Bike Riding and Your Sex Life

Irwin Goldstein, MD
Dr. Goldstein presented the educational lecture to a small but focused group of people for this sexual medicine information session. The following is a synopsis of his lecture.

Perineal anatomy/sexual physiology

Risk factors for erectile dysfunction include diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, all of which can lead to endothelial dysfunction. The endothelium lines all blood vessels. Injury to the endothelium affects blood flow. Conditions that can cause erectile dysfunction are the same as those which can cause endothelial dysfunction.
Endothelial injury can be random or focal. Random injury denudes the endothelium allowing cholesterol to get into the walls of blood vessels causing hardening of the arteries. Focal injury is non-denuded; it is atherosclerosis to a specific spot. Where arteries pass next to a bone, they are susceptible to focal injury of the endothelium. Arteries to the penis and clitoris pass through Alcock’s canal with one wall being bone.

Entrepreneurs Are Healthier, Report Finds

People who go into business for themselves may be healthier than other workers, according to a new report from Gallup.

The report shows that entrepreneurs are less likely to have chronic diseases like diabetes, high cholesterol, obesity and high blood pressure compared to other workers.

Entrepreneurs are also more likely to lead healthy lifestyles than other workers, such as eating produce at least four times a week and exercising on a regular basis, according to the findings.

The Cleavage Countdown: 8 Facts About Breasts

Stephanie Pappas and Jeanna Bryner

Credit: Dreamstime

Boob Basics

The quintessential embodiment of female sexuality, breasts have fascinated and mystified since the beginning of time. From the biology that makes breasts, and breast-feeding, possible, and the odd boob changes that occur with motherhood to historical perceptions of the hourglass shape, LiveScience the art and science of breasts.

The First Bra

Women have strapped down their breasts with fabric bands or boosted their cleavage with body-shaping corsets for centuries, depending on current fashions. But the precursors to modern bras began to appear in the late 1800s and early 1900s. The magazine “Vogue” first used the term brassiere in 1907. In 1914, American Mary Phelps-Jacobs patented the first bra design, which consisted of two handkerchiefs sewn together with baby ribbon used as straps.
The first push-up bra came on the scene in 1948, introduced by Frederick Mellinger of Frederick's of Hollywood fame. According to Redbook magazine, the average woman today owns nine bras.

Avoid eating after dark to lose weight: study

AFP Relax

Make your final meal of the day one that sets with the sun in order to lose weight.

That's the overriding conclusion of a recently published study which found that eating after dark could be a contributing factor to obesity.

It's a theory that correlates the metabolic cycles of different organs to eating schedules, researchers explained in the study published online in the journal Cell Metabolism last week. While other studies have examined how nighttime eating affects the body's circadian rhythms, the latest research also underscores how this unhealthy habit relates to the cycles of particular organs.

"Every organ has a clock," said lead author of the study Satchidananda Panda of the Salk Institute in a statement. "That means there are times that our livers, intestines, muscles, and other organs will work at peak efficiency and other times when they are -- more or less -- sleeping."

Deep belly fat may increase after liposuction: study

A plastic surgeon checks an arm of a patient who is travelling from Australia to Seoul to get a liposuction at the BK DongYang Plastic Surgery Clinic in Seoul October 4, 2011. 
REUTERS/Lee Jae-Won/Files


REUTERS - Thinking of liposuction to trim your tummy? You may want to make sure you exercise after that, or risk putting on even more unhealthy fat.

According to a Brazilian study, women who have liposuction may actually gain some fat deeper within the abdomen - a type of fat that's particularly unhealthy.

The researchers, led by Fabiana Benatti of the University of Sao Paolo, found that within months of abdominal liposuction, there may an increase in the so-called "visceral" fat that surrounds the abdominal organs.

Facebook isn’t making us lonely. It’s making us anxious. Get over it.

How I learned to stop worrying and love the Zuck

As a masterpiece and a cultural catastrophe at once, Facebook is distinctly American. It represents a social regime that’s scintillating and hideous. The values intrinsic to it—velocity, wit, growth, exhibitionism and “connectivity”—can seem superficial, but they’re ours.

This week, the Facebook brass are making housecalls to investors, using razzle, dazzle and astral projections to justify valuing the eight-year-old company at a big, round $100 billion. This comes in preparation for Facebook’s midmonth initial public offering—what’s expected to be the biggest I.P.O. in the history of the Internet.

At the same time, government officials have started to cast a cold eye on Facebook, making sure it—and Apple and Google—don’t get a regulatory pass from Washington just because they’re cute. Facebook not long ago had to agree to a 20-year settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over allegations that the company violated users’ privacy.

Womb cancer deaths 'are rising'

Survival rates for women with womb cancer have improved

The number of women dying from cancer of the womb - known as uterine cancer - has increased by nearly 18% in the past decade, according to the charity Cancer Research UK.

Data showed that more cases are now being diagnosed. While women are living longer after a diagnosis, the total number of deaths has also increased.

It has been argued that rising levels of obesity were behind the rise.

Cancer Research UK said the finding was "hugely troubling".

Cancer of the womb is the fourth most common cancer in women and tends to occur after the menopause.

From the 1970s to 1996 the incidence of womb cancer stayed roughly the same at about 13.7 cases for every 100,000 women in the UK. It now stands at 19.6 per 100,000, a 43% increase.

Survival rates have improved with 77% of women now living at least five years after treatment. However, deaths have gone up.

In the past decade the mortality rate has gone from 3.1 to 3.7 deaths from uterine cancer for every 100,000 women. In 2010, 1,937 women died from the cancer.

Prof Jonathan Ledermann, a gynaecological cancer expert at the charity, said: "It's hugely troubling that more women are dying from womb cancer, but we shouldn't let this cloud the fact that the chances of surviving the disease are still better than ever.

"This is due to better organisation of care for women's cancers and more widespread use of one-stop clinics for post-menopausal bleeding, as well as advances in the use of surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy through clinical trials."

Rachael Gormley, from the World Cancer Research Fund, said: "Womb cancer is one of several types of cancer where there is strong evidence that obesity increases risk. Others include breast, bowel, oesophageal, pancreatic and kidney.

"As levels of obesity rise, we can expect the number of cancer cases to also increase.

"Taking steps to avoid becoming obese, such as eating a healthy diet and being active each day, is one of the most important things we can do to reduce our risk of cancer."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-17609674

Heavy men more likely to have sperm issues: study

A man sits on a bench in central London, September 23, 2009. REUTERS

REUTERS - Heavy men are more likely than their peers with more normal weights to have low sperm counts or no sperm production at all, a key way to measure fertility, according to an international study.

But the review of past studies, which covered a combined total of 10,000 men and appeared in the Archives of Internal Medicine, can't prove that overweight or obese men will have more trouble fathering a child.

"In general you expect that men with lower sperm counts will have a greater frequency of difficulty conceiving than men with higher sperm counts, but it's not completely straightforward," said Jorge Chavarro at the Harvard School of Public Health, part of the collaborative group that put out the study.

How well sperm move, their shape and the quality of DNA they carry matter too, Chavarro said -- but previous studies have suggested some of those measures of sperm quality may be affected by obesity as well.

For the new analysis, French researchers combined data from 14 studies that compared sperm count in samples from normal weight, overweight and obese men, as well as data from their own infertility center.

About one-quarter of the combined 10,000 men had a low sperm count. In another analysis, just over 250 of almost 7,000 men had no sperm in their ejaculate at all.

Overweight men were 11 percent more likely to have a low sperm count and 39 percent more likely to have no sperm than their normal-weight peers, according to calculations by Sebastien Czernichow and colleagues at the Ambrose Pare Hospital, Boulogne-Billancourt.

Obese men, on the other hand, were 42 percent more likely to have a low sperm count than their normal-weight peers and 81 percent more likely to have sperm-free ejaculate.

The researchers proposed a number of different theories for the findings including that male hormones may be converted into estrogen in fat tissue, affecting sperm-making, or that more fat in the hips and stomach could make the scrotum too hot.

The results don't prove that overweight and obese men will have more fertility troubles, although you wouldn't expect men who have no sperm at all to be fertile, Chavorro said.

It's possible that obesity itself isn't to blame. It could be that in some men an underlying health condition causes them to gain weight and affects their sperm, said Stephen Winters, professor of Medicine and Chief of the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Diabetes at the University of Louisville.

Because of that, researchers can't say for sure whether heavy men could boost their sperm production by losing weight.

Czernichow told Reuters Health in an email that losing weight improves fertility in women, but that there's not much data in men - though small case reports have suggested weight-loss surgery may actually have a negative effect on sperm.

A study late last year found that being overweight was tied to a lower sperm concentration and lower motility.

The current report is not conclusive and the risks are "not huge," said Winters, who wasn't involved in the study. But he added that fertility trouble is one of the health risks of obesity.

"This appears to be yet another health outcome for which maintaining a healthy weight appears to be important," Chavarro told Reuters Health.

"It's not only about your cardiovascular disease risk, it's not only about diabetes and some forms of cancer. Obesity also seems to affect outcomes that may be manifested in younger men." SOURCE: http://bit.ly/yEePM4

(Reporting from New York by Genevra Pittman at Reuters Health; editing by Elaine Lies and Bob Tourtellotte)

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/heavy-men-more-likely-sperm-issues-study-013058353.html

Coffee drinking not linked to chronic illness: study

A cafe employee poses for a picture as she drinks from a cup at the Kofein cafe

REUTERS - Coffee drinkers have no more risk of getting illnesses such as heart disease or cancer, and are less likely to develop type 2 diabetes, according to a German study involving more than 40,000 people over nearly a decade.

The findings, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, came in the wake of many previous studies that produced conflicting results, with some tying coffee drinking to an increase in heart disease, cancer, stroke and more.

"Our results suggest that coffee consumption is not harmful for healthy adults in respect of risk of major chronic disease," said Anna Floegel, lead author of the study and an epidemiologist at the German Institute of Human Nutrition Potsdam-Rehbruecke.

The researchers collected information at the beginning of the study on coffee drinking habits, diet, exercise and health from more than 42,000 German adults without any chronic conditions.

For the next nine years, the team followed up on the participants every two or three years to see whether they developed any health problems, particularly cardiovascular disease, stroke, heart attack, diabetes and cancer.

They found that coffee drinkers and non-drinkers were similarly likely to develop one of those illnesses.

For instance, 871 out of 8,689 non-drinkers developed a chronic disease, compared to 1,124 out of 12,137 people who drank more than four cups of caffeinated coffee a day -- about 10 percent in both groups.

On the other hand, the researchers found that coffee drinkers were less likely to develop type 2 diabetes, the form that does not need insulin and is linked with obesity, than those who didn't drink coffee.

Among those who drank four cups a day, 3.2 percent later reported that they had type 2 diabetes, compared to 3.6 percent of people who drank no coffee.

After taking into account factors that could influence diabetes, such as weight and smoking, the researchers determined that frequent coffee drinkers were 23 percent less likely to develop diabetes, a result that squares with other studies.

That doesn't mean that coffee is responsible for preventing type 2 diabetes, but experiments in animals have hinted that certain chemicals found within coffee could positively affect metabolism.

"We do not encourage people to start drinking coffee if they do not enjoy this, but the overall evidence on coffee and health suggests that there is no reason for persons without specific health conditions to reduce their coffee consumption in order to reduce their risk of chronic diseases," said Rob van Damn, a professor at National University of Singapore, who was not involved in the study. SOURCE: http://bit.ly/zbuAYd

(Reporting from New York by Kerry Grens at Reuters Health; Editing by Elaine Lies and Michael Perry)

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/coffee-drinking-not-linked-chronic-illness-study-015810216.html

Sedentary life amplifies obesity genes, says US study

n An obese woman walks down the street on Michigan Avenue in Chicago, Illinois, USA. (AFP FILE PHOTO/JEFF HAYNES)


WASHINGTON: A sedentary lifestyle can amplify a genetic disposition to obesity, but just walking briskly, and briefly, each day can cut that effect in half, a new study showed on Wednesday.

"This is the first study that directly looked at the effect of the sedentary behaviour of television watching on the body mass index (BMI) of individuals with a genetic predisposition to obesity," said study author Qibin Qi at a conference by the American Heart Association this week in San Diego, California.

To combat the results, Qi said a one-hour daily walk "reduced the genetic influence towards obesity, measured by differences in BMI by half." 

The study involved 7,740 women and 4,564 men, with researchers collecting data on their physical activity and TV watching two years prior to assessing their BMI.

The average American watches television for about four to six hours each day, noted Qi.

The BMI indicator is the ratio of weight in kilogrammes to square of height in metres - on this scale, a score of 30 or more is considered obese.

The genetic effect on BMI was seen as "more pronounced in people who spent 40 hours a week watching television than those who spent an hour or less, 0.34 versus 0.08 kg/m2," according to the study.

The recommended walking exercise was associated with 0.06 kg/m2 reduction in the genetic effect on BMI, said researchers, who presented their report at the American Heart Association's Epidemiology and Prevention/Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism 2012 Scientific Sessions conference in San Diego.
- AFP/de 


http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/health/view/1189101/1/.html

Red meat boosts risk of dying young: study

 

WASHINGTON: Eating a portion of processed red meat daily can boost a person's risk of dying young by up to 20 per cent, said a long-running US study of more than 120,000 people released on Monday.

While the research by Harvard University experts offers more evidence that eating red meat increases the risk of heart disease and cancer, it also counsels that substituting fish and poultry may lower early death risk.

"This study provides clear evidence that regular consumption of red meat, especially processed meat, contributes substantially to premature death," said Frank Hu, senior author of the study in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Researchers gleaned their data from a study of 37,698 men who were followed for 22 years and 83,644 women who were tracked for 28 years.

Subjects answered surveys about their eating habits every four years.

Those who ate a card-deck-sized serving of unprocessed red meat each day on average saw a 13 per cent higher risk of dying than those who did not eat red meat as frequently.

And if the red meat was processed, like in a hot dog or two slices of bacon, that risk jumped to 20 per cent.

However, substituting nuts for red meat lowered total mortality risk by 19 per cent, while poultry or whole grains lowered the risk 14 per cent and fish did so by seven per cent.

The authors said between seven and nine per cent of all deaths in the study "could be prevented if all the participants consumed fewer than 0.5 servings per day of total red meat."

Processed red meat has been shown to contain ingredients such as saturated fat, sodium, nitrites and some carcinogens that are linked to many chronic ailments including heart disease and cancer.

"More than 75 per cent of the $2.6 trillion in annual US health care costs are from chronic disease," said an accompanying commentary by Dean Ornish, a physician and dietary expert at the University of California, San Francisco.

"Eating less red meat is likely to reduce morbidity from these illnesses, thereby reducing health care costs."

A separate study, also led by Hu but published in Circulation, an American Heart Association journal, found that men who drank sugar-sweetened beverages daily faced a 20 per cent higher risk of heart disease than men who did not.

The study tracked more than 42,000 men, most of them Caucasian, over 22 years and found higher heart risks, as higher levels of inflammation and harmful lipids known as triglycerides in daily sweet-drinkers.

The effects were not seen in men who drank as many as two sugar-sweetened beverages per week.

According to Hu, the research "provides strong justification for reducing sugary beverage consumption among patients, and more importantly, in the general population."

Heart disease is the biggest killer in the United States and top risk factors include obesity, smoking, lack of exercise, diabetes and poor eating habits.

-AFP/ac


http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/health/view/1188612/1/.html

Vogue article by mom about 7-year-old daughter’s weight sparks heavy backlash

By Dylan Stableford | The Cutline

An article by a woman who is "fighting" her 7-year-old daughter's "childhood obesity" at home--published in the April issue of Vogue--is causing a big backlash online among readers critical of the magazine and its author.

Dara-Lynn Weiss, the author, wrote about her response to a pediatrician who suggested that her daughter, Bea, should be put on a diet because--at 4'4" and 93 pounds--she was clinically obese and could be at risk for high blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes.

It wasn't the diagnosis that readers railed against, but Weiss' management of Bea's subsequent year-long diet.

"Sometimes Bea's after-school snack was a slice of pizza or a gyro from the snack vendor," Weiss wrote. "Other days I forced her to choose a low fat vegetable soup or a single hard-boiled egg. Occasionally I'd give in to her pleas for a square of coffee cake, mainly because I wanted to eat half of it. When she was given access to cupcakes at a party, I alternated between saying, 'Let's not eat that, it's not good for you'; 'Okay, fine, go ahead, but just one'; and 'Bea, you have to stop eating crap like that, you're getting too heavy,' depending on my mood. Then I'd secretly eat two when she wasn't looking."

Weiss continued:

I once reproachfully deprived Bea of her dinner after learning that her observation of French Heritage Day at school involved nearly 800 calories of Brie, filet mignon, baguette, and chocolate. I stopped letting her enjoy Pizza Fridays when she admitted to adding a corn salad as a side dish one week. I dressed down a Starbucks barista when he professed ignorance of the nutrition content of the kids' hot chocolate whose calories are listed as "120-210" on the menu board: Well, which is it? When he couldn't provide an answer, I dramatically grabbed the drink out of my daughter's hands, poured it into the garbage, and stormed out.

After Bea lost 16 pounds--meeting her mom's weight-loss goal for her before a Vogue photoshoot--Weiss wrote about her daughter's reaction:

"That's still me," she says of her former self. "I'm not a different person just because I lost sixteen pounds." I protest that indeed she is different. At this moment, that fat girl is a thing of the past. A tear rolls down her beautiful cheek, past the glued-in feather. "Just because it's in the past," she says, "doesn't mean it didn't happen."

"I have not ingested any food, looked at a restaurant menu, or been sick to the point of vomiting without silently launching a complicated mental algorithm about how it will affect my weight," Weiss admitted. "Who was I to teach a little girl how to maintain a healthy weight and body image?"

"The socialites who write personal essays for Vogue aren't known for their kindness and humility," Katie Baker wrote on Jezebel.com. But Weiss "has to go down in history as the one of the most f---ed up, selfish women to ever grace the magazine's pages."

Weiss "comes across as obsessive and the fact that she made such an issue of her daughter's weight, both in public and in Vogue—seems wrong," Dhani Mau wrote on Fashionista.com.

An anonymous blogger for New York magazine added: "I'm pretty sure Weiss just handed her daughter the road map to all her future eating disorders."

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/cutline/vogue-article-mom-7-old-daughter-weight-sparks-175546979.html;

Liver disease deaths jump 25% in England: study

AFP Relax

Deaths from liver disease have risen 25 percent in England in less than a decade, mainly due to increased alcohol consumption, a study revealed on Thursday.

Alcohol-related liver disease in Britain, notorious for its binge-drinking culture, accounted for over a third (37 percent) of the deaths, according to the National End of Life Care Intelligence Network report.

Obesity, hepatitis B and hepatitis C have also boosted the rate of liver disease deaths between 2001 and 2009, the authors of the government-commissioned study said.

The steep increase in liver disease deaths comes as mortality rates from other major causes of death, such as cancer and heart disease, are falling.

"Liver disease is the only big killer on the rise," said Andrew Langford, chief executive of the British Liver Trust, adding that higher alcohol prices and taxes on high-fat foods could help save lives.

Some 90 percent of victims are aged under 70, the study said, and a rising number of those dying are in their forties. Three-fifths of the victims are men.

There are three times as many deaths from alcoholic liver diseases in the poorest areas of the country than in its richest, the study found.

Britain was named binge-drinking capital of Europe in a 2010 study of the European Union's 27 nations.

A survey by EU pollsters Eurobarometer found that while the British are not Europe's most regular drinkers, they drink the most in one sitting.

Excessive drinking costs Britain £2.7 billion ($4.3 billion, 3.2 billion euros) a year, according to government figures, and has been described by Prime Minister David Cameron as "one of the scandals of our society".

Cameron is reportedly expected to announce a consultation on introducing a minimum price per unit of alcohol in the next few days.

http://ph.she.yahoo.com/liver-disease-deaths-jump-25-england-study-

Blood test could predict heart attacks: US study

AFP Relax 

US researchers have found oddly-shaped blood cells in heart attack patients, indicating that a blood test could help predict whether a patient is at risk of an imminent cardiac emergency.

The study by the Scripps Translational Science Institute (STSI) found that the endothelial blood cells from heart attack patients are abnormally large and misshapen, sometimes appearing with multiple nuclei.

That could make them reliable indicators of an impending heart attack, according to the study published this week in Science Translational Medicine.

"The ability to diagnose an imminent heart attack has long been considered the holy grail of cardiovascular medicine," said Eric Topol, the study's principal investigator and director of STSI.

Doctors have long been able to identify risk factors -- such as smoking, obesity and high cholesterol -- that can put patients at greater danger of heart disease, but cannot predict imminent attacks.

The study involved 50 patients who showed up at emergency rooms with heart attacks at four acute care hospitals in San Diego, California, and who were found to have the unusually shaped cells.

"With some additional validation, the hope is to have this test developed for commercial use in next year or two," said researcher Raghava Gollapudi.

"This would be an ideal test to perform in an emergency room to determine if a patient is on the cusp of a heart attack or about to experience one in the next couple of weeks.

"Right now we can only test to detect if a patient is currently experiencing or has recently experienced a heart attack."

Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, causing some 800,000 deaths every year, according to the Center for Disease Control.

http://ph.she.yahoo.com/blood-test-could-predict-heart-attacks-us-study-

How to be Superwoman

By Jeanne Faulkner

Reviewed by QualityHealth's Medical Advisory Board

What if Superwoman were overweight, depressed, anxious, and crabby? What if she was forgetful, distracted, and downright unhappy? Would we still consider her a superhero? That's what millions of women worldwide experience when they try to do it all; simultaneously giving their best as professionals, mothers, wives, friends, sisters, daughters, and more. She works inside and outside the home and somehow finds time for everyone...except the one person who is most important: Herself.

When you ask Superwoman what she does in a day, she'll probably dictate a mind-boggling list of duties and obligations. She'll certainly include work, household chores, childcare duties, carpools, committees, emails, and commitments galore. If that list doesn't also include exercise and a little downtime, she's not setting her priorities right. If she's short-changing her diet with too much fast food or prepackaged processed meals, she may be doing real damage to her health. If she's flying too fast from activity to activity, multitasking as she goes, she may be missing the good stuff in life or worse, ruining her health.

What should Superwoman do? She should put herself on the top of her to-do list and take care of her emotional, physical, and mental health. That means the following:

1. Make a list and cut it down to size. If Superwoman's schedule is too supercharged, she might be filling her time with unnecessary energy-burners. Evaluate which responsibilities can be delegated or eliminated to free up some "me time."
2. Make exercise a priority. Schedule in three to five workouts every week that include at least 30-minutes of cardio exercise and two or three strength training sessions, each followed by stretching.
3. De-stress. Schedule fifteen minutes (or more) every day for meditation or other stress relieving activities. Tai Chi, yoga, deep breathing, mindful walking, and even knitting are all great ways to integrate the mind-body connection.
4. Eat right. Keep a food journal for a week and look closely at what Superwoman is using for jet fuel. If she's not eating mostly fruits and veggies, lean protein, whole grains, dairy (or another calcium source), and healthy fats, and drinking lots of water (not soda, juice, or alcohol), she runs the risk of being supersized and developing chronic health problems like diabetes, hypertension, and more.
5. Get help. No one says Superwoman has to do it all by herself. Get family to help with chores. Get coworkers and office mates to do their share. Don't create more work by micromanaging, though. Give clear instructions, insist on a good job, then step back and let other people be superheroes too.
   http://www.qualityhealth.com/womens-health-articles/being-superwoman-5-ways-not-overwork-yourself

Could You Have Diabetes--But Not Know It?

By Samantha Manning

Reviewed by QualityHealth's Medical Advisory Board

While the exact cause of diabetes remains unknown, both genetics and environmental factors, such as obesity and lack of exercise, appear to play major roles. Diabetes is a disease in which the body does not produce or properly use insulin, which is a hormone that is needed to convert sugar, starches and other food into energy needed for daily life. 

There are approximately 23.6 million children and adults in the United States have diabetes. While an estimated 17.9 million have been diagnosed with diabetes, experts estimate that 5.7 million people are unaware that they have the disease. Don't allow yourself to be a part of that startling statistic.

Signs of Diabetes

Here are some of the major signs to look out for:

• Frequent trips to the bathroom;
• Unquenchable thirst;
• Losing weight without trying;
• Weakness and fatigue;
• Tingling or numbness in your hands, legs, or feet;
• Blurred vision; and
• Skin that is dry or itchy, or frequent infections, cuts, or bruises that take a long time to heal.

Lower Your Diabetes Risk

If your family has a history of diabetes, or you think you may be at risk of acquiring the illness, know that there are ways to help prevent it. Here is a list of ways to lower your risk of getting diabetes:

• Lose extra weight.

  Moderate weight loss of 7 percent of your weight may cut diabetes risk. For someone who weighs 165 pounds, this means losing 11 or 12 pounds.

• Reduce the amount of fat and calories in your diet.

  This should help with weight loss.

• Skip low-carb or high-protein diets.

  These often fail in the long run.

• Get plenty of fiber.

  Get 14 grams of dietary fiber for every 1,000 calories you eat.

• Go for whole grains.

  Make at least half your grains whole grains.

• Get regular physical activity.

  Aim for two and a half hours per week.

http://www.qualityhealth.com/diabetes-articles/could-you-diabetes-not-know-it?ct=39995

Study: Sugary drink each day ups men's heart disease risk by 20 percent

By

Ryan Jaslow

(CBS News) Bad news for blokes who love soda. A new study has found drinking one glass of a sugary beverage each day might cause heart disease.

Soda a day may lead to heart attacks in men
Swapping sugary drinks for diet soda, water leads to weight loss

For the study, Harvard researchers looked at almost 43,000 men between 40 and 75 who were involved in an earlier study that started in 1986 and ended in 2008. Every two years, the men would answer questions about their diet habits, and each man got a blood test halfway through the 22-year study.

PICTURES: Sugary drink shockers: What recent report says

After controlling for other risk factors for heart disease such as smoking, lack of physical activity, alcohol use and family history of heart disease, the researchers still found that men who drank a 12-ounce sugary beverage each day were 20 percent more likely to develop heart disease. These men also had higher levels of heart disease markers triglycerides and C-reactive protein compared with non-drinkers, and lower levels of "good" HDL cholesterol. The study is published in the March 12 issue of Circulation.

"This study adds to the growing evidence that sugary beverages are detrimental to cardiovascular health," study author Dr. Frank B. Hu, professor of nutrition and epidemiology in the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, said in a written statement.

Drinking something sugary less frequently - like twice per week or twice per month - did not increase risk, nor did drinking diet beverages.

Study co-author Dr. Walter Willett, chair of the nutrition department at Harvard School of Public Health, told CBS News medical correspondent Dr. John LaPook that a typical 12-ounce soda contains 10 teaspoons of sugar, but lots of soda drinkers opt for a 20-ounce bottle, which contains up to 18 teaspoons of sugar in one sitting.

"Continually subjecting our bodies to high amounts of glucose, to high blood sugar levels that trigger large secretions of insulin results in stresses that in the long run show up as high risk of heart disease and diabetes," Willett told CBS News medical correspondent Dr. John LaPook.

The study looked only at men but previous research suggests women aren't off the hook. A study last November showed women who regularly drank sugary beverages were nearly four times more likely to have higher levels of triglycerides and sugar in their blood, compared with women who didn't drink soda.  

Heart disease kills more Americans than any other disease, almost 600,000 deaths each year.

That's not all. Recent studies have tied drinking sugary beverages to more risk for diabetes,obesity, strokes, COPD, insomnia, bone loss and headaches.

Dr. Steven Nissen, chairman of cardiovascular medicine at the Cleveland Clinic, told Dr. LaPook that it's quite possible other factors contribute to these findings in soda drinkers.

"It's very likely people who choose to drink sugared soft drinks actually have a variety of health habits that are not heart healthy, and it may well be those health habits that are responsible for the increase in risk," he said. The American Beverage Association takes that same position.

The American Heart Association recommends that adult men consumer no more than 150 calories per day from added sugars, and 100 calories for American women.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-504763_162-57397299-10391704/study-sugary-drink-each-day-ups-mens-heart-disease-risk-by-20-percent/