GeekHealth.org

New bodybuilding QA site proposed at StackExchange

John Fly — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 16:43:14 +0000

StackExchange: BodyBuilding

For those of you familiar with StackExchange (StackOverflow/ServerFault) you might know it is a great QA platform.

You might not know that groups are now forming their own exchanges, and there is one proposed for BodyBuilding.

If you are interested in helping this site get up and running, all you need to do is follow the above link.

It is a really great opportunity to form a helpful online community.

The end of antibiotics?

John Fly — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 18:55:34 +0000

Antibiotics as we know them today, have only been around for close to one hundred years. They were once heralded as a key to end all disease, but we may soon discover that our use/overuse of antibiotics have become a Pandora’s box. Overtime, bacteria become more resistant to our current arsenal of antibiotics. By treating infections with antibiotics we ensure that only the strongest and most resistant variants survive. This leads to stronger and stronger strains of bacteria reproducing. This cycle requires constant development of stronger and strong antibiotics which in turn ensure that over time we will eliminate all but the most resistant and un-treatable strains of bacteria.

It has been a growing concern that we might reach a point where common antibiotics become completely ineffective, and we are left only with powerful antibiotics that have serious side effects. Eventually even our most power antibiotics will become useless.

If this sounds slightly alarmists, it might be. Instead of just trying to fight off minor infections, more and more people are going to the doctor at the first signs of feeling bad. Doctors prescribe antibiotics, and with prices are so low today, with many antibiotics showing up on $5 plans, most patients have little incentive to not purchase and take the drugs. As we essentially over medicate ourselves with antibiotics we move closer and closer to a day when they will fail us all-together.

So, has this made you twice about rushing off to the doctor for another round of antibiotics?

Further reading : The Guardian : The era of antibiotics is coming to a close. In just a couple of generations, what once appeared to be miracle medicines have been beaten into ineffectiveness by the bacteria they were designed to knock out. Once, scientists hailed the end of infectious diseases. Now, the post-antibiotic apocalypse is within sight.

Lying to survive

John Fly — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 15:28:56 +0000

A recent piece by The Independent : The Science of lying, why the truth can really hurt explores the possibility that lying evolved as a survival trait. If we could survive in the wild better by knowing how to influence animal behavior or the behavior of others, then that might have given us a higher chance to direct their actions. Used in the context of hunting or being hunted this makes sense, there are even some animals in the wild that will feign injury to lead predators away from nests and young or by predators to lure prey closer.

Robert Feldman, Professor of Psychology at the University of Massachusetts does state in the article that he is hesitant to place lying on the level of pure instinct. Dr. Feldman does state that once someone realizes the power of lying, there is more than enough reinforcement to keep up the behavior.

Another report from abc.net.au written by Maryke Steffens tries to relate lying to the ability to empathize. This moves the term lying further away from instinctive deception to a cognitive process only seen in higher level primates. Richard Byrne, Professor of Evolutionary Psychology at the University of St. Andrews in the UK and author of The Thinking Ape, states that the conscious form of deception is different to the plant and animal deception.

Whether instinct or part of a higher level cognitive function lying seems to be part of our daily lives. Lying can also be an addictive behavior and lead to very serious consequences. Would society be better off if humans were incapable of lying? How might we go about becoming more honest or detecting honesty in others? These are questions many behavioral and evolutionary scientist are wrestling with still today.

FDA warns of Vitamin D supplementation for infants

John Fly — Thu, 17 Jun 2010 21:14:57 +0000

The FDA recently published a statement about the dangers and risks associated with giving infants and young children vitamin D supplements. The article suggests that supplementation is suggested for children breast feeding. We highly suggest anyone currently giving or considering giving a child vitamin D supplements read this article.

As a reminder, the human body does produce its own vitamin D when skin is exposed to sunlight. For those wanting a quick refresher (see Wikipedia). Also please note that humans have been relying on sunlight and diet for vitamin D for as long as we have been around. Since you can overdose on vitamin D, please make sure you actually need the supplement before taking it or giving it to a child.

Visitor Question: Hands are wrinkled and hurting, what’s going on?

John Fly — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 17:39:17 +0000

We recently had a visitor ask us to help look into a health problem he is having, if anyone has some suggestions for him, I’m sure he would appreciate the advise.

Issue:

The problem he described was that his right hand looked wrinkled, like he had soaked in water for a long time, but this was fairly constant and moisture didn’t seem to be a factor.

Wrinkling started on my right thumb and then mysteriously spread to nearly every finger on the right hand, to varying degrees. Fingertips are a lot better, though not less wrinkled, on normal days — not freezing, not hot — 70 degrees F.

He also describes having redness and discomfort, but so far no dermatologist have been able to help.

All the dermatologists say that the redness SHOULD cause the wrinkled fingers, but it doesn’t — it’s the opposite!

After doing some research we offered this list of possbilitieis and suggestions:

Found the below link, seems to have a good number of people with permanent or frequent wrinkling of fingers/hands accompanied by discomfort.
http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Dermatology/What-causes-wrinkled-finger-tips-all-the-time/show/542401

Things that might be easy to check out :

Low magnesium levels. (take a supplement or eat foods with it)
Are you on a very low fat diet (where your body isn’t able to keep oils supplied to your skin)
Contact allergy (one guy had a plastic intolerance/allergy) working with keyboards and mice all day, there might be a chemical in yours causing a reaction. (This is something I’ve actually heard about before, some people have to cover their mice/keyboards because of this)
Low absorption of nutrients – Take some probiotics, check that your eating some fiber.

Some of the more serious conditions mentioned :

Celiac Disease (Gluten allergy)
Candida
Thyroid function – (Just incase its a lack of iodine here is a quick check for that. (link)
Many connective tissue disorders.

His response:

I’m on a balanced diet (meats, vegetables, fish, bread, fruit, etc.) and I don’t have any diseases mentioned there, except for psoriasis which is on/off. I’ve considered magnesium deficiency befire but that possibly doesn’t fly because it is on one hand because I eat a lot of bread — see http://apjcn.nhri.org.tw/server/info/books-phds/books/foodfacts/html/data/data5d.html.

I have started to eat nuts (which contain a lot more magnesium) more often. (BTW: did you know nuts could be good for teeth, as a preservative coating? That’s according to my dentist) Of course, since it’s asymptomatic (only on one side of hands), it’s probably not that. Wrinkling is somewhat better than a few months ago, so it COULD be diet related (I started eating more nuts), to a degree.

It is possible I’ve developed some sort of allergy to the plastic in my mouse, because my right hand is often on a mouse, though it would still be surprising because I have used mice all my life and this particular type for about 6 years — bought a few replacements over the years.

My left hand is always touching the keyboard, so it must be a specific type of plastic. I did try a few weeks without touching the mouse directly, and it didn’t seem to help, but I can’t be sure. I saw someone said they used a coating over the mouse, so I will try that and see how it goes.

(The redness could be explained by secondary psoriasis inflammation — it all starts with imperfect skin protection, little bruises and cuts, and then it snowballs to masses of red, inflamed skin if you don’t get rid of it right away somehow — that’s how psoriasis gets you!)

So, it’s a mystery. My insane working theory right now is: minor magnesium deficiency (caused by my psoriasis “genes” or perhaps a side-effect of anti-psoriasis steroids?), aggravated by the specific plastic coating in my Microsoft Intellimouse. (I need to use my PC!) I am trying a few things (like eating moar nuts, and trying to cover my mouse) and with that link will try a few more (like spraying the coating) — thanks!

If anyone else has or is experiencing these or similar symptoms, let us know by adding a comment below.

Study shows anti-obesity potential of Capsaicin

John Fly — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 15:48:13 +0000

GeekHealth.org has covered peppers and capsaicin in the past, now we have some good scientific study data to share with you on this easy to acquire chemical compound.

A study done on rats, has found very positive results when feeding rats 10 mg of capsaicin per kg of body weight.

http://pubs.acs.org/stoken/presspac/presspac/full/10.1021/pr901175w?cookieSet=1

The study, led by Dr. Jong Won Yun from Daegu University, showed the capsaicin treatments caused weight loss in lab rats by up to eight percent. This reduction seems to be linked to the effect of capsaicin on certain proteins in fat, as well as other metabolic chemicals.

For a human to consume the amount of capsaicin discussed in the paper, you need to keep this in mind: the amount of capsaicin in peppers is very low compared to the overall weight of the pepper itself.

In a study of Habanero peppers (link), it was found that the total amount of capsaicin was about 10mg/g. “The total capsaicinoids extracted from oven dried Cunningham peppers ranged from 8.85 – 14.03 mg/g of dry tissue and those from Bailey Farm peppers varied between 9.41 and 11.61 mg/g of dry tissue.”

This means that for an “average” adult US male (link) weighing 190lbs (86kg), you would need a daily dose of 860 mg of capsaicin. If you only ate dried Habanero’s (one of the worlds hottest peppers) you would still need to eat 86 grams of the powder. That comes out to just around 10 full tablespoons of pure habanero powder!

Why should I join GeekHealth.org?

John Fly — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 04:57:15 +0000

Why should you join GeekHealth.org?

There are three main reasons to join GeekHealth.org

You can receive free health related products and services in return all we ask is that you write a small review on those products or services.
You can ask GeekHealth.org staff to research a topic or product for you. We want to give information on things you want to know about. Ask and you shall receive!
You can share your own knowledge, information and experience with others by writing articles or reviews. Find out more!

How do I join?

Is my information kept private?

Absolutely, we will never share the details of an individual with anyone.

How does the review process work?

The process is quite simple, find out more here.

Business Sign Up

John Fly — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 03:48:58 +0000

Looking for a way to advertise your product or service without resorting to mass email campaigns or paying for costly ads that are often ignored by your target audience? GeekHealth.org can help.

GeekHealth.org helps by allowing you to get your product in the hands of real people. These people then use your product following guidelines you help define. As they do so they keep track of its use and effectiveness. Finally the reviewer(s) complete a write up of your product which get compiled into a single review and is published to GeekHealth.org for all to see.

Click here for a more information on our review process.

If you are interested in speaking to GeekHealth.org about our review process, and how it can benefit your company, please fill out the following form. We will review the information and contact you as soon as possible.

[contact-form-7]

Contribute

John Fly — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 23:17:41 +0000

Open Source Health

I am often asked “What does Open Source Health mean?”

The answer is simple, GeekHealth.org invites everyone to share their own personal and professional health related information. All you have to do to get started is create an account, you immediately have access to post articles or reviews.

Write an Article

Members of GeekHealth.org can create a write up on almost any topic they wish.

Articles should be informative and factual.

To share information as an article simply create an account! All GeekHealth.org members have immediate access to create posts.

*Articles will be fact checked before posting on the site.

Write a Review

Members of GeekHealth.org can take it upon themselves to write a product review.

Unlike an article, reviews are opinion based, and can contain any personal opinions and/or viewpoints a member might have. Member written reviews can be over any health or health related item, product or service.

GeekHealth.org reserves the right edit or delete any submitted review if it appears that the sole purpose for the review is for product placement/advertisement.

Sign-Up to be a GeekHealth.org product tester/reviewer

Are you intrested in receiving free health related products or services? If so signup for a GeekHealth.org account, fill out the member profile and check that you want to be a product reviewer. We use your profile information to help match you up with products and services that businesses ask GeekHealth.org to review.

Once you are a member, you can also assist us by identifying products and services your personally intrested it. Once a product is listed with GeekHealth.org we can contact the company to see if they are intrested in having us review their product or service. Most of the time the member who suggests the product will be able to participate in the full review process.

Sign-Up your product to be reviewed by GeekHealth.org

Are you a business seeking to inform the public about your product or service? A great way to get credible advertising is to allow GeekHealth.org to run a full “GeekHelath.org Review”. GeekHealth.org charges nothing for this service, and only asks you donate a few samples of your product or service to us so we can match them up to the best reviewer possible.

For more information on how GeekHealth.org can help your business click here.

Business Services

John Fly — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 20:30:38 +0000

Spread the word about your product or service

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If you are involved in the manufacturing, producing or selling of health related products or services, we can help raise awareness of those products and services.

Our suggested way is for you to work with us in offering a sample or trial of your product or service to our reviewers. Our reviewers are not paid staff members, they are real people looking for real solutions.

By teaming up with GeekHealth.org and allowing us to oversee the review of your product you benefit by :

Allowing real people to comment on the quality of your product.
Having that information published here on GeekHealth.org.
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In essence, by working with us you receive free advertising for your business and products.

To sign up your product or service, or to find out more information on how we can help raise awareness of your business, simply fill out our sign up form here.

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