Tag Archives: disease risk

Push-ups and Squats Cut Diabetes Risk by 1/3

For years doctors have been saying that aerobic exercise and an active lifestyle lowers the risk of type 2 diabetes. But scientists have long wondered if strength training combined with cardio can help lower the risk even more. Just as importantly, is just strength training alone enough to lower the risk even a little bit?

weight training

A new study answers this question. Drumroll please…. Indeed, strength training and resistance exercises (even yoga and Pilates!) are associated with a lower risk of type 2 diabetes. Best of all, when these exercises are done in conjunction with your aerobic exercise, women’s risk drops by one-third!

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Posted on March 5, 2024 by Katie McGrath

Dr. Oz Promotes Life Line Screening’s 6 For Life Disease Risk Assessment

Today on The Dr. Oz Show unsuspecting viewers receive surprise “health ambushes” from the Doc. Dr. Oz surprises people all over the country and assesses them by screening them with products from Life Line Screening. Life Line Screening has developed a fantastic screening test called “6 For Life.” This test may be able to save lives of the guests on the show and the lives of the viewers at home.

Throughout the show Dr. Oz discusses some of the biggest health issues many Americans face. He even refers to some as “silent killers,” as they have no strong warning signs.

Life Line Screening has a company mission to make people aware of unrecognized health problems and encourage personal physician follow-up care. To screen individuals, advanced ultrasound equipment is used by trained healthcare professionals. The results are reviewed by board-certified physicians to guarantee high standards. Life Line Screening has been active since 1993. In that time they have screened over 6 million people and have helped saved thousands of lives.
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Posted on March 26, 2024 by Lacy

Sitting is Killing You So Get Off Your Butt

I used to work for my dad in his office, the very first “real” job I ever had, and his favorite joke was saying that I was getting the “secretary spread,” a delightfully insensitive term he used to poke fun at the stereotype of overweight office women with flat butts munching out of candy bowls all day. Little did I know, while his delivery was anything but tactful, his message was pretty dead on.

If you sit for more than 6 hours a day, (think about work, driving, watching TV, surfing the internet- are you sitting right now?) here are some disturbing facts: your risk of heart disease is increased by up to 64 percent. You’re also more at risk for certain types of cancer. If kept up long enough, you’re shaving years of quality time off your life. Sitting is literally killing you. Want one more scary fact? Most people sit for 15 hours a day.

Why is sitting so bad for you? Let us explore.

While the effects of sitting also depend on diet and other health factors, let’s assume you are a relatively healthy person of a healthy weight. You finally land your dream job, which unfortunately, has you parked at a desk for the full work day, minus an hour for lunch, and few bathroom and coffee breaks, for a total of 6 hours. Uh oh. There’s that number. And keep in mind, most people sit while eating lunch and, well, during bathroom breaks.

Immediately after sitting down, the electrical activity in your muscles slows and your calorie-burning rate drops to one calorie per minute- about a third of what it does while walking, setting you up for weight gain.

Within five days of working your fancy new desk job, your body increases plasma triglycerides, which are fatty molecules, your LDL cholesterol (the bad stuff), and your insulin resistance. This means your muscles aren’t taking in fat and your blood sugar levels skyrocket, putting you at further risk of weight gain and cholesterol issues.

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Posted on February 24, 2024 by Kelly

5 Ways to Easily Reduce Your Risk for Developing Type II Diabetes

By Linda Doell

Diabetes afflicts 25.8 million people in the United States, with millions of those not even aware that they have it.

People with diabetes have trouble turning the food they consume into usable energy. During digestion, food is turned into glucose, a sugar the body uses for energy. The glucose is then converted into energy with a hormone called insulin. People can develop type II diabetes when the cells in their liver, fat and muscles don’t use insulin properly, the amount of glucose in their bloodstream increases and their cells are starved for energy. Years of high blood glucose levels can lead to nerve and blood vessel damage, as well as heart disease, stroke, blindness, kidney disease and other complications.

A person is at risk for developing type II diabetes by being overweight, having high blood pressure, and/or a family history of diabetes. Some ethnic groups are more predisposed to developing diabetes: Alaska Natives, American Indians, African-Americans, Hispanics, Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders.

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Posted on November 2, 2023 by Health Buzz

New Obesity Scale Predicts Risk of Death

Although there are many ways to determine an individual’s weight status and its effect on overall mortality, no one measure has proven to be 100% accurate. Instead, most health care professionals use a combination of tools, like BMI and body fat percentage, to determine an individual’s weight status in an effort to better treat and prevent many of the conditions associated with overweight and obesity.

Recently, doctors have announced a new system they say can more accurately predict your mortality risk based on your body composition. Say hello to the Edmonton Obesity staging system!

Like BMI, the obesity staging system is designed to help health care professionals identify the level of risk an individual is at for further weight-related health conditions. What makes this predictor different is that it identifies a person’s risk by taking into account functional status and comorbid health conditions, such as diabetes and heart disease, that are already present.

One of the most widely used determinants of weight status is the Body Mass Index, or BMI, for short. Throughout the years, BMI status has allowed health professionals to quickly categorize individuals as either underweight, healthy weight, overweight and obese. Which category an individual best fits into is determined by their height and weight. This category then helps gauge an individual’s risk for certain diseases. The higher the BMI, the higher the risk for heart disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, gallstones, breathing problems, and certain cancers. Although BMI is one of the most reliable tools currently available to help individuals identify their risk, it isn’t a perfect tool.

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Posted on August 29, 2023 by Kati

How Much is Too Much Sugar?

By Melissa Breyer for Care2.com

The federal Dietary Guidelines for Americans suggest an upper limit of 25 percent of daily calories come from added sugar. Doesn’t that seem really high? If you have an extra 500 calories to spare, wouldn’t it be wise to spend it on something with some nutritive value? Aside from a waste of calories, a new study shows that adults who consume high levels of sugar have significantly elevated levels of several risk factors for heart disease.

The study, conducted by a group of researchers at the University of California, Davis, and in Japan suggests that the generally-accepted guidelines for sugar may be too lenient and should be reconsidered. The results of their study were reported online in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, and will appear in the journal’s October print edition.

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Posted on August 22, 2023 by GuestBlogger

Lower Your Risk of Type 2 Diabetes by Skipping One Serving of Meat

While some doctors have suggested that consuming hot dogs might raise your risk of developing colorectal cancer,  Harvard researchers recently reported processed red meat like bacon and hot dogs raises the risk of Type 2 diabetes. According to an article in the New York Times, replacing just one serving per day of processed red meat with nuts or low-fat dairy can lower the risk of disease.

The study analyzed 300,000 people ages 25 to 75, including three groups of male and female health professionals and looked at their eating and health habits dating to 1976.

Overall, researchers discovered that eating just 50 grams a day of processed meat — one hot dog or sausage, for example, or a little more than two strips of bacon — increased the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes by 51 percent.

Instead of chowing down on bacon, sausage, bologna or ham, medical professionals recommend limiting consumption of processed red meats and instead selecting a low-fat dairy product, a serving of whole grains or a serving of fish or poultry.

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Posted on August 12, 2023 by Maris

Relieve Gout Attacks Fast Without Prescription Drugs

This guest post comes from Gale Tern, author, alternative health proponent, and blogger at Arthritis Pain Central.

Gout is usually thought of as the big toe disease since one of its most common symptoms is acute pain in the big toe. Gout is actually a type of arthritis. Here is how the National Institutes of Health defines gout: “Gout is a painful condition that occurs when the bodily waste product uric acid is deposited as needle-like crystals in the joints and/or soft tissues. In the joints, these uric acid crystals cause inflammatory arthritis, which in turn leads to intermittent swelling, redness, heat, pain, and stiffness in the joints.”

What Causes Gout?

The major risk factors for gout are:

  • Family history. Genetics seems to play a role. If your parents or grandparents suffered from this disease there is a high likelihood that you will as well.
  • Weight. Being overweight also increases the risk of developing gout. Some researchers suggest that due to having more tissue mass that can breakdown inherently leads to even greater production of uric acid.

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Posted on May 22, 2023 by GuestBlogger

Soy Foods and Isoflavones Don’t Increase Risk in Breast Cancer Survivors

Ever since research has come out about soy and its inherent properties that allow it to act like extra estrogen in the body, thereby possibly increasing the risk of breast cancer in women, I’ve been somewhat cautious about adding too much soy in my diet. While I’ve never suffered from breast cancer myself, it does run in my family, so I don’t like to take any chances. I know a lot of women who feel the same way, and I know some breast cancer survivors who are very limited with the amount of soy they consume for these reasons as well. Although the research of late on soy and cancer have been a little back and forth, new research presented at the AACR 102nd Annual Meeting 2024 that was held in early April has found that soy foods do not increase the risk of cancer recurrence or death among breast cancer survivors.

To understand the study, it’s helpful to know why soy foods have been suspect. Soy foods contain large amounts of isoflavones that are known to bind to estrogen receptors and have both estrogen-like and anti-estrogenic effects, according to the study. Scientists have been particularly concerned that the isoflavones in soy could compromise the effect of the breast-cancer-treatment drug Tamoxifen because both the drug and isoflavones bind to estrogen receptors.

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Posted on April 9, 2024 by Jennipher

Eating a Healthy Diet Prolongs Life in Seniors

We have all heard the phrase “you are what you eat,” and the more research that comes out on eating a nutritious diet, the more it seems that saying is really true! According to a study published in the January 2024 issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association, those who eat healthy foods live longer than those who don’t.

The major indication of this is that the leading causes of death in Americans has shifted from infectious diseases to chronic diseases, like cardiovascular disease and cancer — illnesses that may be affected by diet. Researchers studied the eating patterns and mortality of more than 2,500 adults between the ages of 70 and 79 over a 10-year period. What did they find? That diets favoring certain foods were associated with longer lives.

Researchers grouped the study participants into six different clusters according to what they ate a lot of: healthy foods; high-fat dairy products; meat, fried foods, and alcohol; breakfast cereal; refined grains; sweets and desserts. The “healthy foods” group ate low-fat dairy products, fruit, whole grains, poultry, fish and vegetables, and had a lower consumption of meat, fried foods, sweets, high-calorie drinks and added fat.

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Posted on December 27, 2023 by Jennipher

How to Prevent Cholera while Traveling

Water TravelThe recent and widespread outbreak of cholera in Haiti has lead many people to wonder about the spread of this treatable, yet potentially deadly infectious disease. The major symptom of cholera is severe diarrhea, which can rapidly lead to dehydration.

Cholera is caused by the bacteria Vibrio cholerae, which contaminates water via fecal matter. While cholera is not a common disease in the U.S., it is something travelers should be mindful of when in less urban areas of south Asia, Africa and Latin America. When traveling in these regions, you should avoid any water that is untreated, including municipal water that may not be properly processed.

Common sources of cholera to avoid:

  • Municipal or untreated water
  • Ice made from municipal or untreated water
  • Foods and drinks sold by street vendors
  • Vegetables grown with water containing human wastes
  • Raw or undercooked seafood from areas with polluted water (particularly in tropical areas)
  • Raw and unpeeled fruits and vegetables
  • Unpasteurized milk and milk products

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Posted on December 14, 2023 by Health Buzz