Posts Tagged ‘elderly care’

Omega 3 Essential Fish Oils

Omega 3 essential fatty acids are frequently in the news, but they seem to drift in and out of public consciousness. Let us examine the terminology, they are called ‘essential’ because they cannot be created in sufficient quantities by our bodies. In other words, we have to eat them.

The supreme importance of Omega 3 essential fatty acids really came to light in the 1970’s whilst a group of Danish researchers found than Inuits in Greenland had a far lower incidence of cardiovascular concerns than Europeans and Americans, despite eating a diet high in fat.

However, the difference between the diets was that the Inuits derived their fat from sea creatures whereas the other nationalities derived theirs from land animals. The significance of Omega 3 essential fatty acids was established

Once that original research had been verified, other studies on the same issue were carried out by other groups and they all confirmed the significance of Omega 3 essential fatty acids in our diets. These substances help avert heart disease, cancer, diabetes and macular degeneration and will also alleviate these conditions if you did not find out about them until it was ‘too late’.

Our main source of Omega 3 essential fatty acids is oily fish like tuna, salmon and mackerel fish and other sea foods. Investigation backs up the age-old old wives’ tale that fish is brain food. It actually is, but it also goes further than that. Omega 3 can help ward off many of the so-called age-related issues like memory loss besides the ones already mentioned above.

Some investigation has also shown that a deficiency in Omega 3 in children might lead to learning disorders like hyperactivity and attention disorders. There could also be a link to dyslexia. Other disorders that are more certainly linked to a deficiency of Omega 3 are depression, some allergies and arthritis. This means that expectant mothers should be careful of their consumption of Omega 3.

This fish oil has also been observed to reduce the seriousness of high levels of cholesterol and triglycerides. It also seems to have a beneficial, anti-aging impact on the skin and wrinkles when taken internally as part of a healthy, balanced diet. Most dietitians would recommend eating oily fish twice per week, but that does not mean that you cannot consume it in capsules.

It is vital to see Omega 3 in relation to other essential fatty acids like omega 6. Omega 6 and omega 3 vie for the same position in our systems and that position is just so large. If you eat too much omega 3, omega 6 cannot get a look in and vice-versa. It is a broad subject, so you are encouraged to do more research or take the advice of a dietitian.

However, before you believe everything that they say, enquire about the interaction of omegas 3 and 6 and see what they have to say.

Owen Jones, the writer of this article, writes on several topics, but is now concerned with lowering cholesterol without medication. If you want to know more, please visit our web site at What Foods Lower Cholesterol?

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Muhammad Ali – Boxing Legend

Muhammad Ali was 70 on January 17th, 2012. He was the most awesome adversary in the boxing ring in his long and dynamic career and with very good cause. He won the world heavy weight boxing championship three times after winning a gold medal at the Olympics and was named sportsman of the century by the BBC and Sports Illustrated.

Muhammad Ali was born in Louisville, Kentucky on January 17th, 1942 and was christened after his father Cassius Marcellus Clay. They added the epithet Junior, to distinguish him from his father who was a billboard painter. In 1967, Cassius changed his name to Muhammad Ali and became a Muslim.

A local white Louisville police officer named Joe E. Martin was the first person to see that the young Clay had something extraordinary while he watched him fighting over a stolen bicycle as a twelve tear old. Martin encouraged Clay to go to the boxing ring with him. Martin and Clay trained together at Stoner’s Gym.

Martin and Ali used to perform a display together called ‘Tomorrow’s Champions’. Stone was a useful coach for Ali and he stayed his tutor for nearly all his amateur career (the last four years he was with Chuck Bodak).

As an amateur Ali won six Kentucky Golden Gloves, two National Golden Gloves, an Amateur Athletic Union title and the Gold Medal at the 1960 Rome Olympics for light-heavyweight boxing.

His record as an amateur was 100 wins and five losses. Ali was both hero-worshipped and ridiculed in his motherland. After Ali changed his name he refused to accept the name Clay, saying that his family had been given it by slave-owners.

He was also accused of changing his religion to dodge the call-up, but his famous reply to that accusation was: “I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong… No Viet Cong ever called me nigger”. In 1966 he was banned from fighting in the USA. Ali was stripped of his boxing titles and his boxing license was suspended. So he fought abroad, often in the United Kingdom.

Ali’s first title fight was against Sonny Liston on February 25 1964, but it was almost postponed indefinitely, because it became known that Ali had joined Malcolm X’s Nation of Islam. The promoter, Bill Faversham. was worried that that might spoil the attendance figures, because Ali was not thought likely to win anyway (7:1 against).

Ali agreed not to confirm that he had associations with Malcolm X until after the bout and it went ahead. At the weigh in, Ali’s pulse was 120 as opposed to his norm of 54 and his opponent’s team misread this for nerves. This was when Ali, the Louisville Lip, first said that he was going to “float like a butterfly, sting like a bee”.

Ali saw his first professional defeat in 1971 against Joe Frazier, although he won the title back from George Foreman in 1974. This was the well-known ‘Rumble in the Jungle’ which was given political overtones.

It was ranked seventh in ‘The 100 Greatest Sporting Moments’. Ali’s fight against Chuck Wepner in 1975 motivated the film ‘Rocky’, which won the Academy Award.

Ali announced his retirement on June 27th 1979, but made a comeback 18 months later in October 1980. He finally retired in 1981, but before that the councillors of Louisville renamed Walnut Street as Muhammad Ali Boulevard. Twelve of the seventy street signs were stolen within a week.

In 1984, Ali was diagnosed as having Altzeimer’s, which people who have head trauma are more prone to. Despite his illness, Ali has worked tirelessly for peace and equality and has represented America at several international peace negotiations.

He has won more awards than anyone can possibly remember and established a $60 million not for profit centre in Louisville which houses his awards, but is there to promote peace, social responsibility, respect and personal growth.

On average, Ali travels over 200 days a year to raise money for and consciousness of poverty and hunger. It has been determined that he has helped supply more than 22,000,000 meals.

Angelo Dundee, Ali’s cornerman and trainer from 1960-1981 died on February 1st 2012 at the age of 90,

Owen Jones, the author of this article, writes on a number of topics, but is now concerned with Quotes On Mixed Martial Arts. If you would like to know more, go to our web site at Mixed Martial Arts Quotes

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Birth Control And Cervical Cancer

Birth control is a big issue, there is no doubt of that and women are more aware than ever that having children is not a compulsory result of having sex. They are also aware that having children at the wrong time can damage their careers and they are also aware that passions or alcohol can get in the way of safe sex using condoms very frequently.

This results in women taking supervision of the vast majority of birth control by taking ‘the pill’. The contraceptive pill caused an uproar in the Sixties with the Establishment and the Churches predicting the downfall of society and morality. And in a manner of speaking, they were right. But what happened was to sweep away a great deal of social barriers and privileges that previously just the rich (and men) had had. The ‘old order’ lost a bit of ground.

The problem with the manner that women took control of their sex lives was or is twofold: firstly, men leave ‘that sort of thing’ to the woman and secondly, taking the pill can lead to cervical cancer. The likelihood of acquiring cervical cancer from taking the pill are small (15,000 Americans a year, of which a third dies), but they do exist.

However, there are no recorded cases of men contracting cancer from using a condom.

Women usually contract cervical cancer from having sex. They pick up the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV). Most of the time, the woman’s immune system will prevent that virus from causing cancer, but research has shown that women who take the pill for over five years in a row have a higher risk than women who have not.

So a condom would help here.

Unfortunately, there are no symptoms in the early stages of cervical cancer, but later on, there may be heavier losses of blood, pain after sexual intercourse and even unpleasant smells. Periods could also last a lot longer than ‘normal’.

The difficulty with studies is that, there often comes another study to prove something else and this is true here too. Some studies have shown that the use of the contraceptive pill lessens the occurrence of ovarian cancer.

It is like old sayings, there is always a opposite, as in: ‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder’ and ‘Familiarity breeds contempt’.

If you listen to the ‘experts’, you would be in a permanent state of quandary. Therefore, the only actually safe course to take is to go for frequent tests or screenings – at least once a year, unless your doctor or gynecologist tells you different and if he or she does, query it.

The pharmaceutical businesses have been promising a male contraceptive pill or implant for decades. In fact, the pill may even be there. But that is not the reason usually. The problem is normally men. The majority of men cannot be relied upon to supply sufficient contraception while they are concerned in casual relationships.

As long as this state of affairs continues, women will continue to take risks so that they are not bogged down by a family of 10 kids like their great-grandmothers were.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on a variety of topics, but is now involved with pain patches for back pain. If you would like to know more, please go to our web site at Sore Back Remedies

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Eye Issues That Diabetes Must Be Aware Of

Diabetics have concerns with sugar and starch, both of which the body processes into glucose which it uses for energy. The difficulty with diabetics is that this glucose is not processed properly, it enters into the blood stream and is not dealt with by insulin as it ought to be.

The presence of glucose in the blood is normal and is called glaecemia but when the blood is over saturated, it is known as hyperglaecemia. For this reason, diabetics have to be aware of their blood/sugar levels at all times, which means that they have to be cautious of what they eat.

Lots of diabetics learn tell-tale signs that their bodies give to warn them of their high or low blood/sugar level, but most people also use blood tests by a doctor or even home blood/sugar monitors, which have become cheap enough to purchase for personal use.

Not having enough glucose (sugar) in the blood is known as hypoglaecemia and leaves the brain starved of energy, which leads to temporary dizziness, confusion, blackout or a convulsion. Restoring the glucose level to standard returns full consciousness, Most diabetics learn to successfully circumvent this condition. More difficult is hyperglaecemia.

Hyperglaecemia is the opposite of hypoglaecemia and brings with it its own issues but they tend to cause long term problems. Prolonged periods of hyperglaecemia lead to cardiovascular problems, kidney problems and concerns with eyesight and even teeth.

These complications take a long time to develop and the diabetic may not realize that there is a problem until it is rather late. Therefore the need to monitor blood/glucose levels often. One of the first areas to show problems from hyperglaecemia is the retina because it is so sensitive.

Hyperglaecemic blood in the blood vessels in the retina causes them to swell creating high pressures on the sensitive eye mechanisms. Eyesight is soon impaired. The biggest worry for most diabetics is going blind or suffering macular degeneration, which impairs vision quite severely but does not lead to complete blindness.

It is very important for diabetics to have an eye examination at least once a year and twice is better. The opthamologist will be on the look out for a condition known as diabetic retinopathy. If you are a diabetic you should be on your guard.

If you experience blurred vision, sudden dark spots or flashing lights before your eyes or feel pressure (not easy), you ought to go to the opthamologist as soon as possible.

There are medications, especially in the early stages, but the longer you leave it the worse it gets and the harder to put right, if that is at all feasible.

Prevention is always better that cure, so diabetics ought to maintain their blood glucose level within standard boundaries and maintain a proper body weight. To do this, you will have to learn how much sugar is in various foodstuffs and take regular exercise. In other words: diet and exercise.

Other concerns that a diabetic may experience with their eyes is glaucoma and cataracts. Cataracts can be cut away quite easily, but glaucoma is very serious and leads to blindness.

Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on a variety of topics, but is now concerned with wet macular degeneration treatment. If you would like to know more, please go to our website at Macular Degenerative Disease

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Guide Dogs And Aging

Aging has its plus points, like having more experience, having family and often having fewer financial concerns, but it also brings other problems with it as well, usually health worries. One of the health concerns that older individuals worry about is their eyesight.

Most individuals like to remain independent, but blindness makes you to be dependent, particularly if you go blind when you are older. At least while you are younger, you have a long time to learn how to deal with it.

There are a number of ways that you can lose your sight when you are older but one that effects 10% of those more than 65 and 30% of those over 75 years is macular degeneration. It is often referred to as age-related macular degeneration, ARMD or just AMD because it tends to have an effect on those individuals who are more than 50 years of age.

However, macular degeneration only affects the centre 2.1% of your field of vision, so it is very rare for ARMD to become the cause of complete blindness. The problem is that that 2.1%, centre field of vision is extremely important for recognizing people and for reading.

So what can you do about it, if you get ARMD? One choice would be to buy a guide dog, a ‘blind dog’, as they say in the UK or a ’seeing eye dog’ as they say in America. A guide dog will help prevent you from bumping into things, which you might well do if you lose your central field of vision.

Most registered blind people are not completely blind. Some are worse off than others but sufferers of ARMD usually retain 97.9% of their field of vision, which is the peripheral vision. A guide dog would cover the remainder for you.

Guide dogs are trained as puppies so they will remain with their blind friends for seven or eight years or more This permits the dog and the owner to build up a brilliant relationship, as all individuals do with their dogs. However, the relationship of a blind person with a guide dog though is extra-special. The dog knows that it is being depended upon for its master’ welfare.

If you decide to go down the road of procuring a guide dog, the best place to start is your national association for the blind, the address of which you can find either at your physician’s, in Yellow Pages or on the Net. Some countries’ organizations will charge you for providing a guide dog and others will subsidize your getting a guide dog and its training.

It would be a good idea to arrange a guide dog as soon as you are diagnosed with a disease that threatens your eyesight because that will give you more time to get to know and select a puppy as your future companion.

If you are lucky and your GP saves your eyesight, you have lost nothing and you have gained a wonderful, intelligent friend, but if the worst comes to the worst, you will have an invaluable, seeing, protective, wonderful, intelligent friend. You cannot lose.

Owen Jones, the author of this piece, writes on a variety of topics, but is now concerned with wet macular degeneration treatment. If you want to know more, please visit our website at Macular Degenerative Disease

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