Why a pill just won't cut it

You can't turn on the television, open a web browser, or read the newspaper without an advertisement or study telling you a new way to be healthy. One study says chocolate will help you lose weight, another says it's all genetic anyway - how do you ever know what to believe? One way to think about it is to think about a time not too long ago before fad dieting and obesity were daily topics of conversation. How did your grandmother eat? How did her mother feed her? Many believe our ancestors were much healthier than we are today, and one way to boost our own health may be to mimic those diets. One thing they certainly didn't consume back then: dietary supplements and vitamins.

It may seem like popping a calcium pill is a great, easy way to get your nutrients. Maybe it even sounds more appetizing than having some yogurt. But did you know that a study by the British Medical Journal found a connection between taking calcium supplements and thirty percent rise in the risk of suffering a heart attack. That risk was not seen in those who got their calcium the old fashioned way - by ingesting it in their food - or in people who also took vitamin D with their calcium.

Another major drawback of going the supplement route is the risk that you will encounter adverse side effects. One report found that excessive amounts of vitamin A supplements can cause headaches and birth defects, lower bone strength and can even cause liver damage. Zinc has been associated with nausea, vomiting, and internal organ damage.

Supplements can also have interactions with your prescription medications. For example, blood-thinning medication and vitamin K can be a dangerous combination, potentially increasing risk for blood clots. Vitamins E and C may decrease the effectiveness of chemotherapy. So if you're taking a prescription and you add a dietary supplement to your daily regimen, you may find yourself experiencing some unexpected and unpleasant reactions.

What does all of this tell us? It's hard to say exactly, except that when you pop a pill, you don't really know what the effects will be. Something else you don't know: what's actually in that pill. While the Food and Drug Administration and the United States Department of Agriculture technically regulate what can and cannot appear on a food label, there is no government regulator out there keeping track of what a dietary supplement's label out there. So the health claims made on those bottles could be - and some likely are - entirely made up out of thin air. Is that the kind of product you want to buy? Probably not.

The truth is that we can get all the nutrients we need by eating a balanced diet that relies on a variety of foods and food groups. And food offers a lot of great things that you can't buy in a pill. It brings people together; it teaches us about new cultures; it tastes good. Why would you want to skip all of those benefits for a questionably beneficial supplement? Especially when that supplement comes in a non-regulated bottle and costs money? Do yourself, your wallet, and your taste buds a favor and skip that morning dose.

About the Author: Steven Madison freelances about health-related topics for this website. He's a personal trainer who has seen one too many diets based on supplements go terribly wrong.

Liver Cancer Screening, Study Doubts Value

Screening people with alcoholic liver damage for signs of cancer may not be worth the expense or other downsides, a new report says.

Alcoholism can lead to cirrhosis, or scarring, of the liver. People with cirrhosis have a higher-than-average risk of developing liver cancer, but it is not clear whether screening people with cirrhosis for the cancer extends lives.

In the new study, Danish researchers found that for alcoholic cirrhosis patients in their country, the risk of liver cancer is so low that screening may not be justified.

Of nearly 8,500 Danish adults hospitalized for alcoholic cirrhosis, the chance of developing liver cancer in the next five years was 1 percent, the study found.

That's well below the risk that justifies cancer screening, based on U.S. guidelines for cost-effectiveness.

In the U.S., an abdominal ultrasound would typically cost a few hundred dollars. Follow-up tests, if needed, could cost much more. But there are more than costs to consider when it comes to widespread cancer screening, said the lead researcher on the new study, Dr. Peter Jepsen of Aarhus University Hospital.

Screening always carries some risk of falsely suggesting a person has cancer. And that leads to unnecessary further testing, which may be invasive.

Ultrasound is the method of choice for liver cancer screening, Jepsen told Reuters Health in an email. If that test suggests there is a tumor, the next step is usually a CT scan, which exposes the patient to radiation (at a much higher dose than with standard x-rays).

So the benefits of liver screening would need to outweigh the risks in order to recommend routinely screening people with alcoholic cirrhosis.

The current findings suggest they do not, Jepsen's team reports in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

SPECIALIST GROUPS ALONE

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, a government-backed independent expert panel, has no recommendation on liver cancer screening.

Right now, screening is recommended by two specialist groups the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases and the European Association for the Study of the Liver.

Both groups suggest that cirrhosis patients be screened every six months, Jepsen noted.

"But whether clinicians are actually offering this to their patients, and whether patients are compliant with (screening) if given the offer are unknown," Jepsen said.

The American liver diseases group could not be reached for comment.

The recommendations from the specialist groups are based on the common belief that alcoholic cirrhosis patients have a liver cancer risk that tops 1.5 percent per year. (That's the level at which screening is considered cost-effective.)

But Jepsen's team says the risk may actually be much lower a 1 percent chance over five years, based on their findings.

What's more, the researchers found, less than 2 percent of deaths in their study group were due to liver cancer.

Some past studies in various countries have suggested that liver cancer is a bigger risk for alcoholic cirrhosis patients than the current study implies. (A study in France, for example, found that cirrhosis patients developed cancer at a rate of over 5 percent per year.)

But Jepsen said the bigger numbers are based on "clinic-based" studies, which look at select groups of patients being treated at medical centers.

His team's study, in contrast, was population-based. They had information on all 8,482 Danish citizens who had a first-time hospitalization for alcoholic cirrhosis between 1993 and 2005.

Population-based studies give a clearer idea of the liver cancer risk for the typical alcoholic cirrhosis patient.

Jepsen said he thinks his team's findings are likely to be relevant to countries other than Denmark. The higher rates that have been in some other countries, he noted, are probably because of study design, rather than actual geographic variation.

By: updatednews

Affects Women Differently Than Man

Recent research has shown that the effects of alcohol have some significant difference on women when compared to men.

Some of the physical effects noted had been dead women become addicted and develop illnesses that are related to alcohol at a much higher rate. These include: malnutrition, anemia, liver damage, hypertension, ulcers, heart damage, and brain damage. It has also shown to be true that women who drink heavily developed cirrhosis of the liver earlier on in their drinking and with lesser levels of alcohol consumed, when compared to men.

One study followed 100 women and discovered that 11 years after they had been put in the hospital for alcoholism discovered that fully one third of them had died. Causes of death were, in the name, alcohol related diseases, accidents, and violence. The lifespans of this group of women averaged 15 years lower than the average population.

Drinking heavily can also alter a woman's endocrine system leading to irregularities of the menstrual cycle, amenorrhea, ( which is the absence of menstrual cycles), early menopause, and infertility. These endocrine system defects can occur in any age including the teen years.

In general, heavy drinking or alcoholism has significant impact on a woman's physical body.