Vitamin E is a fat-soluble vitamin which is found primarily in foods such as natural oils, seeds, nuts and cereals. In additional to this, you can also take Vitamin E supplements in order to ensure you are consuming the right amount. The general Recommended Daily Allowance of Vitamin E is 3mg for women, 4mg for men.

There are several potential benefits of taking Vitamin e. These are namely; helping diabetics, preservation of eye health, and slowing down the aging process. Due to the fact that Vitamin E is an anti-oxidant, it destroys harmful molecules in the body (or free radicals) which can damage genetic material. The high anti-oxidant qualities of Vitamin E are exactly the reason that having enough Vitamin E can help sufferers of diabetes.

Diabetics can have low levels of anti-oxidants, so increasing these levels can reduce the risk of heart disease and other health complications. Vitamin E has also been linked with improving eye health, particularly macular degeneration (AMD) which is a common cause of blindness and uveitis. Vitamin E has been shown to work with zinc, beta-carotene and Vitamin C to combat these eye disorders.

Vitamin E is also a key anti-aging Vitamin; this is due again to its high level of anti-oxidants. It can be effective if applied directly to your skin, when taken as a supplement or in your diet (although, it may not always be easy to get the levels of Vitamin E which you need through your diet alone).

It is also Vitamin E’s anti-oxidants which give it its anti-aging qualities, this is also the reason it may help in reducing the appearance of scars and stretch marks. Finally, Vitamin E can help the body to use Vitamin K, which aids in the formation of red blood cells.

It would be a revolution for the sun protection industry, a pill that could protect the skin and eyes from the harmful effect of the suns UV rays, which cause sunburn. A recent scientific study has discovered the way that coral shields itself from these rays. Scientists believe this discovery could make a sun protection pill a reality.

A compound is close to being produced by scientists and should be available within the next five years. The pill will have to be prescription only as taking too much of the pill can be harmful to the body. Additionally some exposure to UV rays is essential for humans as this is how our bodies produce vitamin D – which makes our body have strong bones.

Coral survives because it has algae living inside it, this algae is the key to how to coral protects itself from the sun’s rays. The project is being run by Kings College London, with funding from the taxpayer, and is headed by Dr Paul Long who has said, “What we have discovered is that the algae make the sun protecting compounds, which the coral then takes and converts into a substance that will protect both organisms from the rays.

“We also found that when a fish would eat the coral, they would also become resistant to the sun’s rays. It is this that makes us think that if we can manufacture the compound and give it to humans it will have the same effect as was had on the fish. We should be able to begin testing within two years. Early testing will involve the compound being tested on human skin samples that we will obtain from cosmetic surgeons.”

The team worked with coral samples from the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. They would harvest samples at night and then expose them to sunlight in the day so they could see how the sun protection compound is produced by the coral.

Dr Long has also said, “Our goal is to make a pill that, once taken, will provide sun protection to the whole of the body. We will, of course, have to conduct extensive testing before any such pill could be released, so it will be five years before anything could enter the market.”

This discovery could not only benefit people but crops could be genetically engineered to be resistant to the sun. This could boost world food production as temperate crops that survive only with little sun exposure could be grown in tropical regions. Long has said of this possibility, “This could allow for high yield crops with high nutritional values to be grown in parts of the developing world.”

An Advertising Feature

Reducing back pain with an adequate dentist chair

Back injuries have repeatedly been found to be one of the most common work related health problems leading to sickness absences. Compared to other professionals, dentists have a higher incidence of back pain. Indeed, research has shown that approximately 40% of dentists experience some form of back and/or neck pain.

Whilst most episodes of back pain clear up relatively quickly, some dentists will get persistent back pain that can eventually require them to reduce their work hours, and in the worst case scenario, lead to early retirement.

Without doubt the best way to tackle back pain is to stop the problem happening in the first place. Therefore, the aim of this article is to outline key factors to consider when buying a dentist chair.

Invest in your dentist chair:

Faced with all the expenses of setting up as a dentist, it is not surprising that some dentists simply opt for the cheapest dentist chair on the market. Unfortunately, this can be a false economy, because if you don’t get an ergonomically designed chair that helps promote good spinal alignment, you may increase your risk of developing an injury. It is worth remembering that your spine needs to serve you for your career and so you need to make sure you look after it from day one.

Consider upper limb supports for your dentist chair:

Because dentists need to access the mouth they often have to hold their upper limbs in sustained postures whilst performing precision activities. As a result, certain muscles which control the upper limb muscles (eg the trapezius) have to work hard for prolonged periods of time. Increasingly, dentist chairs are being developed with arm supports that allow you to rest the arms during certain upper limb activities. Some arm supports are moveable which gives you even more flexibility with your arm position.

Consider a dentist chair with wheels:

As a dentist it is very important that you are able to get close enough to your patient in order that you don’t have to get in an awkward position during dental procedures. A dentist chair with wheels not only allows you to get close to the patient but also gives you the flexibility to move around your work station during the day.

Consider saddle seats for your dentist chair:

Salli Surgeon Dentist Chair

Traditionally, healthcare professionals have sat on flat seats or stools. In the last 15 years, however, the development of the saddle chair has completely changed the way that dentists can sit. As the name suggests, saddle chairs have been made in the shape of the saddle. They have been designed in this way to help promote an upright posture without the need of a back rest. By removing the back support, saddle chairs have also been designed to help you build the stability in the muscles around your trunk so you are not reliant on any external supports. One of the most popular types of saddle chairs available is the Salli saddle chair.

Consider a split seat on your dentist chair:

Over the years there has been growing research to suggest that prolonged sitting on narrow seats may put pressure on the genital area leading to numbness and a compromised blood supply. For this reason, some of the newer types of dentist chairs have been designed with a split saddle, which leaves space between each side of the chair for the genitalia.

Make sure your dentist chair is height adjustable:

The height of your chair in relation to the patient will directly influence the type of posture you move into during the day. It is very important, therefore, that you are able to adjust the height of the chair either with a hand lever or a foot lever.

Make sure your dentist chair has a forward lean capability:

Dental health workers have to operate in a position that requires some forward lean. It can be very useful therefore to have a seat that can be tilted forwards and backwards. Moving the chair forwards will help you maintain the natural backwards arch in your lower spine (lumbar arch, whilst working and therefore keep you in a better spinal alignment.

Many people do not think of vaporizers as something that can be used for medicinal purposes instead thinking they are only something that can be used to clean the air.  However, within the medical setting these powerful devices are actually referred to as nebulizers and can be used to treat all types of respiratory diseases.

This is due to the fact that a prescription nebulizer contains medication that is transferred into vapor so that it can be inhaled into the lungs helping to provide direct treatment for a number of different respiratory diseases including quick asthma treatments, bronchitis, and more.

The nebulizer works by hosting compressed air through the liquid medication so it can be turned into vapor and then inhaled through the nose and mouth.  This will allow the medication to work instantly versus the time it takes for your body to absorb the medication in an oral form as a liquid.

If you are having a hard time breathing this is vital since the nebulizer will allow the medication to instantly relieve your symptoms so that you can breathe regularly and safely within minutes of use.  In a way, you can think of a vaporizer as an advanced form of an inhaler for those who need a higher level of aid.

Your diet and the amount of exercise you do are the two most important factors that affect your weight. Food supplements and slimming products may help you lose weight but the serious pounds will only drop if you take serious care of your diet and you begin to take regular exercise.

Watching your diet doesn’t equate not eating, calorie counting or overloading on reduced fat products in order to allow for occasional indulgences such as Pringles and biscuits, it needs perpetual self-check and balance. However, as it is very likely that you’ll be tempted to buy sliming products, below we provide some basic advice that will help you choose better.

Before you acquire them

Consult your doctor. It is very likely that they will advise you to avoid them, but if you explain that you are determined to use one behind their back, they may recommend some or at least tell you what to avoid. Your doctor can check and understand the ingredients of each slimming product on the internet and advise you as to whether they are particularly suitable for you. You may for instance suffer from hypertension, headaches, low blood pressure, stomach upsets and so on and certain ingredients may be harmful.

Choosing the shop

It is advisable to choose a store that you trust and where you can openly discuss with the staff.

The Label

The product you acquire should contain the following information. If it doesn’t it may be illegal:

• Name and description of the product, e.g. pill, liquid etc
• Weight of the product
• Ingredients and amount % per serving
• Any ingredients that may cause allergies
• Sell by date
• Recommended usage (RDA)
• Warnings
• Barcode

Usage

Once you’ve acquired it, keep it out of the reach of children and preferably in a dark and dry place. If you begin to have any side effects such as high fever, trembling, dizziness, instability, nervousness, itching, diarrhoea, consult your doctor immediately and never be afraid to admit that you are using slimming products. Your life is more important than your doctor’s opinion of you.

One yoga instructor who is helping her students to ‘listen to their own bodies’ as she puts it, is Linda Consalvo.  She says that people have a pre-conceived idea of what they believe yoga is and they don’t think that they can do it because they believe it to involve positions such as standing on their head. Today however, it is Linda who is taking Stacy Rinz’s yoga therapy class to help her own back pain.

Yoga is a non-aggressive form of exercise, that can help strengthen core muscles and is excellent for many people who suffer from back pain.  Linda explained that ‘I began having back problems 25 years ago after herniating a disk in my back.  I received chiropractic care for many years and did ok with this, then ruptured a disc and was back in excruciating pain’.  She then went on to explain how yoga saved her, and that she’s even got back to her active lifestyle doing cardio and working out with weights.

Dr Sara Rizk is a firm believer in the use of non-aggressive exercise such as Tai Chi and Yoga to work on the back and strengthen core muscles.  Core muscles are the muscle groups that stabilise the spine and pelvis.  And when you strengthen them, these muscles take the pressure off your spine reducing the pain.  Research has shown that strengthening these core muscles is one of the best treatments for back pain.  It also helps posture, balance and alignment, as well as helping with relaxation because it helps to alleviate stress too.

Dr Rizk believes so strongly in the use of Yoga and Tai Chi that she even writes her patients’ prescriptions for them, and has classes for them at her place of work.  She explains that by monitoring patients they can see who is benefiting from these forms of exercise, and who would be better served by waiting until they have healed more first.  She explains that patients are monitored to make sure that they do not deteriorate and are actually getting better.

Tai Chi and Yoga are widely available in many locations around the country, but before you attend a class, and especially if you suffer from back pain for any reason, you should make sure firstly that your instructor is fully trained and knows what they are doing.  Secondly you should seek consultation with your doctor before you take the class to make sure that it is appropriate for you to be undertaking this form of exercise at this time.

In addition to trying Tai Chi or Yoga you could try the Dynaspine Back Support, which was created specifically to help keep the back muscles active as we lead sedentary lifestyles.  The back support plates on Dynaspine are built on a special spring mechanism that allows the plates to provide the back with support throughout changes in posture such as whilst driving, at the office or even whilst eating lunch!

Joanna began writing The Last Six Months as a blog in order to allow the public to see how loved ones can enter a hospital setting with an outcome that you would never expect.  Her mother entered a NHS hospital to have a simple hip operation but there was a large tragic turn of events and the next six months took a serious tone as she deteriorated away slowly day by day.

Joanna stated that it was hard to write down every detail of the entire ordeal but she found great comfort in creating a diary that tracked the progress of each day that a lived one spent in a hospital and was helpful when things started to go wrong because they provided a reference point.  She added that sometimes a short stay in the hospital can turn into an adventure of emotions that you could not have expected.
In this unique and original way, the author started publishing the first entry from the day before her mother went into hospital from 18th July 2007 in blog format, http://joanna678s.wordpress.com . The blog is updated daily and the reader is able to follow as the story unfolds day by day.

The Last Six Months started out as notes when Joanna’s mother, Kay, went into a hospital in London for a hip operation on 18th July 2007. Six months later, while still in hospital, she died. It has taken the author three years to make her diary public, three years to go back on her notes filling in all the details which has brought back all the hurt and pain her mother went through.

This is a story that should be brought to the attention of the public as this is still happening in our hospitals today.

Joanna’s notes have become an up-to-date diary of her mother and how her condition deteriorated during this terrible and tragic course of events. It has also allowed her to capture all the memories of their time together while she was in hospital: the laughs, the tears, the precious words that were spoken.

The Facts

The population of the UK is ageing. Over the last 25 years the percentage of the population aged 65 and over increased from 15 per cent in 1984 to 16 per cent in 2009, an increase of 1.7 million people. Over the same period, the percentage of the population aged under 16 decreased from 21 per cent to 19 per cent. This trend is projected to continue. By 2034, 23 per cent of the population is projected to be aged 65 and over (from The Office of National Statistics)

Risks of getting illnesses such as cardiovascular diseases later in life can be lowered thanks to a simple blood text that measures homocysteine levels.

The homocysteine test developed by YorkTest Laboratories, who are known for their allergy and food intolerance tests, can test for high levels of homocysteine which have been found to lead to potential illnesses.

Homocysteine is a naturally occurring amino acid that is found in raised levels in blood plasma when body chemistry is out of balance. Homocysteine is biosynthesised from methionine via a multi-step biochemical pathway that occurs in every cell of the body.

The importance of homocysteine as a risk factor is becoming more widely accepted. There are an increasing number of studies that show that homocysteine to be a predictor of potential health problems. Raised plasma homocysteine concentrations can both predict and precede the development of cardiovascular disease including stroke.

A study published in 2010 in the British Medical Journal, showed that homocysteine levels in blood plasma predicts risk of death from cardiovascular disease in older people even better than any conventional measure of risk including cholesterol, blood pressure or smoking. Women with high homocysteine levels find it harder to conceive and are at risk from repeated early miscarriage. Raised levels of homocysteine have also been linked to Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, declining memory, poor concentration and judgement and lowered mood. Recent research from Oxford University has shown that large doses of vitamin B could halve the rate of brain shrinkage associated with memory loss and dementia in the elderly, and, in the study, it was the elderly people with higher levels of homocysteine that had greater brain shrinkage.

Methods for blood sample collection and handling for plasma homocysteine measurement are critical as, after sampling, homocysteine leaches from the red blood cells into the plasma. Thus it is vital to centrifuge blood samples and separate the plasma from the red blood cells within thirty minutes of collection; not always feasible. YorkTest Laboratories have developed a unique patented plasma separator blood collection device that enables the immediate separation of plasma which is collected into an absorbent pad that can be posted back to their laboratory for testing. YorkTest Laboratories claim that, when sampling using the device, samples are stable for up to 10 days.

If you are found to have raised homocysteine levels a simple change in diet and increase in vitamin intake can help you normalise the levels. YorkTest have consultants who can provide more information and help people stay healthier well into old age.

YorkTest have over 25 years experience in home testing including food and allergy testing and are recommended by leading medical charity Allergy UK. The homocysteine test is available to buy online at yorktest.com for £99 or by calling 0800 074 6185.

There are many different makes of wheelchair accessible vehicles on the market. In simple terms, a wheelchair accessible vehicle is an ordinary vehicle that’s been modified so that it’s suitable for a wheelchair user. Manufacturers such as Vauxhall, Renault, Fiat and Peugeot all produce standard vehicles that are often converted.

Passenger or driver?

There are two types: a passenger vehicle, which allows one or more passengers to sit in their wheelchair while travelling, or a vehicle that a wheelchair user can drive.

If you want to drive from your wheelchair, the vehicle will have to be fitted with custom controls and other features to enable you to drive independently.

Modifications

To create a wheelchair accessible vehicle, a range of modifications are carried out. These vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, but most include:

• Lowering the floor of the vehicle (or raising its roof)
• Modifying front seats to allow wheelchair access
• Adding a means of access – ramp or lift
• Strengthening the vehicle’s suspension so that it can take the extra weight of modifications
• Modifying or replacing petrol tanks to take account of the lower floor

Vehicles with a Ramp

Some wheelchair accessible vehicles have:

• A motorised or manual folding ramp, or…
• A sliding ramp that’s hidden under the floor.

Wheelchair lifts

On other vehicles a lift is used to manoeuvre the wheelchair inside. These can be inside or outside the vehicle. Some are powered manually while others are powered electrically.

Double-arm and under body lifts are used in larger wheelchair accessible vehicles such as minibuses or buses. Mono-arm lifts are more suited to private transport since they can fit smaller wheelchair accessible vehicles.

Comfort and Style

These days most wheelchair accessible vehicles look good. From the outside you can’t tell that they’ve been converted. And many are so well fitted out that the trim and finish match the original vehicle.

The prospect of ‘switching off’ coupled with exposure to people with a cold or flu frequently results in many holiday-makers getting sick with a cold or flu on holiday. One preventative measure for flu is to take an anti-viral medication such as Tamiflu or Relenza. Some NHS doctors can be willing to prescribe this but it can be bought legitimately and safely via online healthcare providers such as The Online Clinic (www.theonlineclinic.co.uk)

Many people, especially those with little spare time, are turning to online healthcare providers to purchase a variety of drugs in preparation for their holidays. With online pharmacies and clinics now offering a huge range of medications, including anti-malarials, contraceptives, influenza preventatives such as Tamiflu and Relenza as well as ‘lifestyle drugs’ such as Viagra, deciding which clinic to choose is hard. However online medicine purchase can be done very safely and legally provided you choose a reputable service. The Online Clinic, a leading online healthcare provider (www.theonlineclinic.co.uk), has put together this checklist to help you.

• Registration with the Care Quality Commission; this should be displayed on the homepage but you can cross-check this at the Care Quality Commission website (www.cqc.org.uk)
• UK pharmacies must be registered with the RPSGB, often online pharmacies display this registration number of but again, you can check this at http://www.pharmacyregulation.org/theregister/lookingforapharmacy/index.aspx
• Legitimate online healthcare providers should provide a UK address and phone number – call this and check you are purchasing from a UK supplier, whilst It isn’t necessarily illegal to buy medication abroad but it is much safer to choose a supplier within the UK so that you can check supplier credentials
• Avoid all websites offering to supply prescription-only medicines without a prescription; not only is this illegal it is also unsafe it is highly unlikely they will supply genuine products
• No legitimate website will allow customers to purchase medicines without a consultation with a registered doctor. Online consultations conducted properly can suffice and if a website’s consulting doctor has any doubts as to your suitability for a chosen drug  they will refer you to your GP.
• GMC rules state that all registered doctors must disclose their registration details to patients if they are consulting online. Insist on getting this information if it is not volunteered.