| About the Author |
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Along with bringing the latest news and trends about alternative health, Bob will help you get the most of your Internet health research. Bob is the Living Well Columnist for the Seattle Post- Intelligencer. He covers health and quality of life for the Hearst-owned newspaper and writes regularly for national magazines. He is a former syndicated health columnist for the Chicago Tribune twice nominated for the Pulitzer Prize and author of six books, including “The Good Mood Diet” and “Your Prostate Cancer Survivors’ Guide.” His articles have appeared in Life, Esquire, Parade, Self, Outside and Shape among national magazines. He lives in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and two 11-year-old kids. |
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| Friday, August 29, 2008 |
| Pine Bark Extract Reduces Pain and Stiffness of Arthritis |
There is a pine tree that grows along European coastlines that appears to represent more than just another entry in the world’s botanical catalog. Pine bark extract from the Landes tree, also called the maritime pine, has been the subject this decade of several positive studies related to reducing high blood pressure.
Earlier this year, the maritime pine bark extract was linked to significantly easing arthritis pain and stiffness. The study was performed by Italian researcher Dr. Gianni Belcaro at Chieti-Pescara University. One particular version of pine bark extract has been patented as a registered drug by a French scientist and brand-named Pycnogenol (pronounced “pick-nah-jenn-all)
Pine bark extract was first discovered some 450 years ago by explorers who were suffering from scurvy, the vitamin C deficiency. They decided to make tea brewed from the pine bark and needles of the Landes tree. That plant-centric notion of medicine, quite common in those days, has found confirmation in European researchers who have connected pine bark extract to a group of antioxidants known as OPCs or oligomeric proanthocyanidins. OPCs are believed to fight against the buildup of plaque and cholesterol in the blood vessels, and can also be found in red wine and grape seed extract.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, arthritis |
posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 2:07 PM  |
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| Thursday, August 28, 2008 |
| More Stress and the Single Life |
Picking up from Tuesday’s post, let’s take a few more looks at Stress and the Single Life. As a psychology professor at Loyola University in Chicago, Maryse Richards has intensely studied the family dynamic. What she has found time and again is that married women who work are under considerably more stress than married men who work.
OK, you can stop nodding your heads now or saying, “well, duh, who is this blogger guy, anyway?” While you might find women who anecdotally say they feel more stress than their husbands or male live-in partners, whether the couple has kids or not, Richards found a distinct pattern throughout a number of studies. Here’s the basic finding: When men come home from a day’s work, home seems to them a place of relaxation and decompressing. When a woman arrives at the house or apartment, she’s typically more stressed during the evening and even weekend hours focused on such household matters as what’s for dinner, how to keep the place clean, who needs to be where when.
Remember this holds for whether those two-job couples have kids or not, and it doesn’t matter what age the kids might be. Even social calendars can be stressful, and we all know women handle those details, sometimes because they like that control and other times because Mr. Hubby Man over there isn’t about to go anywhere by choice except to the video store on Friday nights.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, relationships, stress |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 8:14 AM |
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| Wednesday, August 27, 2008 |
| Stress and the Single Life |
Married people live longer than never married or divorce adults. That’s a fact from decades of health research.
This finding has always been puzzling to those people among us who are steadfastly single—along with the happily divorced and unhappily married. The single life offers would-be health perks to all three demographic groups, such as doing what you want with your free time, deciding how clean (or not so clean) your home needs to be and a diminished amount of conflict in intimate relationships.
Of course, there are arguments in favor of marriage, such as more access to health care. Female partners are highly persuasive about getting husbands and significant others to the doctor/chiropractor/nutritionist/massage therapist/etc. Companionship reduces depression, alcohol abuse or both. There are more pluses, such as the finding that married individuals tend to have lower blood pressure than singles and the widowed.
But that’s digressing.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor, relationships, stress |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:51 AM |
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| Yoga Can Ease Hot Flashes and Sleep Problems of Menopause |
There are many healthy reasons to develop your own yoga practice or daily habit of poses (start with the daily sun salutation sequence and you will be motivated to do more). Yoga is a simply a fave here at the Alternative Health Blog.
And here’s one more reason to put the to-do checkmark next to yoga. A new study from India researchers indicates that regular yoga sessions can reduce hot flashes, night sweats and overall sleep disruption among women going through menopause. Even better, the yoga habit improves mental function and clarity—at a time when some women contend such cognitive acuity is most difficult.
The study, published in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, randomly divided 120 women experiencing menopause into two groups. The control group completed basic stretching and strengthening exercises five days a week over two months while the experimental group undertook yoga practices that focused on “slowing down the rate of flow of thoughts in the mind.”
Think about that for a minute... slowing down the rate of flow of thought in the mind. Sounds like something we all can use.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor, menopause, yoga |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:50 AM |
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| Discover How to Use the Internet for Your Optimal Health |
Eighty percent of American adults have searched the Internet for health purposes. Our mission here at AHJ is make easier for all of us to become companions who walk and talk together toward better health. That 80 percent statistic from the Pew Internet & American Life Project has remained steady since the Pew Foundation first developed the research in 2003. It won’t surprise you to know the top five topics/reasons for searching are, from No. 1 to No. 5, a specific disease, a specific medical treatment, diet/nutrition/supplements, exercise and prescription drugs.
Where it becomes instructive is in the Pew findings that only 15 percent of Internet users looking up health info “always” take the trouble to check the source and date of the information. Another 10 percent responded that they check source and date “most of the time.” A full three-quarters of users, we’re talking 85 million people, say they “sometimes,” “almost never” or “never” make sure to check the source and date. So let’s cut to Guideline 1 to being a savvy user of the Internet for health and wellness...
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:48 AM |
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| Saturday, August 23, 2008 |
| Why Wine is Healthy For You – and When It's Not |
The reports of wine as beneficial to your health are long-standing and consistently positive—as long your definition of moderate aligns with the researcher’s version.
Carl Erickson, director of the Addiction Science Research and Education Center at the University of Texas in Austin, has developed an extensive and annotated website related to 300 alcohol facts. He has posted clear definitions of "moderate" and "social" drinking.
Moderate use of alcohol, he writes, has been defined by the Department of Agriculture (and other sources) as one to two drinks per day—one drink for women, two drinks for men. He points out that moderate drinking is associated with reduced risk for heart disease (and possibly to preventing diabetes and strokes), but that the "mechanism of the protective effect is unknown."
A note about what translates to one “drink”: five ounces of wine, 12 ounces of beer, 1.5 ounces. It’s pretty much an honor system for you to estimate personal alcohol consumption. Researchers know that most Americans tend to underreport their alcoholic drink consumption.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor, wine |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:49 AM |
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| Thursday, August 21, 2008 |
| There's Scientific Proof that Massage Therapy Reduces Pain |
One in every four American adults had a massage at least once in the past year. Among those massage clients 50 and older—Boomers—the frequency average seven visits to the massage therapist per year, while 18- to 44-year-olds average five per 12 months.
Of those Americans who see a massage therapist, 87 percent agree massage can be effective for reducing pain and nearly as many see it as a contributor to health and wellenss. The whole “luxury item” or “pampering” notions? Uh, rubbed out. A recent independent survey commissioned by the American Massage Therapy Association showed only one in 10 Americans sought out a massage therapist last year primarily because of the desire to be pampered.
Hearing that an alternative health therapy works for others—loved ones, friends, co-workers, the driver of your commuter bus—is powerful information for all of us interested in self-care. But massage therapy also has a strong foundation of research studies to help determine its value.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor, massage therapy |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:46 AM |
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| Tuesday, August 19, 2008 |
| Discover Natural Pain Relief Without the Pills |
As founder and head trainer at the Athletes’ Performance Institute in Phoenix, Mark Verstegen sends clients home from exhausting workouts Monday through Saturday with one essential and common item: The Original Body Stick. All of the elite athletes who train here for upcoming seasons in pro football, major league baseball and international-caliber soccer are encouraged to pack the self-massage tool in their workout bags.
Verstegen and his other trainers instructs his clients to use the Body Stick on the muscles exercised that day—the quadriceps in the front of the thigh, hamstrings in the back, abdominals, shoulders, whatever was pushed to the limit. The Body Stick is about two feet long with ergonomic handles that you grip to roll the center of the stick (a plastic covering with spindles or bumps that massage the muscles) back and forth.
“Just a few minutes a day can decrease your soreness and pain levels, especially after a workout or any strenuous physical activity,” says Gary Robbins, who oversees all cardiovascular training at Athletes’ Performance. “It helps move lactic acid out of the muscles.”
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:45 AM |
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| Monday, August 18, 2008 |
| Coffee Might Help Win Gold Medals in Beijing |
The Summer Olympics in Beijing are no doubt a caffeinated event. No, not for the spectators in the stands or those of us trying to stay up late enough to watch the prime-time gold medal competition. It's the athletes themselves who are making sure to get enough coffee or caffeinated sports drinks before they go for the gold.
When the World Anti-Doping agency removed caffeine from its list of banned substance in 2004, that allowed Olympians to see how coffee and caffeine drinks fit into their training regimens.
Espresso, anyone? Australian sports official and physician Dr. Peter Larkins said there is a distinct increase in caffeine use by his country’s athletes. He and others have no doubts Americans and Europeans are following suit.
"Caffeine acts to make you more alert, keep you more awake, increases your blood pressure and increases your heart rate and it does tend to offset fatigue – all the things that an athlete would like to have,” says Larkins.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor, caffeine |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:43 AM |
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| Saturday, August 16, 2008 |
| Supplement Strategy: Alpha Lipoic Acid Prevents Heart Disease, Alzheimer's |
The dietary supplement aisles at your local health store is like a “street of dreams” from a classic novel or movie. Some stops on the aisle are bona fide for helping your feel better. Others are more mirage than substance. Put alpha lipoic acid in the bona fide basket.
The naturally occurring nutrient found in low levels in green leafy vegetables, meat and potatoes—how’s that for reaching across food habits?—is getting plenty of positive attention from researchers. Just this year, alpha lipoic acid (also called ALA or lipoic acid) has been associated with improved heart health, Alzheimer’s protection, anti-inflammatory actions and promoting weight gain.
Impressive, and reason enough to learn more about the supplement form.
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, Alzheimer's disease, bob condor, dietary supplements, heart disesase |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:41 AM |
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| Friday, August 15, 2008 |
| Secret to Taking Fewer Drugs: Talk to Your Doctor about Alternative Therapies |
The government knows about it, but a lot of doctors apparently do not. What are we talking about?
That nearly two-thirds of all Americans 50 and older use complementary or alternative medicine therapies. But most of them—77 percent—don’t tell their doctors about it. The data arrives on the Alternative Health Blog’s virtual doorstep from a survey conducted by two big-name organizations, AARP (the org that changed to acronym only because the “retired persons” thing isn’t all that relevant anymore) and the federal National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (the once Office of Alternative Medicine that has expanded into a larger and more influential “center” at the National Institutes for Health).
What makes the results doubly insightful is that Americans at Boomer age and above not only use alternative therapies most frequently compared to other demographic slices, but they stay quiet about it in the highest percentages.
Let’s talk about that, shall we?
Continue reading...Labels: alternative health, alternative medicine, bob condor |
| posted by Alternative Health Journal Blog @ 11:09 AM |
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