Health Tips for a Better Life

For some, there are threats everywhere. They fear the world is dangerous and, unless they stay in a constant state of vigilance, their lives will be at risk. In a small number of cases, this gets out of control and tips into paranoia and mental disorder. For the majority, it”s an exaggerated caution because they do not understand how modern technology works. They see how dangerous electricity can be and so are cautious when using powered equipment, particularly when that involves the use of “radiation”. Now there”s a word to get the conspiracy theorists into action. Yet, from a scientific point of view, you cannot escape the fact that television and computer screens give off electromagnetic radiation (EMR), handphones rely on microwave broadcasts, and then there”s light. In coherent form as a laser, it can potentially blind people. As it shines from the sun, we can see our way and, with appropriate protection from ultraviolet, live healthy lives.

The white light we “see” is in fact made up of all the colors blended together. Each color has a property of its own and you may have seen increasing publicity given to light as a treatment for skin problems like acne. When it”s projected from a TV or computer screen, you get both the EMR and light in the visible spectrum, often with a slightly bluish tinge. For the treatment of skin problems, blue and red are used. For the treatment of sleep disorders, blue and green are being used in a series of clinical trials. It”s perhaps slightly ironic, but those who felt an effect from television and computer screens were probably right, except that the effect seems to be beneficial if you want to change your sleeping times.

We know when to sleep because our internal clock is set to match the local daily cycle. If we move to different time zones so that morning is now night, this confuses us and we find it difficult to match local time for sleep. As a trial, a number of people were cut off from the world in rooms without windows or clocks. There was no way for them to tell how much time was passing. The research team kept them awake for fifty hours and then allowed sleep for eight. When awake, half were exposed to blue light, the other to green. All the participants were carefully monitored and it was found that both colors could reset the internal clocks. The only difference between the two groups was that dim blue and bright green lights were less effective. The relevant neurotransmitters and hormones responded more precisely to bright blue and dim green.

So, in all situations where the sleep problem is caused by the body”s circadian rhythms not being properly synchronised to local time, the use of light may well prove the best long-term solution. Although a drug like ambien can and does produce sleep “on demand”, there are always problems if you come to depend on a drug for any long-term solution. Ambien will always help you get needed rest, but the use of alternative methods is preferable. As counseling and therapy is expensive and often not covered by health insurance plans, the development of light treatment may come as a simple and cheap solution to sleep problems.

When you are young, it’s easy to walk around as if nothing can ever go wrong in your life. Although you had acne for a few months as a teen, you got through that. Now the rest of your life is going to be smooth sailing. So what if there are a few extra hairs in your comb or caught in the drain after you finish your shower. This is nothing to worry about. Except the sad reality is that anyone, no matter what their age or gender, can lose their hair. It can be heredity, caused by some underlying medical condition, a side effect of a drug you are taking. The list goes on. Unless you are taking preventative measures to reduce the risk of hair loss, you need guidance on when to seek a formal diagnosis. Too early and you wasted your money because your doctor could find nothing wrong. Too late and there’s little chance of any treatment helping the hair to regrow. For the record, male pattern baldness can begin during your teens and this is permanent hair loss. Why permanent? Because the growth cycle shortens and every time you shed your hair, it grows back thinner and more likely to fall out. As this speeds up, your hair stops regrowing and there’s no cure.

This is what to think about. At some point, you will notice more hair than usual is falling out. Make a note of the date. If possible, get someone in the family or a friend to take pictures of your head so you can monitor any changes to the shape of the hair. Then watch what happens. Is the loss only occasional or is it continuous? If you have good days and bad days, think about what you eat and what you did. Is there a cause and effect at work? In particular, look for anything that might make the loss worse. Now look around the family. If you are cut off from most of your relatives, ask if there is any history of hair loss on either side of the family.

This gives you enough information about the emerging physical pattern and the rate of loss to share with your doctor. There will be a physical examination of your scalp to judge the appearance of your hair, e.g. whether any hairs are broken off. There is usually a pull test to see how many come out, and skin samples taken to eliminate the possibility of an infection. There will also be a review of your medical history and general wellness to identify any underlying problems such as thyroid disease that may be causing the loss. If this is simple male pattern baldness, the standard treatment is generic propecia. This is taken once-daily and, over time, slows loss and encourages some regrowth. The benefits are lost and hair loss will resume if you stop taking generic propecia. Some commitment to continuing treatment is necessary. More generally, there are preventative measures in changing the way you handle your hair and modifying your diet. Your doctor or dermatologist will advise on how to minimize the effects of hair loss.