Vonnies Health Spot

CHEWING GUM HAS MEDICINAL VALUE

AS A POST-SURGERY ADJUNCT
As the old song goes, chewing gum might lose its flavor on the bedpost overnight, but it can still have medicinal value. Research shows that after abdominal surgery, chewing gum for one hour, three times a day, significantly hastens the resumption of normal bowel function and reduces the time patients spend in the hospital. Eating and drinking are also effective, but can cause nausea.

A 2002 Japanese study showed that gum-chewing patients recovered faster after laparoscopic colon surgery. In 2006 researchers at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital in California found that gum chewers who had undergone conventional large-incision surgery moved their bowels 26 hours earlier than other patients. So pack some gum before heading out to the hospital and after surgery chomp away on it — with your surgeon’s approval, of course.

“Chewing gum doesn’t put as much in your system if you’re not ready for it, yet it might help stimulate intestinal activity,” says Jeffrey Drebin, MD, professor and chief of gastrointestinal surgery at they University of Pennsylvania. “I encourage my patients to chew gum as soon as they’re awake enough not to choke on it.”

TO EASE HEARTBURN WOES
Studies also suggest that chewing gum also relieves heartburn, which results when acid from the stomach backs up into the esophagus, a disorder called gastro-esophageal reflux. In a 2005 British study, 31 people with the condition consumed a fatty, heartburn inducing lunch on two days, and were randomly selected to chew gum for 30 minutes afterward. Acid levels were significantly lower when they chewed gum. An earlier study found that chewing gum for one hour after breakfast reduced symptoms for up to three hours.

Chewing gum stimulates the production of saliva, which neutralizes acid in the esophagus. “It has the same effect as an antacid,” explains C. Mel Wilcox, MD, professor of medicine at the University of Alabama. The treatment may especially appeal to pregnant women who want to avoid medications.

AS AN APPETITE SUPPRESSANT
Chewing gum may also dull the appetite. In a 2007 study sponsored by the Wrigley Company, 60 people were offered a sweet and salty afternoon snack after chewing gum or not chewing gum. They reported less hunger and consumed fewer snack calories after chewing gum. But in a 2006 study from Purdue University researchers were not able to produce the same results.

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Disclaimer: The purpose of this weblog is not to dispense medical advice nor in any way is meant to be construed as diagnostic or prescriptive. Always check with your physician before beginning any new program or trying any of the items discussed in the posts that appear on this site.

WHY DO WE LOVE BABIES?

When I was younger, I was not very interested in babies. I was so focused on developing my career that I couldn’t envision myself as a mother and neither could I connect with other females who would oh and ah over newborns who were proudly trotted into the office by their glowing (but usually worn-out) mothers.

Then I had my own.

Like the born-again Christian or the reformed smoker, I was converted. The mothering instinct had been awakened and I found the whole experience of the developing fetus, the birthing and the caring for children to be a holy, elevating experience. As is my way, I embraced the role with enthusiasm and became a rabid nurturer who sought out only the best for my children and protected them fiercely from harm. Also, an aspect of parenting that many of us may not connect with when we’re starting this odyssey is that “once a parent, always a parent.” In other words, even as our children grow up and leave the nest, we still want the best for them and do everything in our power to support their own odysseys as they go off into the world. As an extension of the learning experience I had as a parent, I have now come to realize how important our children are and how, in the bigger picture, they represent the future of humankind.

Now a group of researchers led by Morten Kringelbach and Alan Stein report that there is a possible brain basis for parental instinct. The hormone oxytocin is partially responsible for us bonding with our own young, but now their seems to be an area of the brain called the medial orbitofrontal cortex, which becomes highly specifically active within a seventh of a second in response to (unfamiliar) infant faces, but not to adult faces.

The investigators were searching for answer to the question of why we almost instinctively treat babies as special, protecting them and enabling them to survive. Darwin originally pointed out that there is something about infants that prompts adults to respond to and to care for them, which allows our species to survive. Nobel-Prize-winning zoologist Konrad Lorenz proposed that it is the specific structure of the infant face, including a relatively large head and forehead, large and low-lying eyes and bulging cheek region, which serves to elicit these parental responses. But the biological basis for this has remained elusive.

Using a neuroimaging method called magnetoencephalography (MEG), at Aston University, UK, the research team found a key difference in early brain activity of normal adults when they viewed infant faces compared to adult faces. A wave of activity occurred within a seventh of a second upon presentation of an infant image, was to fast to be controlled by conscious mind, so therefore deduced to be instinctive.

The clinical application of this research is in the area of post-partum depression. There is evidence linking depression to the nearby subgenual cingulated cortex, which is strongly connected with the medial orbitofrontal cortex. This lends support to the possibility that changes to activity in the medial orbitofrontal cortex, secondary to depression may adversely affect parental responsivity. Postpartum depression occurs in approximately 13 percent of mothers after birth. The present findings could eventually provide opportunities for early identification of families at risk.
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Photo credits: mother & baby, aldomurrillo-iStockphoto.com; loving family, dolgachev-iStockphoto.com
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Disclaimer: The purpose of this weblog is not to dispense medical advice nor in any way is meant to be construed as diagnostic or prescriptive. Always check with your physician before beginning any new program or trying any of the items discussed in the posts that appear on this site.

COFFEE AS A HEALTH DRINK?

I guess by now just about all of us have been exposed to the concept that coffee is no longer the guilt-causing beverage it used to be. When I was younger I suffered from fibrocystic breast lumps. They were quite uncomfortable, not to mention a little disconcerting, so I took myself off to the doctor for a breast cancer screening, only to be told that those aching little buggers were nothing to worry about, but that I should cut back on my coffee drinking and wear nice tight, binding bras with plenty of support.

No problem on the latter, but on the former dictum I dragged my feet. One of my most basic daily pleasures is a good cuppa java first thing in the morning and then again several times throughout the day when I felt like rewarding or comforting myself. So I continued to enjoy my vice in secret … at least secret from my MD.

Now, as is often the case, I find that my instincts were working just fine and that coffee is actually a health drink rather than the baddy it had been made out to be in the past. Science has discovered recently that coffee is loaded with antioxidants and just two cups a day can translate into 25 percent reduced risk of colon cancer, 80 percent drop in liver cirrhosis risk and around 50 percent risk of gallstones.

“Overall, the research shows that coffee is far more healthful than it is harmful,” says Tomas DePaulis, PhD, research scientist at Vanderbilt University’s Institute for Coffee Studies, which conducts its own medical research and tracks coffee studies from around the world. “For most people, very little bad comes from drinking it, but a lot of good.”

Harvard researchers calculate that men slash their risk of developing diabetes by 54 percent and women by 30 percent if they can manage to drink six cups of coffee a day. But that’s a bit much for even me, the veteran coffee drinker. There is some evidence that coffee may help manage asthma and even control attacks when medication is unavailable, stop a headache (Here! Here!), boost mood and even prevent cavities (hmmmm).

So what is it in coffee that can have such a beneficial effect? Caffeine? Antioxidants (which, by the way, become more potent during the roasting process)? Or other mysterious properties? In a word, “yes” to all of the above. As a matter of fact, Parkinson’s drugs that contain a derivative of caffeine are in the developmental stage. Excedrin and Anacin both contain 120 milligrams of caffeine … what you would get in a good-sized cuppa.

STIMULANT
Anyone who has had to burn the midnight oil knows that a good strong cup of coffee chases away the cobwebs and helps keep us going when the stakes are high. Professional athletes have found that coffee is beneficial when they push themselves to better their stats. “What caffeine likely does is stimulate the brain and nervous system to do things differently,” says Terry Graham, PhD, of the University of Guelph in Canada. “That may include signaling you to ignore fatigue or recruit extra units of muscle for intense athletic performance. Caffeine may even have a direct effect on muscles themselves, causing them to produce a stronger contraction. But what’s amazing about it is that unlike performance-enhancing manipulation some athletes do that are specific for strength or sprinting or endurance, studies show that caffeine positively enhances all of these things.”

CHILDREN & COFFEE
“A recent study from Brazil found that children who drink coffee with milk every day are less likely to have depression than other children,” says DePaulis. “In fact, no studies show that coffee in reasonable amounts is in any way harmful to children.”

ANTIOXIDANTS IN COFFEE
Coffee contains a lot of other benefits besides caffeine, however. “Coffee is loaded with antioxidants, including a group of compounds called quinines that when administered to lab rats, increases their insulin sensitivity,” says Graham, who has studied the effects of caffeine and coffee for nearly two decades. Increased sensitivity improves the body’s response to insulin. And these same healthful antioxidants are available in decaffeinated coffee and tea too.

“We don’t know exactly why coffee is beneficial for diabetes,” says lead researcher Frank Hu, MD. “It is possible that both caffeine and other compounds play important roles. Coffee has large amounts of antioxidants such as chlorogenic acid, tocopherols, and minerals such as magnesium. All these components have been shown to improve insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism.”

COFFEE AS A DENTAL PROTECTANT?
There is another compound called trigonelline, which gives coffee its aroma and bitter taste, that Italian researchers tell us contains antibacterial and anti-adhesive properties, thereby helping prevent dental cavities from forming.

THE CAVEATS
There are some cases where coffee should be avoided. There are some people who don’t tolerate coffee well. How much is too much? Whatever your individual body cannot tolerate. If you begin to suffer from nervousness, hand trembling and rapid heartbeat, it’s a good idea to drink decaf, tea or cut back altogether. Coffee may also raise cholesterol levels in some people and may contribute to artery clogging. The most common groups of people usually advised to limit or avoid coffee are pregnant women, heart patients and those at risk for osteoporosis.

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Disclaimer: The purpose of this weblog is not to dispense medical advice nor in any way is meant to be construed as diagnostic or prescriptive. Always check with your physician before beginning any new program or trying any of the items discussed in the posts that appear on this site.

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Photo credits: Costa Rican coffee fields-Martin Harrison, iStockphoto.com; coffee machine-Nikolai Okhitin, LuckyOliver.com; cowboy-DaydreamGirl, iStockphoto.com; woman with cup-LuckyOliver.com
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WATCH FOR MY NEW BOOK

OUT IN FEBRUARY 2008

VONNIES HEALTH SPOT
VOLUME ONE

CHILDHOOD OBESITY SEEMS TO BE RAMPANT

It doesn’t take a scientific genius to figure it out. Just look around you. Whether you’re hanging at a mall or strolling past a school playground, you will notice there seem to be a lot more pudgy kids running around lately. But science likes to measure things, and the prevalence of obesity—both childhood and adult—has captured the attention of many scientific investigators; they are finding that causes of obesity are complex and myriad. The following appeared in Survival of the Sickest by Dr. Sharon Moalem with Jonathan Prince.

“One-third of American children are overweight or obese—that’s 25 million kids. In the last thirty years, the percentage of obese two-to five-year-olds has doubled—and the percentage of obese six- to eleven-year-olds has tripled. A baby girl born in 2000 now has a 40 percent chance—almost a coin toss—of developing Type 2 diabetes, and that’s directly related to the huge surge in heavy kids.

“What’s even sadder is that many of these children are showing symptoms of obesity-related illness while they’re still kids. One recent study showed that about 60 percent of obese five- to ten-year-olds already exhibited at least one major risk factor for heart disease—high cholesterol, high blood pressure, high triglycerides, or high sugar levels. Of those kids 25 percent had more than one risk factor. A 2005 report in The New England Journal of Medicine said that the epidemic of childhood obesity is the critical element in a gathering storm that could produce the first modern decline in American life expectancy—dropping life expectancy as much as five[!] years.

“There’s no question that gallons of sugary soda, baskets of fatty fries, and too many hours watching television and playing video games instead of after-school sports is a fattening combo. But new research suggests that may not be the whole story.

“There is emerging evidence that the dietary habits of parents, especially women in the earliest stage of pregnancy, may have an impact on the metabolism of their children. In other words, if you’re trying to get pregnant, you really should think twice before you bite that Big Mac—once for your own waistline and once for your potential child’s.

“Before you get the wrong idea, this isn’t to suggest some strictly Larmarckian idea that a fat parent is going to have a fat child because the child will inherit the weight problem his or her parent acquired. But this is to say that new research is rapidly changing our understanding of how, when, and whether genes express themselves—that is, how, when, and whether the instructions in a gene are carried out. A series of groundbreaking research over the last five year has shown that certain compounds can attach themselves to specific genes and suppress their expression. These compounds act like a genetic light switch, essentially turning off the genes they attach to. And—here’s where it gets really interesting—the research shows that environmental factors, like the food we eat or the cigarettes we smoke, can flick the switch on or off.

“This research is changing the whole field of genetics—it’s even launched a subdiscipline called epigenetics. Epigenetics is concerned with the study of how children can inherit and express seemingly new traits from their parents without changes in the underlying DNA. In other words, the instructions are the same, but something else overrides them.

“Being a gene isn’t all that it was cracked up to be anymore.”

Dr. Moalem published the foregoing in early 2007. The application here is for people of childbearing age who plan on procreating to improve their dietary habits and get some exercise as  ways of keeping the human race of the future healthy and strong. The future, in many ways, depends on the lifestyle choices we make today. For those who have no plans for bringing new life into being, it is still good advice for their own healthy longevity.

Click on the amazon.com logo in the sidebar if you would like to read more of  Dr. Sharon Moalem's fascinating book. __________________________________________________________________________________________

Disclaimer: The purpose of this weblog is not to dispense medical advice nor in any way is meant to be construed as diagnostic or prescriptive. Always check with your physician before beginning any new program or trying any of the items discussed in the posts that appear on this site.

DENTAL HEALTH MEANS MORE THAN JUST A BEAUTIFUL SMILE

 One thing most of us have in common is that we want to look and feel our best! Whether it’s a new hairstyle, time set aside for the gym or new clothes, the intent is the same ... to maintain self-esteem. And an important part of self-esteem is having great-looking pearly whites! But there are more important reasons to keep your teeth and gums healthy than just good looks.

The New England Journal of Medicine reported that inflammation found in gum disease causes the liver to produce C-Reactive protein, which is an indicator for future heart problems. Diabetics with gum disease are in danger of higher mortality and pregnant women with a high level of periodontal bacteria in their mouths are at risk for delivering pre-term, low-weight babies, according to The Journal of Periodontology. Gum disease (periodontitis) can occur at any time, and by age 35, three out of four adults have some form of it. “The news about gum disease and its connection to our overall health continues to come up again and again in research and medicine,” says Dr. Chris Kammer, DDS www.aboutcosmeticdentistry.com. “It’s time to get serious about the disease that most Americans still do not take seriously.”

There are two stages of gum disease, gingivitis and periodontitis:

• The first, gingivitis, is an inflammation of the gums caused by bacteria in plaque (the sticky stuff you feel on your teeth when you haven’t brushed for awhile). If plaque is not removed every day, it builds up and hardens into calculus (also called tartar), which causes the gums to become red, swollen and to bleed when brushed.
• If left untreated, gingivitis progresses into periodontitis, an infection caused by toxins and volatile sulfur compounds that come from the bacteria living in the calculus surrounding the teeth. The toxins begin to destroy the gum and bone that support the teeth, and will continue insidiously and painlessly until treated or the teeth fall out.

Gingivitis and periodontitis can be prevented easily by regular visits to your dentist followed by proper and consistent flossing and brushing at home. Experts recommend brushing and flossing at least twice a day and no more than three times. Use a soft-bristle brush and  hold it as you would a pen to help avoid the tendency to brush too hard, which can make the gums begin to recede over time. Using an electric toothbrush removes plaque more efficiently. And brushing for at least two minutes at a session is also advised, so turn on your favorite tune and brush until it ends, or buy an electric brush with a built-in timer. Check out www.colgate.com or www.mayoclinic.com/dental for more tips on proper technique.

“Just as you must exercise your body to keep it in shape, you must exercise your gums to keep them healthy. You do that best by brushing and especially flossing. You don’t have to floss all of your teeth, just the ones you want to keep,” says my friend Myron Bromberg, DDS with a smile.

For more information click on www.ada.org or www.kidshealth.org.