In Hand, Underfoot Reflexology

Our poor feet. We walk on them, stub them and squish them into cruel shoes. So now I find out that my entire body is represented by my feet. Does that mean there could be a corn on my kidney or something like that?  

Reflexology is an ancient practice from India and China that uses pressure points on the hands and feet (representing body parts, organs and organ systems) to treat illness and injuries. Each important body part or organ has an energy termination point. Illness or injury creates crystalline deposits at these points and reflexology is designed to break up these deposits and get the energy flowing again. Read More….

Trans fats linked to greater heart disease risk

A study published today supports recent efforts to rid the American diet of trans fats. In the study, women with the highest levels of trans fat in their blood had triple the risk of heart disease as those with the lowest levels.“Humans cannot synthesize, or create, trans fatty acid. The only source is through diet,” study chief Dr. Frank B. Hu of the Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, said in a written statement.

The main source of trans fat in the diet is partially hydrogenated oils that are plentiful in cookies, crackers, pastries and fried foods. “Eliminating the use of partially hydrogenated oils and other sources of trans fat in the U.S. diet — as long as saturated fat intake doesn’t increase — will likely help reduce the burden of cardiovascular disease,” Hu said. Read More…

Blueberries May Help Curb Colon Cancer

Blueberries, already touted as a super food because they may protect against memory loss and heart disease, could help stop the development of colon cancer, a new study finds.The study showed that a natural compound called pterostilbene — found in blueberries and other fruits — helped prevent pre-cancerous colon lesions in rats.

“Pterostilbene is an antioxidant and an anti-inflammatory agent that is mostly found in blueberries and blackberries,” said study leader Bandaru Reddy, a research professor at Rutgers University’s Susan Lehman Cullman Laboratory for Cancer Research, in Piscataway, N.J. “We tested it using a rat model that is very similar to the human situation. Several other compounds tested using this model in the past are already in human trials.” Read More…

doctors’ office also not properly sterilizing equipment

A doctors’ office in the same health region as the troubled Vegreville hospital also was not properly sterilizing medical equipment, health minister Dave Hancock confirmed Monday.

Hancock said he can’t identify the doctors involved or the office’s location in the East Central Health region because the incident was under investigation by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Alberta.

“But I can tell you that it involved a sterilization process with respect to equipment being used in the doctor’s office for examinations and procedures,” he said. Read More…

Angioplasty no more effective than drugs: study

Angioplasty, a common medical procedure that unblocks clogged arteries, is no more effective than a regime combining drugs and lifestyle changes in patients with heart disease, suggests a landmark study that challenges the popular practice.

In less threatening cases, the use of angioplasty and stents to open partially locked arteries should be considered only after medication, diet, and exercises regimes, according to the major new study.

The surprising findings, revealed at the American Cardiology Conference in New Orleans on Monday, are expected to fuel a heated debate between cardiologists who encourage long-term approaches and those who favour angioplasties and stent insertions. Read More…

Flaws in James Randi’s Studies

a recent video, James Randi attempted to ridicule Astrology and demonstrate people’s gullibility – but his methods were wrong. See why…

FDA to tighten conflict-of-interest rules

The Food and Drug Administration said Wednesday that it would bar outside medical experts with a financial interest in a manufacturer from voting on advisory panels assessing whether drugs or other products made by that company are safe and effective.

The proposed restrictions — which would also apply to experts with ties to competing firms — would significantly strengthen the FDA’s conflict-of-interest policy. One recent study suggests that more than one-fourth of FDA advisors may be prohibited from voting. read More…

Smoking May Impair Teens’ Attention

March 21, 2007 — Teens may have more trouble paying attention if they smoke, especially if their mothers smoked cigarettes during pregnancy.

That news comes from researchers including Leslie Jacobsen, MD, of the departments of psychiatry and pediatrics at Yale University’s medical school.

Exposure to tobacco smoke before birth or during the teen years may interfere with the development of attention skills, Jacobsen and colleagues report.

That’s one more reason to prevent smoking, especially among women of childbearing age, and to help people quit smoking, the researchers note.

Their study looked at 181 teens. The researchers asked the teens’ moms if they had smoked during pregnancy. Read More…

U.S. to test supplement against Parkinson’s disease

Early research suggests creatine supplements might be able to help slow the progression of Parkinson’s, an incurable brain disorder that can slowly but steadily paralyze patients.

The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, one of the U.S.

National Institutes of Health, is launching the trial as the first in a series of government-sponsored studies of new Parkinson’s treatments.

Many clinical studies in the United States are sponsored by drug companies, which means that often only medicines they can make money on get tested.

The NINDS will recruit 1,720 people with early-stage Parkinson’s disease across the United States and Canada. Patients and doctors alike will not know whether they are getting creatine or a placebo. The study is due to last three to five years.

“This study is an important step toward developing a therapy that could change the course of this devastating disease,” said NIH Director Dr. Elias Zerhouni.
Read More….

Study confirms how dangerous prescription drugs are

Study confirms how dangerous prescription drugs are:
Drug side effects make 2 million sick
Properly prescribed medicine kills 106,OOO each year

Drugs that cause worst reactions – Heart medications. blood thinners, and chemotherapeutic agents for cancer. Most common cause of death- liver or kidney failure, heart rhythm problems, bone marrow destruction.

More than 2 million Americans become seriously ill every year because of toxic reactions to correctly prescribed medicines taken properly, and 106.000 die from those reactions, a new study concludes. That surprisingly high number makes drug side effects at least the sixth, and perhaps even the fourth, most common cause of death in this country. The analysis, the largest and most complete of its kind, suggests that one in 15 hospital patients in the United States can expect a serious reaction to prescription or over-the-counter medicine. and about 5 percent of these will die from it.

If the findings are accurate, then the number of people dying each year from drug side effects may be exceeded only by the numbers of people dying from heart disease cancer and stroke. and may be greater than the number dying from lung disease, pneumonia or diabetes. Experts said the study, which appears in today’s issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, is stronger than previous ones because it looks only at cases in which drugs were taken correctly. Previous hints of similarly high side effect rates had been attributed in large part to people getting the wrong medicines or taking them in the wrong doses.

Read More….