Some people who rely on fitness trackers to see how hard they work out may want to rethink this approach, according to a small study that suggests the increasingly popular devices may get more accurate heart rate readings when users are at rest than during exercise.
The study tested four popular wristbands, each of which has a light-emitting diode (LED) that measures heart rate from tiny changes in skin blood volumes by using light reflected from the skin.
Participants in the study – 40 healthy adults – wore two trackers on each wrist and compared resting and exercise heart rate readings on the devices to the gold standard used by doctors: an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG) test.
At rest, the Fitbit Surge got heart rate measurements that most closely matched the ECG results, and the Basis Peak was furthest off. In tests that also included the Fitbit Charge and Mio Fuse, none of the trackers got exercise heart rate readings that came close to the ECG.
These results suggest that while the trackers may help monitor daily activity, it’s not clear the heart rate readouts would be accurate enough to help patients with certain health problems make medical decisions, the authors note in Annals of Internal Medicine.
“At any moment, the tracker could be off by a fair bit, but at most moments, it won’t be,” said lead study author Lisa Cadmus-Bertram of the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
“This is why our paper doesn’t suggest that the commercial trackers we tested would be sufficient for medical applications where high precision is needed during exercise,” Cadmus-Bertram said by email. “Yet for the typical recreational user, they may still provide feedback that’s useful and motivational.”
To assess the accuracy of the trackers, researchers examined heart rate data for participants who were 49 years old on average and slightly overweight.
First, they looked at the amount of agreement between the readings from the trackers and the ECG tests.
When participants were seated, researchers took readings for the trackers and the ECG tests at one-minute intervals for 10 minutes.
The narrowest range of differences between the trackers and the ECG, indicating the most accuracy, was for the Fitbit Surge. The range for this tracker ranged from an underestimation of 5.1 beats per minute to an overestimation of 4.5 beats per minute.
The widest range of difference at rest was for the Basis Peak, which ranged from an underestimation of 17.1 beats per minute to an overestimation of 22.6 beats per minute.
When participants exercised on a treadmill, the ranges were even wider. The Mio Fuse ranged from an underestimation of 22.5 beats per minute to an overestimation of 26 beats per minute, for example, while the Fitbit Charge range from an underestimation of 41 beats per minute to an overestimation of 36 beats per minute.
The study is small, and researchers found only limited repeatability with results for the same participant under the same conditions.
Still, the findings are an important first step in understanding the clinical validity of wrist trackers many patients already use, said Dr. Daniel Cantillon, a researcher at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio who wasn’t involved in the study.
“We need data testing these devices among patients with specific disease states, such as heart failure, atrial fibrillation and other chronic medical problems, where it is possible that additional variation will occur with physical activity,” Cantillon said by email.
In particular, patients with the most common heart rhythm disorder, atrial fibrillation, shouldn’t rely on the trackers to detect abnormal rhythms, said Dr. Sumeet Chugh, a researcher at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles who wasn’t involved in the study.
“There is a lot at stake here,” Chugh said by email. “When it comes to the use of wrist-worn trackers, we need to be confident of accuracy comparable to treadmill testing if we are going to use the information for patient care.”
A spokesperson for Fitbit told Reuters Health that Fitbit trackers “are not intended to be medical devices” but instead “to give a more informed picture” of overall health. “Extensive internal studies . . . show that Fitbit’s PurePulse technology performs to industry standard expectations for optical heart rate on the wrist,” the spokesperson said.
Mark Gorelick, Chief Science Officer at Mio Global, said in a statement that the company’s technology “helps consumers understand the intensity of their exercise, based on their personal profile and heart rate data, and empowers them to proactively manage their health and reduce risk of lifestyle-related diseases.”
Health advice has changed drastically during the past decade, and modern science has proven that some “truths” you’ve been told and believed all of your life are completely wrong. The bad advice comes from well-meaning parents (“Drinking coffee will stunt your growth.”) to doctors (“Drink skim milk; it’s healthier.”). Take a look at six common myths you may still believe are gospel.
Napping in the afternoon means you’re lazy. An afternoon nap isn’t just for babies and toddlers, and it certainly doesn’t mean you’re lazy. About a third of American adults enjoy a daily nap and studies show that a brief 10- to 20-minute nap can boost your alertness and creativity as well as help keep you healthy.
Just make sure you don’t nap too long. During a brief nap, you only enter the lightest stage of sleep, but during a 30- or 60-minute nap your body will enter a deep level of sleep that may leave you feeling even more tired than before.
Long naps are also bad for your health. Scientists at the University of Tokyo found that napping for 40 minutes or longer increased the risk of developing metabolic syndrome by as much as 50 percent. Short naps of less than 30 minutes, however, lowered the risk.
A Greek study presented at a meeting of the European Society of Cardiology found that those who took midday naps had lower systolic blood pressure than those who didn’t nap.
Coffee will stunt your growth. In past years, coffee was blamed for everything from heart disease and premature death to stunting growth, but it turns out that the experts didn’t know beans. Recent research shows that drinking even up to six cups a day won’t increase your risk of heart problems, cancer, or dying prematurely from any disease. In fact, a study found that Americans get more health-promoting antioxidants from coffee than anything else, because our bodies absorb antioxidants found in coffee better than those in fruits and vegetables.
Coffee has been linked to a lower risk of all of the following health issues: depression, retinal degeneration, heart failure, Alzheimer’s, heart disease, stroke, diabetes, and some cancers.
Drink skim milk, it’s healthier. Americans have been on a low-fat craze for decades, but recent research found that full-fat milk may be healthier than low-fat or no-fat milk. Tufts University conducted a 15-year study of people between the ages of 30 and 75, and found that those who ate the most full-fat dairy products had a 46 percent lower risk of diabetes. Another study, which was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that women who ate the most high-fat dairy products were more likely to weigh less and to resist gaining weight over time than those who ate low-fat dairy products. Experts believe that when people cut down on fat, they increase their intake of high-calorie foods, such as sugar and carbs.
Eggs are bad for you. For more than 50 years, health experts advised people to limit their consumption of eggs because they believed the cholesterol in eggs raised the risk of heart disease, high blood pressure, and obesity. New studies, however, found that eggs only have a slight effect on cholesterol levels, and in fact, actually enhance brain function.
A new Finnish study, which was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, found that a diet relatively high in cholesterol, such as eating an egg every day, didn’t raise the risk of dementia or Alzheimer’s. It found no association between a high intake of dietary cholesterol and the risk of dementia or Alzheimer’s disease, even among people who carried the APOE4 gene which affects the metabolism of cholesterol and increases the risk of memory disorders. On the contrary, the consumption of eggs was associated with better results in certain tests measuring cognitive performance.
The Finnish study followed several recent studies showing that eggs don’t increase the risk of coronary heart disease, including a 2016 study published in the Journal of the American College of Nutrition which found that eating an egg a day actually reduced the risk of stroke by 12 percent.
While most of us know that good nutrition is vital in assisting us reach our optimum health and feel our best; finding time to eat a balanced diet on a daily basis seems a formidable job in this fast paced, affluent society. Though your life may be frantic, there are still many good tasting, healthful alternatives which can assist you to lose weight and enhance your health. This information is designed to be a practical guide in finding those alternatives whether you are at a friend’s home, on the job, on the road, or at home. The good news is that by taking charge of your diet plan, you can improve your well-being while reducing your own risk of “lifestyle” diseases including heart disease or cancer.
A nice spot to start is defining what constitutes a “healthy” diet. The “Four Food Group” Plan of yesteryear meant that foods in the Meat, Dairy Product, Breads and Vegetable Fruit group were identical in their contribution to a healthy diet. Today, researchers show that diets rich in complex carbohydrates and low in saturated fats may reduce our risk of chronic disease. Health professionals designed the “Food Pyramid” guide to translate these recommendations into a food strategy for daily living.
Complex Carbohydrates
Complex carbohydrates are present in cereals, whole grain breads, starches and fruits and vegetables. These foods are not just rich in B vitamins and trace minerals, but they also contribute dietary fiber that has been shown to reduce risk for helping in weight control, lowering cholesterol levels and developing specific cancers.
Six to twelve servings of cereals, breads and starches may seem like a lot of food, but if you consider one cup of rice is three servings of cereal, you can see that fulfilling these guidelines isn’t that difficult.
Fruits & Vegetables
Similarly for vegetables and fruits. The majority of people gag in the thought of eating four to seven servings daily until they find one medium piece of fruit is two servings.
Proteins
Proteins are observed in the meat and dairy group.
Foods in the dairy group not only provide protein, nevertheless they also bring other essential nutrients needed for synthesizing teeth and healthy bones, Vitamin D and calcium. They could be a significant source of saturated fat, so picked two to three helpings of the low-fat (1% fat or less) milks, yogurts and cheeses.
The meat group includes nuts, fish, chicken and beans or legumes. A three ounce serving is around approximated by a deck of cards and also you need at least two portions a day. These foods provide magnesium, zinc and iron which, along with protein, are used by the body in creating hemoglobin and slender body tissue. These foods may also contribute to a raised intake of saturated fat, so picked lean cuts of meat like round or flank steak, pork tenderloin, ham and leg of lamb. Jump the skin on chicken or turkey and you’ll miss much of the fat and cholesterol.
Fats & Sugar
Sugars, fats and alcohol have the least amount of surface area on the pyramid for a reason. They bring more than calories to the dietary plan and they will be squeezed by your body into a fat cell. Yet, your body will really create another fat cell until they may be burned off, to harbor them,
Many health organizations, like the American Heart Association and also the American Cancer Society, agree that limiting your fat intake to less than 30% of calories goes a ways to protect you from life threatening ailments. That isn’t much fat, as a gram of fat has nine calories. You are better off to avoid adding fat to your food as there’s some fat in dairy products and meat, chicken and fish. Fortunately, there are numerous good tasting low-fat or nonfat salad and sandwich spreads which make the task of averting added fat a lot easier.
Yes, certain fats are essential to good nutrition (like linoleic acid), but these are seen in ample numbers in whole grain breads, cereals and vegetables. Corn, for instance, is where mother nature initially set corn oil. Why don’t you bypass the margarine and merely eat corn?
Overview
In a nutshell, good nutrition means eating a wide selection of foods from each of the five food groups. The Food Pyramid reveals us that by eating more complex carbohydrates and not as total fat and saturated fat, we can become empowered by the good life and not fall victim to it.
Chiropractic care may be able to bring about relief for allergy sufferers. Allergy symptoms may be triggered by misalignments in the neck and upper back, which contain nerves important for the body’s respiratory and immune systems. These misalignments are believed to interfere with the communication between these systems and the brain and cause or worsen allergy symptoms. Advanced Chiropractic Wellness offers adjustments which are targeted to reduce the effects of allergies on the body.
Allergies Result When The Body’s Immune System Is Triggered To Action By Substances That Should Be Considered Innocuous
Typically, this results in the release of excess histamine, which causes the characteristic watery and itchy eyes, stuffy nose, and increased sinus pressure. The sinus pressure may cause extremely painful headaches on top of the general discomfort of the other two. In some cases, body parts may also swell. The eye area is most commonly affected by such puffiness.When all of these symptoms are put together, it can cause serious suffering. Many people find that they can’t go outdoors during the height of the seasons in which their allergy triggers are released. Such triggers include the pollen from juniper and elm trees. This pollen is among the first of the allergens to hit in the spring, so Illinois residents will be encountering it soon if they aren’t already.
Later, Flower Pollen, Molds & Dust Take The Place Of The Tree Pollen
“After a full winter, nobody wants to have to stay indoors breathing filtered air. It’s time to go out and have fun! Yet for many, allergy medication isn’t a good solution. Drowsiness is a common side-effect, and even the non-drowsy types have side-effects of their own. What people need is a solution that addresses the problem at its roots,” said Dr. Scott Stratton, a chiropractor at Advanced Chiropractic Wellness.This solution, according to Dr. Stratton, is chiropractic realignment of the vertebrae that contain the nerves that communicate between the brain and the body’s respiratory and immune systems. The theory is that misalignment here causes miscommunication between these systems, resulting in exaggerated bodily responses to allergens.”When the brain and body can’t get a clear signal pathway between each other, only some of the needed information makes it through. Then, both sides have to try to fill in missing information, and this results in bad guesses. Chiropractic realignment clears up the signal and allows the brain and body to make appropriate responses to its environment,” Dr. Stratton explained.About Advanced Chiropractic WellnessThe Advanced Chiropractic Wellness clinic offers chiropractic care, lifestyle counseling, laser treatments, and more. They take a holistic approach that aims to improve a patient’s overall health instead of simply treating specific symptoms.
Ear problems can be excruciatingly painful, especially in children. With 10 million new cases every year, ear infections (otitis media) are the most common illness affecting babies and young children and the number one reason for visits to the pediatrician�accounting for more than 35 percent of all pediatric visits.
Almost half of all children will have at least one middle ear infection before they�re a year old, and two-thirds of them will have had at least one such infection by age 3. The symptoms can include ear pain, fever, and irritability. Otitis media can be either bacterial or viral in origin, and frequently results from another illness such as a cold. For many children, it can become a chronic problem, requiring treatment year after year, and putting the child at risk of permanent hearing damage and associated speech and developmental problems.
Standard treatment for most cases of otitis media is with antibiotics, which can be effective if the culprit is bacterial (antibiotics, of course, do nothing to fight off viruses). But, according to many research studies, antibiotics are often not much more effective than the body�s own immune system. And repeated doses of antibiotics can lead to drug-resistant bacteria that scoff at the drugs, while leaving the child screaming in pain.
Frequent ear infections are also the second most common reason for surgery in children under 2 (with circumcision being the first). In severe cases�for example, when fluids from an ear infection haven�t cleared from the ear after several months, and hearing is affected�specialists sometimes prescribe myringotomy and tympanostomy, more commonly known as �ear tubes.� During the surgical procedure, a small opening is made in the eardrum to place a tube inside. The tube relieves pressure in the ear and prevents repeated fluid buildup with the continuous venting of fresh air. In most cases, the membrane pushes the tube out after a couple of months and the hole in the eardrum closes. Although the treatment is effective, it has to be repeated in some 20 to 30 percent of cases. And this kind of surgery requires general anesthesia, never a minor thing in a small child. If the infection persists even after tube placement and removal, children sometimes undergo adenoidectomy (surgical removal of the adenoids)�an option that is effective mostly through the first year after surgery.
Before yet another round of �maybe-they�ll-work-and-maybe-they-won�t� antibiotics or the drastic step of surgery, more parents are considering chiropractic to help children with chronic ear infections. Dr. Joan Fallon, a chiropractor who practices in Yonkers, New York, has published research showing that, after receiving a series of chiropractic adjustments, nearly 80 percent of the children treated were free of ear infections for at least the six-month period following their initial visits (a period that also included maintenance treatments every four to six weeks).
�Chiropractic mobilizes drainage of the ear in children, and if they can continue to drain without a buildup of fluid and subsequent infection, they build up their own antibodies and recover more quickly,� explains Dr. Fallon. She�d like to see her pilot study used as a basis for larger-scale trials of chiropractic as a therapeutic modality for otitis media.
Dr. Fallon uses primarily upper-cervical manipulation on children with otitis media, focusing particularly on the occiput, or back of the skull, and atlas, or the first vertebra in the neck. �Adjusting the occiput, in particular, will get the middle ear to drain. Depending on how chronic it�s been and on where they are in their cycle of antibiotics, children generally need to get through one bout of fluid and fight it off themselves.� That means, for the average child, between six and eight treatments. If a child�s case is acute, Dr. Fallon will check the ear every day, using a tympanogram to measure the ear and track the movement of the eardrum to make sure that it�s draining. �I�ll do adjustments every day or every other day for a couple of days if they�re acute, and then decrease frequency over time.�
Dr. Fallon, whose research garnered her the acclaim of childrearing magazines like�Parenting�and�Baby Talk, often sees great success when she treats a child for otitis media. �Once they fight it themselves, my kids tend to do very well and stay away from ear infections completely. Unless there are environmental factors like smoking in the house, an abnormally shaped Eustachian tube, or something like that, they do very well,� she says.
�I have two large pediatric groups that refer to me on a regular basis. In the winter, when otitis is most prevalent, I see five or six new children each week from each group,� says Dr. Fallon. �It�s safe and effective and something that parents should try, certainly before inserting tubes in their children�s ears.�
Chiropractic Care Can Help�
Come on in and talk to us about your child�s ear infections. Doctors of chiropractic are licensed and trained to diagnose and treat patients of all ages and will use a gentler type of treatment for children.�However, Texas chiropractors can answer any questions a patient�may have and refer them to a specialist, they must remain within the scope of their field which is the�Muscular�and the�Musculoskeletal system.
Middle-age white Americans with limited education are increasingly dying younger, on average, than other middle-age U.S. adults, a trend driven by their dwindling economic opportunities, research by two Princeton University economists has found.
The economists, Anne Case and Angus Deaton, argue in a paper released Thursday that the loss of steady middle-income jobs for those with high school degrees or less has triggered broad problems for this group. They are more likely than their college-educated counterparts, for example, to be unemployed, unmarried or afflicted with poor health.
“This is a story of the collapse of the white working class,” Deaton said in an interview. “The labor market has very much turned against them.”
Those dynamics helped fuel the rise of President Donald Trump, who won widespread support among whites with only a high school degree. Yet Deaton said his policies are unlikely to reverse these trends, particularly the health care legislation now before the House that Trump is championing. That bill would lead to higher premiums for older Americans, the Congressional Budget Office has found.
“The policies that you see, seem almost perfectly designed to hurt the very people who voted for him,” Deaton said.
Case and Deaton’s paper, issued by the Brookings Institution, follows up on research they released in 2015 that first documented a sharp increase in mortality among middle-aged whites.
Since 1999, white men and women ages 45 through 54 have endured a sharp increase in “deaths of despair,” Case and Deaton found in their earlier work. These include suicides, drug overdoses, and alcohol-related deaths such as liver failure.
In the paper released Thursday, Case and Deaton draw a clearer relationship between rising death rates and changes in the job market since the 1970s. They find that men without college degrees are less likely to receive rising incomes over time, a trend “consistent with men moving to lower and lower skilled jobs.”
Other research has found that Americans with only high school degrees are less likely to get married or purchase a home and more likely to get divorced if they do marry.
“It’s not just their careers that have gone down the tubes, but their marriage prospects, their ability to raise children,” said Deaton, who won the Nobel prize in economics in 2015 for his long-standing work on solutions to poverty. “That’s the kind of thing that can lead people to despair.”
It’s not entirely clear why these trends have affected whites much more than they have African-Americans or Hispanics, whose death rates are improving.
Case and Deaton note that many Hispanics are “markedly better off” than parents or grandparents who were born abroad, enabling a greater sense of optimism. African-Americans, they add, may have become more resilient to economic challenges given their long-standing disadvantages in the job market.
The data is clear, though: In 1999, the death rate for high school-educated whites ages 50 through 54 was 30 percent lower than the death rate for all African-Americans in that age group. By 2015, it was 30 percent higher.
The educational split is also growing. Even while the death rate for whites without a college degree is rising, the rate for whites who are college graduates is falling, Case and Deaton found.
Americans with less education are also faring much worse when compared with adults in other countries, Case and Deaton concluded. Death rates in Europe for people with limited education are falling — and in most countries, they’re falling faster than death rates for those with more education.
For those reasons, Case and Deaton discount the notion that government disability benefit programs are responsible for some of these problems by enabling more Americans to stop working. Social welfare programs in Europe are typically more generous yet haven’t caused a rise in death rates.
Given the long-running nature of these trends, many of which stem from the 1970s, reversing them could take years, Case and Deaton write. But there are immediate steps that could be taken, Deaton said in the interview. Routine prescriptions for opioids should be cut back.
And, “Europe has a much better safety net than we do, and they’re not seeing the same sort of problems as we are,” he said.
With spring right around the corner, chances are you�ll begin to show symptoms of the “Spring Fever.” It�s not an actual disease in a conventional sense, say experts, and you won�t be bed ridden. But you may experience biological problems and physical symptoms that actually do exist.
�While it�s not a recognized medical condition, people do experiences changes in mood and energy level as spring approaches,� Dr. Sharad Paul, author of �The Genetics of Health: Understand Your Genes for Better Health,� tells Newsmax Health.
�This is definitely a disorder of wealthy nations who pay more attention to the changes in weather as opposed to parts of India and Asia for example where people can�t afford to dwell on the weather. We tend to hibernate and become depressed during the dark winter months and then come to life as the temperatures soar.
One way to minimize the effect of Spring Fever is to maintain exercise levels throughout the winter even if you have to work out indoors and make sure you keep your vitamin D levels stable, Paul says.
�You may need to take supplements if you simply can�t get enough sunshine,� he adds. �You should also try to maintain a similar diet year round so you don�t gain too much weight in winter and then have to shed pounds in the spring.�
Here are six symptoms of Spring Fever to watch for:
You have a surge of energy. Maybe it�s that extra dose of vitamin D from springtime sunshine that gives folks the extra energy to start jogging after work or taking lunch hour walks. Dr. Miguel Smolensky, Ph.D., professor at the University of Texas-Houston School of Public Health, says it may be the image of the body �springing to life� after winter doldrums that gives us the urge to move more.
You�ve got romance on the brain. This is partly because both men and women are wearing less clothing say experts, but it�s also because sunlight helps us release endorphins. A study conducted by the University of Tromso in Norway showed that these extra endorphins put us in a better mood and increase physical attraction.
You are eating lighter. If you start to crave fresh salads and fruit, you�re not alone. Paul says that typically, people eat more and exercise less during the cold winter months. That�s partly because our ancestors used to experience a period of famine during the winter months and to plan for it, they would eat heavier foods just like bears who stock up for winter hibernation. Also in many parts of the country, it�s harder to get reasonably priced fresh fruits and veggies during the off season.
You�re sleeping less. In spring, you may find it harder to sleep at your usual time and that�s not just because we switch to daylight saving time. The additional sunlight tells our bodies to produce less melatonin, a hormone secreted by the pineal gland that regulates our circadian rhythm and natural wake-sleep patterns.
Your general mood brightens. Paul says that the onset of more sunshine in spring and the abundance of color bring us out of our �winter blues� and puts us in a more positive place. You find yourself feeling happier and more sociable. We also experience an increase in production of the �happy hormone� serotonin during the transition to spring.
You may become obsessed with cleaning. The urge to clean the house from top to bottom, and spruce up the yard are sure signs of Spring Fever. Although spring cleaning is probably not caused by biology, it has been so ingrained in our Western culture that our subconscious mind takes over, urging us to get out the cleaning supplies and scrub away winter grime. Cleaning services and products are known to boost their advertising during springtime, cashing in on our natural urge to purge away the old and make way for the new.
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