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I feel like if I were to eat the SAME things for breakfast and lunch each day (i.e same calorie allowance daily) I would be able to manage things better. Sometimes if I eat what I call binge foods (used to have an eating disorder) I can blow out my entire days calories EASY.
Sooo do you or do you not eat the same foods? Obviously it's better for convenience but it would get boring pretttty fast. Or do you have a couple of different meals on rotation?
By Amy Norton
HealthDay ReporterTHURSDAY, May 9 (HealthDay News) -- Even the minor noise that fills everyday life, from the ring of a cell phone to the conversation that follows, may have short-term effects on heart function, a small new study suggests.
In the study of 110 adults equipped with portable heart monitors, researchers found that people's heart rate tended to climb as their noise exposure increased -- even when the noise remained below 65 decibels. That's about as loud as a normal conversation or laughter.
There was also a negative impact on people's heart rate "variability" -- a measure of the heart's adaptation to what is going on around you. Greater variability in the interval between heartbeats is better. When people are relaxed, the space between heartbeats is usually a bit longer as they exhale, and shorter as they inhale.
When people are stressed, however, some of that natural variation is lost. And studies have linked lesser heart rate variability to an increased risk of heart attack.
So does all of this mean you need to wear earplugs to protect your heart? Probably not, experts say.
For any one person, the effects of everyday noise on heart function may be small, said Charlotta Eriksson, a researcher at the Karolinska Institute, in Stockholm, Sweden. Eriksson was not involved in the study.
But since we are all exposed to noise, even a minor effect on heart health could be important on the broad "population level," said Eriksson, who has studied the effects of loud traffic -- from roads or airports -- on people's blood pressure and heart function.
Research has consistently found links between loud workplaces and an increased risk of heart disease, said Dr. Wenqi Gan, a researcher at North Shore-LIJ Health System's Feinstein Institute for Medical Research, in Manhasset, N.Y.
The evidence is more mixed when it comes to "community noise," like traffic sounds, said Gan, whose own research has found a connection.
He said the mixed results may be because it's difficult to weed out the effects of community noise on individuals. You might live in a noisy section of a big city, but have good, sound-muffling windows, for example.
"And some people are more sensitive to noise than others," Gan said. If noise affects the heart by stressing people out, he said, then your personal sensitivity to it would be important.
The new findings, reported in the May issue of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, are based on 110 adults who wore portable devices that measured their heart activity and noise exposure during their normal daily routines.
What was "interesting," Eriksson said, is that lower-level noise seemed to curb activity in the parasympathetic nervous system -- the branch of the nervous system that acts as a "brake," lowering heart rate and relaxing the blood vessels, for example.
By Robert Preidt
HealthDay Reporter
SUNDAY, Feb. 10 (HealthDay News) -- Short stretches of physical activity -- such as taking the stairs or raking leaves -- throughout the day can be just as beneficial as a trip to the gym, according to a new study.
Researchers looked at more than 6,000 American adults and found that this "active lifestyle approach" appeared to be as effective as structured exercise in providing health benefits such as preventing high blood pressure, high cholesterol and the group of risk factors known as metabolic syndrome that increases the risk for coronary artery disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes.
"Our results suggest that engaging in an active lifestyle approach, compared to a structured exercise approach, may be just as beneficial in improving various health outcomes," study author Paul Loprinzi said in an Oregon State University news release. "We encourage people to seek out opportunities to be active when the choice is available. For example, rather than sitting while talking on the phone, use this opportunity to get in some activity by pacing around while talking."
Loprinzi was a doctoral student at Oregon State University when he conducted the study. He is now an assistant professor of exercise science at Bellarmine University in Louisville, Ky.
The researchers also found that 43 percent of adults who did short bouts of exercise met the federal physical activity guidelines of 30 minutes a day, compared with less than 10 percent of those who did longer exercise sessions.
"You hear that less than 10 percent of Americans exercise and it gives the perception that people are lazy," study co-author Brad Cardinal, a professor of exercise and sports science at Oregon State, said in the news release. "Our research shows that more than 40 percent of adults achieved the exercise guidelines, by making movement a way of life."
The study was published in the January/February issue of the American Journal of Health Promotion.
Many people say they don't get enough exercise due to lack of time. These findings are promising in that they show that simply incorporating movement into everyday activities can provide health benefits, Cardinal said.
"This is a more natural way to exercise -- just to walk more and move around a bit more," he noted. "We are designed by nature as beings who are supposed to move. People get it in their minds: 'If I don't get that 30 minutes, I might as well not exercise at all.' Our results really challenge that perception and give people meaningful, realistic options for meeting the physical activity guidelines."
More information
The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute offers a guide to physical activity.
