Author: SupremeCmdr

Thought for Today 09.09.17

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MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road, though I may know nothing about it. Therefore I will trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

– Thomas Merton, “Thoughts in Solitude”

© Abbey of Gethsemani

Eating meat linked to higher risk of diabetes — ScienceDaily

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These findings come from the Singapore Chinese Health Study, which recruited 63,257 adults aged 45-74 years between 1993 and 1998, and then followed them up for an average of about 11 years. The study found a positive association between intakes of red meat and poultry, and risk of developing diabetes. Specifically, compared to those in the lowest quartile intake, those in the highest quartile intake of red meat and poultry had a 23 per cent and 15 per cent increase in risk of diabetes, respectively, while the intake of fish/shellfish was not associated with risk of diabetes. The increase in risk associated with red meat/poultry was reduced by substituting them with fish/shellfish.

Source: Eating meat linked to higher risk of diabetes — ScienceDaily

10 Questions to Challenge Your Medical News Savvy Medpage Today Weekly News Quiz: August 25-31

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Source: 10 Questions to Challenge Your Medical News Savvy | Medpage Today

I intend to post a link to this quiz weekly for life underwriters who are serious about improving their knowledge base.

I scored 70%.

Should have been 80% but I clicked the wrong button.  I knew the answer but answered the question incorrectly.  I had the same problem in college!

 

Global Nutrition Study Changes Nothing – The Atlantic

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The practically important findings were that the healthiest people in the world had diets that are full of fruits, beans, seeds, vegetables, and whole grains, and low in refined carbohydrates and sugar.

As researcher Victoria Miller of McMaster University put it, “Our results indicate that recommendations should emphasize raw vegetable intake over cooked.”  There is a novel idea. Dietary guidelines usually don’t encourage people to prioritize raw vegetables over cooked. Maybe they should. That could be a headline. “Cooking Your Vegetables? Welcome to Early Death.”

When measuring diet, for example, lifelong randomized, controlled trials are impossible. Even if people would volunteer to change their diets for a decade or so—a period long enough that rates of death and cancer and heart attacks could be meaningful—it would be impossible to keep the research subjects blinded. Our perceptions of how well we’re eating change how we behave in a lot of other ways.

Source: PURE, a New Global Nutrition Study, Changes Nothing – The Atlantic

Great article.  Guess I’ll start eating more salads and walking faster.

Slow Walking Indicator of Heart-Related Death

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Source: Slow Walking Indicator of Heart-Related Death, Study Finds | American Council on Science and Health

Earlier articles with walking-speed vs death association:
2015:
“5 year mortality predictors in 498 103 UK Biobank participants: a prospective population-based study”. Excerpts related to walking:
– Self-reported health and walking pace were the strongest predictors in both sexes and across different causes of deaths.
– Our findings suggest that measures that can be simply obtained by verbal interview without physical examination (eg, self-reported health and walking pace) are the strongest predictors of all-cause mortality.
http://www.thelancet.com/jo…

2013
“Association of walking speed in late midlife with mortality: results from the Whitehall II cohort study.”:
– Slow walking speed is associated with increased mortality in the elderly, but it is unknown whether a similar association is present in late midlife. Our aim was to examine walking speed in late midlife as a predictor of mortality, as well as factors that may explain this association.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.go…

Hat Tip and thanks to fellow reader John H. Newcomb who provided the quotes and links above in the comments section from the original article.

Untreated sleep apnea shown to raise metabolic and cardiovascular stress — ScienceDaily

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Sleep apnea, left untreated for even a few days, can increase blood sugar and fat levels, stress hormones and blood pressure, according to a new study of sleeping subjects. A report of the study’s findings, published in the August issue of The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, adds further support for the consistent use of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP), a machine that increases air pressure in the throat to keep the airway open during sleep.

Jun emphasized that the study was limited by studying people with severe OSA and obesity, thus limiting the ability to apply the findings to all OSA patients. The researchers also did not compare CPAP use to a sham CPAP control group to exclude a potential placebo effect

Source: Untreated sleep apnea shown to raise metabolic and cardiovascular stress — ScienceDaily