The researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine concluded that the older we get, the happier we become. So, if you are stressed out right now, don’t worry, better things are yet to come.

This aging paradox, considering extra years are connected to illness and frailty, revealed that our appreciation of life increases as we age. However, the phenomenon happens steadily during our lives from adulthood on. The conclusion unmasks the belief that seniors are by default irritable and depressive.

The team examined the physical and mental health of 1,546 adults aged between 21 to 100 years old who were randomly chosen from San Diego County.

The older individuals appeared to win out over the young when it came to mental health measures such as low levels of stress, depression, and anxiety and satisfaction with life. Participants described feeling better about themselves and their lives decade after decade.

In contrast, the youngest, aged in their 20s and 30s appeared to have the roughest, while other younger participants reported symptoms of depression, higher levels of stress, and anxiety.

It has been broadly considered that the mental health of older people reflects their worsening physical and cognitive function. Moreover, aging has been described as a continuous process of physical and cognitive deterioration with little debate about mental health besides the context of decline.

Some researchers have described a U-shaped curve of well-being across the lifespan, with drops from early adulthood to middle age. However, they are then accompanied by an improvement in later adulthood.

The inferior limit of mental health begins during middle age, roughly 45 to 55. This mid-life dip wasn’t found in well-being.

As one might expect, the older participants did display worsened physical and cognitive functioning than the younger individuals in the study. However, this could only raise the question: why do senior citizens seem happier than the young?

Researchers believe that with age, we change our focus in life. This method should help us find higher satisfaction from simple, achievable things.

When you center your attention on emotionally meaningful goals, life becomes better. The negative emotions appear to be less common, and you manage to feel better. However, the study doesn’t deny the fact that well-being could also arise from the wisdom that occurs with age or the management of the complex social decisions.

Image source: Wikipedia

New research shows that smokers that turn to E-cigarettes get lower cancer-causing chemicals but they are exposed to the same amount of nicotine.

An electronic cigarette or e-cigarette is a handheld electronic device that vaporizes a flavored liquid, which the user inhales. Its fluid is called e-fluid and is usually made of nicotine, propylene glycol, glycerin, and flavorings. Since their introduction to the market in 2004, global usage of e-cigarettes has risen exponentially and by 2013, there were several million users globally.

The main reasons for e-cigarette usage often relate to quitting smoking and recreation. During a US 2013 survey, 56% of respondents reported having used e-cigarettes to quit or reduce their smoking.

Unfortunately, the neighborhood convenience store usually displays ads for tobacco products and e-cigarettes. Because the products like chew, cigarillos and e-cigarettes are usually equipped with bright packages like candy and gum they tend to be very attractive for children.

Moreover, being placed on the counter or near sweets and having different flavors, like strawberry, cherry and banana split they are believed to influence consumption among minors.

There is no surprise that tobacco companies pay big money so their products get a place where they will be easily seen.

The recent study revealed that people who stop smoking tobacco cigarettes and substitute entirely with e-cigarettes may significantly reduce their exposure to many cancer-causing chemicals.

The study was conducted on 20 daily-smoking adults who had smoked for an average of 12 years and replaced the tobacco cigarettes with e-cigarettes for two weeks. The researchers then checked their urine for levels of nicotine and 17 biomarkers of toxins and carcinogens.

During the two weeks trial, in 12 of the 17 biomarkers, there were noted significant declines. Researchers believed that the declines were comparable to those who quit smoking. However, during the study, the nicotine levels remained the same.

The author of the study believes that e-cigarette use may effectively reduce exposure to toxic and carcinogenic substances when completely replacing the tobacco products. However, more studies must be conducted to see if the risk of disease is decreased among dual users -those who both vape and smoke- and those who use e-cigarettes for a long time.

Image source: Wikipedia

New promising therapies have been recently discovered for Alzheimer’s disease. People living with this disease or other dementias are usually placing an enormous financial strain on caregivers who are spending thousands of dollars a year on care.

It is estimated that in 2015, 5.3 million people suffered from this disease and by 2050, there will be an increase up to 13.8 million people in the US in the absence of new treatments.

In America, Alzheimer is the most expensive disease, studies showed. Medicare covers some of the expenses for this disease like doctor visits or hospitalization but other services like transportation or diapers for incontinence greatly raise the costs for the caregivers of Alzheimer patients.

This costly disease usually involves long-term care for patients and now scientists believe that they have discovered new promising therapies.

David Johnson, a 59-year-old former truck driver in Sacramento was diagnosed in 2012 with early-onset Alzheimer’s. He was not surprised by this diagnose as this terrible disease has taken his father, six aunts and uncles, and a cousin.

Although resigned to dying he was enrolled in a clinical trial at Sacramento’s Sutter Neuroscience Institute and now considers that the four years into the five-year clinical trial slowed down the disease if not entirely stopped it. The treatment which involves infusions of special antibodies seems to be working so far. The main result is that the disease is not progressing, doctors have mentioned.

Amyloid, the protein that causes Alzheimer’s by attacking the brain cells is at the forefront of the promising therapies. Although not yet FDA-approved, the therapies are in their final phases.

Researchers believe that we are witnessing the era where we are very close to discovering proven disease-modifying therapies. Dr. John Olichney, a neurology professor and director of clinical trials at the University of California believes that the progression of this disease has been slowed down by this new therapy.

Current medication such as Arricept and Rivastigmine are used to boost the patient’s short time memory, but, unfortunately, this treatment does nothing to slow down the disease’s relentless advancement in the brain.

According to the National Institutes of Health, U.S spent an estimated $991 million in 2016 on Alzheimer’s research but it is still less than what is allocated for cancer, heart disease or AIDS.

Image source: Pixabay

American women from the Millennial generation are less interested in sex than their mothers were. A new study shows that Millennial women wait longer before having sexual intercourse than any generation in the last 60 years.

Researchers cannot explain why these women are delaying sex, but they suspect that some factors may play a role. Millennials are notoriously for being a highly individualistic generation, but they are also known to postpone major adulthood milestones such as owning a home or getting married.

Lead author Prof. Jean Twenge who even wrote a book about the Me-generation aka the Millennials explained that this generation takes longer to grow into adulthood. Her study found that many people born in the 1980s and 1990s reported not having sex for years or at all.

But in Millennial women’s case, abstinence is even more widespread. About 5.4 Millennial women admitted they are abstinent. By contrast, just 2.3 women in their mothers’ generation also known as the Gen X said that.

Twenge’s team interpreted abstinence as being either virgin or not having sex since age 18. So, study authors factored out people who were abstinent for at most a year or lacked a sex partner at the moment of the survey.

The study also focused more on the Millennials in the 20 to 24 age bracket, and compared their sexual behavior to that of the people born in the 60s. In the Millennial group, 15 percent said they had no sexual partners, while in the Gen X group just 6 percent said that.

The latest study involved 27,000 participants.

The trend was recorded in underage groups as well. Last year, a survey found that nearly 60 percent of high school students were virgins. In 1991, only 46 percent acknowledged that.

However, the latest study found that Millennial women experienced the most significant shift in sexual behavior among all sex and age groups. Only 1.9 percent of Millennial men said they had no sexual partners, a slight change from the 1.7 percent in the Gen X.

Study authors believe that Millennial women have a higher ‘erotic plasticity’ or the ability to adapt their sexual behavior to social norms than men.

The findings were published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior.

Image Source: Pexels

Skin cancer can impact anyone at any time that’s why it’s best to pay attention to all of the changes your body shows you. We must be proactive when it comes to cancer detection and prevention because skin cancer is most treatable when it is detected in an early stage.

Although melanoma can appear in places hidden from sunlight, the most preventable risk according to many specialists is ultraviolet radiation exposure. Regardless of our skin color, we must seek to protect ourselves from the sun’s UV rays. Exposing a mole to UV radiation can trigger a mutation which represents an abnormal cell division that characterizes cancer.

Most adults have somewhere between 10 and 40 moles, but those with a lighter skin might have much more. Most of the time, during the years, moles change in appearance or size and rarely become a melanoma, a potentially deadly skin cancer. In some cases, the change of a mole from benign to cancerous can be genetic.

Rapidly rising for at least 30 years, melanoma rates increase with age which is why the American Academy of Dermatology recommends people get tested periodically.

When monitoring our skin for signs of skin cancer, we must pay particular attention to hard-to-see areas.

Common moles are those developed until the age of 40 or those that we are born with. According to the National Cancer Institute, people over 50 are most likely to develop a form of melanoma although other researchers have questioned this theory.

Several strategies for recognizing early signs of melanoma have been drawn up by specialists. Called the Ugly Duckling sign, it represents a mole that sticks out in a group of moles, when it changes its color, shape or size rapidly. If a mole is asymmetrical, this could be a sign of melanoma. Moreover, if the borders of a mole are uneven, or it has a variety of colors, this could also be an early sign of melanoma.
Atypical moles especially appear during puberty. Most of them are considered benign and don’t necessarily become melanoma, but having more than five atypical moles can be linked to higher risks of developing skin cancer.

Doctors advise that in the case of abnormal changes like spots that are different from others, bleeding on the skin or asymmetrical moles with uneven borders to make an appointment as soon as possible.

Image credits : Wikipedia

Being lazy costs a lot of money. Who would have thought?

According to the first study to measure the global cost of being a couch potato, the tab is no less than a whopping $67.5 billion annually.

Australia’s University of Sydney has analyzed data from 2013 from 142 countries, cross-referenced it with five major non-communicable diseases – which would be reduced by exercise – and came up with the cost of being lazy.

Researchers took into account the costs related to colon cancer, diabetes, stroke, coronary heart disease, and breast cancer, but only when the condition was associated with lack of physical activity. These five ailments have been determined to be most commonly to the laziness.

The President’s Council on Fitness, Sports, and Nutrition reports that only one in 3 adults gets enough physical activity per week. The World Health Organization defines that as the equivalent to 150 minutes of moderate-to-intense physical activity each week.

A related study reviewed more than 1 million people and revealed that performing one hour of moderate physical activity per day can cancel the adverse effects of sitting down for 8 hours a day.

There’s a general lack of success in addressing the world’s epidemic of physical inactivity, which has seen a steady rise since 2012. One out of every 4 adults in the world does not perform enough daily physical activity.

Lead author Ulf Ekelund, a professor at the Norwegian School of Sports, said that “Our message is a positive one: it is possible to reduce – or even eliminate – these risks if we are active enough, even without having to take up sports or go to the gym.”

Many people who work in offices do not have time to take a walk in between sitting down for long hours. Professor Ekelund stressed that these individuals must realize it is of the utmost importance to find time to work out, even if it’s jogging in the morning or cycling in the afternoon.

The results of the study were featured in The Lancet, the British medical journal, calling for the world to “get serious about physical activity.”

The true cost of inactivity, defined by WHO as less than 150 minutes per week of moderate-intensity activity, is likely two to three times higher.

Image Sources: 1, 2, 3