If you love me, don’t feed me bacon
A friend reckons he has it good. His partner cooks a bacon-hash-brown-fry-up for breakfast every day. “Are you sure?” I said. “Cause that’s exactly what I would feed my partner if I wanted to bump him off!” It is easy to fall into the trap of giving people you love lots of ultra-processed, high-kilojoule, nutrient-poor foods because they like them. But immediate pleasure comes at a cost. When the food your loved ones eat is of poor nutritional quality, their odds of developin
Rugby damaged my brain
There has been serious attention paid to concussion in sport recently. Rugby has received a lot of this attention in New Zealand. As the game has evolved the athletes have become larger, stronger and faster. I would estimate that professional athletes are now at least 10kg bigger than when I entered the professional game in 1996. Rule amendments have resulted in the game becoming faster and the contact intensity has magnified. The recent focus on concussion within sport has b
How to cut your chances of getting cancer
Reseach claims that making changes to our lifestyles could prevent 40 per cent of cancers from ever occuring. According to medical journalist Anna Magee, there are eight things you can do to start lowering your risk. Writing for Healthista, Magee details simple changes, from wearing SPF30 sunscreen to eating yoghurt, that will help lower the odds of developing the disease. Here's how you can reduce your odds through basic changes to your lifestyle>>
Wearables market up 26 percent since last year, with Fitbit, Xiaomi and Apple leading the pack
The global wearables market is continuing to grow, with 22.5 million devices shipped in the second quarter of 2016 alone, according to a new tracking report by the International Data Corporation (IDC). Top companies in the sector are Fitbit, Garmin, Apple and the Chinese company Xiaomi. In the past year, the overall market has grown 26.1 percent, but the different categories of the industry are moving at “different speeds and directions,” analysts write. Read More>>
Here's Why Social Media Harms Your Teen's Mental Health
The utilization of social media such as Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat has increased dramatically in recent years. This has become especially intense among adolescents and young adults. A recent Ontario study indicates that 80 per cent of young people use social media on a daily basis, with almost 50 per cent using it for over two hours per day. What is the impact of social media usage on the mental health of young people? This is a pressing question for psychiatric researc
Finally, hope for a young patient
That night in the fall of 2009 was a new low in the course of Brenden’s disease, a rare immune disorder called chronic granulomatous disease, or CGD. The condition affects a key component of the immune system, a type of white blood cell called a neutrophil that engulfs and kills invading bacteria and fungi. Since his diagnosis as a baby, Brenden had taken regular preventive antibiotics to fight off infections before they started, gotten thrice-weekly interferon shots to boost
Donald Trump releases medical-exam summary to ‘Dr. Oz,’ goes through ‘full review of systems’
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump handed over a recent health summary during an interview on “The Dr. Oz Show” Wednesday morning, according to the show. The document was based on an examination performed last week by Dr. Harold Bornstein, Trump’s longtime physician who predicted the candidate would be the “healthiest individual ever elected” in an assessment last year. The contents of the records were not immediately revealed by the campaign, though the show was sc
Virtual Health Care: The Future Of Telemedicine
Dr. Edward Brown, CEO of the Ontario Telemedicine Network (OTN), believes the future of medicine is really here. But it's just one piece of the puzzle. As the co-chair of the Digital Home Conference at HealthAchieve, Dr. Brown will look at the integration of virtual care into the home and its impact on overall health and well-being across the care continuum. Here is a snapshot from Dr. Brown of some of the aspects that will be discussed amongst health professionals from acros
6 Heart-Healthy Dinner Time Savers
Going back to the school and work routine after the summer holidays can be both exciting and exhausting. Dinner can easily become an afterthought during this busy transition time, but it's important to keep your energy up! Skip the drive-thru and try these heart-healthy tips to speed up your weeknight dinner prep time here>>
IS THE PAIN OF HIGH-INTENSITY INTERVALS WORTH THE GAIN?
High-intensity interval training can enhance fitness, improve health and even aid recovery from heart disease, according to a growing body of compelling evidence. But, experts caution, intervals should not replace moderate exercise completely. Instead, the two types of activity can complement each other, offering more opportunities for getting fit and staying motivated. “The more exercise options we can give to people is a good strategy,” says Martin Gibala, an exercise physi