Girl Getting Flu (http://www.girlshealth.gov)

The ideal treatment for seasonal influenza is very simple: stay at home, rest, drink plenty of fluids and eat nutritious food. If your symptoms get worse or if you are at risk of influenza complications, contact your health care provider. Limit your contact with others, especially the elderly, people with weakened immune systems and chronic medical conditions, pregnant women, and young children, until you are free of symptoms and feeling well.

More tips on how to take care of yourself and your family:

• Take medications such as acetaminophen and ibuprofen for fever and pain, if necessary. Check the manufacturer’s directions. Do not give aspirin to anyone under 18 years of age, due to the risk of Reye’s syndrome.
• Gargle with salt water to relieve a sore throat.
• Over-the-counter remedies may relieve fever and pain and soothe coughing. Ask your pharmacist for advice.
• Wash your hands thoroughly every time you blow your nose and cough.
• Dispose of used tissues immediately.
• Do not go to work or school as long as you have flu-like symptoms, because you will spread the virus to others.

How long am I contagious?

Most healthy adults may be able to infect others, beginning one day before symptoms develop and for many days after becoming sick. Children may pass on the virus to others for longer than seven days. Symptoms start one-to-four days after the virus enters the body.

When to visit a doctor/clinic

Persons at high risk of complications from influenza-like illness should seek medical attention promptly. This includes pregnant women, children under five, people with chronic medical conditions such as diabetes, those with compromised immune systems, and seniors over 65. If you get flu-like symptoms and are otherwise healthy, you should stay home to recover.

You should see a doctor when:

• your symptoms are severe;
• you have trouble breathing;
• you cough up green or brown secretions;
• you display symptoms other than those for influenza;
• you do not feel better after five-to-seven days; or
• your fever has lasted more than three days.

How long should I stay home?

Stay home from work if you are sick, and keep your children home from school if they have flu-like symptoms. If you or your family goes out while sick, you may spread your illness to co-workers, classmates, neighbours or others. It may take you or your family longer to get better if you are not well-rested. Wait until the fever has subsided and you or your family members are well enough to resume normal activities.

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SAN FRANCISCO — Scientists have good and bad news for hard-driving people who boast they need only six hours of sleep a night.



The good news is a few may be right: Researchers at the University of California-San Francisco have identified a family with a genetic mutation that causes members to require only six hours sleep a night. The bad news? The gene is vanishingly rare in humans, found in less than 3% of people.

Picture by : www.lamattressdepot.com

So almost everyone who says he needs only six hours' sleep is kidding himself. And the consequences of chronic sleep deprivation are serious, says Clete Kushida, president of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and director of Stanford University's Sleep Medicine Center. Sleep deprivation has been linked to an increase in motor vehicle accidents, deficiencies in short-term memory, focus and attention. It's also tied to depressed mood and a decrease in the ability to control appetite.

The family members — a mother and daughter with the gene mutation — were discovered by researchers at UCSF studying circadian rhythms, the waxing and waning biochemical cycles that govern sleep, hunger and activity. Neither woman needed more than six to 6½ hours of sleep a night, and yet both were well-rested, healthy and energetic.



 

Picture by yunghova.com

"One of them is over 70, always traveling internationally and extremely active. She dances three or four nights a week," says Ying-Hui Fu, a professor of neurology at UCSF.

When scientists examined the pair's DNA, they found a mutation in a gene called DEC2, which governs cell production and circadian rhythm.

The mutation seems to result in people who need much less than the normal eight to 8½ hours that most humans require for well-rested functioning, according to the paper, which is published in today's edition of the journal Science. The research by Fu and her colleagues determined that humans and mice that carry the mutation get more intense sleep, as measured by slow-wave electrical activity in the brain, and so they need less of it.


Combating Sleep Debt

But Fu estimates that only about 3% of the population is likely to have this gene and cautions that most people who habitually get less than eight hours sleep a night are only building up a large, and dangerous, sleep debt.

Fu says her lab is investigating whether it might be possible to mimic the effects of the gene with therapeutic compounds, but she cautions the research is only at the very beginning. For now, the only real answer to true productivity is to sleep as much as your body needs, she says.

READERS: How much sleep do you need per night? How much do you usually get?

By ELIZABETH WEISE
August 14, 2009  
Original Source

Frozen Berries (credit : http://us.123rf.com)

A second frozen berry producer has recalled packages containing pomegranate seeds from Turkey over concerns the seeds could be contaminated with hepatitis A, a highly contagious liver infection.

Scenic Fruit Company in Oregon recalled 61,092 8-ounce bags of Woodstock Frozen Organic Pomegranate Kernels shipped between February and May of this year. No one has become sick from eating the kernels nor have researchers found any evidence of hepatitis A contamination, according to a statement on the Food and Drug Administration’s website.

“The company’s decision to voluntarily recall products is made from an abundance of caution in response to an ongoing outbreak investigation by the FDA and CDC,” according to the recall.

An ongoing hepatitis A outbreak linked to berries from Townsend Farms in Oregon has sickened 122 people in eight states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Fifty-four of them have been hospitalized.

Experts told ABCNews.com earlier this month that they suspected the pomegranate seeds from Turkey, which were added to the Townsend Farms berry mix, caused the outbreak.

The Scenic Fruit Company’s recalled pomegranate kernels also came from Turkey, according to the FDA recall.

Hepatitis A is fatal to one in 200 patients, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is usually spread through person-to-person contact when an infected person does not properly wash his or her hands after using the bathroom. It can also be spread through contaminated food, usually in countries with poor sanitation.

This particular strain of hepatitis A is rarely seen in the United States, and is most common in North Africa and the Middle East, according to the CDC’s web page dedicated to the outbreak. According to the Townsend Farms berry mix label, ingredients came from Argentina, Chile, Turkey and the United States.

The CDC, the Food and Drug Administration and state health departments are still investigating the outbreak. Townsend Farms voluntarily recalled the berry blend on June 4, and Costco pulled the berries from shelves and began notifying customers who bought them May 31, according to CDC and FDA news releases.

Since there is no FDA-approved test for hepatitis A on food other than green onions, berries aren’t tested for the virus, Craig Wilson, vice president of food safety and quality assurance at Costco, which sold the Townsend Farms berries, told ABCNews.com. Officials have used the green onion test on the berries in light of the outbreak, but results have been negative. Wilson said he did the same and got the same negative test results.

“Townsend Farms has an excellent record,” Wilson said in early June. “Their food safety program plant is very good. That was confirmed by the FDA inspection. They just went through a five-day FDA inspection.”

Since Costco suppliers are required to have the ability to trace all their product ingredients, they turned their attention to the pomegranate seeds from Turkey that were added to the berry blend, Wilson said. This is because the virus strain that affected consumers is rare in the Americas but common in the Middle East.

Article Source

Jamu Seller

Jamu (formerly Djamu) is traditional medicine in Indonesia. It is predominantly herbal medicine made from natural materials, such as parts of plants such as roots, leaves and bark, and fruit. There is also material from the bodies of animals, such as bile of goat or alligator used. [Alligators are only native to the United States and China not Indonesia]

BRUSSELS, Belgium — Can eating too much sushi reduce your brain power?

Halo, kali ini penulis akan memberikan artikel tentang kesehatan, yakni kiat hidup sehat tanpa obat-obatan.Hidup yang multikompleks dewasa ini membuat kita bisa terlanda ”pe-nyakit” aneh yang sulit diatasi, baik oleh kekebalan tubuh sendiri maupun obat-obatan.