Retinoids can do amazing things, according to Dr. Amy Wechsler, dermatologist, psychiatrist, and author of RealAge’s new skin-care book, The Mind-Beauty Connection.

Beauty in a Bottle
Better skin can come in a bottle — well, actually, a tube. But it’s a tube your doctor has to prescribe. Wechsler recommends two kinds of retinoids in particular — tretinoin (Retin-A, Avita, Renova) and tazarotene (Tazorac, Avage). “These are FDA-approved, rub-on treatments that rank high on my list of skin-renewal candidates,” writes Wechsler in her new book. “Prescription retinoids can transform your skin, smoothing wrinkles, unclogging pores, lightening superficial brown spots, and improving the texture of the skin. It takes several weeks to start seeing results, but it’s so worth it.” (Learn more about our new RealAge skin-care expert.)

Ask your dermatologist if retinoids are right for you.

Did You Know?
Retinoids are vitamin A derivatives, and vitamin A can help your skin from the inside out as well as the outside in. Sweet potatoes are a great source of this skin-friendly vitamin. Here is one more antiwrinkle food to stock up on:

Chocolate:

The Truth About Chocolate and Your Skin

Here’s a formula for sensational skin: cleanser, moisturizer, sunscreen, and . . . chocolate?

You heard right. When eaten, flavanol-rich cocoa, the main ingredient in dark chocolate, improves skin’s texture, thickness, hydration, and blood flow. It may even boost your skin’s defense against the sun by up to 25 percent! How? It packs serious antioxidant power. Just don’t overdo it — chocolate is high in fat and calories, too. And you still need to wear sunscreen every day.

Chocolate’s good for your skin? It’s true! Antioxidant compounds in cocoa, called flavanols, improve artery health by boosting blood flow, and that boost may be good for your skin, too.

Researchers discovered this chocolate benefit in a study of women who consumed half a cup of cocoa (containing 329 milligrams of flavanols per serving, the amount in a 3-½ ounce serving of dark chocolate) daily for 12 weeks. At the end of the study, the women experienced less skin dryness, scaling, and roughness compared to the beginning of the study. Also, their skin was thicker, exhibited improved blood flow, and was even more resistant to sun damage. Pretty amazing.

Still, don’t toss your sunscreen and indulge in mass quantities of chocolate. Consume the sweet in moderation and apply sunscreen every day when you’ll be outdoors for 20 minutes or more.

In its ever increasing desire to answer specific skin problems, Reviva Labs, a natural line created for skin professionals’ demand for individualized formulas that meet specific needs, has found a way to help treat Spider Veins, Rosacea and Varicose Veins and with Vitamin P!

What is Vitamin P you ask? Many years ago a Hungarian scientist (Dr. Szent-Gyorgl) won a Nobel prize for his research on Vitamin C. Within that research, he discovered that rutin and citrus bioflavanoids (part of the Vitamin C complex) were able to uniquely strengthen capillaries, help improve their elasticity and decongest clogged capillaries. He named these bioflavanoids Vitamin P. Vitamin P’s benefits can help lighten Rosacea’s redness as it helps fight further capillary damage. The medical/pharmaceutical world has seemed to overlook Vitamin P in favor of drugs like “Metrogel.” But Reviva Labs contacts with the aesthetician world in Europe enlightened us to their success in treating Rosacea (as well as Facial Spider Veins and Varicose Veins) with Vitamin P, both externally and internally.

In the USA Varicose Veins are reported to affect 30%-40% of middle-age women. About 15% of men are also affected. Reviva’s Labs VARICOSE VEINS & DEEP SPIDER VEIN LOTION WITH VITAMIN P (SRP: $23.00 for 8 oz.) can not only strengthen vein walls, it helps boost circulation and can diminish the vein appearance. For the lotion, in addition to rutin, citrus bioflavanoids (Vitamin P) and grapeseed extract, potent hesperidin complex (a different form of Vitamin P) has been added. There is also special horse-chestnut extract very significant in promoting vein strength and integrity.

Reviva Labs has SPIDER VEIN & ROSACEA DAY CREAM WITH VITAMIN P (SRP: $19.00 for 1.5 oz.) which works continually to aid Rosacea and Facial Spider Veins by aiding capillary strength and function. Particularly when supported by the other elements in the formula.

People who take daytime naps outperform non-nappers on memory exercises. And, surprisingly, a mere 6 minutes of shut-eye is enough to refresh the mind.

The Shut-Eyes Have It
How does a quick catnap power up your thinker? Seems the mere act of falling asleep triggers a brain-boosting neurobiological process that remains effective regardless of how long you snooze.

Brain-Friendly Folate

Protect your brain by kicking up your folate intake.

Adequate folate intake appears to protect against hemorrhagic stroke, a condition that causes bleeding in the brain. Hemorrhagic stroke is a less common type of stroke than ischemic stroke, which is caused by a blood clot-blocked artery. Protect your brain by packing your side dishes with folate-rich asparagus, Brussels sprouts, and artichokes.

Hemorrhagic strokes, which account for 17 percent of all stroke cases, are less common than ischemic strokes. A recent study reveals a link between high blood levels of folate and decreased risk of hemorrhagic stroke. Folate also helps protect blood vessels by lowering homocysteine levels. Homocysteine is an amino acid that increases the risk of atherosclerosis and stroke when found in high levels in the blood. Researchers speculate that folate’s favorable effects on blood vessels may extend beyond lowering homocysteine, but more research is needed to explore other potential benefits. In addition to asparagus, Brussels sprouts, and artichokes, other good sources of folate include orange juice, fortified whole-grain breads and cereals, and black-eyed peas. Folic acid is the synthetic form of folate found in fortified foods and supplements. Controlling high blood pressure, getting at least 30 minutes of physical activity per day, and reducing your weight and cholesterol, if you need to, also may help reduce stroke risk.

That’s right. If you’ve got green tea brewing in there, it’s one celestial seasoning that can extend your earthly stay. If you drink enough, you just might lower your risk of dying from a stroke by up to 42 percent!

Holy Teacup, Batman
In a large study of women, those who sipped at least five cups of green tea a day had a 42 percent lower risk of death due to stroke, compared with women who drank less than one cup a day. Other research shows that just two 8-ounce cups of tea daily can dramatically reduce the risk of dying from heart disease — most likely because of the artery-friendly polyphenols in tea.

A Brew for Your Brain

Green tea is not only good for your body, but it also may be good for your brain.

In a study, older people who drank at least 2 cups of antioxidant-rich green tea per day were about 50 percent less likely to develop cognitive impairment compared to the people who drank 3 or fewer cups per week. Exercising regularly and keeping your brain busy with puzzles, books, and problem solving are other good ways to stay sharp.

Correct water temperature and steeping time are important when making a flavorful cup of tea. Black and herbal teas should be prepared with boiling water and steeped for 4 to 6 minutes. However, these conditions are too harsh for delicate green tea and may affect the flavor and potency. When preparing green tea, heat water to approximately 160-180 degrees Fahrenheit. If you don’t have a thermometer, just bring the water to a boil and then remove it from the heat source for about a minute. Pour the water over your green tea bag or leaves and steep for 2 to 3 minutes, the optimal infusion time for this kind of tea.

You might want to ditch it if you see this in the ingredient list: phenols. Why? These compounds actually strip the top layer off your lips, according to RealAge skin expert Dr. Amy Wechsler.

Peel Appeal?
Phenols are included in some lip balms (Blistex, for one) to help remove very dry, chapped skin off the surface of lips. But if you’re just trying to keep lips moist, the phenols can backfire by removing your lips’ natural protective layer. That may also explain why some people get addicted to them, Wechsler writes in her new book, The Mind-Beauty Connection — the stripping effect can leave lips feeling raw, so you reach for more balm.

Careful Lip Care
To break this vicious lip-balm cycle, Wechsler recommends opting for a good moisturizing lip balm instead. One of her personal favorites is pure, simple Vaseline petroleum jelly. (Use it at night, since it offers no sun protection.) If you need to slough a bit of dry skin from your lips, just brush them very gently with a soft, wet toothbrush.

Dry Skin

Dry skin results when there is not enough water in the stratum corneum for it to function properly. One way this can happen is when protective oils in the stratum corneum are lost and the water that is normally present in the skin is allowed to escape. Too much soapy water, exposure to harsh chemicals, the normal aging process and certain types of skin diseases are some of the causes of decreased amounts of protective skin oils. As the stratum corneum dries out it shrinks and, as it shrinks, small cracks can occur. This exposes the underlying living cells to irritating substances and germs in the environment.

Ointment moisturizers have the greatest ability to trap moisture in the skin, but they have the greasy consistency and feel of Vaseline Petroleum Jelly. People often shy away from using them because of the greasy feel, but this can be minimized by applying a small amount and rubbing it into the skin well. Examples of effective ointment moisturizers include Aquaphor and plain Vaseline Petroleum Jelly. In addition to brand name moisturizers, some common household products, such as Crisco vegetable shortening, can be used as very inexpensive body moisturizers. Again, the key to using an ointment is to apply small amounts and rub it in well.

According to a large 22-year study, men who eat fish and shrimp five times a week have a 40 percent lower risk of colorectal cancer. Just get it broiled, not fried, and go light on the butter.

What’s Fish Got That Colons Love?
Researchers aren’t sure why frequently eating fish has such a protective effect on colon health. The omega-3 fatty acids and the vitamin D in fish might get the credit. Or it could simply be that fans of fish eat less red meat — something known to raise colon cancer risk. Regardless, grab that mahimahi burger instead of the beef patty.

Fish Helps You Keep the Beat

In this ever more polluted world, sometimes you just can’t avoid a little bit of particulate matter in your lungs.

So go fish! Eating finny food not only reduces your risk for heart disease but also may protect your heart from air-pollution-induced arrhythmias.

Taking Heart Against Pollution
Short-term exposure to small airborne particles spewed from cars, power plants, and other industrial sources may cause an irregular heart rate. Serious stuff, because it could open the door to heart arrhythmias and even heart attacks in people who are over 60 or have heart or lung diseases.

Airing Things Out
But fish could help thwart that unhealthy chain of events. A study found that the omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil may help alleviate those irregular beats. That’s just what happened when people over 60 who were exposed to particulate matter took a daily fish oil supplement. Fish oil supplements aren’t for everyone, though, and should be discussed with a doctor first.

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.

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.

Officials are not sure why the 2008 season is so mild

The West Nile virus season is on track to be the mildest in seven years, with less than a third the number of serious cases as last year’s total, U.S. health officials said.

As of Tuesday, there were 368 severe cases, with 18 deaths, according to preliminary reports. Mississippi and California were hardest hit, together accounting for nearly half the cases.

Most West Nile infections are reported in August and September, so health officials believe the worst of the season is probably over.

It’s not clear why this season has been so mild, said officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It’s the fewest cases since 2001, when the mosquito-borne virus was still emerging in the United States and was only reported in 10 states.

Mosquitoes often pick up the virus from birds they bite and then spread it to people. Perhaps the weather in some areas of the country was not as favorable for mosquito-breeding as in years past, some experts said.

West Nile virus was first reported in the United States in 1999 in New York, then gradually spread across the country.

About one in five infected people get sick. One in 150 will develop severe symptoms including neck stiffness, disorientation, coma and paralysis.

For all of 2007, more than 1,200 cases of severe West Nile illness were reported, and 124 deaths. The peaks occurred in 2002 and 2003, when severe illnesses numbered nearly 3,000 and deaths surpassed 260.

People who are afflicted by such lesions, fibers and bouts of cognitive haze say they hope their status in the eyes of the medical community is about to change. After two years of deliberation, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta — the federal agency that fields an elite corps of disease detectives — is looking into their complaints. The investigation, which will not report its findings until next year, could explain their weird symptoms or reject them as the inventions of sick minds.

Real or imagined?

The syndrome is being referred to as Morgellons. The name appears in a 1674 essay that describes an outbreak of “harsh hairs…unquiet symptoms…coughs and convulsions” among French children, but whether the moniker refers to the same disease is not known. Mary Leitao, a biologist in a town near Pittsburgh, found the term in a 1935 medical journal article when she was looking for an explanation for an eruption on her 2-year-old son’s lip. She went on to found the Morgellons Research Foundation, a Web-based group of self-described patients that now has more than 12,000 members.

CDC is investigating

New diseases emerge more frequently than most people realize. There has been roughly one per year since the 1970s. Some have a huge impact, such as AIDS; it has killed millions, but it surfaced as a strange pneumonia in five gay men in 1981. Others arrive with barely a ripple, such as the Dandenong virus, which killed three Australian women last year after they all received organs from an unknowingly infected donor.

But deciding whether a new disease exists is a long, contentious process of doing interviews, performing physical exams, conducting lab experiments, crunching data with computers, trawling textbooks for past cases and searching for a reasonable explanation if one isn’t immediately obvious. At the end of the process, disease detectives ideally want to end up with an agent — a bacterium, a virus, a genetic trigger or a toxin — that causes the symptoms they are seeing, a set of symptoms that only one thing can cause. An official designation as a disease means that sufferers are taken seriously; tests are devised to help make a diagnosis, treatments can be researched and insurance usually ends up paying for care.