December 16, 2009, 11:28 PM CT

Discount Pharmacy: Can They Really Save You Money?

Here is a question that can fetch you several ontrasting replies; while some may respond cheerily, an equally striking number may respond rather grimly. The reason being that experiences vary and so do the lessons that we learn. If someone has been able to strike an exciting deal at a discount pharmacy, chances are he'll seek the services again. So, the question here is: are discount pharmacies really beneficial? Do they actually help save money? The answer is influenced by how and where you search for a discount pharmacy. To start with, you must find a reputable and licensed online drug store that is also of a kind that you feel comfortable recommending to your family or friends.

Discount Pharmacy: How They Can Be of Benefit

A good discount pharmacy offers a whole range of products, starting from common medications to skin care, baby care and other products. A discount pharmacy is able to offer attractive deals to customers through bulk buying and by offering generic drugs. That is, when a customer buys drugs in bulk or several products at a time, he is offered a discount. This may also be the case when the drug store expects repeat sales from a customer. Buying generic drugs is another way to get discounts. Generic drugs contain the same active ingredient as a branded drug, but are less expensive because they are not branded. However, these generic drugs are manufactured and marketed by reputed firms, which validate their trustworthiness and quality guarantee. ........ Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

December 15, 2009, 8:02 AM CT

Motorized Wheelchair

A motorized wheelchair comes in several variations depending upon a user's requirements. This makes it difficult to select a perfect motor powered wheelchair. It is ideal to consult a physical therapy professional and identify which chair is best suited to promote your mobility without stressing yourself.

Rear Wheel Motorized Wheelchairs

The rear wheel drive motorized wheelchairs are widely used. Their chairs offer good speed and stability but these are not very maneuverable. The turning radius of these wheelchairs is poor. It causes difficulties for users while maneuvering the uphill slopes. An important highlight of a rear wheel drive motorized wheelchair is that it prevents a user from falling backwards while climbing ramps or hills.

Center Wheel Motorized Wheelchairs

The center wheel drive motorized wheelchairs are highly maneuverable. They allow maximum flexibility to even novice users. It is possible to navigate indoors easily due to its tight turning radius. The users will benefit by having optimum balance as this type of wheelchair features caster wheels on the front and at the back. Exercise caution while driving up or down hilly areas as the chair can tip in one direction. ........ Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

November 2, 2009, 11:32 PM CT

Lifestyle Changes for diabetes

Sustaining modest weight loss for 10 years, or taking an anti-diabetic drug over that time, can prevent or lower the occurence rate of type 2 diabetes in people at high risk for developing the disease, as per the Diabetes Prevention Program Outcomes Study (DPPOS), a long-term follow-up to a landmark 2001 diabetes prevention study.

Jill Crandall, M.D., associate professor of clinical medicine at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, was a principal investigator in the follow-up study, which appears online in the current edition of the British medical journal The Lancet.

The original study-the Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP)-was a large, randomized trial involving 3,234 people at high risk for developing diabetes. At the start of the study, all were overweight or obese adults with elevated blood glucose levels. Scientists disclosed the findings from DPP in 2001-a year earlier than scheduled-because results were so clear. After three years, intensive changes in lifestyle (modest weight loss coupled with increased physical activity) reduced the rate for developing type 2 diabetes by 58 percent compared with placebo. The oral diabetes drug metformin (850 milligrams twice daily) reduced the rate of developing diabetes by 31 percent compared with placebo......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

October 14, 2009, 10:11 PM CT

Find Affordable Health Insurance and Get the Coverage You Need without spending Much

Healthcare expenses are on the ascending trend and millions of people find healthcare costs very unaffordable. Even though medical-coverage is a little on the costlier side, it can be far more expensive to go without it.

God forbid, if you were to meet with an accident or fall critically ill, the medical bills could be truly overwhelming, possibly out of your reach. Therefore it is very essential for you to find affordable health insurance.

If you are lucky to work for a big company which offers a good medical-benefits package, then you might not have to worry too much. Conversely, a number of people working for small companies or the self employed do not avail any such assistance. Finding a reasonable health plan can be very demanding for such people.

An excellent way to find the coverage for your needs and that too add for an affordable cost is by conducting a thorough comparison study. By comparing the coverage plans and costs of various insurance firms, you'll be able to find the policy which goes well with your needs for the prices which you can survive with.

Comparing coverage plans needn't just happen over the telephones where you end up spending hours on the phone to get the information. You can compare the plans and the prices of various insurance companies just by surfing the net. There are plenty of companies which offer insurance plans online......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

October 13, 2009, 8:20 AM CT

Healthy neighborhoods may result in lower diabetes risk

Individuals living in neighborhoods conducive to physical activity and providing access to healthy foods may have a lower risk of developing type 2 diabetes in a five-year period, as per a report in the October 12 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

"The worldwide epidemic of type 2 diabetes mellitus is largely driven by the combined rise in obesity, intake of energy-dense or nutrient-poor foods and physical inactivity," the authors write as background information in the article. Interventions to reduce risk on the individual levelincluding surgery, medicine and behavior changehave had mixed results. Large-scale behavior change appears to be necessary to reverse the diabetes epidemic, but such a change is difficult to achieve and appears to be unsustainable if the surrounding environment is not supportive.

Amy H. Auchincloss, Ph.D., M.P.H., of Drexel University School of Public Health, Philadelphia, and his colleagues studied 2,285 adults age 45 to 84 who were initially examined between 2000 and 2002. Study participants were from three of the sites in the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) for which neighborhood level data were obtained: Baltimore; Forsyth County, N.C.; and New York City/Bronx. Blood glucose levels were obtained from study participants at baseline and at three follow-up examinations, during which other individual characteristics also were assessed (including diet, body mass index [BMI] and physical activity levels)......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

April 30, 2009, 9:41 PM CT

Sitagliptin could trigger pancreatitis

A drug widely used to treat Type 2 diabetes may have unintended effects on the pancreas that could lead to a form of low-grade pancreatitis in some patients and a greater risk of pancreas cancer in long-term users, UCLA scientists have found.

As per a research findings reported in the online edition of the journal Diabetes, scientists from the Larry L. Hillblom Islet Research Center at UCLA observed that sitagliptin, sold in pill form as Januvia, caused abnormalities in the pancreas that are recognized as risk factors for pancreatitis and, with time, pancreas cancer in humans. Januvia is marketed by Merck & Co. Inc. Sitagliptin is a member of a new class of drugs that enhance the actions of the gut hormone known as glucagon-like peptide 1 (GLP-1), which has been shown to be effective in lowering blood sugar in people with Type 2 diabetes. The study is available at http://diabetes.diabetesjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/db09-0058v1.

"Type 2 diabetes is a lifelong disease people often take the same drugs for a number of years, so any adverse effect that could over time increase the risk for pancreas cancer would be a concern," said Dr. Peter Butler, director of the Hillblom Center and the study's lead investigator. "A concern here is that the unwanted effects of this drug on the pancreas would likely not be detected in humans unless the pancreas was removed and examined." ......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

April 7, 2009, 5:23 AM CT

Reducing sugar and increasing fiber intake

Reducing sugar intake by the equivalent of one can of soda per day and increasing fiber intake by the amount equivalent to one half cup of beans per day appears to improve risk factors linked to type 2 diabetes in Latino adolescents, as per a report in the recent issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Almost 40 percent of Mexican American adolescents age 12 to 19 were overweight or at risk for overweight from 2003 to 2006, as per background information in the article. "Latino children are more insulin resistant and thus more likely to develop obesity-related chronic diseases than their white counterparts," the authors write. "To date, only a few studies have examined the effects of a high-fiber, low-sugar diet on metabolic health in overweight youth, and to our knowledge, none have tested the effects of this type of intervention in a mixed-sex group of Latino youth".

Emily Ventura, M.P.H., of Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles and his colleagues conducted a 16-week study to examine if reductions in added sugar intake or increases in fiber intake would affect risk factors for developing type 2 diabetes in 54 overweight Latino adolescents (average age 15.5). Participants were split into three groups: control, nutrition (receiving one nutrition class per week) or nutrition plus strength training (receiving one nutrition class per week along with strength training twice a week)......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

March 24, 2009, 6:19 AM CT

Those diabetics high-fiber diets

Scientists at UT Southwestern Medical Center report that patients with noninsulin-dependent diabetes (type 2) excreted less calcium through their urine when they consumed 50 grams of fiber a day than when they ate 24 grams a day. Excreting less calcium indicates that they absorbed less of the mineral.

"We already know that fiber helps improve your cholesterol and glucose control and improves your bowel regularity. Our new findings suggest that dietary fiber reduces the body's capacity to absorb calcium," said Dr. Abhia number ofu Garg, professor of internal medicine and an investigator in the Center for Human Nutrition at UT Southwestern. He is senior author of a study appearing online in Diabetes Care. "Because more calcium equals better bone health, we recommend that people on high-fiber diets talk to their doctor about increasing their dietary calcium as well, in order to get the most benefit from both".

Dr. Garg said it's important to speak with a doctor or a registered dietitian before increasing your calcium intake because excessive levels may cause kidney stones.

The American Diabetes Association (ADA) recommends a daily intake of 24 grams of dietary fiber, but the average American consumes about 14 to 15 grams of fiber a day.

Sometimes called "roughage," dietary fiber is the indigestible portion of plant foods that pushes food through the digestive system, absorbing water and easing defecation. Calcium is a nutrient found in food that is absorbed by the body and then excreted in urine, feces or sweat. It is the most abundant mineral in the human body......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

January 28, 2009, 6:59 PM CT

An Old Dawg Can Learn New Tricks!

In an interview with Diabetes Forecast - the consumer magazine of the American Diabetes Association - Randy Jackson reveals his type 2 diabetes story, the hurdles and the path to therapy.

This year, Randy Jackson celebrates 10 years of type 2 diabetes:

Jackson, who was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in 1999, was shocked when he learned that he had a chronic disease. "They were sneaky symptoms," he says. "Of course, I didn't take into consideration that a history of type 2 diabetes ran in my family, because you always believe that happens to somebody else, not you."

But soon after his diagnosis, Jackson took charge. He turned his diet around from the "Southern-fried" foods he was accustomed to, began to exercise regularly, and after much careful consideration, had gastric bypass surgery. As a result of these changes, Jackson has set out to talk to people about changes in lifestyle that can prevent diabetes and its complications.

Also in the recent issue of Diabetes Forecast:

Update on glucose control and heart health: Last year many major studies were published to look at the connections between cardiovascular health and controlling cholesterol, blood pressure and blood glucose in people with type 2 diabetes. Some of the initial results have been confusing, but Diabetes Forecast offers a few key points to help you and your heart......... Posted by: Josly2006      Read more         Source

January 20, 2009, 7:43 PM CT

Five Eye Care Tips for Diabetics

If you have diabetes you should know that you are more susceptible to eye disorders like glaucoma, cataracts, retinopathy and blindness. But there is a lot that you can do to take charge of and prevent such problems. Here are some tips for diabetics that can help fight these eye disorders.

1. Keep your blood sugar levels in control. In order to achieve this you must stay away from sugary snacks and foods that are highly processed and made from white flour. The diet must include a lot of high fiber food, unsalted nuts, fruits and vegetables. Drink lots of water so that toxins and wastes are removed from the system. The right diet keeps blood sugar levels steady without many spikes.
2. Control High Blood Pressure. Obesity and a sedentary lifestyle are risk factors for high blood pressure. The best way to control high blood pressure is to exercise regularly. Even though you don’t have the time to sweat it out at the gym, it would be very beneficial to walk the dog or take the stairs instead of the elevator or do some active gardening etc. A heart-friendly diet with less salt goes a long way in controlling blood pressure.
3. Say Bye to Smoking. It has been observed that smoking triples the retinopathy progression in diabetics. When you realize that your eyes are in danger because of smoking, isn’t it time you took an effort to quit that killer habit?
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