Heart Smarter for Women – by Dr. Jennifer Mieres
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Dr. Mieres takes us through understanding our own heart disease risks as individuals rather than as averages. As the title suggests, she does assume a female readership, so if you are a man and have no female loved ones, this might not be the book for you. But aside from that, she walks us through examining risk in the context of age, other health conditions, lifestyle factors, and so forth—including not turning a blind eye to factors that might intersect, such as for example if a physical condition reduces how much we can exercise, or if there’s some reason we can’t follow the usual gold standard of heart-healthy diet.
On which note, she does offer dietary advice, including information around recipes, meal-planning, and what things to always have in stock, as well as what things matter the most when it comes to what and how we eat.
It’s not all lifestyle medicine though; Dr. Mieres gives due attention to many of the medications available for heart health issues—and the pros and cons of these.
The style of the book is very simple and readable pop-science, without undue jargon, and with a generous glossary. As with many books of this genre, it does rely on (presumably apocryphal) anecdotes, though an interesting choice for this book is that it keeps a standing cast of four recurring characters, each to represent a set of circumstances and illustrate how certain things can go differently for different people, with different things then being needed and/or possible. Hopefully, any given reader will find themself represented at least moderately well somewhere in or between these four characters.
Bottom line: this is a very informative and accessible book, that demystifies a lot of common confusions around heart health.
Click here to check out Heart Smarter For Women, and take control of your health!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Recommended
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
The Non-Alcoholic Drinker – by James Ellison
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
A mere few decades ago, it was often considered antisocial not to smoke. These days, it’s antisocial if you do. The same social change is starting to happen now with alcohol—Millennials are drinking much less than they did in decades past, and Gen Z are hardly drinking at all.
The author, himself a Baby Boomer, champions the cause of mindful, and/but joyful, abstemiousness. Which latter two words don’t often go together, but in this case, he really has put in a lot of work to make non-alcoholic drinking as exciting, fun, and sophisticated as alcoholic drinking always marketed itself to be.
The mocktail recipes in this book are an order of magnitude better than any others this reviewer has encountered before, and did you know they have non-alcoholic bitters now? As in, the cocktail ingredient. Nor is it the only non-alcoholic botanical used, and the ingredients in general are as varied and flavorful, if not sometimes more so, than many that get used in alcoholic mixes.
This book is a very far cry from “rum and coke without the rum”, and instead will have you excited to go ingredient-shopping, and even more excited when you find out how great non-alcoholic things can taste if given the right attention.
As a convenient extra touch, all the ingredients he mentions are available from Amazon, which takes away the fear of “ok, but where do I get…” when it comes to getting things in.
The book does cover things besides just the recipes themselves though, and also talks the reader through navigating non-alcoholism when friends of your own age (unless you’re one of our younger readers) are probably mostly still partying with alcohol.
Really, the biggest value of this book is the recipes, though.
Bottom line: if you’d like to entertain with sophistication and grace and/but not with alcohol, or even just take up a fun new healthy hobby, this book is by far the best book on non-alcoholic mixology that this reviewer has seen to date.
Click here to check out The Non-Alcoholic Drinker, and get mixing non-alcoholically!
Share This Post
-
Sleeping on Your Back after 50; Yay or Nay?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Sleeping Differently After 50
Sleeping is one of those things that, at any age, can be hard to master. Some of our most popular articles have been on getting better sleep, and effective sleep aids, and we’ve had a range of specific sleep-related questions, like whether air purifiers actually improve your sleep.
But perhaps there’s an underlying truth hidden in our opening sentence…is sleeping consistently difficult because the way we sleep should change according to our age?
Inspired by Brad and Mike’s video below (which was published to their 5 million+ subscribers!), there are 4 main elements to consider when sleeping on your back after you’ve hit the 50-year mark:
- Degenerative Disk Disease: As you age, your spine may start to show signs of wear and tear, which directly affects comfort while lying on your back.
- Sleep Apnea and Snoring: Sleep Apnea and snoring become more of an issue with age, and sleeping on your back can exacerbate these problems; when you sleep on your back, the soft tissues in your throat, as well as your tongue, “fall back” and partly obstruct your the airway.
- Spinal Stenosis: Spinal Stenosis–the often-age-related narrowing of your spinal canal–can put pressure on the nerves that travel through the spine, which equally makes back-sleeping harder.
- GERD: The all-too-familiar gastroesophageal reflux disease can be more problematic when lying flat on your back, as doing so can allow easy access for stomach acid to move upwards.
Alternatives to Back Sleeping
Referencing the Mayo Clinic’s Sleep Facility’s director, Dr. Virend Somers, today’s video suggests a simple solution: sleeping on your side. The video goes into a bit more detail but, as you know, here at 10almonds we like to cut to the chase.
Modifications for Back Sleeping
If you’re a lifelong back-sleeping and cannot bear the idea of changing to your side, or your stomach, then there are a few modifications that you can make to ease any pain and discomfort.
Most solutions revolve around either leg wedges or pillow adjustments. For instance, if you’re suffering from back pain, try propping your knees up. Or if GERD is your worst enemy, a wedge pillow could help keep that acid down.
As can be expected, the video dives into more detail:
How was the video? If you’ve discovered any great videos yourself that you’d like to share with fellow 10almonds readers, then please do email them to us!
Share This Post
-
Alzheimer’s may have once spread from person to person, but the risk of that happening today is incredibly low
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
An article published this week in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine documents what is believed to be the first evidence that Alzheimer’s disease can be transmitted from person to person.
The finding arose from long-term follow up of patients who received human growth hormone (hGH) that was taken from brain tissue of deceased donors.
Preparations of donated hGH were used in medicine to treat a variety of conditions from 1959 onwards – including in Australia from the mid 60s.
The practice stopped in 1985 when it was discovered around 200 patients worldwide who had received these donations went on to develop Creuztfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), which causes a rapidly progressive dementia. This is an otherwise extremely rare condition, affecting roughly one person in a million.
What’s CJD got to do with Alzehimer’s?
CJD is caused by prions: infective particles that are neither bacterial or viral, but consist of abnormally folded proteins that can be transmitted from cell to cell.
Other prion diseases include kuru, a dementia seen in New Guinea tribespeople caused by eating human tissue, scrapie (a disease of sheep) and variant CJD or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, otherwise known as mad cow disease. This raised public health concerns over the eating of beef products in the United Kingdom in the 1980s.
Human growth hormone used to come from donated organs
Human growth hormone (hGH) is produced in the brain by the pituitary gland. Treatments were originally prepared from purified human pituitary tissue.
But because the amount of hGH contained in a single gland is extremely small, any single dose given to any one patient could contain material from around 16,000 donated glands.
An average course of hGH treatment lasts around four years, so the chances of receiving contaminated material – even for a very rare condition such as CJD – became quite high for such people.
hGH is now manufactured synthetically in a laboratory, rather than from human tissue. So this particular mode of CJD transmission is no longer a risk.
Human growth hormone is now produced in a lab.
National Cancer Institute/UnsplashWhat are the latest findings about Alzheimer’s disease?
The Nature Medicine paper provides the first evidence that transmission of Alzheimer’s disease can occur via human-to-human transmission.
The authors examined the outcomes of people who received donated hGH until 1985. They found five such recipients had developed early-onset Alzheimer’s disease.
They considered other explanations for the findings but concluded donated hGH was the likely cause.
Given Alzheimer’s disease is a much more common illness than CJD, the authors presume those who received donated hGH before 1985 may be at higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.
Alzheimer’s disease is caused by presence of two abnormally folded proteins: amyloid and tau. There is increasing evidence these proteins spread in the brain in a similar way to prion diseases. So the mode of transmission the authors propose is certainly plausible.
However, given the amyloid protein deposits in the brain at least 20 years before clinical Alzheimer’s disease develops, there is likely to be a considerable time lag before cases that might arise from the receipt of donated hGH become evident.
When was this process used in Australia?
In Australia, donated pituitary material was used from 1967 to 1985 to treat people with short stature and infertility.
More than 2,000 people received such treatment. Four developed CJD, the last case identified in 1991. All four cases were likely linked to a single contaminated batch.
The risks of any other cases of CJD developing now in pituitary material recipients, so long after the occurrence of the last identified case in Australia, are considered to be incredibly small.
Early-onset Alzheimer’s disease (defined as occurring before the age of 65) is uncommon, accounting for around 5% of all cases. Below the age of 50 it’s rare and likely to have a genetic contribution.
Early onset Alzheimer’s means it occurs before age 65.
perfectlab/ShutterstockThe risk is very low – and you can’t ‘catch’ it like a virus
The Nature Medicine paper identified five cases which were diagnosed in people aged 38 to 55. This is more than could be expected by chance, but still very low in comparison to the total number of patients treated worldwide.
Although the long “incubation period” of Alzheimer’s disease may mean more similar cases may be identified in the future, the absolute risk remains very low. The main scientific interest of the article lies in the fact it’s first to demonstrate that Alzheimer’s disease can be transmitted from person to person in a similar way to prion diseases, rather than in any public health risk.
The authors were keen to emphasise, as I will, that Alzheimer’s cannot be contracted via contact with or providing care to people with Alzheimer’s disease.
Steve Macfarlane, Head of Clinical Services, Dementia Support Australia, & Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Monash University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Share This Post
Related Posts
-
Kava vs Anxiety
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Kava, sometimes also called “kava kava” but we’re just going to call it kava once for the sake of brevity, is a heart-shaped herb that
bestows the powers of the Black Pantheris popularly enjoyed for its anxiolytic (anxiety-reducing) effects. Despite the similarity of the name in many languages, it is unrelated to coffee (except insofar as they are both plants), and its botanical name is Piper methysticum.Does it work?
Yes! At least in the short-term; more on that later.
Firstly, you may be wondering how it works; it works by its potentiation of GABA receptors in the brain. GABA (or gamma-aminobutyric acid, to give it its full name), as you may recall, is a neurotransmitter that is associated with feelings of calm; we wrote about it here:
So, what does “potentiation of GABA receptors” mean? It means… Scientists don’t for 100% sure know how it works yet, but it does make GABA receptors fire more. It’s possible that to some degree GABA fits the “molecular lock” of the receptors and causes them to say “GABA is here”; it’s also possible that they just make them more sensitive to the real GABA that is there, or there could be another explanation as yet undiscovered. Either way, it means that taking kava has a similar effect to having increased GABA levels in the brain:
As for how much to use, 20–300mg appears to be an effective dose, and most sources recommend 80–250mg:
Kava as a Clinical Nutrient: Promises and Challenges
This review of clinical trials found that it was more effective than placebo in only 3 of 7 trials; specifically, it was beneficial in the short-term and not in the long-term. For these reasons, the researchers concluded:
❝Kava Kava appears to be a short-term treatment for anxiety, but not a replacement for prolonged anti-anxiety use. Although not witnessed in this review, liver toxicity is especially possible if taken longer than 8 weeks.❞
Another review of clinical trials found better results over the course of 11 clinical trials, though again, short-term treatment only was considered to be where the “safe and effective” claim can be placed:
❝Compared with placebo, kava extract appears to be an effective symptomatic treatment option for anxiety. The data available from the reviewed studies suggest that kava is relatively safe for short-term treatment (1 to 24 weeks), although more information is required. Further rigorous investigations, particularly into the long-term safety profile of kava are warrant❞
Source: Kava extract for treating anxiety
Is it safe?
Nope! It has been associated with liver damage:
The likely main mechanism of toxicity is that it simply monopolizes the liver’s metabolic abilities, meaning that while it’s metabolizing the kava, it’s not metabolizing other things (such as alcohol or other medications), which will then build up, and potentially overwhelm the liver:
Constituents in kava extracts potentially involved in hepatotoxicity: a review
However, traditionally-prepared kava has not had the same effect as modern extracts; at first it seemed the difference was the traditional aqueous extracts vs modern acetonic/ethanolic extracts, but eventually that was found not to be the case, as toxicity occurred with industrial aqueous extracts too. The conclusion so far is that it is about the quality of the source ingredients, and the problems inherent to mass-production:
Meanwhile, short-term use doesn’t seem to have this problem, if you’re not drinking alcohol or taking medications that affect the liver:
Mechanisms/risk factors – kava-associated hepatotoxicity ← you’ll need to scroll down to 4.2.4 to read about this
Want to try it?
If the potential for hepatotoxicity doesn’t put you off, here’s an example product on Amazon ← we do not recommend it, but we are not the boss of you, and maybe you’re confident about your liver and want to use it only very short-term?
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
‘I keep away from people’ – combined vision and hearing loss is isolating more and more older Australians
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Our ageing population brings a growing crisis: people over 65 are at greater risk of dual sensory impairment (also known as “deafblindness” or combined vision and hearing loss).
Some 66% of people over 60 have hearing loss and 33% of older Australians have low vision. Estimates suggest more than a quarter of Australians over 80 are living with dual sensory impairment.
Combined vision and hearing loss describes any degree of sight and hearing loss, so neither sense can compensate for the other. Dual sensory impairment can occur at any point in life but is increasingly common as people get older.
The experience can make older people feel isolated and unable to participate in important conversations, including about their health.
bricolage/Shutterstock Causes and conditions
Conditions related to hearing and vision impairment often increase as we age – but many of these changes are subtle.
Hearing loss can start as early as our 50s and often accompany other age-related visual changes, such as age-related macular degeneration.
Other age-related conditions are frequently prioritised by patients, doctors or carers, such as diabetes or heart disease. Vision and hearing changes can be easy to overlook or accept as a normal aspect of ageing. As an older person we interviewed for our research told us
I don’t see too good or hear too well. It’s just part of old age.
An invisible disability
Dual sensory impairment has a significant and negative impact in all aspects of a person’s life. It reduces access to information, mobility and orientation, impacts social activities and communication, making it difficult for older adults to manage.
It is underdiagnosed, underrecognised and sometimes misattributed (for example, to cognitive impairment or decline). However, there is also growing evidence of links between dementia and dual sensory loss. If left untreated or without appropriate support, dual sensory impairment diminishes the capacity of older people to live independently, feel happy and be safe.
A dearth of specific resources to educate and support older Australians with their dual sensory impairment means when older people do raise the issue, their GP or health professional may not understand its significance or where to refer them. One older person told us:
There’s another thing too about the GP, the sort of mentality ‘well what do you expect? You’re 95.’ Hearing and vision loss in old age is not seen as a disability, it’s seen as something else.
Isolated yet more dependent on others
Global trends show a worrying conundrum. Older people with dual sensory impairment become more socially isolated, which impacts their mental health and wellbeing. At the same time they can become increasingly dependent on other people to help them navigate and manage day-to-day activities with limited sight and hearing.
One aspect of this is how effectively they can comprehend and communicate in a health-care setting. Recent research shows doctors and nurses in hospitals aren’t making themselves understood to most of their patients with dual sensory impairment. Good communication in the health context is about more than just “knowing what is going on”, researchers note. It facilitates:
- shorter hospital stays
- fewer re-admissions
- reduced emergency room visits
- better treatment adherence and medical follow up
- less unnecessary diagnostic testing
- improved health-care outcomes.
‘Too hard’
Globally, there is a better understanding of how important it is to maintain active social lives as people age. But this is difficult for older adults with dual sensory loss. One person told us
I don’t particularly want to mix with people. Too hard, because they can’t understand. I can no longer now walk into that room, see nothing, find my seat and not recognise [or hear] people.
Again, these experiences increase reliance on family. But caring in this context is tough and largely hidden. Family members describe being the “eyes and ears” for their loved one. It’s a 24/7 role which can bring frustration, social isolation and depression for carers too. One spouse told us:
He doesn’t talk anymore much, because he doesn’t know whether [people are] talking to him, unless they use his name, he’s unaware they’re speaking to him, so he might ignore people and so on. And in the end, I noticed people weren’t even bothering him to talk, so now I refuse to go. Because I don’t think it’s fair.
Dual sensory loss can be isolating for older people and carers. Synthex/Shutterstock So, what can we do?
Dual sensory impairment is a growing problem with potentially devastating impacts.
It should be considered a unique and distinct disability in all relevant protections and policies. This includes the right to dedicated diagnosis and support, accessibility provisions and specialised skill development for health and social professionals and carers.
We need to develop resources to help people with dual sensory impairment and their families and carers understand the condition, what it means and how everyone can be supported. This could include communication adaptation, such as social haptics (communicating using touch) and specialised support for older adults to navigate health care.
Increasing awareness and understanding of dual sensory impairment will also help those impacted with everyday engagement with the world around them – rather than the isolation many feel now.
Moira Dunsmore, Senior Lecturer, Sydney Nursing School, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney, University of Sydney; Annmaree Watharow, Lived Experience Research Fellow, Centre for Disability Research and Policy, University of Sydney, and Emily Kecman, Postdoctoral research fellow, Department of Linguistics, University of Sydney
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Play Bold – by Magnus Penker
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
This book is very different to what you might expect, from the title.
We often see: “play bold, believe in yourself, the universe rewards action” etc… Instead, this one is more: “play bold, pay attention to the data, use these metrics, learn from what these businesses did and what their results were”, etc.
We often see: “here’s an anecdote about a historical figure and/or celebrity who made a tremendous bluff and it worked out well so you should too” etc… Instead, this one is more: “see how what we think of as safety is actually anything but! And how by embracing change quickly (or ideally: proactively), we can stay ahead of disaster that may otherwise hit us”.
Penker’s background is also relevant here. He has decades of experience, having “launched 10 start-ups and acquired, turned around, and sold over 30 SMEs all over Europe”. Importantly, he’s also “still in the game”… So, unlike many authors whose last experience in the industry was in the 1970s and who wonder why people aren’t reaping the same rewards today!
Penker is the therefore opposite of many who advocate to “play bold” but simply mean “fail fast, fail often”… While quietly relying on their family’s capital and privilege to leave a trail of financial destruction behind them, and simultaneously gloating about their imagined business expertise.
In short: boldness does not equate to foolhardiness, and foolhardiness does not equate to boldness.
As for telling the difference? Well, for that we recommend reading the book—It’s a highly instructive one.
Take The First Bold Step Of Checking Out This Book On Amazon!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
