Click for details. What’s glycemic load? Details here.
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This is NHANES data. Click for details.
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From a research report in the journal Age:
“In conclusion, we can reasonably state that a higher adherence to a Mediterranean diet pattern, especially by consuming wholegrain cereals, foods rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids, and a limited amount of alcohol, predicts increased longevity in the elderly.”
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Tagged longevity, Mediterranean diet, Swedes
“We found it difficult to obtain price information for [total hip replacement] and observed wide variation in the prices that were quoted. Many health care providers cannot provide reasonable price estimates. Patients seeking elective [total hip replacement] may find considerable price savings through comparison shopping.”
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“Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goal. My strength lies solely in my tenacity.”
—Louis Pasteur
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EcoSalon has an interview with Tom Mueller, author of a new book on olive oil, Extra Virginity. Regarding olive oil…
Consumption is rising swiftly, quality olive oil shops are springing up nationwide. BUT, there’s zero government control of olive oil quality (the FDA has openly abdicated its legal role), and ignorance of what quality olive oil means is still rampant. Lots of bad oil, sometimes adulterated, is being sold as ” extra virgin olive oil” throughout America.
Here are Tom’s top three tips for choosing an olive oil:
1) Harvest date: must be fresh (within the current harvest year).
2) Who made this, and where? Specific producer and specific location of trees as well as oil-bottling.
3) Mention of specific cultivars (though by no means a guarantee of quality, I’ve found mention of specific olive varieties on the label tends to indicate a more professional/serious oil-maker.
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Tagged Extra Virginity, olive oil, Tom Mueller
Half of all clinical trial results are never published. We don’t know what we’re missing. Read about it at MedPageToday.
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“Good job, maggot!”
I took the Army Physical Fitness Test last week, and passed. I’m only working out for 35 minutes twice a week, with a combination of weight training and high intensity interval training on a stationary bicycle. (The weight training is much like this program.)
U.S. soldiers, at least those in the Army, have to pass a physical fitness test twice a year. I wondered how I, at 58-years-old, stacked up so I self-administered the three fitness components. I didn’t run in army boots, nor carry a rifle or backpack! Soldiers need to score a minimum of 60 points on each exercise.
The Army Physical Fitness Test (APFT) performance requirements are adjusted for age and sex.
My Results
Compared to my performance in August 2012, my run took 102 seconds longer, I increased my sit-ups by 9, and my push-ups held steady.
I purposefully “held back” on running because I remembered how bad I felt after the run last August. Even this time I had a little hamstring strain. Nevertheless, I suspect my aerobic endurance is truly less now since I’m riding the stationary bike instead of running the treadmill. The bike exercise is more enjoyable. My knees will thank me over the long-run.
I’m satisfied with this level of fitness. It’s a good base for some strenuous hiking I’ll be doing over the next few months. With a little luck, I’ll be hiking the Grand Canyon rim-to-rim with my son’s Boy Scout troop in May.
—Steve
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Tagged APFT, army physical fitness test, exercise, exercise goals
Read the article at Time: Health & Family. Quotes:
“What are the reasons, good or bad, that cancer means a half-million- or million-dollar tab? Why should a trip to the emergency room for chest pains that turn out to be indigestion bring a bill that can exceed the cost of a semester of college? What makes a single dose of even the most wonderful wonder drug cost thousands of dollars? Why does simple lab work done during a few days in a hospital cost more than a car? And what is so different about the medical ecosystem that causes technology advances to drive bills up instead of down?”
“I got the idea for this article when I was visiting Rice University last year. As I was leaving the campus, which is just outside the central business district of Houston, I noticed a group of glass skyscrapers about a mile away lighting up the evening sky. The scene looked like Dubai. I was looking at the Texas Medical Center, a nearly 1,300-acre, 280-building complex of hospitals and related medical facilities, of which MD Anderson is the lead brand name. Medicine had obviously become a huge business. In fact, of Houston’s top 10 employers, five are hospitals, including MD Anderson with 19,000 employees; three, led by ExxonMobil with 14,000 employees, are energy companies. How did that happen, I wondered. Where’s all that money coming from? And where is it going? I have spent the past seven months trying to find out by analyzing a variety of bills from hospitals like MD Anderson, doctors, drug companies and every other player in the American health care ecosystem.”
Read more: http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/20/bitter-pill-why-medical-bills-are-killing-us/#ixzz2LiH7kQ82
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Tagged Steven Brill
“There’s talk of doom and gloom as the sequestration approaches, and the Administration is running in circles flapping their arms like a local school board telling the district that any cut in the budget will end football and college prep courses and everything else so that the students will have to sit hungry in classrooms without a teacher unless taxes are raised. The truth is that under the sequestration the US will spend more this year than last, and next year than this. The “cut” is in the amount of budget increase, not in actual spending. It seems to me that the whole government would be better off for an across the board 2% cut – actual cut, spend 2% less money next year than last. There’s 2% waste and monkey motion in every department. I note that the Department of Agriculture is threatening to lay off food inspectors, but there’s no talk of firing bunny inspectors. Every department has people doing things we don’t need done, particularly since we have to borrow the money in order to do them.
Bunny inspectors, for those who don’t know, look for people keeping rabbits as pets and offering them for sale – or using them in a stage performance. Bunny inspectors go to stage magic shows and if the performance employs a pet rabbit they demand to see the federal license the magician must have, and no, I am not making this up. By the way, if the rabbit is killed in the act, say eaten alive, you don’t need a federal license. You may be in trouble with the ASPCA but not with the Department of Agriculture. And the bunny inspectors won’t be laid off under the sequestration. I bet if there were a 2% cut in the DOA’s budget they’d go. If not, a bigger cut would be in order…”
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Tagged bunny inspectors, Jerry Pournelle
Click the pic to purchase at Amazon.com. E-book versions also available at Smashwords.com.
Advanced Mediterranean Diet 