Encouraging Health

Courtesy of www.realage.com

The perfect picnic side dish for waist-minded people? Skip the calorie-laden layered bean dip and try a highly portable Layered Black Bean Salad instead.

It’s long on bean and cheese taste but low in calories. And because it’s high in fiber, too, you won’t be tempted to nosh on leftovers at the end of the day. You’ll be satisfied well past sunset. Here’s the recipe.

Fiber Tally
Brenda Watson, author of The Fiber 35 Diet, advises eating 35 grams of fiber a day if you want to slim down and healthy up.

Layered Black Bean Salad
Ingredients
2 tablespoons olive oil
6 tablespoons fresh lemon or lime juice
3 tablespoons rice wine vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
Fresh ground pepper
12 cups baby spinach leaves, stems removed, loosely packed
3 cups cherry or grape tomatoes
1 medium yellow bell pepper, seeded, cut into quarters, and sliced thin
1 medium red bell pepper, seeded, cut into quarters, and sliced thin
Two 15-ounce cans low-sodium or no-salt black beans (drained and rinsed)
4 ounces shredded reduced-fat sharp cheddar cheese
1 medium avocado, peeled, pitted, and sliced into 1/2-inch pieces

Preparation
1. To make the dressing, in a small bowl whisk together olive oil, lemon or lime juice, vinegar, mustard, and pepper. Set aside.
2. In a deep, clear, glass bowl, layer the salad as follows: 6 cups spinach leaves, 1 1/2 cups tomatoes, 1/2 yellow bell pepper, 1/2 red bell pepper, 1 cup beans, 1/2 cup cheese. Repeat the layers. Top the salad with avocado. To serve, pass salad around table followed by the dressing. Serves 6.

healty bean dip

healty bean dip

Help for when you overindulge

Preventing Hangover Headache

First, Lay says, eat a greasy meal before drinking.

When choosing an alcoholic beverage, consider clear ones.

When drinking, don’t guzzle. Sip alcoholic beverages slowly. Give your body time to process the alcohol.

Between drinks, have at least one big glass of a nonalcoholic beverage.

When drinking, don’t guzzle. Sip alcoholic beverages slowly. Give your body time to process the alcohol.

Between drinks, have at least one big glass of a nonalcoholic beverage.

Curing Hangover Headache

If your hair hurts as you read this, it’s too late to prevent your headache.

Fortunately, it’s not too late to do something to make yourself feel better.

“The most important thing is dehydration,” Lay says. “Drink some water.”

Even if you could manage it, a greasy meal isn’t a good idea at this point. But you need something in your stomach.

Lay advises something bland, with protein and carbs — a poached egg on toast should do the trick.

And take in some sugar. Acidic juices aren’t going to go down well — but a little tomato juice or apple juice would be great.

If your stomach can handle it — and if you don’t suffer from ulcers or bleeding disorders — take aspirin, naproxen, ibuprofen, or another NSAID. Again, do NOT take acetaminophen (Tylenol).

hangover help

hangover help

Mom’s Chicken Soup aginst Herbal remedy, Echinacea?

Squashing a cold is like curing hiccups: We all have our favorite methods. But do any of them really work?

Seems echinacea, that controversial cold-quelling herb, really can help people feel better faster. Researchers pored over 14 different studies and determined that echinacea can shorten a cold’s stay by an average of 1.4 days. Now how about that soup?

Immune-System Booster
Certain compounds in echinacea, mainly alkamides, chicoric acid, and polysaccharides, may stimulate the immune system. The end result? Echinacea could help both shorten and prevent colds.

But Before Taking . . .
Always talk to your healthcare provider before taking any herbal remedy. Echinacea may interfere with your other medicines and supplements, or it could be harmful to you if you have certain medical conditions.

Chicken Soup Works, Too
Are you devoted to the cold-soothing chicken soup recipe your mom used to make? Well, you don’t have to give it up. Seems chicken soup has feel-better powers, too.

chicken soup, echinacea

chicken soup, echinacea

Have it with a Berry on Top

A side of sliced strawberries with your steel-cut oatmeal may make for one heck of a smart breakfast combo.

That’s because oats are rich in heart-healthy compounds called phenols. And it seems that adding some vitamin C (from the berries) is like adding water to a Chia Pet: It causes the heart-helping powers of the oats to grow.

Working in Synergy
When oat phenols and vitamin C were combined in a study, they worked synergistically to reinforce LDL cholesterol and make it more stable — even better than the oat phenols alone could do. And you want your LDL to be stable, because that means it’s less likely to break down and stick to the walls of your arteries. You know, that process that can lead to heart attacks, strokes, and other nasty business.

Why Steel-Cut Oats?
They take a little longer to make, but they’re worth it. Steel-cut oats — also called coarse-cut oats — are lightly processed. And that means they probably still have most of their good stuff intact (fiber, nutrients, etc.).

steel-cut oats, strawberries, phenols, vitamin C

steel-cut oats, strawberries, phenols, vitamin C

Common Virus Boosts Fat-Cell Production — and Makes Fat Cells Fatter

By Daniel J. DeNoon
WebMD Medical NewsReviewed by Louise Chang, MDAug. 20, 2007 – Infection with a virus linked to human obesity ups fat-cell production and makes fat cells fatter.

“Infectobesity” is the term coined by Louisiana State University researcher Nikhil Dhurandhar, PhD, and colleagues to describe the phenomenon. Their research strongly links a common human virus — adenovirus-36 or Ad-36 — to human obesity.

Previous research showed that nearly 30% of obese people, but only 11% of lean people, have been infected with Ad-36. Monkeys experimentally infected with Ad-36 gain significant weight.

Now Dhurandhar’s team finds evidence that Ad-36 has a direct effect on human fat cells. Infection of adult stem cells from human fat triggers their transition into pre-fat cells. And these virus-infected cells hold much more fat than normal pre-fat cells.

The end result: more, fatter fat cells.

Dhurandhar colleague Magdalena Pasarica, MD, PhD, presented the findings at the 234th national meeting of the American Chemical Society, held Aug. 19-23 in Boston.

“We’re not saying that a virus is the only cause of obesity, but this study provides stronger evidence that some obesity cases may involve viral infections,” Pasarica says in a news release. “We would ultimately like to identify the underlying factors that predispose some obese people to [the effects of] this virus and eventually find a way to treat it.”

It’s not entirely clear how the virus acts on fat stem cells. But Pasarica reported a major clue: One specific Ad-36 gene, called E4Orfl, is responsible for the virus’s obesity-related effects.

Read more by clicking above.

obesity virus, fat cells

obesity virus, fat cells

Whispering Strokes Are Subtle, Often Overlooked, and Risky, Report Shows

By Miranda Hitti
WebMD Medical NewsReviewed by Louise Chang, MDAug. 2, 2007 — Researchers have coined a new term, “whispering stroke,” for strokes with subtle symptoms that doctors and patients may overlook.

But whispering strokes shouldn’t get hushed. A new study shows that whispering strokes can dim patients’ physical and mental functioning and cut their quality of life.

“People need to take these symptoms more seriously and see a doctor about them,” says researcher George Howard, DrPH, in an American Heart Association news release.

Howard works for the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s School of Public Health. His study appears in today’s early online edition of the journal Stroke.

Learn Stroke Symptoms
Before you read about Howard’s study, review this list of stroke symptoms:

Sudden numbness or weakness of the face, arm, or leg (especially on one side of the body)
Sudden confusion, trouble speaking, or understanding speech
Sudden trouble seeing in one or both eyes
Sudden trouble walking, dizziness, or loss of balance or coordination
Sudden, severe headache with no known cause
Seek emergency care immediately if you or someone you know experiences those symptoms, even to a mild degree.

Those symptoms don’t always indicate stroke, but the stakes are too high to see if the symptoms pass. Stroke is the No. 2 cause of death for U.S. adults. It’s also a leading cause of disability.

Strokes happen when the blood flow to the brain is interrupted. Most strokes are ischemic strokes, which are caused by blood clots. Clot-busting stroke drugs must be given shortly after the onset of stroke symptoms.

Other strokes are bleeding (hemorrhagic) strokes, which happen when a blood vessel in the brain starts to leak. Transient ischemic attacks (TIAs), often called ministrokes, are fleeting but can still cause irreversible damage.

whispering strokes

whispering strokes

Good Coping Skills May Raise ‘Good’ Cholesterol Levels

By Kathleen Doheny
WebMD Medical NewsReviewed by Louise Chang, MDAug. 20, 2007 — The better you cope with stress, the better your “good” cholesterol level is likely to be, according to a new study.

“We know that stress and hostility affect cholesterol,” says researcher Carolyn M. Aldwin, PhD, professor and chairwoman of the department of human development and family sciences at Oregon State University in Corvallis. There has been less research, however, on how coping skills can counteract the effects of stress, she says.

Good coping skills were associated with better levels of the so-called “good” cholesterol or high-density lipoprotein (HDL) in her study.

The study was released at the 115th annual convention of the American Psychological Association in San Francisco.

Stress and Cholesterol
Aldwin and her colleagues evaluated data from 716 men who participated in the Normative Aging Study. The researchers looked at the interplay of hostility, stress, coping, and the participants’ cholesterol levels.

The average age of the participants was 65; most were white. They were evenly split between white-collar and blue-collar occupations.

The researchers assessed the men’s hostility and asked them to describe their most stressful problem in the past week.

The men also completed a questionnaire that asked them to rate how often they used 26 different coping strategies when dealing with a stressful problem in the past month. Some were unhealthy strategies, such as socially isolating themselves when under stress or blaming themselves for the stress. Other strategies were healthy, such as making a plan of action to deal with the problem causing the stress.

The more hostile the men were, the more likely they were to look at problems as stressful. They were also more apt to use unhealthy coping skills to deal with that stress.

After fasting overnight, the men’s blood was tested for HDL cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) or “bad” cholesterol, and triglycerides.

Read more of this study by clicking above.

stress, cholesterol

stress, cholesterol

Here’s how to treat them:

Typically, I get sinus headaches with allergies in seasonal changes. With these hints and tips, your sinus headaches will lessen:

*Avoid smoke, other inhaled irritants, and allergens, such as animal dander.
*Add moisture to the air with a humidifier or a vaporizer, unless you have mold allergy (mold may grow in your vaporizer).
* Inhale steam from a basin of hot water or shower to relieve pain.
* Put warm, most washcloths on your face.
* Use decongestants as directed. Never use nonprescription nasal spray decongestants for more than 3 days. After 3 days they may cause your symptoms to get worse.
* Get plenty of rest and drink a lot of water.
* Elevate your head in bed, but only slightly.
* Take all of your medicine as prescribed.

sinus headaches

sinus headaches

A tip for diabetics:

When you want to grab a blood-sugar-balancing snack, which is better: a fresh apple or a slice of rye toast?

Go for the bread — as long as it’s whole grain. Getting about 17 grams of grain fiber a day (the kind found in whole-grain breads and cereals) could slash type 2 diabetes risk by a third, research shows. And rye bread seems to steady blood sugars best.

When it comes to preventing type 2 diabetes, controlling blood sugar is what it’s all about. And fiber keeps blood sugar nice and steady, so you don’t get glucose spikes that send your pancreas into overdrive. (Are you getting enough fiber?

Although some fruits and veggies are great sources of fiber, they didn’t have quite the diabetes-busting magic touch that the cereal fiber had in a recent study. It may be that magnesium, phenols, and other goodies in whole-grain bread interact with the cereal fiber to help lower diabetes risk. (How close are you to getting diabetes?

diabetics, blood sugar, lower blood sugar

diabetics, blood sugar, lower blood sugar

Men’s Health issue: Prostrate:

Evading prostate cancer could be a little easier if you’d put more of these on your plate: cruciferous vegetables.

Turns out sulforaphane — the compound that makes the veggies in this family taste a little bitter and smell a little funky — can help disarm prostate cancer cells before they do any damage. Here’s the cruciferous lineup.

Team Green (and White)
There’s no surefire way to prevent prostate cancer. But your risk is greatly affected by your diet and everyday habits. For example, how much broccoli you eat. And how much cauliflower. These veggies — along with cabbage, kale, and bok choy — belong to the cruciferous family, and research shows that this family may put the kibosh on prostate cancer like no other veggie group.

More tools to add to your prostate protection squad:
Up your intake of fruits and veggies. Although cruciferous veggies seem to be particularly helpful in protecting your prostate, upping your intake of produce, in general, is good for it, too.

Mens health, prostate health, cruciferous foods, vegetables

Mens health, prostate health, cruciferous foods, vegetables