New Hampshire Health News Digest

Al-Qaida anger at Jazeera on Laden tape - Yahoo! News CAIRO, Egypt - Al-Qaida sympathizers have unleashed a torrent of anger against Al-Jazeera television, accusing it of misrepresenting Osama bin Laden's latest audiotape by airing excerpts in which he criticizes mistakes by insurgents in Iraq. ADVERTISEMENT Users of a leading Islamic militant Web forum posted thousands of insults against the pan-Arab station for focusing on excerpts in which bin Laden criticizes insurgents, including his followers. Analysts said the reaction highlighted militants' surprise at bin Laden's words, and their dismay at the deep divisions among al-Qaida and other Iraqi militants that he appeared to be trying to heal. [...] "It's not about Al-Jazeera, it's about their shock from bin Laden," said Diaa Rashwan, an Egyptian expert on Islamic militant groups. "For the first time, bin Laden, who used to be the spiritual leader who gives guidance, became a critic of al-Qaida and...

Insulin levels affect the brain's dopamine systems Insulin, long known as an important regulator of blood glucose levels, now has a newly appreciated role in the brain. Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers, working with colleagues in Texas, have found that insulin levels affect the brain's dopamine systems, which are involved in drug addiction and many neuropsychiatric conditions. In addition to suggesting potential new targets for treating drug abuse, the findings raise questions as to whether improper control of insulin levels - as in diabetes - may impact risk for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or influence the effectiveness of current ADHD medications. [...] "This finding is in vivo evidence that, in the intact diabetic rat, loss of insulin has compromised DAT trafficking to the plasma membrane," Avison said. "These experiments show that there is likely a strong interplay between these important dopamine neurotransmitter systems a...

Can a Lack of Sleep Set Back Your Child's Cognitive Abilities? -- New York Magazine This is a great article! It shows that lack of sleep is as harmful to a child's brain as ingesting lead. Especially affected are the executive functions The surprise is how much sleep affects academic performance and emotional stability, as well as phenomena that we assumed to be entirely unrelated, such as the international obesity epidemic and the rise of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. A few scientists theorize that sleep problems during formative years can cause permanent changes in a child’s brain structure: damage that one can’t sleep off like a hangover. It’s even possible that many of the hallmark characteristics of being a tweener and teen—moodiness, depression, and even binge eating—are actually symptoms of chronic sleep deprivation. […] “A loss of one hour of sleep is equivalent to [the loss of] two years of cognitive maturation and development,” Sadeh explains. […] He also ...

Psych Pundit: Taking on the Depression Epidemic: A Promising New Treatment Approach According to a sweeping epidemiological survey, roughly one in four Americans will now succomb to debilitating depressive illness by the age of 75. Sadly, the risk of depression is even higher among young adults (see chart below); it now looks like over half of all 18-29 year-olds will become clinically depressed at some point! And we're talking about a disorder that robs people of their energy, their sleep, their memory, their concentration, their ability to love and work and play. It robs over 500,000 people each year of their very lives (via depression-linked suicide). Bizarrely, the depression epidemic keeps getting worse, despite the fact that antidepressant use has gone up over 400% in the past two decades (150 million antidepressant prescriptions are written each year in the U.S. alone). The rate of depression in the U.S. is now 10 times higher than it was in the 1940s, before the advent of a...

How powerful placebos could save the NHS millions - AND still cure illnesses | the Daily Mail Sticking needles randomly into your body is almost as good as real acupuncture when it comes to back pain, according to a new study published last month. Random needles are also just as good at improving the quality of life for Crohn's disease patients, another study found. Why is this so? Sceptics say it's because complementary medicine is nothing more than a placebo. A placebo is a treatment that has no active ingredient but makes the patient feel better simply because they trust the person administering it and believe the treatment will help. The placebo effect has long been used by conventional doctors as a label to discredit alternative treatments. However, in the past few years there has been a revolution in scientists' understanding of placebos - indeed, some experts now believe they could even replace treatments such as anti-depressants. "The placebo effect tells us th...

The New Straits Times Online........ ALLERGIES plague many of us and cause sneezing, itchy eyes, and congestion, or asthma. So what do we do? We resort to popping prescription and over-the-counter drugs which suppress the allergy symptoms but don’t actually prevent them. Some people may take more extreme action: they rip up their carpeting, install expensive air-filtration systems. Some even move to a different climate in a desperate and often futile attempt to “run away” from their allergies. However, experts say that a simple strategy to alleviate and prevent allergies/asthma is to eat a nutritious diet (along with proper exercise and rest, of course). They say proper nutrition can alleviate or prevent allergies and asthma in four ways: Help control underlying inflammation of air passages. Dilate air passages. Thin mucus in the lungs. Prevent food-allergy reactions that trigger asthma attacks. So include the following foods in your diet to try and get allergy relief the natural way: ...

Linkoping University: News and Events One-year-olds whose mothers had ingested fish oil during pregnancy and breastfeeding had considerably fewer allergic reactions than children whose mothers did not take this supplement. Omega-3 fats seem to have a protective effect on allergies in children. One-year-olds whose mothers had ingested fish oil during pregnancy and breastfeeding had considerably fewer allergic reactions than children whose mothers did not take this supplement, according to a study from Linköping University. The study was doubly blind, that is, neither the participants nor the researchers knew who had received what. It turned out that the "fish-oil children" had fewer than half as many reactions to eggs at the age of one year as the placebo group did. This is an important discovery, since allergic reactions to eggs early in life are strongly correlated with the later development of allergic disorders like eczema and asthma. All of the children are now two years ...

Cholesterol and cognitive decline | Health & Nutrition by Michael R. Eades, M.D. The majority of the medical data out there shows that a higher cholesterol is correlated with better health and longevity among the retirement set, but few of them know it. And fewer yet know that a lower cholesterol level is associated with cognitive decline. If there is one thing that elderly people fear more than heart disease and cancer it is probably Alzheimer’s disease or any kind of mental decline. Unfortunately, their fixation on their cholesterol levels are herding more and more of them in that very direction. The brain represents about 2 percent of a person’s overall weight yet contains about 25 percent of the cholesterol in that person’s body. Just those figures alone ought to tell you that cholesterol is pretty important in cognitive function, but most people aren’t aware of those figures. And won’t learn them from the mainstream press (which get’s its info from the pharmaceutically-driven ...

How the Low-Fat, Low-Fact Cascade Just Keeps Rolling Along - TierneyLab - Science - New York Times Blog Good article about cascade phenomena in decision making as an explanation for the low fat fad diet. Found this in the comments and found it interesting. This Dr. Phinney is apparently and expert on the paleodiet and paleofitness. Cascade Candidate: That Nature is linear. If one can show that 30% fat in the diet is bad, and that 40% is worse, then it is simple to conclude that eating 70% or 80% of one’s dietary energy as fat must be instantly fatal. Assuming 15-20% dietary protein, once a human gets above 70% fat, one goes into nutritional ketosis (as distinguished from keto-acidosis). After 2-3 weeks of keto-adaptation, fats become the prefered human fuel, allowing unimpaired endurance and even high intensity human performance (see Metabolism 32:769-76). The keto-adapted individual also has lower serum triglycerides and a reduced percentage of saturated fats in the serum triglyceride...

Cholesterol and cognitive decline | Health & Nutrition by Michael R. Eades, M.D. The majority of the medical data out there shows that a higher cholesterol is correlated with better health and longevity among the retirement set, but few of them know it. And fewer yet know that a lower cholesterol level is associated with cognitive decline. If there is one thing that elderly people fear more than heart disease and cancer it is probably Alzheimer’s disease or any kind of mental decline. Unfortunately, their fixation on their cholesterol levels are herding more and more of them in that very direction. The brain represents about 2 percent of a person’s overall weight yet contains about 25 percent of the cholesterol in that person’s body. Just those figures alone ought to tell you that cholesterol is pretty important in cognitive function, but most people aren’t aware of those figures. And won’t learn them from the mainstream press (which get’s its info from the pharmaceutically-driven ...

ADD and ADHD Basics - Tonsil Removal and ADHD: Connected? Tonsil Removal and ADHD: Connected? Author:Karen Barrow Medically Reviewed On: March 31, 2006 Can a fairly routine problem, enlarged tonsils, be causing attention deficit disorder (ADHD) in your child? Not quite, says a new study, but tonsil problems may be partially to blame for some of your child's behavior problems. While the cause-and-effect relationship is not entirely understood, researchers from the University of Michigan suspect that there is a relationship between enlarged tonsils and sleep-related breathing problems. Taking the relationship one step further, they also suspect that sleep problems may underlie some cases of behavioral problems in children, including ADHD. "An undiagnosed sleep disorder is not the solution for all children with ADHD. But it could be something worth looking into for a substantial minority," said Dr. Ronald Chervin, study author and director of the University of Michigan Slee...

The Bulletin - Philadelphia's Family Newspaper - Council Considers Nutrition Labels On Restaurant Menus A Different View In a new book, Good Calories, Bad Calories, author Gary Taubes challenges the medical orthodoxy that fatty foods cause heart disease and other life threatening ailments. He also challenges the idea that calories alone account for weight gain. He claims medical studies do not support the conclusion. Mr. Taubes, who writes for Science magazine, notes the diets of previous centuries were as high or higher in fat content than the ration in today's modern American intake. His research also concludes there is no new epidemic of heart disease. More heart disease is being reported, he agrees, but people are living longer, seeing doctors more often, and physicians are getting more adept at diagnosing symptoms. In an interview Mr. Taubes did on the PBS program, "Frontline," he asserted, "There were several studies done in the late '80s, where they a...

The Right Brain vs Left Brain | The Daily Telegraph : "The Right Brain vs Left Brain Article from: AAP * Font size: Decrease Increase * Email article: Email * Print article: Print * Submit comment: Submit comment October 05, 2007 12:00am The Right Brain vs Left Brain test ... do you see the dancer turning clockwise or anti-clockwise? If clockwise, then you use more of the right side of the brain and vice versa. Most of us would see the dancer turning anti-clockwise though you can try to focus and change the direction; see if you can do it. LEFT BRAIN FUNCTIONS uses logic detail oriented facts rule words and language present and past math and science can comprehend knowing acknowledges order/pattern perception knows object name reality based forms strategies practical safe RIGHT BRAIN FUNCTIONS uses feeling 'big picture' oriented imagination rules symbols and images present and future philosophy & religion can 'get it' (i.e. meaning) bel...

Have Type 2 Diabetes? You're Likely to Have Sleep Apnea Too - Diabetes Health In obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), the upper airway narrows or collapses during sleep, cutting off breathing. People with OSA may be aroused hundreds of times each night, just enough to start breathing again. Usually the sleeper doesn't recall the partial waking episodes, but feels tired every day. If you have type 2 diabetes, especially if you're overweight, and you feel sluggish all the time, it may well be the fault of OSA. Recently our Advisory Board member Daniel Einhorn, MD, tested 279 type 2 patients for OSA at the Whittier Institute for Diabetes. A full 36 percent of his patients had it. Men were twice as likely to have it as women, especially if they were over 62 years old. If you have type 2 diabetes, Dr. Einhorn advises that you get yourself screened for OSA. Estimates are that up to ninety percent of people who have it remain undiagnosed. It's not something you want to live with, ho...

Myths & Truths About Nutrition Myths & Truths About NutritionPosted in: health in pejung's Blog Myth: Heart disease in America is caused by consumption of cholesterol and saturated fat from animal products. Truth: During the period of rapid increase in heart disease (1920-1960), American consumption of animal fats declined but consumption of hydrogenated and industrially processed vegetable fats increased dramatically. Myth: Saturated fat clogs arteries. Truth: The fatty acids found in artery clogs are mostly unsaturated (74%) of which 41% are polyunsaturated. Myth: Vegetarianism is healthy. Truth: The annual all-cause death rate of vegetarian men is slightly more than that of non-vegetarian men (.93% vs .89%); the annual death rate of vegetarian women is significantly more than that of non-vegetarian women (.86% vs .54%) (Am J Clin Nutr 1982 36:873) Myth: Vitamin B12 can be obtained from certain plant sources such as blue-green algae and soy products. Truth: Vitamin B12 i...

Omega-6, found in almost everything, is killing our kids | www.tucsoncitizen.com Omega-6, found in almost everything, is killing our kids DENNIS D. EMBRY, Ph.D. More on oils and health: Omega-3 can fight depression in moms, kids Something is happening to our kids, and it's killing them slowly. It's increasing health-care costs and mental illness, it's hurting kids' IQ, it's contributing to the rise in childhood asthma and diabetes. It's made homicide rates five times higher than in other countries, and much more. But you and your kids think this killer food is good because of advertising on TV in children's bedrooms. Twenty percent of all calories each day now come from one food consumed by Americans, and 9 percent of the daily diet of Americans is food that inflames every cell in the body. This mystery ingredient is in almost everything your child eats at school, at home, at fast-food and even "good" restaurants, at the neighbor's house, at g...

Nin Andrews: The Male Brain I had to laugh at Friday's entry from daily@delanceyplace.com. So I guess it's true what they say about the male brain being a sex organ, and the female brain being just a blabber box. And I thought those were just urban myths and/or stereo types. "Under a microscope or an fMRI scan, the differences between male and female brains are revealed to be complex and widespread. In the brain centers for language and hearing, for example, women have 11% more neurons than men. The principal hub of emotion and memory formation--the hippocampus--is also larger in the female brain, as is the brain circuitry for language and observing emotions in others. This means that women are, on average, better at expressing emotions and remembering the details of emotional events. Men, by contrast, have two and a half times the brain space devoted to sexual drive as well as larger brain centers for action and aggression. Sexual thoughts floats through a man's brain...