Andropause, the age-related decrease in testosterone in men, has been linked to the following symptoms:
Loss of bone
Increased fracture risk
Loss of skeletal muscle and strength
Increased fat mass
Reduced libido
Reduced erectile function
Infertility
Increased insulin resistance and risk of diabetes
Reduced sense of well-being
Fatigue
Reduced stamina
Depression
Reduced cognition
Researchers at U Mass Medical School found that six percent of forty-year-old men and twelve percent of sixty-year-old men had testosterone deficiency. These researchers estimated that we should expect 500,000 new cases of testosterone deficiency each year.
(Source: J Clin Endrinol Metab, 89: 5920-5926, 2004)
The study results I read did not indicate what constitutes testosterone deficiency, but it was most likely a figure that is far below what is optimal for health; the standard definition of low is usually 200 ng/dL [6.9 nmol/L]. This definition of low is not a fair assessment.
When testosterone levels fall below 400 ng/dL in most men, the health effects listed above begin to appear. Optimal levels are above 500 ng/dL and as high as 1000 ng/dL, which is considered the high end of normal. No one knows how extensive low testosterone levels are, especially with the increases in environmental estrogens that drive test levels even lower.
Saturday, July 23, 2005
Birth Weight and Its Implications
We've known for some time that babies with low birth weight are more likely to have learning difficulties, vision problems, chronic respiratory problems such as asthma, and cerebral palsy. We also know that smoking, alcohol consumption, poor diet, and genetics can result in low birth weight in newborns. New research suggests that high birth weight can be linked to later health problems, as well.
British scientists -- as part of the Swedish Uppsala Birth Control Cohort Study -- found that infants with a higher birth weight had increased risk of digestive system cancers (13 percent increase) and blood cancers (17 percent increase). In women, high birth weight was correlated with an increased risk of breast cancer but a decreased risk of endometrial cancer.
(Source: Int J Cancer online, Feb., 2005)
No cause and effect was established or can be assumed from this study -- at this point the findings are merely a correlation. However, research is showing that increased bodyfat (and fat babies tend to be fat adults) increases estrogen levels throughout the body (fat cells produce estrogen, and often the harshest form of estrogen, estrodiol), which is linked to a variety of cancers.
The message here is that mothers should avoid the temptation to use pregnancy as an excuse to eat everything in sight. A series of news stories have come out over the last year about enormous infants. From what I've read, a healthy birth weight is in the range of 6.5 to 9 pounds.
If you want to keep your baby healthy -- and reduce the fat you gained during pregnancy -- exercise regularly during pregnancy for as long as your health allows. Obviously, not every mother can exercise during pregnancy, but those who can should. Weight training, yoga, and light cardio are all permissible under the guidance of your doctor or a qualified personal trainer.
British scientists -- as part of the Swedish Uppsala Birth Control Cohort Study -- found that infants with a higher birth weight had increased risk of digestive system cancers (13 percent increase) and blood cancers (17 percent increase). In women, high birth weight was correlated with an increased risk of breast cancer but a decreased risk of endometrial cancer.
(Source: Int J Cancer online, Feb., 2005)
No cause and effect was established or can be assumed from this study -- at this point the findings are merely a correlation. However, research is showing that increased bodyfat (and fat babies tend to be fat adults) increases estrogen levels throughout the body (fat cells produce estrogen, and often the harshest form of estrogen, estrodiol), which is linked to a variety of cancers.
The message here is that mothers should avoid the temptation to use pregnancy as an excuse to eat everything in sight. A series of news stories have come out over the last year about enormous infants. From what I've read, a healthy birth weight is in the range of 6.5 to 9 pounds.
If you want to keep your baby healthy -- and reduce the fat you gained during pregnancy -- exercise regularly during pregnancy for as long as your health allows. Obviously, not every mother can exercise during pregnancy, but those who can should. Weight training, yoga, and light cardio are all permissible under the guidance of your doctor or a qualified personal trainer.
Saturday, July 16, 2005
Men Suffer More in Obesity Than Do Women
A new study reported on Healthcentral News suggests that obese men suffer more detriment to their health than do women. Study co-author Dr. Emile F. L. Dubois, from the Department of Pulmonary Diseases at the Hospital Reinier de Graaf Groep in Delft-Voorburg, the Netherlands, focused on 56 severely obese Dutch patients -- 22 men and 34 women, all white. None was known to have a history of heart disease or diabetes.
Blood samples were taken, and all patients were assessed for evidence of carbohydrate intolerance and diabetes. Hormone levels and body fat composition were also calculated, and all the men and women completed a bicycle exercise test to observe respiratory health, muscle strength and fatigue.
According to the researchers, men generally failed to meet expectations on the cycle test while women exceeded the anticipated results.
The women demonstrated better lung capacity -- and significantly better endurance -- when exercising than the men, the study team found.
In addition, 59 percent of the men were found to be either carbohydrate-intolerant or diabetic, compared with just 35 percent of the women.
***
"We were surprised by our findings," Dubois said. "We had the idea that severely obese men and women would both have muscle and endurance capacities above normal, because they're carrying a lot of weight around all day long. But this was only true among women. The men really under-performed."
Dubois suggested a range of potential explanations, including the possibility that women are naturally more efficient at energy storage due to the role they play as a food source for newborns. Another theory is that hormones produced by fat tissue -- including estrogen -- might partially explain gender differences. Men could be more negatively affected than women by the release of these hormones, Dubois speculated.
But the most promising explanation might be linked to the distribution of fat around the body. Men, he noted, tend to store it in the upper parts of their bodies and directly inside muscle tissue, whereas women store fat in the lower body area. This may lead to a relatively greater diminishment in lung capacity among men, because abdominal muscles are compressed under the weight of stored fat.
Further proof than men are genetically inferior to women. Okay, not really. But this is part of the overall pattern of males being more likely to live shorter and less healthy lives. Those of us with a Y chromosome need to be more diligent in our efforts to remain healthy or we will die younger than our female peers.
But this doesn't get women off the hook, either. Just because being overweight won't kill women as fast as it will men, it will still kill you. LOSE THE WEIGHT NOW!
This site has tons of useful information to help you lose weight and keep it off. Join a gym, buy a jump rope, or start walking. Do whatever you can to burn more calories than you take in. Depriving yourself of a few snacks and desserts is much better than depriving yourself of life.
Blood samples were taken, and all patients were assessed for evidence of carbohydrate intolerance and diabetes. Hormone levels and body fat composition were also calculated, and all the men and women completed a bicycle exercise test to observe respiratory health, muscle strength and fatigue.
According to the researchers, men generally failed to meet expectations on the cycle test while women exceeded the anticipated results.
The women demonstrated better lung capacity -- and significantly better endurance -- when exercising than the men, the study team found.
In addition, 59 percent of the men were found to be either carbohydrate-intolerant or diabetic, compared with just 35 percent of the women.
***
"We were surprised by our findings," Dubois said. "We had the idea that severely obese men and women would both have muscle and endurance capacities above normal, because they're carrying a lot of weight around all day long. But this was only true among women. The men really under-performed."
Dubois suggested a range of potential explanations, including the possibility that women are naturally more efficient at energy storage due to the role they play as a food source for newborns. Another theory is that hormones produced by fat tissue -- including estrogen -- might partially explain gender differences. Men could be more negatively affected than women by the release of these hormones, Dubois speculated.
But the most promising explanation might be linked to the distribution of fat around the body. Men, he noted, tend to store it in the upper parts of their bodies and directly inside muscle tissue, whereas women store fat in the lower body area. This may lead to a relatively greater diminishment in lung capacity among men, because abdominal muscles are compressed under the weight of stored fat.
Further proof than men are genetically inferior to women. Okay, not really. But this is part of the overall pattern of males being more likely to live shorter and less healthy lives. Those of us with a Y chromosome need to be more diligent in our efforts to remain healthy or we will die younger than our female peers.
But this doesn't get women off the hook, either. Just because being overweight won't kill women as fast as it will men, it will still kill you. LOSE THE WEIGHT NOW!
This site has tons of useful information to help you lose weight and keep it off. Join a gym, buy a jump rope, or start walking. Do whatever you can to burn more calories than you take in. Depriving yourself of a few snacks and desserts is much better than depriving yourself of life.
Green Tea and Cancer
A recent statement by the FDA claimed that green tea does not offer preventive effects against breast and prostate cancer -- and by extension, any other form of cancer. The studies they cited are weak at best and did not use green tea extract. Simply drinking green tea does not appear to offer any significant protection against cancer.
However -- and there is always a however -- another study has identified the specific mechanism by which green tea DOES fight cancer. A study reported in U.S. News and World Report details the findings of Thomas Gasiewicz, researcher in the Department of Environmental Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center.
Gasiewicz found that "the prime antioxidant component of green tea, which is in the family of plant chemicals called catechins—or epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) to be precise—zooms in on a key target in the cancer cell. And the target is a big one: a normal stress protein, known as heat shock protein 90 (HSP90). Heat shock or stress proteins are critical to survival of all cells, cancerous or otherwise.
"Stress proteins abound in both plants and animals. Think of them as protectors that chaperone the thousands of worker-bee proteins that interact in and on the surface of our cells in the course of any one cell's life. Growth, performance, communication, you name it, and some form of HSP is a key player. When cells are threatened by a treacherous environment such as heat (from which we get the name HSP), proteins curl up and then clump up. We now know it also happens with damaging cold, low oxygen, or poisons. Heat shock protein protectors quickly rev up and come to the rescue to both repair injured proteins and to carry the irreversibly damaged ones to a disposal dump for an out-of-the-way burial so new ones can take their place.
"Cancer hijacks the stress protein network in its efforts to overtake the body. Cancer cells are fast growing and on the march wherever they set up shop—breast, prostate, colon, bone marrow. And in that superstressed state of attack, cancer cells produce abnormally high levels of HSP90 to protect their cancer-producing proteins. Even in the face of toxic radiation and chemotherapy, some cancer cells survive because of these natural potent protectors. What Gasiewicz and his colleagues have shown is that the age-old EGCG does battle with HSP90. A few months ago, his laboratory reported for the first time that EGCG binds to this protective stress protein important to cancer growth and survival and essentially takes it out of commission."
It appears that one would have to drink as many as 10 cups of tea a day to get this effect. But with green tea extract, you can get the protective benefits of EGCG without the insomnia and frequent trips to the bathroom that drinking 10 cups of tea might entail. Studies are now underway to determine if there is a health benefit from taking capsules instead of whole tea.
Once again, your government is out to discredit any possible natural cures for disease. Take anything the FDA says about natural supplements (that isn't supported with a lot of peer-reviewed studies) as a further attempt to make the pharmaceutical companies richer.
However -- and there is always a however -- another study has identified the specific mechanism by which green tea DOES fight cancer. A study reported in U.S. News and World Report details the findings of Thomas Gasiewicz, researcher in the Department of Environmental Medicine at the University of Rochester Medical Center.
Gasiewicz found that "the prime antioxidant component of green tea, which is in the family of plant chemicals called catechins—or epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG) to be precise—zooms in on a key target in the cancer cell. And the target is a big one: a normal stress protein, known as heat shock protein 90 (HSP90). Heat shock or stress proteins are critical to survival of all cells, cancerous or otherwise.
"Stress proteins abound in both plants and animals. Think of them as protectors that chaperone the thousands of worker-bee proteins that interact in and on the surface of our cells in the course of any one cell's life. Growth, performance, communication, you name it, and some form of HSP is a key player. When cells are threatened by a treacherous environment such as heat (from which we get the name HSP), proteins curl up and then clump up. We now know it also happens with damaging cold, low oxygen, or poisons. Heat shock protein protectors quickly rev up and come to the rescue to both repair injured proteins and to carry the irreversibly damaged ones to a disposal dump for an out-of-the-way burial so new ones can take their place.
"Cancer hijacks the stress protein network in its efforts to overtake the body. Cancer cells are fast growing and on the march wherever they set up shop—breast, prostate, colon, bone marrow. And in that superstressed state of attack, cancer cells produce abnormally high levels of HSP90 to protect their cancer-producing proteins. Even in the face of toxic radiation and chemotherapy, some cancer cells survive because of these natural potent protectors. What Gasiewicz and his colleagues have shown is that the age-old EGCG does battle with HSP90. A few months ago, his laboratory reported for the first time that EGCG binds to this protective stress protein important to cancer growth and survival and essentially takes it out of commission."
It appears that one would have to drink as many as 10 cups of tea a day to get this effect. But with green tea extract, you can get the protective benefits of EGCG without the insomnia and frequent trips to the bathroom that drinking 10 cups of tea might entail. Studies are now underway to determine if there is a health benefit from taking capsules instead of whole tea.
Once again, your government is out to discredit any possible natural cures for disease. Take anything the FDA says about natural supplements (that isn't supported with a lot of peer-reviewed studies) as a further attempt to make the pharmaceutical companies richer.
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
EU Supplement Ban Upheld -- Is U.S. Next?
The London Times is carrying the story:
The European Court of Justice approved the Food Supplements Directive even though the court's own Advocate-General advised that the Directive was invalid under EU law.
***
The Directive was first approved by EU governments in 2002, and health food manufacturers were given until today - July 12, 2005 - to submit detailed scientific dossiers proving their ingredients were safe. Those supplements that failed to qualify would be banned.
Over the last three years, health food suppliers have either reformulated their goods, replacing natural substances with synthetic chemicals that already have EU approval, or waited as their legal challenge made its way through the courts.
***
Today's deadline means that health food retailers and manufacturers have sent in hundreds of dossiers for their ingredients over the last week, leaving the current list of which products are banned and which are approved in flux.
The same rules now being imposed on vitamins and supplements by the EU are based on rulings by the World Health Organization (WHO) and have been approved as international law. The U.S. will also have to conform to these barbaric standards or be in violation of the WTO.
I've posted on this issue before. Click here to read more.
The European Court of Justice approved the Food Supplements Directive even though the court's own Advocate-General advised that the Directive was invalid under EU law.
***
The Directive was first approved by EU governments in 2002, and health food manufacturers were given until today - July 12, 2005 - to submit detailed scientific dossiers proving their ingredients were safe. Those supplements that failed to qualify would be banned.
Over the last three years, health food suppliers have either reformulated their goods, replacing natural substances with synthetic chemicals that already have EU approval, or waited as their legal challenge made its way through the courts.
***
Today's deadline means that health food retailers and manufacturers have sent in hundreds of dossiers for their ingredients over the last week, leaving the current list of which products are banned and which are approved in flux.
The same rules now being imposed on vitamins and supplements by the EU are based on rulings by the World Health Organization (WHO) and have been approved as international law. The U.S. will also have to conform to these barbaric standards or be in violation of the WTO.
I've posted on this issue before. Click here to read more.
Tuesday, July 5, 2005
Dairy Calcium Helps in Fat Loss
You've heard it in the commercials and read it in the advertisements, and still more studies are confirming that people who consume larger amounts of dairy calcium are thinner than those who don't. A recent study (Int. J Obes, 29: 115-121, 2004) found that men and women who consumed the most dairy products were 80 percent less likely to be obese and had a lower bodymass index (BMI, an unreliable but often used measure of obesity).
It appears that dietary calcium increases levels of hormones that can prevent fat storage and increases fat breakdown for energy. Dairy calcium works better than supplements or plant-based calcium. Diets low in calcium seem to promote fat storage.
Be smart: consume lowfat or nonfat dairy products, especially cottage cheese, yogurt, and cheese. If you like milk, choose the newer low-carb milk products that are also nonfat. The protein from all these foods will also provide a better, longer-lasting sensation of fullness that will allow you to maintain a steady blood sugar level and avoid binges. The higher fat products taste better but eliminate the health benefits. Also, please keep in mind that most yogurt and milk (unless it is low-carb) are carbohydrate foods, not protein foods, so use them accordingly.
Adults need 1.2 grams of calcium a day (1.5 grams if you are over 60) to maintain proper health. Not only will you lose some fat, but your bones and teeth will be healthier, too. Try to consume at least three servings of nonfat dairy foods per day.
It appears that dietary calcium increases levels of hormones that can prevent fat storage and increases fat breakdown for energy. Dairy calcium works better than supplements or plant-based calcium. Diets low in calcium seem to promote fat storage.
Be smart: consume lowfat or nonfat dairy products, especially cottage cheese, yogurt, and cheese. If you like milk, choose the newer low-carb milk products that are also nonfat. The protein from all these foods will also provide a better, longer-lasting sensation of fullness that will allow you to maintain a steady blood sugar level and avoid binges. The higher fat products taste better but eliminate the health benefits. Also, please keep in mind that most yogurt and milk (unless it is low-carb) are carbohydrate foods, not protein foods, so use them accordingly.
Adults need 1.2 grams of calcium a day (1.5 grams if you are over 60) to maintain proper health. Not only will you lose some fat, but your bones and teeth will be healthier, too. Try to consume at least three servings of nonfat dairy foods per day.
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