Archive for Health
60 Minutes – Explosive – What mind can do to affect health
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Last night’s CBS Television News magazine, 60 Minutes, aired a segment that correspondent Lesley Stahl described as “explosive” in promos for the piece. The segment discussed the new scientific research that is creating a stir in the medical community.
Stahl interviewed psychologist Irving Kirsch, associate director of the Placebo Studies Program at Harvard Medical School. Kirsch’s research challenges the effectiveness of antidepressants. He said the difference between the effect of a placebo and the effect of an antidepressant is minimal for most people.
His specialty research has been the study of the placebo effect, — the usage of an unmedicated pill. Apparently, the fake pill creates an expectation of healing that is so powerful, symptoms are actually alleviated. During the segment, Stahl also spoke with psychiatrists who disagreed with Kirsch’s findings as well as another doctor whose own studies confirmed Kirsch’s analysis.
During the Kirsch interview, Stahl asserted, “But people are getting better taking antidepressants, I know them. We all know them.”
Kirsch responded, “People get better when they take the drug, but it’s not the chemical ingredients of the drugs that are making them better. It’s largely the placebo effect.” Read More→
Want health – try church?
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You say you were dragged to church every week? You didn’t want to go? Your mother insisted it was good for you?
Well, she was right. And in even more ways than she imagined.
Turns out, if you’re concerned about your health, church is the place to be. Read More→
Keeping yourself (and your horse) healthy
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Health and wellness are important to everyone. 80 percent of Internet users look for health information online. We want to be educated.
Yet, health information flows toward us even as we commute to work or relax at home. Advertisements repeatedly broadcast the symptoms of diseases and the side effects of applicable medications. But is this knowledge always helpful? Are we educating ourselves into illness and suffering, inducing problems with fearful predictions and images? Read More→
Spirituality rides back into the Health arena
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Some people are surprised to hear that spirituality ever had a role in healing. However, not counting this blog site, I believe you will hear more and more about the importance of spirituality in regards to health issues.
Perhaps we’ve all forgotten that religions and religious organizations were the first sponsors of medical care institutions.
For those asking whether spirituality and faith should have a place in health care discussions or for those questioning the interface of theology and medicine, Dr. Jeff Levin’s book, God, Faith, and Health: Exploring the Spirituality Healing Connection, supplies considerable talking points. Read More→
“Pain is just mental” – says Dallas Cowboy
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There is just one game left, the Super Bowl. The regular season of the NFL (National Football League) is complete. It was a special year. The Green Bay Packers flirted with a perfect season. Tim Tebow’s faith and dramatic comebacks stole many a headline. The Houston Texans even won their first playoff game. Yet, the New England Patriots and the New York Giants will now decide which team is the best of the best at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis on February 5.
I am a fan of the game. Although I spend more time watching games than I should admit, I spend even more helping to heal the pain and suffering of others. Therefore, it quickly caught my attention when Dallas Cowboys’ safety, Gerald Sensabaugh, recently said, “Pain is just mental.”
The news report I was reading stated that there are only a small number of football players who are able to complete a game with a strained arch and as well, play another game five days later. However, after he helped his team defeat the Miami Dolphins, Sensabaugh has been added to the list. Read More→
Acceptance of Spiritual Healing, An Uphill Climb
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Jane Sarasohn-Kahn reported on a Health 2.0 Spring Fling in her post at Disruptive Women in Heath Care.
She wrote:
Wellness and disease prevention were the meta-themes … Dr. Dean Ornish told the attendees in the standing-room-only ballroom space that the joy of living is a greater motivator than the fear of death. And the 1.0 version of managing health risks has been more the latter than the former. As a result, Ornish’s two decades of research have shown that health is more a function of lifestyle choices than it is drugs and surgery. In fact, people have a “spectrum” of choices to make based on their personal preferences — not a one-size-fits-all “diet,” Dr. Ornish has learned.
Descriptions such as Sarasohn-Kahn’s show that society is beginning to look up from the deck, — ascending above materialistic forms of healthcare. Sadly, however, it may be some time before people are ready to free climb to a purely spiritual system of effective healing. Read More→
Sin’s impact on Health
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There is a lot of suffering these days, it seems.
If I wanted to shoot hoops today, but the only sneakers I could find were a pair of size 8½ red high-tops, I’d be frustrated. I wear 9½, and that garish crimson just won’t do. However, if I went ahead and wore them for a game, how do you think my feet would feel afterward? Likely, I would pay a price the following day.
In the above example, we could call the impulsiveness and impatience a sin; and it illustrates the way in which sin impacts health by causing physical and emotional suffering. Anger, hate, envy, dishonesty, and all selfishness have unpleasant consequences. And sin causes more than blisters on toes. The entire body is affected by thought. For example, many are studying the role stress and emotions have on cardiovascular disease. (See WebMD article) How we feel is connected and subject to how we think.
Read More→
Praying away the cookies
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My most recent piece has been posted at CNN-Belief. Please check it out!
(CNN) – With Christmas cookies, fruitcake and eggnog tempting us at every corner, it is hard not to gain weight during the holiday season. Yet it is not just holiday foods that are enticing.
Oversized and disproportionate – that about sums it up when the average American is 20 pounds overweight. The director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently said, “Obesity, and with it diabetes, are the only major health problems that are getting worse in this country, and they are getting worse rapidly.”
Personally, I have been fortunate never to have had much of a problem with my weight. I was an active, slender, Texas kid. Our family didn’t have a television until Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, so my brothers and I spent countless hours playing outside. I always ran like a jack rabbit, especially after jumping the fence at our neighborhood riding stable. … read more
Find Keith on Twitter: @TexasCS
Related post: Health Benefits of Mistletoe?
Health Benefits of Mistletoe?
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The National Institutes of Health reports that 40 percent of Americans are actively seeking alternative approaches to health. Since this is the time of year that mistletoe begins popping up, I decided to look into any possible health benefits to this potential alternative.
After some investigating, I found that there is no measurable evidence to support claims of a healing effect or improved quality of life from the use of mistletoe extract. So, forget the mistletoe, perhaps, kissing is the key to better health.
It’s been reported that those who kiss their partner goodbye each morning live five years longer than those who don’t. Frequent kissing has scientifically been shown to stabilize cardiovascular activity, as well as decrease blood pressure and cholesterol. Is this why kissing under the mistletoe has been going on for decades? Read More→
Spirituality -> better mental health
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Kirsten Dunst (Photo by Francois Durand/Getty Images)
While promoting her role in the new Lars von Trier film, Melancholia, Kirsten Dunst recently revealed that she has experienced depression. In the film, Dunst plays the role of a woman named Justine who suffers severe mental illness.
Dunst’s admission is yet another celebrity disclosure. Carrie Fisher, Angelina Jolie, and Christina Ricci have all shared similar stories. Yet, there is hope for these women and for everyone.
Weeks ago, while in Durham, North Carolina, I attended a news briefing where the Wave III Baylor Religion Survey was unveiled. The survey confirmed what I have been discovering: Improved mental health is found through greater spiritual awareness. Read More→
