HEALTHBEAT

New studies suggest a person’s sleeping habit or lack of sleep is linked to a higher risk of catching colds. The Washington Post’s “To Your Health” blog published research that stated a person who sleeps six or less hours a night is four times more likely to catch a cold than those who sleep for more than seven hours. The researchers studied 164 healthy participants around the age of 30 to sleep with a wrist actigraph to establish their baseline sleep habits. CBS News reported on their website that “the investigators found that participants who had slept less than six hours a night the week before were 4.2 times more likely to catch the cold when compared to those who slept for more than seven hours a night. Those who slept less than five hours were 4.5 times more likely to get sick.”


HEALTHBEAT

A recent report from the CDC stated that: “the smoking rate dropped to 17 percent last year, down from 18 percent in 2013.” The decline is attributed to “anti-smoking advertising campaigns, cigarette taxes, smoking bans and the growing popularity of electronic cigarettes.”


HEALTHBEAT

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Additional research linking mid-life obesity and Alzheimer’s Disease has been announced by the National Institutes of Health. The research stated that the onset of Alzheimer’s came six and a half months earlier for every point higher on the BMI scale a person was at age 50. In addition, “autopsies and scans found people with higher midlife BMIs also had more of the brain-clogging hallmarks of Alzheimer’s years later, even if they didn’t develop dementia.” The study included data from 1,400 patients over 14 years. Even though a direct casual link is not posited by the study, the Alzheimer’s Association cautioned, “What’s good for your heart is good for your brain.”

 

 

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