An aspirin a day may slow elderly brain decline

08 Monday Oct 2012

Posted by in Health Hints

≈ Leave a comment

An aspirin a day may slow brain decline in elderly women at high risk of cardiovascular disease, research finds.

Around 500 at risk women, between the ages of 70 to 92, were tracked for five years – their mental capacity was tested at the start and end of the study.

Those taking aspirin for the entire period saw their test scores fall much less than those who had not.

The Swedish study is reported in the journal BMJ Open.

Dr Silke Kern, one of paper’s authors, said: “Unlike other countries – Sweden is unique, it is not routine to treat women at high risk of heart disease and stroke with aspirin. This meant we had a good group for comparison.”

The women were tested using a mini mental state exam (MMSE) – this tests intellectual capacity and includes orientation questions like, “what is today’s date?”, “where are we today?” and visual-spatial tests like drawing two interlinking pentagons.

No self-medication

But the report found that while aspirin may slow changes in cognitive ability in women at high risk of a heart attack or stroke, it made no difference to the rate at which the women developed dementia – which was also examined for by a neuropsychiatrist.

Dr Simon Ridley, head of research at Alzheimer’s Research UK, said: “The results provide interesting insight into the importance of cardiovascular health on cognition, but we would urge people not to self-medicate with aspirin to try to stave off dementia.

“The study reports no benefit from aspirin on overall dementia rates in the group, and previous trials investigating the potential of drugs like aspirin for dementia have been negative.”

Dr Kern added: “We don’t know the long term risks of taking routine aspirin. For examples ulcers and serious bleeds may outweigh the benefits we have seen. More work is needed. We will be following up the women in this study again in five years.”

From A to BEE

05 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by in Articles & Reports

≈ Leave a comment

LONG before the GPS was invented, bees learnt how to navigate the shortest possible route when they buzz from flower to flower.

British researchers have attached tracking devices to the backs of bumblebees – which live for about a month – and found that they use trial and error to determine the ideal flight path from one food source to another.

Developing an efficient route between scattered feeding sites – to save both time and energy – is the goal of many species including ants, bats and hummingbirds.

But scientists have struggled to understand how animals achieve this feat in the wild.

Advertisement

“[It’s] analogous to the well-known travelling salesman problem – finding the shortest route to visit a set of locations once and return to the origin,” the study leader, Lars Chittka, said.

The London psychologist from Queen Mary University and his team arranged five artificial flowers, each filled with a few drops of sugar and fitted with motion-sensor cameras, 50 metres apart on an open field to prevent the insects navigating the shortest distance by sight.

They also attached tiny transponders on the backs of five bees to track them as they foraged for food.

When released from their hive, all bees found the closest flower first. After several foraging trips they found the other sites.

Between their first and last attempts, the bees reduced their travel distance about 80 per cent, from 1953 metres to 458 metres, in one day. Measured by a computer, the shortest path was 314 metres.

Of the 120 possible routes between the five flowers and the nest, the bees tried only 20, on average, before finding the shortest.

Because it takes too much time for the bees to explore all the possible routes between food sources, the team suggests that the insects learn the best flight path through experience, abandoning a previous route if they happened upon a new, shorter path. On average, it took the bees 26 trips to figure out the ideal journey.

While the researchers were surprised how quickly the bees could find the best route, given the number of possible solutions, their technique was “simple and elegant”.

“It sounds simple to keep exploring even when you’ve found what looks like a good solution and, if you do find a new route, compare it with your previous one and then stick with the better of the two – but it’s robust and it works for an animal with a brain the size of a pinhead,” said Professor Chittka, whose findings were published in the journal PloS Biology.

When the researchers moved one flower to another location the bees’ distance increased before they incorporated the new location into their ideal circuit.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/animals/from-a-to-bee-first-a-stumble-then-its-a-direct-flight-to-nectar-20120920-269q7.html#ixzz28N0d3FTA

Great Quotes

05 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by in Quotations

≈ Leave a comment

The problem with political jokes is they get elected. ~Henry Cate, VII

We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public
office.~Aesop

If we got one-tenth of what was promised to us in these acceptance
speeches there wouldn’t be any inducement to go to heaven. ~Will Rogers

Those who are too smart to engage in politics are punished by
being governed by those who are dumber. ~Plato

Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge
even where there is no river. ~Nikita Khrushchev

When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President;
I’m beginning to believe it. ~Clarence Darrow

Why pay money to have your family tree traced; go into politics
and your opponents will do it for you. ~Author Unknown

If God wanted us to vote, he would have given us candidates. ~Jay
Leno

Politicians are people who, when they see light at the end of the
tunnel, go out and buy some more tunnel. ~John Quinton

Politics is the gentle art of getting votes from the poor and
campaign funds from the rich, by promising to protect each from the
other.
~Oscar Ameringer

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you
smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The
Republicans are the party that says government doesn’t work and then they
get elected and prove it. ~P.J. O’Rourke

I offer my opponents a bargain: if they will stop telling lies
about us, I will stop telling the truth about them. ~Adlai Stevenson,
campaign speech, 1952

A politician is a fellow who will lay down your life for his
country. ~Texas Guinan

Any American who is prepared to run for president should
automatically, by definition, be disqualified from ever doing so. ~Gore
Vidal

I have come to the conclusion that politics is too serious a
matter to be left to the politicians. ~Charles de Gaulle

Instead of giving a politician the keys to the city, it might be
better to change the locks. ~Doug Larson

Don’t vote, it only encourages them. ~Author Unknown

There ought to be one day – just one – when there is open season
on senators. ~Will Rogers

Mother’s high blood pressure ‘lowers child’s IQ’

04 Thursday Oct 2012

Posted by in Health Hints

≈ Leave a comment

A study of male offspring has found those whose mothers had high blood pressure in pregnancy lost their mental skills quicker throughout their lives than those whose mothers had healthy blood pressure.

The differences were evident at the age of 20, and widened throughout the men’s lives, found Dr Katri Räikkönen and colleagues at Helsinki University in Finland. The biggest gap was in maths ability.

The academics looked at results from 398 men, born between 1934 and 1944, who were tested for maths, language and spatial reasoning at 20 and then again at 69. The study is published in the journal Neurology.

Dr Räikkönen said: “High blood pressure and related conditions such as preeclampsia complicate about 10 percent of all pregnancies and can affect a baby’s environment in the womb.

“Our study suggests that even declines in thinking abilities in old age could have originated during the prenatal period when the majority of the development of brain structure and function occurs.”
Stephen Adams

By , Medical Correspondent

 

Advice from Canman

02 Tuesday Oct 2012

Posted by in Quotations

≈ Leave a comment

Life from the seat of a tractor..
An old Farmer’s Words of Wisdom we could all live by……. Especially politicians, The last quote fits everyone…I don’t care who you are.

Your fences need to be horse-high, pig-tight and bull-strong.
Keep skunks and bankers at a distance.
Life is simpler when you plow around the stump.
A bumble bee is considerably faster than a John Deere tractor.
Words that soak into your ears are whispered….not yelled.
Meanness don’t just happen overnight.
Forgive your enemies; it messes up their heads.
Do not corner something that you know is meaner than you.
It don’t take a very big person to carry a grudge.
You cannot unsay a cruel word.
Every path has a few puddles.
When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty and look like an idiot.
The best sermons are lived, not preached.
Most of the stuff people worry about, ain’t never gonna happen anyway.
Don’t judge folks by their relatives.
Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
Live a good and honorable life, then when you get older and think back, you’ll enjoy it a second time.

Don’t interfere with somethin’ that ain’t bothering you none.
Timin’ has a lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.
If you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop diggin’.
Sometimes you get, and sometimes you get got.
The biggest troublemaker you’ll probably ever have to deal with, watches you from the mirror every morning’.

Always drink upstream from the herd.
Good judgment comes from experience, and a lotta that comes from bad judgment.

Lettin’ the cat outta the bag is a whole lot easier than puttin’ it back in.
If you get to thinking you’re a person of some influence, try ordering somebody else’s dog around.

Live simply, love generously, care deeply,

Speak kindly, and leave the rest to God.

Don’t pick a fight with an old man. If he is too old to fight, he’ll just kill you.

And, finally…………………………………..

They Walk Among US

02 Tuesday Oct 2012

Posted by in Articles & Reports, Daily Humour

≈ Leave a comment

Firefighters were called out to rescue a man whose head was stuck in a public litter bin in Aberdeen Scotland.

It is not yet known how the man got into the predicament, which happened on the city’s Justice Street.

Emergency services were alerted to the man stuck with his head in the opening of the 4ft-high bin early on Sunday evening.

A spokesman for Grampian Fire and Rescue Service said the man was not injured.

He was taken to hospital for a check-up.