WASHINGTON: Elderly people with higher levels of certain vitamins and omega 3 fatty acids in their blood score better on mental acuity tests than those who eat junk food, a study released on Wednesday showed.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

WASHINGTON: People who took blood pressure medicine during a 1980s clinical trial showed longer life expectancy two decades later than people who took a placebo, a US study said on Tuesday.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

WASHINGTON: Women of childbearing age can reduce their risk of heart problems by regularly eating fish rich in omega 3 fatty acids, said a Danish study out Monday.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

Oranges are a great natural source of health and they are useful in numerous diseases!

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

Findings from a recent Stanford University Medical School study may come as no surprise: older and middle-age people reported sleeping better when they added regular exercise to their routine. After 16 weeks in a moderate intensity exercise program, subjects were able to fall asleep about 15 minutes earlier and sleep about 45 minutes longer at night.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

BREAST HEALTH TIP #17: Sleep Go to bed by 10PM, pull down the shades and turn off all the lights.

 A study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute in 2001 found nurses that worked the night shift had a 50% increased risk of breast cancer. The longer they worked the night shift, the higher their risk of breast cancer became. The reason is simple. It has to do with the daily rhythms of the sun and the hormone “melatonin.” Melatonin is extremely powerful at protecting against and fighting breast cancer - but only if you go to bed early and it’s dark.

Scientists have discovered that when it gets dark the pineal gland in our brain produces more melatonin. As this hormone rises, you start to feel sleepy. The moment you fall asleep the level of melatonin goes much higher. But here’s the catch - melatonin doesn’t rise very high unless you’ve gone to bed by 10 pm and it’s dark.

The darker it is, the higher your melatonin will rise. Any type of light-even a soft night light can keep your melatonin levels from rising very high. Researchers think that is why breast cancer is more common in industrialized regions where city lights burn all night and why blind women have a 50% lower incidence breast cancer than women who can see.

If you have breast cancer, going to bed early in a dark room is important too. Breast cancer tumors in experimental animals exposed to constant light grew 7 times faster.

There are several big reasons melatonin is such a great breast cancer fighter. 1) Melatonin is a very potent antioxidant. Antioxidants destroy oxygen free radicals that can damage your cells and DNA –damage that can lead to cancer. 2) Melatonin slows down the production of estrogen. Estrogen stimulates breast cells causing cell division to speed up. The faster cells divide, the higher the risk of cancer. 3) Melatonin prevents the over production of estrogen, and blocks its stimulatory effects on breast cells. But melatonin’s great defenses don’t stop there. 4) Melatonin blocks the effects of two other threats, a hormone and a growth factor that can also increase cell division in the breast: the hormone is called “prolactin” and a growth factor is called “epidermal growth factor.” 5) Melatonin enhances the tumor fighting power of Vitamin D. It increases Vitamin D’s ability to stop tumor growth. Melatonin makes vitamin D’s tumor fighting abilities 20-100 times stronger.

If you have breast cancer and are being treated with chemotherapy, you may want to ask your doctor about taking supplemental melatonin. Researchers found it can enhance the effectiveness of chemotherapy by increasing chemotherapy’s ability to kill tumors. In a 1999 study from Italy, researchers found that breast cancer patients treated with chemotherapy lived longer if they were also given supplemental melatonin. In scientific terms, these patients had an increased “1 year survival.” That means more women than normally expected were alive at one year following the diagnosis and treatment of their breast cancer. Melatonin supplements given in addition to chemotherapy also caused the size of tumors in women to significantly decrease compared to women just receiving chemotherapy alone.

All of melatonin’s diverse breast cancer fighting skills can be summed up into 3 major effects: 1) it prevents the initiation of breast cancer 2) it slows down tumor growth by as much as 70% 3) it prevents metastasis or the spread of tumors to other areas of the body.

The bottom line is: melatonin is a powerful weapon against breast cancer. All you have to do is go to bed by 10 PM, pull down the shades, turn off all the lights and let it work its magic.

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

1. Eat a balanced diet of wholesome foods, focusing on high-nutrient and low-calorie foods—vegetables and whole grains, legumes, and some fresh fruits.
2. Avoid Overeating and don’t eat much after nightfall.
3. Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper. Meaning, consume most of your fuel early in the day so that you will utilize it in your daily activities.
4. Drink plenty (8-12 glasses) of filtered or spring water daily, particularly first thing in the morning and then 30 to 60 minutes before meals to satiate your body and minimize your appetite.
5. Exercise regularly – at least one hour daily – including stretching and strengthening exercises along with 30 to 45 minutes of aerobic activity at least four times a week.
6. Avoid high-fat, processed, and high-calorie foods, such as candy, cookies and cakes, sodas, chips, cheese, and meats, especially lunch meats.
7. Take time to eat. Eat and chew slowly and thoroughly, satisfying yourself with each mouthful; pay attention to eating when you’re consuming food.
8. Be loving and forgiving with yourself both for any weight problems and for whenever you vary from your diet plan. Get back on track quickly and focus on low-fat, low-calorie, wholesome foods.
9. Realize that your weight has many genetic and emotional factors and triggers involved, and you may need support to help you really change your bad habits.
10. The ultimate process for weight loss is the long, slow one that involves you changing your diet for life – rather than going on a diet – to create the body, health and the appropriate weight for you.

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

• Your fingernails grow four times as fast as your toenails?   
• People are the only animals in the world who cry tears? And that It’s totally impossible to sneeze with your eyes open? 
• Every month you grow a brand new outer layer of skin…”a new you”?  
• Your brain weighs about three pounds, but over two pounds of that is water? 
• In your very own lifetime, you’ll produce enough spit to fill two swimming pools? 
• If you were freeze dried, like coffee, 90% of your weight would be the real you, and 10% would be the little critters that call your body their home?
• You breathe in about 7 quarts of air every minute? Good thing it’s free!  
• 314 Americans had their butts lifted surgically in 1994? (Scary thought!) 
• Your dad sweats enough each day to fill up a 6 pack of soda cans…and then some?
• By the time your grandmother is 72 years old, her heart will have chalked up over two-and-a-half BILLION beats!
• Your stomach makes a new layer of mucus every 2 weeks. Otherwise, it will digest itself
• Every time you lick a stamp, you’re consuming 1/10 of a calorie.
• To escape the grip of a crocodile’s jaws, push your thumbs into its eyeballs…it will let go instantly. Hey, you never know… 
• If you yelled for 8 years, 7 months and 6 days, you would have produced enough sound energy to heat one cup of coffee
• If you toot consistently for 6 years and 9 months, enough gas is produced to create the energy of an atomic bomb.
• The human heart creates enough pressure when it pumps blood, that it could squirt blood 30 feet. 
• Banging your head against a wall uses 150 calories an hour And that On average people fear spiders more than they do death. 
• Relative to its size, the strongest muscle in the body is the TONGUE. 
• You can’t kill yourself by holding your breath. 
• Americans on the average eat 18 acres of pizza every day. 
• Did you know that you are more likely to be killed by a champagne cork than by a poisonous spider? 
• Right-handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left-handed people do.
• In ancient Egypt, Priests plucked EVERY hair from their bodies, including their eyebrows and eyelashes. 
• If you blink one eye you move over 200 muscles. 
• The rush of air produced by a cough moves at a speed approaching 600 miles per hour.  
• The liver performs over 500 different functions. 
• Platelets are manufactured at the rate of 200 billion a day.
• You will be totally unable to lick your elbow, and I just know you’re going to try. 
• The length of your foot is the same las that of your forearm between your wrist and the inside of your elbow? You’re probably thinking “no way”, but give it a try…you’ll be amazed!

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

1. You burn more calories sleeping than you do watching the television.

2. Banging your head against a wall will use roughly 150 calories an hour.

3. Toothpaste was ‘invented’ over 4000 years ago, albeit not in the form we know it - Egyptians used crushed pumice stone and vinegar as a form of paste.

4. Romans used urine as tooth cleaner (contains ammonia) and particularly saught out Portugese product.

5. Our nails grow at a rate of around 0.1 mm per day. So it would take roughly 3 months to replace an entire fingernail.

6. Women blink nearly twice as much as men.

7. To humans, acorns are poisonous and if digested can cause kidney damage.

8. The velocity of your cough can be up to 60mph.

9. Each day we lose anywhere from 10,000 to 100,000 brain cells.

10. A study of American currency revealed the presence of bacteria, including staphylococcus, e-coli, and lebsiella, on 18 percent of coins and 7 percent of the bills.

11. The average adult will stand around 0.5 inches taller in the morning than in the evning due the slight cartilage compression that happens over the course of a day.

12. Synesthesia is a rare condition where the human senses are combined. Synesthetes can ‘see’ words, ‘taste’ colours and shapes, and ‘feel’ flavours.

13. It is estimated that around 10% of Americans have picked someone else’s nose.

14. When you wake up in the morning and find crusty stuff in your eyes, that is essentially the same as the stuff in your nose.

15. On average a person will blink over 10,000 times a day.

16. Sneezes can reach up to 100 mph.

17. The human brain is about 75% water.

18. It takes more muscles to frown than it does to smile.

19. Each day your heart beats around 100,000 times.

20. A beard grows an average of 140mm a year.

21. Relative to size, the strongest muscle in the body is the tongue.

22. One out of every three people can’t snap their fingers.

23. Human adults breathe about 23,000 times a day.

24. There are about 100,000 hairs on the human head.

25. In a public bathroom, the stall which is closest to the door is usually the cleanest, because it’s the least used.

26. You spend 1/3 of your life in bed.

27. An average person will spend two weeks of their life kissing.

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

Rains should not be an excuse for not working out. So, this Buzzle article acquaints you with some great ways to exercise on a rainy day.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

Yes! Drinking your own urine is safe, and in fact if this practice is followed regularly in a particular way then, it can have positive effects on your well-being.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)

You must have heard a lot of “rules” about when and how to eat fruits. Instead of solving your queries, they just end up confusing you more because they are pretty contradictory in nature. Are there really any rules for eating fruits? Let’s check out what this article has to say.

Read More

(Source: yourhealthdiary)