Beyond Exercise – Fitness Will Save Your Life

There is a lot written about “exercise”. We all know we need to exercise, eat right and control our weight – but most of us don’t do any of those things with enough regularity to change either our shape or our health. If we did 66% of us wouldn’t be overweight and chronic lifestyle diseases like diabetes wouldn’t be epidemic.

In the May 20, 2009 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association researchers in Japan analyzed data from 33 previous studies that included a total of 102,980 subjects whose fitness had been measured. They wanted to see how fitness related to developing cardiovascular disease or preventing death.

Read this post to see what they found.

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Asbestos - Have You Been Exposed?

The folks at Asbestos.com contacted me to ask me to give you a heads up about mesothelioma, an environmental cancer. If you are like me, when you hear “asbestos” and “mesothelioma”, you think of those TV commercials for lawyers asking you to call them if you know have been exposed.

On page 79 of my book I write: “We are only beginning to understand the extent to which toxins (or poisons) in our environment are increasing the occurrence of cancers. Substances like pesticides, herbicides, asbestos, arsenic, nickel, nuclear waste, and industrial emissions have all been implicated in causing cancer.“

My advice? If you think you are at risk - read this post, contact your health provider, and check out Asbestos.com before your call a lawyer.

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Why NPs Need Full Practice and Prescriptive Authority

NP World News is the official news publication of nurse practitioners. Its contributors and columnists are thought leaders in the NP profession.

This is the second of 5 columns I will write for NPWN this year on subject of NP practice, health and health care reform.

Click “Read Full Post” if you would like to leave a comment.

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Depression Affects 1 in 13 American Adults and 1 in 12 Teens

Depression is a tough and it makes everything else tougher. Many of my patients don’t recognize that depression is a disease just like diabetes, high blood pressure or the flu. It is a medical problem and there are medical solutions that can help. But first depression must be recognized as a problem.

During these uncertain times, depression is on the rise. The economic crises combined with living in a country at war with terrorism can create a sense of gloom that can lead to depression. If enough stressors pile up – things like losing a job, a home, facing a health crisis or suffering the loss of a loved one – they can topple even the most resilient soul.

Read this post to learn what can be done.

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Is It Bad to Take Medications?

This blog is dedicated to helping non-medical consumers make smart choices about how to handle their health and health care. Nowhere, and I mean nowhere, is there more misinformation or more misconceptions than where medications are concerned.

Sometimes when I advise prescription drugs to treat uncontrolled medical conditions patients react as if I am literally trying to poison them. I find the majority of patients, regardless of their intelligence, are not well educated about either the danger of not treating certain conditions or the benefit of treatment with the right drug at the right dose.

Read this post if you are willing to set your preconceptions aside and look at the whole medication question from a health professional’s perspective.

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7 Tips for Staying Energized

Here are 7 safe, solid and proven tips to help you stay energized all through the day.

BTW – these don’t come from me, they are from patients who have read my book and then come up with their own ways to make healthy lifestyle behaviors work in their lives. Those that do the following things say they have energy all day - and they are losing weight, too!

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Smart Women Missing Stroke Risks and Warning Signs

Stroke is the third leading cause of death in both men and women (right behind heart disease and cancer). It occurs equally in men and women until age 75. After age 75 women are at much greater risk for stroke than men. Stroke incidence has been increasing in women of all ages. In recent years strokes have surged in the age 45 to 54 age groups – groups usually at low risk for stroke. Why? Experts believe it’s because of an increase in risk factors that lead to stroke.

In a recent study published in the February 2009 issue of the medical journal Stroke researchers reported that 215 women, all having at least one risk factor for stroke, were unable to identify their risks. Furthermore they did not consider themselves to be at risk and were doing nothing to reduce their risk. The researchers concluded “Educational strategies must advocate for and target high-risk women.”

Read this post to learn the risks and warning signs of stroke these women missed.

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ADVANCE for Nurse Practitioners Spotlights Carla Mills, ARNP in Audio Interview

Here’s a link to an audio interview I did recently with Jennifer Ford, associate editor with the magazine ADVANCE for Nurse Practitioners. ADVANCE is a source for peer-reviewed and professional information for today’s nurse practitioners.

The interview runs about 15 minutes and there is a slide show with some pictures. So if you’d like to hear me talk about how I came to be here and what I am trying to do, click this link and listen.

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Living Longer on the Sunny Side of the Street

Optimists have lower death rates and are less likely to be hypertensive, diabetic or be smokers than pessimists. Wow! So maybe attitude IS everything!

An interesting study titled Psychological Traits and Total Mortality in the Women’s Health Initiative was presented in March 2009 at the American Psychosomatic Society’s 67th annual meeting by Dr. Hilary Tindle, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Tindle and her colleagues found optimistic postmenopausal women fared better over time than pessimists.

Read this post and learn more.

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Consumers are the Ultimate Stakeholder in Health Care Reform

This week President Obama invited “stakeholders” in the health care system to the White House to seek their input about the best ways to reform health care. Representatives from hospitals, the insurance industry, medical device and pharmaceutical companies, labor and physicians came to discuss ways to lower health care costs across the board. Neither consumers nor nurse practitioners were among the invited stakeholders.

Also this month the Deloitte Center for Health Solutions (a subsidiary of the international consulting company Deloitte and Touche) published their analysis of a survey they did of 4,001 American adult health care consumers. The survey (administered either in English or Spanish) sought information about the behaviors and attitudes of consumers regarding health care.

Read this post to learn what we as consumers - the ultimate stakeholders in health care reform - say we want.

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