Health is Wealth

Useful Diets

2012-01-28T18:59:00.000+05:30

10 of the most useful products that are worth incorporating into the diet as often as possible — Created by the very nature of a miracle foods contain whole biologically active complexes of nutrients needed to maintain and restore our health. Of course, the list of such products can be extended to include many kinds of grains, vegetables, fruits and berries.

1. Fish

If the time - at least three times a week - on the menu include fish instead of meat, you can greatly reduce your risk of heart disease and acute (atherosclerosis, coronary heart disease and others), as well as blood cholesterol levels. At the same time in their food and culinary qualities of the fish is not inferior to the meat (it contains many beneficial substances for the human body - from 13 to 23% protein, and fats, extractives and mineral matter), but for ease of digestion of proteins even surpasses it.

2. Bread made from rye flour, wheat flour, corn

This is the bread was staple of our ancestors. Bread made from rye flour, wheat flour, whole grain contains not only vitamins and minerals, but also high in fiber. On its wonderful properties known to many things: fiber lowers blood cholesterol and blood pressure, stimulates digestion and accelerates metabolism, displays the body of toxins, promotes cell renewal and even helps preserve youth. But do not forget that all is good in moderation: too much fiber can cause bloating and other unpleasant consequences.

3. Apples

Of the 15 vitamins necessary to man, the apples have been found 12 - a vitamin B complex, C, E, P, carotene, folic acid and others. Many of them, and minerals (potassium, phosphorus, sodium, magnesium, iodine, iron) and sugars (fructose, glucose, sucrose) as well as pectin and fiber. If every day eat apples, you can significantly reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and cancer. Because these fruits cleanse the body of toxins and reduce cholesterol. And besides, they are rich in antioxidants, which protect cells from aging.

4. Carrots

In carrots rich in vitamins A (carotene), also called vitamin beauty, B1, B2, B3, B6, C, E, K, P, PP, minerals (potassium, calcium, sodium, magnesium, iron, copper, iodine, , phosphorus, cobalt, etc.), it also contains enzymes, fructose, glucose, lecithin, amino acids, proteins and starch. It is recommended for diseases of the heart, liver, gallbladder, kidney, high stomach acidity, salt metabolism disorders, and various inflammatory processes. And carrot prevents the development of cancer, improves blood and is very useful for vision.

5. Pumpkin

Pumpkin without reservation is an ideal vegetable for diet food. No wonder it is recommended to include in the diet for many diseases: heart, blood vessels, stomach, intestine, liver, kidney, and colds. Pumpkin has no equal among the vegetables on the content of iron, so it is indicated for the treatment of anemia. Due to the large quantity of vitamins - C, group B, carotene, E, PP, K, T - it strengthens hair, nails, protects the skin from aging and prevents the appearance of extra pounds. And in a lot of pumpkin pectin and natural antioxidants that remove toxins from the body, lower cholesterol and strengthen the immune system.

6. Blackberry

This miracle berry has surpassed all others in the content of useful substances. It is full of vitamin C (to get his daily dose for an adult should only 30-60 g of berries) and vitamin P (100 g of berries - from 5 to 10 of his daily doses), minerals (iron, magnesium, manganese, and etc.), contains tannin, pectin and organic acids. Black currant strengthens the walls of blood vessels, improves the process of blood, lowers blood pressure and is an excellent tool for the treatment and prevention of infectious diseases. And it improves the metabolism, prevents the appearance of extra weight and is recommended for the treatment of obesity.

7. Briar

Rosehip knowingly consider means of forty diseases. He ranks first among the fruit and berry plants for the content of vitamin C. A lot of it and other B vitamins (P, K, B group, carotenoids) and minerals (phosphorus, potassium, calcium, magnesium, iron, manganese, zinc, molybdenum, cobalt, chromium), contains sugar, malic and citric acid, tannin and pectin. Infusions, decoctions, teas rosehip prevent the development of cardiovascular disease, increase body resistance to infections and have a restorative and tonic effect.

8. Dried fruits

Dried apricots, dried apricots, dried apricots, prunes, raisins, figs, dates, dried apples and pears can serve as the perfect replacement of sugar and sweets with all sorts of artificial additives. Dried fruits that contain vitamins, minerals (high in potassium, phosphorus, calcium, iron) and organic acids include suggestions on the menu at the diseases of the cardiovascular system, lungs, bronchial asthma, anemia, colds. In addition, fruits are an excellent means to strengthen the nervous system, stimulates the blood and cleanse the intestines well.

9. Green tea

Green tea, which contains many vitamins (A, K, PP, C, group B) and minerals (potassium, zinc, fluorine, iodine, etc.), much more useful than black. This drink improves heart, kidney, liver, pancreas and enhances immunity. And green tea normalizes blood pressure, strengthens the walls of blood vessels, improves digestion, neutralizes free radicals, cleanses the body of toxins, reduces the risk of heart disease and cancer and slows the aging process. Another property of this drink - antimicrobial effect, which increases after insisting it within 2-3 days.

10. Honey

Honey is extremely useful: it increases the body's resistance to many infections and has antibacterial properties. It is recommended to accept the treatment of diseases of the liver, gastrointestinal tract, respiratory, etc. This wonderful natural product contains many vitamins (C, K, E, F, group B), enzymes, organic acids and proteins, and in the number of trace elements - whole periodic table: potassium, calcium, manganese, chromium, sodium, nickel, silicon, magnesium, iron, copper, silver and others.

Are you breathing right?

2011-11-12T23:53:00.001+05:30

It is so crucial to life that we should be paying more attention to it, but strangely, we don’t. We worry about erratic pulse rates and ECGs, but not about whether we breathe right. Most of us do not maximize on our breathing potential. But master the art of breathing and you will be rewarded with improved concentration, creativity, boundless energy, physical harmony, mental composure and serenity!

Abdomen aesthetics

We can learn the right way of breathing from babies! Surprised? “That’s because, unlike adults, they aren’t inhibited. Even adults breathe harmoniously when they sleep,” says Dr. N Chandrasekaran, director, therapy, Krishnamachari Yoga Mandiram (KYM).

When you inhale the right way, the dome-shaped diaphragm (located just under our lungs) gets flattened and pushed down, which in turn pushes the upper abdomen out. “Many of us consider abdominal projection unsightly and, therefore, draw in our tummies (abdomen) when we breathe in. This curtails vertical expansion of the lungs and allows us to draw in only about half the air we would have inhaled, had we breathed normally. It also creates a tightness in the area, which can make you emotionally tense too,” says Dr. Chandrasekaran. “For a healthy life, abdominal breathing is critical and about 60 per cent of our bodily ailments can be healed when we correct the way we breathe. Deep breathing can cause a noticeable fullness in the upper abdomen, which is healthy, and indicative of a relaxed abdomen, body and mind. But the lower abdomen should never bulge out, he adds.

Allopaths, such as Dr. Raj B. Singh, chief respiratory physician, Apollo Hospitals, however, feel most of us breathe normally and our body will automatically take in the volume of air it requires. “But breathing exercises calm the mind and allow the body to work better,” he agrees, adding, “Breathing exercises are important for obese persons and smokers, as it clears the collapsed airways in their lungs.” Aerobic exercises (without weight lifting), such as swimming and vigorous games, facilitate deep breathing and better blood circulation.

Ideally, we should take in about 16 to 18 breaths per minute. Get into a comfortable, lying down position, which relaxes your abdominal muscles, and watch how you breathe. Now place your right hand on your chest and observe the movement. Let your exhalations and inhalations be as deep and as long as you are comfortable with. Allow your upper abdomen (above the umbilicus region) to bulge out during inhalation. “Practise this for about 15 minutes in the morning and evening, and the effect will soon spill over into your breathing pattern throughout the day,” says Dr. Chandrasekaran.

Anger control and relaxation

If you have a harmonious breathing pattern, it harmonizes your physiological systems. Emotionally, it makes you relaxed and composed.

Deep breathing with slow release or exhalation followed by a gentle holding of breath leads the brain into the creative alpha state, brain power trainers believe.

Focussed, long inhalation can energise you. So, the next time you feel sleepy in the office, take a deep breath. Likewise, if you feel tense and stressed, focus on exhalation and make it as long as you are comfortable with.

Helps you calm down

When your mind is anxious, agitated, or angry, you tend to hyperventilate and your systolic blood pressure and heart beat rate shoots up. “By consciously slowing your breathing, and breathing deeply, you can bring your breathing to normal. This brings the agitated mind too back to normal and quietens it,” says Dr. Shanthi Raj, Sundaram Medical Foundation.

On the contrary, during panic/anxiety attacks, she suggests breathing into paper bags for about two minutes, wherein you take in more carbon dioxide into your blood. This vaso-dilates the brain and helps you calm down.

Breathing is the rationale behind meditation, pranayama and other techniques which are supposed to empower the mind. “The normal nature of the mind is to move from object to object. Focussed breathing enhances the mind’s focus, makes it powerful and prepares it to fix its attention on a single thing,” says Dr. Chandrasekaran.

To breathe well is to live well, believed our ancient yogis, some of whom survived for days on just breath and without food or water. Whew! Take a breather!

TAKE A BREATHER

Let your inhalation and exhalation be as long and as deep as you are comfortable with.

Don’t draw in your tummy while inhaling. Allow your upper abdomen to jut out while inhaling.

Inhale deeply to refresh/energise yourself.

Exhale deeply to relax and calm yourself.

Practise breathing exercises such as pranayama for a few minutes everyday.

Aerobic exercises enhance breathing and blood circulation.

TOP 10 foods for a good nights sleep

2011-09-17T18:23:00.000+05:30

What is the secret to getting a solid 7 to 8 hours of sleep? Head for the kitchen and enjoy one or two of these 10 foods. They relax tense muscles, quiet buzzing minds, and/or get calming, sleep-inducing hormones - serotonin and melatonin - flowing. Yawning yet?

Bananas. They're practically a sleeping pill in a peel. In addition to a bit of soothing melatonin and serotonin, bananas contain magnesium, a muscle relaxant.

Chamomile tea. The reason chamomile is such a staple of bedtime tea blends is its mild sedating effect - it's the perfect natural antidote for restless minds/bodies.

Warm milk. It's not a myth. Milk has some tryptophan - an amino acid that has a sedative - like effect - and calcium, which helps the brain use tryptophan. Plus there's the psychological throw-back to infancy, when a warm bottle meant "relax, everything's fine."

Honey. Drizzle a little in your warm milk or herb tea. Lots of sugar is stimulating, but a little glucose tells your brain to turn off orexin, a recently discovered neurotransmitter that's linked to alertness.

Potatoes. A small baked spud won't overwhelm your GI tract, and it clears away acids that can interfere with yawn-inducing tryptophan. To up the soothing effects, mash it with warm milk.

Oatmeal. Oats are a rich source of sleep - inviting melatonin, and a small bowl of warm cereal with a splash of maple syrup is cozy - plus if you've got the munchies, it's filling too.

Almonds. A handful of these heart-healthy nuts can be snooze-inducing, as they contain both tryptophan and a nice dose of muscle-relaxing magnesium.

Flaxseeds. When life goes awry and feeling down is keeping you up, try sprinkling 2 tablespoons of these healthy little seeds on your bedtime oatmeal. They're rich in omega-3 fatty acids, a natural mood lifter.

Whole-wheat bread. A slice of toast with your tea and honey will release insulin, which helps tryptophan get to your brain, where it's converted to serotonin and quietly murmurs "time to sleep."

Turkey. It's the most famous source of tryptophan, credited with all those Thanksgiving naps. But that's actually modern folklore. Tryptophan works when your stomach's basically empty, not overstuffed, and when there are some carbs around, not tons of protein. But put a lean slice or two on some whole-wheat bread mid-evening, and you've got one of the best sleep inducers in your kitchen.

A Deep and Dreamy Sleep

2011-07-07T05:53:00.010+05:30

Sleep has always been a somewhat magical state with a mysterious purpose. In Hindu scripture, the world itself is considered the dream of a sleeping Vishnu.

Why do we need sleep? There is no good answer to this question, but it is an ancient biological process. Two stages of sleep, the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) stage, and the Delta-wave, or slow-wave sleep each have distinctive effects on different types of memory and decision making. Sleep is also a general healer. It promotes the rejuvenation of the immune, skeletal, muscular and nervous systems, and a healer of wounds.

Body Chemistry: There is a particularly strong effect of sleep on body chemistry. The important anabolic (body-building) hormones, growth hormone, and insulin are secreted preferentially during sleep and reduced by poor sleep. Reductions in sleep duration result in prediabetic chemistry-even a single disrupted night of sleep can alter insulin response in young, healthy people. Similarly, in one's youth, up to 70% of daily growth hormone is secreted during the deepest part of sleep. With ageing, this decreases with a fall in deep sleep. If we could increase deep sleep in the elderly, we might induce a younger hormonal pattern. Exercise and meditation both increase deep sleep.

How much is enough? The amount of sleep one gets seems to correlate with longevity; seven hours is the 'sweet spot'. A lack of sleep (5 hours or less) more than doubles the risk of cardiac death while too much (8 hours or more) seems to be associated with non-cardiac death. Too little sleep seems to be a particular risk factor for weight gain, hypertension and type 2 diabetes.

Naps: As India lurches towards a more Westernised life, the mid-afternoon nap may become rare. That would be a shame. A study from Greece confirms that regular napping (three times a week, 30 minutes) decreased the risk of coronary disease by 37%!

Factors that influence sleep: Caffeine In the West, caffeine is one of the major culprits in the sleep disruption of modern life- even more so in recent years. Tea has far less caffeine than coffee.

Exercise: Aerobic exercise that lasts for an hour will help you get to sleep and stay asleep. However, it may take up to three weeks for the full effect to be noticeable.

Alcohol: Alcohol at night reduces the healing benefits of sleep. While people fall asleep faster, alcohol increases lighter REM sleep and shortens slow-wave sleep and overall sleep time. As a result, it can cause more sleepiness the next day.

Melatonin: The body creates a chemical called melatonin, which may be a helpful sleeping aid in certain situations like jet lag, shift work, and general insomnia. I sometimes recommend it, particularly for post-surgical patients.

While some take melatonin nightly and tout it as an anti-ageing cure-all, I generally advise my patients to use it sparingly in specific settings until we know more about long-term effects. For jetlag, the optimal dose appears to be 5 mg, taken at bedtime in the new timezone; for insomnia, a dose less than one-tenth of that (0.3 mg).

The bottomline: Folk wisdom about the healing properties of sleep is absolutely correct. Too often it is neglected by physicians in their advice to patients. With a systematic approach and some discipline, you can improve your sleep, feel better and live healthier and longer!

Some Useful Tips to Avoid Back Pain

2011-06-25T19:53:00.000+05:30

Back pain is a matter of swear pain sometimes, and we all can go through this problem at any stage of our life. But there are ways by which you can prevent it from happening to you. Here are 5 important ways to prevent yourself from back pain.

1 – Get up and get moving

Keeping spine and body of yours healthy is really important and for that, exercise is the best solution. You should start with an activity that you love to do and also make sure that activity should be of that type that makes you breath harder than your usual routine and you should do 30 minutes exercise everyday(or on most days of the week) including some hard exercises that make your muscles strong and healthy. This is very good for the circulation process of your body. Some examples are jogging, biking, swimming and gardening can also be a good exercise if done hard.

2 – See your doctor

Make a routine of yours to visit your physician at least once or twice in a year, that’s very much important that you should get yourself medically checked and ensure that all the body systems are working in their proper way and for this thing age does not matter. If you are experiencing back pain for a long time and don’t find relief then definitely you should consult your doctor because in the present medical era, many type of treatments are available, so you don’t have to worry about getting that back pain for life time.

3 – Lose weight

Getting overweighed is another problem causing many heart diseases, diabetes and blood pressure as well as causes your spine to pain and eventually wear out. And according to analysis half of American population is overweighed. So for this reason reduce some weight and relax your spine. If you don’t know the way to reduce weight, consult your doctor to help you with diet plans and exercises necessary to reduce weight.

4 – Good posture

Some people think that slouching while sitting or standing helps to relax your muscles but that’s not true, actually muscles work harder due to that. To avoid exerting extra pressure on your spine, make yourself to be in a good posture that demands you to sit and stand in a relaxed and neutral position.

5 – Rest easy and properly

To sleep on an easy mattress that maintains the same natural alignment of your spine is also a very important thing. If you feel uneasy while sleeping and in the morning you feel your muscles are in pain and you are not feeling fresh, then you must give a look to your bed. Having a complete and easy sleep wakes you up fresh and healthy in the morning. If you keep your back healthy, this will keep you look good for a long time.

Health Benefits of Exercise

2011-06-23T05:34:00.001+05:30

Regular exercise can help protect you from heart disease and stroke, high blood pressure, noninsulin-dependent diabetes, obesity, back pain, osteoporosis, and can improve your mood and help you to better manage stress.

For the greatest overall health benefits, experts recommend that you do 20 to 30 minutes of aerobic activity three or more times a week and some type of muscle strengthening activity and stretching at least twice a week. However, if you are unable to do this level of activity, you can gain substantial health benefits by accumulating 30 minutes or more of moderate-intensity physical activity a day, at least five times a week.

If you have been inactive for a while, you may want to start with less strenuous activities such as walking or swimming at a comfortable pace. Beginning at a slow pace will allow you to become physically fit without straining your body. Once you are in better shape, you can gradually do more strenuous activity.

How Physical Activity Impacts Health

Regular physical activity that is performed on most days of the week reduces the risk of developing or dying from some of the leading causes of illness and death in the United States.

• Reduces the risk of dying prematurely.

• Reduces the risk of dying prematurely from heart disease.

• Reduces the risk of developing diabetes.

• Reduces the risk of developing high blood pressure.

• Helps reduce blood pressure in people who already have high blood pressure.

• Reduces the risk of developing colon cancer.

• Reduces feelings of depression and anxiety.

• Helps control weight.

• Helps build and maintain healthy bones, muscles, and joints.

• Helps older adults become stronger and better able to move about without falling.

• Promotes psychological well-being.

Specific Health Benefits of Exercise

Heart Disease and Stroke. Daily physical activity can help prevent heart disease and stroke by strengthening your heart muscle, lowering your blood pressure, raising your high-density lipoprotein (HDL) levels (good cholesterol) and lowering low-density lipoprotein (LDL) levels (bad cholesterol), improving blood flow, and increasing your heart's working capacity.

High Blood Pressure. Regular physical activity can reduce blood pressure in those with high blood pressure levels. Physical activity also reduces body fatness, which is associated with high blood pressure.

Noninsulin-Dependent Diabetes. By reducing body fatness, physical activity can help to prevent and control this type of diabetes.

Obesity. Physical activity helps to reduce body fat by building or preserving muscle mass and improving the body's ability to use calories. When physical activity is combined with proper nutrition, it can help control weight and prevent obesity, a major risk factor for many diseases.

Back Pain. By increasing muscle strength and endurance and improving flexibility and posture, regular exercise helps to prevent back pain.

Osteoporosis. Regular weight-bearing exercise promotes bone formation and may prevent many forms of bone loss associated with aging.

Psychological Effects. Regular physical activity can improve your mood and the way you feel about yourself. Researchers also have found that exercise is likely to reduce depression and anxiety and help you to better manage stress.

Banana Benefits

2011-05-15T18:47:00.000+05:30

Black Pepper - Health Benefits

2011-04-30T04:29:00.000+05:30

The health benefits of black pepper include relief from respiratory disorders, cough, common cold, constipation, digestion, anemia, impotency, muscular strains, dental care, pyorrhea, diarrhea, and heart disease.

Black pepper is the fruit of the black pepper plant from the Piperaceae family and is used as a spice and also as a medicine. The chemical piperine, present in black pepper, causes the spiciness. It is native to the southern state of India, Kerala. From ancient times, black pepper is one of the most widely traded spices in the world. It is not seasonal and is, therefore available throughout the year.

Because of its antibacterial properties, pepper is also used to preserve food. It is a source of manganese, iron, potassium, vitamin C and vitamin K and dietary fiber. Black pepper is a very good, anti-inflammatory agent.

The health benefits of black pepper include the following:

Good for stomach: Pepper increases the hydrochloric acid secretion in stomach and thus, helps digestion. Proper digestion is essential to avoid diarrhea, constipation and colic. Pepper also helps to prevent formation of intestinal gas. Pepper-added diet promotes sweating and urination.

Helps to lose weight: The outer layer of peppercorn assists in the breakdown of fat cells. Hence, peppery foods are a good way to help you shed weight.

Good for skin: Pepper helps to cure Vitiligo, which is a skin disease that causes some areas of skin to lose its normal pigment and turn white. According to researchers in London, piperine contained in pepper can stimulate the skin to produce pigment. Topical treatment of piperine combined with ultra violet light therapy is much better than the other treatments for vitiligo. It also reduces the chances of skin cancer due to excess ultraviolet radiation.

Relief for cough and cold: In Ayurveda pepper is added in tonics for cold and cough. Pepper gives relief from sinusitis and nasal congestion.The antibacterial property of black pepper helps to fight against infections, insect bites etc. Pepper added diet helps to keeping your arteries clean.

Good antioxidant: An antioxidant, like pepper, can prevent or repair the damage caused by the free radicals and thus helps to prevent cancer, cardiovascular diseases and liver problems.

Enhances bio Availability: Black pepper helps in transporting the benefits of other herbs to different parts of body.

According to Ayurveda, black pepper also helps avoid ear-ache and gangrene. It is also good for conditions of hernia, hoarseness and insect bites. It relieves joint pain.

It is a good treatment for respiratory conditions like asthma, whooping cough etc.

It is used to treat conditions of tooth decay and toothache. In ancient times, pepper was also used to treat eye problems.

Preparing grounded pepper powder at home is better than buying ready-made pepper powder. But even home-made powder retains its freshness for only up to 3 months. Whole peppercorns can keep their freshness indefinitely.

Thus, adding a pinch of black pepper to every meal helps improve taste and digestion. It also improves your overall health and well being.

Precaution: Pepper may cause sneezing. Patients who’ve undergone abdominal surgery should not take pepper added diet because pepper has an irritating effect on the intestines. It is also not good for people with ulcers. Black pepper should not be taken in high concentration.

Health Benefits of Green Tea

2011-04-10T08:51:00.000+05:30

Green tea has increasingly become a very popular drink worldwide because of its immensely powerful health benefits.

It is extraordinarily amazing what green tea can do for your health. And if you're not drinking 3 to 4 cups of green tea today, you're definitely NOT doing your health a big favor.

Here Are The 25 Reasons Why You Should Start Drinking Green Tea Right Now:

1. Green Tea and Cancer
Green tea helps reduce the risk of cancer. The antioxidant in green tea is 100 times more effective than vitamin C and 25 times better than vitamin E. This helps your body at protecting cells from damage believed to be linked to cancer.

2. Green Tea and Heart Disease
Green tea helps prevent heart disease and stroke by lowering the level of cholesterol. Even after the heart attack, it prevents cell deaths and speeds up the recovery of heart cells.

3. Green Tea and Anti-Aging
Green tea contains antioxidant known as polyphenols which fight against free radicals. What this means it helps you fight against aging and promotes longevity.

4. Green Tea and Weight Loss
Green tea helps with your body weight loss. Green tea burns fat and boosts your metabolism rate naturally. It can help you burn up to 70 calories in just one day. That translates to 7 pounds in one year.

5. Green Tea and Skin
Antioxidant in green tea protects the skin from the harmful effects of free radicals, which cause wrinkling and skin aging. Green tea also helps fight against skin cancer.

6. Green Tea and Arthritis
Green tea can help prevent and reduce the risk of rheumatoid arthritis. Green tea has benefit for your health as it protects the cartilage by blocking the enzyme that destroys cartilage.

7. Green Tea and Bones
The very key to this is high fluoride content found in green tea. It helps keep your bones strong. If you drink green tea every day, this will help you preserve your bone density.

8. Green Tea and Cholesterol
Green tea can help lower cholesterol level. It also improves the ratio of good cholesterol to bad cholesterol, by reducing bad cholesterol level.

9. Green Tea and Obesity
Green tea prevents obesity by stopping the movement of glucose in fat cells. If you are on a healthy diet, exercise regularly and drink green tea, it is unlikely you'll be obese.

10. Green Tea and Diabetes
Green tea improves lipid and glucose metabolisms, prevents sharp increases in blood sugar level, and balances your metabolism rate.

11. Green Tea and Alzheimer's
Green tea helps boost your memory. And although there's no cure for Alzheimer's, it helps slow the process of reduced acetylcholine in the brain, which leads to Alzheimer's.

12. Green Tea and Parkinson's
Antioxidants in green tea helps prevent against cell damage in the brain, which could cause Parkinson's. People drinking green tea also are less likely to progress with Parkinson's.

13. Green Tea and Liver Disease
Green tea helps prevent transplant failure in people with liver failure. Researches showed that green tea destroys harmful free radicals in fatty livers.

14. Green Tea and High Blood Pressure
Green tea helps prevent high blood pressure. Drinking green tea helps keep your blood pressure down by repressing angiotensin, which leads to high blood pressure.

15. Green Tea and Food Poisoning
Catechin found in green tea can kill bacteria which causes food poisoning and kills the toxins produced by those bacteria.

16. Green Tea and Blood Sugar
Blood sugar tends to increase with age, but polyphenols and polysaccharides in green tea help lower your blood sugar level.

17. Green Tea and Immunity
Polyphenols and flavenoids found in green tea help boost your immune system, making your health stronger in fighting against infections.

18. Green Tea and Cold and Flu
Green tea prevents you from getting a cold or flu. Vitamin C in green tea helps you treat the flu and the common cold.

19. Green Tea and Asthma
Theophylline in green tea relaxes the muscles which support the bronchial tubes, reducing the severity of asthma.

20. Green Tea and Ear Infection
Green tea helps with ear infection problem. For natural ear cleaning, soak a cotton ball in green tea and clean the infected ear.

21. Green Tea and Herpes
Green tea increases the effectiveness of topical interferon treatment of herpes. First green tea compress is applied, and then let the skin dry before the interferon treatment.

22. Green Tea and Tooth Decay
Green tea destroys bacteria and viruses that cause many dental diseases. It also slows the growth of bacteria which leads to bad breath.

23. Green Tea and Stress
L-theanine, which is a kind of amino acids in green tea, can help relieve stress and anxiety.

24. Green Tea and Allergies
EGCG found in green tea relieves allergies. So, if you have allergies, you should really consider drinking green tea.

25. Green Tea and HIV
Scientists in Japan have found that EGCG (Epigallocatechin Gallate) in green tea can stop HIV from binding to healthy immune cells. What this means is that green tea can help stop the HIV virus from spreading.

10 Tips for Good Night Sleep

2011-03-21T05:52:00.000+05:30

Stick to a schedule: Erratic bedtimes do not allow for your body to align to the proper circadian rhythms. Mum was right when she set a time we always had to go to sleep as kids. Also, make sure you try to keep the same schedule on weekends too, otherwise the next morning, you’d wake later and feel overly tired.

Sleep only at night: Avoid daytime sleep if possible. Daytime naps steal hours from nighttime slumber. Limit daytime sleep to 20-minute, power naps.

Exercise: It’s actually known to help you sleep better. Your body uses the sleep period to recover its muscles and joints that have been exercised. Twenty to thirty minutes of exercise every day can help you sleep, but be sure to exercise in the morning or afternoon. Exercise stimulates the body and aerobic activity before bedtime may make falling asleep more difficult.

Taking a hot shower or bath before bed helps bring on sleep because they can relax tense muscles.

Avoid eating just before bed: Avoid eat large meals or spicy foods before bedtime. Give yourself at least 2 hours from when you eat to when you sleep. This allows for digestion to happen (or at least start) well before you go to sleep so your body can rest well during the night, rather than churning away your food.

Avoid caffeine: It keeps you awake and that’s now what you want for a good nights sleep. We all know that.

Read a fiction book: It takes you to a whole new world if you really get into it. And then take some time to ponder over the book as you fall asleep. I find as I read more and more, regardless of the book, I get more tired at night and so find it easier to fall asleep. Different for others?

Have the room slightly cooler: I prefer this to a hot room. I prefer to turn off the heat and allow the coolness to circulate in and out of the windows. If I get cold, I wear warmer clothes. It also saves on the bills as you’re not going to require the heat all night long.

Sleep in silence: I find sleeping with no music or TV on more easy and restful. I guess others are different, but sleep with no distractions is best for a clearer mind.

Avoid alcohol before bedtime: It’s a depressant; although it may make it easier to fall asleep, it causes you to wake up during the night. As alcohol is digested your body goes into withdrawal from the alcohol, causing nighttime awakenings and often nightmares for some people.

Improve your Brain

2011-03-01T08:04:00.000+05:30

Everyone can take steps to improve their memory, and with time and practice most people can gain the ability to memorize seemingly impossible amounts of information. Whether you want to win the World Memory Championships, ace your history test, or simply remember where you put your keys, this article can get you started. Scientists believe that exercising your brain can create a ‘cognitive reserve' that will help you stay sharp as you age.

1. Convince yourself that you do have a good memory that will improve. Too many people get stuck here and convince themselves that their memory is bad, that they are just not good with names, that numbers just slip out of their minds for some reason. Erase those thoughts and vow to improve your memory. Commit yourself to the task and bask in your achievements — it's hard to keep motivated if you beat yourself down every time you make a little bit of progress.

2. Keep your brain active. The brain is not a muscle, but regularly “exercising” the brain actually does keep it growing and spurs the development of new nerve connections that can help improve memory. By developing new mental skills—especially complex ones such as learning a new language or learning to play a new musical instrument—and challenging your brain with puzzles and games you can keep your brain active and improve its physiological functioning.

3. Exercise daily. Regular aerobic exercise improves circulation and efficiency throughout the body, including in the brain, and can help ward off the memory loss that comes with aging. Exercise also makes you more alert and relaxed, and can thereby improve your memory uptake, allowing you to take better mental “pictures.”

4. Reduce stress. Chronic stress, although it does not physically damage the brain, can make remembering much more difficult. Even temporary stresses can make it more difficult to effectively focus on concepts and observe things. Try to relax, regularly practice yoga or other stretching exercises, and see a doctor if you have severe chronic stress.

5. Eat well and eat right. There are a lot of herbal supplements on the market that claim to improve memory, but none have yet been shown to be effective in clinical tests (although small studies have shown some promising results for ginkgo biloba and phosphatidylserine) . A healthy diet, however, contributes to a healthy brain, and foods containing antioxidants— broccoli, blueberries, spinach, and berries, for example—and Omega-3 fatty acids appear to promote healthy brain functioning. Feed your brain with such supplements as Thiamine, Vitamin E, Niacin and Vitamin B-6. Grazing, eating 5 or 6 small meals throughout the day instead of 3 large meals, also seems to improve mental functioning (including memory) by limiting dips in blood sugar, which may negatively affect the brain.

6. Take better pictures. Often we forget things not because our memory is bad, but rather because our observational skills need work. One common situation where this occurs (and which almost everyone can relate to) is meeting new people. Often we don't really learn people's names at first because we aren't really concentrating on remembering them. You'll find that if you make a conscious effort to remember such things, you'll do much better. One way to train yourself to be more observant is to look at an unfamiliar photograph for a few seconds and then turn the photograph over and describe or write down as many details as you can about the photograph. Try closing your eyes and picturing the photo in your mind. Use a new photograph each time you try this exercise, and with regular practice you will find you're able to remember more details with even shorter glimpses of the photos.

7. Give yourself time to form a memory. Memories are very fragile in the short-term, and distractions can make you quickly forget something as simple as a phone number. The key to avoid losing memories before you can even form them is to be able to focus on the thing to be remembered for a while without thinking about other things, so when you're trying to remember something, avoid distractions and complicated tasks for a few minutes.

8. Create vivid, memorable images. You remember information more easily if you can visualize it. If you want to associate a child with a book, try not to visualize the child reading the book – that's too simple and forgettable. Instead, come up with something more jarring, something that sticks, like the book chasing the child, or the child eating the book. It's your mind – make the images as shocking and emotional as possible to keep the associations strong.

9. Repeat things you need to learn. The more times you hear, see, or think about something, the more surely you'll remember it, right? It's a no-brainer. When you want to remember something, be it your new coworker's name or your best friend's birthday, repeat it, either out loud or silently. Try writing it down; think about it.

10. Group things you need to remember. Random lists of things (a shopping list, for example) can be especially difficult to remember. To make it easier, try categorizing the individual things from the list. If you can remember that, among other things, you wanted to buy four different kinds of vegetables, you'll find it easier to remember all four.

11. Organize your life. Keep items that you frequently need, such as keys and eyeglasses, in the same place every time. Use an electronic organizer or daily planner to keep track of appointments, due dates for bills, and other tasks. Keep phone numbers and addresses in an address book or enter them into your computer or cell phone. Improved organization can help free up your powers of concentration so that you can remember less routine things. Even if being organized doesn't improve your memory, you'll receive a lot of the same benefits (i.e. you won't have to search for your keys anymore).

12. Try meditation. Research now suggests that people who regularly practice “mindfulness” meditation are able to focus better and may have better memories. Mindfulness (also known as awareness or insight meditation) is the type commonly practiced in Western countries and is easy to learn. Studies at Massachusetts General Hospital show that regular meditation thickens the cerebral cortex in the brain by increasing the blood flow to that region. Some researchers believe this can enhance attention span, focus, and memory.

13. Sleep well. The amount of sleep we get affects the brain's ability to recall recently learned information. Getting a good night's sleep – a minimum of seven hours a night – may improve your short-term memory and long-term relational memory, according to recent studies conducted at the Harvard Medical School.

14. Build your memorization arsenal. Learn pegs, memory palaces, and the Dominic System. These techniques form the foundation for mnemonic techniques, and will visibly improve your memory.

15. Venture out and learn from your mistakes. Go ahead and take a stab at memorizing the first one hundred digits of pi, or, if you've done that already, the first one thousand. Memorize the monarchs of England through your memory palaces, or your grocery list through visualization. Through diligent effort you will eventually master the art of memorization.

Info on AIDS

2011-02-02T04:29:00.001+05:30

AIDS stands for "Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome" or "acquired immunodeficiency syndrome" and denotes a condition, which results from the damage done by HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) to the immune system. The condition was first identified in 1981 and the name "AIDS" was first introduced on July 27, 1982.

It has been estimated that around 33 million people around the world have been infected with HIV and that around two million people die from AIDS related conditions each year. On October 27, 1988, the UN General Assembly officially recognized that the World Health Organization declared December 1, 1988, to be World AIDS Day. World AIDS Day has also been observed on this date each year since then.

December 1 is observed as World AIDS Day:

On World AIDS Day, many community, national and international leaders issue proclamations on supporting and treating people living with HIV and AIDS and stimulating research into the treatment of these conditions. The of World AIDS Day was 'Universal Access and Human Rights'.

Symbol:

A simple red ribbon is one of the most widely recognized symbols of HIV and AIDS and the people who live with these conditions. The symbol was presented by the Visual AIDS Artists Caucus in 1991. The red ribbon was originally intended to be worn as a badge, but is now used in a wide variety of ways.

The symbol of the World AIDS Campaign consists of a sketched image of a red ribbon and the words "world aids campaign". The words "world" and "campaign" are in black and the word "aids" is in red. The ends of the ribbon merge into splashes of green, blue, purple and orange. The splashes of color can be interpreted in a variety of ways, but are often taken to indicate the diversity of people living with HIV and AIDS.

Causes:

AIDS is caused by HIV.HIV is a virus that gradually attacks immune system cells. As HIV progressively damages these cells, the body becomes more vulnerable to infections, which it will have difficulty in fighting off. It is at the point of very advanced HIV infection that a person is said to have AIDS. It can be years before HIV has damaged the immune system enough for AIDS to develop.

Important facts about the spread of AIDS include:

AIDS is the sixth leading cause of death among people ages 25-44.

The World Health Organization estimates that more than 25 million people worldwide have died from this infection since the start of the epidemic.

In 2008, there were approximately 33.4 million people around the world living with HIV/AIDS, including 2.1 million children under age 15.

Symptoms:

AIDS begins with HIV infection. People infected with HIV may have no symptoms for 10 years or longer, but they can still transmit the infection to others during this symptom-free period. If the infection is not detected and treated, the immune system gradually weakens and AIDS develops.

Almost all people infected with HIV, if not treated, will develop AIDS. There is a small group of patients who develop AIDS very slowly, or never at all. These patients are called non progressors, and many seem to have a genetic difference that prevents the virus from damaging their immune system.

The symptoms of AIDS are primarily the result of infections that do not normally develop in individuals with healthy immune systems. These are called opportunistic infections.

People with AIDS have had their immune system damaged by HIV and are very susceptible to these opportunistic infections.

Common symptoms are:

Chills

Fevers

Sweats (particularly at night)

Swollen lymph glands

Weakness

Weight loss

TRANSMITION:

Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) causes AIDS. The virus attacks the immune system and leaves the body vulnerable to a variety of life-threatening infections and cancers.

Common bacteria, yeast, parasites, and viruses that ordinarily do not cause serious disease in people with healthy immune systems can cause fatal illnesses in people with AIDS.

HIV has been found in:

Saliva

Tears

Nervous system tissue and spinal fluid

Blood, semen (including pre-seminal fluid, which is the liquid that comes out before ejaculation)

Vaginal fluid

Breast milk.

However, only blood, semen, vaginal secretions, and breast milk generally transmits infection to others.

The virus can be spread (transmitted):

Through sexual contact - including oral, vaginal, and anal sex

Through blood - via blood transfusions.

From mother to child - a pregnant woman can transmit the virus to her fetus through their shared blood circulation, or a nursing mother can transmit it to her baby in her breast milk.

Other methods of spreading the virus are rare and include

Accidental needle injury.

Artificial insemination with infected donated semen.

Organ transplantation with infected organs.

HIV infection is NOT spread by:

Casual contact such as hugging

Mosquitoes

Participation in sports

Touching items previously touched by a person infected with the virus

AIDS and blood or organ donation:

AIDS is NOT transmitted to a person who DONATES blood or organs.

HIV can be transmitted to a person RECEIVING blood or organs from an infected donor.

To reduce this risk, blood banks and organ donor programs screen donors, blood, and tissues thoroughly.

People at highest risk for getting HIV:

Injection drug users who share needles

Infants born to mothers with HIV who didn't receive HIV therapy during pregnancy

People engaging in unprotected sex, especially with people who have other high-risk behaviors.

PREVENTION:

Safe sex

Safe sex to reduce the chance of acquiring or spreading HIV, and other sexually transmitted diseases.

Needle sharing

Do not use illicit drugs and do not share needles or syringes.

Contact with blood

Avoid contact with another person's blood. Protective clothing, masks, and goggles may be appropriate when caring for people who are injured.

HIV-POSITIVE

Anyone who tests positive for HIV can pass the disease to others and should not donate blood, plasma, body organs, or sperm. Infected people should tell any sexual partner about their HIV-positive status. They should not exchange body fluids during sexual activity, and should use whatever preventive measures (such as condoms) will give their partner the most protection.

HIV-POSITIVE WOMEN

HIV-positive women who wish to become pregnant should seek counseling about the risk to their unborn children, and methods to help prevent their baby from becoming infected. The use of certain medications dramatically reduces the chances that the baby will become infected during pregnancy.

Breast-Feeding

It recommends that HIV-infected women avoid breast-feeding to prevent transmitting HIV to their infants through breast milk.

SAFE-SEX PRACTICES

Safe-sex practices, such as latex condoms, are highly effective in preventing HIV transmission. HOWEVER, there remains a risk of acquiring the infection even with the use of condoms. Abstinence is the only sure way to prevent sexual transmission of HIV.

SEXUAL BEHAVIOR

The riskiest sexual behavior is unprotected receptive anal intercourse. The least risky sexual behavior is receiving oral sex. Performing oral sex on a man is associated with some risk of HIV transmission, but this is less risky than unprotected vaginal intercourse. Female-to-male transmission of the virus is much less likely than male-to-female transmission. Performing oral sex on a woman who does not have her period has a low risk of transmission.

Antiretroviral Medications:

HIV-positive patients who are taking antiretroviral medications are less likely to transmit the virus. For example, pregnant women who are on effective treatment at the time of delivery, and who have undetectable viral loads, give HIV to their baby less than 1% of the time, compared with about 20% of the time if medications are not used.

Human Body (Some Interesting Facts)

2011-01-16T08:11:00.001+05:30

Approximately 75% of human poop is made of water.

Your eyes are always the same size from birth but your nose and ears never stop growing.

It takes the food seven seconds to get from your mouth to your stomach.

The average human dream lasts 2-3 seconds.

Your brain is more active during the night than the day.

One human hair can support 3kg.

Human thighbones are stronger than concrete.

The tooth is the only part of the human body that can’t repair itself.

An average human loses about 200 head hairs per day.

It is impossible to lick your elbow.

Your body requires 1000-1500 calories per day just to simply survive (breathing, sleeping, eating).

Every day an adult body produces 300 billion new cells.

Scientists say the higher your I.Q. the more you dream.

You use 200 muscles to take one step.

Muscle cells live as long as you do while skin cells live less than 24 hours.

A full bladder is roughly the size of a soft ball.

Your brain operates on the same amount of power that would light a 10-watt light bulb.

There are 5 million hair follicles on an average adult.

The acid in your stomach is strong enough to dissolve razorblades.

The human brain cell can hold 5 times as much information as the Encyclopedia Brittanica.

The white part of your fingernail is called the Lunula.

There is enough iron in a human being to make one small nail.

A shank is the part of the sole between the heel and the ball of the foot.

The talus is the second largest bone in the foot.

The attachment of human muscles to skin is what causes dimples.

A 13 year old child found a tooth growing out of his foot in 1977.

Your thumb is the same length of your nose.

A woman’s heart beats faster than a man’s.

Dogs and Humans are the only animals with prostates.

It only takes 7lbs of of pressure to rip off your ears.

Helpful Tips on Eye Care

2011-01-14T06:16:00.002+05:30

With so many of us spending lots of time in front of the computer every day it comes to no surprise that research is showing a rise in visual problems. What can one do? First, it’s important to find out how you can protect your eyes through eye health exams and by making a few minor changes in your computer viewing habits. Here are some helpful Eye Care Tips:

Positioning is everything

Correct positioning of your computer, keyboard and typing copy is essential. Your screen should be positioned about an arm’s length from your eyes and 20 degrees below eye level. Consider foot and wrist rests for added comfort.

Lighting can make all the difference

Room lighting should be diffuse, not direct, to reduce glare and reflections from your screen. Look into an internal or external glare screen and be sure to set your colour, contrast and brightness levels to suit you.

A little extra help for your glasses

Anti-reflective coatings on the lenses of your glasses can be applied by your optometrist to reduce discomfort and to ease reduced vision from bright and/or flickering light sources such as VDTs and fluorescent lights. And don’t forget, your doctor of optometry can talk to you about eyeglasses designed specifically for people who use computers a lot.

Take time out, our 20-20-20 rule

Step I

After every 20 minutes of looking into the computer screen, turn your head and try to look at any object placed at least 20 feet away. This changes the focal length of your eyes, a must-do for the tired eyes.

Step II

Try and blink your eyes for 20 times in succession, to moisten them.

Step III

Time permitting of course, one should walk 20 paces after every 20 minutes of sitting in one particular posture. Helps blood circulation for the entire body.

It’s all in the blinking

Did you know that on average we blink 12 times per minute? But wait, did you know that when we’re on the computer we only blink 5 times per minute? That can add up to dry eyes. Relieve the discomfort by using artificial tear drops or gels and remember to blink!

Palming

Sit straight at your workstation and rub your palms against each other till you feel them warm. The warmth of your palms helps soothe and relax tired eyes. Then, lightly cup your eyes with your palms and relax for 60 seconds. Count the seconds in your mind. Repeat this exercise two to three times whenever your eyes feel tired, or as often as you want. While palming, you can either rest your elbows on your desk or keep away from the desk and cup your eyes. Both ways are fine.

Splash water on your face

During breaks, splash water on your face while closing your eyes. This has an overall relaxing effect and helps you feel refreshed.

Use tea bags

Keep two used tea bags in the refrigerator before you leave for work. Once you are home, place the tea bags on your eyes for a few minutes as you relax. This not only soothes tired eyes, but also reduces puffiness.

Eat healthy

Incorporate Vitamins A, C, and E on a daily basis; eat citrus fruits, green leafy veggies, tomatoes, spinach, poultry and dairy products. Pack a box of chopped carrots, cucumber and fresh fruits and munch in-between meals at the office.

How to increase Metabolism?

2010-12-24T22:11:00.000+05:30

Believe it or not, simply changing a few daily habits can have a major impact on your metabolism! If you’re trying to lose weight, increasing your metabolic rate can enable you to lose more weight without cutting more calories.

Here are some tips based on research studies.

What is metabolism?

In the simplest terms, metabolic rate is the rate at which your body burns calories. Very few people have a fast metabolism, and overweight individuals generally have slow metabolisms. However, a faster metabolism will enable you to lose more weight than your friend, even if you both have the same activity level, diet, and weight.

Drink iced water:

As with food, depriving your body of water can encourage it to “hoard” rather than “burn”. When your drink ice cold water, your body burns calories warming it to body temperature. More than ninety percent of the chemical reactions in your body occur in water, so make sure you drink an appropriate amount of water.

Exercise twice a day if possible:

Do your vigorous workout in the morning, and then take a walk after dinner. This way you will continue to burn calories at a higher pace for almost the entire 24 hours.

Boost metabolism in the long run with weight training:

Muscle burns more calories than fat does (73 more calories per kilogram per day, to be exact) so the more muscle you build, the higher your resting metabolic rate (RMR) will be. Every muscle cell that you gain is like a little factory that constantly burns calories for you, even while you sleep, and revs up when you exercise. This is the only way to increase RMR, which accounts for 60 to 70 percent of the calories you burn daily.

Eat Proper Meals:

Never skip meals for the sake of weight loss. Skipping meals sends a signal to your body to lower the metabolism rate as there are fewer calories to burn. With a lower metabolism rate, your calories won’t burn, which will lead to fat accumulation and weight gain. Eating meals will increase your metabolism, thus preventing fat accumulation.

Time Your Meals:

Eat five meals a day. When you eat a meal the metabolism rate is high for about four hours and then is slows down. To increase metabolism you need to eat five meals a day so that it keeps working and burning calories. Increasing metabolism rate also allows you lose weight without going in for a very difficult diet plan. Make sure you eat your meals within four hours of exercise. The metabolism rate in high at that time and thus burns most of the calories thus leading to weight loss.

25 diseases you didnt know you could die from ! :(

2010-11-15T09:57:00.000+05:30

1.Batten Disease is a rare, fatal, autosomal recessive neurodegenerative disorder. Early symptoms, appearing around age four-10, are vision problems and seizures. Eventually, children become blind, bedridden, and demented. Life expectancy varies.

2.Bubonic Plague: the World Health Organization (WHO) reports thousands of new cases every year, though there are still under 50 per year in the U.S. Symptoms are chills and fever, swollen lymph nodes, stomach pain, and cough. It is spread primarily by wild rodents so don’t handle dead (or live) rats on a picnic.

3.Buerger’s Disease (Thromboangiitis obliterans) is a disease associated with tobacco use especially in males 20-40 but also in females. It involves clots in the small and medium arteries and veins in the hands and feet and the symptom is pain in these areas. It often leads to amputation which can lead to early death.

4.Campylobacter means “twisted bacteria.” It is one of the main causes of food-born bacterial disease. It is transmitted fecal-orally, and in contaminated food and water. Symptoms last usually five-seven days, but there are around 100 deaths from it per year in the US.

5.Celiac Disease has an excellent prognosis for a long, healthy life if the patient follows a gluten-free diet, but if untreated, the disease can have life-threatening complications, such as autoimmune disorders and certain types of intestinal cancer.

6.Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) is a degenerative neurological disorder that can’t be cured and always leads to death. The first symptom is dementia, which leads to memory loss, personality change, and hallucination. There are physical symptoms such as ataxia, change in gait, seizures. Symptoms are caused by the progressive death of brain cells, leading sooner or later (symptoms can continue for years) to death.

7.Drug-induced Diarrhea is one of your body’s natural defenses against invaders and the invader can be medicine. Sometimes the cause of chronic diarrhea, because it is a medicine, is not found in time to avoid a life-threatening situation.

8.Ebola Hemorrhagic Fever is named after the Ebola River Valley in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The virus damages blood vessel walls so platelets are unable to coagulate, leading to hypovolemic shock. Transmission is through bodily fluids.

9.Familial Mediterranean Fever is a hereditary inflammatory disorder. There are seven types of attacks. Most patients have their first attacks before they are 18. 75 percent experience joint attacks. Chronic renal failure may lead to early death. FMF is most common among Armenians.

10.Fatal familial insomnia, or FFI is a rare genetic condition where people lose the ability to sleep, and it can lead to coma and death.

11.Fatal Hiccups occurs when a bout of hiccups lasts for days, causing the sufferer to be unable to rest or get proper nutrition, which can result in death.

12.Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) is one of the causes of kidney failure. It involves scarring of the glomerulus, a functional part of the nephron.

13.Haff Disease is the development of swelling and breakdown of skeletal muscle (rhabdomyolysis) with risk of acute kidney failure within 24 hours of ingesting fish. Most cases have been in Russia and Germany and followed consumption of burbot, eel and pike, but 6 cases have been reported in the US (1997) involving buffalo fish.

14.Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome is also known as House Mouse Flu because it’s transmitted by infected rodents through droppings, urine, or saliva. Six states have reported 30 or more cases since 1993. Symptoms include tachycardia and tachypnea which can lead to cardiovascular shock. As a side note, The US researched Hantavirus among other agents as potential biological weapons before suspending its program.

15.Hutchinson-Gilford Progeria Syndrome is a genetic condition characterized by rapid early aging. Patients look normal as infants, then fail to gain weight. They develop external characteristics of aging. Accompanying this is a hardening of the arteries that can result in early heart attack or stroke.

16.Infectious Diarrhea is diarrhea caused by an infection by bacteria, virus, or parasite. It usually last seven days when not treated by antibiotic. In the developing world, infectious diarrhea causes four to six million deaths per year, mainly among children.

17.Legionnaire’s Disease, or Legionellosis, does not always occur in outbreaks such as among American Legionnaires in Philadelphia in 1976, but isolated cases occur. It leads to pneumonia and in five to 30 percent of cases, death.

18.Lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM) affects females of childbearing age. It involves the disorderly growth of smooth muscles (leiomyoma) in the lungs which results in the obstruction of small airways. May be misdiagnosed as asthma or other common lung disorders. A chronic disease which may not be fatal for decades. Treatment is through lung transplant.

19.Marburg Virus, or just Marburg, originated in Central and East Africa and is also known as the green monkey disease because it originated with primates. It’s spread through bodily fluids, such as blood, saliva, excrement, and vomit. Symptoms, from headache and fever to hemorrhaging and delirium, last one to three weeks, then the afflicted person either gets better or dies.

20.Membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis is caused by deposits in the kidney and membrane thickening. Type II of the disease will progress to end stage renal disease within ten years.

21.Menkes Disease is also called copper transport disease, or kinky hair disease. It affects copper levels in the body, leading to copper deficiency. Onset is usually during infancy. Symptoms can include developmental delay and mental retardation. Death may result from rupture of blockage of arteries in the brain.

22.Norovirus is an RNA virus that causes 90 percent of epidemic nonbacterial outbreaks of gastroenteritis around the world. It affects people of all ages. It is transmitted in faecally contaminated food and water, by person-to-person contact, or by contamination of surfaces. There are a few hundred fatalities in the US every year.

23.Nuclear Factor Kappa B Essential Modulator (NEMO) is a condition discovered in 2007, found only in males, that results in immunodeficiency. Symptoms include repeated infections, conical teeth, fine hair, and abnormal bone growth. Treatment is through bone marrow transplant.

24.Prion Diseases are transmissible spongiform encephalopathies, a family of rare neurodegenerative disorders that affect both humans and animals. They have long incubation periods, progress rapidly, and are always fatal, causing the brain to become sponge-like. One example is Mad Cow Disease.

25.Santavuori-Haltia Disease is a rare, inherited, biochemical disorder involving the build-up of certain chemicals in body tissues due to deficiency of an enzyme needed to process them. Closely associated with neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis, it begins in infancy, causes developmental delay, impaired intelligence, progressive dementia, lowered life expectancy.

8 Tips to Take Control of Your Weight

2010-10-24T09:14:00.000+05:30

Anyone who is overweight will testify that losing weight is not as easy as it seems. The people that are lean, or have gone from fat to skinny will say it’s just a matter of motivation and elbow grease. Although it is not as simple as that. Our environments have waged war on us. Their weapons are sedentary lives and Trans fats of mass destruction. All is not lost though, here are some quick simple tips to get ahead!

1. Substitute Water.
Our bodies are about 65-70% water. It follows that water would be not only essential, but the best possibly choice of liquids to ingest. In fact, our bodies will sometimes simulate a hunger response, when in reality the body is craving hydration. When hungry, drink a glass or two of water to check if it suppresses your hunger.

2. Chew Your Food.
Chewing our food very slowly and deliberately has several benefits that are often overlooked. It gives us the ability to relax, and enjoy our meal. Slow chewing is the first, and highly important, step in a complex system of digestion. Besides, if we eat slowly, we might feel full before finishing the whole meal, and can leave the rest for the next meal.

3. Exercise daily.
How silly of me to include something as obvious as exercise. I did a 30 day trial with waking up, and walking for 30 minutes first thing in the morning. My journal records that I was feeling amazing during the period of time that I was following this habit.

4. Publicize your intentions.
Start a blog, join a forum, and have other people keep you accountable to help. Tell other people your plan, it would help you get the motivation to go with it!

5. Create a food schedule.
Plan your day so that you’re eating at approximately the same time each day. This scheduling will incorporate itself into your circadian rhythm, and aid in digestion.

6. Do not over eat.
Know your limit and stop eating when you are full. I have often been a victim of wanting to finish a meal so that it doesn’t go to waste. This has left me with many a stomach ache. Next time, doggy bag it for later, and don’t hurt yourself!

7.Choose your snacks wisely.
Put down the Lays® and cheese puffs. Pick up the apple and baby carrots. Make the right decision, I know you can do it.

8.Lifestyle.
Remember, it’s not about special diets, or special exercise programs. The real secret is in turning your health into a lifestyle, and focusing on this healthy lifestyle with every choice you make.

Remedy for Dengue fever

2010-08-27T02:54:00.000+05:30

Dengue Fever Remedy

I would like to share this interesting discovery from a classmate's son who has just recovered from dengue fever. Apparently, his son was in the critical stage at the ICU when his blood platelet count drops to 15 after 15 liters of blood transfusion.

His father was so worried that he seeks another friend's recommendation and his son was saved. He confessed to me that he gave his son raw juice of the papaya leaves. From a platelet count of 45 after 20 liters of blood transfusion, and after drinking the raw papaya leaf juice, his platelet count jumps instantly to 135. Even the doctors and nurses were surprised. After the second day he was discharged. So he asked me to pass this good news around.

Accordingly it is raw papaya leaves, 2pcs just cleaned and pound and squeeze with filter cloth. You will only get one tablespoon per leaf. So two tablespoon per serving once a day. Do not boil or cook or rinse with hot water, it will loose its strength. Only the leafy part and no stem or sap. It is very bitter and you have to swallow it like "Won Low Kat". But it works.

*Papaya Juice - Cure for Dengue*

You may have heard this elsewhere but if not I am glad to inform you that papaya juice is a natural cure for dengue fever. As dengue fever is rampant now, I think it's good to share this with all.

A friend of mine had dengue last year. It was a very serious situation for her as her platelet count had dropped to 28,000 after 3 days in hospital and water has started to fill up her lung. She had difficulty in breathing. She was only 32-year old. Doctor says there's no cure for dengue. We just have to wait for her body immune system to build up resistance against dengue and fight its own battle. She already had 2 blood transfusion and all of us were praying very hard as her platelet continued to drop since the first day she was admitted.

Fortunately her mother-in-law heard that papaya juice would help to reduce the fever and got some papaya leaves, pounded them and squeeze the juice out for her. The next day, her platelet count started to increase, her fever subside. We continued to feed her with papaya juice and she recovered after 3 days!!!

Amazing but it's true. It's believed one's body would be overheated when one is down with dengue and that also caused the patient to have fever papaya juice has cooling effect. Thus, it helps to reduce the level of heat in one's body, thus the fever will go away. I found that it's also good when one is having sore throat or suffering from heat.

Please spread the news about this as lately there are many dengue cases. It's great if such natural cure could help to ease the sufferings of dengue patients.

Furthermore it's so easily available. Blend them and squeeze the juice! It's simple and miraculously effective!

Absolute 'no-no' in front of kids

2010-03-25T20:37:00.002+05:30

Our children are our biggest imitators. And very often they emulate the practices they see in their parents. So parents must be careful of what they do and say in front of their li’l ones.

Tara Sharma, a home maker recalls her mistake, “Once when I was experiencing a fit of anger I slapped the maid in our house over breaking our expensive cutlery set in front of my two-year-old. Little did I realize that I was setting the stage for my child's subsequent bad behaviour. What followed subsequently took me by surprise. My son started repeating my act. He was actually mimicking me and I was ashamed of the way I had behaved.”

Child psychologist Dr Manish Chopra points out, “Kids who are exposed to aggression in their homes are very likely to exhibit the same kind of violent behaviour at an early age.”

Children inculcate certain habits and behavioural traits from their parents and their surrounding environment. So, it's quintessential that you keep your child away from practices and influences that can affect their physical and mental growth in the future. We explore what are those ‘no-no’ moves:

1. Fighting and arguing
Sonia Bhasin, a Bangalore-based home maker says, “Since my husband is the sole earner in our family, money has always been in short supply. And this often leads to disagreements which turn ugly and result in violent fights with my husband. My teenager son, who has grown up seeing the two us fighting, has consequently become ill tempered over the years. He usually keeps it to himself, but when he gets agitated, he erupts like a volcano”

A recent report carried out by researchers at the University of Washington and the University of Indiana revealed that most children who witness domestic violence become bullies themselves.

Parenting Tip: “When parents fight, scream or insult each other, children who are witness become aggressive, anxious and withdrawn. How you two handle disagreements in your relationship will directly impact how your kids learn to equip theirs, once they grow up,” says Dr Chopra.

2. Getting cosy.
“My husband is very romantic and sometimes he gets very intimate with me in front of our 10-year old son. I have observed that our son notices our intimate acts and behaves in an unusual way. I have asked my husband to keep a restrain," shares Neha, a school teacher.

Experts suggest that a clear line be drawn between sexual and affectionate behaviour. While the former is harmful, the latter is beneficial. As a parent it’s your duty to strike a balance and behave responsibly in front of your kid.

Parenting Tip: Child psychologist, Dr Chopra states, “Certain gestures like hugging, holding hands, placing your head on your partner's shoulder are positive signs that the parents share a healthy relationship. But sexual display of love between a couple often acts like sexual abuse in the child’s tender mind. The damages done can be grave and the natural growth of the child can get tampered."

3. Cursing/swearing
Rajesh Pandey, a journalist says, “We often hear our next door neighbour abusing his wife. Me and my wife were worried how it was likely to impact their children. Our fear came true as one day we heard his son, who was in college, cursing his mother in a similar way”.

How many times have you dropped the F-bomb in front of your children? Swear words are not always easy to evade, especially if you are used to saying them in your daily vocabulary.

Parenting Tip: Dr Chopra warns against the use of swear words in front of kids. “If you use profanities in front of your children, they will think that it's acceptable to use such words.”

4. Watching violence and nudity on screen
Pratima Ishpunani, an interior designer opines, “We make it a point to drop our two kids at my parents’ place, when we go out every weekend for a movie. We feel that they are too young to handle violence and nudity that is shown in most of the movies today. However, we do take them out to amusement parks, museums and zoological park to make it up for lost time."

Modern age children are exposed to the TV/Internet at a very early age, so it is imperative to ensure that they do not watch violent and vulgar shows as they has a lasting impact on their mind.

Parenting Tip: “There have been many incidents reported in the media where children have hurt themselves copying daring stunts shown in ads, particularly those which exhibit motorbikes stunts. There is always a potential risk of your child becoming aggressive if they watch too much of violence on the TV, while sleazy and vulgar scenes can make them inquisitive and confused. So, it is important to hold back kids from such exposure till the child reaches an age where he/she can differentiate between what is wrong and what is right,” adds Dr Chopra.

5. Drinking/Smoking
“The other day my fourteen-year-old son returned late from his friend’s birthday party. I was shocked to see him in an inebriated state. When I questioned him he bluntly snubbed me by reminding me of my drinking habits,” says Pranjal Joshi, a businessman.

Parenting Tip: Relationship expert, Mahima Mathur points out, “If parents themselves engage in drinking or smoking in front of their children, they lose the moral right to stop their kids from indulging in the same, once they grow up. Besides, it’s a known fact that passive smoking can affect children’s respiratory system. So, if you want that your child does not imbibe these bad habits, then try to be an ideal role model by becoming a teetotaler or at least do not drink/smoke in front of them."

6. Lying
“To decline unwanted calls, I have often made up several excuses and have relayed them through my 11-year-old daughter. Lately I have observed that she cooks up some story to hide her misdoings,” said Trideep, a radio artiste.

Parenting Tip: “Parents often find themselves lying to their children to avoid confrontation, explanations and tears. Most parents lie to keep inquisitive and difficult questions at bay which they find tricky to handle or answer. Since children rely on adults to explain the world to them, it is not recommended that parents present a different picture to them from what actually is,” suggests relationship expert, Mahima Mathur.

STRESS - Signs and Factors of Stress!

2010-01-18T20:47:00.002+05:30

STRESS is already a part of daily living. You may never know it but you are already affected by this issue. You shout at your kids or nag your partner about something. You seem to raise an issue out of a particular event even if it is not true. You also tend to be suspicious at some points. All these are due to stress.

Scientifically, stress is a state of high tension or pressure, resulting from an accident or injury or a psychological reaction of heightened emotional response. Certain occupations are particularly stressful, such as acting, advertising, controlling air traffic, politics, investing and gambling. As an effect of stressful emotions such as panic attacks, fear and anger, the blood pressure rises, the pulse beats faster, breathing is accelerated, digestion stops, and the adrenal glands become overactive.

MAJOR FACTS FOR STRESS:

1. It can be caused by many factors. Fear and anxiety are the greatest causes of psychological stress. In modern times people are constantly beset by the threat of calamities. They fear depression and inflation, unemployment, cancer and heart failure, missiles and bombs and famine. At home they may be confronted with marital incompatibility, quarrels, family illness, or financial troubles.

2. It can also cause something. Many illnesses are caused by mental stress, including ulcers, spastic constipation, diarrhea, high blood pressure and migraine headaches. Sometimes latent mental disorders are precipitated by stressful circumstances, as in the case of manic-depressive psychosis, schizophrenia, hysteria and neurasthenia.

3. It can worsen through time. When a person is subjected to repeated stresses, she is likely to develop what people call nervous breakdown, an unscientific but expressive term. The stress produced by the problems of everyday living has led to the widespread use of tranquilizers, a last resort when there seems to be no escape from a difficult situation.

4. It happens in daily living. Stress exists in almost every human activity and is not the same as nerve tension. Some stress is beneficial since it may stimulate action.

5. It can be lessened through healthy intimate relationships. Psychiatrists also found out that for the avoidance of excessive stress being married is better than being divorced or single.

6. There are major stressful events connected to it. Studies also showed that the death of a child is the most stressful of any life’s events. Other items include a jail sentence, major financial problems, divorce and the beginning of an extra-marital affair. Some of the environmental factors that may be related to stress are the status of health, the social class, and the size of the household.

7. There are also some stresses that cannot be controlled. Too much stress can show itself in various emotional, behavioral and physical signs, and the signs of stress differ extremely according to each individual.

Usual Physical, Emotional and Behavioral Signs of Stress:

The physical indications of stress include sleep interruptions, tense muscles, annoyance, gastrointestinal problem, and exhaustion. Its emotional and behavioral indications consist of apprehension, fear, alterations in eating practices, depleted energy, and mood swings. All of the symptoms given cannot tell whether a person has an elevated stress level because these indications may be due to other medical or mental problems.

It is also a fact that persons in stress are most likely to maintain harmful activities like drug and alcohol addiction, excessive cigarette smoking, and poor eating habits. These harmful activities can extremely add to the severity of the indications connected to stress.

Remember that all people may be prone to stress – no matter what age you are in and no matter what status of life you have. The extent may vary also depending on how you take up the challenge that goes with it. If you have a support system with you, it is easy to do away with the situation. But at the worse, it may only lead you to panic attacks.

Little-known Facts about your Eyes

2009-12-06T20:13:00.002+05:30

1.Eyes are the most complex organs you possess except for your brain.

2.Eyes are composed of more than two million working parts.

3.Eyes can process 36,000 bits of information every hour.

4.Under the right conditions, can discern the light of a candle at a distance of 14 miles.

5.Eyes contribute towards 85% of your total knowledge.

6.Eyes utilize 65% of all the pathways to the brain.

7.Eyes can instantaneously set in motion hundreds of muscles and organs in your body.

8.In a normal life-span, will bring you almost 24 million images of the world around you.

9.The external muscles that move the eyes are the strongest muscles in the human body for the job that they have to do. They are 100 times more powerful than they need to be.

10.The adult eyeball measures about 1 inch (2.5 cm) in diameter. Of its total surface area only one-sixth is exposed — the front portion.

11.The eye is the only part of the human body that can function at 100% ability at any moment, day or night, without rest. Your eyelids need rest, the external muscles of your eyes need rest, the lubrication of your eyes requires replenishment, but your eyes themselves “never” need rest. But please rest them!

Sleep and Heart Attacks

2009-11-20T07:05:00.003+05:30

Sleep and Heart Attacks

What killed Ranjan Das and Lessons for Corporate India

A month ago, many of us heard about the sad demise of Ranjan Das from Bandra, Mumbai. Ranjan, just 42 years of age, was the CEO of SAP-Indian Subcontinent, the youngest CEO of an MNC in India.

He was very active in sports, was a fitness freak and a marathon runner. It was common to see him run on Bandra's Carter Road. Just after Diwali, on 21st Oct, he returned home from his gym after a workout, collapsed with a massive heart attack and died. He is survived by his wife and two very young kids.

It was certainly a wake-up call for corporate India. However, it was even more disastrous for runners amongst us. Since Ranjan was anavid marathoner(in Feb 09, he ran Chennai Marathon at the same time some of us were running Pondicherry Marathon 180 km away), the question came as to why an exceptionally active, athletic person succumb to heart attack at 42 years of age.

Was it the stress?

A couple of you called me asking about the reasons. While Ranjan had mentioned that he faced a lot of stress, that is a common element in most of our lives. We used to think that by being fit, one can conquer the bad effects of stress. So I doubted if the cause was stress.

The Real Reason

However, everyone missed out a small line in the reports that Ranjan used to make do with 4-5 hours of sleep. This is an earlier interview of Ranjan on NDTV in the program 'Boss' Day Out':

http://connect.in.com/ranjan-das/play-video-boss-day-out-ranjan-das-of-sap-india-229111-807ecfcf1ad966036c289b3ba6c376f2530d7484.html

Here he himself admits that he would love to get more sleep (and that he was not proud of his ability to manage without sleep, contrary to what others extolled).

The Evidence

Last week, I was working with a well-known cardiologist on the subject of ‘Heart Disease caused by Lack of Sleep’. While I cannot share the video nor the slides because of confidentiality reasons, I have distilled the key points below in the hope it will save some of our lives.

Some Excerpts:

· Short sleep duration (<5>

As you know, high BP kills.

· Young people (25-49 years of age) are twice as likely to get high BP if they sleep less.

Paper published in 2006.

· Individuals who slept less than 5 hours a night had a 3-fold increased risk of heart attacks . Paper published in 1999.

· Complete and partial lack of sleep increased the blood concentrations of High sensitivity C-Reactive Protein (hs-cRP), the strongest predictor of heart attacks. Even after getting adequate sleep later, the levels stayed high!!

· Just one night of sleep loss increases very toxic substances in body such as

Interleukin-6 (IL-6), Tumour Necrosis Factor-Alpha

(TNF-alpha) and C-reactive protein (cRP). They increase risks of many medical conditions, including cancer, arthritis andheart disease.

Paper published in 2004.

· Sleeping for <=5 hours per night leads to 39% increase in heart disease. Sleeping for <=6 hours per night leads to 18% increase in heart disease. Paper published in 2006.

Ideal Sleep

For lack of space, I cannot explain here the ideal sleep architecture. But in brief, sleep is composed of two stages: REM (Rapid Eye Movement) and non-REM. The former helps in mental consolidation while the latter helps in physical repair and rebuilding. During the night, you alternate between REM and non-REM stages 4-5 times.

The earlier part of sleep is mostly non-REM.

During that period, your pituitary gland releases growth hormones that repair your body. The latter part of sleep is more and more REM type.

For you to be mentally alert during the day, the latter part of sleep is more important. No wonder when you wake up with an alarm clock after 5-6 hours of sleep, you are mentally irritable throughout the day (lack of REM sleep). And if you have slept for less than 5 hours, your body is in a complete physical mess (lack of non-REM sleep), you are tired throughout the day, moving like a zombie and your immunity is way down (I’ve been there, done that L)

Finally, as long-distance runners, you need an hour of extra sleep to repair the running related damage.

If you want to know if you are getting adequate sleep, take Epworth Sleepiness Test below.

Interpretation: Score of 0-9 is considered normal while 10 and above abnormal. Many a times, I have clocked 21 out the maximum possible 24, the only saving grace being the last situation, since I don’t like to drive (maybe, I should ask my driver to answer that lineJ)

In conclusion:

Barring stress control, Ranjan Das did everything

right: eating proper food, exercising

(marathoning!), maintaining proper weight. But he missed getting proper and adequate sleep, minimum

7 hours. In my opinion, that killed him.

If you are not getting enough sleep (7 hours), you are playing with fire, even if you have low stress.

I always took pride in my ability to work 50 hours at a stretch whenever the situation warranted. But I was so spooked after seeing the scientific evidence last week that since Saturday night, I ensure I do not even set the alarm clock under 7 hours. Now, that is a nice excuse to get some more sleep. J

Unfortunately, Ranjan Das is not alone when it comes to missing sleep. Many of us are doing exactly the same, perhaps out of ignorance.

Cancer Update from Johns Hopkins

2009-10-03T22:03:00.001+05:30

AFTER YEARS OF TELLING PEOPLE CHEMOTHERAPY IS THE ONLY WAY TO TRY AND ELIMINATE CANCER, JOHNS HOPKINS IS FINALLY STARTING TO TELL YOU THERE IS AN ALTERNATIVE WAY .

Cancer Update from Johns Hopkins :

1. Every person has cancer cells in the body. These cancer cells do not show up in the standard tests until they have multiplied to a few billion. When doctors tell cancer patients that there are no more cancer cells in their bodies after treatment, it just means the tests are unable to detect the cancer cells because they have not reached the detectable size.

2. Cancer cells occur between 6 to more than 10 times in a person's lifetime.

3. When the person's immune system is strong the cancer cells will be destroyed and prevented from multiplying and forming tumours.

4. When a person has cancer it indicates the person has multiple nutritional deficiencies. These could be due to genetic, environmental, food and lifestyle factors.

5.. To overcome the multiple nutritional deficiencies, changing diet and including supplements will strengthen the immune system.

6.. Chemotherapy involves poisoning the rapidly-growing cancer cells and also destroys rapidly-growing healthy cells in the bone marrow, gastro-intestinal tract etc, and can cause organ damage, like liver, kidneys, heart, lungs etc.

7. Radiation while destroying cancer cells also burns, scars and damages healthy cells, tissues and organs.

8. Initial treatment with chemotherapy and radiation will often reduce tumor size. However prolonged use of chemotherapy and radiation do not result in more tumor destruction.

9. When the body has too much toxic burden from chemotherapy and radiation the immune system is either compromised or destroyed, hence the person can succumb to various kinds of infections and complications.

10. Chemotherapy and radiation can cause cancer cells to mutate and become resistant and difficult to destroy. Surgery can also cause cancer cells to spread to other sites.

11. An effective way to battle cancer is to starve the cancer cells by not feeding it with the foods it needs to multiply.

WHAT CANCER CELLS FEED ON:

a. Sugar is a cancer-feeder.. By cutting off sugar it cuts off one important food supply to the cancer cells. Sugar substitutes like NutraSweet, Equal,Spoonful etc are made with Aspartame and it is harmful. A better natural substitute would be Manuka honey or molasses but only in very small amounts. Table salt has a chemical added to make it white in colour. Better alternative is Bragg's aminos or sea salt..

b. Milk causes the body to produce mucus, especially in the gastro-intestinal tract. Cancer feeds on mucus. By cutting off milk and substituting with unsweetened soya milk, cancer cells are being starved..

c. Cancer cells thrive in an acid environment. A meat-based diet is acidic and it is best to eat fish, and a little chicken rather than beef or pork. Meat also contains livestock antibiotics, growth hormones and parasites, which are all harmful, especially to people with cancer.

d. A diet made of 80% fresh vegetables and juice, whole grains, seeds, nuts and a little fruits help put the body into an alkaline environment. About 20% can be from cooked food including beans. Fresh vegetable juices provide live enzymes that are easily absorbed and reach down to cellular levels within 15 minutes to no urish and enhance growth of healthy cells. To obtain live enzymes for building healthy cells try and drink fresh vegetable juice (most vegetables including bean sprouts) and eat some raw vegetables 2 or 3 times a day. Enzymes are destroyed at temperatures of 104 degrees F (40 degrees C).

e. Avoid coffee, tea, and chocolate , which have high caffeine. Green tea is a better alternative and has cancer-fighting properties. Water- best to drink purified water , or filtered, to avoid known toxins and heavy metals in tap water. Distilled water is acidic, avoid it.

12. Meat protein is difficult to digest and requires a lot of digestive enzymes. Undigested meat remaining in the intestines become putrified and leads to more toxic buildup.

13. Cancer cell walls have a tough protein covering. By refraining from or eating less meat it frees more enzymes to attack the protein walls of cancer cells and allows the body's killer cells to destroy the cancer cells.

14. Some supplements build up the immune system (IP6, Flor-ssence, Essiac, anti-oxidants, vitamins, minerals, EFAs etc.) to enable the body's own killer cells to destroy cancer cells. Other supplements like vitamin E are known to cause apoptosis, or programmed cell death, the body's normal method of disposing of damaged, unwanted, or unneeded cells.

15. Cancer is a disease of the mind, body, and spirit. A proactive and positive spirit will help the cancer warrior be a survivor. Anger, unforgiveness and bitterness put the body into a stressful and acidic environment. Learn to have a loving and forgiving spirit. Learn to relax and enjoy life.

16. Cancer cells cannot thrive in an oxygenated environment. Exercising daily, and deep breathing help to get more oxygen down to the cellular level. Oxygen therapy is another means employed to destroy cancer cells.

Gas in the Digestive Tract

2009-09-22T21:35:00.002+05:30

Everyone has gas and eliminates it by burping or passing it through the rectum. However, many people think they have too much gas when they really have normal amounts. Most people produce about 1 to 4 pints a day and pass gas about 14 times a day.

Drawing of the digestive system with parts labeled: mouth, esophagus, stomach, large intestine (colon), small intestine, ileum, rectum, and anus.
The digestive tract.

Gas is made primarily of odorless vapors—carbon dioxide, oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, and sometimes methane. The unpleasant odor of flatulence, the gas that passes through the rectum, comes from bacteria in the large intestine that release small amounts of gases containing sulfur.

Although having gas is common, it can be uncomfortable and embarrassing. Understanding causes, ways to reduce symptoms, and treatment will help most people find relief.

What causes gas?

Gas in the digestive tract—the esophagus, stomach, small intestine, and large intestine—comes from two sources:

* swallowed air
* normal breakdown of certain undigested foods by harmless bacteria naturally present in the large intestine, also called the colon

Swallowed Air

Aerophagia, or air swallowing, is a common cause of gas in the stomach. Everyone swallows small amounts of air when eating and drinking. However, eating or drinking rapidly, chewing gum, smoking, or wearing loose dentures can cause some people to take in more air.

Burping, or belching, is the way most swallowed air—which contains nitrogen, oxygen, and carbon dioxide—leaves the stomach. The remaining gas moves into the small intestine, where it is partially absorbed. A small amount travels into the large intestine for release through the rectum. The stomach also releases carbon dioxide when stomach acid mixes with the bicarbonate in digestive juices, but most of this gas is absorbed into the bloodstream and does not enter the large intestine.

Breakdown of Undigested Foods

The body does not digest and absorb some carbohydrates�the sugar, starches, and fiber found in many foods�in the small intestine because of a shortage or absence of certain enzymes that aid digestion.

This undigested food then passes from the small intestine into the large intestine, where normal, harmless bacteria break down the food, producing hydrogen, carbon dioxide, and, in about one-third of all people, methane. Eventually these gases exit through the rectum.

People who make methane do not necessarily pass more gas or have unique symptoms. A person who produces methane will have stools that consistently float in water. Research has not shown why some people produce methane and others do not.

Foods that produce gas in one person may not cause gas in another. Some common bacteria in the large intestine can destroy the hydrogen that other bacteria produce. The balance of the two types of bacteria may explain why some people have more gas than others.

Which foods cause gas?

Most foods that contain carbohydrates can cause gas. By contrast, fats and proteins cause little gas.

Sugars

The sugars that cause gas are raffinose, lactose, fructose, and sorbitol.

Raffinose. Beans contain large amounts of this complex sugar. Smaller amounts are found in cabbage, brussels sprouts, broccoli, asparagus, other vegetables, and whole grains.

Lactose. Lactose is the natural sugar in milk. It is also found in milk products, such as cheese and ice cream, and processed foods, such as bread, cereal, and salad dressing. Many people, particularly those of African, Native American, or Asian background, normally have low levels of lactase, the enzyme needed to digest lactose, after childhood. Also, as people age, their enzyme levels decrease. As a result, over time people may experience increasing amounts of gas after eating food containing lactose.

Fructose. Fructose is naturally present in onions, artichokes, pears, and wheat. It is also used as a sweetener in some soft drinks and fruit drinks.

Sorbitol. Sorbitol is a sugar found naturally in fruits, including apples, pears, peaches, and prunes. It is also used as an artificial sweetener in many dietetic foods and sugar-free candies and gums.

Starches

Most starches, including potatoes, corn, pasta, and wheat, produce gas as they are broken down in the large intestine. Rice is the only starch that does not cause gas.
Fiber

Many foods contain soluble and insoluble fiber. Soluble fiber dissolves easily in water and takes on a soft, gel-like texture in the intestines. Found in oat bran, beans, peas, and most fruits, soluble fiber is not broken down until it reaches the large intestine, where digestion causes gas.

Insoluble fiber, on the other hand, passes essentially unchanged through the intestines and produces little gas. Wheat bran and some vegetables contain this kind of fiber.

What are some symptoms and problems of gas?

The most common symptoms of gas are flatulence, abdominal bloating, abdominal pain, and belching. However, not everyone experiences these symptoms. The type and degree of symptoms probably depends on how much gas the body produces, how many fatty acids the body absorbs, and a person's sensitivity to gas in the large intestine.
Belching

An occasional belch during or after meals is normal and releases gas when the stomach is full of food. However, people who belch frequently may be swallowing too much air and releasing it before the air enters the stomach.

Sometimes a person with chronic belching may have an upper gastrointestinal (GI) disorder, such as peptic ulcer disease, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), or gastroparesis, also called delayed gastric emptying.

Sometimes people believe that swallowing air and releasing it will relieve the discomfort of these disorders, and they may intentionally or unintentionally develop a habit of belching to relieve discomfort.

Gas-bloat syndrome may occur after fundoplication surgery to correct GERD. The surgery creates a one-way valve between the esophagus and stomach that allows food and gas to enter the stomach but often prevents normal belching and the ability to vomit. It occurs in about 10 percent of people who have this surgery but may improve with time.
Flatulence

Another common complaint is too much flatulence. However, most people do not realize that passing gas 14 to 23 times a day is normal. Too much gas may be the result of carbohydrate malabsorption.

Abdominal Bloating

Many people believe that too much gas causes abdominal bloating. However, people who complain of bloating from gas often have normal amounts and distribution of gas. They may just be unusually aware of gas in the digestive tract.

Doctors believe that bloating is usually the result of an intestinal disorder, such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). The cause of IBS is unknown but may involve abnormal movements and contractions of intestinal muscles and increased pain sensitivity in the intestines. These disorders may give a sensation of bloating because of increased sensitivity to gas.

Any disease that causes intestinal inflammation or obstruction, such as Crohn’s disease or colon cancer, may also cause abdominal bloating. In addition, people who have had many operations, internal hernias, or bands of internal scar tissue called adhesions may experience bloating or pain. Finally, eating a lot of fatty food can delay stomach emptying and cause bloating and discomfort, but not necessarily too much gas.
Abdominal Pain and Discomfort

Some people have pain when gas is present in the intestine. When pain is on the left side of the colon, it can be confused with heart disease, which sometimes causes abdominal pain. When the pain is on the right side of the colon, it may mimic gallstones or appendicitis.

What diagnostic tests are used to find the cause of gas?

Because gas symptoms may be caused by a serious disorder, those causes should be ruled out. Health professionals usually begin with a review of dietary habits and symptoms. The health professional may ask the patient to keep a diary of foods and beverages consumed for a specific time period.

If lactase deficiency is the suspected cause of gas, the health professional may suggest avoiding milk products for a period of time. A blood or breath test may be used to diagnose lactose intolerance.

In addition, to determine if someone produces too much gas in the colon or is unusually sensitive to the passage of normal gas volumes, the health professional may ask a patient to count the number of times he passes gas during the day and include this information in a diary.

Careful review of diet and the amount of gas passed may help relate specific foods to symptoms and determine the severity of the problem.

Because the symptoms that people may have are so variable, the health professional may order other types of diagnostic tests in addition to a physical exam, depending on the patient's symptoms and other factors.

How is gas treated?

Experience has shown that the most common ways to reduce the discomfort of gas are changing diet, taking medicines, and reducing the amount of air swallowed.

Diet

Health professionals may tell people to eat fewer foods that cause gas. However, for some people this may mean cutting out healthy foods, such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and milk products.

Health professionals may also suggest limiting high-fat foods to reduce bloating and discomfort. Less fat in the diet helps the stomach empty faster, allowing gases to move into the small intestine.

Unfortunately, the amount of gas caused by certain foods varies from person to person. Effective dietary changes depend on learning through trial and error how much of the offending foods one can handle.

Nonprescription Medicines

Digestive enzymes, available as over-the-counter supplements, help digest carbohydrates and may allow people to eat foods that normally cause gas.

The enzyme lactase, which aids with lactose digestion, is available in caplet and chewable tablet form without a prescription; Lactaid and Lactrase are two common brands. Taking lactase supplements just before eating helps digest foods that contain lactose. Also, lactose-reduced milk and other products, such as Lactaid and Dairy Ease, are available at many grocery stores.

Beano, an over-the-counter digestive aid, contains the sugar-digesting enzyme that the body lacks to digest the sugar in beans and many vegetables. The enzyme comes in liquid and tablet form. Five drops are added per serving or one tablet is swallowed just before eating to break down the gas-producing sugars. Beano has no effect on gas caused by lactose or fiber.
Prescription Medicines

Doctors may prescribe medicines to help reduce symptoms, especially for people with a disorder such as IBS. For more information about IBS, see the Irritable Bowel Syndrome fact sheet from the National Digestive Diseases Information Clearinghouse.
Reducing Swallowed Air

For those who have chronic belching, health professionals may suggest ways to reduce the amount of air swallowed. Two options are to avoid chewing gum and to avoid eating hard candy. Eating at a slow pace and checking with a dentist to make sure dentures fit properly should also help.

Points to Remember

Although gas may be uncomfortable and embarrassing, it is not life threatening. Understanding causes, ways to reduce symptoms, and treatment will help most people find some relief.

* Everyone has gas in the digestive tract.
* People often believe normal passage of gas to be excessive.
* Gas comes from two main sources: swallowed air and normal breakdown of certain foods by harmless bacteria naturally present in the large intestine.
* Many foods with carbohydrates can cause gas. Fats and proteins cause little gas.
* Foods that may cause gas include
o beans
o vegetables, such as broccoli, cabbage, brussels sprouts, onions, artichokes, and asparagus
o fruits, such as pears, apples, and peaches
o whole grains, such as whole wheat and bran
o soft drinks and fruit drinks
o milk and milk products, such as cheese and ice cream, and packaged foods prepared with lactose, such as bread, cereal, and salad dressing
o foods containing sorbitol, such as dietetic foods and sugar-free candies and gums

* The most common symptoms of gas are belching, flatulence, bloating, and abdominal pain. However, some of these symptoms may be caused by an intestinal disorder, such as IBS, rather than too much gas.
* The most common ways to reduce the discomfort of gas are changing one’s diet, taking digestive enzymes to help digest carbohydrates, and reducing the amount of air swallowed.

Chinese Breathing Techniques

2009-09-18T23:13:00.001+05:30

Breathing techniques

The five major schools of breathing are medical, Confucian, Buddhist, Taoist and wushu or martial arts. Medical breathing techniques aim at strengthening one’s overall health and are mainly preventive. The Confucian school of breathing deals with self-cultivation and temperament. Taoist breathing deals with one’s moral character and longevity. The Buddhist breathing exercises are broken into two lines of thought and involve mainly the mind. The first Buddhist school is called ‘Samadhi’ and claims that everything in the world is illusionary. The other school is that of meditation which deals with the cultivation of the mind and the preservation of all forms of life on earth. The wushu method of breathing is for physical training and good health.

All of these schools have one thing in common, that of training of the mind and development of the qi, or ch’i.

The breath is the most important part of the Chinese self-healing arts. There are certain ways to breathe while performing the various exercises described in this book.

The first and most important way to breathe is the natural way i.e. we try to get our breathing back to a more natural way, the way of the child. As we grow older and are affected by stress, the cause of 70% of all modern diseases, our breathing rises to the upper chest and we end up only using the top portion of our lungs. The lungs start just under the collarbone and end at the bottom of the rib cage. But the major part of the lungs is the part covered by the ribs on either side of the abdomen. This part, through tension and stress is sometimes not used, and so we are only receiving a small amount of oxygen. We try to compensate for this by breathing faster. One of the big faults in western posture is the ‘pull the belly in and stick out the chest’ syndrome supposed to look good on men and women. But in order to pull in the stomach and stick out the chest we have to tense certain muscles and this restricts our lung capacity.

The first thing to do is relax the upper chest and shoulders so that the breath is able to go deeper into the lungs and eventually fill up the whole lung again.

If you find it difficult to relax the chest while standing in a Qigong position, lie down and place your palms across your stomach.

As you breathe in, feel the lower abdomen pushing outward and try to totally relax the chest. It may not look too cosmetic but it may just save your life. Feel your palms rise with each breath and lower with each exhalation. Try to not force the action, just breathe and it should happen naturally IF YOU ARE RELAXED. If you have access to a small child, see how it breathes and copy that. If you have been doing heavy exercise then the chest may rise a little more with the breath, but generally the chest should not stick right out.

Breathe with your nose; that’s what it’s for There are certain times when we breathe through the mouth and I’ll cover these later. Try breathing naturally while doing the triple warmer exercise covered earlier — this tends to open the lungs more. And remember there is a natural wait from inhaling to exhaling unless violent exercise has been undertaken.

Cure for Cancer

2009-09-01T12:59:00.000+05:30

View of an Amblyomma cajennense. Brazilian reasearchers have identified a protein in the saliva of the South American tick that apparently reduces and can even eradicate cancerous cells while leaving healthy cells alone.

It may be one of nature's repulsive little blood-sucking parasites, but the humble tick could yield a future cure for cancers of the skin, liver and pancreas, Brazilian researchers have discovered.

They have identified a protein in the saliva of a common South American tick, Amblyomma cajennense, that apparently reduces and can even eradicate cancerous cells while leaving healthy cells alone.

"This is a radical innovation," said Ana Marisa Chudzinski-Tavassi, the molecular biologist at the Instituto Butantan in Sao Paulo who is leading the research.

"The component of the saliva of this tick... could be the cure for cancer," she told AFP.

She said she stumbled on the properties of the protein, called Factor X active, while testing the anti-coagulant properties of the tick's saliva -- the way it stops blood thickening and clotting so the tick can keep gorging itself on its host.

The protein shares some characteristics with a common anti-coagulant called TFPI (Tissue Factor Pathway Inhibitor), specifically a Kunitz-type inhibitor which also has been shown to interfere with cell growth.

A theory that the protein might have an effect on cancerous cells led to laboratory tests on cell cultures -- which exceeded all expectations.

"To our surprise it didn't kill normal cells, which were also tested," Chudzinski-Tavassi said. "But it did kill the tumorous cells that were being analyzed."

In her modest lab in the institute, housed in a rundown building, a line of immobile bloated ticks could be seen lined up with straws under their heads.

The small amounts of saliva captured that way was reproduced many times over in yeast vats so that tests could be carried out on lab rats with cancer.

The results have been more than promising.

"If I treat every day for 14 days an animal's tumor, a small tumor, this tumor doesn't develop -- it even regresses. The tumor mass shrinks. If I treat for 42 days, you totally eliminate the tumor," the scientist said.

Producing a medicine from the find, though, will require years of clinical tests and a significant financial investment -- neither of which Brazil is geared to provide.

Chudzinski-Tavassi has applied for a patent on the tick protein, and is presenting her team's discovery in medical journals and conferences around the world.

But she says moving beyond her lab "proof of concept" will be frustratingly difficult.

"To discover this is one thing. To turn it into a medicine is a whole other thing entirely," she said.

Swine Flu Symptoms with Q&A

2009-08-12T21:01:00.000+05:30

H1N1- Swine Flu Symptoms

The symptoms of this virus are like many others. Monitor their symptoms and look for a
high fever over 101 degrees following a cold. Worsening cough is also a sign of Swine Flu.
If you are treating your child for flu, and their cough worsens, it is a symptom of the virus.2

· Look for a Rash
Look for a rash that accompanies the fever. This is an indication of Swine Flu
infection. The child may also have a blue color to their skin. This indicates a lack
of oxygen and requires immediate emergency care.

· Stops Drinking
If your child quits drinking fluids do not hesitate to rush them to the emergency
room. Dehydration is a killer for young children. In addition, if they have explosive
diarrhea or vomiting you should seek immediate emergency treatment.

· Breathing Problems
If they appear to be breathing quickly or having any shortness of breath, get
them help quickly. The faster you get emergency help in this situation, the more
likely they will suffer no adverse affects.

· Body Aches
If they act as if they are in pain when you hold them, or try to wriggle away
because they appear uncomfortable, it could indicate severe body pain. Get
them to a treatment facility immediately. This is an indication of a Swine Flu virus
infection.

· Flat Affect
If they are not maintaining eye contact, or appear flat in affectation this is a
warning sign of severe viral infection. Get to an emergency facility.

· Will Not Wake Up
Finally, if you are unable to wake your child, call an ambulance immediately. Do
not hesitate in this situation. Swine Flu is a deadly virus and can be treated with
antiviral medications such as Tamiflu so getting your child treated immediately
can save your child's life. The Swine Flu epidemic is likely to get worse before it
gets better and it is important to be aware of symptoms of the virus that may
require emergency care.

Q&A of Swine Flu

What can I do to protect myself from catching influenza A(H1N1)?

The main route of transmission of the new influenza A(H1N1) virus seems to be similar to
seasonal influenza, via droplets that are expelled by speaking, sneezing or coughing. You
can prevent getting infected by avoiding close contact with people who show
influenza-like symptoms (trying to maintain a distance of about 1 metre if possible) and
taking the following measures:
· avoid touching your mouth and nose;
· clean hands thoroughly with soap and water, or cleanse them with an alcohol based
hand rub on a regular basis (especially if touching the mouth and nose, or
surfaces that are potentially contaminated);
· avoid close contact with people who might be ill;
· reduce the time spent in crowded settings if possible;
· improve airflow in your living space by opening windows;
· practise good health habits including adequate sleep, eating nutritious food, and
keeping physically active.

What about using a mask? What does WHO recommend?

If you are not sick you do not have to wear a mask.
If you are caring for a sick person, you can wear a mask when you are in close contact
with the ill person and dispose of it immediately after contact, and cleanse your hands
thoroughly afterwards.
If you are sick and must travel or be around others, cover your mouth and nose.
Using a mask correctly in all situations is essential. Incorrect use actually increases the
chance of spreading infection.

How do I know if I have influenza A(H1N1)?

You will not be able to tell the difference between seasonal flu and influenza A(H1N1)
without medical help. Typical symptoms to watch for are similar to seasonal viruses and
include fever, cough, headache, body aches, sore throat and runny nose. Only your
medical practitioner and local health authority can confirm a case of influenza A(H1N1).

What should I do if I think I have the illness?

If you feel unwell, have high fever, cough or sore throat:
· stay at home and keep away from work, school or crowds;
· rest and take plenty of fluids;
· cover your nose and mouth when coughing and sneezing and, if using tissues,
make sure you dispose of them carefully. Clean your hands immediately after
with soap and water or cleanse them with an alcohol-based hand rub;
· if you do not have a tissue close by when you cough or sneeze, cover your mouth
as much as possible with the crook of your elbow;
· use a mask to help you contain the spread of droplets when you are around
others, but be sure to do so correctly;
· inform family and friends about your illness and try to avoid contact with other
people;
· If possible, contact a health professional before traveling to a health facility to
discuss whether a medical examination is necessary.

Should I take an antiviral now just in case I catch the new virus?

No. You should only take an antiviral, such as oseltamivir or zanamivir, if your health care
provider advises you to do so. Individuals should not buy medicines to prevent or fight this
new influenza without a prescription, and they should exercise caution in buying antivirals
over the Internet.

What about breastfeeding? Should I stop if I am ill?

No, not unless your health care provider advises it. Studies on other influenza infections
show that breastfeeding is most likely protective for babies - it passes on helpful maternal
immunities and lowers the risk of respiratory disease. Breastfeeding provides the best
overall nutrition for babies and increases their defense factors to fight illness.

When should someone seek medical care?

A person should seek medical care if they experience shortness of breath or difficulty
breathing, or if a fever continues more than three days. For parents with a young child
who is ill, seek medical care if a child has fast or labored breathing, continuing fever or
convulsions (seizures).Supportive care at home - resting, drinking plenty of fluids and using
a pain reliever for aches - is adequate for recovery in most cases. (A non-aspirin pain
reliever should be used by children and young adults because of the risk of Reye's
syndrome.)

Should I go to work if I have the flu but am feeling OK?

No. Whether you have influenza A(H1N1) or a seasonal influenza, you should stay home
and away from work through the duration of your symptoms. This is a precaution that
can protect your work colleagues and others.

Can I travel?

If you are feeling unwell or have symptoms of influenza, you should not travel. If you have
any doubts about your health, you should check with your health care provider.
The Union Government has identified the Communicable Disease Hospital, 87, T.H. Road,
Tondiarpet, as the isolation facility, specifically for testing suspected swine flu patients in
Chennai. The government has set up a screening facility at the Chennai International
Airport for all the inbound passengers to prevent the spread of H1N1. Doctors from the
Hospital are round the clock screening the passengers at the Airport.

A confirmed case of swine flu infection is a person with an acute respiratory illness with
laboratory confirmed swine flu infection by one or more of the following tests:
Real-time RT-PCR
Viral culture

Two laboratories in Tamil Nadu — Kings Institute of Preventive Medicine and Christian
Medical College, Vellore — and JIPMER in Puducherry are authorised to screen people
for the infection. Throat swabs will be sent to the National Institute of Communicable
Diseases, New Delhi and the National Institute of Virology, Pune, for verification.

More information can be found in the following links:

www.mohfw.nic.in and www.nicd.nic.in

http://www.swinefluindia.com

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2009_flu_pandemic

http://www.who.int/csr/disease/swineflu/frequentlyaskedquestions/what/en/index.html

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103506962

http://www.ehow.com/how_4933047_flu-symptoms-baby-young-child.html

Know Your Organ Timings ! ! ! !

2009-08-07T03:57:00.001+05:30

The Most Complicated or Say Complex Machine in this earth is the Human Body..

This Chart will list the time, where each organ works at its best efficiency..

WAYS TO ENHANCE MEMORY

2009-07-28T19:43:00.000+05:30

Did you know that people compete every year to win the
U.S. Memory Championship? To attain the rank of grand
master of memory, you must be able to memorize 1,000
digits in under an hour, the exact order of 10 shuffled
decks of playing cards in under an hour, and one shuffled
deck in less than two minutes.

To this day, there are only 36 grand masters of memory in
the world.

And while you may not be interested in memorizing digits
and playing cards, I'm sure all of us would like to increase
our mental brain power. Whether you want to quickly
memorize the periodic table, learn a new language,
recite the names of each president forwards and
backwards, or cut down on your studying time, the
following memory techniques will help you do it.

The brain wasn't designed to remember abstract symbols like
numbers and miscellaneous facts. However, if you can
translate those symbols into vivid visual images and
associations, even the dullest list of dates can become as
memorable as your own telephone number. The key is to
develop a system that allows for quick encoding and easy
recall.

1. Acronyms

One of the most common memory techniques is the use of
acronyms. This technique uses an easily remembered word
whose first letters are associated with the list of items that
need to be remembered. Pilots use these extensively to run
through essential checklists during flight time.

An example would be:

ROY G. BIV: the colors of the visible spectrum Red, Orange,
Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet

Keep in mind that associations which are exaggerated, absurd,
humorous, and involve all five senses are much easier to
remember than normal ones. We remember emotionally charged
events much better than boring ones.

2. Chunking

Chunking is one of the oldest memory techniques. Using this
method, the items to be memorized are divided into small
chunks or groups. Chunking is especially helpful for memorizing
telephone numbers, ID numbers, etc.

For example, if you want to memorize the number 411645754,
then split it up into small groups: 411, 645, 754. You can
then memorize each group by rote. By dividing the
larger number into smaller subsets, it will be much easier
to commit the number to memory.

When using this technique, it is also helpful to make
connections and associations among the different chunks and
numbers.

For example, if you want to memorize a grocery list, you
should group each of the items into related categories. So,
one chunk or group might be composed of oranges, apples, and
pears, while another chunk is made up of vegetables.

3. Acrostic

An acrostic is a memory technique that uses a made up
sentence or poem with a first letter cue. The first letter
of each word is a cue to an idea you need to remember.

One example is:

Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally (PEMDAS).

This acrostic represents the sequence in solving or
evaluating math equations. Parenthesis, Exponents,
Multiplication, Division, Addition, Subtraction

4. The Method of Loci

The Method of Loci is a memory technique that dates back to
ancient Greek times when orators, philosophers, and others
had to rely on memory for memorizing speeches and knowledge
in general. This was essential seeing that the printed book
wouldn't come around until approximately two thousand years
later.

Therefore, they invented the Method of Loci. This memory
technique involves associating information you want to
remember with specific locations, also known as loci.

These locations can be points along a journey or objects in
a room. The ancient Greeks not only created rooms, but
entire palaces and cities to remember lots of information.

According to Wikipedia,

"In ancient advice, the loci were physical locations,
usually in a familiar large public building, such as a market
or a church.

To utilize the method, one walked through the building
several times, viewing distinct places within it, in the
same order each time. After a few repetitions of this,
one should be able to remember and visualize each of
the places in order reliably.

To memorize a speech, one breaks it up into pieces, each
of which is symbolized by vivid imagined objects or symbols.
In the mind's eye, one then places each of these images
into the loci.

They can then be recalled in order by imagining that one is
walking through the building again, visiting each of the
loci in order, and viewing each of the images that were
placed in the loci, thereby recalling each piece of the
speech in order."

To create your own mental journey, you must first select the
path you wish to use. Be sure to choose a location that has
the same number of locations as the number of chunks in the
information you wish to memorize.

Take a mental journey through the selected path. You should
be able to recall the specific order of the locations
without trouble.

Now it's time to associate this new information with each
location along your chosen path. If you want to
memorize the presidents, then you might take a
mental journey through your school. In the first
room, you could have George Washington in an
astronaut suit and cutting firewood. In the
second room you could have John Adams
break dancing in front of the classroom.
And on and on until you have completed all
43 presidents.

Remember, emotion and exaggerated associations
are the key to memory.

5. The Image-Name Technique

Here's an excellent (but simple) memory technique for
remembering names.

All you have to do is make up a relationship between the
name and the physical characteristics of the person's name
you are trying to remember.

For example, if you were trying to remember a person by the
name of Tom, you might associate their name with the person
you went to prom with who was also named Tom. In this
instance, you are making the connection between Tom and prom
(rhyming) and between someone you previously knew from
high school.

If you want to remember the name Sally, you might imagine
them in a ballet. This association will help you remember
their name because of the visual imagery and the connection
between the "closely related" words that almost rhyme:
Sally and ballet.

By making connections, you are instantly more likely to
remember their name the next time you see them.

6. Mind Mapping

One of the best ways to learn new things is to relate what
you want to learn with something you already know. This is
known as association and it is the mental glue that drives
your brain.

Associations are also one of the best ways to improve your
memory. To maximize our mental powers, we must constantly
look for associations that connect new ideas and knowledge
with old ideas and concepts that we are already familiar
with.

Association is the primary method that memory champions use
to win international memory competitions. If you want to
enhance your mental abilities, then association is one skill
that you will definitely want to practice.

Mind mapping is one of the best ways to practice association.

According to Wikipedia, mind mapping:

"is a diagram used to represent words, ideas, tasks or
other items linked to and arranged radially around a central
key word or idea."

Mind maps have been used for centuries to aid in learning,
brainstorming, memory, and problem solving.

To start creating your own mind map, simply get
out a piece of paper, multiple colored pens, and begin
drawing a handwritten mind map that connects a variety
of ideas and concepts to a central key word or idea.
The simple act of using your hand for thought can really
get the brain going.

7. Write an Article

One of the best ways to learn a topic is to start writing
about it yourself. This forces you to clarify your thoughts
and dig a bit deeper into the topic at hand.

By expressing the core ideas in your own words, you will
gain a much deeper understanding of the topic.

Explaining a topic to others will help you to "really"
understand the matter because teaching something to others
requires a completely different level of insight.

Think about it. If you had to teach a class, wouldn't you
make sure that you understood the material even better than
the students. Take on the role of an instructor and you will
find yourself gaining a much deeper understanding of the
topics you study.

8. Peg words

Peg words are extremely powerful, but it does take some time
to learn how to use them. However, once you master this
technique, you can probably cut your studying time in half.

The use of pegs goes all the way back to the seventeenth
century and Henry Herson. He came up with a list of ten
objects that physically resembled the number itself. For
example, the number 1 was represented by a candle.
Number 8 was a pair of spectacles.

Peg words essentially become "hangers" or pegs on which
you can hang different items that you want to remember.

This system works by pre-memorizing a list of words that
are easy to associate with the numbers they represent. To
begin, you can connect simple objects with the numbers 1-20.
Those objects form the "pegs" of the system.

Once you have created a list of words for each number, you
can then begin using your peglist to quickly memorize a
list of objects.

For example, let's say you want to memorize a grocery list
of 10 items. To begin, you would need to make a peg list for
the numbers 1-10. Here's an example:

1- pencil
2- shoe
3- phone
4- door
5- book
6- basketball
7- hat
8- radio
9- car
10- barn

Now, you must associate the groceries on your list with each
of your peg words. Remember that your associations must be
exaggerated and filled with emotion in order to make them
easy to remember. Here are some examples of how you could
associate the grocery list with each of the peg words:

1- tomatoes - Visualize an army of pencils attacking a field
of overgrown tomatoes.
2- grapes - Visualize your favorite TV character stomping
through a big barrel of grapes with bright white shoes.
3 - cereal - Visualize opening your phone and having your
favorite cereal start shooting out of the mouth piece.

Get the idea?

Once you have created your list of peg words, you can use
them over and over again to memorize a variety of different
lists.

You could use the peg system to memorize the Presidents of
the United States, the periodic table, or the state capitals.

When creating your peg words, it's best to use tangible
things or objects for each peg word because objects are
easier to associate other items to.

Also, make sure that you don't use similar peg words for
different numbers. For reference, always keep a full list
of the peg words close by. In fact, putting this list in
your wallet or purse is one of the best places. This way,
you will always have access to the peg system.

At first, you may find it difficult to come up with the creative,
illogical, and exaggerated associations that help you
remember more. It comes with practice. However, once you
have mastered the technique of association, you will find
that you have also increased your creativity and problem
solving skills at the same time. The key to creating good
associations is thinking like a child again. Let your mind
wander past the limitations created out of what we now know
as "adulthood".

9. Visualization

Visualization is an extremely powerful memory technique.
However, visualization doesn't just improve memory. It can
also help reduce stress, improve sports performance, and
increase your motivation.

Create descriptive pictures of your possible future and move
yourself towards it. Visualize your next sports event or
public speech to improve your performance.

When studying history, play out visual renditions in your mind
of historical events that you want to remember. Imagine the
smells, sights, and sounds of Gettysburg or the excitement
and unity created by Martin Luther King's famous "I Have a
Dream" speech. By visualizing history with mental replays,
you are much more likely to remember them in detail.

10. FlashCards

When it comes to rote memorization, flash cards are my
favorite memorization tool. Flashcards can help you learn
new subjects quickly and efficiently. They are especially
useful for learning new vocabulary or even a new language.

One of the biggest benefits of flashcards is their portable
nature. They allow you to study anywhere at any time. It
doesn't matter whether you're on the bus, stuck in
traffic, or in the doctor's office. You can always whip out
your flashcards for a quick 2 to 3 minute study session.

To create effective flashcards, dedicate one point to each
card. For example, you could put a vocabulary word on one
side and the definition on the other side. This way, you can
repeatedly quiz yourself until you have mastered all of the
concepts.

Considering that memory is such a fundamental skill, it's
surprising that schools don't teach us more about how to
learn and use our memory to its optimum potential.

Our mind, just like the rest of our body, needs continuous
exercise and training. Those who think they have a poor
memory actually just have an untrained memory.

Just reading this article won't improve your memory. A good
memory comes from practice. Find something new and exciting
to learn. Start testing out these methods as soon as possible.

You could learn how to fly, learn a new language, photography,
or even investing.

Types of Head ache

2009-07-24T19:35:00.001+05:30

Detect the type of headache.

Headaches are irritants that could spoil your day. They could take away your efficiency by almost 50 per cent.

Often we neglect headaches and try to get on with the daily chores till finally 3-4 hours later the headache becomes unbearable. After hours of this slow torture, finally we pop in a tablet to relieve the pain. If you do a quick analysis, you'll realise that from the moment the headache began to the time you took the tablet, you may have lost many hours of productive time.

So the next time you feel the headache coming, first of all try to identify what kind of headache it might be. And then go for the cure.

Headaches occur for many reasons. They come due to tension or inflammation of the sinus.
Sometimes headaches come when the eyes are under strain.

Tension headache: The most common type of headache, immortalised in TV commercials where a harried woman is hounded by a demanding husband, bratty children and a tyrannical boss.
Symptom: Feels like a tight band around your head.
Cause: Tight muscles in the face, neck and scalp, usually caused by stress.

Migraine: A headache has to be pretty nasty to earn the name migraine, which means "half a head" in French.
Symptom: A throbbing pain, usually on one side of the head. Usually accompanied by nausea, vomiting and sensitivity to light and sound.
Cause: Uneven levels of the brain chemical serotonin, which causes the blood vessels in the head to constrict, then expand, putting pressure on surrounding nerves. Can be aggravated by the hormonal changes of the menstrual cycle.
Prewarning: Most migraines are preceded by what's called an aura - flickering points of light or jagged lines that distort your vision.

Sinus headache: Pain around the bridge of your nose, jaws and ears. Sometimes pain moves down into the gums. Usually starts in the morning and gets worse throughout the day.
Cause: When you have a sinus infection, trapped air and pus press against the swollen, tender lining of your sinuses.
Hard fact: Sinus infections are common but sinus headaches are actually quite rare.

Cluster headache: The most excruciating of all headaches.
Symptom: A piercing, throbbing, burning pain that bores into one side of the head, around or behind the eyes. Can occur several times each day for weeks or months at a time.
Cause: Unknown.

Nutrition tips for kids

2009-07-20T19:29:00.000+05:30

Many more children are being diagnosed with high cholesterol, or as overweight or obese. These conditions can cause many health problems for your child such as diabetes and high blood pressure, both now and as he or she moves into adulthood.

By helping your child eat a healthy diet and exercise regularly, you can reduce his or her risk of experiencing these health problems.

How can help a child eat right?

If you prepare healthy foods for your family and eat healthy foods yourself, your child will eat healthier, too.

Make sure to prepare a variety of foods, so your family gets all the vitamins and minerals their bodies need to function properly.

What are some examples of healthy meals?

Breakfast:

The first meal of the day is a good time to give your child foods that are high in fiber. Whole-grain breads, cereals, fruit, low-fat or nonfat cheeses and yogurt are also good breakfast foods. Use skim or low-fat milk rather than whole or 2% milk. Fruit juice is usually high in calories and has less nutrients than whole fruit (fresh or canned).

Lunch:

Use whole-grain breads and rolls to make a healthier sandwich. Whole grains increase the total fiber in your child's diet and are less processed than enriched white bread. Give your child whole-grain crackers with soups, chili and stew, and always serve fresh fruit (with the skin) with meals instead of chips or other high-calorie options.

Here are some ways to make healthier sandwiches:

Use low-fat or fat-free lunch meats. They are good in sandwiches or cut into strips on top of a salad.

Buy leaner meats, such as turkey, chicken or veggie dogs.

Put leftover chicken or turkey strips in a tortilla to make a cold fajita (add strips of raw red and green peppers and onions). Use fat-free sour cream as a dressing.

Stuff a pita-bread "pocket" with vegetables, fat-free cheese and bits of leftover grilled chicken.

Cut up vegetables such as onion, carrot, celery and green peppers to add to tuna salad. Mix vegetables and water-packed tuna with fat-free mayonnaise or, for a different taste, mix with a fat-free salad dressing.

Chunky bits of leftover chicken mixed with fat-free mayonnaise, raisins, shredded carrots and sliced almonds is a great chicken salad. Serve it in a pita-bread pocket. Top it with salsa for a Southwestern flavor.

Mix cranberry sauce and fat-free mayonnaise to add to a turkey sandwich.
When buying peanut butter, choose an "all-natural" option. For jelly, buy one that 100% fruit and does not contain high fructose corn syrup. This will make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches much healthier.

Sliced ham and low-fat or fat-free cheese with mustard is great on rye bread.

Low-fat cheese makes a good sandwich with tomato slices and mustard or fat-free mayonnaise on a whole-grain roll.

Slice leftover pork tenderloin and top with barbecue sauce for a hot or cold sandwich.

Make grilled-cheese sandwiches with low-fat or fat-free cheese and serve them with raw carrot and celery sticks.

What snacks are good for child?

Fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low- or nonfat dair also make great snacks for children. Here are some ideas for ways to serve these foods to your kids:

Fruits:

Bits of fruit stirred into nonfat yogurt
Strawberries
Raisins
Grapes
Pineapple chunks
Orange or grapefruit sections
Bananas cooked lightly in apple juice
Apple slices with all natural peanut butter
Dried fruit mixes

Vegetables:

Carrot sticks
Celery sticks with all natural peanut butter
Raw broccoli and cauliflower florets with a low-fat dip or salsa

Protein:

1% fat or fat-free cottage cheese or ricotta cheese
Water-packed tuna mixed with fat-free mayonnaise on top of celery sticks or whole-grain crackers
Fat-free yogurt topped with sunflower seeds, chopped dried fruit or a spoonful of oat bran

Whole grains:

Cereals or cereal bars that are low in sugar and fat, and high in fiber and protein
Whole-grain crackers, breads or bagels
Sweets and desserts:
Fat-free frozen yogurt
Juice bars
Sherbet and sorbet

Super Fruits

2009-07-16T19:20:00.000+05:30

Kiwi :Tiny but mighty

This is a good source of potassium, magnesium, Vitamin E & fibre. It's Vitamin C content is twice that of an orange.

Apple: An apple a day keeps the doctor away.

Although an apple has a low Vitamin C content, it has antioxidants & flavonoids which enhances the activity of Vitamin C thereby helping to lower the risks of colon cancer, heart attach & stroke.

Strawberry : Protective Fruit

Strawberries have the highest total antioxidant power among major fruits & protect the body from cancer causing, blood vessels clogging free radicals

Orange : Sweetest medicine

Taking 2 -4 oranges a day may help keep colds away, lower cholesterol, prevent & dissolve kidney stones as well as lessen the risk of colon cancer

Watermelon : Coolest Thirst Quencher

Composed of 92% water, it is also packed with a giant dose of glutathione which helps boost our immune system. They are also a key source of lycopene - the cancer fighting oxidant. Other nutrients found in watermelon are Vitamin C & Potassium.

Guava & Papaya : Top awards for Vitamin C

They are the clear winners for their high Vitamin C content. Guava is also rich in fibre which helps prevent constipation. Papaya is rich in carotene, this is good for your eyes.

He who laughs, lasts !

2009-07-12T19:17:00.000+05:30

Of all the species in the animal kingdom, man is the only one who laughs and it is quite true to say, "He who laughs, lasts".

It has so many health benefits which can easily be credited with prolonging life.

Ha!, cynics might exclaim, without pausing to consider the science behind the theory. However, it is easy to understand that laughter frees the mind and body from the bonds of stress. And therein lies the secret of its effectiveness.

Laughter drives stress away, taking the edge off high blood pressure, anxiety, depression, nervous breakdown, heart disease and peptic ulcers. In fact, since a link between stress and cancer progression has been medically discerned, it may well be that laughter can mitigate the ravages of cancer or even ward it off in the first place.

Over the years, many relaxation theraphies have been tried out. But the one that's proving really effective, and hence gaining in popularity all over the world is laughter therapy. It is more of a supplementary and preventive therapy.

The technique of simulated laughter has to be learned, but when practised in a group under a leader, it is quite easy.

Always, try a new type of laughter like laughing with the lips together or with a humming sound. If you observe, there is some peculiarity in each person's laugh.

Fortunately, we don't have to wait years for data that has already been collected by scientists over the last 30 years.

It has been found that laughter:

strengthens the heart
supports the immune system
gives more power to the lungs (more "dum")
massages internal organs
improves digestion
lowers cholesterol
breaks down mental blocks
stimulates the production of endorphins, the 'feel good' hormones
When you laugh out loud, without inhibition, you tone up 240 of your body's muscles - that's more than one-third of the 640 muscles you have altogether.

Besides, making you healthier, laughter makes you a nice person to know, more welcome into various social circles. It can diffuse a tense situation even in the workplace.

For this, two elements are essential - surprise and timing.

So always remember this in your life - "He who laughs, lasts"

All About Cholesterol

2009-07-08T19:14:00.000+05:30

Cholesterol is small molecule, one of the steroids. It is essential to life. It has also been responsible for 17 Nobel Prizes, countless pages of reports in scientific journals and the popular press, and mounting anxiety on the part of health-conscious people. Why?

The human body contains about 100 g of cholesterol.
Most of this is incorporated in the membranes from which cells are constructed and is an indispensable component of them.

The insulating layers of myelin wound around neurons are especially rich in cholesterol. In far smaller quantities, but no less important, cholesterol is used to synthesize several steroid hormones, including the sex hormones estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone as well as the corticosteroids. Cholesterol is also the precursor from which the body synthesizes vitamin D.

One of the major uses of cholesterol is the synthesis of bile acids. These are synthesized in the liver from cholesterol and are secreted in the bile. They are essential for the absorption of fat from the contents of the intestine. A clue to the importance of cholesterol is that most of the bile acids are not lost in the feces but are reabsorbed from the lower intestine and recycled to the liver. There is some loss, however, and to compensate for this and to meet other needs, the liver synthesizes some 1500-2000 mg of new cholesterol each day. It synthesizes cholesterol from the products of fat metabolism.

There is also an unceasing transport of cholesterol in the blood between the liver and all the other tissues. Most of this cholesterol travels complexed with fatty acids and protein in the form of low density lipoproteins (LDLs). Cells that need cholesterol trap and ingest LDLs by receptor-mediated endocytosis.

Cholesterol can also create problems. Cholesterol in the bile can crystallize to form gall stones that may block the bile ducts. Cholesterol is also strongly implicated in the development of atherosclerosis: fatty deposits (plaques) that form on the inside of blood vessels and predispose to heart attacks. The major culprit seems to be levels of LDLs that are in excess of the body's needs.

The level of cholesterol in the blood is measured in milligrams per deciliter (mg/dl), which is equivalent to parts per 100,000. The levels range from less than 50 in infants to an average of 215 in adults and to 1,200 or more in individuals suffering from a rare, inherited disorder called familial hypercholesterolemia. For those of us in the normal range, approximately two-thirds of our cholesterol is transported as LDLs. Most of the rest is carried by so-called high density lipoproteins (HDLs).

Because of their relationship to cardiovascular disease, the analysis of serum lipids has become an important health measure.

The table shows the range of typical values as well as the values above (or below) which the subject may be at increased risk of developing atherosclerosis.

LIPID Typical values (mg/dl) Desirable (mg/dl)
Cholesterol (total) 170-210 <200
LDL cholesterol 60-140 <130
HDL cholesterol 35-85 >40
Triglycerides 40-150 <135

Total cholesterol is the sum of

HDL cholesterol

LDL cholesterol and

20% of the triglyceride value

Note that - high LDL values are bad, but high HDL values are good.

Using the various values, one can calculate a cardiac risk ratio = total cholesterol divided by HDL cholesterol

A cardiac risk ratio greater than 7 is considered a warning.

In May of 2001, a panel of the National Institutes of Health recommended a more aggressive attack on reducing cholesterol levels in the U.S. population. In addition to a better diet and more exercise, they urged that many more people at risk of developing heart disease, such as -

smokers ,diabetics ,people with high blood pressure and/or ,obesity
be put on cholesterol-lowering drugs.

There are several types:
drugs that interfere with the ability of the liver to synthesize cholesterol by blocking the action of the enzyme HMG-CoA reductase. These are the "statins", e.g., lovastatin (Mevacor®), pravastatin (Pravachol®), atorvastatin (Lipitor®).

insoluble powders ("colestipol", "cholestyramine") that bind to bile acids in the intestine so that instead of being reabsorbed they are eliminated in the feces. In compensation, the liver increases its consumption of blood-borne cholesterol. The main drawback to these drugs is that they are gritty powders and must be consumed in rather large amounts.

nicotinic acid(niacin)

"fibric acids" such as gemfibrozil and clofibrate.

Careful attention to diet may by itself lead to a reduction in cholesterol levels.

In one study, men with high (>265 mg/dl) levels were able to lower these an average of 3.5% (10 mg/dl) by diet alone. Their diets were low in fat as well as low in cholesterol, and it was not - and still is not - clear as to what aspect of the diet contributed to the modest reduction. Cholesterol is made from fat and lowering the proportion of fat in the diet will probably help. Favoring unsaturated fats over saturated fats appears to be beneficial. There is little evidence that lowering one's intake of cholesterol is, by itself, useful. An average intake of cholesterol of 300-500 mg per day is joined in the intestine by several times that amount that has been synthesized by the liver and appears to have little or no effect on blood levels of cholesterol. So when choosing between the pat of butter and the pat of margarine, it is not the 30-odd mg of cholesterol in the butter (vs. 0 in the margarine) but its high content of saturated fat (over 3 times that in the margarine) that is probably significant.

HEALTHY JUICES - Must Try !

2009-07-04T19:05:00.000+05:30

Carrot + Ginger + Apple - Boost and cleanse our system.

Apple + Cucumber + Celery - Prevent cancer, reduce cholesterol, and improve stomach upset and headache.

Tomato + Carrot + Apple - Improve skin complexion and bad breath.

Bitter gourd + Apple + Milk - Avoid bad breath and reduce internal body heat.

Orange + Ginger + Cucumber - Improve Skin texture and moisture and reduce body heat.

Pineapple + Apple + Watermelon - To dispel excess salts, nourishes the bladder and kidney.

Apple + Cucumber + Kiwi - To improve skin complexion.

Pear & Banana - regulates sugar content.

Carrot + Apple + Pear + Mango - Clear body heat, counteracts toxicity, decreased blood pressure and fight oxidization .

Honeydew + Grape + Watermelon + Milk - Rich in vitamin C + Vitamin B2 that increase cell activity and strengthen body immunity.

Papaya + Pineapple + Milk - Rich in vitamin C, E, Iron. Improve skin complexion and metabolism.

Banana + Pineapple + Milk - Rich in vitamin with nutritious and prevent constipation.

Know your Body

2009-06-21T19:29:00.001+05:30

Learn the common causes behind your body’s little quirks. Whether uncomfortable, embarrassing or just plain weird, there are some pretty funky things that our bodies do. Curious about the causes of such reactions as hiccups, goose bumps and eye twitches, we spoke with Eric Plasker, DC, author of The 100 Year Lifestyle, to get the real scoop. Read on to discover the common reasons for 14 peculiar bodily functions.

Charley Horses

These sudden, super-painful muscle spasms can be blamed on several things, including dehydration or electrolyte imbalances often from strenuous exercise. After a demanding workout or an extra-long run, sip a sports drink to keep your system running smoothly. If you experience this type of cramping, walk around to help relieve the pain.

Sneezes

Sneezes happen when your body is trying to expel an irritant from the nasal cavity. If you have allergies, pollen or pet dander is usually to blame. If you have a cold, your body makes mucus to trap the virus, and sneezing helps force it (and the sickness) out of your body. An over-the-counter allergy or cold medicine helps suppress your reaction to allergens or reduce mucus production, which should prevent sneezing fits.

Ear Popping

The Eustachian tube in your inner ear is responsible for maintaining equal pressure on both sides of your eardrum. When you experience a rapid change in altitude during takeoff in an airplane or when riding an elevator in an extra-tall building the Eustachian tube opens to release pressure, and you hear a pop. To force the tube open (and your ears), squeeze your nostrils closed while exhaling forcefully through your nose.

Ear Ringing

Ear ringing, or tinnitus, can happen for two reasons. If you have fluid or an infection in your middle ear, you may hear a constant buzz. However, the more common cause is damage to the microscopic ends of your hearing nerves, which often happens when you are exposed to loud noises. To prevent permanent damage (and preserve your hearing), wear earplugs at concerts and sporting events or even when you mow the lawn.

Eye Twitches

Serious eye twitches can be a symptom of neurological disorders, but often there is a more mundane explanation. Common causes for eye twitches include stress, lack of sleep, extended staring or eye strain. Before you get frantic, try reducing your stress level, cutting back on caffeine and catching up on sleep.

Goose Bumps

Those tiny bumps that cover your skin when you are cold or scared are actually a defense mechanism. Goose bumps occur when the arrector pili, a tiny muscle that connects the hair follicle with skin, contracts and makes the hair stand on end. If you had more hair like cavemen did the upright hair would trap air to keep you warm or make you look bushier and therefore more threatening to predators.

Hiccups

If you have frequently got a case of the hiccups, try slowing down when you eat and drink, suggests Dr. Plasker. Doing either too quickly causes your stomach to swell; this irritates your diaphragm, which contracts and causes hiccups. You may also get hiccups in emotional situations or if your body experiences a sudden temperature change. In both of these cases, the hiccups are a result of a glitch in your nerve pathways, which is why a sudden scare which might shake up and reset your nerves can sometimes end an episode.

Itches

According to Dr. Plasker, our skin most often gets itchy because of dryness associated with the environment or over-washing; water and soap can strip skin of its natural oils, thus sapping moisture. Face or body lotion should be able to keep these types of itches under control; also look for body washes and soaps labeled. If you still have itchy patches, you may be experiencing an allergic reaction to a chemical, plant, food, animal or drug. See an allergist if the itching is persistent.

Limbs falling asleep

When there is consistent pressure on part of a limb-like when you sit on your feet or rest your head on an arm, the pressure squeezes your nerve pathways and scrambles messages sent to your brain. The mixed messages make you lose feeling in the squished body part because your brain has trouble telling it what to do. To prevent a case of pins and needles, avoid sitting or lying in positions that compress your nerves.

Seeing Stars

If you stand too quickly, suffer a blow to the head or are stricken by a migraine, there is a good chance you will see stars as blood surges to different parts of your body. Generally these tiny flashes of light will fade in a few seconds. If you see stars for more than a few moments, you could have a tear or tiny clot in your retina, and you should consult a physician immediately.

Shivers

Shivering, says Dr. Plasker, is full-body muscle twitching. When your temperature drops too low, your body shakes all over in an attempt to generate heat. The only way to cure these kind of shivers is to get your temperature back to 98.6°F.

Sneezes

Sneezes happen when your body is trying to expel an irritant from the nasal cavity. If you have allergies, pollen or pet dander is usually to blame. If you have a cold, your body makes mucus to trap the virus, and sneezing helps force it (and the sickness) out of your body. An over-the-counter allergy or cold medicine helps suppress your reaction to allergens or reduce mucus production, which should prevent sneezing fits.

Stomach Rumbles

As food, liquid and gas move through your digestive tract, your stomach muscles and intestines contract and cause rumbling noises borborygmi is the scientific name. Everyone’s stomach makes noise during digestion, but if you have extra-loud rumbles, a teaspoon of olive oil or a cup of herbal tea with lemon may help ease them, says Dr. Plasker.

Yawns

If your body is low on oxygen, your mouth opens wide and tries to suck more in. Yawning is a way to regulate the amount of carbon dioxide and oxygen in your blood. Unfortunately, yawns are nearly impossible to stifle.

How the Flu Works

2009-06-02T22:35:00.000+05:30

Every winter, like clockwork, the flu returns. It infects millions of us -- about 5 to 20 percent of the U.S. population alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Health Canada estimates that 10 to 25 percent of Canadians get the flu each year. It leaves us sniffling, sneezing, coughing, achy and generally feeling miserable for anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.

What is the Flu?
The flu is a respiratory illness caused by the influenza virus. The flu is not the same as a cold, although they share many of the same symptoms. The cold is caused by a different virus, and it tends to have milder symptoms than the flu. Colds are also less likely to cause serious complications.

Flu symptoms can include any or all of the following:

Coughing
Sneezing
Fever
Body aches
Runny nose and/or congestion
Tiredness

These symptoms, although uncomfortable, are generally not dangerous. But the flu also weakens the immune system, leaving it vulnerable to more serious infections. High-risk individuals (see Who is at Risk?) in particular are susceptible to serious complications, such as:

Bacterial pneumonia
Dehydration
Sinus problems and ear infections (primarily in children)
Worsening of preexisting conditions, such as asthma or diabetes

How do People Get the Flu?

Flu season in North America runs from November through March, but dates can vary from year to year. January and February tend to be the most active flu months.

The "Stomach Flu"
The term "stomach flu" is actually a misnomer. Vomiting, diarrhea and stomach aches can be caused by a virus, but they are rarely related to the flu. The flu is a respiratory illness, not a gastrointestinal one.

How is the flu spread?
The flu is highly contagious. It is spread primarily by coughing and sneezing (which people who have the flu tend to do a lot of). Let's say you have the flu virus. Every time you cough or sneeze, you release tiny droplets of fluid into the air. Those tiny droplets can fly pretty far -- up to 3 feet (about 1 meter). If some of those droplets land on the nose or mouth of a person standing nearby, that person is likely to get as sick as you are, usually within one to four days. You can also spread the virus if you touch something (like a doorknob or table) after you've sneezed or coughed into your hand, and then other people come along and touch the same doorknob or table and put their hand on their nose or mouth.

If you have the flu, you're not just contagious when you have symptoms. You can pass along the virus one day before you start sniffling and sneezing, and you can keep passing it along for seven days after you start sniffling and sneezing. Children can be contagious even beyond the seven days.

Who is at Risk?
Anyone can get the flu, but some groups are more susceptible than others and are at greater risk for more serious complications or even death.
Risk groups include:

Children under the age of 2 (whose immune system is not yet fully developed)
Seniors over the age of 65 (most flu deaths are among seniors)
Anyone who has a chronic medical condition (such as asthma or diabetes)
Pregnant women
Health care workers
Nursing home residents

How Can You Treat the Flu?

Unfortunately, there isn't a pill or a liquid you can take that will "cure" you of the flu. Penicillin and other antibiotics won't work, because they only kill bacteria, and the flu is caused by a virus.
There are, however, a few approved antiviral drugs, including Symmetrel®, Flumadine®, Relenza® and Tamiflu®, that have been shown to shorten the duration of the illness.

Relenza® (zanamivir) and Tamiflu® (oseltamivir phosphate) are neuraminidase inhibitors. They work by blocking the action of a protein called neuraminidase, which sits on the surface of a cell and normally helps the influenza virus enter and leave the cell. Neuraminidase inhibitors trap the virus once it enters a cell.

By stopping the virus from spreading to other cells, Relenza® and Tamiflu® lessen the severity and shorten the duration of the flu infection.

Symmetrel® and Flumadine® also lessen the severity and shorten the duration of the flu, but they only work against influenza A. Both are antiviral medications that work by stopping the virus from replicating.

All four drugs are by prescription only and do have potential side effects, so they should only be taken with the advice of a doctor.

The best advice for treating the flu is to rest and drink plenty of liquids. Over-the-counter cold and flu remedies can alleviate some of the symptoms, at least temporarily. Aspirin may relieve fever and aches, but it should not be given to children and adolescents because of the risk of a rare but potentially dangerous illness called Reye's Syndrome.

How Can You Avoid Getting the Flu?

Experts say the best way to avoid catching the flu is to practice good hygiene during flu season. Here are a couple of tips:
Wash your hands throughout the day with warm water and soap.
Avoid anyone who is coughing or sneezing.
If you do get sick, you can avoid infecting others if you:

Stay home until you're feeling better.
Cover your mouth and nose with a tissue whenever you cough or sneeze.
If you have to sneeze or cough into your hands, wash them thoroughly afterward with warm water and soap.
Remember that you can spread the flu for up to seven days after you get sick, so be careful with your germs even after most of your symptoms have passed.
In the next section, we'll take a look at the flu vaccine and see how it wards off this illness.

The Flu Vaccine
Another way to prevent the flu is by getting a vaccine at the beginning of each flu season (October or November). The earlier you get vaccinated the better, because it takes about two weeks for the vaccine to take its full protective effect. Children under the age of 9 who have never had a flu shot especially need to get an early start, because they will need to have two vaccinations administered about one month apart.

The flu vaccine works by triggering your body's immune system response. When you get a flu vaccine, your body recognizes the flu virus as a foreign invader and produces antibodies to it. The next time your body encounters the flu virus, it will remember that it is a hostile invader and quickly launch an immune attack to kill off the virus.

But if your body remembers the virus, why do you need to get a flu shot every year? First, because flu strains differ from year to year; and second, because immunity declines over time.

The flu vaccine comes in two forms: a shot and a nasal spray.

Reference : www.howstuffworks.com

Health Care Exams - for women

2009-05-28T22:29:00.000+05:30

Health Care Exams

Women of all ages sometimes seek medical help only for pregnancy or gynecological issues. Don't neglect your routine health care during these busy years. According to the National Women's Health Information Center, these are the routine checkups that every woman needs. Further, these exams can be beneficial in identifying problems and should be performed if you experience any abnormal symptoms such as pain, lump or discharge from your breast; irregular bleeding or foul smelling vaginal discharge; vaginal, uterine or ovarian pain; blood in your stool; skin growths; or dental carries

Physical Examination

Most experts recommend an annual physical by a health care practitioner. In addition to the tests listed below this should include pelvic, rectal, skin, and blood pressure evaluations. Pelvic exams, along with routine pap tests, evaluate the health of the female reproductive tract and help identify sexually transmitted diseases, cancer, or other abnormalities. Rectal exams are recommended annually for women over age 50, earlier if you have inflammatory bowel disease or a first-degree relative with colon cancer. Skin examinations should also be performed annually to check moles or suspicious growths.

Breast Examination

Your doctor should perform a professional exam of your ******* annually and you should perform a breast self-exam every month. It is recommended that women perform breast self-exams, as women are often the first to notice subtle changes in their *******.

Because breast tissue changes slightly with cyclic hormone fluctuations, the best time to do the exam is 7 to 10 days after the beginning of your last menstrual period. For women who experience breast changes during ovulation, it may be better to perform breast self exam on the last day of the menstrual cycle. For those past menopause, try to perform the exam at the same time each month.

Mammography

The mammogram (breast x-ray) can often detect a lump well before you or your doctor can feel it. An initial or baseline mammogram is recommended for most women before their 40th birthday, and follow up exams are scheduled according to age and risk profile.

Some women find this procedure uncomfortable, but it is currently the best screening tool for breast cancer. In fact, many studies have shown that screening mammograms taken on a regular basis have the potential for reducing deaths from breast cancer in women between the ages of 50 to 69 by up to 40 per cent. Consult your doctor about getting regular screening mammograms.

Pap test

The Pap test is a screening tool used to monitor for precancerous or cancerous cells in the cervix or neck of the uterus. This test is usually part of a routine examination for women, starting from onset of sexual activity or age 18. Frequency of the test may be performed yearly or up to every 3 years depending on your age, risk and history of normal tests. This is best discussed with your physician to decide what is best for you.

Although this procedure is uncomfortable, it remains the number one screening tool we have for cervical cancer. Worldwide, cervical cancer is the second most common cancer among women. One-half of the women with newly diagnosed invasive cervical cancer have never had a Pap test, and another 10 percent have not had a Pap test in the past 5 years.

Blood tests

Blood tests may be done to screen for a variety of diseases. A blood glucose test may be performed to detect elevated blood sugar and diabetes. Total cholesterol and HDL cholesterol should be checked annually to watch for elevated cholesterol and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease. Your doctor may also want to check for thyroid disease using the Thyroid-Stimulating Hormone (TSH) test.

Hemoglobin and ferritin levels may be done to check for anemia. Anemia can be a risk in women for two reasons, menstrual bleeding and dietary deficiency. If during menopause you experienced prolonged or heavy bleeding, your doctor may monitor these levels for development of anemia. To avoid nutritional deficiencies, be aware of the food sources of iron, vitamin B12, and folate and include them in your diet daily.

Dental exams

Twice yearly for cleaning and checkups.

Food Horoscope !

2009-05-24T20:28:00.000+05:30

CAPRICORN
SENSIBLE IS BEST
The majority of Capricorns realizes early on that it's wise for them to eat well. They have learnt from health upsets in the past how important their well being is. Lovers of fresh foods, many a Capricorn's garden are filled with herbs and veggies, organically grown to provide them with inner fortitude to face the world. They are great hosts and fabulous cooks. They operate and feel best when they avoid sugar, alcohol and ice-cream.

AQUARIUS
CREATURE OF HABIT
It's not unusual for Aquarians to eat exactly the same breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday. They don't enjoy surprises, particularly when it comes to food. They are not into cooking for pleasure, but will cook something to eat. They are content eating snacks such as biscuits and cheese with a glass of wine. This is enough to tide them over until they have a real meal- an evening out or a meal prepared by someone else.

PISCES
SWEET TREATS
Sweet dreams hold a special meaning for Pisceans. For them, it means going to bed loaded with chocolate and biscuits. Many have a love/hate affair with food. They love to eat but hate putting on weight. Many eat to ease troubled minds. That's why so many are constantly going on a diet, then off again. When Pisces puts on lots of weight and keeps it on, it's an indication they are protecting themselves.

ARIES
THE MUNCHER
Aries often look forward to meals with anticipation, but generally don't like preparing food. These munches love to crunch on foods with texture, rather than smooth foods. They enjoy having a full tummy. It's surprising we don't see more heavy" people born under Aries - being such an active sign, they burn their weight off with mental and physical activity. Feed them quickly as they become irritable when hungry.

TAURUS
THE SELF-INDULGER
Willpower is hard for Taureans to summon up when they diet. Many a Taurean's life revolves around what the next meal will be. At health clubs and gyms, you will see them working overtime to lose a few kilos, only to indulge in a chocolate sundae after their workout. They are excellent cooks (particularly desserts). There are more professional chefs and authors of cook books from this sign than any other.

GEMINI
ALL OR NOTHING
Geminis often need to carefully plan their diet and watch their eating habits, because these areas of their life can spin out of control. They often eat on the run, have strange food desires, unusual snacks or many drinks (such as coffee) during the day. Overeating (or drinking and smoking) can become Gemini's outlet for nervous energy. Equally, Geminis rate high on the statistical list of anorexics.

CANCER
THE MOOD EATER
Food means a lot to Cancer, because it has a lot to do with feeling loved and comfortable. As Cancer is the sign which rules the tummy, everything they eat has a profound impact on them. Eating excessively can be their outlet for emotional turmoil, especially if they have been through an upset such as marriage break-up or a job disappointment, or have financial
difficulties. Many suffer from bulimia.

LEO
FEAST OR FAMINE
Leos are hearty eaters, but they also like to have fine food quality means more than quantity. They like to make their meals a special occasion. What makes a meal memorable for them is the presentation, the company, thewine and the location. If Leos cook, they have a great sense of style and presentation about it. Dinner parties at their homes can turn into a performance, which is talked about for a long time after.

VIRGO
SIMPLE'S BEST
Virgos are fussy eaters. They prefer to avoid the unknown and like to stick with foods and spices they know well. The more basic, healthy and simple their diet is, the better they feel towards it.
They feel guilty (or even suffer from nausea) if they eat fatty foods or desserts. Simplicity is their idea of dining perfection. More vegetarians and health food fanatics are born under this sign than any other.

LIBRA
PLEASURE SEEKER
As Librans are under the sign of the trend-marker; they are often into food styles that are different or up-to-the-minute. Good cooks, they show their originality and style by serving sophisticated dishes. They can be veritable health-food gourmets (baking their own breads etc!). The same applies to what they drink - it will be juices and herb teas (if their linkling is towards health foods) or the best wines and French champagne.

SCORPIO
POWER EATER
As the sign of passion, intensity and desire, when Scorpios get into food, they really get into it and overeat. The same attitude applies to a diet - if they decide to diet, they do it well. This sign can have a desirous nature all of its own - which no other sign can beat. They can be obsessive about food preferences. If inviting a Scorpio for dinner, it's wise to inquire in advance what they do or do not like to eat.

SAGITARIUS
SECOND-HELPING KING & QUEEN
When Sagittarians get hungry, they get super-hungry. Most are born loving food and the total dining experience. They love the whole thing of sitting around a table with a drink in one hand, a fork full of food in the other, telling tales of their conquests or the things that have occurred during the day.
Dieting for Sagittarians can be hard. Removing them from food fun can be like taking a duck away from water.

Prevent Back Pain with Good Posture

2009-05-13T19:54:00.000+05:30

Why is good posture important?

When it comes to posture, your mother did know best. Her frequent reminders to stand up straight and stop slouching were good advice.

Your spine is strong and stable when you practice healthy posture. But when you stoop or slouch, your muscles and ligaments struggle to keep you balanced — which can lead to fatigue, back pain and other problems.

Your spine's curves

A healthy back has three natural curves:

* An inward or forward curve at the neck (cervical curve)
* An outward or backward curve at the upper back (thoracic curve)
* An inward curve at the lower back (lumbar curve)

Good posture helps maintain these natural curves, while poor posture does the opposite — which can stress or pull muscles and cause pain.

Good standing posture

When standing, keep these tips in mind:

* Hold your chest high.
* Keep your shoulders back and relaxed.
* Pull in your abdomen and buttocks.
* Keep your feet parallel.
* Balance your weight evenly on both feet.

Try not to tilt your head forward, backward or sideways, and make sure your knees are relaxed — not locked.

Take the wall test

To test your standing posture, take the wall test. Stand with your head, shoulder blades and buttocks touching a wall, and your heels about two to four inches (five to 10 centimeters) away from the wall. Reach back and slide your hand behind the curve in your lower back, with your palm flat against the wall.

Ideally, you'll feel about one hand's thickness of space between your back and the wall. If there's too much space, tighten your abdominal muscles to flatten the curve in your back. If there's too little space, arch your back so that your hand fits comfortably behind you. Walk away from the wall while maintaining this posture. Keep it up throughout your daily activities.

Good sitting posture

When seated, keep these tips in mind:

* Choose a chair that allows you to rest both feet flat on the floor, while keeping your knees level with your hips. If necessary, prop your feet with a foot stool or other support.
* Sit with your back firmly against the chair. If necessary, place a small cushion or rolled towel behind the curve of your lower back.
* Stretch the top of your head toward the ceiling, and tuck your chin in slightly.
* Keep your upper back and neck comfortably straight.
* Keep your shoulders relaxed — not elevated, rounded or pulled backward.

Keep your shoulders straight

Whether you're sitting or standing, pay attention to the position of your shoulders. Slouching or rolling your shoulders forward shortens your chest muscles and reduces their flexibility. On the flip side, pulling your shoulders too far back causes your abdomen to stick out too far in front.

Check out your reflection

To see if you're keeping your shoulders straight, stand in front of a mirror or ask a friend to evaluate your shoulder position. Your shoulders should be in the same position as the image on the left.

It all adds up

Although good posture should be natural, you may feel wooden or stiff at first if you've forgotten the sensation of sitting and standing up straight. The key is to practice good posture all the time. You can make improvements at any age. Stretching and core strengthening exercises can help, too.

Swine Flu (Update and FAQ)

2009-04-29T19:10:00.000+05:30

The swine flu outbreak continues to grow, with more documented cases in the United States and internationally. As of 11 AM today, there are 64 cases of swine flu in the U.S. and additional countries reporting confirmed cases. The World Health Organization has raised the worldwide pandemic alert level to phase 4. This marks a significant upwards shift in the risk for a pandemic.

Below are answers to frequently asked questions regarding swine flu:

What is swine flu?
Swine Influenza (swine flu) is a respiratory disease of pigs caused by type A influenza viruses that causes regular outbreaks in pigs. People do not normally get swine flu, but human infections can and do happen. Swine flu viruses have been reported to spread from person-to-person.

What are the signs and symptoms of swine flu in people?
The symptoms of swine flu in people are similar to the symptoms of regular human flu and include fever, cough, sore throat, body aches, headache, chills, runny nose and fatigue. Some people have reported diarrhea and vomiting associated with swine flu.

How does swine flu spread?
Spread of this swine influenza A (H1N1) virus is thought to be happening in the same way that seasonal flu spreads. Flu viruses are spread mainly from person to person through coughing or sneezing of people with influenza. Sometimes people may become infected by touching something with flu viruses on it and then touching their mouth or nose.

How can someone with the flu infect someone else?
Infected people may be able to infect others beginning 1 day before symptoms develop and up to 7 or more days after becoming sick. That means that you may be able to pass on the flu to someone else before you know you are sick, as well as while you are sick.

What should I do to keep from getting the flu?
First and most important: wash your hands. Try to stay in good general health. Get plenty of sleep, be physically active, manage your stress, drink plenty of fluids, and eat nutritious food. Avoid close contact with sick people.

Are there medicines to treat swine flu?
Yes. If you get sick, antiviral drugs can make your illness milder and make you feel better faster. They may also prevent serious flu complications. For treatment, antiviral drugs work best if started soon after getting sick (within 2 days of symptoms).

What surfaces are most likely to be sources of contamination?
Germs can be spread when a person touches something that is contaminated with germs and then touches his or her eyes, nose, or mouth. Droplets from a cough or sneeze of an infected person move through the air.

What can I do to protect myself from getting sick?
There is no vaccine available right now to protect against swine flu. There are everyday actions that can help prevent the spread of germs that cause respiratory illnesses like influenza. Take these everyday steps to protect your health:

* Cover your nose and mouth with a tissue when you cough or sneeze. The tissue should be properly disposed of after use. If a tissue is not readily available, you should cough or sneeze into the inner part of your elbow, not your hands.

* Wash your hands often with soap and water, especially after you cough or sneeze. Alcohol-based hand cleaners are also effective.

* Avoid touching your eyes, nose or mouth. Germs spread this way.

* Try to avoid close contact with sick people.

* Seek medical attention at the earliest onset of symptoms. Your health care practitioner will determine if you are a candidate for further respiratory precautions (such as a surgical mask), diagnostic testing and treatment with prescription medications.

What is the best technique for washing my hands to avoid getting the flu?
Washing your hands often will help protect you from germs. It is recommended that you wash your hands with soap and warm water for at least 15 to 20 seconds. If soap and water are not available, alcohol-based disposable hand wipes or gel sanitizers may be used. If using gel, rub your hands until the gel is dry. The gel doesn't need water to work; the alcohol in it kills the germs on your hands.

What should I do if I get sick?
If you live in an area where swine influenza cases have been identified and become ill with influenza-like symptoms, including fever, body aches, runny nose, sore throat, nausea, or vomiting or diarrhea, you should seek medical attention. Your health care provider will determine whether influenza testing or treatment is needed.

Do not take aspirin for flu symptoms. Motrin (or similar products) and Tylenol (or similar products) may be used for relief of symptoms.

You should go to the Emergency Room if you have one of the following warning signs:

In children emergency warning signs that need urgent medical attention include:

· Fast breathing or trouble breathing

· Bluish skin color

· Not drinking enough fluids

· Not waking up or not interacting

· Being so irritable that the child does not want to be held

· Flu-like symptoms improve but then return with fever and worse cough

· Fever with a rash

In adults, emergency warning signs that need urgent medical attention include:

· Difficulty breathing or shortness of breath

· Pain or pressure in the chest or abdomen

· Sudden dizziness

· Confusion

· Severe or persistent vomiting

Can I get swine influenza from eating or preparing pork?
Usually not. But possible in some cases. Hence, avoid eating pork

Power diet for quick weight loss

2009-04-26T07:55:00.000+05:30

Today most of the people find it difficult to reduce their weight and are becoming more prone to Blood Pressure, cardiovascular diseases and diabetes and the core reason behind this is Obesity.

In this fast moving life we do not get much time to spare for physical exercise
so in such a situation a healthy and nutritious diet can solve the purpose.

Early Morning
Start your day with lemon juice and honey in lukewarm water; this helps your body to get rid of harmful acids produced by the body.

Breakfast
Choose any one or two from the following options
Egg white omelet (2) + 2 slices of brown bread,
Milk (Skimmed Milk) +Cornflakes/ Oats /Wheat bran
Fruit salad / Sprouts.
Vegetable Poha / Upma
Skimmed milk cottage cheese + Brown Bread

Pre Lunch
Take black coffee before the afternoon meal this helps in boosting metabolism.

Lunch
Boiled / Roasted Chicken/ Soyabean (200 grams) +Brown Rice (1/2 plate) / Chapatti (1)
Boiled Dal +salad + Brown Rice (1/2 plate) / Chapatti (1-2)
Take Probiotic curd (100grams) as it helps in digestion.
Vegetable Daliya

Evening
Take some citrus fruits to satisfy the hunger pangs in the evening,
Green tea with two Marie Lite biscuit
Boiled Channa

Dinner
Choose any one or two from the following options
Boiled Soybean Nutrela/ soup + salad,
Boiled Egg White (3) + Vegetable clear soup
Chicken or Tuna salad.
Boiled Dal
Vegetable Daliya

Pre Bed –time
150 -200 ml of skimmed milk.

Beside the above diet keep in mind the following points-
• Avoid heavy dinner; maintain at least 3 to 4 hours of gap between meal and sleep.
• Replace cold drinks with coconut water, vegetable soup or butter milk
• Drink at least 2 to 3 liters of water everyday
• Fibre is excellent for weight loss , so consume more of raw vegetables and fruits
• All carbs are not bad; avoid simple carbs like sugar, sweet and processed food.
• Never skip meals.
• Avoid Bakery products.
• Replace Chicken Tikka with Chicken Salami
• Avoid taking water along with the meal.
.
Follow the above mentioned points for 6 days in a week and once in a week please your taste buds with one meal of your choice but don’t forget only one. Try to take out some time for physical exercises at least thrice a week

Pursue the above mentioned rules and fit in your old clothes again but don’t forget the results may vary from person to person and don’t try to bully your body.

5 steps to a great body

2009-04-22T21:52:00.000+05:30

Does your diet and fitness regime go haywire every time you travel for work or pleasure?

You cannot take your gym with you, but with our 'no-equipment, do-anywhere workout', you can still keep fit while on the move.

Do one to three sets of each exercise, with eight to 15 repetitions per set.

Step 1: The warm up

Leg lifts: Stand with your feet apart at hip width. Place your hands on your hips. Bend both knees slightly and shift most of your weight onto your left leg.

Keeping your knee slightly bent, lift your right leg up and out to the side, about six inches. Lower to the original position. Repeat with the right leg, then with the left.

Arm curls: Use hand weights or dumbbells. Hold a weight in each hand, arms at your sides, palms facing forward.

Stand with your feet apart at hip width, knees slightly bent. Curl the weights up to your shoulders, then lower to the original position.

Step 2: Stretch exercises

Inner thigh stretches: Sit on floor; place the soles of your feet together. Drop your knees toward floor. Gradually, lower your torso towards the floor until you feel a gentle tension in your inner thighs. Release.

Modified hurdler: Sit on floor, right leg extended, left foot against the right knee. Lower your torso and reach for your ankle until your hamstring feels tight. Repeat on other side.

Hamstring stretch: Lie on the floor and stretch your legs. Raise your left leg, using a towel to assist, until you feel the tension in your hamstring. Hold. Repeat on other side.

Step 3: Floor exercises

Crunches: Lie on the floor with your feet hip width apart. Cradle your head in your hands without lacing your fingers together and with your elbows pointed slightly inward.

Tilt your chin a little bit toward your chest and pull your abdominal muscles in. Exhale through your mouth as you curl your head, neck and shoulders up off the floor. Hold this position for a moment, then inhale as you return to your original position.

Push-ups: Lie on your stomach. Bend your knees and cross your ankles. Bend your elbows and place your palms on the floor, in front of your shoulders and a bit to the side. Straighten your arms and lift your body so you are balanced on your palms and knees.

Tuck your chin a few inches towards your chest so that your forehead faces the floor. Tighten your abdominal muscles. Bend your elbows and lower your entire body at once. Rather than trying to touch your chest to the floor, lower until your upper arms are parallel to the floor. Push back up.

Squats: Stand tall with your feet apart at hip width, with your weight slightly back on your heels. Place your hands on your hips. Sit back and down as if you're sitting into a chair directly behind you. Lower as far as you can without leaning your upper body more than a few inches forward (this depends on your flexibility and your build).

If you can bend your knees far enough so that your thighs are parallel to the floor, stop. Don't allow your knees to travel out in front of your toes. Once you feel your upper body fold forward over your thighs, straighten your legs and stand up. Take care not to lock your knees as you complete the movement.

Step 4: Stretch exercises

Lunges: Stretch your legs a stride's distance apart. Slowly bend your knees until you are in a kneeling position with your knees not quite touching the floor. Don't look down; don't allow your knees to shoot out past your toes. Return to your original position.

Dips: Sit at the edge of the desk or on a sturdy chair. Place your hands with the palms facing your body. Slide yourself off the seat and support yourself with just with your hands. Slowly lower yourself by bending your elbows until your upper arms are parallel to the floor, and then press yourself back.

Step 5: Face exercises

Tilt your head backwards. Let your upper lip cover your lower lip. Maintain the posture as you curl your tongue up inside the mouth and press it against your upper palette. Then smile.

Place the entire thumb inside your mouth, between the teeth of the upper jaw and the upper lip. Press the upper lip back into the teeth so that your thumb is squeezed.

This exercise helps to get rid of furrows and lines on the forehead. All you have to do is lift the eyebrows upward and open your eyes wider with each count.

Pregnant ? Here's what you should eat . . .

2009-04-19T21:44:00.000+05:30

You are expecting your first child and are feeling both excited and nervous.

Everyone is doling out advice about almost everything, including what you should and should not eat.

image In this flurry of information overdrive, here's what you need to remember. On an average, you require between 1,800- 2,000 calories per day. If you are pregnant, you need only about 300 calories extra each day for you to stay healthy and help your unborn child grow.

You certainly do not have to 'eat for two' as the old saying goes.

First three months

A healthy, balanced diet includes adequate protein, vegetables, fruits, grains and dairy products.

Many women feel queasy or nauseated during the first three months of their pregnancy (also known as the first trimester). Eating small meals through the day, and dry crackers (such as Britannia's cream cracker biscuits) when you feel sick, may help.

You may lose weight due to nausea. Don't worry about it if your gynaecologist says you are okay.

Eating a variety of nutrient dense foods, consuming adequate calories and taking the prenatal vitamins prescribed by your gynaecologist are essential.

The second trimester

Your appetite will begin to increase as will your requirement for calories, vitamins, minerals and proteins. This resulting increase in energy is required for two reasons:

~ To increase the amount of blood in your body. Your growing baby requires this extra blood.

~ To nourish the growing uterus, prepare the breasts for lactation and increase overall fat stores that nourish the foetus.

Continue eating a variety of nutrient dense foods and taking your prenatal vitamins. Limit your intake of sweets and junk foods.

Last three months

Eat a balanced diet that includes fruits, vegetables, cereals and proteins like dals and pulses. Decrease the intake of salt, sugary products and fatty food.

Drink plenty of water to help reduce swelling and avoid constipation.

Try and avoid 'heaty' foods like dry fruits, raw papaya, grapes and pineapple.

Diet dos

~ Eat raw fruits, vegetables, prunes, whole grains or bran cereals like readymade wheat flakes.

~ Add one teaspoon of bran (wheat husk) flour to your wheat flour when making chapattis.

~ Increase your intake of fruits to at least three servings a day. Avoid fruits like papaya, pineapple and grapes.

~ Increase your intake of raw vegetables like cucumber, carrots, tomatoes, beetroot and lettuce leaves.

~ Avoid eating raw sprouts -- this can give you gas. Steam sprouts before you eat them.

~ Have at least one vegetable with every meal.

~ Drink at least one to two litres of fluid per day between meals, but not during meals. Your liquid intake could include juices, soups, coconut water, etc.

~ If you are constipated, have a cup of hot water three times a day.

~ Eat dry crackers, toast/ cereal before getting up or when feeling sick and to avoid nausea.

~ Eat smaller meals more frequently; say five to six meals a day.

~ Drink a glass of warm milk before sleeping to avoid insomnia.

~ Consume at least 0.4 milligrammes of folic acid everyday. Folic acid is found in vegetables, whole grain foods and citrus foods. It reduces the risk of birth defects of the spine and brain.

Folates, however, are easily destroyed by cooking, which is why it is recommended you have fresh vegetables like two to three leaves of lettuce, cabbage and cucumber. You can also include citrus fruits, juices, nuts, seeds, dried beans/ peas, bananas, tomatoes, etc, in your diet.

~ Ideally, your diet should supply all vitamins but since this is not feasible, you should take one multivitamin tablet every day.

~ Fish can form a part of your diet as it contains Omega3 fatty acid, an essential nutrient for a healthy delivery and lactation.

~ Vegetarians can fulfill their daily protein needs by having two to three cups of milk and milk products every day. Besides two cups of milk, non-vegetarians are advised to take one average helping of meat, fish, chicken or eggs.

~ Use low fat dairy products like skimmed milk, low fat cheese and yoghurt and soy products in your diet.

~ Use only lean meats like poultry and fish.

~ Bake, broil, grill or stir-fry your food instead of frying it.

~ For optimal absorption of an iron supplement or other non-meat iron sources, take it with a good source of Vitamin C like orange juice, grapefruit, cantaloupe, green pepper or broccoli.

~ Cut down on low calorie, low nutrient foods such as cakes, candy, pastries and soda.

~ Exercise regularly to keep from getting too tired. Exercise enhances stamina, strength and flexibility and can reduce stress. Walking is a good exercise.

Tip: Learn to control conditions like diabetes, epilepsy, high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease before you get pregnant; this will make your pregnancy easier.

Diet don'ts

~ Pregnant women are prone to acidity; avoid greasy, spicy foods as these alleviate acidity.

~ Try not to eat foods with strong smells (like garlic, onions, etc), to avoid nausea.

~ Avoid processed foods like pickles, papads, ketchups, jams, jellies, chocolates, chips and farsans.

~ Unless you are making it at home, avoid Chinese food. Most restaurants add ajinomoto or monosodium glutamate to their food. This is high in sodium content; too much sodium can lead to hypertension or high blood pressure.

~ Avoid outside food, especially non-vegetarian food like prawns, liver or any raw/ undercooked meats and eggs.

~ Don't lie down immediately after eating; go for a moderately paced walk instead. Try to have your food at least one hour before bedtime.

~ Avoid excess use of table salt.

~ Don't have too much caffeine; it suppresses the appetite. When had with or immediately after meals, it hinders the absorption of vitamins.

~ Avoid fasting during pregnancy as this causes a rapid fall of plasma glucose as compared to its fall in women who are not pregnant. Fasting increases body fat metabolism in the mother and, instead of glucose, the foetus is obliged to utilise ketones to get energy.

Ketones are produced when the body breaks down fat instead of carbohydrates to derive energy. This adversely affects foetal metabolism and development and lowers the foetus' IQ.

Don't diet when you are pregnant.

~ It would be a good idea to have an early breakfast.

~ Drinking alcohol is harmful. Alcohol may produce spontaneous abortion. A small dose may depress the foetus' breathing activity.

Heavy drinking during pregnancy is recognised as a major cause of mental retardation in the foetus. Though the facial malformation reduces with time, the small skull, short stature and low weight problems persist.

~ Smoke may harm the foetus due to exposure to nicotine, carbon monoxide or cyanide.

Smoking during pregnancy can increase the risk of spontaneous abortion. It also lowers the child's birth weight and raises the risk of prenatal mortality.

If a non-smoking mother is exposed to smoke during pregnancy, it can reduce the birth weight of the newborn.

Nicotine has been detected in the breast milk of mothers who smoke. In fact, children of mothers who smoke before and after conception have a higher risk of developing leukaemia or lymphoma.

Mothers who stopped smoking before pregnancy or soon after its onset gave birth to babies with an improved birth weight as compared to those mothers who continued to smoke through their pregnancy.

~ Avoid eating undercooked meat; it is a known source of toxoplasmosis, an infection that can seriously harm the foetus.

A balanced, nutritious diet will ensure the quality and quantity of your milk without depleting your body, paving the way for a healthy postpartum/ lactation period.

10 Tips to Reduce Muscle Pain Naturally - Without Side Effects

2009-04-10T17:44:00.000+05:30

If you suffer from muscle or joint pain you know how much it can impact your life. From not being able to play active sports to missing out on family fun – the effects can be far-reaching and upsetting. So, its natural that we search for pain remedies.

Almost everyone is familiar with pain relief formulas. Over 30 billion over-the- counter tablets and 70 million prescriptions are sold annually just in the USA. Known as ‘Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs’ (NSAIDs), a few commonly known names include Aspirin, Ibuprofin, Advil, and Motrin as well as prescription products like Celebrex and Vioxx. What most people might not know is that over 16,000 Americans die from NSAIDs a year and approximately 107,000 patients are hospitalized annually for NSAID related gastrointestinal complications.(1)

There is an alternative. Natural pain relief therapies can decrease inflammation and help repair tissues. The following are some starting points for investigating natural solutions further:

1. Get 7 to 8 hours of sleep a night: During the deeper stages of sleep the human body produces growth hormone, which results in tissue healing and repair. Inadequate amounts of sleep contribute to pain. Natural sleep remedies that can help you get a deep and restorative sleep are Melatonin, Hydroxy L- tryptophan (5-HTP), Calcium, Mangesium and colloidal gold. You can also listen to relaxing music – try searching on itunes for ocean sounds.

2. Take a green-lipped mussel oil supplement: If you suffer from pain, swelling or other symptoms commonly associated with arthritis, you may benefit from taking green-lipped mussel oil from New Zealand. In a clinical trial conducted at the Glasgow Homeopathic Hospital in Glasgow, UK, preparations of green-lipped mussel extract were shown to benefit 76 percent of rheumatoid arthritis patients and 70 percent of osteoarthritic patients (2) The omega-3s contained in green-lipped mussel oils (more potent than fish oils) cannot be manufactured by our body and decrease inflammation. The EPA and DHA essential fatty acids have been so effective that some people have been able to discontinue their use of other medications altogether.

3. Take MSM, or “organic sulphur”. It can lessen inflammation, pain, and stiffness due to arthritis, muscle, or back pain and helps to balance the blood chemistry in these conditions. MSM helps supply the sulfur amino acids needed for healing.

4. Massage a blend of essential oils of arnica, Calendula and St John’s work into the affected painful area. Applying essential oils directly on the area nourishes cells and enables the body to metabolize waste and heal injuries more quickly. Herb Pharm makes a a blend called “Trauma Oil” which is very effective. Essential oils can help relax tense muscles and improve circulation.

5. Eat a whole food, mineral rich diet with plenty of vegetables and whole grains. Vegetable juices and green chlorophyll-rich foods can help relieve muscle inflammations by promoting the elimination of toxins from the body. Cut back on the amount of meat containing large amounts of saturated fat, which impacts the effective functioning of the liver – possibly leading to inflammation and irritation. Animal fats also contain arachadonic acid which can stimulate inflammation.

6. Take Glucosamine sulfate: Glucosamine is a naturally occurring element in the body that plays a crucial role in the building and healing of cartilage. Glucosamine may be efficient in treating and even delaying the progression of osteoarthritis. Some studies have hinted that glucosamine may be as effective as NSAIDs in treating joint conditions, while having fewer gastrointestinal side effects.

7. Magnetic therapy: Magnetic therapy is a safe method of applying magnetic fields to the body for therapeutic purposes. It helps speed the healing process and improve quality of sleep without any adverse side effects. A study from the University of Virginia showed that that a magnetic field of moderate strength can result in significant reduction of swelling when applied immediately after an inflammatory injury. Dilation of blood vessels is a major cause of swelling, and it’s thought that the magnets worked by limiting blood flow to the affected area. Individuals wearing magnetic jewelry have reported diminished muscle soreness and lessening of cramps. Try sleeping on a magnet mattress pad to help ease the pain of muscle soreness or apply magnet straps to sore muscle or tendonitis areas.

8. Take Vitamin D: Researched conducted by the University of Minnesota found that 93% of all subjects with non-specific musculoskeletal pain were vitamin D deficient. Taking Vitamin D and CoQ10 can help alleviate muscle pain caused by cholesterol-lowering statin drugs. Vitamin D can also be synthesized naturally by the body upon exposure to sunlight.

9. Cayenne pepper:A teaspoon of cayenne shaken in 2 ounces of olive oil can be used as an ointment and rubbed directly into sore muscles. Cayenne contains capsaicin which eventually inhibits secretion of the neurotransmitter Substance P, that transmits pain to the brain, lessening muscle soreness, sprains and cramps.

10. Try an Epsom salt bath: The magnesium sulfate of Epsom Salt acts as a muscle relaxant, and by easing muscle pain it helps the body to eliminate harmful substances. Due to changes in agriculture in the past century, most Americans are deficient in Magnesium. Studies show increased magnesium levels from soaking in a bath enriched with Epsom salt! Magnesium and sulfate are both easily absorbed through the skin. Fill a bathtub with water as hot as you can stand. Add 2 cups of Epsom salts. The heat of the bath will increase circulation and reduce inflammation.'

how to stay young

2009-04-07T22:26:00.000+05:30

1. Throw out nonessential numbers. This includes age, weight and height.
Let the doctors worry about them. That is why you pay them.

2. Keep only cheerful friends.
The grouches pull you down.
(Keep this In mind if you are one of those grouches

3. Keep learning.
Learn more about the computer, crafts, gardening, whatever.
Never let the brain get idle.
"An idle mind is the devil's workshop."
And the devil's name is Alzheimer's!

4. Enjoy the simple things.

5. Laugh often, long and loud. Laugh until you gasp for breath.
And if you have a friend who makes you laugh, spend lots and Lots of time with HIM/HER.

6. The tears happen.
Endure, grieve, and move on.
The only person who is with you your entire
life, is yourself. LIVE while you are alive.

7. Surround yourself with what you love
whether it's family, pets, keepsakes, music, plants, hobbies, whatever.
Your home is your refuge.

8. Cherish your health.
If it is good, preserve it.
I f it is unstable, improve it.
If it is beyond what you can improve, get help.

9. Don't take guilt trips.
Take a trip to the mall, even to the next county, to a foreign country, but NOT to where the guilt is.

Useful Tips to Cure Back Pain

2009-04-04T10:38:00.000+05:30

Beat anger at office

2009-03-29T19:57:00.000+05:30

Getting angry and frustrated is only natural. And, work can get so stressful at times that it only takes a little push before you are ready to blow up. But, getting angry at work is self-destructive and nothing good comes out of it. We bring you some ways to keep the ugly head of anger at bay on the job

In control

Do not ever let arguments get out of hand. Remember, no matter how laidback your office environment is, it's still a professional place and you have to treat it like that. Always maintain a level of professionalism at work. Never resort to name calling or worse - throwing punches!

Walk it out

The best stress- and anger-buster is a brisk walk. Take a few deep breaths and get some fresh air into your system. If you step away from the situation that is making you angry, it will help calm you down and put things in perspective. You also have a few uninterrupted moments to think the problem through.

Take a break

Just stop working for a while and clear your mind. Avoid the person who is making you angry for that time. A short break will refresh you and when you get back to work you'll be calmer and ready to deal with the co-worker who had your blood boiling a few minutes ago.

Stress ball

There's nothing as therapeutic as taking your anger out on a smiley-faced yellow ball. The stress ball will help you direct your anger onto something specific. It's the best alternative when you want to punch an annoying colleague! You could stick your boss's picture on the ball for maximum anger relief. Just don't let him see it though!

Music mantra

When you are angry, play some music that calms you down. Put on the iPod and listen to songs that will help ease your nerves. It also blocks the noise from the office when you aren't able to get out.

Anger is something we all have come face to face with. It could get ugly, especially at the workplace. But, if you follow these tips, you'll have a more peaceful work environment.

Can't lose it ?

2009-03-27T19:55:00.000+05:30

When your favourite jeans don't fit you anymore or you don't look as sexy as you used to in your little black dress, it's time to face up to the facts - you've put on weight!
But you don't understand how, since you exercise and try to eat healthy, or are even on a diet.

So why are you still piling on the pounds? Here are some points to think about:

Stress

This can play havoc with your metabolism. A slower metabolism means fewer calories are burnt. Stress is also the reason people tend to overeat.

A classic example is eating chocolates in the hope that you will feel better. "Don't burden your stomach with fatty foods. Fruits are a better option," says Dr Snehashish Gupta, a nutritionist.

Always sleepy

Sleep deprivation affects all the systems in your body. "It makes you tired and lethargic, because of which you need energy. This makes you start snacking on unhealthy foods which in turn stores fat in your cells," says Dr Gupta.

Starving? Not wise

Starving will affect your digestion and metabolic rate. When you starve yourself your body starts storing fat for later use.

"Moreover, when you starve your body, you tend to overeat after some time to fulfill your body's requirements. This is called binge eating," says Dr Gupta.

Unmask those calories

Certain foods that claim to be diet foods may in fact have a lot of hidden calories and preservatives which may be responsible for your weight gain.

"People blindly eat these unhealthy foods just because they are marketed well but ultimately they end up piling on these hidden calories," says Dr Tanya Menon, a nutritionist.

Couch potato

Ensure that you do not lack any kind of physical activity. Doing so will not allow you to burning the calories you consume. This is especially true if you have a desk job where you sit in one spot all day.

To maintain a good body, it's important that you exercise, eat healthy and get enough rest. If you are not able to burn the extra calories in spite of following all these methods, it's time to consult a nutritionist.

Powerful Sleep: How To Sleep Less And Have More Energy

2009-03-25T22:23:00.000+05:30

Is it possible to sleep for 4-5 hours and feel more rested, more alert, and more
energized than you did when you slept for 8 or 9 hours (or more)?

Yes it is! While this e-book may be short, the information in it is extremely powerful,
do not underestimate it. This is state of the art optimum life performance information,
which may shatter some of your old beliefs about sleep, and give you many
learning's and understandings that you will be able to use to revolutionize your life. If
you follow the information in this short e-book you will be able to:

1) Reduce your sleeping time.
2) Increase the Quality of your Sleep
3) Gain more energy than you ever had before.
4) Eliminate all feelings of drowsiness / inability to concentrate during the day.
5) Reduce your Daily Stress Levels

Just imagine what radical changes you could create, and what things you could
accomplish in your life if you were able to sleep just half as much as you do now?
Time is the most precious commodity we have in our lives! Or what you could do if
you slept the same amount of time you do right now, but the sleep you got was more
energizing and fulfilling than ever before?

39 Point HAND BOOK FOR YOU

2009-03-23T22:21:00.000+05:30

Health:

1. Drink plenty of water.
2. Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar.
3. Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants.
4. Live with the 3 E's -- Energy, Enthusiasm, and Empathy.
5. Make time to practice meditation, yoga, and prayer.
6. Play more games.
7. Read more books than you did in 2008.
8. Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day.
9. Sleep for 7 hours.
10. Take a 10-30 minutes walk every day. And while you walk, smile.

Personality:

11. Don't compare your life to others'. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
12. Don't have negative thoughts or things you cannot control.. Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment.
13. Don't over do. Keep your limits.
14. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
15. Don't waste your precious energy on gossip.
16. Dream more while you are awake..
17. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
18. Forget issues of the past. Don't remind your partner with his/her mistakes of the past. That will ruin your present happiness.
19. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don't hate others.
20. Make peace with your past so it won't spoil the present.
21. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.
22. Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn. Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.
23. Smile and laugh more.
24. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

Society:

25. Call your family often.
26. Each day give something good to others.
27.. Forgive everyone for everything.
28. Spend time with people over the age of 70 & under the age of 6.
29. Try to make at least three people smile each day.
30. What other people think of you is none of your business.
31. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends will. Stay in touch.

Life:

32. Do the right thing!
33. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
34. GOD heals everything.
35. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
36. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
37. The best is yet to come.
38. When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it.
39. Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.

Health - Very Very Important Tips

2009-03-21T22:19:00.000+05:30

Answer the phone by LEFT ear.
Do not drink coffee TWICE a day.
Do not take pills with COOL water.
Do not have HUGE meals after 5pm.
Reduce the amount of OILY food you consume.
Drink more WATER in the morning, less at night.
Keep your distance from hand phone CHARGERS.
Do not use headphones/earphone for LONG period of time.
Best sleeping time is from 10 pm at night to 6amin the morning.
Do not lie down immediately after taking medicine before sleeping.
When battery is down to the LAST grid/bar, do not answer the phone as the radiation is 1000 times.

Here are some healthy tip for your smartness & physical fitness.
Prevention is better than cure.

HEALTHY JUICES

Carrot + Ginger + Apple - Boost and cleanse our system.

Apple + Cucumber + Celery - Prevent cancer, reduce cholesterol, and eliminate stomach upset and headache.

Tomato + Carrot + Apple -Improve skin complexion and eliminate bad breath.

Bitter gourd + Apple + Milk - Avoid bad breath and reduce internal body heat.

Orange + Ginger + Cucumber- Improve Skin texture and moisture and reduce body heat.

Pineapple + Apple + Watermelon -To dispel excess salts, nourishes the bladder and kidney.

Apple + Cucumber + Kiwi - To improve skin complexion.

Pear & Banana - regulates sugar content.

Carrot + Apple + Pear + Mango - Clear body heat, counteracts toxicity, decreased blood pressure and fight oxidization .

Honeydew + Grape + Watermelon + Milk- Rich in vitamin C + Vitamin B2 that increase cell activity and strengthen body immunity.

Papaya + Pineapple + Milk -Rich in vitamin C, E, Iron. Improve skin complexion and metabolism.

Banana + Pineapple + Milk -Rich in vitamin with nutritious and prevent constipation

Tasty way to cut calories and fat

2009-02-06T08:05:00.000+05:30

Here’s a simple way to cut off major calories from some of your favorite comfort foods-and you wont miss a thing, when you’re making lasagna, chilli and other ground beef dishes, use chopped mushrooms, instead of meat. If you’re like the people in a recent study, you’ll naturally eat about 420 few calories with these mushroom-enriched meals.

Meaty Delight!

The study also said states that the mushroom makeovers tasted as good and kept them feeling full just as long as the beef versions did. And not only did the mushroom-based dishes mean a low calorie meal, but the mushroom eaters also ate fewer calories and less fat throughout the day than the beef eaters did.

Happy Hour for your Heart

2009-02-03T08:03:00.000+05:30

Wine boosts blood levels of the fatty acids

You know that eating fish is a great way to get more heart-healthy omega-3s. But what about drinking wine?

It seems so. Wine itself doesn’t have any onega-3s, but research suggests that a bit of wine-not too much, not too little-somehow boosts blood levels of the fatty acids.
Wine and dine

Researchers aren’t sure why wine has this effect, but they suspect that polyphenols-key antioxidant compounds in wine-may play a role. Still, there’s a caveat with this health message: Alcohol may only be right for some people’s health-and then, only in moderation.
And drinking may have no benefits before a certain age.

Awesome omegas

Omega-3s are commonly found not only in fish but also in nuts. Here’s what they can do for you:

You heart loves omega-3s a lot
Omega-3s improve your memory as well
They also may help protect your kidneys

Curb Hunger pangs with this oil

2009-02-01T08:01:00.000+05:30

Olive oil is rich in a special appetite-controlling kind of fat

Here’s a snack that ought to stop you from, well, snacking: whole-grain bread dipped in olive oil. That’s because olive oil is rich in a special appetite-controlling kind of fat that may help with weight control!

Getting the message: Olive oil contains oleic acid, a monounsaturated fat. Upon reaching the small intestine, oleic acid triggers the production of oleoylethanolamide (OEA), another fatty substance. OEA then finds its way to nerve endings that carry a hunger-curbing message to the brain. And that message is loud and clear. “Hey, Stop eating! You’re full!”
Researchers are hoping that new appetite-suppressing drugs using OEA will be developed to reduce obesity.

More ways to eat less: Taking too many trips to the fridge? Here are some tips:

Work out an appetite. With regular aerobic exercise, you may consume fewer calories.

Adding a little red pepper to your morning egg whites decrease food intake later in the day.
Pepper stunts hunger messages.

Munch on apples or pears or any fiber-rich fruits or vegetables with higher water content.