ILMU SYAHADAT SEJATI DIRI MANUNGGALING KAWULO GUSTI

Alhamdulillh, saya cuma newbie yang belum berpengalaman tapi kalo mo bahan bacaan silahken dibaca postingan ini: Bro ini aku cuma mau dongeng tolong jangan dianggap serius banget ya, gini ya kalo sekedar bisa apa namanya ghaib ya lumayanlah bukan bermaksud sombong sama sekali tidak tetapi akukan belajar karena diajak Bapakku Alm, trus tadinya walaupun aku hobby dri kecil terhadap hal-hal berbau Tasawuf/Laduni/Supranatural dll, tetapi aku masih sambil lalu saja sampai pada suatu waktu tahun 1990 Bapak kena Santet (jadi liver) akhirnya wafat sebagai salah seorang Bupati di Wilayah Tapal Kuda Jatim, baru karena keadaan ini aku jadi berniat belajar lebih serius lagi (kepada banyak supranaturalis/kyai-kyai mumpuni) sampai akhirnya bisa JUMENENG (menghadirkan Malaikatullah Hafadzah/Penjaga baca Qur'an Surat 13 Ar-Ra'du/Petir ayat 11 & Surat 86 At- Thariq/Bintang Gemilang ayat 4) dengan cara duduk dengan kedua kaki bersila (posisi duduk dzikir, kedua tangan rilex dengan masing-masing ditaruh diujung kedua dengkul kaki) duduk tegap sempurna agak membusungkan dada wajah menghadap arah kiblat/barat, ambil prnafasan halus sembari membaca 2 kalimat syahadat pendek, lalu menarik nafas perlahan dari hidung dengan membaca LA ILLA HAILLALLAH berkali-kali sbanyak-sebanyaknya (di dalam HATI) sembari kempeskan perut busungkan dada isi dengan udara yang sebanyak-banyaknya tahan terus didada sekuat-kuatnya & selama mungkin terus wajah menghadap kelangit/tengadah buang nafas/udara secara perlahan lewat mulut sembari membaca MUHAMMADARASULULLAH (di dalam HATI). sampai udara habis dihembuskan lewat mulut secara perlahan-lahan, mulut gembung seperti bersiul, sampai nanti terasa getaran yang bergerak didalam diri mulai pusar/pusat perlahan naik kedada terus mengisi seluruh kepala/wajah & akhirnya keluar lewat mulut ucapan ALLAHUAKBAR (bukan kita tetapi ucapan dari Sedulur Sejati/ESP (extra sensory personal)/Saudara Kembar Bathin/Kakang Kawah Adi Ari-ari/Nyai Kyai Among yang Ngemong/Jaga Kita karena Malaikat tidak berkelamin) cara ngetesnya bahwa yang berbicara bukan kita coba bro bertanya di dalam hati (misal ucapkan salam yang keras di dalam hati) nanti ucapan yang keluar lewat mulut adalah jawaban dari bisikan pertanyaan di dalam hati nah klo begitu selamat anda sudah berhasil JUMENENG (bukan kesurupan karena kita sepenuhnya masih sadar/mengusai diri kita) bila ingin kembali keposisi awal sadar taruh tangan kanan di dada dengan telapak tangan menghadap arah jantung lalu tekan ke bawah ke arah pusar sembari menyebut ALLAHUAKBAR SADAR KEMBALI ALHAMDULILLAH HRA. Salamat mencoba semoga anda sekalian bisa berhasil menjadi Kalifah/Pemimpin bagi diri sendiri, jadi Ksatrya Pininggit dengan jalan Allah SWT. Dengan mengusai ilmu Syahadat Sejati Diri (Ingat barang Siapa yang BENAR-BENAR mengenal dirinya Akan MENGENAL TUHANNYA) Insya Allah aplikasinya bisa untuk apa saja tergantung kelebihan/bakat masing-masing orang sejak kelahirannya (lebih mempertegas/bisa jadi booster untuk memperkuat kelebihan/potensi diri) asal dipergunakan untuk kebaikan di jalan yang benar & di Ridhai Allah tidak untuk sombong atau jumawa (Insya Allah bila telah banyak orang yang dapat menguasai ILMU ini), saya berani menjamin INDONESIA/NUSANTARA akan KOKOH KUAT AMAN DAMAI KAYA DAN MAKMUR karena efeknya akan sangat dahsyat bagi masing-masing diri pribadi  & keluarga orang yang mengamalkannya (lebih bijaksana, super pede/yakin, lebih tentram/damai, adem). Alhamdulillah HRA dengan mengajarkan ilmu ini/membantu membuka/mengenalkan dengan sejati diri teman-teman, saya telah punya murid yang tadinya sangat atheis orang berkebangsaan Jepang teman Room Mate Study di Australia jadi lebih religius & percaya akan Ke-Maha Esaan Allah (sebagai syiar akan ke-ESAAN ALLAH SWT) terus setelah pulang ke Osaka jadi produser program acara di TV seperti liputan tempat-tempat angker/urban legend dengan menggunakan kamera yang memiliki fasilitas infrarednya padahal dulunya penakut & tidak percaya hal-hal ghaib (ada lagi yang beragama Budha dri Thailand, Beragama Katolik dari Filipina dll) inilah sekelumit kegunaan Ilmu SYahadat SEjati DIRI untuk bekal Intinya bahwa hal-hal gaib memang nyata ada (bahkan untuk orang yang sgt modern/atheis) semua adalah bukti ke-Mahabesaran ALLAH SWT Tuhan SEMESTA ALAM dan setiap orang adalah pemimpin (minimal bagi diri pribadi & keluarganya) punya potensi tersembunyi untuk menjadi seorang Ksatrya (Satrya Pininggit). Alhamdulillah HRA dengan Ridha Allah SWT melalui ilmu ini saya pernah mencoba mencegah terjadinya kerusuhan Massal CHAOS kedua setelah tahun 1997 & BERHASIL SUKSES peristiwanya adalah pada waktu Beliau Presiden Gus Dur mendatangkan ribuan laskar pagar nusa ke Jakarta untuk membantu menyelamatkan Beliau dari penggulingan kekuasaan, pada saat itu ada potensi benturan dahsyat dimasyarakat tetapi dengan bantuan teman sekalian & tentu saja mmpergunakan semua yang ada pada saya (Ilmu Syahadat Sejati Diri & semua pusaka pilih tanding yang saya pegang) saya dapat menetralkan nafsu amarah angkara murka & ilmu-ilmu kanuragan lain yang punya potensi ditunggangi oleh anasir gaib/jin jahat sehingga waktu itu sebagian besar hati yang bergemuruh menjadi reda & benturan fatal bisa dihindarkan ALHAMDULLILLAH keadaan mereda tanpa tumpah darah..

Sorry ini sekali lagi cuma DONGENGAN jadi jangan terlalu serius ya, hanya jadi bahan renungan saja. Terus sehubungan dengan ILMU SYAHADAT SEJATI DIRI (sebenarnya ini syiar juga mengenai KE-MAHA ESAAN ALLAH SWT/TAUHID) jadi INGAT ISLAM adalah Agama RAHMATAN LIL ALAMIN/Rahmat/kebaikan untuk Semesta Alam (sedangkan Kanjeng Rasul Muhammad SAW pernah diingatkan Allah SWT ketika pada zaman Makiyah/sebelum Hijrah/Madininiah masih berhaluan garis keras & sangat mengutamakan SYARIAT Beliau dengan agresif berniat untuk Mengislamkan Dunia tetapi ALLAH SWT mengingatkan dengan berfirman "Hai RasulKu apakah engkau akan mengIslamkan dunia?... Samasekali tidak! Karena ketahuilah semua ini adalah Kehendak-Ku, jikalau apabila seandainya saja Aku ingin/berkehendak demikian maka mudah bagi-Ku seperti semudah membalikan Telapak Tangan", Allah sanggup untuk menciptakan dunia yang homogen/1 agama saja secara mudah/seperti membalikan telapak tangan, lalu Rasul bersujud mohon ampunan Allah, Subhanallah Astaghfirullahaladzim Ya Allah Yang Maha Tahu & Bijaksana maafkanlah Kebodohan & kesombonganku). Kalau sudah belajar Tasawuf/transendental Jiwa jadi Tenang, Adem, Tak Takut Apapun tapi Bijaksana, Di Mata Allah yang lebih utama adalah manfaat apa dengan keberadaan kita seberapa banyak amal/kita bermanfaat bagi yang lain/semesta alam, baru Ibadah kita dilihat. Hal ini sesuai dengan pengalaman saya bergaul dengan orang Jepang/Atheis, orang Thai/Buddhis, orang bule/Kristen, orang Filipina/Katolik, saya bisa membuktikan akan Ke-Maha Esaan Allah dengan cara menterjemahkan kalimat TAUHID (Tiada Tuhan lainnya yang patut disembah kecuali HANYA ALLAH, Tuhan SEMESTA ALAM/LORD OF THE UNIVERSE) melalui bahasa Inggris kemudian ke bahasa lokal masing-masing dengan dibarengi latihan pernafasan halus untuk membuka kemampuan supranatural/tabir gaib, mereka jadi tiba-tiba terbuka Kashyaf/hijab/alam gaib bisa melihat & merasakan sensasi getaran gaib melalui telapak tangan kanan diarahkan ke tempat wingit/angker/jorok/kuburan dll, maka bisa merasakan bedanya dengan telapak tangan & hati mereka sendri dengan 100kali lebih peka/sensitif dll, bahkan salah satu teman Jepang saya (Junnichiro Yamamoto/Zimmo San) yang selama hidupnya hanya belajar beladiri karate tiba-tiba bisa/mengusai ilmu-ilmu kuno Jepang seperti Ninjitsu/Samurai Bushido dengan cara berdoa memohon kepada ALLAH SWT agar melalui Sejati Diri/Malaikat Penjaga/Guardian Angel/Sedulur Kembaran Gaibnya ( yang telah ada sejak kita lahir) dapat membimbing latihan gerakan-gerakan sabetan, lompatan, berkelit dengan cepat & bahkan terkadang sangat tidak masuk diakal (karena sebenarnya ALLAH SWT adalah sumber segala ILMU atau bisa juga disebut SUPER ULTRA MAINFRAME HYPER SUPER COMPUTER ALAM SEMESTA) mungkin begitu rekan-rekan Bro Kaskusers sekalian semoga anda semua bisa paham

Setiap Manusia terdiri dri Badan Halus & Kasar/Wadag yang ukuran-ukurannya sudah menjadi ketentuan Allah SWT, yang dipengaruhi oleh 4 unsur utama (sedulur 4) yaitu:

1. ALWAMAH (yang bersifat super Ego/nafsu kepemilikan punyaku, mobilku, pacarku, rumahku dll; punya ambisi memenuhi kebutuhan duniawi & akhirat) intinya adalah Api/nafsu/ambisi-ambisi selaku THE PROTECTOR, SANG PELINDUNG SEGALA KEPENTINGAN PRIBADI DUNIA AKHIRAT dari SANG PEMILIK JIWA, yang paling mudah dipanggil saat kita Dzikir Pernafasan Halus dengan Syahadat untuk JUMENENG/Hadir!
2. MUAMALLAH (yang bersifat beramal/cenderung mengajak untuk memberikan segala sesuatu kepada siapapun yang dikehendaki/ngikut treteg ati/bisikan hati sanubari) intinya adalah Air, tidak memandang siapapun atau apapun semata hanya sekedar berbagi terhadap sesama mahkluk ALLAH (misal tiba-tiba kita ingin memberikan sesuatu kepada seseorang tanpa memandang siapa dianya).
3. SUPIAH/MUAWIYYAH (cenderung mendatangkan daya tarik keindahan pada diri kita sehingga orang lain tertarik melihat/mendengarkan kita) intinya adalah Tanah/bumi/besi/metal/magnetik, karena pada dasarnya setiap orang diciptakan sempurna & masing pasti punya POTENSI DIRI atau DAYA TARIK (misal Bung Karno dengan RUPA, PIKIRAN, UCAPAN dan IDE-IDEnya).
4. MUTHMAINAH (yang tertinggi cenderung mengajak kita untuk selalu beribadah/Dzikir/Ingat Allah) intinya adalah Angin/udara, (misal tiba-tiba kita ingin SHALAT, DZIKIR, ingin PUASA) selalu mengajak kepada ILMU KETUHANAN disebut juga JIWA YANG TENANG.
5. MAKRIFATHULLAH (Menyatu memahami ke-MAHAESAAN ALLAH SWT dalam DIRI LAHIR BATIN KITA yang merupakan PUNCAK PERJALANAN Terakhir SUFISTIK TRASENDENTAL dari diri PRIBADI kita selaku BADAN WADAG sebagai pemimpin/imam adalah diri kita sendri selaku ANCER-ANCER yang menguasai & memerintahkan kepada 4 pendamping yang berbeda karakternya seperti tersebut di atas sebagai wadag/tempat semuanya berkumpul jadi satu, intinya adalah gabungan Api, Air, Tanah, Angin & Ruhullah (ingat hanya manusia yang proses penciptaanya ditiupkan Ruh Allah SWT sedangkan mahluk yang lainnya cuma berfirman "Jadilah/Kun fayakun.. maka terjadilah seketika itu juga"). 

HAKIKAT MANUSIA ADALAH KALIFATULLAH WK ALLAH!

Contoh pada zaman dahulu kala ada seorang pejuang kemerdekaan yang dikejar-kejar oleh sepasukan Belanda, dia berlari sekencang-kencangnya hingga sampai pada suatu pertigaan jalan (T) dia belok kekanan lalu menceburkan dirinya ke selokan/got dengan ketakutan bersembunyi sembari berdoa memohon pertolongan Allah, maka lalu tiba-tiba rombongan tentara terseutb melihat seperti pejuang yang berlari kearah kiri (berlawanan dengan arah yang diambil pejuang tadi) itulah Malaikat Penjaga yang rupa wajahnya dimiripkan dengan si pejuang tadi sehingga selamatlah dia dari kejaran Tentara Belanda. Wass

*** Cuma membantu menyampaikan, Post dari sepuh eagleroaming di threadnya "MANUNGGALING KAWULO LANGUSTI" forum supranatural kaskus dengan sedikit perbaikan dan penyempurnaan kata.

Utah lawmakers vote for abstinence-only sex education

(CNN) – When I was a senior in the late 1980s, my high school brought in a woman from Planned Parenthood to talk to my health class. I remember her because she had props – a condom and a banana. Utah may outlaw lessons like that one very soon. The state's legislature passed a bill mandating that when it comes to sex education, public schools must teach about abstinence, and almost nothing else.
If the bill is signed by Gov. Gary Herbert, Utah's teachers will not be allowed to inform students about contraceptives, "the intricacies of intercourse," homosexuality, or sexual activity outside of marriage. The bill says teachers would have to inform students that, "abstinence from all sexual activity before marriage and fidelity after marriage as the only sure methods for preventing certain communicable diseases." Teachers would still be allowed to provide instruction on male and female physiology and anatomy, as well as health issues like AIDS/HIV. The proposed law does allow schools one other option: not to teach anything about sex at all.

According to CNN affiliate KSL, the bill's sponsor, Utah state Rep. Bill Wright, said that he believes sex education shouldn't be taught in the classroom; he says that kind of instruction should take place in the home. Wright says he decided to change existing sex education laws after seeing instructional materials provided by Planned Parenthood that he viewed as inappropriate. The proposed bill mandates that Utah schools must use approved abstinence-only curriculum materials for sex education instruction.
The Utah Education Association – a teacher's union – and the Utah Parent Teacher Association are urging the governor to veto the bill. A state senator opposed to the bill said that schools need to teach young people about sex because parents might not address the topic at home. Critics of the bill point to a 2007 study of abstinence classes that found no difference in the abstinence rate between students who took the class and students who did not.
An online petition has garnered more than 35,000 signatures, asking the governor to veto the bill.
Current Utah law stresses abstinence, but teachers can currently provide contraceptive instruction. In addition, parents can decide whether their children will receive sex education. According to the Salt Lake Tribune, very few parents in Utah's largest school districts opt out of these kinds of lessons for their children.
The bill is on Herbert's desk, but there has been no indication yet whether the governor will sign or veto the bill. A spokeswoman for the governor's office said that he has received thousands of calls, e-mails and letters on both sides of the issue. The governor has said his decision will reflect the best policy for Utah, not necessarily public opinion.

sumber : http://schoolsofthought.blogs.cnn.com

A rare disease in the smallest of patients

 
 
(CNN) -- Haleigh Jacobs and her husband, David, have spent the last two months in the hospital, hovering over their 8-pound newborn, Brantley. He has yet to spend a day outside the incubator, smell fresh air or go home to meet his siblings.

Brantley's right leg juts out like a reddish brown lump of flesh that is thicker than his torso. His toes, indistinguishable from each other, look like dimples. The leg is studded with damaged blood vessels, veins and capillaries that look like raisins. Another lump protrudes from his abdomen.

"It is frustrating," his mother said. "For one, being a parent, you feel helpless, and then, you've got a baby that's hurting."

But this is an improvement from what Brantley has endured. He had a rectal tear that spontaneously gushed blood and fluids. That has been healing.

For families dealing with rare diseases, the road to a diagnosis is a long, winding one, riddled with confusion, complications and expenses. Although pop culture has left an impression that there is a genius doctor somewhere, like the fictional Dr. House who can identify and cure rare diseases, the reality is far different.

After the diagnosis, the lack of answers or effective treatment can be completely unsatisfying.

"Two-thirds of the people with rare diseases are children, because these are genetic diseases," said Mary Dunkle, the vice president for communications at the National Organization for Rare Disorders. "It's very often young parents with a new baby and they're very, very worried and very much in unfamiliar territory."

On December 28, the Jacobses, who are from Blanchard, Oklahoma, welcomed their second son. Brantley Lane Jacobs was born eight weeks early.

"I didn't get to see him," Haleigh Jacobs said, about after the birth. "But I saw his leg. It was hard not to see his leg. ... I started bawling."

Brantley weighed 4 pounds, 3 ounces. His leg weighed 1 pound.

Haleigh Jacobs cuddles her 2-month-old son, Brantley, who has severe medical problems.

The leg had puffed up because of a buildup of blood vessels, called hermangioma. The skin of his legs had stretched thin to encase the increasing swelling and had become fragile like a burn patient's. The leg required constant wrapping and moisturizing to prevent chapping and bleeding.

Jacobs had learned before giving birth there was something unusual about her third baby. Twenty-one weeks into her pregnancy, she and her husband went to get an ultrasound to find out whether the baby was a boy or a girl. The specialists noticed an unusual lump on the fetus.

When he was delivered, Brantley's physical state was perplexing.

The doctors were baffled, Jacobs said. The swelling on Brantley's leg kept growing. Every time Brantley was moved or his leg touched, he would wince or scream.

The hole near his rectum would bleed whenever someone tried to wipe him during a diaper change.

Brantley has never been breastfed, because he's too fragile. His mother gingerly feeds him with a bottle, worried that any jerks or sudden movements could bother his skin.

His doctors in Oklahoma called specialists and sent images and test results to other pediatricians and specialists around the country. Maybe, one of the doctor speculated, Brantley had Klippel-Trenaunay syndrome, a rare childhood genetic disease.

Another doctor suggested it could be CLOVES Syndrome, another rare vascular disease that causes malformations and has only been found in 80 people. Another doctor thought it could be a combination of both diseases, possibly a new condition.

There are almost 7,000 rare diseases in the United States, according to the National Organization for Rare Disorders.

The swelling in Brantley's leg increased after birth.

These tend to be complex diseases," said Dunkle. "It's really not in any way bashing the professional medical community. People have a hard time getting a diagnosis, it's obviously distressing and difficult for families and patients."

The parents wanted to find someone who could help their son. Haleigh Jacobs e-mailed doctors and worked with doctors in Oklahoma to get referrals to other hospitals.

In mid-February, Brantley was referred to Arkansas Children's Hospital in Little Rock. Jacobs took a leave from her job as a dispatcher for the police department and so did her husband, who works for a company that locates and marks underground gas and electric lines.

Families are often encouraged to go to teaching hospitals on the theory that they will have a better chance there of interacting with medical professionals who may have seen something similar to their situations.

When Brantley arrived in Arkansas, the diagnosis was Klippel-Trenaunay syndrome, a rare disorder that appears in one in 100,000 children, said Dr. Gresham Richter, associate professor at the University of Arkansas for medical sciences.

Richter sees about 30 cases a year at the hospital. The way Brantley presented with the disease was so unusual Richter said he has only seen it in two other patients.

Some Klippel-Trenaunay patients have internal bleeding because of the malformation of blood vessels in organs such as the liver, heart, lungs and rectum. They usually have port wine marks on the skin and the growth of masses of blood vessels and varicose veins.

"It's usually a cutaneous birthmark that is red and inflamed. It becomes bigger and bigger," Richter said. "It usually does not appear at birth like Brantley's does. It's a rare form of KTS, and the one that is most dangerous because it grows very quickly."

The swelling in Brantley's leg is caused by accumulating lymphatic fluids collecting in his leg. The muscles, tendons and bones in Brantley's right leg are being infiltrated, Richter said.

There is no cure for the disease, which is often the case when dealing with rare diagnoses.

"The worst thing is to get a diagnosis and find out there's no treatment, no support group," Dunkle said. Sometimes that's how patient advocacy groups are formed, she added.

Although the appearance of Klippel-Trenaunay syndrome is shocking, Richter said patients can have a normal life expectancy.

Brantley will need laser surgery continually to remove the damaged blood vessels in his leg. The surgery does not address the underlying cause of the disease, which is believed to be genetic.

His leg will have to be amputated at some point, Richter said.

Brantley's parents are seeking a second opinion and another hospital as they contemplate their next step. They brought Brantley home for the first time this week. But the homecoming has been overshadowed by a looming medical decision.

"We have been going back and forth," she said. "Do we tell them to take the leg? Is he going to be mad at us when he gets older?"

Her husband added that when they first learned of the malformation during pregnancy, they were given two options: abort Brantley or give birth and see what happens.

"That was an easy decision on our part," he said. "This whole leg amputation, it has been left up to us. That's a tough decision because the decisions we have to make have nothing to do with us. It's for the betterment of him. Do we leave the leg and hope someone can fix it three or four years down the line?"

Fat In Diet Linked To Sperm Count

The amount and type of fat in men's diets may affect the quality and concentration of sperm in their semen, according to a new small US study whose results need to be corroborated by a larger trial before we can say for sure whether this finding stacks up. But the researchers say in the meantime men already have much to gain by reducing the amount of saturated fat in their diet: we know too much of it is linked to poor health, and now it may also signify poorer fertility.

The study, by Jill Attaman and colleagues, is published in the 14 March online issue of the journal Human Reproduction.

Attaman was a clinical and research fellow in reproductive endocrinology and infertility at Massachusetts General Hospital, as well as an instructor in obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive biology at Harvard Medical School when they did the study.

In their study, of 99 American men, Attaman and colleagues found that a high total fat intake was linked to a lower total sperm count and concentration.

They also found that the sperm of men whose diets contained more omega-3 polyunsaturated fats, the type of fat that is often present in fish and plant oils, was better formed than that of men who ate less of these healthier fats.

However, they are careful to point out this was just a small study, the first to look at links between specific dietary fats and male fertility, and the findings need to be considered in the light of several limitations. These include, for instance, that the data came from food frequency questionnaires and may have missed some foods the men consumed, and there was only one sperm sample per participant. Also, being of cross-sectional design, it can only suggest links, it can't say there is a cause and effect relationship.

Attaman and colleagues suggest more research should now be done to find out for sure what role different types of dietary fat play in male fertility.

But in the meantime, they can still take action, says Attaman, "if men make changes to their diets so as to reduce the amount of saturated fat they eat and increase their omega-3 intake, then this may not only improve their general health, but could improve their reproductive health too."

"At a global level, adopting these lifestyle modifications may improve general health, as high saturated fat diets are known to be a risk factor for a range of cardiovascular diseases; but, in addition, our research suggests that it could be beneficial for reproductive health worldwide," she added.

Previous studies have looked at links between Body Mass Index (BMI) and semen quality, but the findings are not clear. Even less is known about the potential effects of different types of dietary fat on semen quality, which is what prompted Attaman and colleagues to start investigating.

They invited men attending a fertility clinic to take part in the study. Between the end of 2006 and the fall of 2010, 99 men answered questions about their diet, and gave semen samples for sperm analysis. The researchers were also able to measure levels of fatty acids in sperm and seminal plasma in 23 of the participants.

When they analyzed the results, the researchers put the men in three groups, according to the amount of fat in their diet: at the top was the third who ate the most fat, and at the bottom was the third who ate the least.

They found that compared with those in the bottom third, the top third, who ate the most fat, had a 43% lower total sperm count and a 38% lower sperm concentration.

Total sperm count is the total number of sperm in one ejaculation of semen. Sperm concentration is the amount of sperm in a millilitre of semen.

The results also showed that the relationships between fat in the diet and semen quality appeared to be largely driven by intake of saturated fats.

Compared to the third whose diets contained the least amount of saturated fats, the men in the top third saturated fat intake had a 35% lower total sperm count and a 38% lower sperm concentration.

Attaman said:

"The magnitude of the association is quite dramatic and provides further support for the health efforts to limit consumption of saturated fat given their relation with other health outcomes such as cardiovascular disease."

Another measure that experts take into account when assessing male fertility is sperm morphology, or the shape of the sperm. Normal sperm have an oval head and a long tail. Abnormal shapes occur when the head is too big or misshapen or the tail is crooked or there are two of them. Such defects can affect the ability of the sperm to get into and fertilize the egg.

In this study, the researchers found that the third of men who had the most omega-3 fats in their diets had slightly more normal-shaped sperm than the third who ate the least.

In their discussion, Attaman and colleagues point out that 71% of the men in the study were overweight or obese, which can also affect semen quality. However they did adjust for the potential effect of BMI, and they also noted that 71% overweight or obese is not very different from the 74% in the general US male population.

They conclude:

"Given the limitations of the current study, in particular the fact that it is a cross-sectional analysis and that it is the first report of a relation between dietary fat and semen quality, it is essential that these findings be reproduced in future work."

"Further, studies with larger samples are now required to confirm these findings," they urge.

Written by Catharine Paddock PhD
Copyright: Medical News Today

Most women with cancer want a role in decisions

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - About two-thirds of women diagnosed with early stage breast cancer want to take part in making decisions about their treatment, according to a new survey of patients from five different countries.
Some of these women want complete control over making treatment choices while others want to share the decision with their doctor -- yet only a minority of them actually get the level of involvement they are hoping for.
"Physicians should be trying to elicit patient preferences," said Richard Brown, the lead author of the study and an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Brown's team asked 683 women who were recently diagnosed with breast cancer what kind of role they would like to have in making decisions about their treatment: would they like to have total control, a shared role with their doctor, or have the doctor make the choices.
After the women met with their physicians, the researchers followed up to ask how their visit went and whether their preferences for how involved they would like to be in the future had changed.
Only 28 out of every 100 women initially wanted to delegate the decision to their doctor, but 46 out of every 100 reported that their doctor ended up making the decision.
"I think it's not so surprising that the actual decision making tended to be more doctor-directed than the patients wanted," said Dr. Michael Barry, president of the Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making, who was not involved in this study.
"I think sometimes clinicians think most patients don't want to participate in decisions, particularly around serious things like cancer, and that's not the finding here or in previous studies," he told Reuters Health.
Among the 282 women who changed their preference after the consultation with their doctor, a little more than half of them shifted toward a greater involvement.
A third of them originally wanted their doctor to make the decision and later preferred to either share it or take control themselves, and one in five who originally wanted to share the decision later preferred to make the choice on their own.
When women had more involvement than they originally intended, they "were less conflicted over the decision, more satisfied with their ultimate decision, more satisfied with the consultation communication" than women who had less involvement, the authors write in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.
Barry said the findings make sense for women with early-stage breast cancer, because there are often multiple, effective options for treatment.
For instance, the risk of death might be the same if a woman has her breast removed compared to having her breast preserved, but one woman might prioritize keeping her breast and be more willing to go through the extra surgeries and radiation.
"When patients then understand there are multiple reasonable options for treatment of early stage breast cancer...usually you'll see more desire for participatory decision making," Barry said.
After they had the consultation with their doctor, about a third of the women in the study continued to want their physicians to have control over the decision.
"The preference to leave the decision to the physician is a perfectly reasonable decision to make," Brown told Reuters Health.
He and his colleagues note in the new report that they intend to pursue future studies of patients with other cancers, especially those with limited treatment options.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/xp9uLX Journal of Clinical Oncology, online February 6, 2012.

Does sex ed keep girls from becoming teen moms?

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - In a new study, states with more comprehensive sex education programs had lower teen birth rates -- but the effect seemed to be due more to political, religious and social differences between those states than the sex ed itself.
That doesn't mean sex ed never helps prevent pregnancy, researchers said. But attitudes of family and friends, and whether teens have access to contraception and family planning services, might be just as important to putting a dent in the number of new teen moms.
"Although the teen birth rates and teen pregnancy rates are dropping year after year... we still have disparities between states, and we have higher teen birth and teen pregnancy rates when we're compared to other industrialized countries," said Patricia Cavazos-Rehg, from Washington University in St. Louis, who worked on the study.
Researchers said there have been mixed results when it comes to whether a comprehensive sex ed program, which teaches contraceptive use and HIV prevention, does prevent teen births.
Whether school programs should include anything other than abstinence-only education has also been the topic of political battles in some parts of the country.
To get a big-picture take on sex ed's effectiveness, Cavazos-Rehg and her colleagues compared curriculums in 24 states with birth rates for girls ages 15 to 17 in those states between 1997 and 2005.
They found wide variation over the study period, from one birth in every 100 New Hampshire girls each year to three or four births for every 100 Arkansas girls.
In general, the more districts in a state that covered how to use a condom, how to prevent HIV and other sex ed topics, the fewer teen births there were, the researchers report in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.
But when they took into account race, poverty and crime levels in states, much of the link disappeared: poorer states with more minorities and more crime had less sex ed and more teen births. And when "religiosity" and laws on abortion were thrown into the mix, sex ed programs themselves no longer predicted birth rates.
Researchers said that there are a number of ways to interpret the findings -- but none of them suggest teens can't learn from sex ed.
First, conservative and religious states might teach sex ed in a less effective way than liberal ones -- meaning more teens in those states end up pregnant.
"There can be enormous variation between what goes on in one state and what goes on in another state even if they both indicate that they discuss how to use a condom or pregnancy prevention," said Amy Bleakley, who studies teen sexual behavior and reproductive health at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
Or, it could be that teen pregnancy rates are more similar between states, but in places with liberal abortion laws, more adolescent girls end their pregnancies early.
Cavazos-Rehg said that abortions may account for some of the difference in birth rates, but not all of it. Although data on pregnancy rates are less comprehensive, she said, her own research has still shown much higher teen pregnancy rates in Arkansas and Mississippi, for example, than in New England.
Regardless of what teens are taught in school, whether they can easily get condoms and have their parents' support for "healthy sexual decision-making" may depend on state politics and social factors, Marla Eisenberg, an adolescent health and medicine researcher at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, told Reuters Health in an email.
"In short, school-based sex ed is only one part of a much larger puzzle of influences on adolescent sexual behavior, and as the authors conclude, the demographic, religious and political environment matters a lot," added Eisenberg, who didn't participate in the new research.
Still, sex ed can be improved, the experts agreed.
To prevent teen pregnancies, kids in sex ed need to be taught more than just how to use a condom, but the consequences of getting pregnant and having a baby, according to Cavazos-Rehg.
Bleakley, who also wasn't involved in the new study, called for better standards regarding what goes into a comprehensive sex ed program, and better training of instructors across states, to erase any disparities that could be tied to the religious and political environment in a given area.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/AquJBE Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, online February 6, 2012.

Chavez home in a week, facing more cancer therapy

 

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said on Sunday he will be home from Cuba in a week and start radiation therapy for cancer that could leave him weakened ahead of his re-election bid on October 7.
Chatting for more than two hours in a televised address from Havana, where he is recovering from a third surgery to treat cancer in his pelvic area, Chavez seemed eager to show he is fully in command of the government despite his illness.
Flanked by some of his cabinet ministers at the head of a long table, he laughed and sang songs in an apparent effort to squelch rumors he has a life-threatening condition like a spreading cancer.
"Today we are in the thirteenth day post-operation, with completely normal vital signs, a good general state of health and with no complications, good scarring, daily monitoring, rehabilitation and long walks," he said, reading off a document with details about his cancer treatment.
"In the coming weeks we will start the already announced phase of radiation therapy," Chavez said wearing a windbreaker with the colors of the Venezuelan flag.
During his recovery he said he was reading many books, quoting from a thick volume by Marxist philosopher Istvan Meszaros.
Since arriving in Cuba on February 24, Chavez has been firing off tweets, meeting with foreign leaders and phoning state TV, in what could be preparation for a triumphant homecoming.
"God willing, next Sunday afternoon I will be in Caracas," the 57-year-old leader said at the end of the pre-recorded broadcast.
In June he made an emotional return from his first round of surgery in Cuba, surprising the country with an unannounced dawn arrival in Venezuela and shortly thereafter waved to tearful supporters from a balcony at the presidential palace.
This homecoming will likely be less dramatic.
Last month he contradicted his own upbeat assurances that he was "completely cured," announcing he would once again have to go under the knife to remove a reappearance of the cancer in the same pelvic area.
GOVERNMENT BUSINESS, TOUGH CAMPAIGN
Chavez linked up via satellite with his vice president and other ministers back in Venezuela presiding over the inaugurations of government projects, like a chicken farm jointly owned with an Argentine company.
He approved the issue of a bond in local currency for some $2.325 million due between 2015 and 2017 to spend in the agricultural sector with the participation of a government fund and state oil company PDVSA.
According to analysts, those bonds will be bought by local banks to replace government-mandated quotas of agriculture sector loans, which banks have been struggling to meet.
Venezuela's leftist government is on a massive spending push, funded by oil dollars from the coffers of South America's largest crude exporter, to win over poor voters with popular welfare programs, including job training and new housing units.
The side effects from radiation may slow down Chavez's gregarious on-the-street campaigning style - where he is known to meet with recipients of the state's largess in person - just as he faces a formidable race against 39-year old opposition candidate Henrique Capriles.
He may instead have to fall back on "virtual campaigning" through frequent Twitter posts, pre-recorded televised speeches and phone calls to state television.
Little is known about what kind of cancer the president has or how serious it is, but medical experts say the radiation treatment could take a heavy physical toll.
Capriles, a former state governor, won a strong mandate in a primary election last month and is expected to contrast his energetic and youthful image with Chavez's convalescence.
Opinion polls show Chavez, in power since 1999 and omnipresent in the media, still has the edge over Capriles in voter enthusiasm, although roughly a third of the electorate is still undecided.
With no clear successor to carry on Chavez's "21st Century revolution," Venezuelans will be closely watching for signs he has the strength to run a campaign and rule for another six-year term after 13 years in power.

Study prompts call for wider ban on metal hips

LONDON (Reuters) - New research confirmed that all-metal artificial hips fail more often than other types, fueling concerns about the devices and prompting a call from researchers on Tuesday for a ban.
The analysis in The Lancet medical journal came two weeks after Britain's medical regulator said nearly 50,000 Britons with metal-on-metal hips needed annual check-ups to monitor for problems, including exposure to toxic metals.
The finding will likely fuel criticism about the regulation of medical devices in the wake of a scandal over French-made breast implants and past problems with other implantable devices, including faulty leads on some heart defibrillators.
Metal-on-metal hips were developed to be more durable than traditional implants, which combine a ceramic or metal ball with a plastic socket.
But recent experience suggests they may actually do worse, prompting the recall of one device made by Johnson & Johnson that critics argue should never have been allowed on the market.
Results from the most comprehensive study to date now show that there is a 6.2 percent chance patients with all-metal hips will need a replacement within five years -- some three times greater than the revision rate seen with older implants.
The rate was particularly high with larger-head implants and those used in women, in whom failure rates were up to four times higher, the researchers said.
The team from the University of Bristol analyzed data from the National Joint Registry of England and Wales covering more than 400,000 hips replacements, including 31,171 all-metal ones, that were undertaken between 2003 and 2011.
The results, they said, were unequivocal: "Metal-on-metal stemmed articulations give poor implant survival compared with other options and should not be implanted."
Their analysis did not cover resurfacing systems, which avoid the use of a stem sticking into the bone, such as Smith & Nephew's Birmingham Hip Resurfacing joints.
TIGHTER REGULATION
In recent years, the use of metal-on-metal implants has declined in Britain, but they are still used extensively around the world, including in the United States.
Art Sedrakyan of Cornell University said the problem highlighted weaknesses in the regulatory systems on both sides of the Atlantic due to "outdated and low-threshold regulatory pathways".
In a strongly worded Lancet commentary accompanying the latest research, he called for better studies before implants reach the market.
"We are left with more than 500,000 patients with metal-on-metal prostheses in the USA and more than 40,000 in the UK who are at elevated risk of device failure, which will inevitably result in the burden of further surgical treatment as well as billions of dollars in costs to taxpayers," he said.
Ashley Blom of the University of Bristol said that total hip replacement surgery remained a very successful operation for the vast majority of people but regulators should learn lessons as they seek to balance safety against innovation.
"In this case, with the benefit of hindsight, I think that tighter regulation may have prevented this," he told Reuters.
Under the new guidelines from Britain's Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), doctors are being advised to consider removing and replacing implants if patients have abnormal MRI scans or if metal ion levels in the blood reach worrying levels.
With the exception of J&J's DePuy ASR system, which was pulled from the market in 2010, the MHRA decided in its recent ruling against a ban on use, arguing that stemmed metal-on-metal implants could still be good news for some patients.
Other companies that make metal-on-metal hip implants include Zimmer, Stryker, Corin and Biomet.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/ykNRa6 and http://bit.ly/yD8X4d The Lancet, online March 13, 2012.

Sumber : http://www.healthnews.com

Coke, Pepsi to alter caramel color ingredient

(Reuters) - Coca-Cola Co and PepsiCo Inc are making changes to the production of an ingredient in their namesake colas to avoid the need to label the packages with a cancer warning.
The changes will not alter the colas' taste, color or formula, according to statements from both companies.
Coke and Pepsi said on Friday that they had asked their suppliers of the caramel coloring in their colas to alter their manufacturing process to meet the requirements of a California ballot initiative aiming to limit exposure to toxic chemicals.
The change is meant to reduce the amount of a chemical called 4-methylimidazole, or 4-MI, which in January was added to the list of chemicals covered by California's Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986, also known as Proposition 65.
High levels of that chemical have been linked to cancer in animals.
Earlier this week, the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), a U.S. watchdog group, said it found unsafe levels of the chemical in cans of Coca-Cola, Pepsi-Cola, Dr Pepper Snapple Group Inc's Dr Pepper and Whole Foods Markets Inc's 365 Cola.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said at the time it was reviewing the group's petition but stressed that the drinks were still safe.
An FDA spokesman said a person would have to drink "well over a thousand cans of soda a day to reach the doses administered in the studies that have shown links to cancer in rodents".

Sumber :  http://www.healthnews.com

Child cancer patient deals with drug shortage

Editor's note: Owen McMasters, 12, was diagnosed with Acuta Lymphoblastic Leukemia in November 2011. His family has been dealing with the shortage of methotrexate, a drug that treats cancer by slowing the growth of cancer cells. Between 2006 and 2010, drug shortages increased by more than 200%. Read more about these shortages, and what the FDA is doing to help, on The Chart.

Learning that the enlarged lymph nodes I showed my mom meant Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL), a type of cancer, and not mono, was devastating.
It meant that I would not be returning to school until at least next August. It meant I would spend unknown amounts of time in the hospital. It meant I would not be able to be around groups of people. (I have to limit which friends and family members I am around, since a simple cold for you could mean severe illness for me.)
It meant my hair I loved fell out, leaving me with baby bird fuzz on my head.
I underwent two operations in the first 36 hours and then went under anesthesia for either a spinal tap with chemotherapy, a bone marrow biopsy, or both, nearly every week. Because my platelets and white blood cell count are often critically low, I am unable to ride my bike, play any sports, wrestle with my brothers or do many of the things I like to do.
My new friends are other kids with bald or fuzzy heads who are going through the same thing as me.

Because I have every intention of beating cancer, and seem to be doing a great job of it so far (despite being told in November that my cancer was high-risk), I have done everything my doctors have asked of me.
I take many different kinds of chemotherapy drugs, at least once per week and sometimes many days per week. I have to get my blood drawn frequently. I have to get up early, go to the doctor’s office or the hospital, and spend many hours getting treatment. I have been in the hospital sometimes for up to 10 days in a row.
I had a severe infection from my immune system being wiped out.
I have to get radiation treatments in my brain. Sometimes the treatments don’t bother me too much; sometimes they make me tired, weak, nauseated and unable to eat for days. They make me cramp all over and swell.
While none of this is any fun, I do what I have to do and deal with it in my own way. I joke with the doctors. I entertain my parents. Sometimes I use bad words and get away with it because I have cancer. But I do everything I am told to do because I am going to live and be cured of cancer. The doctors say I have a very good chance to be cured if I take all of the treatments, which last for three and a half years.
Two weeks ago my main doctor told me I was doing better than he ever expected. He was honestly shocked with my latest bone marrow biopsy. But in the next minute he told my mom I would likely not be able to undergo my next phase of chemo.
The next phase is high dose methotrexate. I would receive this drug all the time - through an IV in my spine. It is the most frequent drug and the high dose is evidently going to be hard. I was ready for it because it is also what will keep my cancer from returning. It is what will make me live.
My doctor told me drug companies had stopped making methotrexate in the form I needed and that the shortage was so bad no one would be able to get it in the next few weeks unless something drastic changed. He said the shortage had been going on to some degree for two years, but that it was critical now.
I knew it was critical - it was going to affect me and all the other kids in the clinic that day and all the kids in the U.S. who also have ALL.
I asked if we could get it from other countries and was told it isn’t that easy. He also said that the shortage of chemotherapy drugs for kids with cancer was a constant problem and was not just with methotrexate. Six months ago there was a shortage of AraC, another drug I take frequently.
That very day the clinic nurses asked me if I had decided what I wanted for my wish from the Make A Wish Foundation. The people from Make a Wish had visited me the last time I was in the hospital, but I was so sick I only talked to them briefly.
I talked to my parents and told them I would feel bad asking for something to be bought for me but might consider something all the kids could enjoy at clinic or on the children’s oncology unit at Kosair Children’s Hospital.
After I got home from clinic, we researched the methotrexate shortage and found that my doctor wasn’t exaggerating. I decided my wish would be to fix the shortage of chemotherapy drugs so that other kids could get the treatments that they need to be cured of cancer.
I wanted to make the shortage of methotrexate known by everyone who could do something about it. I wanted the drug companies to share my goal of curing my cancer and cancer in lots of other kids by making these drugs, even though they are cheap and might not make as much money as some others.
The FDA has said that methotrexate will be available for now. But this problem is not solved for good. A permanent solution to this problem must be found. I don’t care how the problem is solved, it just needs to be solved.
I like to think that I helped to make a difference by sharing my story. Thanks to Dr. Gupta and others who have expressed an interest in helping my wish to come true.
I plan to live.
See Owen and his family and learn more about the shortage of critical cancer drugs on "Sanjay Gupta, M.D." on Saturday and Sunday at 7:30 a.m. ET.

Post by: Owen McMasters -- Special to CNN Filed under: Cancer • Children's Health

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/24/child-cancer-patient-deals-with-drug-shortage/

12:26 PM ET Share Comments (20 comments) Permalink Tweet CDC director: We can reduce prescription drug overdoses

Thirty years ago, I attended medical school in New York. In the key lecture on pain management, the professor told us confidently that patients who received prescription narcotics for pain would not become addicted.
While pain management remains an essential patient right, a generation of health care professionals, patients, and families have learned the hard way how deeply misguided that assertion was. Narcotics - both illegal and legal - are dangerous drugs that can destroy lives and communities.
Millions of Americans struggle with substance abuse. Across the United States, overdoses involving opioid painkillers - a class of drugs with narcotic effects that includes hydrocodone, methadone, oxycodone - have skyrocketed in the past decade.
Today, the United States consumes most of the world’s supply of opioid painkillers. By 2010, enough opioid painkillers were prescribed to medicate every American adult around-the-clock for a month. And every year, nearly 15,000 people die from overdoses involving these drugs... more than from heroin and cocaine combined.

Studies by scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and elsewhere show that most of these deaths are not the result of people taking small doses of opioids for a short time. Typically, problems arise when people take large amounts of painkillers or use them over a long period of time.
About 1 in 20 people in the United States age 12 or older reported using opioid painkillers for non-medical purposes in 2010. Some of these people engage in doctor shopping - getting prescriptions for commonly abused drugs from several practitioners in a short time and having the prescriptions filled at several pharmacies. In this way, people can obtain dangerous amounts of a prescription drug rapidly.
And in addition to the heavy toll this can take on lives and communities, non-medical use of prescription painkillers costs health insurers up to $72.5 billion annually in direct health care costs.
We can do more as a society to help prevent overdoses involving prescription painkillers while making sure patients who need them have access to safe, effective treatment.
Health care providers should prescribe opioid painkillers only under specific conditions, as in the treatment of chronic cancer pain when other treatments have not worked, and in limited quantities.
Providers can also screen patients for risk and history of substance abuse before prescribing opioid painkillers. Drug addiction is a disease of the brain that can be treated.
But health care providers aren’t the whole answer. Insurers and health care institutions must set up systems to identify and take action when providers or patients are using prescription drugs in dangerous ways. Some states have passed laws to rein in rogue pain clinics (“pill mills") run solely for profit, that attract drug shoppers from other states.
Individuals can help protect themselves and others by doing the following:
– Talk with your provider about alternatives to opioid painkillers.
– Use opioid painkillers only as directed by a health care provider.
– Make sure you are the only one to use your painkillers. Not selling or sharing them with others helps prevent misuse and abuse.

– Store opioid painkillers in a secure place and dispose of them properly.
To learn more about prescription painkiller overdoses, join Dr. Frieden on Twitter @DrFriedenCDC today at 2 p.m. ET

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/24/cdc-director-we-are-not-powerless-against-prescription-drug-overdoses/?hpt=he_c2

Top Chef' Talbot: Cooking and diabetes can mix

Editor's note: In the Human Factor, we profile survivors who have overcome the odds. Confronting a life obstacle – injury, illness or other hardship – they tapped their inner strength and found resilience they didn't know they possessed. This week meet Sam Talbot, executive chef at the Surf Lodge in Montauk, New York, who became known across the nation when he joined season 2 of Bravo's reality show "Top Chef." He is living with type 1 diabetes.

I remember being about 8 years old in Cleveland, Ohio, and going to the farmer's market with my grandmother, and getting eggs and making scrambled eggs and all those types of things that an 8-year-old doesn't necessarily just pick up.
And I fell in love with it. As time went on, I'd try to make my parents breakfast in bed. It would be Saturday morning and they had to ban me from the kitchen because I was in there at 7 a.m. banging things around.

	Post by: Sam Talbot - Special to CNN Filed under: Celebrity Health • Diabetes • Human Factor

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/02/24/top-chef-talbot-cooking-and-diabetes-can-mix/?hpt=he_c2
My whole thing is about being as eco-sustainable as possible and cooking sustainable seafood, and food that makes sense for the mind, body and soul. 

I am a person living with type 1 diabetes, but I'm not necessarily cooking for diabetics all the time. Diabetes has never hindered me or stopped me from doing something I wanted to do.
The cookbook "The Sweet Life" that I just came out with is like a chronicle, almost like a memoir with a cookbook. It really goes into the story about when I was 12 and goes until present day.  It goes into, not just the healthy aspects of eating and the things you should be eating, but how to manage stress when you're living with diabetes; how to be able travel the world; how to be able to have syringes in your pocket or an insulin pump.  [If you] go to Budapest, they don't speak English – how do you explain you're diabetic to someone in Budapest? I go into those things because I've really had mishaps happen along the way of traveling [and talk about] overcoming those obstacles.
I think one of the key components that really makes up a good chef is really taking to heart what you're doing and knowing that basically the customers' lives are in your hands when you're cooking. You want to make food that makes sense, that nourishes, that fuels, that can be heart healthy and doesn't leave you just feeling like you ate a loaf of bread. 
If you take all those things into consideration and you're creative and that's your creative outlet and you really spend the time to know about the food you're serving, you can educate those who want to be educated about what they're eating.
I've made it my passion to take the food that I grew up on, to take the food I know, that I love and the food that I create on a daily basis and really just fine tune those modern, healthy tweaks and swap outs you can make. Instead of using heavy cream, try almond milk. Instead of using white flour, try coconut flour, almond flour, whole wheat flour or whatever it is and that's what I've dedicated my cooking to.

How to fake a good night's sleep

 
Early-morning sunlight is best for helping you start the day feeling rejuvenated
 
(Health.com) -- No matter how dedicated you are to getting your shut-eye, sometimes a less-than-stellar night's sleep is inevitable. The good news: "One bad night's sleep isn't going to hurt you long term," says Joyce Walsleben, Ph.D., coauthor of "A Woman's Guide to Sleep."
But it can make you feel not so great the next day. Luckily, there are ways to feel normal (or very close!) after a rocky night's rest.
1. Open your shades
A big dose of sunshine is the first thing you'll want to try. "Natural light resets your body clock, helping you function better all day," Walsleben says. "Even the low light on a cloudy or rainy day wakes you up better than any indoor bulb."
Early-morning sunlight is best for helping you start the day feeling rejuvenated. To perk up fast, open your shades as soon as you get up.

Dr. Oz's rules for better sleep

Help for women to get sleep

Health.com: 7 tips for the best sleep ever
2. Grab the right eats
"When we're tired, our instinct is to reach for sugary foods for a quick rush," says Samantha Heller, R.D., clinical nutrition coordinator at the Center for Cancer Care at Griffin Hospital in Derby, Connecticut. "But those foods make your blood sugar spike and crash, setting off a roller coaster of energy highs and lows."
For lasting energy, start your day with healthy protein and whole-grain carbs, Heller says. Try a whole-wheat English muffin with peanut butter and a sliced banana.
Health.com: America's healthiest fast-food breakfasts
3. Try this if you can't take a nap
The ideal remedy for the mental fatigue that occurs after sleep loss is an afternoon nap, says Matthew Edlund, M.D., author of "The Power of Rest." But since that's not possible for most people with jobs, the next best thing is a form of active rest called "paradoxical relaxation."
Edlund explains: Focus on one muscle group in your body for at least 15 seconds, concentrating only on how it feels and nothing else. Repeat up and down the body. Surprise -- you feel recharged.
4. Drink your coffee nice and slow
No need to gulp down that morning brew: Pour it into a thermos and sip slowly enough to make it last most of the workday. People who consumed the caffeine equivalent of just 2 ounces of coffee per hour still got a kick, according to a study in the journal Sleep. Just cut off the java by 3 p.m., or you may have trouble falling asleep that night.
Health.com: Big perks: coffee's health benefits
5. Take a walk to wake up
The time of day when the sleep deprived drag the most is between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., says Michael Breus, Ph.D., author of "The Sleep Doctor's Diet Plan." If you find yourself yawning through afternoon meetings, try stepping out for a 10-minute walk.
"Movement boosts core temperature and stimulates the heart, brain, and muscles, preventing a slump," Breus says. Even pacing around your office will help kick your body back into gear.
Health.com: How to instantly boost your energy
6. Go to bed on time
As tempting as it is to crash at 8 p.m. the evening following a rough night's sleep, you'll feel most refreshed if you hit the sack close to your usual bedtime.
"Our bodies have a natural rhythm of sleep and wake -- you'll get the most restorative sleep if you stick to that pattern," says Janet Kennedy, Ph.D., a New York City--based clinical psychologist who specializes in sleep disorders. "Changing your schedule to make up for lost sleep can actually lead to other problems, like early waking and even insomnia."
Instead of hitting the sack (or sacking out on the couch) after dinner, go to bed no earlier than an hour before your normal bedtime and wake up no later than an hour past your normal wake time to catch up on lost sleep without overdoing it.
Health.com: Alarm clocks for heavy sleepers
7. Hang around the water cooler
Sleep deprivation can mildly dehydrate you, even if you're not suffering from a happy-hour hangover. And dehydration actually compounds fatigue, Breus says -- so sipping water will help lessen sleepiness. Drink enough so you're not thirsty and you have clear-ish urine, Breus recommends.
Another trick: Throw in a few ice cubes. "Unlike warm drinks, which tend to relax you, cold beverages can increase alertness because they are more refreshing," Kennedy says.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/23/health/fake-good-nights-sleep/index.html?hpt=he_t5

Are women turned off by stressed-out men?

 
A study found that men with higher testosterone levels tended to have stronger immune systems and faces that were more attractive to women.
 
(Health.com) -- Scientists have been trying to confirm what Hollywood has known for decades: Women are often attracted to men with chiseled cheekbones and lantern jaws.
These and other masculine facial features are associated with high testosterone levels, and women seem to know this fact intuitively. Studies suggest that women are especially drawn to rugged-looking guys when they're in the mood to mate (i.e., when they're ovulating), while at other times, when they're more interested in companionship, they tend to prefer a softer, more delicate look—think Ryan Gosling versus Burt Lancaster.
It's not entirely clear why testosterone-fuelled features are attractive, but some experts have proposed that they're a sign of a healthy immune system. Testosterone dampens immune function, so a man with high testosterone who's still standing, the theory goes, is likely to have a stronger-than-average constitution. And he'll pass those hardy genes on to his offspring, making him an attractive mate choice.
Health.com: How love changes your body chemistry
A new study, published this week in the journal Nature Communications, provides the strongest evidence yet to support this theory. It also adds a new wrinkle: stress.
In the study, men with higher testosterone levels tended to have stronger immune systems and faces that were more attractive to women. This relationship, however, was especially pronounced in men with low levels of cortisol, a stress hormone involved in the so-called fight-or-flight response.
This finding, researchers say, suggests that a man's stress levels may play a key role in whether his testosterone is free to work its magic on women. Cortisol may even have a direct impact on a man's facial features, although it's much too soon to say if that's the case or not, says Benedict Jones, Ph.D., a psychologist at the University of Aberdeen, in Scotland, who researches the influence of hormones on attractiveness.
"The important thing here is that...we're seeing evidence that the relationship between men's facial attractiveness and their hormone levels is probably much more complex than we once thought it was," says Jones, who was not involved in the new study. "The interplay between cortisol and testosterone seems to be more important than the effects of any one hormone."
Health.com: Surprising libido boosters
Why is testosterone so sexy and cortisol, apparently, such a turnoff? The answer may lie in something called the "handicap hypothesis."
Biologists who study mate choice across species have suggested that attention-getting male features—such as the peacock's tail, or the deer's antlers—are attractive to females because they're largely useless and impractical. They're often a disadvantage in areas of life besides attracting a mate, but they signal to females that a male is healthy enough to divert some energy away from surviving and put it towards looking good.
"The very fact that you're able to stay alive with this handicap means that the female choosing you is getting a high-quality mate," says Anthony Little, Ph.D., a research fellow at the University of Stirling, in the United Kingdom, who did not participate in the new research but has studied how human faces communicate information.
Health.com: Celebrity health secrets: fit, famous men over 40
Rugged features aren't exactly seen as a handicap in humans, but a similar dynamic nevertheless may be at work, Little says. "Humans don't have colorful feathers, but we pay lots of attention to things like facial appearance and body appearance."
The handicap hypothesis has been around since 1975, but the new study is the first to provide concrete evidence for a link between high testosterone levels, good immune system function, and attractiveness in humans.
In the study, researchers asked a large group of female college students in Latvia to look at photographs of 74 male students and rate their facial attractiveness. Meanwhile, the researchers tested the men's testosterone and cortisol levels and gauged their immune-system function by measuring their antibody response to the hepatitis B vaccine.
The men with the strongest immune systems—those with the most antibodies—generally got the highest marks on looks. "Women seem to be able to detect the men who've got the strongest immune response, and they seem to find them the most attractive," says study coauthor Fhionna R. Moore, Ph.D., a psychology lecturer of Abertay University in Dundee, Scotland.
Health.com: 4 secrets to never getting sick
A stronger immune system was also linked to higher testosterone levels, but all of these links were weaker in men who also had high cortisol levels. It's as though cortisol, which tends to suppress the immune system, interferes in the conversation between testosterone, immune response, and attractiveness.
Cortisol isn't a perfect marker for stress, Little notes. It's not clear from one test, for instance, whether high cortisol levels are due to a momentary spike in stress or to chronic stress that keeps cortisol persistently elevated.
Still, he says, the fact that cortisol appears to come between testosterone and facial attractiveness suggests there's something about stress that women find unattractive.
Once again, Hollywood seems to have beaten science to the punch: It's no secret that there's something attractive about a man who seems relaxed and cool under pressure.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/02/22/health/living-well/testosterone-women/index.html?hpt=he_t4

Best nutrients for sperm's in the Marine Fish

Illinois, the ability of males to fertilize their partner is determined by the quality of sperm. Many nutrients that can improve sperm quality, one of which is a marine fish that was mentioned most good for the formation of sperm tough.
A study at the University of Illinois shows, content Docosa Hexaenoic Acid (DHA) in marine fish greatly affect the process of sperm formation. If the sperm produced are genetically less good, these nutrients can improve it.
In the process of formation of sperm cells, DHA is required to make a sheath that will accommodate certain enzymes. The better the veil, the more enzymes are conceived by sperm so that its ability to penetrate an egg cell also increased.
"The cells of normal sperm has an arc-like structure called the acrosome, which is very critical role in the process of egg fertilization," said Prof. Manabu Nakamura, who led the study as quoted from Indiavision, Wednesday (11/01/2012).
The role of DHA in the formation of sperm quality proven in an experiment on mice. Some male mice genetically modified to be sterile can finally mendapai inseminate female mice after a high DHA diet for some time.
By adding a fluorescent compound so that sperm can fluoresce, or light, the scientists also proved that changes in the level of fertility in male rats was influenced by the enzyme. Sheath formation of DHA increased the levels of enzymes so that sperm getting tough.
In addition to nutritional factors influenced the quality of sperm is also determined by one's physical and hormonal conditions in general. These conditions must be maintained with a healthy lifestyle, including regular exercise and always try to avoid stress.

Ozone Exposure Lower Quality of Sperm

Jakarta, sperm quality is affected by many things, from food eaten, physical activity undertaken, to environmental influences. Researchers found that exposure to ozone in the atmosphere also affect the process of sperm development in men.
A study of men who live in Los Angeles found that exposure to ozone can reduce sperm quality. The study, published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives this could add to the understanding of the causes of infertility in men.
This study analyzed the semen samples collected from a sperm bank in Los Angeles and compare it with the air quality.
The researchers found that exposure to high ozone levels near the homes of donors adversely affect semen quality. The impact of pollutants were found capable of affecting the entire development cycle of sperm in the body (spermatogenesis).
"We found an inverse relationship between ozone exposure and sperm concentration at all points studied. Our data show that sperm are vulnerable to toxic exposure in the entire period of spermatogenesis," said the researcher, Rebecca Z. Sokol as reported Altpenis, Friday (01/13/2012).
This study also analyzed other pollutants such as nitrogen dioxide, carbon monoxide and other fine particles. Each of these air pollutants is believed to affect sperm production, but no affect sperm density.
What causes the ozone mempu reduce sperm production remains unclear. Exposure to ozone is known to cause oxidative stress is known to interfere with testicular function and sperm.
Exposure to ozone can cause an inflammatory reaction, both in the male genital tract or form toxic chemicals that circulate in the body. Both could be expected to cause a decrease in sperm concentration.
"Many of the findings that demonstrate the potential hazards of the environment on the reproductive system. Some of them reported a decline in sperm counts in certain industrialized countries. The validity of these findings is still reaping the controversy. But most researchers agree that the decline in semen quality may be associated with the location geographically, "said Sokol.