Encouraging Health

From www.WebMD.com:

Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore is the nation’s top hospital, according to U.S. News & World Report’s 2007 list of America’s best hospitals.

The magazine considered 5,462 U.S. hospitals for their annual list of top hospitals. Only 18 hospitals made the list.
Here is the magazine’s “honor roll” list of America’s best hospitals. Hospitals that received the same rank are listed together.

Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore
Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles
Cleveland Clinic
Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston
New York-Presbyterian University Hospital of Columbia and Cornell in New York
Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., and University of California, San Francisco Medical Center
Barnes-Jewish Hospital/Washington University in St. Louis
Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston
University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle
Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
University of Michigan Hospitals and Health Centers in Ann Arbor, Mich.
Stanford Hospital and Clinics in Stanford, Calif., and Yale-New Haven Hospital in New Haven, Conn.
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, and the University of Chicago Medical Center
How the Best Hospitals Were Chosen
Rankings are based on factors including hospital quality in 16 medical specialties: cancer, digestive disorders, ear/nose/throat, endocrinology, geriatrics, gynecology, heart, kidney disease, neurology/neurosurgery, ophthalmology, orthopedics, psychiatry, rehabilitation, respiratory disorders, rheumatology, and urology.

The magazine also sent surveys to more than 850,000 U.S. doctors, asking them to rank the top five hospitals in their specialty for difficult cases, regardless of location or expense.

The rankings are also based on hospital death rates in Medicare patients with certain conditions, the number of patients and nurses, hospital credentials, and the availability of advanced medical technology.

The rankings don’t include military or veterans hospitals because the magazine couldn’t get government data needed to rank those hospitals.

Top Hospitals Far Away?
U.S. News & World Report states that “for most people most of the time, the hospital their doctor recommends is fine.”

The magazine points out that “going to a hometown hospital means being close to family and friends, whose watchfulness might keep things from going wrong. And patients draw strength from their comforting presence.”

However, the magazine notes that top-notch hospitals might be best for difficult or complex conditions.

Talking to your doctor may help you decide whether a highly ranked hospital is the right place to get treatment.

Did your hospita make the list?

America’s best hospitals, News & World Report

America’s best hospitals, News & World Report

From www.RealAge.com:

Do This Exercise While You Web Surf

Wouldn’t it be nice to have the washboard abs you saw in that online diet ad?

You can start by squeezing. No, not your abdominals. Your booty! Here’s the three-step exercise you can do all day.

Do It Now — And Wherever You Can
Yes, while you’re reading this tip, try this exercise for flatter abs:

1. Suck your belly button in tight.
2. Squeeze your butt as if you’re trying to pull on a pair of too-tight jeans (pretend the top of your head is being pulled toward the ceiling by a string).
3. Hold that position.

Do this often (on the elevator, waiting in line, at work, every time you walk somewhere) and you’ll quickly firm up your middle by working your transverse abdominis — the muscle that supports the abdominal wall. And you’ll have better posture to boot.

flat abs exercise, posture

flat abs exercise, posture

From www.RealAge.com:

3 Veggies That Make Your Brain Younger

Broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage. Consider them a facelift for your brain.

That’s because munching on veggies like these — which belong to the cruciferous family of veggies — could shave 1 to 2 years off your mind’s age. Here’s how they help.

The Big Memory Reveal
Women who filled out a food-intake questionnaire demonstrated some pretty significant memory muscle on tests when their questionnaires revealed a true love for all things cruciferous (as well as leafy and green, like spinach). In fact, the veggie-lovers’ test scores were more in line with those of women a couple of years younger. That means your brain could be 48 when the calendar says it’s 50. Not bad. How’s your memory?

Mighty Nutrients
Researchers speculate that nutrients like lutein and folate, found in abundance in foods like spinach, may be part of the reason for the brain benefits that cruciferous and leafy green veggies confer.

cruciferous vegetables, brain boosters

cruciferous vegetables, brain boosters

From www.WebMD.com:

Weight Training for Heart Disease
A No-No No More: Weight Training Aids Ailing Hearts

By Daniel J. DeNoon
WebMD Medical News

It’s no longer a no-no. Moderate weight training offers big benefits to people with heart disease, the American Heart Association says.

In 2000, the AHA approved weight training for people with several kinds of heart disease. Now that cautious permission has become a ringing endorsement.

“Just as we once learned that people with heart disease benefited from aerobic exercise, we are now learning that guided, moderate weight training also has significant benefits,” says Mark Williams, PhD, of Creighton University School of Medicine in Omaha, Neb.

Williams and colleagues rewrote the AHA’s new weight training advice. Those recommendations appear in the July 31 issue of the AHA journal Circulation.

Weight training — or “resistance training,” as researchers like to call it — is no substitute for aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise such as walking, running, and biking is still the most important way to stay fit. But to get the most out of aerobic exercise, one should add weight training.

The benefits of weight training include:

Increased muscle strength
Increased bone density
Increased lean muscle mass — and, if weight is kept constant, loss of fat
Increased insulin sensitivity
Increased endurance (to a somewhat lesser extent than with aerobic exercise)

read more by clicking above.

heart disease, weight training, strength training

heart disease, weight training, strength training

From www.RealAge.com:

Pumping Up with Protein

The journey of getting older doesn’t have to mean getting weaker, too.

But go just one week without enough protein and your muscles could be on the path to punyville.

Protein Power
We all know that exercise is the best way to keep muscles in tip-top shape and fight the natural decline in strength that comes with aging.

But what you eat matters, too. That’s what a recent study of older men and women revealed. Those who went for a week without adequate protein started to show early signs of muscle deterioration.
In a world of high-protein diets and meat-laden buffets, getting enough protein may not seem like problem No. 1 for most people. But research shows that elderly people often fail to do just that.

What’s Your Number?
You don’t want to go overboard on protein, because too much could stress your kidneys. How much protein do you need?

protein, elderly, muscle deterioration

protein, elderly, muscle deterioration

From www.msnbc.com’s health section:

Restless legs in the genes, not the imagination
2 studies show strange-sounding twitchy syndrome is a real condition

Scientists have linked certain genes to restless legs syndrome, suggesting the twitching condition described as “jimmy legs� in a “Seinfeld� episode is biologically based and not an imaginary disorder.

New studies published this week in two top medical journals are being called the first to identify specific genes responsible for restless legs syndrome symptoms.

Research in the New England Journal of Medicine, linked a common gene variation to nighttime leg-twitching. It involved people in Iceland and the United States.

A second study in Nature Genetics identified the same gene variation and two others in Germans and Canadians with restless legs syndrome.

“This discovery demonstrates the power of genetics not only for uncovering the biological causes of disease, but also for defining diseases such as RLS and establishing them as medical conditions,� said Dr. Kari Stefansson, in a prepared statement.

Stefansson is a prominent Icelandic scientist who co-authored the New England Journal study.

Restless legs syndrome is a neurological condition characterized by an irresistible urge to move the legs. Sufferers say it often hits at night, preventing them from sleeping.

restless legs syndrome

restless legs syndrome

From www.ArticlesTree.com:

The secret to looking young and beautiful is to have beautiful skin. We all dream of getting a miracle in a bottle and so many advertisements have led us to believe that it is possible to have zero pores, instant face lifts and more. In our pursuit of getting that miracle bottle, we are willing to pay hundreds of dollars for a tiny jar of moisteriser that is supposedly going to fix our problems forever. We have been brainwashed to think that only expensive beauty products would be able to deliver what we seek. But that is not true. A good skin care product does not need to be expensive. Here are my ten tips to have beautiful skin without spending hundreds of dollars each year.
1)Have a routine to cleanse, tone and moisterise your face twice each day, morning and night. The skin collects a lot of dirt and dust and you’ll want to avoid the pores from being clogged up with impurities. Clogged up pores lead to bigger pores, blackheads, pimples and blemishes.

2)Try to exfoliate the skin weekly to get rid of the dead cells that is causing the skin to appear dull. You won’t believe what a weekly polish will do to your skin. Use either home made exfoliators or mask.

3)Replenish the lost nutrients by applying a homemade mask on a weekly basis - preferably after a good exfoliation. Dependent on what kind of mask it is, put it on for 5 to 15 minutes. This will leave the skin soft, smooth and refreshed.

Read more cheap skincare treatment tips by clicking above.

cheap skincare treatment

cheap skincare treatment

From www.msnbc.com:

The headlines were irresistible: “Lunch Break Boob Jobs Headed to Europe.” According to some news outlets that carried the story, doctors would be using women’s own belly fat for a one-hour breast-augmentation procedure that could be available as early as next year. But if you think getting a flatter stomach and bigger cup size in the time it takes to eat a sandwich sounds too good to be true, you’re right. So let us set the record straight: there’s no such thing as the one-hour boob job—unless you count some of the architectural wonders now being sold at Victoria’s Secret.

So how did the news-that’s-not get such, um, pick up? Well, there is a globule of truth in that a small San Diego-based biotech company called Cytori Therapeutics has developed a system that uses the stem cells in fat to make fat grafts more viable. That’s important if you’re going to have surgery involving relocation of fat cells. (Left to its own devices, transplanted fat often dies or gets re-absorbed. If used to boost breasts, it can calcify in a way that can make make cancer detection more difficult.) But not only is the Cytori technique still in clinical trials, the procedure will not take place at drive-by speed.

Read more of this tantilizing article by clicking above.

breast enhancement

breast enhancement

From www.RealAge.com:

The Weak Bones Diet

What do you call a diet that asks you to cut calories but doesn’t require you to exercise? Call it weak.

That’s exactly what happens to your bones when you opt for exercise-free weight loss — they get weaker. And that means a slip or fall may be more likely to put you out of commission. Talk about lame.

Density Decline
Weight loss has long been known to make bones lighter and less dense. Makes sense, because bones get stronger when they’re routinely stressed, and with less weight to carry around, bones don’t have to work quite as hard.
Enter exercise. In a study of healthy middle-aged people, those who lost weight by exercising were fortunate to report no bone-density changes (see how it’s measured) in their hips or spine.

Strong Stuff
When you exercise, your smart body recognizes the extra strain and tries to make sure your bones are strong enough to endure it, so weight-bearing exercises are best for building bone. We’re talking about things like walking, climbing stairs, and lifting weights, as well as balancing exercises. Make sure you’re getting enough calcium and vitamin D, too. Bones need those nutrients to build new bone.

weak bones diet

weak bones diet

From www.RealAge.com

Where the Wild Cravings Are

That supersize bag of chips and gallon of caramel-swirl ice cream didn’t just jump into your grocery cart. So what happened?

There may actually be a very scientific reason why the jumbo bag of frozen Brussels sprouts didn’t leap into your cart instead, especially if you were shopping while hungry.(

Sweet and Salt Sensitive
In a study, researchers recently tested healthy men’s ability to taste salty, sweet, and bitter solutions. Turns out that when the men had skipped a meal, their taste buds were more tuned-in to sweet and salty flavors, but not so much the bitter ones — think broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and lots of other veggies.

Researchers suspect that our bodies may have been hardwired since ancient times to associate “sweet” and “salty” with “safe to eat,” so these flavors may be more likely to trigger eating, especially when the body needs energy.

Hunger-Control Central
Now that you understand the craving, maybe you’ll have more willpower the next time the candy aisle is calling. Here’s another way to control your eating habits: Eat three square meals a day, plus a snack, so you never get ravenous.

craving, sweet and salty

craving, sweet and salty