Dr. Chet’s Health Memos
If it’s in the health news today, I’ll be writing about it as soon as I read the research, both old and new. With my email Health Memos, you’ll know more about making lifestyle choices that will help you get and keep good health. These free, concise updates on health are emailed to subscribers twice a week. Subscribe today and get a free MP3, in English or Spanish, of Dr. Chet’s Top Ten Tips—Small Changes for a Healthier Life.
Shhhh… It’s a Secret!
If your house is as busy as ours, you probably don’t mind that today’s Memo is very short. Here’s the deal: the next Memo will come Friday instead of Saturday and will include a freebie just for subscribers, whether you’re on the Nice list or the Naughty list. Stay tuned to see exactly what’s to […]
Lifestyle, Activity, and Aging
Here’s the question: if the subjects with the highest leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) lived longer, why did those subjects age faster based on the tests used in the study? The answer is complicated. Exercise and Longevity The researchers analyzed the data several ways. In the first analysis, they adjusted the data for sex, age, and […]
How Exercise Affects Aging
If a headline says, “exercise could make you age faster,” you know I absolutely must read it. There were a variety of commentaries on an unpublished study by Scandinavian researchers who won the Finnish national sports medicine prize; an advanced copy was published in PUBMED. Researchers used data collected from an ongoing twins study with […]
Anticipate Change
Adapt. Innovate. Improvise. Overcome. That’s a group of words I put together years ago about how to respond when faced with challenges. The approach works in the present. When it comes to changes in health that are associated with aging, we don’t know exactly what they will be. Therefore, we must anticipate what might happen. […]
Life Is Change
Do you ever think about your life in five or ten years or even longer? Doesn’t matter how old you are today, whether you’re 30 or 70. What will your life be like? Let me define it more clearly for you with this example. After Thanksgiving, Paula began setting up the Christmas tree. As she […]
Yes, the Nutrients Are There
My question is whether you get any nutrients besides sugar and fat from those marshmallow-covered yams or the green beans swimming in condensed mushroom soup and topped with fried onions from a can. The research on cooking techniques and retention of vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients in vegetables and fruits is not extensive but overall, the […]
Nutrients in Holiday Foods
I hope you had a great Thanksgiving. With all the traditional and maybe not-so-traditional foods associated with the holidays, did you wonder how you fared from a nutrient perspective? We had a few of those foods that make you wonder: cheesy grits, corn pudding, and cranberry chutney to go along with the turkey. And don’t […]
Fiber: Food or Supplements?
We don’t seem to eat enough whole or minimally processed plant foods, so the researchers were trying to discover whether getting fiber, especially insoluble fiber, was better from plant material or whether taking fiber in supplement form would suffice. Researchers approached the question from the perspective of other beneficial nutrients that might be found in […]
Natural Fiber vs. Added Fiber
In a recent paper, researchers reviewed the literature to see whether there are benefits to eating more plant foods or whether adding insoluble fiber to processed foods would be an adequate substitute. But first, a review. The Recommended Dietary Intake of fiber is 25–35 grams per day; American adults eat only 10–15 grams per day. […]
How Can Vaccinations Reduce Alzheimer’s Disease?
In reading possible explanations for the potential benefits of flu vaccinations for reducing the risk of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), it always comes back to reducing inflammation. Further, it isn’t just the flu vaccine that seems to have that effect. Pneumonia, DTAP booster, shingles, and others have also been studied with similar results: vaccinations seem to […]
