Encouraging Health

What do bananas have in common with corn, eggs, salmon, and spinach? Hint: a vitamin that’s great for your colon.

We’re talking about B6. And science shows that simply getting your share of this nutrient could cut your risk of colon and rectal cancer. A lot.

Big Time B Benefits
In one of the largest studies to date on B6 and colon health, people with the highest intake of the
vitamin — from food and supplements — reduced their risk of colorectal cancer by 20 to 30 percent. And this study is just one of many showing a benefit. Researchers suspect that B6’s role in the metabolism of folate — another colon-friendly B vitamin — might explain the protective effects.

From Top to Bottom
A healthy colon is just one reason to load up on B6-rich foods. The mighty vitamin might also help stave off Parkinson’s disease and depression.

Recipe Corner
Bananas have close to half a milligram of B6 each (you need less than 4 milligrams). And sure, a plain banana makes a nice quick snack, but these EatingWell recipes can dress up your banana in seconds:
Add some protein to your banana with these: Mini Rice-Cake Stacks.
For a quick and easy dessert that tastes like a sundae but is way better for you, try this: Chocolate and Banana.
Put a delicious twist on burgers or chicken fingers with this: Spicy Banana Ketchup.

Satisfy that chocolate craving with a drizzle of melted chocolate chips over banana slices for an easy treat.

Makes 1 serving

ACTIVE TIME: 5 minutes

TOTAL TIME: 5 minutes

EASE OF PREPARATION: Easy

1 tablespoon semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 banana, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon nonfat vanilla yogurt

Melt chocolate chips in a small bowl in the microwave. Top banana slices with the chocolate and yogurt.

A U.K. hospital has found that copper surfaces contained 95 percent fewer bugs than stainless steel. But copper prices and theft may deter hospitals from switching.

Copper Reduces Spread of Bacteria
In April 2007, Birmingham’s Selly Oak Hospital replaced many of its stainless steel surfaces—including faucets, toilet seats, door handles and push plates—with copper. Over the next 18 months, it tested the bacterial content on its stainless steel and copper surfaces and found that copper surfaces contained 95 percent fewer bugs.

“The findings of a 90 to 95 per cent killing of those organisms, even after a busy day on a medical ward with items being touched by numerous people, is remarkable,” said Professor Tom Elliott, deputy medical director at University Hospital Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust. “It may well offer us another mechanism for trying to defeat the spread of infection.”

Copper has long been known for its healing power, and was used by the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans to treat wounds. However, over the past several decades, most hospitals have eschewed copper for the more modern stainless steel, even as some doctors said they preferred copper.

“The stainless steel, to the eye, looks a nice, bright, clean surface,” Southampton University Professor Bill Keevil told BBC Radio Ulster in 2004. “But stainless steel can scratch and so we get, effectively, microscopic valleys where bacteria can hide in the valleys.”

Selly Oak had a similar problem with its copper figments prior to the beginning of the study. According to Elliott, many of the hospital’s brass fixtures, which contain copper, were covered in chrome “to make them look nice,” which negated “any properties in the copper alloy which could kill bugs.”

With copper proven to provide such a large benefit, other hospitals may follow Selly Oak in installing copper surfaces. Along with a comprehensive “deep clean” of U.K. hospitals and an insistence on personal hygiene, British health officials believe that the spread of superbugs can be effectively contained.

The PatientPak, featuring wipes and sprays designed to stop the spread of superbugs such as MRSA, has been released in Britain, giving patients a personal cleaning station.

Courtesy of Denis Cummings. The PatientPak was made available to the British public last week for £15.99 (about $30) per kit. It features “antimicrobial products (wipes, hand sanitiser, fabric spray and hair and body wash), proven to kill 99.99% of all germs, with a carefully considered range of disposable products (cleansing wipes, soap, nail brush, lip balm and pen),” according to the PatientPak Web site.

The antimicrobial products contain Clinell, a chemical formula previously found only in hospitals that is “hailed as the most universal formula for killing infections.” PatientPak claims that the products can kill MRSA, e-coli, norovirus and salmonella within 10 seconds of application.

The kit will allow hospital patients, staff and visitors to protect themselves from infection, which can spread if hospitals are not as sanitary as they should be. “Although it is impossible to completely eliminate harmful germs, the new pack is designed to help patients and visitors exert control over their own safety,” said PatientPak medical adviser Dr. Guy Braverman. “Crucially, when people protect themselves, they are protecting others too.”

But Graham Tanner, chairman of the National Concern for Healthcare Infections, said to U.K. paper Daily Mail that the kit undermines the credibility of Britain’s hospital system. Hospitals already have many cleaning stations set up and they encourage staff and civilians to use them frequently throughout the day.

“Ill patients should not be forced to pay for a service that hospitals should provide as a basic principle of the NHS,” said Tanner. “This is a very cynical move by a company that is making these products to exploit fears and anxieties.”

If foot pain is throwing a wrench in your daily plans, there’s a simple solution that could get you back to high-stepping.

Research shows that orthotics — custom-made insoles that help realign abnormal foot mechanics — can work wonders for many types of foot pain.

Happy Feet
A review of 11 clinical studies found that custom orthotics, made for your feet, can ease pain from a host of problems, including high arches, rear-foot aches from rheumatoid arthritis (RA), and hallux valgus — misalignment of the big toe. Orthotics are somewhat less successful at relieving plantar fasciitis but may still be worth trying.

Get a Jump on Joint Pain
Dealing with foot, knee, or hip pain can be a drag, but it doesn’t have to stop you from doing the things you love. Here are some ways to ease the aches:

Exercise. Yup, regular physical activity can actually alleviate pain and stiffness.

Antiarthritis Lifestyle

Get a leg up on achy joints by exercising the pain away.

Resistance training, range of motion exercises, and walking increase quality of life and reduce pain and stiffness in people living with leg and knee osteoarthritis, a recent study reveals. For an exercise program designed especially for your needs, enlist the help of a physical therapist. To help keep you motivated, work out with a buddy.

For people with osteoarthritis, eating right and exercising can help ease pain, increase physical function, and improve quality of life. Make sure your fitness plan incorporates strength training, aerobic activities, range of motion exercises, and stretching to increase flexibility. If you have special limitations or severe pain, work with your healthcare provider to design a program that works for you. Over-the-counter pain medication may help ease aches before or after workouts. Follow your healthcare provider’s advice regarding medication. Foods that may have anti-inflammatory powers include cherries, blueberries, raspberries, broccoli, spinach, onions, kale, beans, and omega-3-rich fish, flaxseeds, and walnuts.

A team of researchers from the University of Rochester Medical Centre and Princeton University has discovered that existing anti-obesity drugs can be used to treat infections like flu, hepatitis or HIV.

Metabolism refers to a process by which living things break down nutrients to produce energy. For instance, the breakdown glucose and its conversation via chain reactions into adenosine triphosphate, the energy-storing currency of cellular life.

Glucose can also be converted into fatty acids - the lipid building blocks of human hormones and cell membranes - that are used by influenza, HIV and hepatitis viruses to build their viral cover and hijack human cells.

During the study, the researchers developed a new technique to analyse the mechanisms regarding how such viruses penetrate the metabolic building blocks from their cellular hosts.

They also studied the fluxes or concentration and turnover, of interchangeable molecules within the metabolic reactions that convert sugars into fatty acids.

“Using new fluxomic techniques, our study reveals that viral infection takes control of cellular metabolism and drives, among other things, marked increases in fatty acid synthesis,” Nature magazine quoted Dr. Joshua Munger, assistant professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of Rochester Medical Centre, and a study author, as saying.

“We also found that if you target these increases in fatty acid metabolism using existing anti-obesity and anti-metabolism drugs, you inhibit viral replication,” Munger added.

The new technique enabled the researchers to measure the changes in metabolic flux in human cells as they became infected by human cytomegalovirus (HCMV), an enveloped virus of the b-herpes family that infects most human adults and that causes severe disease in those with weakened immune systems.

The team used drugs known to inhibit enzymes that build fatty acids, acetyl-CoA carboxylase (ACC) and fatty acid synthase (FAS), used in the treatment of obesity and high cholesterol, to determine whether HCMV-induced fatty acid production was necessary for enveloped viruses to make copies of themselves.

They found that treatment with TOFA, an ACC inhibitor, led to a more than thousand-fold reduction in HCMV replication, while C75, an inhibitor of FAS, resulted in a more than 100-fold reduction.

From Paxalles: For the first time, researchers have developed a genetically altered animal model for cystic fibrosis (CF) that closely matches the characteristics of the disease in humans. By studying the complex and multi-organ disease process in the pig model, researchers can now better understand how the complications of CF develop, an advancement that may lead to new avenues for research in prevention and treatment.

The study, published in the Sept. 26 edition of “Science,” was funded in part by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), along with the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), both of the National Institutes of Health, as well as the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.

CF is an inherited disease of the mucus-secreting glands which is caused by mutations in the gene responsible for making the protein cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR), important for making sweat, digestive juices, and mucus. CF affects multiple organs, including the lungs, pancreas, liver, intestines, sinuses, and sex organs. In CF, mucus becomes thick and sticky, and builds up in the lungs and in the pancreas, blocking the airways, and disrupting the digestive system, resulting in recurrent, destructive infections and trouble digesting food. Respiratory failure and liver disease are the most common causes of death in CF.

Before now, mice have been the only animal model for CF. However since mice do not exhibit typical symptoms of CF, and the lung and liver diseases found in humans, finding a better model was crucial to furthering CF research.

“This represents a significant advance in research on cystic fibrosis. Until now, no animal model has come close to mimicking the disease as seen in humans. This model offers unprecedented opportunities to understand how the respiratory disease develops during childhood which may lead to novel prevention and therapeutic strategies,” said Elizabeth G. Nabel, M.D., director, NHLBI.

“By tracking how the lungs of these pigs respond to challenges to their respiratory systems introduced by the environment, we hope to better understand how the complications of CF progress in children,” said Michael J. Welsh, M.D., University of Iowa and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and senior author of the study.

Products Need Warning Labels, Scientist Says; Industry Contends They’re Safe to Drink

Caffeinated energy drinks that promise super alertness — and sometimes imply better sports performance — should carry labels that specify their amount of caffeine, says a Johns Hopkins University scientist.

Drinks with the highest caffeine content should also warn of potential health dangers, says Roland Griffiths, PhD, a professor of psychiatry and neuroscience at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, and senior author of a new report on the beverages.

“Many of these drinks do not label the caffeine content,” he says, and some energy drinks contain as much caffeine as found in 14 cans of soda.

The industry begs to differ, with spokespeople pointing out that most “mainstream” energy drinks contain the same amount of caffeine, or even less, than you’d get in a cup of brewed coffee. If labels listing caffeine content are required on energy drinks, they should also be required on coffeehouse coffee, says Maureen Storey, PhD, a spokeswoman for the American Beverage Association.

Energy Drinks: Caffeine Content
Griffiths and his colleagues contacted more than two dozen makers of energy drinks, asking for caffeine content. Here are some of the findings:

(The caffeine content is in milligrams per serving. Although serving sizes vary, Griffiths contends that most people will drink the entire can, whatever the number of ounces.)

Red Bull: 80 milligrams per 8.3-ounce serving
Tab Energy: 95 mg per 10.5-oz serving
Monster and Rockstar: 160 mg per 16-oz serving
No Fear: 174 mg per 16-oz serving
Fixx: 500 per 20-oz serving
Wired X505: 505 mg per 24-oz serving
In comparison, according to Griffiths:

Brewed coffee: 200 milligrams per 12-oz serving
Instant coffee: 140 mg per 12-oz serving
Brewed tea: 80 mg per 12-oz serving
Mountain Dew: 54 mg per 12 oz. serving
Dr. Pepper: 41 mg per 12-oz serving
Pepsi Cola: 38 mg per 12-oz serving
Coca-Cola Classic: 34.5 mg per 12-oz serving
Canned or bottled tea: 20 mg per 12-oz serving
Some of the energy drinks have lower caffeine contents, Griffith says. Among the lower doses:

Bomba Energy has 75 mg per 8.4-oz serving
Whoop Ass has 50 mg per 8.5-oz serving

(more…)

Over 80% Of The Teachers Surveyed Want More ADHD Training, UK

A new survey has revealed that over half of UK teachers have not had any training about Attention Deficit Hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). With millions of UK children back to school this month, this finding paints a distressing picture for the estimated 5% of school age children in the UK who have ADHD. These results are also particularly concerning as teachers are the most commonly used source of help in the UK for 70% of parents of children with ADHD.

The survey highlighted the lack of support for teachers trying to cope with ADHD in the classroom with almost half of all teachers saying that there is no official management strategy in place at their school.

Although 83% of teachers said that they could recognise the symptoms of ADHD, they did not feel that they were suitably equipped or supported to deal with a child with ADHD. Most had not received sufficient, or any, training in this matter.

“Many children with ADHD get into trouble at school because there is a lack of understanding and support for their difficulties. Improving the skills of teachers is essential. Not only does this affect the child at school, but the manner in which children with ADHD are managed in the classroom also impacts on their social and emotional development outside of school hours “, commented Holly Evans, ADHD Advisory Teacher. “There are techniques that can help teachers manage students with ADHD in the classroom effectively whilst helping these students reach their academic potential”.

(more…)

Ooze can help remove arsenic, kill bacteria and clear cloudiness

The slimy ooze inside prickly pear cactuses that helps the plants store water in the desert can also be used for scouring arsenic, bacteria and cloudiness out of rural drinking water, according to research at the University of South Florida in Tampa.

Biochemical engineer Norma Alcantar first learned of the cactus’s unique abilities from her grandmother, a native of north central Mexico. There, the residual water from boiling the flat, oval-shaped lobes of prickly pear for salads and other dishes was used to clear up cloudy water drawn from the river before use for cooking or drinking.

“When you boil [the prickly pear], what is getting separated is mucilage,” Alcantar said.

Mucilage is the clear, gooey, viscous liquid from within the cactus which helps to seal water inside the plant so it can survive desert-dry conditions.

Alcantar began to study how the mucilage worked to clear cloudy water. She found that the mucilage binds to the dirt and causes the particles to coagulate, forming large enough clumps that they can settle out of the water.

Then, she turned her attention to other water contaminants. The group’s more recent research has shown that the mucilage can also form a complex with arsenic, a carcinogenic water contaminant that can occur naturally or from industrial or agricultural pollution.

The arsenic-mucilage complex is large enough that it can be removed by drawing the water through a sand filter.

(more…)

Got an achy back? A bum knee? Consider soothing yourself with this poolside treat: a mai tai.

Okay, you can probably skip the rum. The real joint-soothing power in this pick-me-up comes from the pineapple.

Any Way You Slice It
That’s right. Pineapple –
be it part of an icy drink, a fruit salad, or a barbecue kabob — contains an anti-inflammatory enzyme called bromelain. New research shows that bromelain soothes your cells by reducing the migration of white blood cells to sites of inflammation — like sunburned skin, injured muscles, and arthritic joints.

Getting It Straight
If you’re not a pineapple fan, you can get bromelain straight from a supplement. It might even be the preferred method, since you don’t get tons of bromelain from fresh pineapple.

Moist, chewy, and oh so good. Here’s an upside-down pineapple breakfast treat you’ll flip for:

It’s the first week of fall. Help usher it in with this healthful, seasonally inspired treat: Pineapple Upside-Down Muffins.

They’re moist, chewy, and oh-so-good for you. And they make an easy breakfast option or lunch-bag addition for busy days. Here’s how to make ‘em.

Recipe Corner
Pineapple Upside-Down Muffins*
They glisten like sticky buns, but they’re whole-grain muffins packed with pineapple, raisins, and carrots. Here’s what you’ll need:

Topping
2 tablespoons packed light brown sugar
2 tablespoons chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)
1 10-ounce can pineapple slices

Muffins
3/4 cup whole-wheat flour
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
2 large eggs
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup canola oil
2 tablespoons pineapple juice or orange juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 8-ounce can crushed pineapple (not drained)
1 cup grated carrot (1 large)
1/2 cup old-fashioned oats
3/4 cup raisins, preferably baking raisins
1/4 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)

Preparation
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Coat 12 muffin cups with cooking spray.
2. To prepare topping: Sprinkle 1/2 teaspoon brown sugar into each muffin cup. Sprinkle nuts, if using, over the sugar. Stack pineapple slices and cut into 6 wedges. Place 2 wedges in each muffin cup.
3. To prepare muffins: Whisk whole-wheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a large bowl.
4. Whisk eggs and brown sugar in a medium bowl until smooth. Whisk in oil, juice, and vanilla. Stir in crushed pineapple. Make a well in the dry ingredients; add the wet ingredients and stir with a rubber spatula until just combined. Stir in carrot, oats, raisins, and nuts, if using. Scoop the batter into the prepared muffin cups (they’ll be quite full).
5. Bake the muffins until the tops are golden brown and firm to the touch, 15 to 25 minutes. Immediately loosen edges and turn muffins out onto a baking sheet. Restore any stray pineapple pieces and nuts. Let cool for at least 10 minutes. Serve upside down, either warm or at room temperature. Makes 1 dozen muffins.