Running- a Very Healthy Habit

Running is an activity that people do for various reasons. Studies have shown that the health benefits of running are many and widespread, and doctors often recommend it to their patients. First, running can boost your immune system and prevent anything from the common cold to cancer in some people. It is one of the best aerobic exercises, as it conditions your heart and lungs, and ensures the flow of blood and oxygen to all parts of the body; effects that are proven to lessen the risk of heart attacks.

Running can strengthen bones and increase their density, and is also good for the leg and core muscles. Many women take up running or jogging in order to maintain a flat stomach. Aside from boosting a person’s confidence in their appearance, running is a wonderful stress-reliever and can even ease mild depression. Many athletes enjoy running because of the “runner’s high,” the euphoric, calm and confident state of mind that is achieved after a hard run. Adults who exercise on a regular basis are found to be healthier and happier. Running creates an energetic and creative attitude.

Why Massages Are So Healthy

Massage is often thought of as an enjoyable, relaxing experience for a vacation, but it is in fact incredibly beneficial for your health. If done correctly, massage and bodywork treatments can:

• Alleviate of back pain and improved range of motion
• Assist with labor for pregnant women
• Enhance the immune system by stimulating lymph flow
• Exercise and stretch weak or tight muscles
• Improve the condition of the skin
• Reduce muscle spasms and cramping
• Help prepare for and recover from workouts
• Release endorphins- the body’s natural pain killer
• Improve circulation
• Relieve emotional and physical stress

These are only a few of the many helpful aspects of massage. Instead of treating yourself to an expensive massage on the rare occasion, you may want to consider going to regular, half hour sessions a few times a month. Or, you and your partner or a friend can attend massage classes, and then give each other free treatments!

The Government Health Care Plan Covers “Wellness Visits” And Preventative Care

The New Year has brought some positive changes to those who receive Medicare benefits. Now, in addition to covering doctors’ visits when you are ill, the government sponsored health care plan also covers ‘wellness visits’ and other preventative care measures. According to the new guidelines which went into effect on January 1st, 2011, most preventative care will be 100% covered by Medicare with no deductible or co-payments.

People with traditional Medicare coverage can now take one free ‘wellness visit’ to their doctor every year. At this check-up they can discuss all kinds of issues with the goal of preventing disease from arising, including evaluating the patients family history, other health-care professionals the patient is seeing, and the medications he is on.

The doctor will also make sure the patient is on schedule with cancer screenings, vaccinations and other preventative tests. And not only is this visit free, but the screenings and tests, such as a mammogram or colorectal cancer screening are completely covered by Medicare as well. Even the doctor-recommended pneumococcal -a vaccine, which at the moment over 40% of seniors do not get, will be free of charge. If everyone at risk received this vaccine, many, and perhaps all of the 40,000 Americans who die each year from pneumonia, would live.

New Cancer-Detecting Technology

A new cancer-detecting method is currently being developed, in a study conducted by Veridex, Johnson & Johnson and Massachusetts General Hospital. The new blood test uses CTC (circulating tumor cell) technology to capture, count and identify tumor cells which circulate in a patient’s bloodstream. These cells are found at very low levels.

Cancer-cell“This new technology has the potential to facilitate an easy-to-administer, non-invasive blood test that would allow us to count tumor cells, and to characterize the biology of the cells,” explained Robert McCormack of Veridex in a press release issued by Johnson & Johnson. “Harnessing the information contained in these cells in an in vitro clinical setting could enable tools to help select treatment and monitor how patients are responding.”

Today, patients must undergo painful biopsies in order to be diagnosed. The samples do not determine the correct treatment for the patient, and many experimental treatments are administered in order to identify which is the most effective. The process is often very slow and many patients do not survive the wait. If the new research is successful, the CTC technology will enable doctors to provide an immediate, more accurate diagnosis, as well as more personalized treatments for the patients.

Hope for New Device in Helping to Find Cancer Sooner

The new cancer cell detection device, whose development was announced on Monday by Johnson & Johnson and its inventors from Massachusetts General Hospital , could change the way doctors test for and treat cancer.

Today mammograms, colonoscopies, etc are the only, ways that we have to screen for a variety of different cancers. The hope is that this new device, which can find one cancer cell among millions of healthy cells, will bring better screening procedure for these deadly diseases.

“There’s a lot of potential here, and that’s why there’s a lot of excitement,” said Dr. Mark Kris, lung cancer chief at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. Sloan-Kettering is another one of the four cancer centers which will be studying the test this year.

Presently, many cancers are diagnosed through needle biopsies which often do not give a large enough sample to determine the biochemical pathways or the genes that control the tumor’s unimpeded growth. Alternatively, the sample may no longer be available when the patient gets to the specialist who will prescribe his treatment.

This new tool actually captures the cancer cell, which is then available for study. Doctors can easily follow a patient’s response to drug and/or radiation therapy by looking for even just one cell, in the blood. Dr. Haber of Massachusetts General Hospital and one of the developers of this test said, “If you could find out quickly, ‘this drug is working, stay on it,’ or ‘this drug is not working, try something else,’ that would be huge.”