I Received an Email from an M.D. for whom I have a great deal of admiration. I thought I would share it with you here. The disease that we discuss here is recognized as one that creates a great deal of stress for caregiver and victim alike. here is what Dr. Al Sears wrote in his email.

“Today I want to talk to you about stress.

When you feel stressed, your body produces a hormone called cortisol. In the right amounts, cortisol isn’t harmful to your body. But when your body makes too much cortisol, it can be extremely toxic.

Too much cortisol can affect your brain cells. It’s what causes mental haziness, forgetfulness, and confusion associated with being stressed. And it can also reduce bone density and increases the loss of vital muscle mass.

To keep excess cortisone under control, many doctors give their patients prescription meds. But these drugs have harmful side effects and can easily lead to addiction if the patient isn’t careful.

That’s why I recommend simple, natural ways to help my patients reduce their stress and cortisol levels. Some of the most effective ones include:

• Taking a deep breath. Breathing techniques can help calm your body and release stress. I often recommend these techniques to my patients. They’re simple to do, and can be quite effective.

  One of the most effective is cadence breathing. First, clear your mind. Then breathe in to a count of four, hold your breath to a count of seven, and exhale to a count of eight.

  While you are doing this, focus your attention on your breathing. Think about your breath and exclude other thoughts. Observe how long it takes you to inhale and exhale. Make sure you’ve inhaled fully, using your abdomen and lungs. Then, push out all of your breath slowly and fully. After you’ve completed these exercises, take a second and record how you feel. Most likely, you’ll feel calmer and ready to handle whatever you have in front of you.

• Eating the right foods. Eat foods rich in protein and omega-3. Wild-caught fish, grass-fed beef, free-farmed organic poultry, nuts, olives, eggs and avocados will do the trick. Avoid processed foods and get your carbohydrates mainly from locally grown, organic vegetables and fruits.

• Doing your favorite things. Everyone has an activity or two that relaxes them and lets them forget about their worries. It could be golfing, painting, gardening or visiting a special place. Set aside time for your favorite things and do them more often.

Another way to combat stress and slow the aging process is to promote production of neurochemicals by “exercising” your brain. “

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Important Brain Nutrient Info from M.D.

Today I received an email with reminding about a several important  nutrients for the brain. The email was from Dr. Al Sears M.D.. Dr Sears marches to his own beat and is often cutting edge in his advice especially in the matter of nutrition for optimum health. Brain nutrition is of course the area of his advise that most interest peolple who read this blog. I believe that it is never too late to start treating the brain optimally in a nutritional sense. Here is Dr Sears email to me and others:

Do you find yourself forgetting where you left your car keys… or just feel like your brain is in a fog sometimes?

Contrary to popular belief, forgetfulness is not just a normal part of growing older. As you age, your brain loses critical nutrients that it needs to fire on all cylinders.

If your mental spark plugs aren’t firing like they used to, don’t worry. I’ll show you how to get your brain’s engine back to running as smooth as a Rolls Royce. You just need to know what’s missing and how to get it.

Your brain uses chemicals called neurotransmitters to transmit messages in the brain. There are millions of these messages happening every second. Neurotransmitters are conductors of these messages, allowing them to fire from one part of your brain to another.

One important neurotransmitter is acetylcholine (ACh). Your body uses ACh to help regulate your heart, breathing, and sleep. Your body even uses it to control your muscles and keep you fired up for the bedroom.

Here’s the thing… your brain needs you to supply certain nutrients to make neurotransmitters.

But there’s a key nutrient it uses to make ACh that is probably missing from your diet. It’s called choline, and if you don’t get enough, you’re headed for trouble.

Choline is a necessary nutrient for overall brain health and functioning and it is important to avoid nutritional deficiencies to keep your brain sharp and healthy.

When you don’t give the body enough choline, the brain is forced to get it from other parts of your brain. It starts eating itself alive to get what it needs for vital functions like heart and lung regulation.

I’ll show you ways to get the choline your brain needs in a second, but first let me introduce you to choline’s partner – DMAE.

DMAE (Dimethylaminoethanol) works with choline to create ACh. In fact, it does such a good job, the FDA almost approved it as a drug. The only reason it didn’t happen is that the manufacturer didn’t want to pay the expenses to get it classified as one.

But it is the main ingredient in a commonly prescribed drug in Europe. Called Centrophenoxine, it has been shown to boost cognitive functions.2

Proper doses of DMAE are a safe and side-effect-free solution to support brain health and reduce age-related mental decline and mood/behavioral problems.3

To get the nutrition your brain needs to stay sharp and clear, you may need to combine food and supplementation. Here’s how to get your ACh cranking:

Choline – You need at least 425 mg a day as a woman, 550 mg if you’re a man. The richest food sources of choline are (in mg per 100 g of food):

Whole cooked eggs – 272. Make sure you get free-range eggs without antibiotics or hormones. They’ll help fuel your muscles as well as give you much-needed choline.

Raw egg yolks – 682. Go ahead and crack open a couple eggs into your protein shake. It’s only an urban legend that there’s danger in eating them raw.

Chicken liver – 290. Though some people get turned off by organ meats, they’re a potent source of high-powered nutrition. And it’s an old wives tale that they store toxins – they don’t.

Turkey liver – 220. Another great source of nutrition. Just like any liver, it also provides vitamin A, CoQ10 and iron.

Pork – 130. Just like beef, you want to eat organic, grass-fed animals only for the proper balance of fats and zero hormones and antibiotics.

If you’re older, you may need more – as much as 1500 mg a day. That may require supplementation. If you take a supplement, be sure it’s in the form of choline citrate. To try my brain-boosting formula that combines choline and DMAE, go here now.

DMAE – You need at least 35 mg of DMAE a day. Fish is a good food source, especially sardines and anchovies.

So stop starving your brain of these critical nutrients. They’re easy to replace and will help to promote a healthy mind into your golden years.

To you best health,

Dr Al Sears

This is good stuff from this thoughtful medical doctor and we thank him for his continuing work in the field of nutrition and our health especially nutrition for the brain.

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Increased Deaths with the Use of Alzheimer’s Drugs

I share with you today an email sent to me by William O. Douglass M.D. his concern is the alrming statistics related to the common use of big pharma alzheimer’s drugs. I offer this without comment as I believe Dr Douglass says it all with the help of study statistics:

Dear Friend,

Let me bring you up to speed on the use of anti-psychotic drugs used to treat dementia patients.

First of all, a 2006 study showed that Alzheimer’s patients who took these drugs had no significant improvement over placebos. We also know that these drugs can cause some serious side effects in Alzheimer’s patients, such as an increased risk of stroke and respiratory issues. And another study linked the use of "atypical" antipsychotic drugs to an increased risk of sudden cardiac death – even in younger patients.

Now a study shows that the anti-psychotic drugs that are commonly prescribed to treat Alzheimer’s could actually double a patient’s risk of dying within a few years. The lead author of this study, Clive Ballard of the Wolfson Centre for Age-Related Diseases at King’s College London, says that risk of death likely outweighs the benefit of these drugs.

Well, no kidding! I have yet to see anything good come from loading these helpless elderly people up on anti-psychotic drugs that were never even intended to be used in this way.

Ballard’s study tracked 165 Alzheimer’s patients aged 67 to 100. Half continued on their course of anti-psychotics, while the other half were took placebos.

At the end of two years, 71 percent of the placebo group were still alive – but only 46 percent of the group on anti-psychotics survived.

After three years, just 30 percent of those taking the anti-psychotics were alive, while 59 percent of the placebo group were still going strong.

Yet in spite of the increasing evidence of the dangers of these anti-psychotic drugs such as Risperdal, Thorazine, and Stelazine (as well as other derivatives like risperidone, quetiapine, and olanzapine), they racked up a staggering $14.5 billion in international sales in 2007. These are three of the top 10 best-selling drugs on the planet.

These drugs were never meant to be used long-term, yet as many as 60 percent of nursing home residents with dementia are placed on anti-psychotic regimens that last as long as two years.

William Thies of the Alzheimer’s Association said that "at some points, some people will be better off with no medication." I doubt that’s something that the Big Pharma companies that paid for this study will want to hear.

William Campbell Douglass II, M.D.
 

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Cognitive Decline In Your Future

Are symptoms of Alzheimers in your future asks today’s guest article writer:

Do you sometimes wonder if symptoms of dementia are in your future? You need to make some deposits in your brain reserve account.

In my former life as a banker one of my favorite quips was, ‘Money isn’t everything, but it’s way ahead of whatever is in second place.’

It’s nice to have money but you can’t buy health with money, as so many have discovered during their golden years. Good health has to be earned by making smart lifestyle choices. This of course is a lot easier said than done. For most of us this requires discipline and the moving of exercise nearer to the top of our To Do list.

The dividends accrued from these efforts are far greater and more lasting than the gains from financial investments, especially in the world we live in today.

They include dramatically better health and increased energy to live a vital, high quality independent life for a long, long time.

When it comes to heart health I have greater experience than most. It isn’t everyone who has enjoyed having their chest sawed open by a heart surgeon to stitch in bypasses to six of their favorite heart arteries.

I’ve known for a long time that physical and mental exercise are good for both my heart and brain, but it wasn’t until recently that I learned that my lifestyle changes have been making regular deposits into a brain reserve account.

It used to be thought that after age 20, brain cells (neurons) began to die and were never replaced. Declining function was inevitable.

Thankfully, this fallacy has since been proven wrong. Today’s researchers have proven that our brains can grow and evolve as long as we live.

Brain cells are ready and waiting to adapt to new challenges. You have the ability to keep symptoms of dementia at bay. Mental and physical exercise stimulates growth of new neurons and neuronal pathways and increases connectivity between neurons and between brain regions.

This growth and adaptation is known as cognitive reserve or brain reserve. It works somewhat like a money market account, storing up short and long-term brain functionality by increasing the efficiency of connections between neurons. And the dividends include a more powerful and quicker brain.

David Snowden eloquently described this in the 2003 landmark Nun Study. In this study, autopsies of the brains of nuns who lived well into their nineties or older were examined.

Snowden discovered that many of the nuns showed significant changes in brain structures and brain pathology usually associated with Alzheimer’s disease.

But in spite of the damage to their brain, they did not show any of the usual symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. Snowden concluded that continued mental exercising encouraged the development of new pathways that bypassed the diseased portions of the brain and preserved mental functioning into old age.

This is great news. My brain needs all the help it can get.

By: Gene Millen

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

Do you sometimes wonder if Alzheimer’s is in your future? Are there times when your "forgetter" outwits your memory? This site explores the latest research about brain fitness and shows you how to revitalize your memory, create new brain cells and keep Alzheimers at bay. www.BrainBeQuick.com

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Today I want to share an email I received from Dr Al Sears. I have a lot of respect for Dr Sears willingness to go outside the traditional medical box so to speak in his thinking. This is true especially in his approach to the nutritional aspect of health issues. In this missive he addresses the hazards of sticky proteins which are suspect as a cause of Alzheimer’s disease and a number of other diseases associated with aging. The prevention of Alzheimer’s is the challenge of researchers worldwide and we must take every opportunity to reduce the risks inherent in lifestyle choices that increase our chances of age related dementia. Keep in mind that there is no intention to offer medical advice in the pages of this website. We are just sharing with you information related to the causes, treatment and prevention of the disease in the hope that you will use this info to further educate yourself on the subject. Here is Dr Sears Email:

The Hidden Dangers of Cooking
Dear Member,

Before you cook that chicken breast to a perfect golden brown or caramelize those onions to add to your favorite dish, you may want to heed the latest research.

Browning your food – the cooking term is “caramelizing” – occurs when sugar molecules attach to protein.

Though your taste buds are enjoying the party, the rest of your body is paying the price.
When the sugar attaches to the protein, a series of other reactions occur called glycation that causes proteins to stick together. When proteins stick together, it is called “cross linking”. The official term for these cross-linked proteins is Advanced Glycation End products, or AGEs.

When these “sticky proteins,” or AGEs, build up, that’s when the real trouble begins. These AGEs can gather in any number of tissues in the body, and the basic result is that the tissue gets “stiffer”. When tissues get stiffer, they don’t work as they should.

AGEs have been associated with a number of diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, metabolic syndrome, arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease, and cancer.

Preventing the build up of AGEs may be an important factor in preventing many age-related diseases. Here are a few things you can do:

Avoid a diet heavy in foods that have been heated for prolonged periods of time, particularly meats, fats, and broiled foods. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat quality meat, just don’t overcook and prevent browning if possible. Cooking with water prevents caramelizing – like steaming or boiling.

AGEs can be inhaled through cigarette smoke.  As if you needed another reason to quit!
Here are some supplements that have been shown to slow down AGE formation:
Carnosine – An excellent overall antioxidant, carnosine hasbeen shown to prevent cross linking. Carnosine levels drop dramaticallywhen we age, so supplementation is a good idea, 100 – 200mg a day.

Pyridoxine (vitamin B6) – Has been shown to reduce AGE formation. Vitamin B6 is also a good antioxidant and helps with metabolism of carbohydrates. 300-500 mg a day.
Thiamine (vitamin B1) – Another good substance to slow down AGE formation. An important part of carbohydrate metabolism, vitamin B1 is also known to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. 1.5 mg a day.

An important note, high blood sugar levels can greatly increase cross linking and AGEs. So avoid a high sugar diet, or your sweet tooth may cost you more than an extra trip to the dentist.

To Your Good Health,

Al Sears MD

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Additional Risk Factors Associated with Alzheimer’s Disease

Here is an excerpt from a New York Times Article Alzheimer’s an in Depth Report which ran a while ago.It gave a good accounting of the disease we call Alzheimer’s disease including the iformation provided here in this segment.. This particular excerpt is in reference to what the article calls other risk factors in the development of Alzheimer’s disease:

"Lower Education and Economic Groups. A number of studies have reported either a higher risk for Alzheimer’s disease in people with less education or a lower risk for Alzheimer’s disease in those who remain mentally active. Some experts speculate that learning itself may stimulate more neurons to grow and thus create a larger reserve in the brain so that it takes longer for brain cells to be destroyed. Some evidence suggests that early malnutrition, which is more likely to occur in lower income and educational groups, has been associated with smaller brains and with Alzheimer’s disease in old age. Low-birth weight can cause problems in growth factors that could affect both mental and physical health later on in adulthood.

Small Head Size. The size of the skull is fixed by age 7. Brain size approximates the head size until old age, when it begins to shrink. Some evidence has reported an association between small head size (and therefore less brain volume) and Alzheimer’s disease, possibly because people who start with larger brains can sustain more injury over time. For example, a 2002 study indicated that it was reduction in overall brain volume, not specific regions, that contributed to mental impairment in older healthy adults. Another study reported that people who had small heads plus the ApoE4 gene had 14 times the risk for Alzheimer’s disease than those without this combination. Nevertheless, other studies have found no association between a small head size and Alzheimer’s disease.

Some experts suggest that the relationship observed in other research may simply be due to social and economic factors, such as malnutrition or low birth weight, which have been associated with both Alzheimer’s disease and small head size. Small head size independent of other factors, they argue, does not pose a higher risk for either Alzheimer’s disease or low intelligence

Depression. There is a significant overlap between depression and dementia in the elderly. In fact depression itself is often an early symptom of Alzheimer’s disease. In a 2002 study of Catholic nuns, for each of four depressive symptoms, the risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease increased by an additional 19%. For example, for a woman with four depressive symptoms the risk increased by 76%. Some evidence suggests that there may even be common genetic factors in people who have both early depression and Alzheimer’s disease.

Head Injury. Some studies have found an association between serious head injuries in early adulthood and the development of Alzheimer’s. It is not yet known if such injuries directly cause Alzheimer’s or simply accelerate the disease in people who are already susceptible to it.
In-Depth From A.D.A.M. Prevention

Although there is no strong evidence that any lifestyle change can prevent Alzheimer’s disease, studies suggest that certain behaviors may help protect against mental decline. In particular, medications and lifestyle choices that protect the heart may be of specific importance. Various preventive drugs are under investigation, including antioxidant and anti-inflammatory therapies.
Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs) as Prevention

In 2004, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) halted a large clinical trial that was investigating the use of anti-inflammatory drugs in preventing Alzheimer’s disease. While prior data had confirmed that NSAIDs were not effective in treating AD, research continued to explore these drugs’ potential preventive benefits.

The Alzheimer’s Disease Anti-Inflammatory Prevention Trial (ADAPT) was launched in 2001 to investigate whether long-term use of naproxen (Aleve) or celecoxib (Celebrex) could decrease the risk of developing AD. The trial was based on the premise that because inflammation is known to be involved in the process of Alzheimer’s disease, anti-inflammatory drugs may help to prevent it. The NIH suspended this trial due to evidence that the NSAID naproxen was associated with increased incidence of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular events among participants. No adverse effects appeared during this trial for the COX-2 inhibitor celecoxib. However, heart safety concerns about this drug had been raised in other trials, and investigators did not believe that celecoxib’s potential benefits outweighed its risks.

Since 2004, the ADAPT investigators have continued to monitor the trial’s participants to see if these treatments had any effect in changing their risk for Alzheimer’s. In an update analysis of ADAPT data published in 2007, the researchers announced that neither naproxen nor celecoxib appear to reduce the risk for Alzheimer’s."

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That Ginkgo Might Prevent Age Related Dementia, Alzheimer’s Appears Untrue

Here is a study that first came to my attention in the Healthday News last November I am finally sharing it here:

Gingko had created some high hopes in the botanical medicine area as useful in preventing and treating alzheimer’s disease and other age related dementia.

During the study period, 523 people developed dementia, and 92 percent of those cases were classified as possible or probable Alzheimer’s disease.

Healthday News 11/08

Although commonly taken to improve memory, new research suggests that the herb ginkgo biloba won’t help prevent dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease.

"We found that giving a standardized dose of ginkgo biloba over a period of time does not slow down the incidence rate of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease," said the study’s lead author, Dr. Steven DeKosky, who was chair of the department of neurology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Medical Center at the time of the study.

The findings were published in the Nov. 19 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease, currently affects about 5 million people in the United States, according to background information in the article. Dementia is a significant cause of age-related disability and the need for long-term nursing home care, the study reported.

There are currently no medications that have been approved for the primary prevention of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. However, previous small, short-term clinical trials have suggested there might be a small benefit from ginkgo for people with dementia. Sales of ginkgo biloba are almost $250 million each year in the United States, according to the study.

The current study included almost 3,100 community-dwelling adults aged 75 or older. Most had normal cognition at the start of the study, while 482 had mild cognitive impairment when the study began.

The study volunteers were randomly assigned to receive either a twice-daily dose of 120 milligrams of ginkgo biloba extract or a twice-daily placebo. The study participants were assessed for signs of dementia every six months, and the average length of study participation was just over six years.

During the study period, 523 people developed dementia, and 92 percent of those cases were classified as possible or probable Alzheimer’s disease.

Overall, the dementia rate for those taking ginkgo was 3.3 per 100 person-years of follow-up versus 2.9 per 100 person-years for the placebo group.

"If you’re in your 70s or 80s, and you’re contemplating taking ginkgo to prevent Alzheimer’s or dementia, the idea that it can prevent these is not true," said DeKosky, who is vice president and dean of the University of Virginia School of Medicine in Charlottesville.

But, said DeKosky, the good news from this study is that there appear to be "no major problems for safety" where ginkgo is concerned.

One representative of the botanicals industry took issue with the findings.

"There is an significant body of scientific and clinical evidence supporting the safety and efficacy of ginkgo extract for both cognitive function and improved circulation," said Mark Blumenthal, the founder and executive director of the American Botanical Council.

He also cited what he considered shortcomings with the Pittsburgh study, including a relatively short follow-up period, and the lack of a comparison treatment (there is currently no treatment that prevents or curbs dementia). Blumenthal also noted that 60 percent of participants stopped taking gingko by the end of the study, potentially lending uncertainty to the results.

However, the author of an accompanying editorial in the same issue of the journal, Dr. Lon Schneider, director of the State of California Alzheimer’s Disease Research and Clinical Center at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, pointed out that for people with a history of cardiovascular disease, there was an increased risk of hemorrhagic stroke in the group taking ginkgo, though the difference didn’t reach statistical significance. Eight people in the placebo compared to 16 in the ginkgo group had a hemorrhagic stroke, Schneider noted.

He also pointed out that at least one smaller trial found an increased risk of the more common type of stroke, ischemic stroke, and transient ischemic attacks, in people taking ginkgo.

"In the absence of efficacy, people should be fairly careful about taking a drug anyway, and here, we’ve seen no evidence for potential gain, and there’s some reason to be concerned about its use in the long term," said Schneider.

SOURCES: Steven T. DeKosky, M.D., vice president and dean, University of Virginia School of Medicine, Charlottesville, Va.; Lon S. Schneider, M.D., director, State of California Alzheimer’s Disease Research and Clinical Center at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles; news release, Nov. 18. 2008, American Botanical Council; Nov. 19, 2008, Journal of the American Medical Association

Publish Date: November 18, 2008

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Alzheimer’s Symptoms in Brief

A first sign of Alzheimer disease is a continuous pattern of forgetting things like trouble to remembering recent events, activities, or the names of familiar people or things. They may not be able to solve simple math problems. This starts to affect a person’s daily life. Symptoms of the disease include memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, personality changes, disorientation, and loss of language skills. Always fatal, Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of irreversible dementia.

Other symptoms can include:

* Lack of concentration
* Confusion about time and place
* Self-neglect
* Restlessness
* A tendency to wander aimlessly
* Sometimes saying or doing outrageous things
* Mood can be depressed, anxious or agitated
* Reasoning can be come slow and muddled
* Some people may experience hallucinations or delusions

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 Age Related Dementia and Vitamin D

From the New York Times an article those with interest in the subject of age related dementia with find confirming to previous articles in this blog.

Aging: Vitamin D Levels Tied to Dementia Risk

By NICHOLAS BAKALAR

Low blood levels of vitamin D may be associated with an increased risk for age related dementia, a British study has found.

Scientists measured blood levels of the vitamin in a representative sample of 1,766 people over 65 and assessed their mental functioning with a widely used questionnaire. About 12 percent were cognitively impaired, and the lower their vitamin D level, the more likely they were to be in that group. Compared with those in the highest one-quarter for serum vitamin D, those in the lowest were 2.3 times as likely to be impaired, even after statistically adjusting for age, sex, education and ethnicity. Men showed the effect more strongly than women.

“The cause of dementia is not vitamin D deficiency,” said David Llewellyn, a research associate at Cambridge University and the study’s lead author. “It’s a very complicated disease. But while further research is needed, vitamin D supplementation is cheap, safe and convenient, and may therefore play an important role in prevention.”(of age related dementia)

According to background information in the study, which appears online in The Journal of Geriatric Psychology and Neurology, vitamin D receptors are present in a variety of cells, including neurons and the glial cells associated with them. That suggests that the vitamin may play a role in brain development and the protection of neurons.

Technorati Tags: Cause of age related dementia, prevention of age related dementia, vitamin and dementia

Don’t Wait for Bad News to Change Bad Habits.

Guest article writer today reprots on a part of human nature that often defies our giving ourselves the best chance for the best health:

 (HealthDay News) — Being diagnosed with a serious condition such as heart disease or diabetes can prompt middle-aged and older adults to make health behavior changes, such as quitting smoking or losing weight, a Yale University study shows.

The researchers analyzed data from the Health and Retirement Study, which included middle-aged and older adults who were surveyed at least twice between 1992 and 2000. The surveys included 20,221 overweight or obese people younger than 75, and 7,764 smokers.

During the survey period, 18 percent of the smokers quit, and the average body-mass index (BMI) of overweight and obese respondents increased by 0.04 units. About 13 percent of the smokers were diagnosed with stroke, cancer, lung disease, heart disease or diabetes. About 8 percent of the overweight/obese people were diagnosed with lung disease, heart disease or diabetes.

The Yale researchers found that people newly diagnosed with health problems were more likely to change their health habits than those without a new diagnosis. Smokers newly diagnosed with at least one condition were 3.2 times more likely to quit than those without a new diagnosis. Overweight or obese people diagnosed with at least one condition lost an average of 2 to 3 pounds more than those without a new diagnosis.

Multiple diagnoses increased the likelihood of health behavior changes. Smokers with multiple diagnoses were 6.1 times more likely to quit than those with no new diagnoses. Overweight/obese people with one diagnosis lost an average of 0.34 BMI units, while those with more than one diagnosis lost an average of 0.64 BMI units.

The findings were published in the Feb. 9 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.

"Targeting individuals with recent new diagnoses may be particularly effective in middle-aged and older individuals, who are increasingly likely to receive a major diagnosis or to be hospitalized as they age," wrote study author Patricia S. Keenan, of Yale School of Medicine and Yale School of Public Health.

"Individuals with new adverse health events are accessible through contact with the health-care system or through the Internet or other written information about their disease, and this study suggests that they are more motivated to change health habits."

More information

The American Academy of Family Physicians has more about healthy habits.
— Robert Preidt

SOURCE: JAMA/Archives journals, news release, Feb. 9, 2009

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