Care Your Health problem

The authors of this new study did not specifically look at the health consequences of their lack of insurance or the lack of access to proper medical care, but it is reasonable to assume that these two factors could lead to many medical complications. Dr. Andrew Wilput, an instructor in medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle and a fellow at Harvard Medical School while the study was being conducted, said,This is something that is very true in my clinical experience. The uninsured can't get in to see the doctor, they miss medications, their blood pressure is out of control and, really, you see devastating consequences."

Another expert agreed that the lack of insurance along with someone who has a chronic illness could be a combination that is potentially lethal. Dr. Oliver Fein, the president-elect of Physicians for a National Health Program and a professor of clinical medicine and public health at Weill Cornell Medical College of Cornell University in New York City, said, "These people are going to end up with complications of their illnesses prematurely. They will be disabled early. They will probably die younger. It is a major public health disaster....Longer-term, there will be expensive admissions to hospitals, usually through the emergency department, due to diabetes out of control and congestive heart failure because of hypertension."

The number of Americans that do not have insurance is approximately 47 million in 2006, which is up from 31 million in the year 1987 is plentiful information. However, what has been less clear in the study is how many individuals suffer from a chronic illness, although some, including the policymakers, have suggest that many of the people are healthy.

The data came from interviews with almost 12,500 people that were between the ages of 18 and 64 who had participated in the National Health and Nutritional Survey. From this information, the authors concluded that approximately 11.4 million of the working-age Americans with at least one out of seven chronic medical conditions did not have any health insurance.

These people included 15.5 percent out of the 38.2 million with hypertension, 7.8 million with cardiovascular disease, 16.6 million out of the 8.5 million with diabetes. Some other conditions that were examined include high cholesterol, previous diagnosis of cancer, asthma, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Wilper said that they found some pretty big differences when they compared uninsured people with on of these seven conditions with people who were insured with one of the conditions. Approximately 26 percent of the people who did not have insurance reported no standard site of care, versus the 6.2 percent of the people who did have insurance. More than 22 percent of the people who were uninsured reported that they had not been to see a physician within the last year and 7.1 of those uninsured with a chronic illness report that the emergency room was their main site for medical care. The 6.2 percent of the people with insurance did report that they had seen a physician within the last year and only 1.1 percent of those went to the emergency room for medical care.

Wilper stated that the conditions listed are ones that they can take care of in a clinic. Physicians know that they can prevent complications that are disabling or catastrophic if they are able to manage the conditions. Greg Scandlen, the founder and the director of Consumers for Health Care Choices, an advocacy group for health-care consumers that is non-profit, said that none of the findings are surprising. It is interesting that we are finding that chronic conditions are shown to be more common among the people with insurance than ones without, although, that is not surprising either. The people that suffer from a chronic condition are more likely to place a higher value on their insurance coverage and they will work harder to get it and keep it. Scandlen added, "But having insurance is not likely to prove to be a panacea for these folks....People with chronic conditions who are insured are not doing so well, either. We do not do a very good job of delivering chronic care in this country for anyone."

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snoring

Franklin and his research team polled women and men between the ages of 25 to 54 along with all the residents of Iceland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Estonia, and they got responses from 15,556 people. Participants were asked about their childhood, such as whether they had a dog or any other pets, whether they were ever hospitalized for respiratory infections before the age of two, and whether they suffered from recurrent ear infections. They were also asked about the size of their family, their parents' educational background, and the ages of their mothers.

Lead author and physician at University Hospital in Umea, Sweden, Karl Franklin, M.D., Ph..D, has said that his research findings include identifying early life environments as affecting whether or not you are a snorer later in life. Other experts that have done similar studies with these findings say that more research will be needed, and Franklin even acknowledges that the research is no reason to steer clear of the idea of childhood pets. The researchers found that four independently associated with snoring later in life.

• If they were hospitalized for a respiratory infection before the age of 2, their risk of later snoring was boosted by 1.27 times.


• If they suffered from reccurent ear infections as a child their risk was raised by 1.18 times.


• If they grew up in a family with more than five members it increased their risk by 1.04 times.


• If they exposure to a dog in the houshold as a newborn their risk was boosted by 1.26 times.

Franklin decided to take a look at early childhood exposures and later risk of snoring, following a trend in medical research of looking at how many adult associated diseases, such as diabetes and cardiovascular, can be traced to childhood exposures and experiences. He stated that exactly why the exposures he found associated with snoring ups the risk is not yet known. "Perhaps these things like dogs, infection, might increase the size of the tonsils," and that could in turn boost the risk of snoring later in life.

A sleep medicine expert and a the medical director of Northshore Sleep Medicine in Evanston, Illinois, said that the findings of the study need significant follow-up research. "This doesn't say much to me," she stated about the findings. Early infections are the most feasible of all of the risk factors associated with boosting the risk of snoring. "It's not clear how the dog and the large family is associated with snoring." The two risk factors that are well known for snoring, she says, are the structure of the throat of each individual and obesity.

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Take time to lose weight

The Surgeon General reports that about one-third or over 68 million Americans age 20 and older are overweight, while another 64 million are classed as obese.

Current data, showing that over one-third of American women are now considered obese, has given cause for a new study led by John Jakicic, chairman of the Department of Health and Physical Activity at the University of Pittsburgh. It appears that the American Heart Association's current guidelines of at least 30 minutes of moderately intense activity five days a week (150 minutes per week) falls short-by almost half-of what the new study recommends. After following 200 women considered being overweight or obese for a two-year period, Jakicic's team found that in order to take of weight and keep it off that the study group needed to exercise about 275 minutes a week, which translates to 55 minutes, five times a week or 40 minutes a day.

For the study, the women were divided into four groups, each with a different calorie intake restriction between 1,200 and 1,500 per day, and each group was assigned moderate to vigorous physical activity with varying levels of duration requiring a calorie burn of 1,000 to 2,000 per week. After six months, all of the women had lost weight; averaging between 8 and 10 percent of their starting weight-but only 47 women were able to sustain that weight loss at the two-year mark. These women exercised the most, burnt the most calories, and reported eating less food in general and decreasing dietary fat. The lead author of the study, John Jakicic, stated that people need to exercise more to keep losing weight, especially if they are already obese or overweight.

It is hard for many people to find time for this kind of exercise with today's hectic life style, but there are ways to add more activity to your day that doesn't require much extra time. Try walking or biking to work, take the stairs, do leg lifts while sitting at your desk, wear wrist or leg weights during exercise or all day, be creative and make-up some of your own. Anything that keeps you moving helps to burn calories, and that is what it takes to get the weight off and keep it off.

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