Use glycemic index to help control blood sugar

Picture an old-fashioned roller coaster with plenty of ups and downs. That’s what your blood sugar and insulin levels look like over the course of a day. The highs that follow meals and snacks drop to lows later on. Learning to eat in a way that makes your blood sugar levels look more like a kiddie coaster with gentle ups and downs than a strap-’em-in, hang-on-tight ride with steep climbs and breathtaking drops can make a difference to your health. How can you do this?gay porn A tool called the glycemic index (GI) can help. It rates carbohydrate-containing foods by how much they boost blood sugar (blood glucose). As someone with diabetes, I use the glycemic index as one strategy to keep my blood sugar under control. And there may be other benefits—low glycemic index diets have been linked to reduced risks for cancer, heart disease, and other conditions.

New test may speed detection of heart attacks

A heart attack (more formally known as myocardial infarction) isn’t always an instantly recognizable event. Severe chest pain often has nothing to do with the heart or blood vessels. Some heart attacks are so small they pass almost unnoticed, written off as indigestion or the flu. Others are major catastrophes, causing death or long-lasting disability. amateur porn A new blood test may help speed the diagnosis. This is important, because the sooner a heart attack is diagnosed, the sooner treatment can begin. The sooner treatment begins, the more heart muscle can be saved. Fifty years ago, doctors had to rely on a person’s symptoms and sometimes hard-to-interpret changes on an electrocardiogram to determine if a heart attack was under way. Today, blood tests are available that can detect the chemical signature of dying heart cells. The blood test preferred today is called troponin. Troponin is a protein complex found almost exclusively in heart and skeletal muscle cells. Its sudden release into the bloodstream signals damage to the heart muscle. Combining troponin results with characteristic changes on the electrocardiogram and symptoms is currently the gold standard for identifying myocardial infarction. Within the first few hours of a heart attack, though, both the troponin level and the electrocardiogram can be normal. That means people with results in the gray zone are observed and monitored for 12 to 16 hours with more troponin tests and electrocardiograms.

New ads offer help, resources for caregivers

Taking care of yourself and your nuclear family is not always easy. Add the need to take care of an aging and ailing parent or family member and the stress can become overwhelming. I know this first-hand. My husband and I suddenly needed to move one of our parents into our home when he could no longer safely live alone. This was absolutely the right thing to do. But it was also very hard to manage his care and keep him safe while taking care of our two young children and somehow managing to keep up with our full-time jobs (we are both physicians). Many Americans find themselves similar situations. According to some estimates, more than 40 million adults in the United States care for older or sick adult relatives or friends on a regular basis. AARP has estimated that these family and friends provide up to $450 billion worth of care. The responsibility often falls on family members, because long-termporn video care outside the home can be very expensive and most Americans can’t afford private long-term care insurance that might cover these costs. Regular health insurance, or Medicare, does not pay for the kind of regular daily care many adults need later in life. A new ad campaign sponsored by AARP (formerly the American Association of Retired Persons) and the nonprofit Ad Council wants caregivers to know that they are not alone and that help is available. The goal of the ads is to raise awareness of the effects that family caregiving can have and to help people find the resources they need to reduce the stress.