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Not only do apples taste delicious on their own or when added to dishes, but they come loaded with health benefits. “Apples have been linked to numerous health benefits, including improved gut health and reduced risk of stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and some cancers,” says Jessica Levinson, RDN, a culinary nutrition expert in Westchester, New York. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a medium-sized apple is a good source of fiber: It contains 4....

Why it works to reduce stress: Circuit training alternates weight-training moves with cardio, with short rests in between. The result is a high-intensity workout that offers the same benefits of longer exercise sessions in less time (30 minutes or less). It’s short, sweet and pumps up your body’s endorphin level, which improves your mood. Better yet, you don’t have to stress about finding lots of time to fit a workout in....

For the new study, researchers examined medical records from more than 81,000 older adults treated by more than 3,500 doctors in Italy between June 2016 and November 2020. They also looked at air quality data from 617 monitoring stations across 110 Italian provinces to estimate levels of two types of so-called particulate matter: PM2.5, which is smaller than 2.5 micrometers in diameter and can include emissions from burning gasoline, oil, and wood; and PM10, which is 10 micrometers or less in diameter and includes everything in PM2....

For instance, moderate alcohol consumption may reduce the risk of developing diabetes in people who don’t have the condition, particularly women, according to a data analysis published in the September 2015 issue of Diabetes Care. And in people who have type 2 diabetes that is well-controlled, a glass of red wine a day as part of a healthy diet may help improve heart disease risk factors, according to results of a two-year study published in Annals of Internal Medicine in October 2015....

Let’s just say that this new video, featuring former Massachusetts First Lady Ann Romney talking about MS, made me feel alternately excited and angry. Romney was diagnosed with MS in 1998, and she has spoken publicly about it periodically over the years. In addition, her collaboration with Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston created the Ann Romney Center for Neurologic Diseases in 2014. The center is set to do important work across several conditions, not just multiple sclerosis....

According to research published September 5, 2019 in the journal Cell, scientists discovered that a course of antibiotics may cut the effectiveness of the flu vaccine by killing off gut microbes that appear to play an important role in keeping the immune system healthy. RELATED: Cold and Flu 101 “This study really further demonstrates the relationship between our gut microbiome and immune system,” says Alan Embry, PhD, the chief of the respiratory diseases branch in the division of microbiology and infectious diseases at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases....

The term assistive technology describes any item or system that is used to maintain or improve the functioning of an individual with a disability. When some people think of assistive technology, they might imagine high-tech, computerized devices that help people move or communicate, but assistive devices can also include low-tech equipment like a modified handle or utensil. Both high-tech and low-tech devices can help people with cerebral palsy enhance their independence and participate more in the classroom, at work, at home, and in society....

For the most part, however, particularly for people living with disabilities, the restrictive protocols have been an added layer of difficulty. Learn, Participate, and Advocate for MS Like many roadblocks in our continuing life with MS, we just seem to find our way over, under, around, or through these obstacles. This year, the European Multiple Sclerosis Platform (EMSP) is both adhering to local and international COVID-19 restrictions and helping people with MS to live their best lives with the disease....

Many body odors are normal, but when they gross you out, that could signal an illness. “Diseases change the balance of chemicals in the body,” explains William Hanson, M.D., professor of anesthesiology and critical care at the University of Pennsylvania Health System in Philadelphia. Those chemicals can trigger small changes in the scent of breath, urine and other body fluids. “Generally, our sense of smell isn’t sensitive enough to pick all these up,” Dr....

Today, thanks to better and safer treatments for Crohn’s, bowel rest is far less common — but it may be used as a last recourse, says James Marion, MD, director of education and outreach at the Susan and Leonard Feinstein Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Clinical Center at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. Bowel rest involves giving your digestive system a break from eating any food by mouth, according to the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation (CCFA)....

Some health officials, however, caution that the evidence is preliminary, that mouthwash is no miracle cure, and that the infection can live on in a person despite gargling. In lab tests conducted at Penn State, scientists found that common mouthwash and gargle products like Listerine inactivated 99 percent of a strain of coronavirus genetically similar to the one that causes COVID-19 in just 30 seconds. “At one or two minutes, we couldn’t detect any infectious virus left using Listerine,” says lead study author Craig Meyers, PhD, a professor of microbiology and immunology and obstetrics and gynecology at Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, Pennsylvania....

The authors noted that losing 33 pounds (lbs) often helps put diabetes into remission. Yes, that sounds pretty specific, but it makes more sense if you consider that the data is based off of losing 15 kilograms, which equals 33 lbs. It’s a bold statement, considering many people think type 2 diabetes is a chronic, lifelong condition. In that study, the authors concluded that type 2 diabetes “is a potentially reversible condition....

Adjuvant Therapy Given in addition to the primary therapy (usually surgery), adjuvant therapy, also known as adjunct or add-on therapy, maximizes treatment effectiveness and reduces relapse. Adjuvant therapy is given after the primary therapy. Conversely, neo-adjuvant therapy is given before the primary surgery, such as chemotherapy (with or without radiation) given before removing a tumor. Benign A word that, in the context of cancer, is used to describe tumors or imaging findings that are not cancerous or particularly suspicious....

According to research, extreme weather, an increase in vector-borne illnesses, and poor air quality, which are linked to climate change, may push rates of heart disease even higher than they are today. Climate change is expected to take an enormous toll on human health and, like heart health, its effects span the globe. “Climate change is unlike other health pandemics in that it cannot be solved by a vaccine,” says Barrak Alahmad, MBChB, MPH, a physician and Mission Scholar at Kuwait University and PhD Student at T....

Public health and regulatory officials in several states, working with the CDC and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), identified ice cream made by Big Olaf Creamery as a potential source of the outbreak. Big Olaf Creamery is voluntarily contacting retailers to ask them not to see its ice cream products until further notice, the CDC said in a July 2 statement. “Consumers who have Big Olaf Creamery brand ice cream at home should throw away any remaining product,” the CDC said....

One common MS treatment, Ocrevus (ocrelizumab), has had low numbers of minority participants in its clinical trials so far. In studies that compared Ocrevus with another treatment, Rebif (interferon beta-1a), 91 percent of participants were white, 4 percent were Black or African American, and 5 percent belonged to other racial or ethnic groups. And in a study that compared Ocrevus with a placebo (inactive treatment), 94 percent of participants were white, 2 percent were Black or African American, and 4 percent belonged to other groups....

“People who have concussions often have slower reaction times as a result, and do more poorly on tests of thinking skills after their injury than their peers without concussions," says the senior study author Julianne Schmidt, PhD, an associate professor of kinesiology and a certified athletic trainer at the University of Georgia in Athens. “Our study suggests that complicated driving skills, the kind involving split-second reaction times that could mean the difference between life and death, are the ones that may take the longest to regain after you have a concussion — even when all of your symptoms have resolved,” Dr....

The diet, which scientists worked on for 15 years, is made up of three phases to treat flares and maintain remission. In the first phase of the diet, a person increases his or her intake of prebiotic and probiotic foods, while avoiding certain carbohydrates. Probiotics are fermented foods that have live bacteria in them, such as: Plain yogurtKefirKimchiMisoSauerkraut Prebiotics, which support the growth of probiotics in the digestive system, include:...

And thanks to their popularity, you can find everything from probiotic smoothies, chocolate, and granola bars to probiotic supplements and powders. Though they’ve become more prominent over the last two decades, “Probiotics have actually been consumed by humans in one form or another for more than 100 years,” says Susan Lucak, MD, a gastroenterologist in New York City and a special lecturer at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University....

States are split on how the roughly 1.4 million Americans living behind bars fit into the vaccination plan. As the first vaccines reach healthcare workers, prisons continue to be outbreak hotbeds. According to a report published in early December by the Council on Criminal Justice, the average rate of COVID-19 cases among inmates is 4 times higher than the national average, and twice as deadly. Spread of the virus isn’t slowing down, and some states are seeing a new trend, with inmates testing positive for the virus a second time — health officials in Michigan have now counted 115 cases of reinfection among inmates in the state, where roughly half of all inmates and one-quarter of prison staff have had COVID-19, according to a December 12 article in the Detroit Free Press....