We spend BILLIONS on drugs, but a good pair of running shoes is still BEST ROI (when used).

Another study review exhaulting the benefits of high fitness levels (although the review doesn't mention how that is defined, only that cardiorespiratory fitness as it relates to other men the same age).

We spend Billions of dollars each year to reduce risk factors such as blood pressure, cholesterol and LDL's and weight loss. BUT it's fitness levels that carry the greatest predictive value. Meaning fitness levels play a greater role in reducing the risk of dying (early I suppose, since we all do...die) from CHD.

Let me say it again. We SPEND BILLIONS!!! Where wearing out a good pair of running (even if you walk) shoes at maybe 100 bucks per year could benefit you more. The key factor here is wear the shoes to DO the activity and do it often enough to wear the shoes out in a year or less.

That's our problem, we prefer to spend BILLIONS instead of DOING for hundreds.

I prefer to spend and DO and the SAVE my money for vacations, education, home improvement and the like. I'd rather hold onto my hard earned dough and have some fun!

The article and the study brings up many positives, but I have some concerns about the study itself.
1. where are the women?
2. fitness levels compared to other men of the same age. is the fitness level high or just higher than a couch potato?

The use of drugs is not only expensive they cause a host of other issues (side-effects) that harm the body AND they cause issues in the environment, namely our water. These drugs do eventually get into our sewer system you know.

It's all connected. I'd prefer to go for a jog!


Active Voice: Does Cardiorespiratory Fitness Level Trump LDL-Cholesterol Level for Predicting CHD Mortality?:

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Guest Blog: Hearing Loss: Its Preventability and How it Relates to Your Lifestyle

Living a healthy long life doesn't have to mean you give up all the FUN stuff in your life. If you still thinking smoking is fun, well, yes. Living healthy really is more about finding enjoyment in less destructive behaviors and reaping the benefits now and into the future.

It's in the future that we find ourselves looking desperately for "cures", for anything that will slow the process of aging and earlier than need be, death. I know I want to reap the rewards and I also know I'll have some regrets of unheeded advice from my younger years, like sun over-exposure. I am and will continue to pay the price of all those sunburns.

The outdoor world still calls me and I still answer, but now I cover up more and earlier. I used to crank up my music, now I tone it down a bit especially if I have my plugs in. In fact I'm looking at headphones that are bigger, that cover my ears more so I can keep more outside noise out and turn the volume down. 

I do want to be able to hear the world around me as I get older, even if that means hearing the young wipper-snappers call me to move the the slow lane on the track...

Thanks John for the Blog. sAq

Hearing Loss: Its Preventability and How It Relates to Your Lifestyle

An insightful and helpful Guest Blog By John O'Connor, Stoneham, MA

It is very common knowledge that the loss of hearing can also cause a rapid deterioration of both lifestyle and happiness; the prevention of hearing loss through a healthy lifestyle has become progressively more important as a larger percentage of people become affected by it. According to the Better Hearing Institute, approximately half of all people impacted by hearing loss are below the age of 55. As this condition continues to strike younger people, steps must be made if any individual wishes to ensure that his or her hearing will still be fully functional by the time of a middle-age adulthood. Hearing loss can negatively impact nearly all areas of a person's life- his relationships, his emotions, and even how he can go about his day. Although using a hearing aid is an immediate option for those who suffer from the condition, the preliminary prevention of any such condition is ideal. It is of the utmost importance to live a healthy lifestyle with the prevention of hearing loss on the mind, for living in healthiness is one of the only surefire ways to try to combat this condition before it actually strikes.

There is a multitude of steps that one can take to better his or her lifestyle and protect the senses. First, it is essential to take a look at the lifestyle that one is living- someone may need to ask himself "Am I a chronic smoker? Do I eat a nutritious diet? Do I always have my headphones blasting in my ears?" These are just a few questions that are relevant to the prevention of hearing loss through a healthier lifestyle.

Are Smokers More Susceptible to Hearing Loss?

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 20 percent of all adults in the United States are smokers; even without the threat of hearing loss, this habit can deliver a wide array of negative effects on one's health. However, smoking can actually have a significant effect on any habitual individual's hearing. A wide variation of studies have revealed that frequent exposure to nicotine can have a negative impact on one's ability to process and hear sounds. The ability to detect higher frequencies with hearing is significantly diminished by chronic exposure to cigarettes, whether it is through firsthand or secondhand smoke.

The Detrimental Impact of Loud Noise

Although this is hailed as one of the most obvious damages to hearing, some people are just not aware of how detrimental unnecessarily loud noise can really be to a person's hearing senses and health. For those who make a living out of working with tools such as chainsaws or jackhammers, their respective noise levels are far above the minimum level that can bring on hearing loss when their use is at a frequent occurrence. Being close to even just one gunshot can cause long term damage on a person's hearing; therefore, being wary and careful of one's surroundings and attempting to avoid overtly loud noise is key to preventing hearing loss.

Nutrition's Effects on Hearing

Not only can poor nutrition potentially bring on diabetes, it can also cause significant hearing loss. Getting proper nutrition is one of the surefire ways to help keep hearing sharp up through old age and beyond. Several studies have revealed that a diet rich in antioxidants can prove to be effective against hearing loss; and a lack of vitamins can contribute greatly to a lesser ability to hear. Watching one's lifestyle is of the utmost importance, and food is a monumental part of that.

The lifestyle habits listed above are just a few of the many factors that can be changed to prevent hearing loss. Doing research would be highly beneficial if any individual is fearing that he or she may be getting an early onset of hearing loss, and the lifestyle of that person has the potential to change everything. Hearing loss is not a pleasant condition for anyone, and the prevention of that should be the ultimate goal.

Deceptive Marketing Should Be OUTLAWED....Oh! It is?

Marketing. Success is scored by increases in sales. Not health. Their success increases their wallets and your waistlines.

Success has absolutely nothing to do with health of the end user, the consumer. It's all about short term profits. It's all about value to the share-holder, which, if you are working and you invest in a 401k or the like, you are one of those profiting. Doesn't matter that it's making us sick.

And that kind of sickness is costing us BIG right now! Obesity. Diabetes. Stroke. Heart Disease. Cancer.

Do yourself a favor ignore the packaging and eat real food.

Don't want to bother? Then don't bother to whine when you have to pay for the high cost of medicines to "manage" your expensive health condition that over consumption of "healthy" products such as these promote.


BBC News - Cereal bars: Healthy image a myth - Which?

You know, we can't make enough laws to stop this kind of hurtful behavior as long as we have business people running our government. But don't get me started on that topic!

Incorporating Fitness and Nutrition into Diabetes Management - A Guest Blog

Incorporating Fitness and Nutrition into Diabetes Management

The best approach to diabetes management is a multi-faceted approach involving medication, nutrition and fitness. While medication can help to balance out blood glucose levels or keep them manageable, a patient with diabetes cannot fully manage this disease without good nutrition and fitness as well. There is no cure for diabetes, but when you combine good diet and exercise with the right medications, it is possible to get a handle on blood glucose levels for long term management.

* Manage all diabetes medication. Speak with a physician to make sure that all diabetes medications and other treatments are compatible with a new nutrition or fitness plan. Good diabetes health management means ensuring that medication, diet and exercise are all compatible with one another for the best possible results.

* Choose a healthy nutrition plan rather than a diet. Dieting to lose weight and eating healthily for diabetes are two different things. Good diabetes health management means eating nutritionally sound meals that incorporate the right types of calories, carbohydrates, proteins, fibers and fats. Drastically reducing the amount of any of these nutrients such as a low-carb diet or severely low calorie diet can harm management of diabetes rather than helping it, even if the diet is promoting weight loss. Weight loss is not the only puzzle piece when managing any type of diabetes.

* Add fitness in slowly. Adding exercise in to a daily routine can be absolutely essential to good diabetes health management. The key is to add exercise in slowly, tracking how it impacts health and blood sugar along the way. It is essential not to overdo it when starting out on an exercise plan since every diabetes patient responds differently to working out.

* Work closely with a doctor. Nutritionists, endocrinologists and general practitioners can all play an important role in developing a fitness and nutrition routine for good diabetes management. Work closely with these specialists and professionals to make sure that all elements of a diet and fitness program are compatible with current and future diabetes management plans.

* Log and track everything. Keep a diet and fitness log where blood sugar, fitness types and nutrients can all be tracked. This information will make it possible to see how diet and exercise are impacting blood sugar on both a short term and log term basis. There are other things that can be tracked as well, such as mood along the way.

Combining good nutrition with exercise and diabetes health management through medication is a great way to make sure blood sugar is managed on a long term basis. Because diabetes medications can cause complications when taken over a long term basis, such as Actos which causes bladder cancer risk factors  and other side effects, it is better to reduce one's need on diabetes medication in favor of natural, healthful diabetes management.  Filing an Actos Lawsuit is also an alternative plan of action if harmed by this drug.

Elizabeth Carrollton writes about defective medical devices and dangerous drugs for Drugwatch.com.

A BIG Chink in Higher Education & Research's Armor

Today's New York Times highlighted an article that exposes some deep concerns for me as a parent, as a health professional, a tax payer, and a citizen who potentially could be harmed by this report.

Having been involved in higher education in one or another my entire adult life I have seen how the competitive environment at these institutions operate. Teaching is less valued. Research dollars, opportunities and promotions are, though this article makes no mention of this point, distributed in a sexist fashion. Research findings are marketed, oft times erroneously (stretching the point to make the news).

Why should you be concerned about this chink in the armor? It pulls into question the very premise of what research offers us as a society, truth & understanding to better our lives. If the research is false, programs, drugs, equipment and treatments can be more harmful to us.

I'm glad to see that a stricter over-sight procedure is being developed. The question is can the field monitor themselves. I for one have very little trust in self-monitoring when money, careers and reputations are at stake. Cover-ups happen.

One need only to look at our banking & mortgage industry collapse of recent times, savings & loans of many years ago, Enron and other corporate debacles.

Self-regulation doesn't work. The one thing our "Forefathers" expressed in their system of government (our ability to govern) was that checks & balances were of prime importance.

This article doesn't surprise me. It does however concern me deeply.  Higher education and it's research are vital to our knowledge and growth. Higher education is also an economic engine in and of itself and many cities and towns rely on that economic flow.

We can't let it fail by not making sure it is held to a higher standard. They will if they as a education and research business don't right these wrongs and clean-up their act.

Rise in Scientific Journal Retractions Prompts Calls for Reform - NYTimes.com:

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When a Pedometer is a GOOD thing

Physical activity. There are so many levels from ADL's just getting out of bed and just standing up to ultra marathons and ironman triathlons and everything in between.

Physical activity is movement and movement of any kind is good.

As a manager of a health promotion program I am constantly in search of new ways to make physical activity inviting, energizing, challenging, motivating....in short engaging.

I want as many people to engage in movement on a regular basis as possible. Until I get 100% involved I believe my job is not complete, not done, not successful.

So I have my work cut out for me because life seems encourage us to do otherwise.  Watch T.V., play video games, surf the internet, send e-mails (and yes, I send e-mails to my staff even when they are less than a half dozen steps away!), Twitter, Facebook...work...work...work...sitting down.

It's the sitting and the stressing for long periods of time that is killing us. So a simple Pedometer can be of value. You can see for yourself just how much you move about everyday. Or perhaps just how much you don't.

Either way, as long as the pedometer doesn't fall off and into the toilet (yes, that happens more than you know) the feedback can be valuable, even motivational.

I bike, I run (at least I keep trying to "run", it's more like jogging these days), I kayak, hike, walk, play badminton, golf, ski, snow shoe, but I can still move more. A pedometer shows me that.

Like eating regularly throughout the day moving throughout the day is as powerful and in some instances more powerful than all the activity I do on a recreational level.

A pedometer encourages me to get those 10,000 steps a day. If I arrive at the end of the day and I'm not complete, out the door I go.

For some the 10K steps a day is ALL they do.

I think that's great! They are my 10K athletes!

Phys Ed: How Staying Active Keeps Us Healthy - NYTimes.com:

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The Right to Be Healthy - Who Decides?

The FREEDOM to be healthy is at risk here.

I am sure there is more to the story from the FDA (I can't believe all FDA employees are blatantly & willingly placing our health at risk), but the fundamental truth is the FDA at the higher levels is a bought federal organization. So in the name of health they are covertly being controlled by "Independent" corporations with a huge interest in making their company profitable, who are NOT at all interested in our health.

A law suit has been filed against the FDA and it's a HUGE uphill battle if you understand who the real players are, BIG money.

You have to realize our processed foods are NOT healthy! They are toxic, full of chemicals and making us sick. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but down the road. And when we get sick those same companies say they can make us well by spending the rest of your life on their drugs. It's a win-win for them.

You've heard the saying: "Pay me now or pay me later." Well in this scenario it's "Pay me now AND pay me later, It's the Law."

It's a lose-lose for those who really want to be and remain healthy in the purest sense of the word.

I don't believe I am healthy if I'm on drugs whether they come in our foods or from the pharmacy or on the streets. I want the right to choose otherwise.

The freedom to choose to be healthy in my mind is at stack here.

Please pay attention.

This is my humble opinion and so far I am thankful that I have the right to express that opinion....

Shocking: The FDA Says You Have No Right To Freedom Of Food | Before It's News:

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