Hi there, welcome to my 'personal library'. I am just another ordinary guy who love to share and care! This is some sort of my very own one-stop reference centre. It's kinda 'out of the box' thinking, not to the average Malaysians.. to dig of such infos up to this depth. Whatever health challenge happened to the other side of the globe is possible to happen to me as well. U R most welcome to visit my library.. I Care, U Care, We Care!! Love U all..
This is a true story (from my friend). Mum said my uncle saw it in Tunjang (Kedah) and the pasar malam in Titi Chai Kangar (Perlis) where goreng pisang was sold on afternoons. The hawker added a plastic drinking straw into a wok of hot oil and let it melt completely before he started to fry some bananas in the bubbling oil. This is why some fried bananas and ubi are so crispy... for hours...!! My uncle asked the hawker about this, but the hawker did not answer him. When my uncle told my mum about this, they realised this is how the hawkers ensure that fried food stays crispy for their customers. My mum said that in Thailand, they do the same thing to keep fried ikan bilis and fried onions crispy, even if left in the open for hours!!
Another time, I was with my family in Cameron Highlands. It was 3:00 pm and we were hanging around the market area, where there were several hawker stalls. At one of them, there was a big wok of boiling oil with an empty plastic bottle floating in it and slowly melting. At first I thought it had fallen into the oil accidentally, but then I saw a little girl, about 7-years old, holding a pair of chopsticks and stirring the bottle around in the hot oil. I realised, Oh my God... these people were using melted plastic to fry food, so that the fried snacks would not turn soft when it cooled down later.
Please forward to all your friends... DO NOT EAT CRISPY FRIED SNACKS from the hawkers!! Even if you don't see them melting the plastic in oil, they might have added the plastic a few hours before. After all, they keep the black oil for next day's frying as well, to save cost on cooking oil.
WANT longer-lasting crispiness in your food? Just add plastic. No this isn't a page from Psychotic Cooking 101.
Causing a stir of late are unsubstantiated reports that some hawkers in Malaysia are adding plastic straws and bottles into boiling oil and frying it with their snacks, which then remain extra crispy for several hours.
But Singaporeans fearing such bizarre, cancerous culinary calamities could happen here need not get steamed up.
Scientists say that adding melted plastic to a dish to give it extra crunch is pointless as it would not work.
And health authorities here assure that checks have not turned up any examples of such health hazards.
Malaysian paper The New Straits Times had cited 'witnesses' as seeing a goreng pisang (banana fritters) seller in Johor Baru throwing a plastic bottle into boiling oil, and frying it with his snacks. Apparently the hawker said his customers are fine with it and the new recipe is popular with other hawkers.
The report was picked up by Singapore papers, and while some sceptics scoffed, others were alarmed.
Housewife Alice Kang, 60, was so horrified that she warned her family members to avoid deep-fried foods when eating out.
She said: 'You never know if local hawkers are doing the same. Even if they throw in a straw, it can be harmful. So it's just better to avoid it totally.'
The starch fact is this: Goreng pisang's crispy crust is due to a chemical reaction between starch and proteins in the flour-coated food. And Dr Ludger Paul Stubbs, senior research fellow at the Agency For Science, Technology And Research (A*star), said: 'The same effect is certainly not possible with plastics.'
A*star senior scientist Chen Zhikuan said that plastics, when thrown into hot frying oil, can soften and melt, but it also degrades into 'mainly aromatic compounds which may contain cancer-causing substances'.
Dr Stubbs added: 'What can be said with certainty is that none of these degradation products would be beneficial in the frying process. Deep-fried plastic or anything deep-fried together with plastic should not be consumed due to possible health risks.'
General practitioner and popular food blogger Leslie Tay agrees: 'When PVC burns, it releases dioxins which can cause lower fertility rates, neurological problems (and) cancers.'
A spokesman for the National Environment Agency (NEA), which governs licensing for all food and beverages retailers, said: 'We have not come across such harmful practices being used by local food operators.'
The agency conducts routine hygiene checks on the food retailing industry, and an operator found guilty of non-compliance with regulations can be fined up to $2,000, and may have his licence suspended or revoked.
Local goreng pisang seller Corlinn Lim, 46, owner of the popular Lim Kee banana fritters at Maxwell food centre, said the stir over stirred plastic is 'ridiculous'. Every hawker has his own special recipe for preparing the same dish, he said, but as for adding something like plastic, there is no such practice in Singapore.
He also pointed out that the strict hygiene standards and checks here will ensure it does not happen.
Proteins are very important molecules in our cells. They are involved in virtually all cell functions. Each protein within the body has a specific function. Some proteins are involved in structural support, while others are involved in bodily movement, or in defense against germs. Proteins vary in structure as well as function. They are constructed from a set of 20 amino acids and have distinct three-dimensional shapes.
Below is a list of several types of proteins and their functions:
Structural Proteins - are fibrous and stringy and provide support. Examples include keratin, collagen, and elastin. Keratins strengthen protective coverings such as hair, quills, feathers, horns, and beaks. Collagens and elastin provide support for connective tissues such as tendons and ligaments.
Transport Proteins - are carrier proteins which move molecules from one place to another around the body. Examples include hemoglobin and cytochromes. Hemoglobin transports oxygen through the blood. Cytochromes operate in the electron transport chain as electron carrier proteins.
Antibodies - are specialized proteins involved in defending the body from antigens (foreign invaders). One way antibodies destroy antigens is by immobilizing them so that they can be destroyed by white blood cells.
Contractile Proteins - are responsible for movement. Examples include actin and myosin. These proteins are involved in muscle contraction and movement.
Enzymes - are proteins that facilitate biochemical reactions. They are often referred to as catalysts because they speed up chemical reactions. Examples include the enzymes lactase and pepsin. Lactase breaks down the sugar lactose found in milk. Pepsin is a digestive enzyme that works in the stomach to break down proteins in food.
Hormonal Proteins - are messenger proteins which help to coordinate certain bodily activities. Examples include insulin, oxytocin, and somatotropin. Insulin regulates glucose metabolism by controlling the blood-sugar concentration. Oxytocin stimulates contractions in females during childbirth. Somatotropin is a growth hormone that stimulates protein production in muscle cells.
Storage Proteins - store amino acids. Examples include ovalbumin and casein. Ovalbumin is found in egg whites and casein is a milk-based protein.
Summary
Proteins serve various functions in the body. The structure of a protein determines its function. For example, collagen has a super-coiled helical shape. It is long, stringy, strong, and resembles a rope. This structure is great for providing support. Hemoglobin on the other hand, is a globular protein that is folded and compact. Its spherical shape is useful for maneuvering through blood vessels.
White paint might just be the solution to tackling climate change.
Heat absorbers: Concrete surfaces absorb heat, causing the heat island effect. If roofs and buildings are painted white, they will reflect the heat instead.
THE stifling heat might have gotten some of us thinking about how best to cool our homes without pushing up the electricity bill in this time of financial crunch.
Dr Gary Theseira thinks he has the answer – simply reflect the light and heat back to the atmosphere. He suggests that we look at the potential of our roofs – that space that is directly exposed to the sun and absorbing vast amounts of heat during the day – as a reflector.
He says conventional tiles absorb heat as almost all are made from material that do not reflect heat and the heat absorption is intensified manifold with the dark-coloured tiles preferred by most Malaysians.
The botanist with the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia (FRIM), who has represented Malaysia at several United Nations climate change negotiations, is frustrated that no one take is taking him seriously about making changes to our roofs.
Theseira feels the world is giving disproportionate attention to the loss of white snow cover at the poles, and is failing to address the heat island effect of cities at the Equator, where the heat intensity is 2.5 times higher than at the pole.
“If we at the Equator bounce off the light and heat back to the atmosphere, that would really help,” he explains.
Having designs on the roof as a climate change mitigating tool is not a new idea but it hasn’t caught on in a big way. In fact, the roof is not the only building surface that can help lower the temperature of buildings.
“In the Middle East and Mediterranean, for thousands of years, buildings have been traditionally white-washed to keep them cool in the summer,” says Dr Hashem Akbari, who heads the Heat Island Group of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley, California, in the United States.
(Heat island is a phenomenon where an urban centre is significantly warmer than its surrounding rural area due to the modification of land surfaces and heat generated by high energy usage.)
Akbari is known for his relatively simple idea to cool the earth’s urban surfaces: make all rooftops and paved surfaces white. He is pioneering the white-roof concept and recently launched the 100 Cool Cities programme to get homeowners to switch to white roofs or at least a cool-coloured roof. No cities have signed on, however, despite showing interest.
“I am hoping to create an international programme to recruit as many large cities as possible. My current focus, in addition to the US cities, are China, India, Brazil and the Middle East. I would like to make sure that the building standards in all these countries prescribe white or cool-coloured materials for roofs,” he says in an e-mail interview.
Akbari found that communities with white roofs and cool pavements are a few degrees cooler, thus requiring less air-conditioning in the summer. Also, a lower ambient temperature reduces the reaction rate of smog-producing pollutants, leading to better air quality.
Akbari’s work shows that replacing 10sqm of a dark roof with a reflectivity of 0.15 albedo (reflecting only 15% of incoming solar radiation) with a white roof with a reflectivity of 0.55 will offset about one tonne of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.
White is best
“If all cities in hot and temperate climates were to use white material on their roofs or cool-coloured materials, we can offset about 24 gigatonnes of CO2 emissions which is equivalent to over 10 years of emissions from all cars in the world. The current world emission is about 27 gigatonnes, ” he says.
He says a white roof has an initial reflectance of about 0.7 to 0.85 albedo. Over time, its reflectivity drops (due to dust collection) to about 0.55 to 0.65 albedo, depending on the location and climate.
Globally, roofs account for 25% of the surface of most cities, and pavement accounts for about 35%.
“I call it win-win-win,” Akbari says. “First, a cooler environment not only saves energy but improves comfort. Second, cooling a city by a few degrees dramatically reduces smog. And the third win is offsetting global warming.”
He says some leading industries are pushing the idea while some, who are afraid of losing market share, resist.
His colleague Arthur Rosenfeld, who is a commissioner with the California Energy Commission, told the San Francisco Chronicle in an interview, that the team estimated that a worldwide conversion to white rooftops would take at least 20 years.
Rosenfeld said California is the only state to embrace white roofing, at least for commercial projects. In 2005, with the aid of Akbari’s research, the state passed a building standards law that requires all builders to first consider cool colours for major retrofits or new buildings.
Akbari says the roofing industry responded well, designing new materials and cooler colours to appeal to builders and homeowners seeking cost-savings and ecological benefits. Cooler colours refer to paint with cool pigments that reflect more of the near-infrared part of the solar spectrum. Painting or coating roofs is one option, he adds.
While costs (without incentives from the government) is prohibitive, there are Malaysians who have embraced the idea at their own expense. When Tony Cheah of Taman Tun Dr Ismail in Kuala Lumpur decided to renovate his single-storey link house two years ago, he came across a UV-resistant roof coating called Tileflex.
“Replacing the whole roof would have cost me in excess of RM25,000, not to mention the mess I would have had to endure. I had no intention of changing the original tiles which were still in excellent condition,” he says, adding that he ended up paying RM6,500 and got a new coating for the roof in three days.
While Cheah couldn’t specify the savings in electricity bill or provide a reading of the ambient temperature in the house post-renovation, he says the house “is considerably cooler”.
Lim Voon Bin, director of Nuruf Sdn Bhd which distributes Tileflex, says electricity savings will be apparent in the long run. He claims the product reflects up to 3°C of heat.
Lim ran a roof-making business for 30 years before he closed down his factory in Nilai in 2004 when he realised that he would be helping the environment if he could “restore roofs rather than replace them”. So far, he has restored 150 houses since 2005, as eco-consciousness takes root among Malaysians.
In the early days of abundant resources and minimal development pressures, little attention was paid to growing environmental concerns in Malaysia. The haze episodes in Southeast Asia in 1983, 1984, 1991, 1994, and 1997 imposed threats to the environmental management of Malaysia and increased awareness of the environment.
As a consequence, the government established Malaysian Air Quality Guidelines, the Air Pollution Index, and the Haze Action Plan to improve air quality. Air quality monitoring is part of the initial strategy in the pollution prevention program in Malaysia. Review of air pollution in Malaysia is based on the reports of the air quality monitoring in several large cities in Malaysia, which cover air pollutants such as:
Carbon monoxide (CO),
Sulphur Dioxide (SO2),
Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2),
Ozone (O3),
and Suspended Particulate Matter (SPM).
The results of the monitoring indicate that Suspended Particulate Matter (SPM) and Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2) are the predominant pollutants.
Other pollutants such as Ox and Pb are also observed in several big cities in Malaysia.
The air pollution comes mainly from:
land transportation,
industrial emissions,
and open burning sources.
Among them, land transportationcontributes the most to air pollution. This paper reviews the results of the ambient air quality monitoring and studies related to air pollution and health impacts.
How can air pollution hurt my health?
Air pollution can affect our health in many ways with both 'short-term' and 'long-term' effects. Different groups of individuals are affected by air pollution in different ways. Some individuals are much more sensitive to pollutants than are others. Young children and elderly people often suffer more from the effects of air pollution.
People with health problems such as asthma, heart and lung disease may also suffer more when the air is polluted. The extent to which an individual is harmed by air pollution usually depends on the total exposure to the damaging chemicals, i.e., the duration of exposure and the concentration of the chemicals must be taken into account.
Examples of short-term effects include irritation to the:
eyes,
nose and
throat, and
Upper respiratory infections such as bronchitis and pneumonia.
Other symptoms can include:
headaches,
nausea, and
allergic reactions.
Short-term air pollution can aggravate the medical conditions of individuals with asthma and emphysema. In the great "Smog Disaster" in London in 1952, four thousand people died in a few days due to the high concentrations of pollution.
Long-term health effects can include:
chronic respiratory disease,
lung cancer,
heart disease,
and even damage to the:
brain,
nerves,
liver, or
kidneys.
Continual exposure to air pollution affects:
the lungs of growing children and
may aggravate or complicate medical conditions in the elderly.
It is estimated that half a million people die prematurely every year in the United States as a result of smoking cigarettes.
Research into the health effects of air pollution is ongoing. Medical conditions arising from air pollution can be very expensive:
Sleep is essential for a person’s health and wellbeing, according to the National Sleep Foundation (NSF). Yet millions of people do not get enough sleep and many suffer from lack of sleep. For example, surveys conducted by the NSF (1999-2004) reveal that at least 40 million Americans suffer from over 70 different sleep disorders and 60 percent of adults report having sleep problems a few nights a week or more. Most of those with these problems go undiagnosed and untreated. In addition, more than 40 percent of adults experience daytime sleepiness severe enough to interfere with their daily activities at least a few days each month - with 20 percent reporting problem sleepiness a few days a week or more. Furthermore, 69 percent of children experience one or more sleep problems a few nights or more during a week.
What are the signs of excessive sleepiness?
According to psychologist and sleep expert David F. Dinges, Ph.D., of the Division of Sleep and Chronobiology and Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, irritability, moodiness and disinhibition are some of the first signs a person experiences from lack of sleep. If a sleep-deprived person doesn’t sleep after the initial signs, said Dinges, the person may then start to experience apathy, slowed speech and flattened emotional responses, impaired memory and an inability to be novel or multitask. As a person gets to the point of falling asleep, he or she will fall into micro sleeps(5-10 seconds) that cause lapses in attention, nod off while doing an activity like driving or reading and then finally experience hypnagogic hallucinations, the beginning of REM sleep. (Dinges, Sleep, Sleepiness and Performance, 1991)
Amount of sleep needed
Everyone’s individual sleep needs vary. In general, most healthy adults are built for 16 hours of wakefulness and need an average of eight hours of sleep a night. However, some individuals are able to function without sleepiness or drowsiness after as little as six hours of sleep. Others can't perform at their peak unless they've slept ten hours. And, contrary to common myth, the need for sleep doesn't decline with age but the ability to sleep for six to eight hours at one time may be reduced. (Van Dongen & Dinges, Principles & Practice of Sleep Medicine, 2000)
What causes sleep problems?
Psychologists and other scientists who study the causes of sleep disorders have shown that such problems can directly or indirectly be tied to abnormalities in the following systems:
Physiological systems
Brain and nervous system
Cardiovascular system
Metabolic functions
Immune system
Furthermore, unhealthy conditions, disorders and diseases can also cause sleep problems, including:
Pathological sleepiness, insomnia and accidents
Hypertension and elevated cardiovascular risks (MI, stroke)
Groups that are at particular risk for sleep deprivation include night shift workers, physicians (average sleep = 6.5 hours a day; residents = 5 hours a day), truck drivers, parents and teenagers. (American Academy of Sleep Medicine and National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Working Group on Problem Sleepiness. 1997).
How environment and behavior affect a person’s sleep
Stress is the number one cause of short-term sleeping difficulties, according to sleep experts. Common triggers include school- or job-related pressures, a family or marriage problem and a serious illness or death in the family. Usually the sleep problem disappears when the stressful situation passes. However, if short-term sleep problems such as insomnia aren't managed properly from the beginning, they can persist long after the original stress has passed.
Drinking alcohol or beverages containing caffeine in the afternoon or evening, exercising close to bedtime, following an irregular morning and nighttime schedule, and working or doing other mentally intense activities right before or after getting into bed can disrupt sleep.
If you are among the 20 percent of employees in the United States who are shift workers, sleep may be particularly elusive. Shift work forces you to try to sleep when activities around you - and your own "biological rhythms" - signal you to be awake. One study shows that shift workers are two to five times more likely than employees with regular, daytime hours to fall asleep on the job.
Traveling also disrupts sleep, especially jet lag and traveling across several time zones. This can upset your biological or “circadian” rhythms.
Environmental factors such as a room that's too hot or cold, too noisy or too brightly lit can be a barrier to sound sleep. And interruptions from children or other family members can also disrupt sleep. Other influences to pay attention to are the comfort and size of your bed and the habits of your sleep partner. If you have to lie beside someone who has different sleep preferences, snores, can't fall or stay asleep, or has other sleep difficulties, it often becomes your problem too!
Having a 24/7 lifestyle can also interrupt regular sleep patterns: the global economy that includes round the clock industries working to beat the competition; widespread use of nonstop automated systems to communicate and an increase in shift work makes for sleeping at regular times difficult.
Health problems and sleep disorders
A number of physical problems can interfere with your ability to fall or stay asleep. For example, arthritis and other conditions that cause pain, backache, or discomfort can make it difficult to sleep well.
Epidemiological studies suggest self-reported sleep complaints are associated with an increased relative risk of cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. For women, pregnancy and hormonal shifts including those that cause premenstrual syndrome (PMS) or menopause and its accompanying hot flashes can also intrude on sleep.
Finally, certain medications such as decongestants, steroids and some medicines for high blood pressure, asthma, or depression can cause sleeping difficulties as a side effect.
It is a good idea to talk to a physician or mental health provider about any sleeping problem that recurs or persists for longer than a few weeks.
According to the DSM IV, some psychiatric disorders have fatigue as a major symptom. Included are: major depressive disorder (includes postpartum blues), minor depression, dythymia, mixed anxiety-depression, SAD and bipolar disorder.
Teenagers, sleep problems and drugs
According to a long-term study published in the 2004 April issue of Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, young teenagers whose preschool sleep habits were poor were more than twice as likely to use drugs, tobacco or alcohol. This finding was made by the University of Michigan Health System as part of a family health study that followed 257 boys and their parents for 10 years. The study found a significant connection between sleep problems in children and later drug use, even when other issues such as depression, aggression, attention problems and parental alcoholism were taken into account. Long-term data on girls isn't available yet. The researchers suggest that early sleep problems may be a "marker" for predicting later risk of early adolescent substance abuse—and that there may be a common biological factor underlying both traits. Although the relationship between sleep problems and the abuse of alcohol in adults is well known, this is the first study to look at the issue in children.
Children and Sleep Disturbances
Nightmares are dreams with vivid and disturbing content. They are common in children during REM sleep. They usually involve an immediate awakening and good recall of the dream content. Sleep terrors are often described as extreme nightmares. Like nightmares, they most often occur during childhood, however they typically take place during non-REM (NREM) sleep. Characteristics of a sleep terror include arousal, agitation, large pupils, sweating, and increased blood pressure. The child appears terrified, screams and is usually inconsolable for several minutes, after which he or she relaxes and returns to sleep. Sleep terrors usually take place early in the night and may be combined with sleepwalking. The child typically does not remember or has only a vague memory of the terrifying events.
Sleepiness and Decision Making
In the August 2004 issue of the journal Sleep, Dr. Timothy Roehrs, the Director of research at the Sleep Disorders and Research Center at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit published one of the first studies to measure the effect of sleepiness on decision making and risk taking. He found that sleepiness does take a toll on effective decision making.
Cited in the October 12, New York Times Science section, Dr. Roehrs and his colleagues paid sleepy and fully alert subjects to complete a series of computer tasks. At random times, they were given a choice to take their money and stop. Or they could forge ahead with the potential of either earning more money or losing it all if their work was not completed within an unknown remainder of time.
Dr. Roehrs found that the alert people were very sensitive to the amount of work they needed to do to finish the tasks and understood the risk of losing their money if they didn't. But the sleepy subjects chose to quit the tasks prematurely or they risked losing everything by trying to finish the task for more money even when it was 100 percent likely that they would be unable to finish, said Dr. Roehrs.
Consequences of lost sleep
According to the National Commission on Sleep Disorders Research (1998) and reports from the National Highway Safety Administration (NHSA)(2002), high-profile accidents can partly be attributed to people suffering from a severe lack of sleep.
Each year the cost of sleep disorders, sleep deprivation and sleepiness, according to the NCSDR, is estimated to be $15.9 million in direct costs and $50 to $100 billion a year in indirect and related costs. And according to the NHSA, falling asleep while driving is responsible for at least 100,000 crashes, 71,000 injuries and 1,550 deaths each year in the United States. Young people in their teens and twenties, who are particularly susceptible to the effects of chronic sleep loss, are involved in more than half of the fall-asleep crashes on the nation's highways each year. Sleep loss also interferes with the learning of young people in our nation's schools, with 60 percent of grade school and high school children reporting that they are tired during the daytime and 15 percent of them admitting to falling asleep in class.
According to the Department of Transportation (DOT), one to four percent of all highway crashes are due to sleepiness, especially in rural areas and four percent of these crashes are fatal.
Risk factors for drowsy driving crashes:
Late night/early morning driving
Patients with untreated excessive sleepiness
People who obtain six or fewer hours of sleep per day
Young adult males
Commercial truck drivers
Night shift workers
Medical residents after their shift
How to get a good night sleep
According to sleep researchers, a night's sleep is divided into five continually shifting stages, defined by types of brain waves that reflect either lighter or deeper sleep. Toward morning, there is an increase in rapid eye movement, or REM sleep, when the muscles are relaxed and dreaming occurs, and recent memories may be consolidated in the brain. The experts say that hitting a snooze alarm over and over again to wake up is not the best way to feel rested. “The restorative value of rest is diminished, especially when the increments are short,” said psychologist Edward Stepanski, PhD who has studied sleep fragmentation at the Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. This on and off again effect of dozing and waking causes shifts in the brain-wave patterns. Sleep-deprived snooze-button addicts are likely to shorten their quota of REM sleep, impairing their mental functioning during the day. (New York Times, October 12, 2004)
Certain therapies, like cognitive behavioral therapy teach people how to recognize and change patterns of thought and behavior to solve their problems. Recently this type of therapy has been shown to be very effective in getting people to fall asleep and conquer insomnia.
According to a study published in the October 2004 issue of The Archives of Internal Medicine, cognitive behavior therapy is more effective and lasts longer than a widely used sleeping pill, Ambien, in reducing insomnia. The study involved 63 healthy people with insomnia who were randomly assigned to receive Ambien, the cognitive behavior therapy, both or a placebo. The patients in the therapy group received five 30-minute sessions over six weeks. They were given daily exercises to “recognize, challenge and change stress-inducing” thoughts and were taught techniques, like delaying bedtime or getting up to read if they were unable to fall asleep after 20 minutes. The patients taking Ambien were on a full dose for a month and then were weaned off the drug. At three weeks, 44 percent of the patients receiving the therapy and those receiving the combination therapy and pills fell asleep faster compared to 29 percent of the patients taking only the sleeping pills. Two weeks after all the treatment was over, the patients receiving the therapy fell asleep in half the time it took before the study and only 17 percent of the patients taking the sleeping pills fell asleep in half the time. (New York Times, October 5, 2004)
According to leading sleep researchers, there are techniques to combat common sleep problems:
Keep a regular sleep/wake schedule
Don’t drink or eat caffeine four to six hours before bed and minimize daytime use
Don’t smoke, especially near bedtime or if you awake in the night
Avoid alcohol and heavy meals before sleep
Get regular exercise
Minimize noise, light and excessive hot and cold temperatures where you sleep
Develop a regular bed time and go to bed at the same time each night
Try and wake up without an alarm clock
Attempt to go to bed earlier every night for certain period; this will ensure that you’re
getting enough sleep
Insomnia and cognitive-behavioral treatment
In clinical settings, cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) has a 70-80 percent success rate for helping those who suffer from chronic insomnia. Almost one third of people with insomnia achieve normal sleep and most reduce their symptoms by 50 percent and sleep an extra 45-60 minutes a night. When insomnia exists along with other psychological disorders like depression, say the experts, the initial treatment should address the underlying condition.
But sometimes even after resolving the underlying condition, the insomnia still exists, says psychologist Jack Edinger, Ph.D., of the VA Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina and Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University and cautions that treating the depression usually doesn’t resolve the sleep difficulties. From his clinical experience, he has found that most patients with insomnia should be examined for specific behaviors and thoughts that may perpetuate the sleep problems. When people develop insomnia, they try to compensate by engaging in activities to help them get more sleep. They sleep later in the mornings or spend excessive times in bed. These efforts usually backfire, said Edinger.
From his clinical work and research on sleep, psychologist Charles M. Morin, Ph.D., a Professor in the Psychology Department and Director of the Sleep Disorders Center at University Laval in Quebec, Canada says that ten percent of adults suffer from chronic insomnia. In a study released in the recent issue of Sleep Medicine Alert published by the NSF, Morin outlines how CBT helps people overcome insomnia. Clinicians use sleep diaries to get an accurate picture of someone’s sleep patterns. Bedtime, waking time, time to fall asleep, number and durations of awakening, actual sleep time and quality of sleep are documented by the person suffering from insomnia. A person can develop poor sleep habits (i.e. watching TV in bed or eating too much before bedtime), irregular sleep patterns (sleeping too late, taking long naps during the day) to compensate for lost sleep at night. Some patients also develop a fear of not sleeping and a pattern of worrying about the consequences of not sleeping, said Morin. “Treatments that address the poor sleep habits and the faulty beliefs and attitudes about sleep work but sometimes,” said Morin, “medication may play a role in breaking the cycle of insomnia. But behavioral therapies are essential for patients to alter the conditions that perpetuate it.”
CBT attempts to change a patient’s dysfunctional beliefs and attitudes about sleep. “It restructure thoughts – like, ‘I’ve got to sleep eight hours tonight’ or ‘I’ve got to take medication to sleep’ or ‘I just can’t function or I’ll get sick if I don’t sleep.’ These thoughts focus too much on sleep, which can become something like performance anxiety – sleep will come around to you when you’re not chasing it,” said Edinger.
What works in many cases, said Morin and Edinger, is to standardize or restrict a person’s sleep to give a person more control over his or her sleep. A person can keep a sleep diary for a couple of weeks and a clinician can monitor the amount of time spent in bed to the actual amount of time sleeping. Then the clinician can instruct the patient to either go to bed later and get up earlier or visa versa. This procedure improves the length of sleeping time by imposing a mild sleep deprivation situation, which has the result of reducing the anxiety surrounding sleep. To keep from falling asleep during the day, patients are told not to restrict sleep to less than five hours.
Standardizing sleep actually helps a person adjust his or her homeostatic mechanism that balances sleep, said Edinger. “Therefore, if you lose sleep, your homeostatic mechanism will kick in and will work to increase the likelihood of sleeping longer and deeper to promote sleep recovery. This helps a person come back to their baseline and works for the majority.”
A person can also establish more stimulus control over his or her bedroom environment, said Dr Morin. This could include: going to bed only when sleepy, getting out of bed when unable to sleep, prohibiting non-sleep activities in the bedroom, getting up at the same time every morning (including weekends) and avoiding daytime naps.
Finally, a person can incorporate relaxation techniques as part of his or her treatment. For example, a person can give herself or himself an extra hour before bed to relax and unwind and time to write down worries and plans for the following day.
In CBT, said Morin, breaking the thought process and anxiety over sleep is the goal. “After identifying the dysfunctional thought patterns, a clinician can offer alternative interpretations of what is getting the person anxious so a person can think about his or her insomnia in a different way.” Morin offers some techniques to restructure a person’s cognitions. “Keep realistic expectations, don’t blame insomnia for all daytime impairments, do not feel that losing a night’s sleep will bring horrible consequences, do not give too much importance to sleep and finally develop some tolerance to the effects of lost sleep.
According to Dr. Edinger, aging weakens a person’s homeostatic sleep drive after age 50. Interestingly, the length of the circadian cycle stays roughly the same over the lifespan but the amplitude of the circadian rhythm may decline somewhat with aging.
Do you know what is in your food? Is it genetically engineered?
Frequently Asked Questions
Question: Why don't the food manufacturers and the biotech companies want you to know if your foods have been genetically engineered?
Answer: Because if they are labeled, you will start asking questions such as "Have these genetically engineered foods been safety tested on humans?" The answer to that question is NO!
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Question: Doesn't the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) require genetically engineered foods to be safety tested like they do for new drugs and food additives before they are sold to the public for consumption?
Answer: NO! With limited exceptions, under current FDA regulations, companies are not even required to notify the agency they are bringing new genetically engineered products to the market.
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Question: How much of the food I buy in the grocery stores contain genetically engineered ingredients?
Answer: Since genetically engineered soy and corn are used in many processed foods, it is estimated that over 70 percent of the foods in grocery stores in the U.S. and Canada contain genetically engineered ingredients.
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Question: Are people all over the world eating genetically engineered foods?
Answer: No, all of the European Union nations, Japan, China, Australia, New Zealand and many other countries require the mandatory labeling of foods that contain genetically engineered ingredients. As a result, food manufacturers in all those countries choose to use non-genetically engineered ingredients.
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Question: Are you telling me that people in the United States and Canada are eating a lot more genetically engineered foods than in many other countries in the world?
Answer: Yes, citizens in the United States and Canada are engaged in the largest feeding experiment in human history and most people are not even aware of the fact.
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Question: What countries are growing genetically engineered crops?
Answer: There were only five countries that grew about 98 percent of the $44 billion of commercial genetically engineered crops in 2003-2004. Those five countries were: the United States ($27.5 billion), Argentina ($8.9 billion), China ($3.9 billion), Canada ($2.0 billion) and Brazil ($1.6 billion).
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Question: What can I do to help properly regulate genetically engineered foods so that I can rest assure that these experimental crops will not harm human health or the environment?
Answer: The single most important step you can take is to mail three letters using the U.S. Postal Service. One letter goes to your Congressional Representative in the U.S. House of Representatives and the other two to your state's two Senators serving in the U.S. Senate. The letters request that they support legislation to label genetically engineered foods. We have form letters on this web site for this purpose. Click here for more information.
A brief word about terminology
Analysts use many different phrases to describe genetically engineered foods. The biotech industry rarely uses the phrase "genetically engineered foods," sticking with the more bland (and less controversial) phrase "biotech foods."
In Europe, genetically engineered foods are more commonly referred to as genetically modified foods, genetically altered foods or GMOs (short for genetically modified organisms). But scientists generally agree that "genetically engineered" more accurately represents the process than "genetically modified."
Supporters of biotech foods often try to argue that we have been genetically modifying our foods for centuries, through a process known as hybridization, or interbreeding. But that process is far different than the recombinant DNA splicing used in modern agricultural biotechnology.
It is interesting to note that the eleventh edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary added the word "Frankenfood" as another term to describe genetically engineered food.
Parents are becoming increasingly aware of the dangerous products and toxins that make their way into our homes these days. From the household cleaners under the kitchen sink to the lead in many lipstick brands it is not hard to find chemicals in the products we use every day. These dangerous chemicals are hidden in places we might never suspect though and shockingly they can even be found in products designed for the smallest and most vulnerable members of society, babies.
An industrial chemical called Bisophenol A or BPA is making the headlines all too often. Interestingly it is not getting so much attention because of it hormone-like qualities and dangerous ramifications as it is the fact that it can most commonly be found in products like baby bottles, sippy, cups, and baby formula cans. It is hard to understand why products aimed at babies would contain such harmful ingredients.
What is BPA and why should it be avoided?
Bisphenol A is an industrial chemical used to make polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins. BPA is used to make lightweight, high-performance plastics that are tough and heat resistant. It is also used to make durable epoxy linings for metal cans. Immediately then you can see the benefit to companies in choosing to use this ingredient for things such as bottles, cups, and formula cans.
This chemical has the ability to mimic hormones as well and several studies have linked BPA to weight gain, abnormalities that can lead to breast and prostate cancer, brain damage, abnormal organ development, and hyperactivity. The companies using BPA have declared their products only contain amounts considered safe but this does not address cumulative exposure from all the various products we use that contain BPA.
When you consider all of the different products you may use that contain this chemical the exposure level does not appear to be so safe or small. In fact the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences has declared that “human exposures are above the current U.S. safety limit.”
What can you do to avoid BPA?
The good news is that consumer demand has prompted several companies to refrain from using Bisphenol A in their product formulations. If you use baby bottles in the home you can find safe alternatives from companies like Born Free, Nubi, and Green to Grow. They all offer plastic baby bottles that do not contain BPA. Classic glass baby bottles are another good alternative as well. They are quite durable and since they are plastic free they are also BPA free. If you are worried about possible breakage there also a few companies like Siliskin and Wee-Go that sell glass bottles covered with protective silicone sheaths.
In lieu of sippy or toddler cups that commonly contain BPA parents might opt to use stainless steel sippy cups and bottles from Klean Kanteen or Thermos. Sigg makes an aluminum alternative with a water based epoxy lining on the inside and a large array of kid friendly designs. Born Free also makes a safe sippy.
Breastfeeding would reduce or even eliminate the need for bottles or formula and subsequent exposure to BPA. For parents that need to use formula though it is hard to find companies that are not using BPA to line their cans of powered or liquid formula. A new study from the Environmental Working Group has discovered that 4 out of 5 formula manufacturers acknowledge using BPA in their formula cans and while some did not acknowledge using BPA, they could not provide documentation of their alternative packaging. Their study also concluded that powdered formula has 8 to 20 times less BPA than liquid formula. So parents who need to use formula should look to powdered formula to reduce overall exposure to BPA.
While BPA exposure should be a concern for parents they can take comfort in the fact that there are a growing number of alternative products that are designed to keep our babies safe.
1. What is the endocrine system? The endocrine system is a complex network of glands and hormones that regulates many of the body's functions, including growth, development and maturation, as well as the way various organs operate. The endocrine glands -- including the pituitary, thyroid, adrenal, thymus, pancreas, ovaries, and testes -- release carefully-measured amounts of hormones into the bloodstream that act as natural chemical messengers, traveling to different parts of the body in order to control and adjust many life functions. 2. What is an endocrine disruptor? An endocrine disruptor is a synthetic chemical that when absorbed into the body either mimics or blocks hormones and disrupts the body's normal functions. This disruption can happen through altering normal hormone levels, halting or stimulating the production of hormones, or changing the way hormones travel through the body, thus affecting the functions that these hormones control. Chemicals that are known human endocrine disruptors include diethylstilbesterol (the drug DES), dioxin, PCBs, DDT, and some other pesticides. Many chemicals, particularly pesticides and plasticizers, are suspected endocrine disruptors based on limited animal studies. 3. What are some likely routes of exposure to endocrine disruptors? Exposure to endocrine disruptors can occur through direct contact with pesticides and other chemicals or through ingestion of contaminated water, food, or air. Chemicals suspected of acting as endocrine disruptors are found in insecticides, herbicides, fumigants and fungicides that are used in agriculture as well as in the home. Industrial workers can be exposed to chemicals such as detergents, resins, and plasticizers with endocrine disrupting properties. Endocrine disruptors enter the air or water as a byproduct of many chemical and manufacturing processes and when plastics and other materials are burned. Further, studies have found that endocrine disruptors can leach out of plastics, including the type of plastic used to make hospital intravenous bags. Many endocrine disruptors are persistent in the environment and accumulate in fat, so the greatest exposures come from eating fatty foods and fish from contaminated water. 4. How do we know that endocrine disruptors are dangerous? Many plant and animal species are showing signs of ill health due to exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals. For example, fish in the Great Lakes, which are contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and other man-made chemicals, have numerous reproductive problems as well as abnormal swelling of the thyroid glands. Fish-eating birds in the Great Lakes area, such as eagles, terns, and gulls, have shown similar dysfunctions.
Scientists have also pointed to endocrine disruptors as the cause of a declining alligator population in Lake Apopka, Florida. The alligators in this area have diminished reproductive organs that prevent successful reproduction. These problems were connected to a large pesticide spill several years earlier, and the alligators were found to have endocrine disrupting chemicals in their bodies and eggs. 5. Should humans be concerned for their health based on evidence that fish, birds and alligators have been affected? Yes. All vertebrates (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals, including humans) are fundamentally similar during early embryonic development. Scientists can therefore use the evidence acquired on other species to make predictions about endocrine disrupting effects on humans. 6. Is there direct evidence that humans are susceptible to endocrine disruption? Yes. In the 1950s and 1960s pregnant women were prescribed diethylstilbestrol (DES), a synthetic estrogen, to prevent miscarriages. Not only did DES fail to prevent miscarriages, but it also caused health problems for many of these women's children. In 1971, doctors began reporting high rates of unusual vaginal cancers in teenage girls. Investigations of the girls' environmental exposures traced the problem to their mothers' use of DES. The girls also suffered birth defects of the uterus and ovaries, and immune system suppression. 7. Are children at greater risk from endocrine disruptor exposure? Yes. Because endocrine disruptors affect the development of the body's vital organs and hormonal systems, infants, children and developing fetuses are more vulnerable to exposure. And as was the case with DES, parents' exposure to certain chemicals may produce unexpected -- and tragic -- effects in their children, even decades later. 8. These days don't chemicals have to be safe to be allowed on the market? No. The majority of the more than 2,000 chemicals that come onto the market every year do not go through even the simplest tests to determine toxicity. Even when some tests are carried out, they do not assess whether or not a chemical has endocrine interfering properties. 9. What can I do to reduce my risk of exposure?
Educate yourself about endocrine disruptors, and educate your family and friends.
Buy organic food whenever possible.
Avoid using pesticides in your home or yard, or on your pet -- use baits or traps instead,
keepin your home especially clean to prevent ant or roach infestations.
Find out if pesticides are used in your child's school or day care center and campaign for non-toxic alternatives.
Avoid fatty foods such as cheese and meat whenever possible.
If you eat fish from lakes, rivers, or bays, check with your state to see if they are contaminated.
Avoid heating food in plastic containers, or storing fatty foods in plastic containers or plastic wrap.
Do not give young children soft plastic teethers or toys, since these leach potential endocrine disrupting chemicals.
Support efforts to get strong government regulation of and increased research on endocrine disrupting chemicals.
"Sugar is without question one of the most dangerous substances on the food market today.
What we are talking about here is sucrose, the white crystalline sugar refined from cane or beet juice by stripping away all its vitamins, minerals, protein, fiber, water, and other synergists.
White sugar is an industrially processed chemical not found in nature, and it is not fit for human consumption.
Other sugars such as fructose (in fruit and honey), lactose (in milk), and maltose (in grains) are natural substances with nutritional value.
Raw sugar is a coarse, brown, sticky variety made by simply boiling down whole cane juice and it too is a wholesome food, but it is very difficult to find in the Western world.
The so called 'brown sugar' sold in supermarkets is nothing more than refined white sugar with some molasses spun back into it for color and flavor. It is not a 'health food'.
Sugar suppresses the immune system by causing the pancreas to secrete abnormally large quantities of insulin, which is required to break it down.
Insulin remains in circulation in the bloodstream long after sugar has been metabolized, and one of its main side effects is to suppress the release of growth hormone in the pituitary gland.
Growth hormone is a primary regulator of the immune system, so anyone who eats a lot of sugar every day is going to experience critical growth hormone deficiency and consequent immune deficiency caused by the constant presence of insulin in the bloodstream.
Furthermore, refined white sugar is treated as a toxic foreign agent by the immune system, owing to its unnatural chemical structure as well as the industrial contaminants it retains from the refining process.
Sugar thus triggers an unnecessary immune response while simultaneously suppressing immune function, thereby debilitating the immune system with a double edged sword.
Sugar is the chief culprit in many diseases and degenerative conditions.
It can easily cause diabetes and is a major factor in candidacies, both of which are epidemic in the industrialized Western world.
Since sugar is 'nutritionally naked', the body must 'borrow' the missing vitamins, minerals and other synergistic nutrients required to metabolize sugar from its own tissues.
Heavy sugar consumption therefore causes a constant siphoning of nutrients from the body. Recent evidence suggests that sugar causes dental problems not so much by contact with the teeth but rather by leaching the teeth of calcium from within.
Sugar also depletes the body of potassium and magnesium, which are required for proper cardiac function, and is therefore a major factor in heart disease.
The nutritional leaching caused by sugar can give rise to intense food cravings and eating binges, as the body seeks to replenish the nutrients 'stolen' from it by sugar.
Most people consume far more sugar than their bodies can possibly use for energy. When this happens, the liver converts the extra sugar into molecules called triglycerides and stores it as fat, or else produces cholesterol from the by-products of sugar and deposits it in veins and arteries. Sugar is thus a major factor in obesity and arteriosclerosis as well.
Sugar is an addictive substance. In Sugar Blues, William Dufty writes; 'The difference between sugar addiction and narcotic addiction is largely one of degree.'
Abruptly giving up sugar invariably brings on the sort of withdrawal symptoms associated with narcotic drugs- fatigue, lassitude, depression, moodiness, headaches, aching limbs.
Its addictive nature is also reflected in current per capita consumption in the USA- an average of 130 pounds of sugar per person per year, or about 1/3 pound daily. That qualifies as 'substance abuse'. Most people don't even realize how much sugar they're taking every day because much of it is hidden in other foods.
A 12-ounce can of a typical soft drink, for example, contains about nine teaspoons of refined white sugar.
Sugar consumption in the USA is so high that it has also caused a social problem through its deleterious effects on behaviour, especially in children, who are displaying increasingly severe behavioral disorders and learning disabilities.
In a recent study conducted by Dr. C. Keith Connors of the Children's Hospital in Washington, DC, a 'deadly' link was established between the consumption of sugar with carbohydrates (such as breakfast cereal, cake, and biscuits) and violent behaviour, hypertension, and learning impediments.
In other studies, chronic violence in prisons was remarkably reduced simply by eliminating refined sugar and starch from prison diets. Singapore in 1991 banned sugary soft drink sales from all schools and youth center's, citing the danger that sugar poses to the mental and physical health of children.
If you or your children have a sweet tooth, you can easily satisfy it by concocting treats with honey, molasses, and barley malt, which are not only sweet but also nutritious and therapeutically beneficial."
