Daily Health News Blog

 A team of scientists at Umeå University, in collaboration with colleagues in Melbourne, Australia, have found that television viewing and lack of exercise at age 16 is associated with the risk of developing metabolic syndrome at 43 years age. Metabolic syndrome is a name for the disorder of metabolism -- a combination of abdominal obesity, elevated blood lipids, hypertension and impaired glucose tolerance -- which provides for a significantly increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes, stroke and cardiovascular disease. It has previously been shown that lack of physical activity increases the risk of metabolic syndrome. It is also known that low leisure-time physical activity, for example, how much time spent watching TV is linked to the risk of metabolic syndrome independent of exercise habits. The new research findings have now been able to show is that these relationships extend over a large part of life, specifically between 16 to 43 years of age. The study is publish...

 Forget "slow and steady wins the race." A new study shows that, at least sometimes, the best way to conserve energy and reach your destination on time is to alternate between walking and running -- whether your goal is the bus stop or a marathon finish line. In the January 30, 2013 issue of the Journal of the Royal Society Interface , researchers examined how people budget their time as they travel on foot to reach a destination at a particular appointed time. The study found that when people have neither too much time nor too little time to reach their destination, they naturally switch back and forth between walking and running, which turns out to be the best strategy for saving energy. The study is the first of its kind not conducted on treadmills, and it supports the notion that the human body has an innate sense of how to vary speed to optimize energy when we're on the move in our natural environment. "We don't live our lives on a treadmill,"...

A new study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers has found that red meat consumption is associated with an increased risk of total, cardiovascular, and cancer mortality. The results also showed that substituting other healthy protein sources, such as fish, poultry, nuts, and legumes, was associated with a lower risk of mortality. "Our study adds more evidence to the health risks of eating high amounts of red meat, which has been associated with type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, and certain cancers in other studies," said lead author An Pan, research fellow in the Department of Nutrition at HSPH. The researchers, including senior author Frank Hu, professor of nutrition and epidemiology at HSPH, and colleagues, prospectively observed 37,698 men from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study for up to 22 years and 83,644 women in the Nurses' Health Study for up to 28 years who were free of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer at bas...