Managing Your Health

  Diet, exercise, and other lifestyle factors are known to affect your risk of heart disease. The major risk factors for heart disease, as well as the condition itself, are all closely linked to the risk of developing atrial fibrillation. Can a heart-healthy lifestyle prevent atrial fibrillation? Can it reduce symptoms?  There's preliminary evidence that managing the risk factors for heart and blood vessel disease may improve the long-term outlook for people with atrial fibrillation. On a practical level, that could mean fewer episodes of a-fib and improvements in symptoms - in short, a better quality of life for you.  Focus on heart health The ability of lifestyle change to reduce the burden of atrial fibrillation remains an active area of research. In the meantime, take steps to live a healthy and active lifestyle, in addition to medication and other standard a-fib treatments: If you smoke, quit. Control high blood pressure. Get treatment for sleep apnea if you have it. Maintain

Lasting, healthy weight loss demands that you transform your eating and exercise habits. But many other choices you make each day, such as how much time you spend sleeping or surfing the Internet, can also make a difference. Set small, specific, and realistic goals Perhaps you'd like to be the same size you were in high school or when you got married, but that would mean dropping more than 50 pounds. Don't go there - not yet, at least. Set a more realistic goal of losing 5% to 10% of your weight, and give yourself plenty of time and some flexibility to reach that goal, keeping in mind that most people take at least six months to achieve that degree of healthy weight loss. Also try to avoid generalized goals, such as "I should eat less at dinner and exercise more." Instead, set specific and short-term (that is, daily or weekly) goals, such as these: I will choose a few dinner recipes and shop for the ingredients on Sunday. I will bring a healthy lunch from home instead

  When Peter Wayne, medical editor of introduction of Tai Chi, began conducting scientific studies on the health benefits of tai chi, he began noticing that tai chi works in a variety of ways, not just one. Whereas most drugs have a single active ingredient, he observed that tai chi was more like a multidrug combination that uses different components to produce a variety of effects.  Wayne formulated the idea of the "eight active ingredients" of tai chi, which he and his colleagues now use as a conceptual framework to help evaluate the clinical benefits of tai chi, explore the underlying mechanisms that produce these effects, and shape the way tai chi is taught to participants in clinical trials (and to teachers). While different styles of tai chi emphasize different ingredients, these therapeutic factors ae interwoven and synergistic. Here's a summary of one of the active ingredients of tai chi. Structural integration. Tai chi looks at the body as an interconnected syste

Sit-ups once ruled as the way to tighter abs and a slimmer waistline, while "planks" were merely flooring. Now plank exercises, in which you assume a position and hold it, are the gold standard for working your core, while classic sit-ups and crunches have fallen out of favor. Why the shift? One reason is that sit-ups are hard on your back - they push your curved spine against the floor and work your hip flexors, the muscles that run from the thighs to the lumbar vertebrae in the lower back. When the hip flexors are too strong or too tight, they tug on the lower spine, which can create lower back discomfort. Second, plank exercises recruit a better balance of muscles on the front, sides, and back of the body during exercise than do sit-ups, which target just a few muscles. Finally, activities of daily living, as well as sports and recreational activities, call on your muscles to work together, not in isolation. Sit-ups or crunches strengthen just a few muscle groups. Through

Many health conditions are worsened by excess weight, and the stress of extra weight on joints can lead to painful conditions, particularly of the knees and feet. It makes sense, then, that losing weight often helps to relieve some kinds of pain. Finding an eating plan that is healthful and enjoyable will help you stick with your weight loss goals for the long term and maintain any weight loss you manage to achieve. To manage your weight, follow these simple rules to cut back on calories: Keep track of how much you eat. Keeping a food diary keeps you accountable and gives you valuable feedback on your eating trouble spots. Make small changes. Change your diet slowly to ensure you will be able to stick with it. Abruptly reducing the amount and type of foods you eat will likely backfire, causing you to go back to overeating. Use mindfulness techniques. Be mindful of when, where, and how much you're eating and when you begin to feel full. One tip is to take 20 minutes to finish a meal

Normally, nerves branch off the spinal cord through spaces between the vertebrae. If one of these exit spaces shrinks, it can squeeze the nerve root (the radicular nerve) and cause symptoms in the area served by the nerve. A number of problems can cause a pinched nerve, including a herniated disc, spinal stenosis, or degenerative disc disease. Age-related degenerative changes in the spine account for 70% to 90% of all cases. The good news: there are multiple options for pinched nerve treatment. People with a pinched nerve can have a positive outlook for recovery. As a result, pinched nerve treatment almost always begins with conservative therapies. Your doctor will likely recommend an over-the-counter pain reliever. You will be advised to avoid activities that cause pain or discomfort and may be told to use a cervical collar for a brief period of time, as well as a cervical pillow while you sleep. Physical therapy, range-of-motion exercises, and strengthening exercises can help make yo