Health and Weight

Maybe you even know what your birth weight was. Most babies weigh less than 10 pounds and sometimes as little as 3 or 4 pounds. But very quickly, a young baby gains weight and everyone is glad about that because it means the child is growing bigger and stronger.

Your weight is still important when you get older. It's something your parents and doctor will probably keep an eye on. When you go for a checkup, the doctor often will record your height and weight and compare it with what it was the last time you came in. The doctor wants to check that you are a healthy weight because weighing too much — or too little — can be a problem.

In the last 25 years, a growing number of kids and teenagers have developed weight problems. Today, 1 out of 3 kids and teens between the ages of 2 and 19 are overweight or obese, which is a word that means very overweight. Many grown-ups understand what it's like to have weight problems. Mostly half of adults are overweight or obese.

For kids and adults, overweight can lead to illnesses and health problems. And a kid who is overweight might get teased or find it hard to keep up with friends on their neighborhood.

Do We Need a Doctor When Dehydration

Some cases of dehydration can be handled at home. But sometimes, that isn't enough to get a kid feeling better. A kid may need to go to the doctor or emergency department if he or she has a heat-related illness or a virus with vomiting or diarrhea that just won't quit.

At the hospital, the good news is that an intravenous (say: in-truh-vee-nus) (IV) line can get fluids into your body fast. An IV line is a special tube (like a very thin straw) that goes right into your veins, so the liquid goes right to where your body needs it most. It may pinch a little when the nurse is inserting it, but it often helps a person feel much better.

Muscles can be strengthens by exercise

Another kind of exercise can help make your muscles stronger. Did you ever do a push-up or swing across the monkey bars at the playground? Those are exercises that can build strength. By using your muscles to do powerful things, you can make them stronger. For older teens and adults, this kind of workout can make muscles bigger, too.

Here are some exercises and activities to build strong muscles:

• push-ups
• pull-ups
• tug-of-war
• rowing
• running
• in-line skating
• bike riding

Keep our hearth

Catch heart disease early and you should be ok. Leave it too late and the statistics are dead against you. Even if you eat well, go to the gym every day and have muscular biceps, you’re still at risk of hearth disease, but there is still a prevention factor in living healthily. Millions of people suffer from the early stages of hearth disease without even realizing it.

Improper diet and risky lifestyle choices are the major causes of hearth disease. Having an annual checkup is essential because your blood sugar level and blood pressure are key indicators.

Hearth disease has four stages, the first one all about impossible to detect.

In stage two the symptoms are barely perceptible and only in stage three do most people realize they have a problem, when chest pains and feeling indigestion show up, the last stage requires hospitalization.

In the early stages, recovery is possible with better diet and exercise.

By the third stage your chance drop to 50 -50, and by the final stage to 15% only.

You need balance in terms of food, exercise and work, the chance becoming stricken with hearth disease increases if you get exhausted easily, smoke, work too much, sleep to little or over exercise.

When body get dehidration

When it's hot outside and you've been sweating, you get thirsty. Why? Thirst is a sign of dehydration (say: dee-hye-dray-shun). Dehydration means that your body doesn't have enough water in it to keep it working right. A person gets water by drinking and eating. You lose water when you sweat, urinate (pee), have diarrhea, or throw up. You even lose a little water when you breathe.

Our bodies need water to work properly. Usually, you can make up for the water you lose — like when you come in from outside and have a long, cool drink of water. If you don't replace the water your body has lost, you might start feeling sick. And if you go too long without the water you need, you can become very ill and might need to go to the hospital.

Many times kids get dehydrated when they are playing hard and having fun. Have you ever gotten really sweaty and red-faced when you've been playing? This often happens when it's hot outside, but it can happen indoors, too, like if you're practicing basketball in a gym.

Kids also can get dehydrated when they're sick. If you have a stomach virus (say: vye-rus), you might throw up or have diarrhea (say: dye-uh-ree-uh). On top of that, you probably don't feel very much like eating or drinking. If you have a sore throat, you might find it hard to swallow food or drink. And if you have a fever, you can lose fluids because water evaporates from your skin in an attempt to cool your body down. That's why your mom or dad tells you to drink a lot of fluids when you're sick.

In addition to being thirsty, here are some signs that a person might be dehydrated:

• feeling lightheaded, dizzy, or tired
• rapid heartbeat
• dry lips and mouth

Another sign of dehydration is not peeing as much. Normally, urine should be a pale yellow color. Dark or strong-smelling pee can be a sign of dehydration.

What to Do

If you can, try not to get dehydrated in the first place. If you're going to be going outside, it's a good idea to drink water before, during, and after you play, especially if it's hot. Dehydration can happen along with heat-related illnesses, such as heat exhaustion (say: ig-zos-chun) and heat stroke. In addition to drinking water, it's smart to dress in cool clothes and take breaks indoors or at least in the shade.

If you're sick, keep taking small sips of drinks and soups, even if you're not that thirsty or hungry. Eating an icepop is a great way to get fluids. How is an icepop a liquid? Well, it's basically frozen water and flavoring. The warmth in your mouth and stomach turns it from a solid to a liquid. Other foods, such as fruits and vegetables, contain water, too.

exercise all the time

Kids exercise all the time without even thinking of it. Just being active, like when you run around outside or play kickball at school, is a kind of exercise. What else counts as exercise? Playing sports, dancing, doing push-ups, and even reaching down to touch your toes.

When you exercise, you're helping build a strong body that will be able to move around and do all the stuff you need it to do. Try to be active every day and your body will thank you later!

Exercise Makes Your Heart Happy

You may know that your heart is a muscle. It works hard, pumping blood every day of your life. You can help this important muscle get stronger by doing aerobic (say: air-o-bik) exercise.

Aerobic means "with air," so aerobic exercise is a kind of activity that requires oxygen. When you breathe, you take in oxygen, and, if you're doing aerobic exercise, you may notice you're breathing faster than normal. Aerobic activity can get your heart pumping, make you sweaty and quicken your breathing.

When your give your heart this kind of workout on a regular basis, your heart will get even better at its main job - delivering oxygen (in the form of oxygen-carrying blood cells) to all parts of your body.

So you want to do some aerobic exercise right now? Try swimming, basketball, ice or roller hockey, jogging (or walking quickly), in-line skating, soccer, cross-country skiing, biking, or rowing. And don't forget that skipping, jumping rope, and playing hopscotch are aerobic activities, too!

Healthy prostate

The prostate is the seat of the masculinity when a man is young, but a specter of discomfort when he gets old.

It is a male organ made up of smooth muscles that help expel semen during ejaculation and according wikipedia, its main function to store and secrete clear fluid amounting 10% to 30% of seminal fluid.

At birth the prostate is tiny but as levels of testosterone rise during puberty, it grows fast, doubling in size by age 20.

Growth slows down during the next two decades, but not causing problems for many years, but as men grow older, the prostate becomes less friendly, it grows for a second time by age 40.

One in four men between the ages 40 and 50 have an enlarged prostate, while almost half of the men aged between 60 and 90 have the same problem.

According to urologist there is no data on the mortality rate of prostate cancer patiens in the world.

Fatigue syndrome

For decades, people suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome have struggled to convince doctors, employers, friends and even family members that they were not imagining their debilitating symptoms. Skeptics called the illness “yuppie flu” and “shirker syndrome.”

But the syndrome is now finally gaining some official respect. The Centers for disease control and prevention, which in 1999 acknowledged that it had diverted millions of dollars allocated by Congress for chronic fatigue syndrome research to other programs, has released studies that linked the condition to genetic mutations and abnormalities in gene expression involved in key physiological processes.

The agency has also sponsored a $6 million public awareness campaign about the illness. And last year, it released survey data suggesting that the prevalence of the syndrome is far higher than previously thought, although these findings have stirred controversy among patients and scientists.

Some scientists and many patients remain highly critical of the C.D.C.’s record on chronic fatigue syndrome. But nearly everyone now agrees that the syndrome is real.

“People with C.F.S. are as sick and as functionally impaired as someone with AIDS, with breast cancer, with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease,” said Dr. William Reeves, the lead expert on the illness at the disease control agency, who helped expose its misuse of chronic fatigue financing.

Chronic fatigue syndrome was first identified as a distinct entity in the 1980s. (A virtually identical illness had been identified in Britain three decades earlier and called myalgic encephalomyelitis.) The illness, which afflicts more women than men, causes overwhelming fatigue, sleep disorders and other severe symptoms. No consistent biomarkers have been identified and no treatments have been approved for addressing the underlying causes, although some medications provide symptomatic relief.

Patients say the word “fatigue” does not begin to describe their condition. Donna Flowers of Los Gatos, Calif., a physical therapist and former professional figure skater, said the profound exhaustion was unlike anything she had ever experienced.

“I slept for 12 to 14 hours a day but still felt sleep-deprived,” said Ms. Flowers, 51, who fell ill several years ago after a bout of mononucleosis, “I had what we call ‘brain fog.’ I couldn’t think straight, and I could barely read. I couldn’t get the energy to go out of the door. I thought I was doomed. I wanted to die.”

Studies have shown that people with the syndrome experience abnormalities in the central and autonomic nervous systems, the immune system, cognitive functions, the stress response pathways and other major biological functions. Researchers believe the illness will ultimately prove to have multiple causes, including genetic predisposition and exposure to microbial agents, toxins and other physical and emotional traumas. Studies have linked the onset of chronic fatigue syndrome with an acute bout of lyme disease, Q fever, Ross River virus, parvovirus, mononucleosis and other infectious disease.

“It’s unlikely that this big cluster of people who fit the symptoms all have the same triggers,” said Kimberly McCleary, president of the Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome Association of America, the advocacy group in charge of the C.D.C.-sponsored awareness campaign. “You’re looking not just at apples and oranges but pineapples, hot dogs and skateboards, too.”

Under the most widely used case definition, a diagnosis of chronic fatigue syndrome requires six months of unexplained fatigue as well as four of eight other persistent symptoms: impaired memory and concentration, sore throath, tender lymph nodes, muscle pain, joint pain, headaches, disturbed sleeping patterns and feelings of malaise after exertion.

The broadness of the definition has led to varying estimates of the syndrome’s prevalence. Based on previous surveys, the C.D.C. has estimated that more than a million Americans have the illness.

Last month, however, the agency reported that a randomized telephone survey in Georgia, using a less restrictive methodology to identify cases, found that about one in 40 adults ages 18 to 59 met the diagnostic criteria — an estimate 6 to 10 times higher than previously reported rates.

Many patients and researchers fear that the expanded prevalence rate could complicate the search for consistent findings across patient cohorts. These critics say the new figures are greatly inflated and include many people who are likely to be suffering not from chronic fatigue syndrome but from psychiatric illnesses.

Increase metabolism naturally

The problem with fad diets is that many actually cause the metabolism to slow down, a decreased metabolic rate is often the very reason that weight loss progress grinds to a sudden halt. Because the net loss of protein in the muscle continues to lower your metabolism, the body will adapt to the lower calorie intake.

What are the benefits to increasing your metabolism?
Permanent fat loss will occur if the metabolism is increased beyond normal, it’s a physiological fact that when we loss weight, we also loss protein from our muscles. And the quicker the weight loss, the greater the loss protein, because there is less intake of protein from dieting, the protein in the muscles is broken down and used for energy or to create new proteins for our immune systems. Unfortunately, a net loss of protein will always decrease the body’s metabolism.

As protein is lost from the cell, it gradually lowers the total lean body weight, this affects the body composition and lowers the body metabolism, because of this process, we gradually require fewer calories to maintain the body weight.

If the current diet is continued, weight loss will eventually stop, in fact, it’s even possible to slowly gain back weight if a dieter sticks to a very low calorie diet.

Increase the metabolism for less chance of water loss, the more protein that is lost from the muscle, the more fluid that is also lost, because protein holds around four times its weight in water, protein and its fluid replacement is the main reason that many dieters regain weight after a diet.

Glance of food allergies

Food allergies

Are common among children, but whit proper care and attention, food allergies can be managed, and there is no reason why your child cannot grow up healthily and happily.

Although food allergies can pose a serious problem, only 6% of children are affected, some of these allergies can be avoided or outgrown, although recent findings suggest that fewer children are out growing allergies to milk and eggs.

Toddlers are more likely to develop food allergies than adults because allergies usually occur early I life when the immune and digestive systems are not mature.

Many mix up food allergies with food intolerance, an allergy is an immune system response symptoms can occur just a few minutes after eating the trigger food.

Food intolerance, on the other hand is a reaction to food that does not involve the immune system.

Symptoms caused by food allergies can very greatly, they can differ in severity, timing body location and amount of food eaten, allergic reactions to certain food can be mildly irritating, but they can be life threatening in some children and symptom appear within 10 minutes to 2 hours after eating the allergenic food.

Ear pain

Ear pain is usually caused by infection of the outer or middle ear.

Left untreated, ear infections may lead to pus building up behind the ear drum and within the middle ear, causing it to burst and result in hearing impairment.

Outer ear infection is inability to hear can affect your child speech development, so do take ear infections seriously.

The skin on the outer ear canal becomes inflamed, swollen and red if your child has an outer ear infection, he will also experience pain and itchiness inside the ear.

The infection may have been caused by scratches or frequent swimming in chlorinated or unclean water.

If your child has eczema, he is likely to get an outer ear infection if water gets into his ear.

The solutions are:

• Take your child to a doctor and give him the recommended dose of pain killer to ease the pain.
• Do not let water get into your child ear during baths and use a sponge to wash his hair.
• No swimming until the infection clears up.

Middle ear infection is mostly middle ear infections occur with or shortly after a cold, the cold virus spreads from the nose and the throat to middle ear via a tube called the Eustachian tube.

There maybe severe ear pain with rubbing or tugging at the ear, high fever, loss of appetite, or even partials deafness.

Discharge from the ear usually indicates that the ear drum has perforated.

The consequences of middle ear infection are persistent ear discharge, impaired hearing, and even meningitis (inflammation of the coverings of the brain).

Preventing ear infections: if your child prone to ear infections, you may want to discourage him from swimming for a while, also apply menthol drops or rubs when he has a cold to unclog his nasal passages, this cuts down the risk of an infection spreading to the ear, or the alternatively, give him nasal decongestants obtained from doctor.

Another cause of ear infections is the pneumococcus bacteria, your child can be protected from this infection by immunization.