Even without the survey, the researchers will be able to craft a health horoscope of sorts, predicting with startling accuracy whether I prefer whole grains or junk food, whether I’m on antibiotics, and how much time, if any, I spend digging around in the garden. Then, like the best astrologers, they’ll also tell me that no matter what my makeup, I still have the power to change at least some of it for the better....
Spider VenomUse it for: Pain that isn’t relieved with current treatmentsHow it works: The same compound spiders use to paralyze their prey long enough to suck them dry could be the next big thing in pain relief. Scientists recently identified seven compounds in tarantula venom that block an important step in your body’s pain process. The paralytic essentially turns off one of the body’s sodium channels, called Nav1.7, which sends pain signals to the brain....
ELIGIBILITY: The Sweepstakes is open only to legal residents of the 48 continental United States and District of Columbia (excluding residents of Alaska, Hawaii, Canada, Guam, Puerto Rico and all other U.S. territories and possessions), and, who are 18 years of age or older and the age of majority in his/her state, province, or territory of residence at the time of entry. Any individuals who have, within one year prior to the start date of the Sweepstakes, performed services for Sponsors, or their respective parents, subsidiaries, affiliates and successor companies or any organizations responsible for fulfilling, administering, advertising or promoting the Sweepstakes or supplying any prize, and the immediate family and household members of such individuals, are not eligible to enter the Sweepstakes or win the prize....
More from Prevention.com: Get Your Kids to Love Exercise While only time will tell what Armstrong’s legacy will be—Cycling hero? Cheater? Cancer crusader?—and questions remain as to whether he did or didn’t dope, one thing’s for sure: The issue brings to light the shady world of sports-enhanching supplements. Some are legal, some aren’t, and all are geared toward fueling athletes’ desires to meet the ever-increasing standard of athletic achievement. [sidebar]If you’re the parent of a young athlete—or if you’ve ever taken sports supplements yourself—you’ve likely got a lot of questions about the risks....
The measure, known as Proposition 37, would have been the first state law to require the labeling of GMOs, ingredients derived from corn, soy, and canola plants that have been genetically altered to resist high doses of potentially toxic pesticides. (Confused about GMOs? We break it down for you in Foods As Nature Made Them.) Because of the size of California, the impact of the labeling law would undoubtedly have been felt nationally....
But first, what is E. Coli? E. coli bacteria are found in the environment, foods, and intestines of people and animals, according to the CDC. Some strains are totally harmless, but others can make you super sick. Common symptoms include diarrhea (often bloody), severe stomach cramps, and vomiting. Symptoms typically appear within 3 to 4 days of ingesting the bacteria. Most people recover within 5 to 7 days. And how’s E....
A study of 3.5 million American adults has found that married people have lower odds of cardiovascular disease than those who are single, divorced, or widowed. “Our survey results clearly show that when it comes to cardiovascular disease, marital status really does matter,” Dr. Carlos Alviar, who led the study at New York University’s Lagone Medical Center, told the Associated Press. He called it the largest study to ever look at the link between marriage and heart health....
We can hear the carb-lovers lamenting already: What’s left? Thank goodness for nuts, the ultimate Passover food and mainstay of any Seder meal. (Our favorite dish is charoset, a fragrant blend of nuts, fruits, and wine.) Nuts are the perfect snacks to fuel you ’til Seder—or really, any day. But we wondered: Is there a difference between the raw and roasted varieties? We pit raw nuts against oil-roasted nuts to see which nut takes the unleavened cake....
[sidebar]“I’m angry about my knee. Why did this happen to me?” Janice cried. A homemaker and writer, Janice, 44, had injured her knee skiing 5 years earlier, and after surgery, the knee became infected. She endured prolonged medical and physical therapy. And arthritis. In the end, Janice’s knee hurt if she walked too fast or used the stairs. High heels were history and so were the step aerobics classes she’d loved....
Often the latter choice is the best one. “Urgent care centers are primarily used to treat patients who have an injury or illness that requires immediate care but isn’t serious enough to warrant a visit to a hospital emergency room,” says David Kim, MD, facility medical director of Memorial Care Medical Group in Long Beach, California. In other words: non life-threatening. But knowing whether urgent care is your best bet isn’t always that black and white....
Those same healthy eaters often end up at sit-down restaurants, where everything is freshly cooked and there’s always salad on the menu–obviously healthier, right? Wrong. After reviewing eight years of data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, a researcher at the University of Illinois found that your fancy, sit-down restaurant meal is just as bad for you as grabbing dinner at the drive-thru. MORE: Three Surprising Ways to Trick Yourself into Eating Less Surprised?...
Veggie Grill, Native Foods Cafe, LYFE Kitchen, True Food Kitchen, and Tender Greens all started in the West, their menus filled with ancient grains, leafy greens, meat substitutes or grass-fed beef, and lots of coconut-based beverages. Sure enough, several of them have now opened outlets east of the Mississippi and, in turn, spawned worthy imitators like SweetGreen that have expanded up and down the Atlantic seaboard and then ping-ponged back to California....
MORE: 11 Celebrity Yoga Secrets Pretend you’re a ninja as you move through this sequence from The Women’s Health Big Book of Yoga by pro yogi Kathryn Budig, and you’ll get through it in no time—strong, calm, quiet, and slick! The goal here isn’t to see how many reps you can pump out in a short amount of time. Take the time to breathe and make your movements thoughtful and precise....
The research: Lead researcher Alison Huang, assistant professor at UCSF School of Medicine, studied 20 women 40 years and older who suffered from urinary incontinence on a daily basis. Half of the women took part in a six-week yoga therapy program while the other half did not. The women who did yoga experienced an overall 70% reduction in the frequency of urine leakage, while the control group experienced a 13% improvement....
About every five hours, different clock genes take center stage in your skin’s stem cells, with genes that promote UV protection peaking during daylight hours and the cell’s most vulnerable phase, DNA replication, taking place in the evening and at night. That’s great, unless your schedule doesn’t happen to line up with your skin’s schedule. “Disrupting the ability of the cells to know when is best to perform a specific function results in striking premature aging of the skin,” says study author Salvador Aznar Benitah, PhD, a research professor at the Centre for Genomic Regulation in Barcelona....
That silence hasn’t just left us in the dark about our toilet-time activities, it’s also allowed for some pretty pervasive (and mostly untrue) myths about what makes a “healthy” poop. We talked to a poopologist (okay, a gastroenterologist) to decode those crappy myths. Here, everything you never wanted to know about poop. Myth: Healthy people poop once a day This is the myth that won’t die, despite a total lack of scientific evidence supporting it....
Maybe you’ve heard the buzz: Fermented foods are kind of awesome for you. They often begin as whole foods, and with the help of microorganisms, their sugars and carbs are converted into compounds like lactic acid—the stuff that gives pickles and sauerkraut their signature sour taste. The process also turns these foods into probiotic powerhouses that boost levels of good bacteria in your digestive tract, improving the health and balance of your body’s collective microbiome, or bacterial community....
