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Switching Neighborhoods May Improve Health

Editor — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 16:04:18 +0000

Switching Neighborhoods May Improve Health

Women encouraged to move with their families from a poor neighborhood to a more affluent one had lower rates of extreme obesity and diabetes 10 to 15 years later, a new study found. Future research into the reasons why may yield insights into how to design healthier communities.

Studies examining people in different neighborhoods have suggested that features such as access to parks and healthy food outlets can affect obesity. However, it’s difficult to prove which factors influence obesity because people in poor areas differ in many ways from those in more affluent ones. A research team led by Dr. Jens Ludwig of the University of Chicago set out to test whether helping families move to less impoverished neighborhoods would affect obesity and diabetes rates.

The researchers turned to a program called Moving to Opportunity. The program was designed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to explore the effects of residential location on employment, income, education and well-being. About 4,500 women with children who lived in public housing in high-poverty areas in the mid-1990s were randomly assigned to 3 groups. One group received “opportunity” vouchers—rent-subsidy vouchers that were redeemable only if the families moved to a more affluent neighborhood. They were given short-term counseling to help them find housing. The second group received traditional rent-subsidy vouchers with no special restrictions on where they could live. They were not given any extra counseling. A control group received no vouchers or counseling.

From 2008 through 2010, Ludwig and colleagues measured health outcomes in the women, including calculating body mass index (a ratio of weight to height) and testing blood for signs of diabetes. The study was partly funded by NIH’s Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), National Institute on Aging (NIA) and National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Results appeared on October 20, 2011, in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The researchers found that the women receiving opportunity vouchers had lower rates of obesity and diabetes than the control group. The voucher group had 13% fewer women with a BMI of 35 or more (“very high” disease risk), 19% fewer with a BMI of 40 or more (“extremely high” disease risk) and 22% fewer with diabetes. The differences between the group receiving traditional vouchers and the control group were too small to prove they weren’t due to chance.

“Giving a low-income woman the opportunity to move with her children to a less impoverished neighborhood appears to lower her risk of diabetes and extreme obesity,” says co-author Dr. Stacy Tessler Lindau.

“These results highlight the great importance of learning more about what specific aspects of the social or physical environment reduce the risk of diabetes and obesity; for example, greater access to grocery stores, more opportunities for physical activity, or feelings of greater safety and reduced psychological stress,” Ludwig says.

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* The above story is reprinted from materials provided by National Institutes of Health (NIH)
** The National Institutes of Health (NIH) , a part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is the nation’s medical research agency—making important discoveries that improve health and save lives. The National Institutes of Health is made up of 27 different components called Institutes and Centers. Each has its own specific research agenda. All but three of these components receive their funding directly from Congress, and administrate their own budgets.

Switching Neighborhoods May Improve Health is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Designing New Diabetes Drugs

Editor — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 16:34:11 +0000

Designing New Diabetes Drugs

Building on recent insights into how diabetes medications work, researchers have designed experimental drugs that are as effective in mice as current medications, but cause fewer side effects. The finding may lead to new drugs to combat diabetes.

Almost 26 million Americans have diabetes, a disease in which the body has problems producing or using insulin. The body needs this hormone to convert sugars into energy. Diabetes is the main cause of kidney failure, limb amputations and new-onset blindness in adults nationwide. It’s also a major cause of heart disease and stroke.

Some people with diabetes need to take medications. The thiazolidinedione class of drugs, which includes rosiglitazone (Avandia) and pioglitazone (Actos), is effective for treating type 2 diabetes, the most common form of the disease. But these drugs can cause side effects ranging from uncomfortable to dangerous, such as fluid retention, bone loss, weight gain, bladder cancer and congestive heart failure. Recently, the Food and Drug Administration severely restricted the sale of drugs containing rosiglitazone because of the elevated risk of heart attack and stroke.

These drugs work by increasing the body’s sensitivity to insulin. They attach to a receptor in the cell’s nucleus called PPARγ. PPARγ affects gene expression and drives fat cell development. The drugs activate PPARγ, but their molecular modes of action were unclear. Last year, researchers found that anti-diabetic PPARγ compounds activate the receptor to varying extents. Many don’t block the ability of PPARγ to drive fat cell development. However, the effective compounds are similar in one respect: they block the addition of a phosphate group to PPARγ—a process called phosphorylation.

The scientists thus set out to design an improved generation of anti-diabetic drugs by specifically preventing the phosphorylation of PPARγ, which is carried out by a protein called Cdk5. The team was led by Drs. Patrick R. Griffin and Theodore Kamenecka at Scripps Florida and Dr. Bruce Spiegelman at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School. The research was supported by NIH’s National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS).

As described in Nature on September 22, 2011, the scientists first selected a compound that binds strongly to PPARγ but doesn’t broadly affect gene expression. They then synthesized a series of similar compounds and searched for ones that block Cdk5 phosphorylation of PPARγ. To find a compound specific for PPARγ, they ruled out compounds that also blocked Cdk5 phosphorylation of an additional protein.

One compound called SR1664 specifically blocked the Cdk5 phosphorylation of PPARγ in fat cells but didn’t interfere with gene expression or with fat cell growth and development. When tested in diabetic mice, SR1664 lowered glucose levels and insulin resistance. However, it didn’t cause fluid retention and weight gain. It also didn’t interfere with bone formation in laboratory cultures.

These preliminary results are far from use in the clinic. Still, they illustrate that it’s possible to develop drugs that specifically target the phosphorylation of PPARγ.

“It appears that we may have an opportunity to develop entire new classes of drugs for diabetes and perhaps other metabolic disorders,” says Spiegelman.

Designing New Diabetes Drugs is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Five Lifestyle Factors Lower Diabetes Risk

Editor — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 15:51:06 +0000

Five Lifestyle Factors Lower Diabetes Risk

A new analysis has found that a combination of 5 healthy lifestyle factors may help reduce the chance of developing type 2 diabetes, even if family history puts you at risk for the disease.

Diabetes affects an estimated 25.8 million Americans of all ages—over 8% of the population. The most common form is type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90% to 95% of all diagnosed cases in adults. Diabetes leads to excess glucose, a type of sugar, in the blood. Over time, high blood glucose damages nerves and blood vessels, leading to complications such as heart disease, stroke, blindness, kidney disease, nerve problems and amputation.

Previous research has tied several lifestyle factors to a reduced risk of type 2 diabetes, but the studies have tended to focus on the impact of one risk factor at a time. A research team led by Dr. Jared Reis of NIH’s National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) set out to examine the combined influence of several healthy lifestyle factors. The 5 factors they studied were following a healthy diet, maintaining an optimal body weight, engaging in recommended amounts of physical activity, not smoking and keeping alcohol use to no more than 1 drink per day for women and 2 drinks per day for men.

The team used data collected from more than 200,000 adults enrolled in the NIH-AARP Diet and Health Study. Men and women aged 50-71 completed extensive surveys in the mid-1990s about their diets, demographic characteristics, lifestyle and medical conditions. They were then followed for 11 years to see if they developed diabetes. The results appeared in the September 6, 2011, issue of Annals of Internal Medicine.

The researchers found that the more healthy lifestyle factors a person adopted, the greater the reduction in diabetes risk. Men with all 5 healthy lifestyle factors had a 72% lower risk for developing diabetes, while women had an 84% lower risk.

“Not being overweight or obese led to the greatest protection,” Reis says. “However, we found that overweight or obese adults with a greater number of the other healthy lifestyle factors had a lower risk of developing diabetes. This is good news because it suggests that overweight or obese adults can benefit by adopting other healthy lifestyle behaviors.”

The study also found that while a family history of diabetes is strongly linked to type 2 diabetes, people may be able to largely prevent or delay the disease by leading a healthy lifestyle.

A new analysis has found that a combination of 5 healthy lifestyle factors may help reduce the chance of developing type 2 diabetes, even if family history puts you at risk for the disease.

Five Lifestyle Factors Lower Diabetes Risk is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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A Way to Burn More Calories?

Editor — Mon, 18 Jul 2011 21:33:45 +0000

A Way to Burn More Calories?

Scientists have uncovered a pathway in mice that allows white fat—a contributor to obesity and type 2 diabetes—to burn calories as if it were brown fat or muscle.

The body uses white fat to store extra energy. Too much white fat (obesity) increases the risk of type 2 diabetes and other diseases. Brown fat, in contrast, generates heat to maintain body temperature and, like muscle, has lots of calorie-burning mitochondria.

Brown fat is found in small mammals like rodents throughout their lives. Humans have it at birth, but we lose it as we age. Researchers once thought that our brown fat was essentially nonexistent by adulthood. Recent studies found that not only do adults have brown fat but it also may play an important role in weight control. Boosting the activity of brown fat, or converting white fat to brown fat, could be potential strategies for fighting obesity.

A team of NIH researchers led by Dr. Sushil G. Rane of NIH’s National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) were studying a protein called TGF-beta. TGF-beta and its related factors are known to control the development, growth and function of many different cell types. Blood levels of TGF-beta have been linked to obesity in both mice and humans. In previous work, the team found that the TGF-beta pathway plays an important role in regulating insulin genes. To further investigate, the researchers studied mice deficient in the protein Smad3, which regulates gene expression in response to TGF-beta signals.

The researchers reported in the July 6, 2011, edition of Cell Metabolism that Smad3-deficient mice developed significantly less fat mass. The mice also had enhanced glucose uptake in their white fat. This observation prompted the scientists to examine the mice’s white fat more closely. They discovered that, without the influence of TGF-beta, the white fat became browner with more mitochondria. The increased metabolic activity due to the mitochondria burned more calories, lessening obesity.

To test whether blocking TGF-beta might help combat obesity, the scientists tested an antibody that neutralizes TGF-beta. The antibody suppressed fat formation and weight gain in 2 well-characterized mouse models of obesity. Similar to the Smad3-deficient mice, the antibody-treated mice showed an increase in mitochondrial activity.

“We weren’t looking to have white fat acquire the properties of brown fat, but that’s what we found, with the fat getting browner from increased mitochondria and displaying genes typically expressed in muscle. It was a striking difference,” Rane says.

These findings suggest a potential new approach to treating obesity and type 2 diabetes. However, this research is a long way from being applicable to people. A TGF-beta blocking antibody is currently being tested as a cancer treatment in a clinical trial at NIH’s National Cancer Institute (NCI). Due to the potential side effects of the antibody, it hasn’t yet been tested for treatment of human obesity. The researchers are working to design a more targeted approach to transform the white fat of mice into a brown fat or muscle-like state.

“Efforts to reduce obesity by dieting are mostly unsuccessful in the long term, so finding ways to prevent excess fat storage is an urgent medical need,” Rane says. “Our discovery that white fat can be reduced by partially transforming it to brown fat and muscle opens up new avenues to combat the obesity epidemic.”

A Way to Burn More Calories? is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Certain Foods Linked to Long-term Weight Gain

Editor — Mon, 11 Jul 2011 19:11:00 +0000

Certain Foods Linked to Long-term Weight Gain

Munching more unprocessed plant foods may help keep the middle-aged bulge away, a new study suggests. On the other hand, meat, french fries and sugar-sweetened drinks can help pack on the pounds. The findings suggest that the types of food you choose, not just calories, are important for avoiding age-related weight gain.

Weight gain results from an imbalance between how much energy you take in and how much you expend. Even small amounts of excess weight can increase your risk for disorders such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, metabolic syndrome and cancer.

A research team at the Harvard School of Public Health, led by Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian and Dr. Frank Hu, sought to gain insights into the changes in people’s lifestyles that lead to gradual, long-term weight gain. Their work was partially funded by NIH’s National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) and National Cancer Institute (NCI).

The team followed the lifestyle and dietary habits of 3 large groups of health professionals, totaling over 120,000 people, for 12 to 20 years. Participants completed a biennial survey detailing their physical activity, television habits, alcohol use, sleep duration and diet. Their weight was measured every 4 years. The study appeared in the June 23, 2011, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

The researchers found several general lifestyle changes linked to weight gain over a 4-year period. Participants who increased their physical activity gained less weight than those who didn’t. However, only increases in activity during the period produced this result; absolute levels of physical activity weren’t associated with weight change. People who slept for less than 6 hours a day or more than 8 hours gained more weight. Increases in TV-watching led to an average gain of about a third of a pound for every hour of TV watching per day.

Food choices also affected weight. Potato chips, sugar-sweetened drinks, processed meats and unprocessed red meat were each linked to weight gain of about a pound or more. Eating more french fries led to an average gain of over 3 pounds. Eating more refined grains and sweets or desserts led to about half a pound of weight gain. By contrast, eating more vegetables, whole grains, fruits, nuts and yogurt was linked to reductions in weight over a 4-year period. Yogurt led the pack, with an average of 0.82 pounds of weight lost.

The researchers suggest that highly processed foods may not satisfy hunger as well as less processed, higher fiber foods, causing a higher total intake of calories. “The idea that there are no ‘good’ or ‘bad’ foods is a myth that needs to be debunked,” Hu says.

This was an observational study, in which people were asked to recall the foods they ate. While the findings are compelling, future controlled studies will be needed to confirm whether eating particular foods can affect long-term weight gain more than simply counting calories.

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Certain Foods Linked to Long-term Weight Gain is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Oolong Tea, Green Tea, Black Tea. Health Benefits and Effects.

Editor — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 21:36:23 +0000

Tea is the most-consumed beverage worldwide next to water. For some 5,000 years, people have been getting a lift from brewing tea leaves. But it’s only been in the last three decades that researchers have immersed themselves in the science behind tea’s purported health benefits.

Leaves from the plant Camellia sinensis are processed three different ways to produce the three major classes of tea, known as black (left), green (center), and oolong. Photo by Photo by Stephen Ausmus.

Differences in Tea Types

The age-old Camellia sinensis plant is the source of all nonherbal teas. Manufacturers process C. sinensis leaves three different ways to produce the three major classes of teas known as green, black, and oolong. Today, about 75 percent of the tea produced worldwide is black; about 23 percent is green; and about 2 percent is oolong.

Consider that coffee beans are green before roasting turns them brown and ready for market. Tea leaves are also green at harvest. To achieve a variety of taste profiles, manufacturers carefully control whether, and for how long, tea leaves are exposed to air, a process called fermentation. When fermentation is completely arrested, the tea stays “green” or yellowish brown. When fermentation time is long, the leaves darken and become “black” tea. Somewhere in between these two extremes, “oolong” tea is created.

Over the centuries, as C. sinensis plants grew in the sun, they protected themselves against photosynthetic stressors by forming chemicals known as polyphenols. This group of beneficial compounds includes flavonoids—the same class of compounds that give many fruits and vegetables their antioxidant boost. It is perhaps because of tea’s high antioxidant activity that tea research is taking such a variety of turns.

The Metabolics of Tea

Oolong Tea and Weight Loss

Physiologist William Rumpler is investigating the ancient Chinese belief that oolong tea is effective in controlling body weight. Rumpler is with ARS’ Diet and Human Performance Laboratory (DHPL), one of seven laboratories that make up the Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center (BHNRC), Beltsville, Maryland.

To measure how tea influences energy expenditure (EE), Rumpler and colleagues gave each of 12 male volunteers 4 separate beverage formulas for 3 consecutive days. Before the study, the volunteers refrained from consuming caffeine and had their 24-hour EE measured. EE was measured again on the third day of each formula treatment. The treatments consisted of full-strength tea, colored water with caffeine equal to full-strength tea, half-strength tea, and colored water.

The results showed that the EE of volunteers was about 3 percent higher after they drank either the caffeinated water or the full-strength tea than after they drank the colored water. On average, the volunteers burned an additional 67 calories a day when they drank tea instead of an equal amount of water. Perhaps most interesting was that fat oxidation was a significant 12 percent higher after the full-strength tea treatment than after the water treatment.

“Our data suggested that a component of tea other than caffeine might have promoted preferential use of fat as an energy source,” says Beverly Clevidence, a study coauthor and head of the DHPL. “But the information is tentative, and we need more studies to confirm it,” she adds.

It is universally accepted that caffeinated tea raises metabolic rate because caffeine is a stimulant. “The interesting part of our study, which agreed with findings from a similar study in England, was that when you drink tea you turn on the fat-burning spigot a little bit more than when you drink caffeinated water,” says Rumpler. Some scientists speculate that caffeine and EGCG—a highly active catechin in tea—may act together to increase fat oxidation.

“Anecdotal evidence over time, particularly in China, points to a relationship between green tea consumption and weight loss,” says Rumpler. “But until we do a really comprehensive study in which we have humans drink tea and see whether they lose weight, we can’t actually say that green tea makes people lose weight. What we can say is that it raises metabolic rates and increases fat oxidation rates. Those are two things that are predictive of weight loss.”

One of the best oolong teas for weight loss available is Tava Tea, click here for the official Tava Tea website, or have a look at our Oolong Tava Tea review first.

Drinking Tea and Heart Disease. A Low-Down on Lipids

Judd, who is with the DHPL, is the lead author of a recent study that found that drinking tea lowered cholesterol and, therefore, could possibly reduce the risk of coronary heart disease (CHD). Judd points out that while several epidemiological studies found that green and black tea consumption is associated with reduced risk of CHD, experimental studies had not confirmed this. “The experimental studies did not control the background diet of the volunteers,” says Judd. “Other foods or nutrients consumed during the studies could very well have affected the risk factors.”

Judd’s recent study assessed the effects of black tea consumption on blood lipid and lipoprotein concentrations in adults with mildly high cholesterol. He carefully controlled the volunteers’ diet and weight. Seven men and eight women were given five servings of black tea a day for 3 weeks and a tea-flavored water for another 3-week period. In a third study period, caffeine was added to the tea-flavored water in an amount similar to that found in the tea.

“Overall, we found a 6 to 10 percent lowering of blood lipids in drinkers of black tea in just 3 weeks,” says Judd. What’s more, the study showed no effect on high-density lipoprotein, or “good,” cholesterol.

The study’s authors concluded that drinking black tea—along with following a prudent diet moderately low in fat, cholesterol, and saturated fatty acids—reduces total and LDL cholesterol by significant amounts and may, therefore, reduce the risk of CHD. The study is slated to appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of Nutrition that will feature the tea symposium proceedings and an introduction by Blumberg.

Judd is now conducting a study on the antioxidant effects of tea phytonutrients on smokers.

Drinking Tea Enhances Insulin Activity

ARS chemist Richard Anderson found that regularly brewed tea, when added to the fat cells of laboratory rats, increased insulin activity by more than 15 times. Anderson is with the BHNRC’s Nutrient Requirements and Functions Laboratory. He noted that this increased insulin activity was found with green, black, and oolong teas, regardless of whether caffeinated or decaffeinated.

Further, his research showed that in green and oolong teas, the catechin EGCG was largely responsible for the results. In black tea, active ingredients included tannins and theaflavins, in addition to EGCG. “The amount we tested was comparatively very small, considering the effect we observed,” says Anderson. Confirmational studies in humans are required before the results can be applied to people.

Ernst J. Schaefer, director of the HNRCA’s Lipid Metabolism Laboratory, recently completed a pilot study during which 8 volunteers with type II diabetes had lower blood sugar levels by 15 to 20 percent after drinking 6 cups of tea per day for 8 weeks. Schaefer and Blumberg have since launched a 24-week, randomized, double-blind study involving 40 male and female volunteers with type II diabetes, not taking insulin. “We want to examine the effect that green and black teas have on the glucose levels of the volunteers,” says Schaefer.

Topping the Flavonoid Charts

Since nearly 95 percent of tea’s polyphenol compounds are flavonoids, tea ranks among plants with the highest total flavonoid content. Green tea contains more simple flavonoids, called catechins, while black tea contains more complex varieties, called thearubigins and theaflavins. Some polyphenols have recently been determined—in test tube studies—to be more potent antioxidants than the well-known vitamins A, C, and E. But results from such test tube, or in vitro, tests cannot be applied to humans because they do not account for factors such as bioavailability, metabolism, and excretion, says Blumberg.

“We know that these flavonoids are not as bioavailable as vitamin C on a per-milligram basis,” says Paul E. Milbury, a scientist with the Boston HNRCA’s Antioxidants Research Laboratory. Still, one 6-ounce cup (about 173 grams) of green tea has about 235 milligrams of catechins, whereas a medium-large (178 grams) apple has 16 milligrams of catechins and 10 milligrams of vitamin C. This data is available from the BHNRC’s Flavonoid and National Nutrient databases.

Up to 90 percent of tea consumed in the United States is black. But green tea consumption has more than doubled recently. “Over the last 4 years, green tea consumption increased tremendously, going from 3 to 4 percent of total tea consumed in the United States to about 9 percent today,” says Joe Simrany, president of the New York City-based Tea Council of the U.S.A. Simrany says the council is seeking a standardized system for measuring and labeling commercial teas’ antioxidants.

Blumberg says consuming a variety of tea types and preparations adds nutritional benefits to the diet. “The beauty of tea is that it can be enjoyed in so many ways, depending on individual tastes and preferences,” he says. “My hope is that future studies will be designed to accurately assess tea’s polyphenol levels and to measure tea’s role in lowering the risk of chronic diseases.”

—By Rosalie Marion Bliss, Agricultural Research Service Information Staff.

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Oolong Tea, Green Tea, Black Tea. Health Benefits and Effects. is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Would convenient access to affordable fresh produce improve eating habits?

Editor — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 15:25:57 +0000

Would convenient access to affordable fresh produce improve eating habits?

If your employer made fresh produce available at reasonable prices just down the hall, would you eat more fresh fruits and vegetables? Would a few health tips sweeten the deal? A new Brown University study will investigate what it takes to help people eat better.

Good to Go If the price is right, the produce is fresh, and the market is just down the hall, will people eat more fruits and vegetables? Research now under way will find out. Credit: Mike Cohea/Brown University

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Drop that doughnut. In a study called “Good to Go,” health researchers at Brown University will test whether setting up a low-priced, fresh produce market within workplaces will motivate higher employee fruit and vegetable consumption.

“There have been no other studies like this,” said Kim Gans, research professor of community health at the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University and interim director of the Institute for Community Health Promotion. “We’re reducing prices and bringing it to people where they work, year-round.”

Kim Gans. Interim Director, Institute for Community Health Promotion

Gans knows that eating more fruits and vegetables reduces the risk of several types of cancer, as well as diabetes, heart disease and high blood pressure. A major focus of public health research is to determine the best ways to help people heed that advice. Good to Go is one of four studies now underway by Gans to learn about what might motivate people to eat more fruits and vegetables.

“There are many people who know they should eat more fruits and vegetables but can’t seem to do whatever it takes to make it happen for a variety of reasons, including convenience, habit, taste, cost, availability, family likes and dislikes, cultural norms,” she said. “Meanwhile, there are other people out there who just don’t know about the benefits. Through advertising, we get hit over the head with other good-tasting, cheap, easy-to-find foods that are not very healthy for us.”

In Good to Go, funded by the National Cancer Institute, Gans will take away at least three excuses: cost, convenience, and ignorance. In parallel she’s also doing that on the streets of Providence with a program called “Fresh to You,” where her team has set up weekly low-priced fresh produce markets in a variety of community locations including an outdoor market in downtown Providence.

Efforts such as these might be what’s needed to reverse consumption habits in Rhode Island. According to the Centers for Disease Control, from 2000 to 2009 the percentage of state residents who ate fruit two or more times per day decreased from about 43 percent to 37 percent and the percentage that ate vegetables three or more times per day decreased from about 29 percent to 26 percent.

Workplace produce-ivity

For the workplace study, Gans is looking to recruit 24 employers with at least 200 workers at a single site in either Rhode Island or surrounding communities in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Each company would participate for a year.

The participating workplaces will be assigned to one of three groups. Eight companies will get an onsite produce market, eight will get the produce market plus educational programs on healthy eating, and the remaining eight companies will receive health promotion and education programs on health topics other than healthy eating. After the first year, the companies in this group would then have the option to host a market.

In each case, about 100 employees will be asked to fill out surveys on their households’ fruit and vegetable consumption and other related topics at the beginning of the year, midway through and at the end of the year. Employees will receive $20 for each survey they complete. Gans and her team will be measuring changes in fruit and vegetable consumption in each of the three groups.

While the health benefits for employees remain to be seen, the sheer convenience of being able to walk down the hall to a conference room to buy oranges or a head of lettuce should delight at least some workers. Because the vendor is a wholesaler, Gans says, the produce is fresher than what’s in the supermarket and almost always less expensive. She said her team monitors prices weekly and beats all but the loss-leader prices in local markets.

For employers, Gans said, the program is a way of providing an employee health promotion and morale-boosting program for free. She will also share her aggregated program data with employers (but not any individual employee data), so they can gain insight into the health of their workforce.

“Employers pay the health insurance for their employees,” she said. “If this program does have effects in improving people’s health, that affects the bottom line. It’s a win-win.”

Employers looking for additional information or interested in taking part can reach Gans by e-mail at goodtogo@brown.edu

* The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Brown University
** More information at Brown University (Providence, Rhode Island, USA)

Would convenient access to affordable fresh produce improve eating habits? is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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Grape Seed Extract Intake Benefits

Editor — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 03:24:05 +0000

Basic information about grape seed extract - uses, potential side effects, and resources for more information. The grape seeds used to produce grape seed extract are generally obtained from wine manufacturers. The leaves and fruit of the grape have been used medicinally since ancient Greece.

Common Name—grape seed extract

Latin Name—Vitis vinifera

What Grape Seed Extract Is Used For

Grape seed extract is used for conditions related to the heart and blood vessels, such as atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and poor circulation.
Other reasons for the use of grape seed extract include complications related to diabetes, such as nerve and eye damage; vision problems, such as macular degeneration (which can cause blindness); and swelling after an injury or surgery.
Grape seed extract is also used for cancer prevention and wound healing.

How Grape Seed Extract Is Used

Grape seed extract is prepared from the seed of grapes. It is available in capsule and tablet forms.

What the Science Says

Laboratory studies have shown that grape seed contains antioxidants-substances that prevent cell damage caused by free radicals, which are highly reactive molecules that can damage cell function. However, it is still unclear how grape seed might affect human health.
Grape seed extract has shown some beneficial antioxidant effects in preliminary clinical trials. However, few trials have looked at specific diseases or conditions, and little scientific evidence is available.
A study funded by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) found that grape seed extract did not reduce the hardening of breast tissue that can occur after radiation therapy for breast cancer.
NCI is also funding studies evaluating whether grape seed extract is effective in preventing breast and prostate cancers.
NCCAM is studying whether the action of grape seed extract and its components may benefit the heart or have protective effects in the brain.

Side Effects and Cautions

Grape seed extract is generally well tolerated when taken by mouth. It has been used safely for up to 8 weeks in clinical trials.
Side effects that have been reported most often include headache; a dry, itchy scalp; dizziness; and nausea.
The interactions between grape seed extract and medicines or other supplements have not been carefully studied.
Tell your health care providers about any complementary and alternative practices you use. Give them a full picture of what you do to manage your health. This will help ensure coordinated and safe care.

Grape Seed Extract Intake Benefits is an article review from: Medicinezine.com

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