Lifestyle « Weekly Gravy

If 2020 is the year you’ve resolved to quit smoking, don’t start vaping. No matter what e-cigarette companies advertise, their products aren’t approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration as a safe and effective way to give up tobacco, the American Lung Association warns. And switching from tobacco to e-cigarettes isn’t quitting. “The simple truth is that e-cigarettes are tobacco products, and the Lung Association has been helping people avoid and quit using tobacco for decades,” said Michelle Caul, the association’s director for health promotions. She said misinformation about the health risks of vaping runs rampant, especially among young people. She offered these facts in a news release: E-cigarettes are tobacco products and no tobacco products are safe. Hospitalizations and deaths from vaping show that e-cigarette use is harmful. Quitting is ending addiction to nicotine, which can be difficult. E-cigarettes contain dangerous metals and toxic chemicals that can cause lung disease. “One of the biggest problems with e-cigarettes is that many times people become dual users, meaning they smoke cigarettes when they can and use vaping devices at other times,” said Dr. Albert Rizzo, chief medical officer of the association. “Using e-cigarettes is not safe,” he added. “A new study released in December found adults who currently or ever used e-cigarettes are 30% more likely to develop chronic lung disease, including asthma, bronchitis and… read on >

Obesity is seldom a friend to health, but in one medical context it might give patients a slight advantage, new research suggests. Specifically, when Australian researchers looked at trials of atezolizumab, an immune system-based treatment for lung cancer, they found that the drug worked better in people who were overweight. The trial involved more than 2,100 people with the most common form of lung tumors, non-small cell lung cancer. About half of the participants were normal weight, about one-third were overweight and 7 percent were obese. About two-thirds of patients received the newer drug, atezolizumab, while the remaining third got an older drug, docetaxel. The researchers found that obesity — a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or above — “was associated with significantly improved overall survival in patients treated with atezolizumab, but not in those who received docetaxel.” What’s more, there seemed to be a “linear relationship.” As body weight rose in patients taking atezolizumab, so too did their odds for survival. The study was led by Dr. Ganessan Kichenadasse, a medical oncology researcher at the Flinders Centre for Innovation in Cancer. “This is an interesting outcome and it raises the potential to investigate further with other cancers and other anti-cancer drugs,” Kichenadasse said in a Flinders University news release. “While our study only looked at baseline and during treatment, we believe it warrants… read on >

If you plan to make a New Year’s resolution about improving your health, the American Medical Association (AMA) has some good suggestions. “With too many holiday sweets and not enough exercise likely in the rearview mirror, now is the perfect time to consider your personal goals and how you can make positive health choices in the coming year,” AMA President Dr. Patrice Harris said in an association news release. “The good news is that there are a few easy steps you can take that will set you on the right track for a healthier 2020,” Harris added. Learn your risk for type 2 diabetes and take steps to prevent or delay the onset of the disease. Get the recommended amount of physical activity. For adults, it’s at least 150 minutes a week of moderate-intensity activity, or 75 minutes a week of vigorous-intensity activity. Know your blood pressure and, if you have high blood pressure, take steps to get it under control. Doing so will reduce your risk of heart attack or stroke. Cut back on processed foods, especially those with added sodium and sugar. Eat less red meat and processed meats, and eat more plant-based foods, such as olive oil, nuts and seed. Reduce your consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages and drink more water instead. If you’re prescribed antibiotics, take them exactly as directed. Antibiotic resistance… read on >

Childhood obesity is such a crisis in America that officials have been updating recommendations for how early intervention should begin. Obesity now affects as many as 20% of the nation’s children. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force reviewed the literature on kids between 2 and 18 years of age and now recommends that kids over 6 be screened using a measure of body fat based on height and weight called Body Mass Index (BMI). The Task Force also recommends intensive behavioral therapy for those kids who are obese. Behavioral therapy was shown to reduce blood pressure, although it did not show any reduction in cholesterol. While the Task Force saw no benefit to performing obesity screenings on kids younger than 6, this isn’t to say it’s not a problem. Children between the ages of 2 and 5 as a group showed a sharp increase in obesity rates over just the last few years, according to a report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). The AAP’s 2018 report also found an upward trend for all definitions of overweight and obesity among 2- to 19-year-olds, most pronounced among adolescents. And some ethnic groups are at greater risk than others. White and Asian American children have significantly lower rates of obesity than black and Hispanic kids. The report added that, contrary to the notion that obesity in… read on >

Roughly 40% to 50% of married couples ultimately split up, according to theAmerican Psychological Association. But Northwestern University professorEliFinkelsaysthe best marriages are actuallybetter than ever. How do you keep your marriage from going from blissful tobust?The psychologist, who hasextensively examined the history of marriage,offers three tips in his book, The All-or-Nothing Marriage. Tip One: Become a love hacker.All relationships require time and effort to keep the fire alive. But chances are that your kids, workplace demands or other responsibilitiesslow the sizzle every now and then.Boost your bliss with love hacks — quick and simple practices that show you care.Here are some easy ones to try: Show appreciation. Say thank you more often. When your spouse tells yougood news,celebrate his or her joy andrespond with a question ortwo. Touch more often: Hold hands during a TV show, for example. This boosts trust and security. Tip Two: Take the time to really talk to each other.Love hacksare great, butopen, deepcommunication is the key — and talk about something other than the kids and the weather. Here’s an idea: Go to the movies and see a romantic comedy.One study showed thatcouples who watched and discussedrelationship movies monthlycut their divorce rate in half within three years. Tip Three: Lower your expectations. Yes, it’s true.One of the best things you can sometimes do for your marriage is to ask less… read on >

Millions of Americans have filled movie theaters over the holidays to watch the latest in the Star Wars saga, but a new study suggests that enjoyment of the film may be governed by prior expectations. To see how expectations affect viewing pleasure, researchers surveyed 441 people before and after they saw “Star Wars: Episode VIII — The Last Jedi” in 2017. Based on the results, it’s best not to see “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” believing you’re going to love or hate it, said researcher James Alex Bonus, an assistant professor of communication at Ohio State University, in Columbus. People who had high expectations for the movie but were disappointed had the lowest enjoyment of anyone. Those who expected little from the movie but felt happy after seeing the film had lower overall enjoyment compared with people who had high expectations for the film and enjoyed watching it, researchers found. “It wasn’t really helping people to go in with those low expectations,” Bonus said in a university news release. “The negative bias going in dragged them down and even if they were pleasantly surprised by the movie, they still didn’t like it as much as other people did,” Bonus noted. It’s a lot less about what’s in the movie and a lot more about what you expected it to be, he explained. Three weeks… read on >

Lose weight. Eat healthier. Quit smoking. These are all popular New Year’s resolutions that are often only kept for a short time, if at all. About 40% of Americans make a New Year’s resolution, most of which are abandoned by February, according to researchers at Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. But Bernadette Melnyk, vice president for health promotion and chief wellness officer and dean of the College of Nursing at Ohio State, has some tips to help you make your resolutions stick: Set a realistic, specific, 30-day goal. The more specific and realistic the goal, the more likely it will be achieved. Break big goals down into small ones, and try to tackle one small change for 30 days. Many resolutions fail because people try too much, too fast. Write your goal down and put it where you can see it every day. Keep a journal of your successes and write encouraging messages to yourself. Visualize yourself accomplishing your goal and celebrating your success. If you have a positive attitude, you’re more likely to achieve your goal. Share your resolution with a friend or family member, and enlist them to help support your effort with encouraging texts and calls as you let them in on your progress. Work toward your goal one day at a time. You can always start again if you fall… read on >

(HealthDay News) — Obesity can increase your child’s risk of cardiovascular disease, high cholesterol, high blood pressure and prediabetes, says Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. With minor changes, you can help your child maintain a healthy weight. To help your child safely shed pounds, the hospital encourages parents to: Reduce or eliminate sweetened beverages, including soda. Add more vegetables to family meals. Make sure your family is eating a high-fiber diet. Make sure your child is getting enough sleep. Eat together as a family as often as possible. Be a good role model. Enjoy healthy food in front of your child. Limit your child’s screen time to no more than two hours per day. Encourage your child to be active.

The holidays are peak buying time, and perhaps the worst time of the year for people who simply can’t control their urge to shop. Now, research shows that the ease of online purchasing could be making things worse for people with so-called “buying-shopping disorder” (BSD). BSD is still debated as a stand-alone diagnosis, and hasn’t yet been included in the psychologists’ bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. But that’s probably only because not enough good data on the condition exists, said the author of a recent study into online shopping addiction. There’s a “relative lack of published scientific literature,” said Dr. Astrid Muller — but psychologists have long dealt with such cases. “There is well over 100 years of clinical history describing dysfunctional buying or acquisition excesses that interfere with daily life, and are associated with significant clinical distress and impairment in important areas of functioning,” said Muller. She’s head psychologist in the department of psychosomatic medicine and psychotherapy at Hannover Medical School in Germany. BSD is defined as an “extreme preoccupation with shopping and buying [and] to impulses to purchase that are experienced as irresistible,” Muller said. The condition can cause real harm, including post-purchase guilt and regret, a sense of loss of control, family conflict over excessive purchasing, and financial distress. According to Muller, BSD is thought to affect about… read on >

Microbes that live in a child’s upper airway could be linked to severe asthma attacks, new research suggests. For parents, it’s an all-too familiar scene: A child’s seemingly harmless cough quickly escalates to wheezing, gasping and an urgent need for emergency treatment. Asthma is the leading chronic disease in kids and third-most common cause of hospitalization among those under 15, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America. Now, a new study found an association between asthma flare-ups in children and the makeup of the upper-airway microbiome, communities of microscopic organisms that include bacteria. “In the future, we wish to understand whether the upper-airway bacteria can play a causal role in the severity of asthma symptoms,” said study author Dr. Yanjiao Zhou, who conducted the research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. She is now an assistant professor of medicine at UConn Health in Farmington, Conn. Zhou and her colleagues collected data on 214 school-aged children who were part of a clinical trial. Participants had mild to moderate asthma that was being treated with daily inhaled corticosteroids. Nasal samples were collected twice — once when asthma was under control, and again when kids had the signs of an emerging flare-up, what the investigators called the “yellow zone.” The researchers said kids who had early warning signs of a flare-up were more… read on >