John Cleese takes us on a tour of a laughter therapy practice in India.
Laughter promotes stress reduction, community bonding, stronger immune system... and joy. What a simple solution!
Antioxidants increasingly have been praised for their benefits against disease and aging, but recent studies at Kansas State University show that they also can cause harm.
Researchers in K-State's Cardiorespiratory Exercise Laboratory have been studying how to improve oxygen delivery to the skeletal muscle during physical activity by using antioxidants, which are nutrients in foods that can prevent or slow the oxidative damage to the body. Their findings show that sometimes antioxidants can impair muscle function.
Antioxidant
"Antioxidant
is one of those buzz words right now," said Steven Copp, a doctoral
student in anatomy and physiology from Manhattan and a researcher in
the lab. "Walking around grocery stores you see things advertised that
are loaded with antioxidants.
I think what a lot of people don't realize is that the antioxidant and pro-oxidant balance is really delicate.
One of the things we've seen in our research is that you can't just give a larger dose of antioxidants and presume that there will be some sort of beneficial effect. In fact, you can actually make a problem worse."
David C. Poole and Timothy I. Musch, K-State professors from both the departments of kinesiology and anatomy and physiology, direct the Cardiorespiratory Exercise Laboratory, located in the College of Veterinary Medicine complex. Researchers in the lab study the physiology of physical activity in health and disease through animal models. Copp and Daniel Hirai, an anatomy and physiology doctoral student from Manhattan working in the lab, have conducted various studies associated with how muscles control blood flow and the effects of different doses and types of antioxidants.
Abnormalities in the circulatory system
Abnormalities in the circulatory system, such as those that result from aging or a disease like chronic heart failure, can impair oxygen delivery to the skeletal muscle and increase fatigability during physical activity, Copp said. The researchers are studying the effects antioxidants could have in the process.
"If you have a person trying to recover from a heart attack and you put them in cardiac rehab, when they walk on a treadmill they might say it's difficult," Poole said. "Their muscles get sore and stiff. We try to understand why the blood cells aren't flowing properly and why they can't get oxygen to the muscles, as happens in healthy individuals."
Some of the oxidants in our body, such as hydrogen peroxide, are helpful to increase blood flow.
Copp said there is a potential for antioxidants to reverse or partially reverse some of those changes that result from aging or disease. However, K-State's studies have shown that some of the oxidants in our body, such as hydrogen peroxide, are helpful to increase blood flow.
"We're now learning that if antioxidant therapy takes away hydrogen peroxide - or other naturally occurring vasodilators, which are compounds that help open blood vessels - you impair the body's ability to deliver oxygen to the muscle so that it doesn't work properly," Poole said.
Antioxidants can actually suppress key signaling mechanisms that are necessary for muscle to function effectively.
Poole said antioxidants are largely thought to produce better health, but their studies have shown that antioxidants can actually suppress key signaling mechanisms that are necessary for muscle to function effectively.
"It's really a cautionary note that before we start recommending people get more antioxidants, we need to understand more about how they function in physiological systems and circumstances like exercise," Poole said.
Mobility for advancing age and diseases like heart failure
Hirai said the researchers will continue to explore antioxidants and the effects of exercise training. Their studies are looking at how these can help individuals combat the decreased mobility and muscle function that comes with advancing age and diseases like heart failure.
"The research we do here is very mechanistic in nature, and down the road our aim is to take our findings and make recommendations for diseased and aging populations," Copp said.
The researchers have published their recent findings in several journals, including the Journal of Applied Physiology, Respiratory Physiology and Neurobiology, Microvascular Research, The American Journal of Physiology and Experimental Physiology.
The Cardiorespiratory Exercise Laboratory has been funded by grants from the National Institutes of Health, American Heart Association and intramural awards from the College of Veterinary Medicine.
"This is important, because surgery is not often affordable or reimbursed by insurance," said leading scientist Dr. Donna Ryan. "In fact, many medical treatments are frequently not reimbursed by insurance if they are for obesity. So this research is needed to show that primary care doctors are capable of helping obese patients lose weight to improve health, even those with extreme obesity. "
Ryan said losing only five-percent of body weight can reap healthy benefits for the extremely obese, and nearly 61-percent of those in her clinical trial achieved that. More than 40-percent lost 10-percent body weight or more.
Physicians Trained in Intensive Medical Intervention
Ryan and her team spread out across Louisiana to recruit and train practicing physicians and their office staffs in eight cities in what she called "intensive medical intervention," in which physicians used a combination of medication, low-calorie diets and behavior changes. All of the techniques were endorsed by national guidelines for obesity management. Training of physicians and their staffs took about a day and a half.
Funded by the Louisiana Office of Group Benefits, which provides health coverage for state employees, the research team contacted state employees, seeking participants to screen for and enroll in the trial. Nearly 400 participants enrolled in the two-year trial, called LOSS, using the nearest trained physicians.
About half of the participants received the intensive medical intervention, the other half received what Ryan called "usual care."
Program Starts with Low-calorie Liquid Diet
Those in the intense intervention group were immediately placed on a low-calorie liquid diet. They gradually moved to a low calorie, highly controlled diet using meal replacements, and received weight loss medication and group behavioral therapy that included lessons in exercise, activity, self-monitoring and recommendations for walking, water exercise and weight training. The group sessions were supervised by office staff.
Recommended Activities
Success in Daily Routine of Doctor's Practice
"We conducted this trial as close to the reality of a typical clinic setting as we could," Ryan said, "We didn't want to learn just if these strategies worked, but if they would work in the daily routine of a doctor's practice."
Challenge of Keeping Weight Off
Ryan noted that the continual challenge in weight loss
is keeping weight off, and that means sticking with a routine.
More than 50% of the LOSS participants stuck with it for two years or more, keeping much of the weight off, but Ryan said that does leave room for improving weight loss maintenance.
The LOSS trial results were published in the current issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.
The Pennington Biomedical Research Center is a campus of the Louisiana State University System and conducts basic, clinical and population research.More information about recalled food products is available on the Food Safety and Inspection Service Web site at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/
The Hygienic Laboratory is the state of Iowa's environmental and public health laboratory, with facilities located at the University of Iowa's Research Campus in Iowa City and at the Iowa Lab Facilities in Ankeny, a Des Moines suburb. For more information about the laboratory and its programs and services, visit http://www.uhl.uiowa.edu.
Newswise -- Buying medicine by mail may encourage patients to stick
to their doctor-prescribed medication regimen, new research suggests.
Patients with diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol
Researchers from UCLA and Kaiser Permanente's Division of Research in Oakland, Calif., found that patients with diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol who ordered their medications by mail were more likely to take them as prescribed by their physicians than patients who obtained medications from a local pharmacy.
"The
field of medication adherence research typically focuses on patient
factors for poor adherence, leading to a 'blame the patient' approach
for non-adherence," said Dr. O. Kenrik Duru, the study's lead
researcher and an assistant professor in the division of general
internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen
School of Medicine at UCLA.
Streamline the medication-acquisition process
"Our work helps to place this issue in a larger perspective," Duru said. "Our findings indicate that mail-order pharmacies streamline the medication-acquisition process, which is associated with better medication adherence."
The researchers found that 84.7 percent of patients who received their medications by mail at least two-thirds of the time stuck to their physician-prescribed regimen, compared with 76.9 percent of those who picked up their medications at traditional "brick-and-mortar" Kaiser Permanente pharmacies.
"The results were consistent for all three classes of medication, including medications to control diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol," said co-investigator Julie A. Schmittdiel, Ph.D., a research scientist with the Kaiser Permanente research division.
Other findings include:
• Before adjusting for other variables, white patients were more likely than Hispanics to obtain medications by mail (61.0 percent vs. 37.1 percent) and to be in the highest socioeconomic status quartile (27.5 percent vs. 17.8 percent).
• Mail-order pharmacy users were more likely than local pharmacy users to have a financial incentive to fill their prescriptions (49.6 percent vs. 23.0 percent) and to live a greater distance from a local pharmacy (8.0 miles vs. 6.7 miles). An example of a financial incentive is receiving a three-month supply of medication for the cost of a two-month supply.
• After adjusting for other variables, whites were more likely to use mail-order pharmacies (24.1 percent) than were Asian/Pacific Islanders (8.4 percent), Hispanics (5.2 percent), African Americans (4.0 percent) and individuals of mixed race (8.0 percent).
While other research has examined the association between medication costs and mail-order and local pharmacies, this is the first study to look at the relationship between pharmacy type and medication adherence. Furthermore, it controls for differences in out-of-pocket costs and medication supply (by number of days) between mail-order and local pharmacy users, something other datasets have not included.
"In other words, our study is able to isolate the use of mail-order pharmacies specifically, without the results being affected by differences in cost or in the number of pills provided with each dispensing," Duru said.
The study does have some limitations. For example, the findings need to be confirmed by a randomized controlled trial.
Still, the research suggests that increased mail-order use to obtain medications could improve patients' adherence.
In
addition to Duru and Schmittdiel, researchers included Wendy Dyer,
Melissa Parker, Connie Uratsu, James Chan and Andrew J. Karter of the
research division at Kaiser Permanente Northern California.
Grants
from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases funded
this study.
The Kaiser Permanente Division of Research conducts,
publishes and disseminates epidemiologic and health services research
to improve the health and medical care of Kaiser Permanente members and
society at large.
According to one of my favorite online health information sources, Mayo Clinic, physical activity is a "best practice" for everyone's health.
Regardless of age, weight or athletic ability, aerobic activity is good
for you. As your body adapts to regular aerobic exercise, you'll get
stronger and your body's organs get more efficient.
Consider these 10 ways that aerobic activity can help you feel better and enjoy life to the fullest.
Aerobic activity can help you:
|
a new weapon in the battle of the bulge by quenching the sensation of hunger. Credit: Wikimedia Commons, Jon Sullivan |
A real possibility exists for developing a new generation of
foods that make people feel full by releasing anti-hunger aromas during
chewing.
Scientists in the Netherlands are reporting that foods could fight the global epidemic of obesity with aromas that quench hunger and prevent people from overeating. Their article appears in ACS' Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry: "Retronasal Aroma Release and Satiation: A Review".
Rianne Ruijschop and colleagues note that scientists long have tried
to develop tasty foods that trigger or boost the feeling of fullness.
Until recently, that research focused on food's effects in stomach
after people swallow it.
Efforts now have expanded to include foods that release hunger-quenching aromas during chewing. Molecules that make up a food's aroma apparently do so by activating areas of the brain that signal fullness.
Their analysis found that aroma release during chewing does
contribute to the feeling of fullness and possibly to consumers'
decisions to stop eating. The report cites several possible
applications, including developing foods that release more aroma during
chewing or developing aromas that have a more powerful effect in
triggering feelings of fullness.
SOURCE:
"Retronasal Aroma Release and Satiation: A Review"
Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry
