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How To Take A Bite Out Of Macular Degeneration

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Macular degeneration is a chronic eye disease most often associated with aging.

The macula is the tissue just inside the back of your eyeball. And if you have macular degeneration, it begins to slowly deteriorate thereby affecting your central vision.

While this disease doesn’t result in a complete loss of vision, your lifestyle may go through drastic changes. Such changes might include the inability to drive a car because you have a blind spot in your vision which prevents you from seeing “the whole picture.”

Although aging is the main cause of macular degeneration, people who smoke, drink too much alcohol, are obese or have a family history of the disease are at higher risk for developing macular degeneration.

Other risk factors include gender (women appear to be at greater risk than men) and high blood pressure. [Read more…] about How To Take A Bite Out Of Macular Degeneration

No Amount of Tobacco is Safe

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This news release points out once again that smoking of any sort is not good for you.

Just yesterday I met a young woman who had a four month old baby. She had just quit smoking one week ago. She deserves lots of congratulations as she is doing extremely well given many of her challenges.

She was rightly worried that her mother continues to smoke, even when caring for the infant. That is rude beyond belief to me.

Second case in point. I saw another woman yesterday who has smoked for many years. Her blood pressure has been slowly creeping up over.

When I saw her just weeks before I told her to take her blood pressure and pulse at home BEFORE she had a cigarette, and then again right after. The results were even more dramatic that I suspected they would be.

Her blood pressure rose by nearly 40%!!!

If you smoke, try this yourself… it will give you that final push to stop smoking for good.
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Any Tobacco Use Raises Heart Attack Risk
08.17.06, 12:00 AM ET

THURSDAY, Aug. 17 (HealthDay News) — All types of tobacco use or exposure — smoking, chewing, or secondhand smoke — boost a person’s risk for heart attack, Canadian researchers say.

Researchers at McMaster University in Ontario analyzed data from more than 27,000 people in 52 countries and factored in other lifestyle traits — such as diet and age — that could affect heart attack risk. They found that any form of tobacco use or exposure was harmful.

Publishing in the Aug. 19 issue of The Lancet, they found that moderate and heavy smokers had a three-fold increased risk of a heart attack and light smokers (8-10 cigarettes a day) had a two-fold risk.

The risk decreased with time after a person stopped smoking, the study said. Among light smokers, there was no excess risk 3 to 5 years after they quit smoking. Moderate and heavy smokers still had an excess risk of about 22 percent even 20 years after they kicked the habit.

The researchers also concluded that exposure to secondhand smoke increased the risk of heart attack in both former smokers and nonsmokers.

People with the highest levels of secondhand smoke exposure (22 hours or more per week) have about a 45 percent increased risk of heart attack, the study said.

Chewing tobacco doubled the risk of heart attack, the researchers found.

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You’ll find more information about smoking and quitting at the OlderWiserWomen Smoking Cessation page.

Need help to quit smoking?

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You know all the reasons to quit smoking, yet you still do it. That is the power of that Nicotine Demon that lives in your head. I tell my patients that their little demon is akin to a toddle having a major temper tantrum in the middle of the cereal aisle at your favorite upscale grocer.

Becoming a smoke free individual is not easy, but there are lots of resources available to help you quit. In WA State we have Quit Line – a service where you can actually call and talk with a Quit counselor 7 days a week. Your state health department may have a similar program.

Other online resources to check out include:

Tobacco Free Nurses – the first national program focused on helping nurses and student nurses to stop smoking
Tobaccofreenurses

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – Tobacco Information and Prevention Source
CDC.gov/tobacco/

Surgeon General – ‘You Can Quit Smoking’ Consumer Guide
surgeongeneral.gov/tobacco

American Lung Association – Tobacco Control
lungusa.org

American Cancer Society – Guide to Quitting Smoking
Cancer.org

Quitnet.com – Savings Calculator
Quitnet.com

Smokefree.gov
Smokefree.gov

 

Smoking is an issue that seems to penetrate all aspects of an individuals life. It’s not just an individual health issue anymore…it’s a quality of life issue, a societal issue, a financial issue, and a public health issue. It affects you, your children, your grandchildren, your partners, your friends.

It’s time to stop…for good.

Age Related Macular Degeneration

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A new study was just published by the Archives of Ophthalmology which showed that smoking contributes to the risk of developing Age-Related Macular Degeneration (ARMD).

ARMD is particularly disturbing because it is progressive, there is no known cure and no way to reverse the loss of vision. It tends to run in families – for example, it affects my mother as well as all of her siblings. It is also more common in women.
What can you do?

  • See your eye doctor (either ophthalmologists or optometrists) for a checkup.
  • There are various vitamin/antioxidant preparations available which appear to slow the development and progression. It should contain vitamin C, vitamin E, beta-carotene, zinc oxide, and copper.
  • There is evidence that supplements containing lutein and zeaxanthin (in addition to the above) can also be helpful.
  • Stop Smoking!

For further resources on ARMD:

Smoking And Obesity ‘Age People’

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ObesityThis shouldn’t come to news to any us… excess weight and smoking are significant risks for many illnesses. Being overweight and a smoker will make you age faster in more ways than one.

You can read the findings below or go to BBC NEWS | Health | Smoking and obesity ‘age people’

Being overweight and a smoker makes a person biologically older
than slim non-smokers of the same birth age, UK and US researchers
have found.

Smoking accelerated the ageing of key pieces of a person’s DNA by about
4.6 years. For obesity it was nine years. These genetic codes are important for regulating cell division and have been linked to age-related diseases.

The study in the Lancet was based on 1,122 twins from a database held by St Thomas’ Hospital in London. The researchers looked at telomeres – strips of DNA that cap the end of chromosomes and appear to protect and stabilise them. Telomeres shorten each time a cell divides, until there is nothing left, making cell division less reliable and increasing the risk of disorders. This happens naturally with ageing.

Accelerated ageing

Both smoking and obesity are important risk factors for many age-related diseases, therefore Professor Tim Spector and colleagues set out to see whether they might accelerate telomere shortening. Among the study sample, all women aged 18-76, 119 were clinically obese, 203 were current smokers and 369 were ex-smokers.

By analysing blood samples for DNA the researchers found telomere length decreased steadily with age, as expected. However, the telomeres of the obese women and smokers were far shorter than those of lean women and those who had never smoked of the same age. Each pack year – the number of cigarette packs smoked per day multiplied by the number of years smoking – was equivalent to a loss of an additional 18% on top of the average annual shortening of telomeres. A woman who had smoked a pack per day for 40 years accelerated her ageing by 7.4 years, according to telomere length.

Chromosomal clock

Professor Spector, from the twin research unit at St Thomas’ Hospital, said: “What you are seeing here is that the entire body is ageing from smoking, not just your heart or your lungs. So you are accelerating your whole chromosomal clock by this activity which is an important message for younger people to think about. People would probably think twice if they knew that at every age they were five or seven years older than their contemporaries biologically because that has influences on their skin, brain and bones.”

Tobacco smoke contains poisons. The research suggests that these poisons may affect cells at one of the most fundamental levels. Excess fat is believed to disrupt the chemical proposition of the body in a negative way. Such stressors can damage the body. Dr Lorna Layward, research manager at Help the Aged, said the work supported what we already know about smoking and obesity being extremely damaging to health.

“While the research is not conclusive, we should take heed of the alarm bells. Most over 65s are not getting enough exercise which has massive implications aside from obesity, such as declining strength and mobility.

Giving up smoking is the biggest thing you can do reduce your chances of developing coronary heart disease. “In today’s fast-paced life, many of us say we don’t have time to exercise or eat healthily, but unless we change our ways we will soon have to find time to cope with ill health.”

Source: BBC Health