Protect Vision with Leafy Greens

It is found that people who eat at least two servings of leafy greens, such as collard greens and spinach, are 46 percent less likely to develop macular degeneration. Even though carrots have been considered helpful at maintaining vision, leafy vegetables are more important at keeping eyes healthy.

Leafy greens contain lutein and zeaxanthin, which are two carotenoids that are good at helping the eyes to absorb short wavelength light and to protect the retina. They may also help to reduce discomfort from glare, enhance contrast, reduce photostress recovery time, and increase visual range. The American Optometric Association recommends ten milligrams of lutein per day. Leafy greens also contain beta-carotene, which reduces the possibility of developing serious cataracts by 39 percent.

Cure Colds with Echinacea

Echinacea is a herb that can reduce cold and flu symptoms, such as coughs, fever, and sore throat. It is good at shortening the duration and severity of cold and flu symptoms. It was commonly used by the North American Plains Indians for its general medicinal properties and has been used thought history to treat infections, wounds, scarlet fever, syphilis, malaria, blood poisoning, and diphtheria. It works by stimulating the body's immune system to fight infections. A study done by the University of Connecticut has shown that it can cut the chances of catching a cold by more than half and cut the duration of a cold by 1.4 days. It is recommended to get 3 grams daily in tincture or capsule form starting at the first sign of symptoms.

Pediatricians Double Vitamin D Recommendation

The American Academy of Pediatrics has doubled its recommendation for the daily dose of vitamin D that children should take to try to prevent diseases, such as rickets, and they say that this decision could have life-long benefits. It is now recommended that children receive 400 international units of vitamin D per day, starting in the few days of their life.

Not getting enough vitamin D can result in the disease rickets, which causes bone-softening, stunted growth, and skeletal deformities if it is not corrected while the child is young. Babies that are breast-fed have a big risk of being vitamin D deficient but these babies can be given supplements of the vitamin.

Good sources of vitamin D include exposure to sunlight, vitamin D fortified milk, fortified cereals, tuna, mackerel, and sardines.

Hospitals Offering Clinical Trials Could Be Better

American and Canadian researchers have found that hospitals that practice drug and device studies could be better at dealing with life-threatening situations and they have lower patient death rates than hospitals that don’t do clinical trials. There was another study done that found that ovarian cancer patients at these types of hospitals have a 28 percent lower mortality rate.

Get a List of Hospitals that Offer Clinical Trials at: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov

Grapefruit Increases Cancer Risk

A recent study found that women who ate half of a grapefruit every other day had a 30 percent increase of breast cancer risk when compared to women who didn’t eat the fruit. Grapefruit contains the chemical compound furanocoumarins that inhibits the way that estrogen is metabolized. This leads to a higher concentration of estrogen, which increases the risk of breast cancer.

It is recommended that post menopausal women that consume grapefruit regularly and women that have had estrogen-receptor-positive cancer should not eat this fruit. The American Cancer Society recommends eating five servings of a variety of fruits and vegetables each day to limit the exposure to possibly harmful substances from a single food.

Cocaine Could Cause Heart Attack Symptoms

The American Heart Association is warning doctors that younger ER patients with heart attack symptoms should be asked if they had recently used cocaine. Some heart attack treatments can be deadly to a person that is using cocaine. Symptoms of a heart attack in younger people that don’t have a heart disease risk could be caused by cocaine use.

Cocaine can cause chest pains, shortness of breath, anxiety, palpations, dizziness, nausea, and heavy sweating, which are all symptoms of a heart attack. Cocaine use can cause a heart attack but that only happens in 1 to 6 percent of people with chest pain caused by cocaine. It is important for anybody that has chest pains for any reason to get it checked out. Cocaine works by increasing blood pressure and heart rate. It also constricts the arteries into the heart. The heart rate would go up because the heart would need more oxygen and arteries that go to the heart would shrink.

Cocaine users that go to the hospital due to chest pains should be given an electrocardiogram and other tests to rule out a heart attack. They should be monitored and not admitted to the hospital as having a heart attack. Users with chest pains should not be treated with clot busting drugs because they have a risk of bleeding into the brain in people with high blood pressure. Betablockers should be avoided because they would raise blood pressure and squeeze arteries that are already narrowed by the cocaine. It is recommended that cocaine users that have a coronary artery blockage get a bare metal stent instead of a drug-coated one since drug users may not take the medication as needed to prevent new blockages.