Health Tips

The importance of getting regular exercise is so well known that there is little reason to rehash all of its benefits.  Likewise, most people are aware of the physical activity recommendations for overall cardiovascular health promoted by the American Heart Association (AHA) that encourages healthy adults to do: At least…

What is Shingles?  Shingles, known in medical jargon as herpes zoster, is an outbreak on the skin that is caused by the same virus that causes chickenpox — the varicella-zoster virus (VZV).  Following a bout of chickenpox, the virus retreats into nerve fibers and becomes dormant.  Shingles occurs when the…

Most people are aware that diabetes is a disease characterized by having high blood glucose (sugar).  Indeed, an antiquated term for diabetes was “sugar diabetes”.  But under the umbrella of the disease that doctors refer to as “diabetes mellitus” are really two entities, Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes. Type…

The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence defines domestic violence as “the willful intimidation, physical assault, battery, sexual assault, and/or other abusive behavior as part of a systematic pattern of power and control perpetrated by one intimate partner against another.” Domestic violence can take on a number of forms including physical…

Last week we looked at several factors that increased a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer but could not be changed.  The purpose of this was to encourage women at increased risk to receive screening measures beyond those developed for women at average risk.  Today we’ll look at a number…

A risk factor is anything that affects your chance of getting a disease such as cancer.  Some of these risk factors can be modified, while some can’t be changed. For example, even though breast cancer does occur in males, being a woman is its biggest risk factor since breast cancer…

“Hepatitis” means inflammation of the liver.  Toxins, certain medications, heavy alcohol use, as well as bacterial and viral infections can all cause hepatitis. The most common types of viral hepatitis are Hepatitis A, Hepatitis B, and Hepatitis C, each caused by a different virus. These viruses may produce similar symptoms…

There is no question but that an epidemic of influenza will occur during the 2016-2017 “flu season”.  What is not known is when this epidemic will happen, the specific strains of flu virus responsible for illness, or the number or severity of cases of flu that will occur.  For that…

Stomach “growling” is typically associated with hunger or an absence of food in the stomach.  The medical term for intestinal rumbling is borborygmus (bor-boh-RIG-mus).  If you say this out loud, you may find that pronouncing the word mimics the sound produced when your stomach growls.  In fact, the word borborygmus…

Fibromyalgia is a chronic medical condition characterized by widespread muscle pain, fatigue, and multiple tender areas known as “trigger points”. Fibromyalgia is considered to be an arthritis-related condition, but it is not truly a form of arthritis because it does not affect the joints (knees, shoulders, wrists, etc.) per se. …