Each healthy news update is interesting in its own right and can be helpful to your own health issues. Many of these health updates address winter health problems too.
If you’ve been informed that your cholesterol levels are getting high, it could be more to do with the time of year when they were checked. Bad LDL cholesterol rises dramatically during the winter months, which could possibly trigger a prescription for statin drugs.
The level can subsequently lower in the summer months. Brazilian researchers have discovered this seasonal fluctuation in both high-density lipoprotein (HDL) and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels; they believe the differences could be even greater in northern Europe and North America, where winters are even colder.
However, even in the mild winters of Brazil, LDL cholesterol can rise to levels high enough to put hundreds of thousands of people on statin therapy, when by the summertime, the same levels would have returned to normal anyway.
Researchers at the State University of Campinas in Sao Paulo made the discovery when they assessed cholesterol levels of 227,359 people over a two-year period. Levels of LDL cholesterol rose by an average of 7mg/dL during the winter, which made eight per cent of people new candidates for a statin drug.
Coming up to the Christmas period, fasting is the last subject you would want me to write about. However, consider this for the New Year. Fasting can be as beneficial as exercise or surgery, if you have heart disease. It improves blood pressure while releasing a protein that naturally protects the heart and recent research suggests it may even reverse type 2 diabetes.
All the benefits of fasting have been evaluated by scientists at Aston University in Birmingham, the UK, and they produced a long list, showing heart health at the top, followed by reversal of diabetes and reduction in inflammation.
Intermittent fasting (where food is not eaten on alternative days or several days a week) is also an effective way to lose weight, says lead researcher James Brown. The diet is just as effective as exercise and weight-loss surgery, which is usually performed in obese patients, and improves pancreatic functioning.
When someone fasts, the body raises levels of adiponectin, a protein that helps to protect the heart (Br. J. Diabetes Vasc. Dis., 2013).
Flu vaccines are topical this time of year. Ten homeopathic flu vaccines have just been licensed for use by Canada’s health regulator. They join a growing list of homeopathic vaccines available to Canadians, including those preventing polio, measles and whooping cough.
All the vaccines have passed tests that deem them to be safe and effective when used according to instructions on the label. The latest licences have been granted to a range of homeopathic flu vaccines called influenzinum, which has been manufactured by various companies (BCMJ, 2013).
Just to remind you of the summer. The benefits of sunshine far outweigh any increased risk of cancer, say researchers who believe that the current ‘safe sun’ guidelines need to be rewritten. Exposure to the sun’s ultraviolet rays lowers blood pressure, and this can reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke, potentially even prolonging life, say researchers from Edinburgh University in the UK.
Bad LDL cholesterol rises dramatically during the winter months
The benefits of sun exposure far outweigh the risks because heart disease causes 80 times more deaths than skin cancer, it was reported. Just an hour’s exposure to the sun dramatically reduces blood pressure by releasing nitric oxide, a compound essential for cardiovascular health.
The researchers say that they now want to look at the risks of sunbathing over different periods of time. If they still find that sunbathing has a positive effect on heart health, the current safe sun guidelines will need to be re-considered.
In addition, vitamin D (the sunshine vitamin) could help reduce the worst effects of asthma, so sufferers should do more sunbathing or take supplements, say researchers.
Apparently, asthmatics with more severe symptoms tend to have low levels of vitamin D, while those with high levels are able to control their symptoms better. Researchers at King’s College in London say the connection between levels of the vitamin and severity of symptoms is quite striking (J. Allergy Clin. Immunol., 2013).
Finally, have you found yourself getting a little forgetful? It may not be due to ageing, but to over-the-counter drugs. They could be for everyday ailments, such as insomnia or poor digestion.
Medications with anticholinergic effects cause memory loss and other mental dysfunctioning within just 90 days, researchers have discovered. The drugs block acetylcholine, a nervous system neurotransmitter, so they also cause memory loss and impairment of general mental functioning.
Although these drug effects have been known for some time, researchers at the University of Iowa were surprised just how quickly they can cause problems. In a study of 3,690 older people taking anticholinergic medication, their mental functioning began to be affected within 90 days (Alzheimers Dement., 2013)
kathryn@maltanet.net