Skip Navigation.

September 2008 vol. 13 no. 9

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)


Table of Contents:


AFPA’s Fitness, Trainer, Sports & Mind Body Conference

October 17 & 18, 2008
Charlotte Convention Center
Charlotte, NC

Download the Brochure and Registration


AFPA Internet Specials

http://www.afpafitness.com/store/specials.html


Affordable Health Insurance for AFPA Members

Nearly FORTY MILLION Americans have NO health insurance. Most believe that they can’t afford good health insurance and even those that are currently insured may be overpaying for benefits they’ll never use. A new service by GetInsured.com helps Americans find quality health insurance that they can afford… and they do it for FREE.

Place a call to 1-866-452-0839- a health insurance expert will craft a personalized, quality, affordable plan for you. The call is free and there is absolutely NO obligation.

Or you can shop online by clicking the following link: http://www.getinsured.com


Vitamin B12 May Protect Aging Brains

Vitamin B12, a nutrient found in meat, fish and milk, may protect against brain volume loss in older people, according to a study published in the September 9, 2008, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

For the study, 107 people between the ages of 61 and 87 underwent brain scans, memory testing and physical exams. Researchers also collected blood samples to check vitamin B12 levels. Brain scans and memory tests were also performed again five years later.

The study found that people who had higher vitamin B12 levels were six times less likely to experience brain shrinkage compared with those who had lower levels of the vitamin in their blood. None of the people in the study had vitamin B12 deficiency.

“Many factors that affect brain health are thought to be out of our control, but this study suggests that simply adjusting our diets to consume more vitamin B12 through eating meat, fish, fortified cereals or milk may be something we can easily adjust to prevent brain shrinkage and so perhaps save our memory,” said study author Anna Vogiatzoglou, MSc, with the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. “Research shows that vitamin B12 deficiency is a public health problem, especially among the elderly, so more vitamin B12 intake could help reverse this problem. Without carrying out a clinical trial, we acknowledge that it is still not known whether B12 supplementation would actually make a difference in elderly persons at risk for brain shrinkage.”

“Previous research on the vitamin has had mixed results and few studies have been done specifically with brain scans in elderly populations. We tested for vitamin B12 levels in a unique, more accurate way by looking at two certain markers for it in the blood,” said Vogiatzoglou.

Vogiatzoglou says the study did not look at whether taking vitamin B12 supplements would have the same effect on memory.


Exercise Can Overcome Fat Gene

Vigorous physical activity can help even people genetically prone to obesity keep the weight off, U.S. researchers said on Monday.

They said a study among a group of Amish people found those who had an obesity-related gene called FTO but were very physically active weighed about the same as others who did not carry the gene.

“When we looked at the Amish who were the most active, there is suddenly no effect of that gene,” said Dr. Soren Snitker of the University of Maryland, whose study appears in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

The findings, which suggest physical activity can overcome a genetic predisposition for obesity, may help inform the debate over whether changes in diet or physical activity will make the biggest difference in fighting obesity.

Researchers focused their study on a group of 704 Old Order Amish men and women in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, a religious group whose members often do not drive cars or have electricity in their homes.

Snitker said the group offered a unique mix of activity levels, with some farmers in the community still using horse-drawn plows while others holding more conventional jobs, including factory work.

He and colleague Evadnie Rampersaud of the University of Miami were looking to see if physical activity in this group might offset the effects of the fat mass and obesity associated with the FTO gene, found in more than half of all people of European descent.

People with two copies of the FTO gene on average weigh nearly 7 pounds (3 kg) more and are about 70 percent more likely to be obese than those who do not have the gene.

The volunteers wore a device called an accelerometer to track motion for a week.

The researchers compared body mass index or BMI, a measure of weight to height, and found those who were less active and had the FTO gene variant were significantly more likely to be overweight or obese.

But among the most physically active, the FTO gene made no difference.

“We probably carry genes that 150 years ago were not risk factors for obesity, but because of changes in our environment, they become liabilities,” he said.


Stress May Increase Breast Cancer Risk

The results of a new study support an interaction between severe life events, psychological distress, and breast cancer. The findings appear in the online BioMed Central journal BMC Cancer.

“Young women who are exposed to severe life events more than once should be considered as a risk group for breast cancer and treated accordingly,” first author Dr. Ronit Peled said in a telephone interview with Reuters Health.

Peled, from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel, and colleagues studied 255 women younger than 45 years old who had been diagnosed with breast cancer, and compared them with 367 healthy women of a similar age.

The team evaluated interactions between breast cancer and severe life events such as the loss of a parent, close relative or spouse, or the divorce of parents before age 20 and mild to moderate life events e.g., separation from a spouse, loss of a job, an economic crisis, or severe illness in a close relative.

After correcting for potentially influential variables, their analysis revealed a positive association between exposure to more than one adverse life event and breast cancer. For these women, the risk of breast cancer was increased by 62 percent. “It wasn’t enough to be exposed to one life event, a woman had to be exposed to more than one event,” Peled said.

Compared with healthy women, women with breast cancer also demonstrated significantly higher scores of depression and significantly lower scores of happiness and optimism.

Moreover, the results showed a negative association between happiness and optimism and breast cancer. General feelings of happiness and optimism seemed to offer protection against breast cancer, Peled noted. “The more you are happy and feel optimistic with your life, the less the probability of developing breast cancer.”

SOURCE: BioMed Central journal BMC Cancer, August 22, 2008.


Black Raspberries Slow Cancer by Altering Hundreds of Genes

New research strongly suggests that a mix of preventative agents found in concentrated black raspberries could more effectively inhibit cancer development than single agents aimed at shutting down a particular gene.

Researchers examined the effect of freeze-dried black raspberries on genes altered by a chemical carcinogen in an animal model of esophageal cancer. The carcinogen affected the activity of 2,200 genes in the animals’ esophagus in only one week. However, 460 of those genes were restored to normal activity in animals that consumed freeze-dried black raspberry powder.

Black raspberries contain many vitamins, minerals, phenols and phytosterols, which are known to individually prevent cancer in animals.

Science Blog August 28, 2008
Cancer Research August 1, 2008, 68, 6460-6467


Selected segments are reproduced from: 

Dr. Mercola’s excellent website: http://www.mercola.com

Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine http://www.pcrm.org