Health News

REPORTING POINT 12/12

HEALTH NEWS

“Live healthy...Live well”

Dedicated to providing pertinent information on health, fitness, and nutrition to foster a culture of wellness among Southwest Airlines flight crews and their families.

by Larry Kline

email: livehealthy-livewell@cox.net

Black Pepper and Fat - For centuries traditional Eastern medicine used black pepper to treat gastrointestinal distress, pain, inflammation and other disorders. A new study found that piperin, the pungent-tasting substance that gives black pepper its characteristic taste, can block the formation of new fat cells. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 05/12.

VITAMIN E AND PROSTATE CANCER RISK – the large Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial found that these two nutrients did not help protect against prostate cancer.  Recent research indicates that the men who had taken vitamin E (400 IU of the synthetic form a day) have 17 percent higher risk of prostate cancer than those taking a placebo.  The report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggests that effects of supplements can show up years after people stop taking them.  University of California Berkeley Wellness Letter, 02/12.

What's For Breakfast?  Eating foods at breakfast that have a low glycemic index may help prevent a spike in blood sugar throughout the morning and after the next meal of the day. These breakfast foods can also increase feelings of satiety and fullness and may make people less likely to overeat throughout the day. The glycemic index ranks foods on the extent to which they raise blood sugar levels after eating. Foods with a high index digest rapidly and result in high fluctuations in blood sugar levels. Foods with a low glycemic index produce gradual rises in blood sugar and insulin levels and are considered healthier, especially for people with diabetes. Low glycemic foods include rolled oats and groats, whole grains, nuts and seeds, sweet potato, barley b-glucan, yam flour, glucomannan, durum pasta, vegetable flours, chia/flax seed and resistant starch. Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism, 04/12.

INDULGE EARLY – There have been many articles published about the importance of eating a good breakfast.  Now Israeli researchers believe that adding dessert to your breakfast may aid in long-term weight loss.  Overweight people who age a high-carb, high-protein breakfast that included dessert had fewer cravings and were more likely to stick with a diet than were people who ate a low-calorie, low-carb breakfast.  According to the researchers, a morning dessert can curb cravings for sweets later by suppressing production of the hunger hormone ghrelin.  Men’s Health, 06/12.

Tart Cherry Juice - Drinking tart cherry juice two times per day for three weeks resulted in considerable reductions in vital inflammation markers. This is good news for arthritis and join pain sufferers. American College of Sports Medicine Conference, 05/12.

SITTING TOO MUCH IS A HEALTH RISK – sitting too much increases the risk of premature death, even in people who exercise, according to an Australian study of 222,000 healthy adults in the Archives of Internal Medicine.  The greatest risk was among those sitting for at least 11 hours a day, who were about 40 percent more likely to die over the course of the three-year study than those sitting less than 4 hours a day.  These findings are in line with other research and held true regardless of body weight, age, overall health, smoking status, and time spent exercising.  Prolonged sitting can have adverse effects, notably on blood vessel function, HDL (good) cholesterol, triglycerides, and blood sugar.  Many people spend 90 percent of their waking hours sitting.  Try to break up prolonged sitting time by getting up every hour or two and walking for a few minutes (or at least getting out of your seat on long flights for a few minutes to stretch and get some muscle movement-LK).  University of California Berkeley Wellness Letter, 07/12.

MORE ON TRANS FATS – the closer science looks at trans fats, the more harmful the fats seem to be.  Researchers at Oregon Health & Science University found that people with higher blood levels of trans fats had more problems with memory and cognition.  Trans fats may displace healthy fatty acids in the brain’s neurons.  Avoid products that contain partially hydrogenated vegetable oils and eat more vegetables, fish, nuts, beans, and citrus fruits, all of which foster cranial health.  Men’s Health, 04/12.

Pain Relief? - Exercise helps to alleviate pain related to nerve damage (neuropathic pain) by reducing levels of certain inflammation-promoting factors called cytokines. This supports exercise as a potentially useful non-drug treatment for neuropathic pain. In experiments, exercise reduced abnormal pain responses by 30-50 percent. Anesthesia & Analgesia, 06/12.
DECIPHERING LAB RESULTS – if you receive a copy of your lab results from your doctor and cannot figure out what the readings indicate, besides asking your physician what the numbers mean, you can also go online to the website www.labtestsonline.org to answer many of your questions.  Though sponsored by clinical laboratory groups and several diagnostic companies, the website is noncommercial and written for consumers.  There is a pull down menu just under the main website header that accesses most lab tests and gives a narrative of their significance, range, and common questions relating to the individual tests. There is also a mobile app: LabTestsOnline-M. University of Californian Berkeley Wellness Letter, 02/12.
5 WAYS TO CUT BREAST CANCER RISK

1.    WORK OUT CONSISTENTLY – moderate to vigorous exercise is linked with a 25 percent decrease in risk.  Exercise for 45-60 minutes five days a week.

2.    STAY SLIM – obesity is the biggest avoidable cause of breast cancer. Losing 5 to 10 percent of your weight lowers your risk if you are overweight.

3.    BREAST FEED – research shows that moms who nursed for a lifetime total of a year were less likely to get the disease than those who never breast fed.

4.    EAT MORE PLANTS – foods with high fiber content seem to lower breast cancer risk. Some researchers believe that the risk may be reduced by 60 to 80 percent through diet alone.  Healthy eating includes a diet heavy in fruit, vegetables, whole grains, and beans.

5.    LOSE THE VICES – a 2011 Archives of Internal Medicine study shows that smoking before menopause may be linked to a modest boost in breast cancer risk.  Alcohol raises it, too, and the more you drink, the higher it gets.  Health, 10/11.

Eating Fish -Regular fish consumption can decrease colorectal cancer risk by 12 percent. American Journal of Medicine, 06/12.
MORE ON MAMMOGRAMS – several years ago the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force changed its mammogram recommendations, advising screening every two years instead of annually between the ages of 50 and 75, and suggesting that women in their forties not be routinely screened.    

One issue of mammography being a very imperfect screening test is its high rate of false positives. These false alarms lead to anxiety and recalls for further testing because of suspicious findings and sometimes result in unnecessary biopsies and treatment of small slow-growing cancers that would never be life-threatening. One study found that with a decade of annual mammograms, most women, 61 percent, had at least one false-positive result, a figure higher than previously reported. Screening every other year lowered the probability by one-third, to 42 percent over the decade and also reduced unnecessary biopsies by about a third.

Besides confirming some advantages of alternative-year mammograms, this study should help women understand just how likely they are to have false-positive results eventually.  However frequently you get screened, one way to reduce false alarms is to make sure the radiologist has your previous mammograms for comparison.  That can reduce false positives by half, the study indicated.  University of California Berkeley Wellness Letter, 02/12.

PROTECT YOUR BRAIN – consuming just one soft drink a day raises the stroke risk by 16percent, according to a study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.  One theory believes that the soda’s sweeteners and caramel coloring may lead to artery damage.  Black coffee was found to lessen stroke risk.  Men’s Health 09/12.