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Eyesight and exercise E-mail
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People with impaired vision take 26% fewer steps per day than normal-sighted individuals and are about half as active physically, which could increase their risk of chronic illness, says a report by Maryland researchers in Archives of Ophthalmology. Loss of vision affects mobility and balance, but rehabilitation programs rarely stress physical exercise, they said.

Physical activity was assessed in 5,722 subjects from a 2003-2006 U.S. health survey, of whom 5,226 had normal vision, 351 needed glasses to see normally, and 145 had low vision that couldn't be corrected to normal. Normal eyesight was defined as 20/40 or better, which is the minimum driving requirement in most states. Activity levels were assessed with an accelerometer worn on the hip for approximately 14.3 hours a day over seven days. All subjects underwent eye examinations.

Individuals with low vision took 5,992 steps per day compared with 9,964 for normal-sighted people and 9,742 for those with glasses. Average daily exercise was 9.3 minutes in low-vision subjects and 23.5 minutes in the other groups. The study is the first to report an association between visual impairment and objectively measured physical activity.

Caveat: Accelerometer readings don't capture upper-body exercise or swimming activities and shouldn't be taken as absolute, researchers said. The study didn't account for the normal age-related physical decline.

 

                                                                                                                                                             2012-05-18

 
Tips to Restore Joint Health E-mail
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The importance of healthy joints cannot be underestimated. Good joint health can go a long way in promoting your overall health.

Those with strong supple joints can perform day to day tasks easily and effortlessly than those with brittle joints. Strong supple joints are truly a blessing; ask those at the receiving end of debilitating joint pain! Muscle tear, ligament damage, swelling and other painful symptoms are also mentally disturbing. What's more, joint pain can make you cranky and snappy. In a nut shell, it affects your mental, physical and emotional health.

Do you know that your tendons and ligaments tend to deteriorate with age? You ought to take good care of them! If you don't take great care of your joints, you cannot expect them to last you for life. Muscle inflammation and joint inflammation can cause tremendous pain and discomfort. Painful conditions like arthritis can render you immobile; in fact, it can lead to disability in some cases. Healthy joints, on the other hand, can make routine tasks simple and hassle-free for you. You will never have to struggle to get out of the bed or experience discomfort while walking or moving down the stairs.

Here's how you can take good care of your joints:

1) Make exercise an integral part of your routine - It is a myth that exercise aggravates joint pain; in fact, the opposite of it is true. Commit yourself to exercising on a daily basis. Make time to exercise your bones and joints to increase strength and flexibility.

2) Ladies, ditch those heels! It is a lesser known fact that killer heels cause a great deal of stress to the foot. Heels put extra stress on the knees. Avoid them at all costs!

3) Shed extra weight - Those who are overweight are likely to suffer from joint pain. All those extra pounds put unnecessary stress on the knees. Losing weight will make you healthier, lovelier and reduce the risk of joint pain.

4) Boost your intake of calcium supplements to keep your bones healthy and sturdy. Joint health supplements like Glucosamine tablets are also highly effective in maintaining healthy joints. These tablets promote joint flexibility and improve pain caused by injuries and accidents.

Remember, healthy joints mean less pain. You can look forward to maintaining a healthy stress-free lifestyle. You will never have trouble switching tasks and activities. Improve your joint health; embrace a healthier way of life!

 

 

                                                                                                                                         2012-05-13

 

 
How To Get Rid Of A Lisp E-mail
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Having a speech lisp can be so much of a trouble? This is especially true when people start requesting you to repeat what you have just said. It may also be a cause of bullying when people start copying your speaking mannerisms or your voice.

To avoid the problems that are brought about by a lisp, here are the things that you can do.

First, you need to find out in what situations you are experiencing a lisp. Normally, people with lisp do not experience the condition all the time. It only comes out during specific periods or emotions such as when a person is excited or nervous about something. Knowing when your lisp manifests will help you in avoiding such situations and thus avoiding lisping.

Next, you always have to try to speak more slowly than usual. If people around you are already getting conscious about the way you speak, then you need to start being very careful. Speaking slowly will allow you to articulate every word that you are saying and it will also allow you to pronounce the words better. It will also relax your muscles therefore you will be able to control them more easily.

The third step is to get help from experts. Some cases of lisp are quite extreme. For people who have them, it will be advisable to get help from the professions. There are certain speech therapy programs that are provided in order to correct the way of speaking for people with lisp.

If you have done the first two steps and you are not that willing to get help from a professional yet, then you can try the teeth smiling method. This method is a kind of speech therapy that aims to enable the tongue to move more freely. The first thing you need to do for this method is to smile. Your smile should be big and warm. It should be big enough such that your teeth are showing when you are doing it.

Keeping that same smile, grab a book and read it aloud. If you do not have a book with you, then do a monologue. It may seem weird but this is a good practice for your tongue. Whenever you say something aloud, your tongue gradually learns how to position itself. Do this technique when you are alone in your room and never try it in front of people or they might think you are crazy.

You can also have a friend or a family member help you in overcoming the lisp problem. Ask someone close to you to say some words that are difficult for you to say. Watch their mouth and the movement of their tongue carefully then try to imitate them in front of a mirror. This will help you in knowing how to properly move your tongue to produce the right sounds.

It may take some time to completely get rid of lisp but that is okay. All you need is to practice hard and be patient. Do the best that you can and be confident in yourself that you can overcome it.

 

                                                                                                                                                          2012-05-09

 
Glucose Monitoring E-mail
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Glucose Monitoring: Type 2 diabetes patients not using insulin might not benefit much from self-monitoring their blood glucose levels, according to a meta-analysis in the Cochrane Library.

Most type 2 diabetics don't use insulin. Instead, they seek to manage their glucose levels through diet and exercise, or with other medications, according to the American Diabetes Association. While monitoring of blood sugar levels (typically with portable electronic devices) has been found to be effective for patients with type 1 diabetes, and patients with type 2 diabetes who use insulin, there has been little consensus on its efficacy for type 2 diabetics not using insulin. (Unlike type 1 diabetics, type 2 diabetics do produce insulin─but their bodies respond incorrectly to the hormone.)

The study authors updated a previous meta-analysis, adding six new randomized trials of blood glucose self-monitoring, bringing the total to 12 studies comprising 3,259 patients. Compared with control groups, self-monitoring was associated with a decrease of 0.3% in blood sugar levels in the first six months, among patients who had been living with diabetes for at least one year. Although the decrease was small, researchers said it was statistically significant. Still, the improvements disappeared after another six months of follow-up.

Self-monitoring was somewhat more effective for newly diagnosed patients: Their blood sugar levels decreased 0.5% in the medium term─between 6 and 12 months. Still, the authors said they 'did not find good evidence for an effect on general health-related quality of life, general well-being, patient satisfaction, or on the decrease of the number of hypoglycaemic episodes,' when blood glucose levels drop dramatically.

Caveat: As with all meta-analyses, the findings depend to some degree on the quality of the underlying studies

 

                                                                                                                                                                  2012-05-07

 
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