BodyRestored.com

Database of Dietary Supplements Labels

2008-01-15T15:25:00.001-05:00

The Dietary Supplements Labels Database offers information about ingredients in more than two thousand selected brands of dietary supplements. It enables users to determine what ingredients are in specific brands and to compare ingredients in different brands.

This information is published by the United States National Library of Medicine. However the database has copied across claims by the supplement manufacturers which have not been verified.

So this database is valuable reference but you still need care to filter out unverified claims of health benefits.

Core training

2008-01-13T10:28:00.002-05:00

Training the "core" is an important consideration for most people wanting to improve fitness, recover after pregnancy and to generally be better equipped to deal with the stresses that life throws at us. As a result most gyms have Swiss Balls available for use and many also have "Wobble Boards" and Hard Foam Rollers to balance on. Until now it has been difficult to know when to workout on unstable surfaces like wobble boards and Swiss balls and when to simply stand on the hard stable gym floor.

The current issue of ACSM's Health and Fitness Journal (January/February 2008 Volume 12 Number 1) has an excellent analysis of when unstable surfaces help and when they hinder. Coming at the subject of core training from a medical and a scientific angle helps enormously. The chart to the right is an analysis of what exactly is in "The Core".

The analysis starts with:

what exactly is "The Core"
what exactly are you trying to achieve with "Core Training".

As it turns out the core muscles comprise much more than just the visible 6-pack muscles - the rectus abdominis. The core goes beyond just the abdominal muscles and the lower back which many have regarded as core muscles. The list of muscles gets rather long. Here is the ACSM view of core muscles after full consideration of human anatomy:

transversus abdominis
internal oblique abdominis
quadratus lumborum
external oblique abdominis
erector spinae
rectus abdominis
latissimus dorsi
rectus femoris
sartorius
iliacus
psoas (major and minor)
gluteus maximus
semimembranosus
semitendinosous
biceps femoris (long head)
multifidus
rotatores
intertransversalis
interspinalis

This is quite a list to which one could add a few more muscles. All of these muscles are working to some extent in all core related exercises. It turns out that "isolation" is just about impossible.

The big point from this ACSM article is the important perception about the results from training core muscles. Core exercise can emphasises one or more of :

Endurance from core muscles
Strength from core muscles
Power from core muscles.

Looking at core exercise in terms of are you trying to improve endurance, strength or power means that the exercises used need to be different. If you want all three to improve then you'll need to train for endurance then strength and then power. Take a couple of weeks of exercise for your body to recover and then go around the exercise loop again but this time starting from a higher level.

Core Endure is important for everyone whether you are an older person recovering from a serious medical issue or a highly paid professional sports star. Unstable surfaces such as Swiss Balls, Bosu's and Wobble Boards all help in the development of core endurance. The technical term for an unstable surface such as a Swiss Ball is a "labile surface" Look at this article which has some nice pictures of abs exercises on a bench, on a Swiss ball and on a wobble board. However it also turns out that exactly where you place the Swiss ball makes a big difference to how hard the exercise is. Read this piece of research. It turns out that having the Swiss ball near your shoulders makes core exercise easier and having the ball at the low back makes it harder. This is important to know is you are just starting to move your core exercises onto a Swiss ball. Easier to start and then gradually increase the challenge.

Core Strength becomes important after the core muscles have sufficient endurance. To develop core strength you need to move your exercise to get off the Swiss ball, wobble board, etc and move to a stable surface i.e. the floor. However the important thing to know about this phase of core development is that one sided (unilateral) exercises become critical for strength development. Use dumbbells for one sided exercises with one or both feet firmly planted on the floor. An example would be a one-sided hip extension while holding a dumbbell (reasonably heavy) in one hand. This article reports research showing that you need a stable surface for strength development.

Core Power is the ability to generate a lot of force rapidly i.e. you can move heavy objects fast. For core power both feet have to be firmly planted and you are rotating while pushing a load well within your capabilities i.e. for core power the weight or resistance is less than you are capable of but you are moving the weight fast. For instance you might be pushing a cable row handle forward (or back) as fast as you can against a reasonable resistance.

There are many books on Core Performance. I really like the one opposite by Mark Verstegen which covers exercise from many angles.

There are also books which just describe Swiss ball exercises - of which there are a great number. The book by Goldenberg and Twist is aimed at a sports audience but is a good read for many people but it does not make any distinction between endurance, strength and power.

Sleep Apnea

2008-01-09T19:51:00.001-05:00

Sleep Apnea is becoming an epidemic - maybe at a rate of 24% in men and 9% in women.It looks as if the rise in Sleep Anea is tracking the spread of obesity. According to an article in the Lancet, severe Sleep Apnea is correlated with a three-fold increase in the risk of a heart attack (or similar cardiac incident).

The rise of Sleep Apnea as an important health issue motivated the ACSM (American College of Sports Medicine) to devote the whole of its October-December 2007 Certified News to the topic of Sleep Apnea. The issue was headlined as "Obstructive Sleep Apnea: An Elephant in the Closet of Importance to the Exercise Professional."

So what can be done ? The answer :

lose weight - maybe as little as 12 pounds and 10% of body weight should make a big difference
use a sleep aid such as a CPAP.

Is there a problem ? Well yes, because Sleep Apnea makes exercise more difficult:

heart rate does not increase the way it should in a healthy body
blood pressure goes up more than it should during exercise.
wearing a CPAP every night is no bed of roses and hence long-term, every night use of a CPAP is unlikely. The peaceful image of a CPAP in use at the head of this blog is just a tad idealized. Read this forum to get an idea of what it's really like.

Can a Personal Trainer help ?
Is there an exercise prescription for Sleep Apnea ?
At the moment the ACSM does not have any specific exercise recommendations for Sleep Apnea but the issue of Certified News referred to above is the start of defining such a prescription.

One major problem standing in the way of a simple exercise prescription is the possibility, even likelihood, that anyone with severe obstructive sleep apnea is going to have other health issues such as obesity, Type 2 Diabetes, hypertension and a variety of heart issues such as congestive heart failure, cardiac arhythmias and perhaps a stroke risk.

The bottom line is to try for 45 to 60 minutes of low intensity exercise every day (or at least 5 days) a week. Low intensity is defined by the ACSM for this purpose as being 40%to 60% of maximum heart rate. This is longer than ACSM recommendations for hypertension, Type 2 diabetes and CV diseases but at a lower intensity.

The ACSM emphasizes that exercise for anyone with severe sleep apnea should be concluded gradually with an extended cool down period of at least 15 minutes. One additional ACSM recommendation is to closely monitor blood pressure and in particular to measure blood pressure 5 to 15 minutes after the end of exercise cool down. This is to check that blood pressure has returned to baseline value. If it has not then either the exercise intensity was too high or the cool down was too short.

Prescription Sleep Aids

2008-01-08T09:16:00.001-05:00

The Mayo Clinic Health Letter for January 2008 has a good summary of prescription drugs to aid sleep. Mayo makes the distinction between finding it difficult to get off to sleep as contrasted with the problem of staying asleep (sleep-maintenance insomnia). Older adults more commonly have sleep-maintenance insomnia.

The Health Letter has a useful summary of drugs used for helping getting off to sleep and for those that help one stay asleep.

The newest class of sleep drug are the melatonin agonists. These are related to the natural hormone melatonin. Rozerem is the brand name and it seems somewhat weak in its affect but not habit forming.

Another group of sleep aids currently being heavily promoted are from the class called non-benzodiazepine hypnotics. This includes brands such as Ambien, Ambien CR, Lunesta and Sonata. It appears that older adults can take these fairly well with little residual drowsiness. However Mayo say that there are some reports of amnesia after taking them. That said this new class of non-benzodiazepine hypnotics is much better than their predecessors, the benzodiazepine which have been used for the last 40 years.

Sonata (one of the non-benzodiazepine hypnotics) is short acting and wears off quickly.

Mayo is fairly dismissive about non-prescription medication sleep aids such as Benadryl, Somine and Unisom saying they have minimal effectiveness.

The Mayo summary is:

Ambien - Useful for initiating sleep, sleep onset 7 to 27 minutes, low risk for dependency
Ambien CR - Useful for initiating sleep, sleep onset 30 minutes, more chance of morning drowsiness than with Ambien
Lunesta - Good for both initiating sleep and sleep maintence, sleep onset 10 minutes, low risk dependency.
Sonata - Good for night awakening and for sleep initiation, sleep onset 30 minutes, short acting so you can take it middle of night and be OK in morning.

Remember that these are all on prescription, so listen to your doctor, take exactly as prescribed and read all the warnings.

Difficulty sleeping can reach an extreme in sleep apnea. This topic is worthy of a blog all on its own.

Bra's cause Breast Cancer ?

2008-01-01T15:30:00.004-05:00

In yesterday's post saying that I like OnExercise Magazine, I mentioned that one of the magazine articles was on Bra's causing Breast Cancer. I also mentioned that my wife, a breast cancer survivor, said that she was not going to stop wearing a bra and overall she was not impressed by the article.

If you put any set of words into a Google search, thousands of hits will result: some interesting and valid; some off the wall; and quite a few totally irrelevant. I tried searching on "bra cancer" and no surprise lots of information came to the surface - not all of it believable. One of my motivations for this is a desire not to add to urban legends. Once a story gets started on the internet and can race off with a life of its own.

It all goes back to a book called Dressed to Kill by Sydney Ross Singer and Soma Grismaijer published in 1995. You can buy it on Amazon for about $15. By the way, there are lots of books and videos with Dressed to Kill as a title so pick up the right one.

Other sites say - don't worry - look at this one as an example.

The BBC carried a report in 2000 saying that Professor Robert Mansell (University of Wales, Cardiff) who has been researching this area said that he thought women had nothing to worry about.

However there are many who firmly believe the link.

The frequently used argument that decades ago no one believed there was a link between smoking and lung cancer, so if today (or at least 1995) no one believes there's a link from bra's to breast cancer then just wait for more evidence. After 12 years no more evidence. Your decision.

OnFitness Magazine

2007-12-31T18:52:00.002-05:00

OnFitness is a magazine that I sometimes see lying around in the gym - usually old, well thumbed copies. Earlier this year I decided to stop being a cargo cultist i.e. hoping that good things would just magically land right in front of me and instead buy my own copy of OnFitness.

It turns out that the magazine is trying to survive by gaining readers through word of mouth rather than advertising. I've never seen it on a magazine rack at a bookstore. This is the tough way to build magazine circulation.

The magazine approach is "The natural approach to health & fitness."

I can't agree with everything in the magazine but it's always interesting, sometimes provocative and once in a while just plain aggravating. For instance the January/February 2008 edition arrived today in my mailbox and included an article about bra's causing breast cancer. My wife who has survived breast cancer said that she was not going to stop wearing a bra and added in the thought "What about corsets? Did they cause intestinal cancers ?"

This Jan/Feb 2008 issue has multiple articles around the theme of exercise intensity. All worth reading and absorbing.

If you happen to stumble upon a copy of the Jan/Feb 2008 magazine, start off by turning to page 68 to find the article " Weight Training for Seniors." I know that this is one of my favorite topics - us old people need to hang on to muscle for as long as possible - weight training is the best way to do this.

I'm not in any way paid or encouraged by OnFitness to write about them but they are a magazine I presently read avidly.

Drinking alcohol may keep leg arteries healthy

2007-12-30T15:36:00.001-05:00

I blog'd earlier today about telling the difference between lower back pain due to spinal stenosis as contrasted with the similar pain due to poor blood circulation in the legs.

By strange chance the January 2008 edition of American Journal of Epidemiology has an article about

Alcohol Consumption and Lower Extremity Arterial Disease among Older Adults

The article is not against moderate alcohol consumption as you might be tempted to expect. Rather 1 or 2 drinks a day seem to help.

In a study, researchers found that elderly men and women who reported drinking from one to 13 servings of beer, wine, or liquor a week had a 44 percent lower risk of being hospitalized for leg artery disease, compared with elderly men and women who reported no alcohol consumption.

"These results are consistent with the long-standing observation that moderate drinkers have a lower risk of heart attack, which is also caused by blockages in arteries," Dr. Kenneth J. Mukamal, of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, in Brookline, Massachusetts, told Reuters Health.

Nexium and Osteoporosis

2007-12-30T14:28:00.001-05:00

I take a Nexium capsule every morning so I'm interested in news about Nexium.

This month's issue of the Mayo Clinic Health Letter has a piece about the increased risk of osteoporosis from taking drugs like Nexium to stop acid reflux. The Mayo Clinic Health Letter comes to me through the mail and I don't know whether there is an electronic version available - hence no way to let you click through to read the piece for yourself.

The issue is that to stop acid reflux you either take one of the proton pump inhibitors (like Nexium, Aciphex, Prevacid, Prilosec, Protonix, Zegerid) or take one of the H-2 receptor blockers (like Pepcid, Zantac) but they reduce proper absorption of calcium from food. As a result bones become weaker and down the line there is the possibility of a fractured hip.

Not taking Nexium, or one of the others, is not a good option because you get acid reflux back and untreated you could eventually be dealing with a cancer in the throat.

The Mayo Clinic answer is to:

keep taking the pill for acid reflux
take your calcium supplement in the form of calcium citrate
take the calcium supplement multiple times spread through the day
increase calcium from food e.g. dairy if dairy is part of your diet, dark green veggies
make sure you are getting enough Vitamin D (for most people that means supplementing with Vitamin D in Winter and even in Summer if you always go out with sunblock already applied.)

Nothing these days is simple - even taking something as low tech as calcium.
If you might have kidney stones, parathyroid disease even taking specific antibiotics, then you'll need detailed medical advice.

Mayo Clinic Health Letter December 2007

2007-12-30T13:49:00.001-05:00

New Letters flooded in after Christmas as if they had been stuck behind the deluge of Christmas cards and were now free to land in mailboxes everywhere. This month's Mayo Clinic Health Letter has its usual interesting selection of items.

One of its items covers lower back pain due to spinal stenosis and how to distinguish such a pain from pain due to poor blood flow in the legs. Some of the questions are worth remembering if you ever find yourself with lower back pain.

Does:

leaning forward at the waist relieve pain
pain start high and then radiate downwards
sleeping on your back cause pain

and you can ride a bicycle with no pain:

then the pain might be due to spinal stenosis.

Now to look at the alternative possibility of pain due to poor blood flow to the legs

Does:

stopping walking and standing still reduce the pain
does the pain while walking start in the calf and then radiate upwards
sleeping does not cause pain
riding a bicycle cause pain

then the pain might be due to poor blood flow to the legs.

If the answers take you in the direction of Spinal Stenosis then there are lots of options open to you to reduce the pain and to get your life back. Exercise is going to be important as is losing weight - big surprise with that ! Learn to swim the backstroke - it could help a lot. You'll need prescriptions for the kind of pain killers that quiet irritated nerves.

Poor blood flow to the legs might sound like the better option but it is not. In a similar way to blood vessels around the heart furring up and slowing (or even stopping) blood flow, the major blood vessels to the legs can also become partially blocked. The pain you feel in the legs as a result of poor blood flow is called claudication. It means that the leg muscles are not getting enough oxygen and as a result are letting you feel pain.

There is the temptation to walk, cycle, swim less just to reduce the pain. The trouble is that every time you reduce your exercise load the poor blood flow issue becomes worse. One day the blockage in your legs could come free and block a heart blood vessel or even something in your brain.

Do not let poor blood flow to the legs be one of the things your going to do something about one day.
Get on it today. If you need any specific exercise recommendations after seeing a qualified medical specialist post a question on this blog.

One last thought: lower back pain could be due to a multitude of causes. At this time of year shoveling snow or raking leaves are obvious possibilities. The advice above on telling spinal stenosis from poor blood flow to the legs are just a couple of the possibilities.

Asthma

2007-12-18T17:46:00.001-05:00

Asthma is the biggest barrier to working out effectively for 3 of my personal training clients. My wife has had huge lung issues. Her lungs probably have the inflammation from an asthma reaction and probably 'something else' even though the 'something else' has never been diagnosed exactly. A chest biopsy was totally inconclusive. I am probably border-line sensitive to exercise-induced asthma. These factors motivated me to write Exercising Safely with Exercise-induced Asthma.

The Fall 2007 issue of Medline Plus Magazine focuses on Asthma with a front cover picture of Wynonna Judd - who never lets Asthma hold her back. Pages 14 to 19 give an easy to read update on the latest in Asthma treatment.

Anyone trying to exercise with Asthma needs to know:

take your medication exactly as prescribed. Trying to 'ween' yourself off the anti-inflammatory medications that form the preventative aspect of asthma treatment is making life difficult for yourself
warm-up slowly. If an exercise-induced asthma attack is going to happen it is most likely in the first 8 minutes of working-out. So warm up very slowly to try and get through this danger period safely.
if you do get an asthma attack, do not give up - you still might be able to work out but ease down to slow walking (better than stopping totally). There is every chance the attack will pass and then you have a period of an hour, possibly longer, in which the chance of a second attack is unlikely.
cool-down slowly. You might get an asthma attack if you finish working out too abruptly. Just stopping and sitting down feeling pooped - not a good idea. Slow down over about 10 minutes should give you protection from an asthma attack.
about 90% of people with Asthma are likely to get an exercise-induced asthma attack. So even if you have 'ordinary' asthma, following these simple rules is a sensible thing to do.

There are also some nutrition changes you should think about making - particularly with regard to omega-3 fatty acids, salt and caffeine. My book gives you all the details.

Functional Training

2007-12-15T16:03:00.000-05:00

The American Council on Exercise sponsored this research to find out if Functional Training could benefit those of us clocking up the years. For the study 24 people in the age range 58 to 78 (men and women) were recruited. The idea was to find out if simple looking exercises each using two or more joints at the same time could be just as beneficial, or even more beneficial, than the more traditional gym workouts centered around the use of machines.

Follow the Functional Training link to get the 5 page report which was originally published earlier this year in the ACE's Fitness Matters magazine (aimed at Personal trainers like myself).

Men's Health on eating at restaurants

2007-12-14T22:32:00.000-05:00

I used to love Men's Health Magazine. There was a time in the '90's when I was still living in London, England but often traveling to the USA and Canada that there were some years I bought every issue of Men's Health in the UK and at least half of the USA editions for the same year. At that time the UK edition of Men's Health was much raunchier than the USA version. I finally got over Men's Health when the recipes and sex advice had more space than workouts !

Once in a while Men's Health gets serious - especially when it has a book to sell. This expose on restaurant food is useful. Most of my clients eat out at least half of the time - sometimes a lot more than that. So it is important that restaurants provide accurate information on what exactly you are eating.

Most people struggle with the idea that restaurants they like and use frequently might lie to them but unfortunately that is the reality. If you look at this Men's Health survey, most restaurants you are likely to use lie to you about the calories in your meal, how much fat is in there and probably anything else they care to screw with - bon appetite.

Avandia for Diabetes causing heart attacks in the elderly ?

2007-12-12T18:48:00.000-05:00

After yesterday's welcome news that Nexium does not precipitate heart attacks, today the news is more somber, Avandia used in the treatment of Diabetes might be causing heart attacks.

Today, December 12, 2007, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) ran the result of research in Ontario, Canada. The researchers involved are based at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Science in Toronto (ICES).

Avandia is used in the treatment of Type Diabetes. This study comes to a conclusion that the increased risks of Avandia are considerable. In the view of the researchers anyone taking Avandia has a 60% increased risk of heart failure, 40% higher chance of a heart attack and a 30% increased risk of death compared to other patients taking other diabetes medications.

This study looked at everyone in Ontario taking Avandia over a 4 year period and from this population drew the conclusion that out of every 100 people taking Avandia: there would be 5 additional deaths.

GlaxoSmithKline make Avandia and state that the risk is not as bad as the research would indicate because the patients being treated with Avandia tend to be sicker than the average and hence at higher risk. The FDA agrees with this and has no plans to further restrict Avandia use - Avandia already has a black box warning label.

The trial lawyers are happy with the position of the FDA and GlaxoSmithKline. This could be another money maker for the lawyers.

Nexium does not cause heart attacks

2007-12-10T18:52:00.001-05:00

A few seconds after the alarm goes off, always well before dawn, I swallow a Nexium capsule with the first glass of water of the day. Today the FDA put out a very welcome press release saying that Nexium and Prilosec do not increase the risk of cardiac events.

Nexium and Prilosec help heal erosions in the lining of the esophagus (known as erosive esophagitis). Last year, almost accidentally, I was identified as having this issue and since then Nexium has become part of my daily routine.

One good piece of news, unless of course you believe nothing put out by the government.

BBC American - Body Image Month

2007-12-04T16:41:00.000-05:00

'Super Skinny Me' isn't heavy

I had to include this story from the LA Times because it talks about dieting and body image issues in Britain. As a big bonus it covers BBC America ( a cable channel I watch a lot, possibly second only to the Fox Soccer Channel).
======================================

Here in the land of Big Macs and thin obsessions, 'Super Skinny Me' just seems so British.
By Mary McNamara

Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

November 30, 2007

Strangely enough, December is "body image month" on BBC America, which translates into five hour-long documentaries looking at issues as varied as small breasts, obesity and trans-genderism. In "Super Skinny Me," which kicks off the series, two female journalists go on five-week crash diets to see what it takes to whittle their normal-sized bodies down to a model- esque size 0.

No, wait. That's what the documentary would have been about if it had been made in the U.S., where dieting is an obsession, a national hobby and often a competitive sport. But "Super Skinny Me" is British, and so, rather than glamorizing the quest for thinness for the audience, the emphasis is what happens, physically and psychologically, to two women who have never been on diets before as they make their way through a regimen of cleansing drinks, rigorous workouts and colonics. (Hint: nothing good.)

You can tell this is not an American production right away, and not because of the accents. First off, can you imagine finding two female American journalists who had never ever been on a diet? Can you imagine a 28-year-old American woman saying, as Louise Burke does, that at size 4 she felt too skinny? Really, it's worth watching for the contrast in cultures alone.

"Super Skinny Me" is billed as a "Super Size Me" in reverse. But whereas Morgan Spurlock was willing to go to extreme lengths to make his point about the harmful effects of junk food -- growing bloated and pale and sweaty right before our eyes -- the creators of "Super Skinny" play it very safe. This is good for the mental and physical health of the participants, of course, but bad for the documentary.

When, after four weeks, Kate Spicer, 37, develops a fondness for colonics and has some binge issues -- her eating is described as "chaotic" -- she is taken out of the experiment. The decision is obviously the humane one, but it requires an appreciation for subtlety that is not what we expect from documentaries like this one. To an American eye, at least, Spicer's "chaotic" misery over drinking yet another glass of cleansing lemonade or sudden surrender to a dessert looks normal enough for a woman trying to squeeze down several dress sizes. This may be a sad reflection on the state of eating, or perhaps television, in America, but it seems something a little more dramatic is called for -- fainting, or meltdowns or something. Frankly, I've seen more physical and emotional deterioration on "Project Runway."

The very nature of the project makes it perhaps not the best choice for film. Although there was a wince-worthy fascination with watching Spurlock shove Big Macs in his face, it is not terribly exciting to watch women not eat. Five weeks may be a long time to exist on protein shakes, but listening to the women complain of fatigue and crankiness was a bit like listening to every woman I know, including myself, at some dieting point in their lives. Suck it up, I wanted to say, that's why it's called dieting.

Of course, the point is that these women didn't need to lose weight -- their weight, size and body-fat levels were all healthy. So right there you lose half of the obesity-prone American audience. What the filmmakers are saying -- that so many stars and, by extension, young women are obsessed with being very skinny -- is obviously valid. But neither of the women come close to the skeletal images of Nicole Richie or Keira Knightley. The visuals are not exactly startling, no hair loss or ashen skin, no cessation of menstrual periods. In fact, the women look pretty darn good after the five weeks, though, of course, that may be my media conditioning speaking.

All of which makes me wonder if this wouldn't have been a better newspaper story. The strongest moments came when the women were discussing how they felt on the diets -- exhausted or irritable or out of control. How it put a strain on their relationships, how it made them measure their self-worth in pounds (or stones). What was occurring internally was more interesting than what was happening externally. When Louise says straight out, "I don't think I've ever been so unhappy in my life," it's a little hard to believe. Yes, we've seen her slumping at work, but we haven't been made privy to her depressive thoughts.

And she's even pretty excited when those size-0 jeans slide on so nicely.

mary.mcnamara@latimes.com

Mental Decline and Calcium Levels

2007-12-04T16:16:00.000-05:00

Calcium levels are important to bone health. We all know that. Osteoporosis and low calcium level are linked (plus of course the need for sufficient Vitamin D - see yesterday's post on Vitamin D). However have you thought about the link between mental acuity and blood calcium levels.

The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society reported last month (November 2007) of this linkage in over 75's. Reuters have a good summary of the research. High levels of calcium can kill nerve and brain cells - hence possibly contribute to mental decline. So where might the high-levels of blood calcium in the elderly come from? The research hypothesis's about cancer, incipient kidney failure or possibly excessive parathyroid activity. I'd kick in one more thought about calcium being released from the skeleton as a result of reduced standing and walking (hence the 'body' signaling lower requirement for bone strength).

Are you getting enough Vitamin D ?

2007-12-03T15:07:00.002-05:00

Tufts Health & Nutrition Letter (December 2007 - Vol 25, #10) has an article about what is enough Vitamin D. There are two take aways in terms of immediate action from this article:

we are not getting enough Vitamin D. In late Winter the average American has 15 to 18 ng/mL in their blood of the principal and longest acting form of Vitamin D (25-hydroxyvitaminD). To get a cancer preventing impact a level of at least 55 ng/mL is needed.
Vitamin D supplements do not contain sufficient Vitamin D. Supplements typically contain 400 to 600IU whereas an intake of 2,000IU is justified from the research.

Read the labels on your supplements, Vitamin D comes in several forms. It is the D3 version that is most potent.

This article summarizes the situation:

Suboptimal vitamin D status is a highly prevalent but treatable condition in both hospitalized patients and the general population

Authors: Moore, Nicole L.¹; Kiebzak, Gary M.

Source: Journal of the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, Volume 19, Number 12, December 2007 , pp. 642-651(10)

The summary: Poor Vitamin D status (ranging from suboptimal to overt deficiency) is common in both hospitalized and ostensibly healthy individuals of all ages and geographic latitude. Suboptimal vitamin D status is associated with muscle weakness, functional deficits, and perhaps longer length of stay of hospitalized patients. Fortunately, treatment with 50,000IU of Vitamin D2 for several weeks is a very inexpensive and safe yet effective treatment to replete Vitamin D status.

This large dose of Vitamin D refers to the D2 variant. Vitamin D sufficiency can be sustained by sensible sun exposure or ingesting at least 800-1000IU of vitamin D₃ daily. Patients being treated for osteoporosis should be adequately supplemented with calcium and vitamin D to maximise the benefit of treatment.

This recommendation from:

Optimal Vitamin D Status for the Prevention and Treatment of Osteoporosis

Author: Holick, Michael F.¹

Source: Drugs & Aging, Volume 24, Number 12, 2007 , pp. 1017-1029(13)

Fitness Trends from the ACSM worldwide survey

2007-12-01T13:10:00.000-05:00

The November/December 2007 Health & Fitness Journal published by ACSM [American Council on Sports Medicine] recently arrived in the mailbox and as usual it had a few gems. One such is the results from the annual survey of fitness trends. The top 5 and the changes between last year and this year:

Fully certified and accredited health/fitness professionals. (previously #3). In Georgia,USA there is draft legislation to license Personal Trainers. If a Personal Trainer is well qualified this is a good thing. However the major gym chains are all against it and probably are able to spend enough on lobbying to stop it becoming law.
Fighting childhood and adolescent obesity. (previously #1). This slipping down a notch is a surprise as I can see more and more parents sending their children into the gym to workout with Personal Trainers.
Personal Training (up from #7). In an area like mine, north of Atlanta, most people have long, tough commutes. Working out has to be squeezed into an already punishing schedule. Having a Personal Trainer makes sure that maximum value is obtained from time spent in the gym.
Strength Training (previously #6). Weight loss or weight control is an issue for many and it is now well established that an integrated program of cardio (aerobic) training plus muscle strength training is the best combination of exercise.
Core Training (unchanged at #5). Just about everyone wants a flat tummy and nice looking abs. This is not an easy look to get because you have to really work at it. The trick is to work the whole core area because just concentrating on the Rectus Abdominous (the 6 pack ab muscle in the front) does not get results. What you have to do is work the whole core area which includes everything front, back at sides from the hips up to the line across the nipples. To do all of this you need to know a lot of exercises and be able to use them in sequence and combination.

NSCA Performance Training Journal - Nutrition

2007-11-30T17:55:00.001-05:00

The National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) puts out an excellent on-line magazine entitled NSCA's Performance Training Journal 6 times a year. Perfectly on schedule the December 2007 issue arrived in my inbox on the afternoon of this last day in November. This particular edition is given over to Nutrition.

Not surprisingly an NSCA journal has a sports bias, but none the worse for that. Most of us are interested in what athletes do because it offers pointers for us ordinary mortals.

Some of the topics covered in this December issue:

Iron deficiency in endurance athletes: Tips for prevention and recognition
Every day nutrition v. Game day nutrition
Protein update: How much protein is enough
The Glycemic Index and recovery
Does consuming whey protein before and after resistance training alter net protein synthesis ?
HMB supplementation improves aerobic performance and body composition.

Some topics here which are of interest to anyone interested in health and fitness.

Top 100 Health and Wellness Blogs

2007-11-29T14:48:00.001-05:00

Think about this as your Christmas reading list (serious reading).
The top 100 health and wellness blogs according to the Nursing Online Education Database.
Days and days of internet scuba and all of it good.

Exercise with Resistance Bands

2007-11-29T14:40:00.000-05:00

Kim Strother has made a number of really nice, easy to understand videos on YouTube.
This one showing the use of resistance bands for simple, safe home exercise is right on the mark.

Exercise Video - butt and back

2007-11-28T17:21:00.001-05:00

Easy to see and understand butt and back exercises.

10,000 steps a day

2007-11-25T15:55:00.000-05:00

Use a pedometer to motivate yourself to walk just a little farther each day.

That small extra effort has a big payback according to Dr Dena Brevata's study published this month in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). She reviewed 26 different studies (and in the process read more than 2,00 articles) about the use and effectiveness of pedometers.

The results ? Use of a pedpometer encouraged users to increase the number of steps they take every day by more than 2,100. Enough to take a little weight off and to reduce blood pressure.

In the research, it showed that pedometer users, increased their stamina by about 27 percent and it showed that on average, the volunteers loss pounds and their blood pressure dropped, which is enough to lower the risk of heart disease and stroke, Bravata said. She added, "Every night, you write down how many steps you walked that day. By flipping back through your diary, you're able to see patterns: 'On the two days a week I took the stairs, I increased my steps.'"

This is not a total solution to all your weight and health issues but is a good "step forward".

There are a vast range of pedometers but researchers tend to recommend not too cheap and not too expensive. Say around $20 to $30 for good product which will count steps accurately.

Aging and Exercise

2007-11-25T15:29:00.000-05:00

26 useful thoughts about exercise as you age from a remarkably sensible site.

Lots of advertising at lifetips but not objectionable.

Tip 9 (out of 26):

Balance Training: Falling can be dangerous for older people, and fear of falling can cause people to restrict their activities. Strength training can help prevent falls. Tai chi and some yoga can improve balance, and there are also specific balance exercises, some using exercise balls. Exercise training is specific so you have to do balance training on your feet. Chair exercises won´t do it.

Naked Yoga

2007-11-25T15:17:00.000-05:00

You've got to love New York, Everywhere else in America men are over-weight but in Manhattan men are willing to show all at Naked Yoga.

“What I’m trying to get back to in these classes is more of our connection to the Earth,” says my teacher Isis Phoenix, the sensual, yoga-certified “shaman and healer” who launched Naked Yoga NYC with two other yoga instructor partners in May. “I’m uncovering the divine. It’s not like, 'One and two and three and four—breathe in and out!’ It’s about all shapes and sizes, all warrior ones as opposed to the right warrior ones.”