Live Younger Now!

“Feeling down?  Go outside.  Researchers analyzed 10 studies involving 1,252 people and learned that five minutes of light exercise outdoors can boost self-esteem and brighten mood.  The effects were even greater if the time was spent over water.  All participants–but especially kids and the mentally ill–benefited from walking, gardening, biking, or other outdoor activities.” Source, Environmental Science & Technology, published online March 25, 2010

“To maintain a healthy weight, women need to exercise more than current recommendations suggest, say researchers who studied more than 34,000 middle-aged women for 13 years.  Normal-weight women who gained less than 5 pounds during the study did moderate-intensity exercise, such as running, for an hour a day, seven days a week. Even as little as 5 pounds of weight gain, the researchers say, is enough to worsen health.  Still, if you can’t commit to stepping up your workout schedule, the researchers noted that the recommended 30 minutes of exercise, five days a week, is enough to reduce the risk of many chronic illnesses.”  -Source: JAMA, March 24/31, 2010

Certain activities have been proven to strengthen bone.  These include: basketball, dancing, hiking, walking, skating, jogging, running, soccer, softball and  resistance activities such as weight training and and using resistance bands.  While swimming and biking are good for your health, they are not the best activities to build strong bones.  Why not?  The water or bike bear your weight, so the bones aren’t benefiting from the impact of the activity. -source: St Luke’s Hospital news letter, April 2010

“Getting active may be good for your brain.  In a study of o9ver 1,300 adults, researchers learned that those who exercised moderately in midlife were 39 percent less likely than other to have mild cognitive impairment, a state between dementia and the normal mental decline that happens with age.  And in participants who did moderate exercise later in life, the odds of having the condition dropped by 32 percent.  Another study found that high-intensity aerobic exercise helped adults with mild cognitive impairment improve their condition more than a stretching program did.”  Source: Archives of Neurology, Jan 2010

“Midlife fitness pays.  Researchers who studied date on more than 13,500 women le3arned that of those who survived to age 70 and beyond, the ones who exercised more when they were middle-aged were less likely to have one of 10 major chronic diseases, heart surgery, physical limitations, or cognitive impairment.  Even just walking made a difference in long-term health outcomes.  What’s more, the benefits showed up in both lean and overweight women.” Source: Archives of Internal Medicine, Jan 25, 2010

“The older you get, the harder it is to fall asleep and stay asleep.  But that’s completely normal, according to researchers in the United Kingdom.  They studied 110 people who had no sleep disorders and found that adults ages 66 to 83 slept 43 minutes less per night than 20 to 30 year olds.  How often participants woke up during the night increased and how much time the spent in deep sleep decreased, with age. despite getting less sleep, older adults were less likely to be drowsy during the day than the young participants.  According to the study’s authors, knowing daytime sleepiness isn’t normal in seniors could help doctors spot sleeping disorders.” Source: Sleep, Feb 1, 2010 – for information regarding natural sleep inducing herbs click here.

“Omega-3 fatty acids from fish may help keep cells young.  Scientists measured the blood levels of these healthy fats in study participants, all of whom had heart disease, as well the length of telomeres in their white blood cells.  Telomeres are pieces of DNA that protect the ends of chromosomes and tend to shorten with age; recent findings suggest that longer telemeres mean healthier people.  Over five years, people who started out with the most omega-3s had the slowest rate of chromosome shrinkage.  More research is needed to confirm the link and explain how the fish fat can protect cells.” Source: Journal of the American Medical Association, Jan. 20, 2010 – click here for more information about omega-3 fatty acids.

“Getting active may be good for your brain.  In a study of over 1,300 adults, researchers learned that those who exercised moderately in midlife were 39 percent less likely than others to have mild impairment, a state between dementia and the normal mental decline that happens with age.  And participants who did moderate exercise later in life, the odds of having the condition dropped by 32 percent.  Another study found that high-intensity exercise helped adults with mild cognitive impairment improve their condition more than a stretching program did.”  (Archives of Neurology, January 2010

Surf the Web.  Older people who began to spend time roaming around the Internet experienced improvements in mental activity in as little as a couple of days.  After seven days of doing Internet searches for an hour a day, the MRI brain scans of participants without prior Internet experience showed greater mental activity during Web browsing than they had at the study’s start. (Presentation at the Society for Neurosciences annual meeting)

“Resveratrol, a chemical found in red wine, has received a lot of attention because of studies that suggest it could someday help treat diabetes and other diseases.  Yet scientists aren’t sure how resveratrol imparts its benefits.  Now a study has found that resveratrol’s anti-diabetic activity may come straight from the top: the brain.  Lab mice on an all-you-can eat diet tend to develop diabetes.  But when researchers delivered resveratrol directly into the brains of mice with diet-induced diabetes, their blood glucose levels dropped regardless of diet or weight.  The findings suggest that resveratrol may work by interacting with receptors in the brain that control insulin.” Source: Endocrinology, Dec. 2009 For more information on a revolutionary resveratrol supplement click here