Body of Wealth

Tooth filling is harmful for the neurological health of your kid. If this is the thought you carry then simply forget it, as dental amalgam tooth fillings has nothing to do with your kid’s neurological heath. This became more evident after a team of experts, having members from the University of Lisbon, Portugal, and the University of Washington, Seattle, went through an intensive long-study of seven years.

Finally I read about some positive outcome in the field of medical science. A team of British scientists recently made a revolutionary breakthrough, when they discovered certain chemicals that can help prevent spread of the deadly cancer in the human body. If further studies can be conducted, there is a high probability of generating drugs that will have the potential to stop almost 90 percent of cancers from spreading. Furthermore, these drugs will be most effective against the deadliest of 2 cancers which we are aware of till date: breast and lung cancer.
How the cancer spreads so rapidly inside the human body? The source of the disease is a tumor in the body. Sometimes, cancerous cells from that tumor can be easily distributed across the entire body by our bloodstream. What happens thereafter is, these cells again start reproducing and form tumors. This is how the cancerous disease spreads across the whole body and eventually leads to death. The researchers in the recently concluded study observed that a protein named E-cadherin is responsible for the cells to remain clustered together, thereby hindering them from breaking away and spreading throughout the body. Following this highly successful study, the scientists are now planning for further advancement in this field by creating new drugs that can restrict the process of the spread of cancer (called metastasis, in medical terminology) in the body.

Suffering from pneumonia? Get ready to lie on a hospital bed. Yes! This was the common remark a person, struggling with pneumonia, would normally get from doctors and others. However, the situation seems to be taking a new turn now, in fact, a significant one this time.

Such assumption caught spark after experts in Pakistan found that treating children with severe pneumonia at home is just as effective as treating them in hospitals. Before coming up with such assumption experts carried out a study, involving around 2,037 children with s severe pneumonia were randomly assigned to get either injectable antibiotics in a hospital or antibiotic pills at home. Finally, what experts found was that of the five children who died during the study, four were hospitalized. This somewhere shows treating pneumonia patient at home would provide similar benefits that one can have at the hospital.

Penicillin, the once wonder drug is fast losing its effectiveness with widespread undesirable prescription of the drugs by general physicians. As a result, there has been a rapid increase in the number of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that are complicating diseases.

To prevent misuse of antibiotics, a campaign called ‘Clean, Safe Care’ has been launched in UK to educate health workers. ₤45 million will be spent by the UK National Health Service to cleanse hospitals of drug-resistant bugs. Despite of being viral infections, antibiotics are widely prescribed for common cold, cough and flu.

Be careful with your travel plans if you are pregnant, especially in the first trimester. If you are in a job that requires frequent traveling, see that you are not exposed to traffic fumes frequently as researchers have found that air pollution could stunt the growth of the babies in the womb. The most damaging pollutants are sulfur dioxide and particulate matter, which come directly out of the car exhaust.
When Brisbane researchers analyzed the ultrasound scans of over 15,000 women who lived within fourteen kilometers of the city center, they found that women who lived close to main roads carried smaller babies. The differences in the size of the fetuses were between one and two millimeters. It is a known fact that bigger babies grow into healthy adults.

Well, there have been studies showing that heavier babies have higher IQ (intelligence quotient) at age seven and then lower risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes later on in adult life, so, these are pretty serious, pretty big things.

Says Dr Adrian Barnett, a senior research fellow at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane.

The studies however did not take into the account of lifestyle factors such as alcohol consumption, smoking and diet of the study participants.

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Via:ABC

We had interesting viewpoints on Instablogs whether obesity was a media created hype or a genuine problem. There seems to be more to create another debate on whether the obsession with size-zero is a hype or a genuine problem.

The media is bombarded with skeleton exposing celebrities who look like they will be blown away with the first waft of wind, driving increasing number of women to anorexia. Hospitals are facing an overwhelming problem having to cope up with the increase in patients with eating disorders.

An alarming number of patients with eating disorders are checking in at the Britain hospitals. The situation has put the health authorities on high alert as these patients are occupying beds reserved for patients having genuine health concerns. Compare this; in 2002 the number of bed days taken up by patients with eating disorders was 51,878 and the numbers rose to 84,377 in 2007. These figures only indicate those of people seeking medical advice and the number of people suffering from anorexia and bulimia could be far higher.

The scientists have in the past expressed a grave concern over the possible pandemic of the human form of Bird flu which can kill approximately fifty million people worldwide. To combat this possible outbreak the scientists have developed a new vaccine which is said to provide protection against all kinds of flu.
The new vaccine, called ACAM-FLU-A is made by Acambis and promises defenses against all strains of influenza A which is said to be the main cause of pandemics. The deaths caused by flu the world over are approximately 500,000 per year. Keeping these dangerous numbers in mind it was felt necessary to redesign the vaccine which would shield the person from not one specific virus causing the flu but from all the strains of influenza viruses.

Increased carbon dioxide emission is responsible for global warming and associated with climate change. Environmentalists have been warning us for a long time that the greenhouse gases would increase the rate of human mortality by increasing the level of pollutants that would adversely affect our health.

There has been a large increase of patients with respiratory distress worldwide, resulting from high level of pollutants. The only handicap that lay in establishing a direct relation between greenhouse gases and health hazards was th lack of any concrete data.

Cyanide is a rapidly acting poison and is known to be fatal, killing victims within minutes of administration. The poison slows down the cellular activities by reducing oxygen supply, thus hindering many important bio-chemical processes that the body requires to survive. This results in acute conditions which can eventually lead to death. There have been inventions of many antidotes to combat the lethal poisoning of cyanide compounds. However, these antidotes have their limitations. They are either too slow or prove ineffective if administered after a certain time of poisoning.
As the saying goes ‘Necessity is the mother of invention’. On feeling the necessity, an effective antidote which can work faster and even after a window time of cyanide poisoning is discovered. The original concept was proposed by the now retired professor Herbert Nagasawa of the University of Minnesota. The idea is further being researched upon by Steven Peterson, Ph.D. who is the principal investigator and associate director of the University of the Minnesota Centre for drug design. The principle that this antidote works on is very simple. Many things in nature such as seeds of Apple, some grasses and other foods contain small amounts of cyanide. The human body can combat small amounts of cyanide poisoning by releasing antibodies which convert the toxic cyanide to non-toxic thiocynate. However, these antibodies are not produced at fast and continuous pace and hence cannot be relied upon to be life saving during a massive cyanide attack.The newly discovered antidote provides these antibodies to the body thus helping it combat the poisoning.

Eating plenty of vegetables every day can prevent a wide variety of diseases, including cancer. You might have heard from many health experts, dietitians, doctors and elders of your family that raw vegetables are more nutritious than cooked one. But, according to the Dec. 26 issue of ACS’ Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, it is cooked vegetables that can boost the release of some nutrients!

However, scientists are trying to find out how the cooked vegetables are more beneficial for health compared to their raw counterparts. The most common cooking practices are boiling, steaming, and frying. The boiled or steamed vegetables maintain the antioxidant compounds of it. But frying may cause higher loss of antioxidants in vegetables. Steaming broccoli may increase the content of glucosinolates that has cancer-fighting abilities.