playground activity by adults and children for a week with the benches present, and for another week after they were taken away, then again for a week when the benches were returned.

When the benches were removed, the adults were as much as 23 times more likely to engage in moderate to vigorous activity, the researchers found.

With benches gone, the parents were “walking around following their child, watching them play, swinging or pushing children on swings, walking around and socializing with other parents, walking through the splash pad to cool off, playing with the kids/lifting kids up to monkey bars and other play equipment,” Roemmich told Reuters Health in an email. “A couple times they brought a Frisbee or football and threw them around with the kids.”

Removing the benches did not affect the amount of time adults were willing to let the children stay and play at the park, the researchers point out in their report.

They also found that removing the benches did not make the children more active.

“That’s because children are already very active when they’re at the playground, running from swings to slides, climbing and jumping,” Roemmich said. “Increasing their activity level is more challenging.”

The one thing that did tend to increase children’s activity level, Roemmich said, was if they arrived at the park with a friend or sibling. That “social facilitation,” he said, upped kids’ activity level because much active play typically requires partners.

Research also suggests that children play more if their parents aren’t hovering too close, Roemmich notes. “I’m not advocating leaving kids at the playground unsupervised, just give them some space,” he said.

The 17-acre park where the study was conducted is across the street from Roemmich’s office, so he passed by it daily.

“I saw a terrific playground there, and I noticed that the parents or adult caregivers were sitting while kids were playing,” he said. “I thought, ‘Wow, what a terrific opportunity for parents not to be sitting.'”

Roemmich said the study is an example of a “micro-environmental” change – a small alteration that can sometimes change behavior. Other micro-environmental changes include painting portions of the playground in bright colors and adding playground equipment – both of which have been shown to increase activity levels in children.

James Sallis, a professor of family and preventive medicine at the University of California, San Diego, said one of the virtues of this study is that “it could really be done in virtually any park or playground.”

Sallis, who was not connected with the study, is director of Active Living Research, an organization that supports research designed to promote physical activity in children and families.

“There’s a lot of applicability,” Sallis said, noting that removing benches is easy and inexpensive. “People are always looking for something you can do that’s cheap.”

“You could argue that it’s just a little bit of activity,” he said. “But that’s how we got to be an inactive society to begin with, with a million tiny little decisions like that. Who decided you needed benches in every playground?”

When asked if parents objected to the removal of the benches during the study, Roemmich said the parks department got “three or four complaint calls” from parents unhappy with the removal of the benches. “But once it was explained that it was a study, they were okay with it,” he said.

Sallis said he wishes the study had gone a step further and looked at whether removing the benches facilitated social activity among the adults.

“People tend to go to their own separate seat,” he said. “But if you’re standing up and wandering around, you may be more likely to have some social interaction – that could be an additional benefit,” he said.

Sallis also suggested that a next step to encourage adult activity might be to put adult exercise equipment on the periphery of the playgrounds.

Source: Fox news

Hair Transplants Not for the Young, Expert Warns

25-year-old Manchester United footballer Wayne Rooney surprised the world when he tweeted a picture of himself (with his new locks) immediately following a hair transplant procedure.

He posted on his Twitter account, “Just to confirm to all my followers, I have had a hair transplant. I was going bald at 25 why not. I’m delighted with the result.”

Rooney underwent Follicular Unit Extraction, also known as FUE, the most advanced hair restoration method available today. Three months later, the results are looking great, but one hair transplant expert warns that it might not last forever.

Dr. Bessam Farjo, one of the world’s leading hair transplant doctors and founder of the Farjo Medical Centre, told BBC News that young men like Rooney should wait until they are around the age of 30 to undergo hair transplant surgery.

And while Rooney’s surgery brought awareness to male pattern baldness and hair restoration, Dr. Farjo thinks it’s sending the wrong message to other guys in their 20’s.

“When a celebrity comes out with it, you only hear the good things. You don’t hear the cautions or the potential complications,” he told BBC.

Although he’s seen interest from more young men since Rooney’s surgery, the complications are apparently so great, that Dr. Farjo doesn’t recommend any hair transplant procedure for patients under 25 years of age.

This might not be good news for the thousands of young men who start to experience hair loss in their late teens and early 20’s, but Dr. Farjo makes a good point.

He explained to BBC that if a patient receives a hair transplant too young, his body still may be going through the hair loss process, and this could mean a very awkward-looking long-term result.

He said, “If you have the surgery too early and you go bald, you don’t have enough hair to keep chasing the hair loss. You can end up with isolated patches of hair. You could end up with hairy temples and a bald forehead, which isn’t pretty, but is also hard to fix.”

Hairy temples and a bald forehead?

Most guys would probably agree that waiting a few years would be completely worth avoiding a mess like that.

The good news is there are other things that can be done to prevent hair loss at a young age. Before diving straight into surgery, Dr. Farjo does everything in his power to preserve a patient’s already existing hair.

He explained, “I ask them questions about their family history, record the hair loss, and monitor it over a period of time. I also offer them medication to see if their hair stops falling out. I am then able to have a much fuller picture of how much hair they will lose.”

Predicting an individual’s total hair loss, he said, is the key to achieving excellent hair transplant surgery results.

Unfortunately, however, there are no age limits or regulations in place to inform or protect younger patients from undergoing hair restoration surgery. Dr. Farjo says some hair transplant clinics are more concerned with making money, rather than the health and happiness of their patients.

As an alternative, he suggests that surgeons work to inform colleagues and patients about the risks associated with age, as a form of self-quality control within the community of hair transplant specialists.

For younger men currently experiencing hair loss, you may want to take advantage of FUE or FUT technology and nip baldness in the bud, but take Dr. Farjo’s advice and wait it out.

Source: Where is my doctor

Omega-3 rich diet helps you sleep soundly: Study

A new study has revealed that higher levels of omega-3 DHA in diet would give better sleep.

The randomized placebo-controlled study by the University of Oxford found that children on a course of daily supplements of omega-3 had nearly one hour more sleep and seven fewer waking episodes per night, as compared with the children taking the corn or soybean placebo.

According to the study, it found that there is possible links between sleep and fatty acid status in healthy children, and that higher blood levels of the long-chain omega-3 DHA are significantly associated with better sleep, including less bedtime resistance, parasomnias and total sleep disturbance.

It was also revealed that higher ratios of DHA in relation to the long-chain omega-6 fatty acid AA (arachidonic acid) are also associated with fewer sleep problems.

Professor Paul Montgomery of Oxford University said that various substances made within the body from omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids have long been known to play key roles in the regulation of sleep and lower ratios of DHA have earlier been linked with lower levels of melatonin.

The study is published in the Journal of Sleep Research.

Source: business standard