Causes of weight loss

Moderate Drinking Might Help Men Live Longer After Heart Attack

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Early, Temporary HIV Treatment Can Postpone Long-Term Therapy

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Could Unroasted Coffee Beans Help You Shed Pounds?

HealthDay – 38 mins ago TUESDAY, March 27 (HealthDay News) -- When taken as a supplement, unroasted -- or green -- coffee-bean extract can help people shed pounds, according to a small preliminary study.

The research, which is being presented this week at the national meeting of the American Chemical Society in San Diego, involved just 16 overweight and obese patients who were given daily doses of green coffee extract in capsule form.

All the patients were instructed to maintain their usual dietary habits, while the study team monitored them for weight loss over a period of nearly six months.

The apparent result: Daily consumption of a small amount of green coffee extract translated into a nearly 11 percent drop in body weight, on average.

The study was conducted in India and funded by Applied Food Sciences, the American manufacturer of two green-coffee-extract products. It has not been published in a journal, and therefore has yet to undergo peer review.

Supplements of this kind, however, are not subject to the rigorous U.S. Food and Drug Administration safety and efficacy testing typically applied to all pharmaceutical medications.

"This was indeed a small study," acknowledged corresponding study author Joe Vinson, a professor of chemistry at the University of Scranton, in Pennsylvania, but he noted that prior research has been conducted in both France and Japan. "Those studies demonstrated that patients experienced somewhat mild weight loss. But here, with higher extract doses than have been used before, the patients experienced what I would call rather large weight loss."

"While this of course needs to be confirmed with follow-up, I do think the subject is absolutely worthy of further exploration," Vinson added.

Vinson said his team was not focused on the weight-loss impact of caffeine as much as that of unprocessed, unroasted coffee's primary ingredient: chlorogenic acid.

"That's the main natural compound in unroasted coffee, and roasted coffee has much, much less of it than unprocessed coffee," Vinson said. "So we're not talking about something that is interchangeable with the coffee we drink," which is produced by roasting beans at a temperature between 464 and 482 degrees Fahrenheit.

Green coffee-bean extracts are sold online at prices ranging from about $10 to $20 for 60 capsules.

The study was broken into three six-week sections. In one section, study participants, who were all between the ages of 22 and 26, consumed a capsule filled with 700 milligrams of green coffee extract. In the second section, participants took a 1,050-milligram capsule. The third section had participants taking a placebo. Each patient ultimately cycled through each section.

While maintaining their pre-study dietary and exercise regimens, the patients lost an average of 17 pounds by the study's close. On average, patients lost 10.5 percent and 16 percent of their body weight and body fat, respectively.

"Basically, there was steady weight loss, without side effects, while the active green coffee extract was being taken at either dose," Vinson said.

A follow-up study involving 60 patients is now in the planning stages.

Lona Sandon, a registered dietitian and assistant professor of clinical nutrition at the University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas, cautioned that the study is short on specifics, making it difficult to draw any conclusions.

"First of all, you need more than 16 people to have any statistical significance attached to these findings," Sandon said. "And we really have no idea how this might be working. For example, the patients were allowed to continue with their regular diet. But did this extract in any way influence their hunger and what they wanted to eat, and then what they actually ate? We don't know. What we have here is basically just a hypothesis that there's something about this compound that could be helpful."

"Just because it might cause weight loss doesn't mean it's healthy," she warned. "Because supplements are not regulated as drugs, they can be put on the market with no safety or efficacy testing. They don't even necessarily have to be tested for purity."

"That means that in the past, various weight-loss supplements have been found to contain weight-loss drugs or other drugs at higher doses than what would be allowed in a prescription dose," Sandon added. "So while people might have this perception that it's all natural since it's coming from a coffee bean, with supplements in general it's still a buyer-beware market."

More information

For more on dietary supplements, visit the Office of Dietary Supplements of the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

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In cancer science, many "discoveries" don't hold up

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Supreme court struggles with healthcare law's fate

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Lower death risk with heart bypass vs. angioplasty

Older patients with clogged heart arteries may have a little lower death risk over time if they get bypass operations instead of angioplasty and stents to fix the problem, new research suggests.

It's not the kind of study that gives conclusive evidence, but doctors say it gives a "real world" look at how people fare in ordinary practice. As such, it could tip the balance toward surgery for patients considering the choice, especially because research already shows bypass gives a better and longer lasting result for people with multiple blockages.

In a bypass operation, doctors move healthy blood vessels from other parts of the body to detour around clogged arteries supplying blood to the heart. Angioplasty treats the problem via a tube pushed through a blood vessel. A tiny balloon is inflated to flatten the clog and a mesh scaffold, a stent, is placed to prop the artery open.

Researchers compared these approaches using records on 190,000 Medicare patients with two or three blockages

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Court won't reconsider bone marrow payments ruling

Justices could strike other parts of health law

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US Supreme Court in final day of Obama health law hearings

"Two policemen guard outside the US Supreme Court. US Supreme Court justices battled Wednesday over the fate of President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare law, with liberals fighting to salvage the rest of the law if a key provision is declared unconstitutional. (AFP Photo/Mladen Antonov)" title

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US man gets 'most extensive' face transplant ever

Half of all cancers are preventable: study

"Half of all cancers could be prevented if people just adopted healthier behaviors, US scientists argued on Wednesday. "Pollution and crime, poor public transportation, lack of parks for play and exercise, and absence of nearby supermarkets for fresh food hinder the adoption and sustained practice of a lifestyle that minimizes the risk of cancer and other diseases," said the study. (AFP Photo/Odd Andersen)" title

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Sensitive Skin Care

March 28th, 2012

Being honest, all skin is really sensitive and needs . Despite this, we often forget the importance of investing in skin care products that you have researched on and are actually effective.

I always think of sensitive skin as skin that is prone to infections that could lead to more serious conditions such as eczema; acne etc, and remember this; your skin can reflect how healthy our diet is.

What you need in cosmetic products is the use of ingredients that are safe ,effective and gentle on the skin. For instance, Active manuka honey is a unique type of honey from New Zealand which contains scientifically proven healing properties for the skin.

And these healing properties are due to its special enzymes that give it amazing antibacterial and anti oxidant properties. Having these properties in a product for skin sensitive like yours ensures that you are protected against any build up of harmful bacteria on your skin.

And the anti oxidant activity is there to ensure that it prevents oxidation through free radical damage.

And in addition to that active manuka honey stimulates the immune system making sure you are always protected.

What makes it even more special is the fact that even though a patented process to convert Active manuka honey to a powder has been developed for use in skin care products, it still does not lose any of its active ingredients. Hence, it is still very much effective.

And, Cynergy TK- a unique patented form of

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Wednesday, March 28, 2012