Prevention November 2018

YOU MIGHT THINK, from these (adorable) pictures, that I’m going to tell you about being grateful for my pets—but there’s more to the story. Last fall, the savvy mice in our kitchen were thwarting all our humane traps when my husband saw a Facebook post by an old college friend, Jessica. She was fostering kittens that had been born in her backyard. Was anyone in the market? My son was aching for two cats—and Jessica told us that the most promising mouser was pretty attached to her brother. A year later, our kittens are cats, the mice have moved out, and my son is living his dream. What I’m grateful for most is Jessica, whom my husband hadn’t seen for decades and I’d never even met before all this. She…

Q As a teacher, I’m on my feet all day, but I never seem to hit 10,000 steps. It’s so frustrating! Is there anything I can do? —Hope Mulholland, Windham, CT A Yes! Try rethinking that 10,000-steps goal. It’s a big number, and hitting it is certainly great—it means you’re moving even more than the CDC recommends—but you know as a teacher that being active doesn’t always mean walking in a straight line. Consider using the Google Fit app, which recently made some changes with the help of the American Heart Association. You can now earn Move Minutes for all kinds of activity, plus Heart Points that show how well you’re protecting your ticker. Or try the new Fitbit Charge 3, which helps you set other goals (it celebrates with…

Sleep Tracker — or Sleep Zapper? If your slumber is more restless than restful, there could be a surprising culprit at play, suggests a Rush University study—your fitness tracker. The research found that wearing the device to bed could make people obsess over their sleep stats, leading to a poor night’s rest and a form of insomnia. “If in the morning your app says you slept only 65% of the night, you may become anxious and develop psychophysiological insomnia, which means you start to turn to bad habits like alcohol or medication to try to get what your app says is sufficient sleep,” says Raj Dasgupta, M.D., assistant professor of clinical medicine at Keck School of Medicine of USC. For better zzz’s, try taking off your fitness tracker before hitting…

Omega-3s have been said to offer protection for your heart, but the medical community is at odds over just how beneficial they are in supplement form. A Cochrane review of 79 randomized trials involving over 112,000 people found that while there’s no harm in taking omega-3 fatty acid supplements, they have little—if any—benefit related to heart health, stroke or heart disease risk, or risk of death from any cause. “Omega-3 supplements shouldn’t be prescribed for heart health, because they don’t reduce the risk of heart attack or stroke,” says Nieca Goldberg, M.D., medical director of the Joan H. Tisch Center for Women’s Health at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City. “Plus, they don’t contain other vital vitamins and nutrients you’d get from eating omega-3-rich foods.” However, other doctors…

Your forehead wrinkles may reflect how healthy your ticker is. European researchers followed 3,200 adults for 20 years; those with the most defined wrinkles had nearly 10 times the risk of dying from heart disease as those with few or none, even after adjusting for age, gender, and health measures like smoking and blood pressure. Researchers think deep forehead wrinkles may signal atherosclerosis, or narrowing and hardening of heart arteries—tiny blood vessels in the forehead may be susceptible to coronary plaque buildup. There are better methods for detecting heart risks, but researchers say wrinkles may be a visual red flag (you can’t see risk factors like high cholesterol) that could prompt physicians to run further tests.…

FIX YOUR POSTURE Keep touchy dinner table discussions from getting to you by sitting up straight in your chair, feet flat on the floor. Maintaining good posture while seated has been shown to help people retain positive self-esteem and tame a negative mood in stressful situations. HUM A TUNE When worrisome thoughts begin to kick in—prepping for your in-laws, balancing that holiday budget—start humming. Studies have shown that music can help relieve stress by lowering blood pressure and levels of cortisol (the stress hormone). EAT PUMPKIN SEEDS These little seeds contain tryptophan, which promotes production of serotonin, the neurotransmitter that helps you sleep and relax. Keep a bag of them handy, then politely pop a few when your opinionated uncle corners you to talk politics…again. SNIFF AN ESSENTIAL OIL Stash…