The Fat of the Land

Once you are ten pounds over your ideal weight each additional pound costs you a month of your life. Each pound slows you down, makes you less effective in personal encounters, and often lowers your self-image. Fat people are hospitalized more frequently than people of normal weight; they have more gallbladder problems, more surgical complications, more cases of breast cancer, more high blood pressure, heart attacks, and strokes. They also develop atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) at earlier ages. These facts are well-known.

It is less commonly known that the fat person cannot even eat much more than his or her thin counterpart. A day’s food represents about one pound of body weight: if you fast, on average you lose a pound a day; if you eat double, you gain a pound. Thus, if you gain ten pounds each year, you will be very fat, but this weight gain represents only an additional ten-days worth of food over the year, or approximately 3 percent. The fat person can eat only 1 to 5 percent more than a thin person.

We respect the difficulty of this problem, and we share these difficulties with you. But the solutions are personal, not medical. A few people have glandular illnesses that cause their weight problem, but for most of us the problem is not a medical one. As with the other habits that change health, management of the problem begins with its recognition as a problem. Weight control requires lifelong discipline and vigilance. It is not easy.

There are generally two phases to weight control: the weight reduction phases and the weight maintenance phase. The method you use to lose weight doesn’t matter too much (although liquid-protein diets are some what dangerous), and you can choose from any of a number of sound diets. Diets usually have a gimmick of some kind which encourages you and helps you remember the diet. Most people have some success with losing weight; if you se a target, tell people what you are trying to do, and stick with it for a while you can probably lose weight.

Weight Maintenance at your new weight is more difficult. Weigh yourself regularly and record the weight on a chart. Draw a red line at three pounds over your desired weight and maintain you weight below the line, using whatever method you need. Accept no excuses for increasing weight; it is easier and healthier to make frequent, small adjustments in what you eat than to try to counteract binges of overeating with dieting. Keep yourself off the roller coaster. You have to choose between calories and complications, early diet and early demise.

THE DRUG SCENE

All drugs can be used to excess, with harmful consequences. The major drugs of our society are alcohol, nicotine, and caffeine, and each has its well-known problems. But there are two other categories of drugs whose consequences are more easily ignored: the illegal or “street” drugs, and the various “happiness pills” obtained with a doctor’s prescription.

Marijuana is a rather mild drug with a soothing effect. However, experiments indicate that large amounts of marijuana administered over a long period of time may cause genetic damage in animals. Heavy use is associated with loss of motivation in many individuals. Marijuana has been used extensively by young people and has adversely affected their early life decisions regarding further schooling and choice of occupation. Its medical consequences are presently not well known. Marijuana users are fond of saying that their drug is not as hazardous as alcohol or cigarette smoking; this statement will probably prove to be false, but even if it were true, it is a very naive kind of argument. Armed robbery is not as bad as murder, but this is a rather weak justification for armed robbery.

Amphetamines and “speed” stimulate the body, creating an illusion of extra energy, but they almost certainly increase some forms of heart disease by constricting the small blood vessels. It is now generally agreed that they have almost no medical use, their prescription is much more tightly controlled than it was five years ago, and tragedies such as that which occurred to Elvis Presley have increased public awareness of the problems posed by these agents.

The “hard” drugs and narcotics (such as heroin, cocaine, morphine, Demerol, and methadone) have potential for fatal overdose, and addiction invariably leads to social degeneration of the user. A large fraction of crimes, both violent and nonviolent, are related to these drugs; not because the user is directly crazed by the drug but because money must be obtained to buy more. Recently, there has been some “fashionable” use of cocaine in social circles noted more for their high income and personal idiosyncrasies than for their good sense. Cocaine is a highly dangerous drug, and do not let anyone tell you differently. Stay away from it!

Legal drugs are no less hazardous than illegal drugs, but because they are “respectable,” we forget their hazards. The number of prescriptions for these drugs is going down, and we hope that Take care of yourself has had something to do with the decline in their sales. These drugs hinder your taking care of yourself. During the period of peak use, more than one out of every of every six people in the United States were regularly using a prescribed mood-changing drug. Even now, such drugs are in first and second place of all drugs prescribed and hold eight positions in the top twenty prescription drugs used – a truly shocking indictment.

Tranquilizers, in the language of the street, are “downers.” These have been the most popular mood-changing drugs and include Valium, Librium, Equanil, Miltown, and others. They used to be prescribed when a patient reported “nervousness” or “anxiety,” or as a quick and satisfactory method of getting the patient out of the office. That is, they were given for symptoms reflecting difficulty in coping; but “downers,” like alcohol, further impair one’s ability to cope with the immediate environment. One standard tablet of the stronger of these medications (such as Librium or Valium) is roughly equivalent, as a sedative, to one alcoholic drink. Most would agree that taking one or two drinks three times a day is not the best way to solve life’s problems.

Sedatives may also be given to “help” patients sleep. Insomnia, while a troublesome complaint, is not often helped by sleeping pills. The body’s instinct for sleep is extremely powerful; sleep is demanded by the body when it is needed. Many adults require only six hours of sleep, and this amount appears to decrease with age. A feeling of poor sleep one night often leads to an early bad time the next night; this leads to a restless night with periods of wakefulness, causing the patient to think sleep has been inadequate, and a vicious cycle begins. True insomnia requiring medical care is unusual. Sedatives, which do not simulate natural sleep vary closely, are seldom needed.

If you do use sedatives, you or your child may die of an overdose of them. They affect enzymes in the liver, and can lead to complications when other drugs are used at the same time. They may carry over into a morning hangover, and they increase the chance that your children won’t listen to you when you tell them about the evils of their drugs.

“Uppers,” usually amphetamines, used to be prescribed in a misguided attempt to help patients lose weight. They do not assist in weight reduction, except very temporarily, and many studies have demonstrated the futility of weight reduction programs based on the use of these agents. They cause severe mood changes, tightening of the small arteries, and impose an extra strain on the heart. Amphetamines were once used in the athletic arena by trainers and players because they create the illusion of physical prowess. However, careful studies in track- and field events, where direct measurement of performance is possible, indicate that amphetamines neither help nor hinder performance at events such as the hundred-yard dash or the mile run but have a tendency to impair performance in such events as the hurdles or pole vault which require close coordination.

Drugs are Chemicals. The drugs you swallow react in the bloodstream, with other drugs or with various chemicals already made by your body. If several drugs are taken together, the complexity of their interactions is such that no physician or scientist can adequately analyze the situation. Almost any medical symptom can represent a side effect of a drug or a combination of drugs. Between 10 to 20 percent of all hospital admissions are now felt to represent complications of prescription drugs. The great majority of the drugs that have caused these reactions were medically optional and were not required to maintain the health of the patient. Medications sometimes help to eliminate disease, but they do not make you healthy; do not look for health in a pill bottle.

THE TWO-MARTINI LUNCH

The drinking of alcoholic beverages is a social custom for the great majority of adults in the United States. In moderation this custom may improve circulation, reduce blood pressure, and act as a relatively mild and safe tranquilizer. However, 10 percent of our population have serious drinking problems. These people constitute over 20 percent of all hospitalized patients. They typically suffer from one or more of a set of related serious problems; cirrhosis of the liver, ulcer disease, bleeding from the bowel, premature senility, and vitamin deficiencies are among the most frequent. Sometimes they show signs of severe mental psychosis, and they may exhibit the spectacular “delirium tremens” – the “DT’s” or “the shakes.” They drive automobiles into immovable objects or innocent folks with a frequency that is truly alarming; deaths related to alcohol represent nearly one-half of all deaths in young adult life. Suicide and homicide are frequently related to alcohol use.

Alcohol is high in calories. It may increase obesity, as in a “beer belly,” and it thereby increases other health problems related to obesity. People who drink heavily tend to eat less nutritional food. This can result in a variety of nutritional problems as well as cirrhosis of the liver.

Treatment of the alcoholic continues to be a frustrating, often unsuccessful venture. Within the medical community, enthusiasm for a wide variety of treatment methods waxes and wanes. Non-medical organizations, especially alcoholics Anonymous, enjoy a success rate that is at least equal to that of any “medical” treatment. Associated organizations, such as Al Anon, which work with the families of alcoholics, also show considerable promise. The key elements of these treatments are that they deal with motivated people who truly wish to change, and the treatments continually reinforce the subject’s desire to remain free of alcoholic influence.

When should you seek help? Everyone has a different definition of how much alcohol is too much, and the amount probably is different for different people. You should seek help if you have problems with alcohol, and you should not make excuses for the problems. Face up to them. Here are some of the frequent signals that you need help: a drunken driving citation, an automobile accident after two or more drinks, missing work because of feeling poorly from drinking the night before, a pattern of work absences on Monday mornings, a hospitalization for an alcohol-related problem such as gastritis or upper bowel hemorrhage, inability to function at top efficiency in the afternoon because of a two-martini lunch or its equivalent. If you develop the insight that you have these serious problems and that your situation must be changed, you are a good candidate for successful treatment.

COFFIN NAILS

Cigarette smoking, it says on the pack, may be hazardous to your health. This is the most harmful of the personal vices, and is fortunately becoming less socially acceptable. Physicians rate smokers by their number of “pack-years,” which is the number of packs per day multiplied by the number of years that you have smoked. For example, if you have smoked two packs per day for five years, you are a ten pack-year smoker. For each pack-year that you smoke, you decrease your life expectancy by about one month. You greatly increase your chance of sudden death. A heavy smoker, smoking two packs daily for thirty years, or sixty pack-years, has decreased his or her life expectancy by five years.

THE CIGARETTE SMOKER

More Heart Attacks (x2)
More strokes (x4)
More Lung Cancer (x300)
More Emphysema (x300)
More skin Wrinkles (x4)
More High Blood Pressure (x2)

Other bad things happen too. The physical reserve of the cigarette smoker is decreases. Smokers are less healthy, less vigorous, have less active sex lives, and appear to develop skin wrinkles at earlier ages. They spend twice as much time in the hospital as nonsmokers.

Just as important, the last years of a cigarette smoker are not a period of grace and beauty. Tortured wheezing, swollen purple lips, and the feeling of suffocation mark these years. In medical slang, the late-stage cigarette smoker is termed a “blue bloater.” Fortunately, present evidence suggests that the ex-cigarette smoker can regain much lost function and improve life expectancy, although not back to that of the nonsmoker. Pipe and cigar smoke, when not inhaled, is less hazardous and accounts for only a fraction of the problems created by inhaled cigarette smoke, but smoking a pipe or cigar can also certainly decrease your social acceptability. The militant nonsmoker (“Would you mind putting out that cigarette?”) is a constructive new social phenomenon, and the smokers are being packed into smaller and smaller spaces in the back of the airplane. The hazards of “second-hand smoke” are real, although relatively small, and many people feel that forced exposure to the smoke of others is deeply offensive. Five up your cigarettes and avoid the hassles.

Fitness

Probably the most important lifetime habit is active exercise. Body parts need to be used to work will; use them or lose them. Our organs tend to rust out more quickly than they wear out.

Without exercise the muscles get flabby. The bones become brittle. The sex drive decreases. The heart muscle becomes soft; in medical terms “cardiac reserve” is lost. The weakened heart muscle is less able to respond to the needs of stressful situations. The body cells cannot use oxygen as efficiently. The reflexes decay, and falls and accidents become more likely.

Exercise is the key to many of the health risk factors. It helps with weight control, decreases cholesterol, lowers pulse and blood pressure, helps counter stress, and helps prevent depression. It increases physical reserve, improves stamina during the working day, and promotes personal confidence.

Your exercise program should be pleasurable, and almost all people obtain deep satisfaction from their exercise program after it has become a habit. It is the initial undertaking and perseverance that are difficult. You don’t have enough time? Exercise is the activity that adds time to your day by increasing your stamina, and it adds vigorous years to your life.

Exercise should be regular, at least four days a week. It should be “aerobic,” so that it conditions the heart and the oxygen-utilization mechanisms; this means steady exercise for at least fifteen minutes that is sufficient to raise the heart rate and break a sweat.

Exercise should be undertaken gradually, to allow the body to prepare for the next level of activity. You may require many months or even several years to develop your full program. Be gentle in the beginning, increasing your activity slowly as you feel the ability and the desire. If your activity is causing discomfort, you are progressing too rapidly.

The particular activity matters little and can be freely chosen. Jogging is currently the most popular, but it has no particular advantages over other forms of exercise. We have been regular runners for many years and enjoy the solitude of the fields and hills. Other people like to run on a track, whim, bicycle, walk, or jump rope. Some sports, such as basketball and soccer, can give aerobic exercise. Your particular choice is much less important than choosing an activity that gives you pleasure, one you can anticipate continuing for a long period of time. Schedule the activity into your routine: an early morning or lunchtime or cocktail-hour run, bicycling to work a time for swimming, a brisk walk after breakfast.

Even if your work is physical, you need an exercise program; you will find that it helps you to maintain your energy level at work. Very few physical jobs require aerobic exercise, and lifting and pushing at intervals throughout the day, while tiring, is not good conditioning. Then too, there are psychological benefits from exercise programs that are freely undertaken, from the voluntary decision to take personal responsibility.

People who exercise tend to become intolerable converts, and their new euphoria is often translated into missionary zeal. Many overly detailed exercise formulas have been promoted, but in fact, common sense is your best guide. The body was designed for a less pampered life than we have given it over recent decades, and it works better if used more. You need to decide how to translate this general principal into your own life.

Your Habits and your health

For the most part, your health is upon to you. You can do much more than any physician to maintain your health and well-being. To do this, you have to get in the habit of health. At the age of fifty, individuals with good health habits are physically thirty years younger than individuals with poor health habits; you can have a physical age of sixty-five or a physical age of thirty-five. It’s up to you.

Your doctor’s examination of your heart will not prevent a heart attack, but you can greatly decrease chances of a heart attack by maintaining a good diet and exercising, and by not smoking cigarettes. You don’t really need physician to remind you that alcohol acts to destroy the liver and stomach lining, or that you can avoid lung diseases if you quit smoking tar-laden cigarettes, or that fat people have more health problems than slim people. You already know these things, and your destiny is controlled by your decisions.

In contrast, surprisingly few diseases can be prevented by actions of the physician. On occasion, the physician may detect an illness, such as high blood or cancer, at any early stage, and appropriate medical treatment can contribute significantly to you long-term health. Unfortunately, at the present time there is no way that your doctor can halt the progression of our major chronic diseases such as atherosclerosis, diabetes, osteoarthritis, emphysema, cirrhosis, and cancer of the lung. Perhaps it would be nice if the doctor could do it and you could avoid the responsibility, but this is not possible.

If we could eliminate all unhealthy habits, what would happen? Lung cancer and emphysema would almost completely disappear, death due to all cancers as group would decrease by almost one-half, cirrhosis of the liver would become a rare disease. Peptic ulcers and gastritis would decrease greatly, massive upper GI bleeding (bleeding from the stomach) would become unusual, pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas) would be rare. High blood pressure would be less common, and there would be fewer strokes and heart attacks. Atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries) would occur less frequently. We could eliminate one-half of the hospital beds now available. The cost of medical care would decrease, the price paid for the expensive bad habits would be saved, and the consumer would have more pocket money. The number of sick days would decrease by over one-half, and the national productivity would rise. An incredible set of possibilities!

Without the help of the patient, medicine can make no such promises. It is up to each of us. Here we review some of the habits that directly affect our health.

Hypertension

High BP is one of the 3 main risk factors for heart attack and stroke.

The other risk factors are smoking and raised blood cholesterol levels.

Lowering blood pressure ( and lowering blood cholesterol) saves lives.

If your blood pressure is consistently over 160/90mmHg, your doctor would tell you that you have hypertension. But generally speaking, the lower your blood pressure, the better. If your pressure is between 140/90 and 160/90mmHg, then you may be diagnosed as having ‘border line’ hypertension. Blood pressure readings are a remarkably accurate predictor of life expectancy: the higher the pressure, the greater the risk of heart disease than people with lower than average levels.

For this reason, it has been extremely difficult to find a working definition of hypertension. Perhaps the most sensible view is to define it as ‘that level of blood pressure where treatment with anti-hypertensive drugs does more good than harm’, because there is no such thing as drug treatment that does not have some potential side effects.

If your BP is found to be more than 160/90 mmHg, and if you have several different risk factors for heart disease, such as high cholesterol, being a smoker and a family tendency to heart disease, then treating your high BP is likely to be very worth-while. On the other hand, for some young people with only marginally raised blood pressure, and no other risk factors for heart disease, the value of BP lowering drugs is very small and drug treatment may therefore be held back. However it is however, crucial that such people are re-checked at regular intervals of about 6 months.

Hypertension has been called the ‘silent killer’ because it usually causes no symptoms until a late stage of the disease, contrary to what many people believe, it is not possible to feel you own blood pressure. The only way to find out whether your blood pressure is raised is to have it measured with a BP machine. As BP causes no symptoms until complications begin to show themselves, about half of all individuals who have it remain unaware that they have a problem.

WHY HYPERTENSION MATTERS:

Blood vessels are like rubber tubes that carry blood constantly to wherever it is needed. Arteries have to withstand the great pressures with which the blood is pumped out of the heart. If the BP is higher than usual over many years, as in untreated hypertension, the vessel gets damaged. The lining of the arteries can become rough and thick, and this eventually causes them to narrow and become less flexible, or elastic, than previously, this is known as arteriosclerosis. If an artery becomes too narrow, Blood cannot get through properly, and the part of the body that relies on that artery for its blood supply is starved of blood and the all important oxygen that it carries. As the artery narrows there is an increased tendency to develop blood clots (thrombosis), which may cause total blockage of the artery so that the part of the body that it serves dies, If the heart or the brain is affected, the dead area is called an infarct.

OTHER RISK FACTORS: High BP over many years can cause health problems, and the whole point of measuring BP regularly, and treating it effectively if it is high, is to prevent these complications. However, you are more likely to develop these complications if you smoke and if you have untreated high blood cholesterol levels. The reason is that smoking damages blood vessels in much the same way as high BP, making them narrower and their lining thick and rough. High cholesterol can cause fatty deposits called arthromeres in the lining of the artery to develop more rapidly than normal, which also helps to narrow the arteries. It is not possible for your level of serum cholesterol to be too low, and treatment to lower cholesterol saves lives. Another common risk factor that can also contribute to narrowing of the arteries is diabetes (diabetes mellitus), which affects 4 to 5 percent of the population and a greater proportion of the indigenous population. High glucose levels in the blood damage arteries in a similar way as high BP. But it would not do to paint too gloomy a picture.

Its better to have your BP checked than feel sorry at a later stage:

The whole point of having your BP checked is that if you are found to have hypertension, it is possible to treat it effectively and thus bring down to normal. It does not matter particularly how severe the hypertension was in the first place. What is really important is how well your blood pressure is controlled over the ensuing years. It is better to have had severe hypertension that has been well treated than to have slightly raised blood pressure that remains untreated or neglected.

LONG TERM EFFECTS OF HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE:

The heart is a muscle that needs its own blood supply, which is brought to it by the coronary arteries. If these arteries are narrow, blood does no get to the heart muscle efficiently, the heart needs to work a bit. Harder than usual, E.g when your walking up a hill the heart muscle cannot get the blood supply and oxygen that it needs. This causes pain in the chest, known as myocardial is chaemia or angina. If a coronary artery narrows and then a blood clot forms, the part of the heart muscle that relies on that coronary artery dies.

This is known as coronary thrombosis, a myocardial infarction or a heart attack.

Over the years, as arteries narrow and become less elastic as a result of hypertension, it gets harder and harder for the heart to pump blood out efficiently to he rest of the body. The increased work load eventually damages the heart and impairs it’s performance. Fluid collects in the lungs, causes shortness of breath. This is known as congestive cardiac failure.

Narrowing of an artery that carries blood and oxygen to the brain can lead o temporary loss of function in he part of the brain served by that artery, this is known as Transient Ichaemic Attack (TIA). Permanent closing off of the artery with a blood clot results in the death of the part of the brain reliant on that artery, which results in a stroke.

Smaller blood vessels in the legs can be damaged, resulting in the legs getting damaged, resulting in less blood getting to the feet and pain in the calf muscles on walking.

When blood vessels supplying the kidneys are affected, the result may be gradual kidney damage. This is why a blood test to check kidney function is a vital part of regular check ups for any one with hypertension.

The small blood vessels in the eyes can also be affected, although this may not become apparent until the damage is extensive. Rarely, in severe hypertension there may be damage to the retinal with haemorrhages. This condition is called malignant hypertension, although with treatment the outlook is very good.

Oh! Pain in the Neck?!

Oh! Pain in the Neck?!

Neck pain, at times, can become pain in the neck' quite literally. People who have experienced neck pain alone know how painful the neck pain can turnout to be.

Neck is one of the most flexible regions of the spine, which consists of vertebrae, seven shock absorbing discs, muscles, and vertebral ligaments to hold them in place. The uppermost cervical disc connects the top of the spinal column to the base of the skull. The spinal cord, which sends nerve impulses to every part of the body, runs through a canal in the cervical vertebrae and continues all the way down the spine.

What Causes neck pain?

Most people experience neck pain at some point in their lives. Neck pain can be acute, lasting for few hours or a few weeks, or it can be chronic. Neck pain that lasts several weeks or longer is considered chronic neck pain.

Neck pain can be caused by an activity or injury or by a medical condition. Your head and neck region is vulnerable to many different stresses. Bad posture can cause misalignment of your neck, head, and spine. Car accidents can cause whiplash. Age and wear and tear can cause arthritis. Even activities such as chewing gum and reading in bed and cause pain. How do we avoid these potential problems? And if we can’t avoid them, how can we recover as quickly as possible.

Non-specific neck pain

Many people develop a stiff and painful neck for no obvious reason. It may happen after a minor twisting injury, for example while gardening. Since the underlying cause for this type of neck pain is not fully understood hence it is called ‘non-specific neck pain’ Having non-specific neck pain does not mean that your neck is damaged. Often it happens in people whose necks would appear completely normal under an x-ray. It is the most common type of neck pain and disappears after a few days.

Activities that cause neck pain

Neck pain mostly is caused by activities that result in repeated or prolonged movements of the neck’s muscles, ligaments, tendons, bones, or joints. This can result in a strain(an overstretched or overused muscle), a sprain (injury to a ligament), a spasm of the neck muscles, or inflammation of the neck joints.

• Holding your head in a forward or odd position for long periods of time while working, reading, watching TV, or talking on the telephone.
• Sleeping on a pillow that is too high or too flat or doesn’t adequately support your head, or sleeping on your stomach with your neck twisted or bent.
• Spending long periods of time resting your forehead on your upright fist or arm.
• Work that uses the upper body and arms, such as painting a ceiling or other overhead work.

Injuries that cause neck pain

The Spine consists of interlocking bones(vertebrae) and discs that separate the vertebrae. The portion of the spine that runs through the neck is known as the cervical spine. Muscles and ligaments in the neck hold the cervical spine together. Injury to any of these structures may result in neck pain.

Minor injuries may occur from tripping or from excessive motion of the cervical spine. Severe neck injuries may occur from whiplash in an accident, falls from significant heights, direct blows to the face or the back or top of the head, sports-related injuries , a penetrating injury such as a stab wound, or pressure applied to the outside of the neck, such as strangulation.

Pain from an injury may be sudden and severe. Bruising and swelling may develop soon after the injury. Sudden (acute) injuries can result in strain and pain in the neck, dislocation of the spin, or a ruptured disc.

Medical conditions that cause neck pain

Neck pain may be caused by or related to medical conditions such as:

• Cervical Spinal Stenosis
• Cervical Spondylosis
• Illnesses, such as meningitis, which cause inflammation around the tissues of the brain and spinal cord.
• Chronic conditions such as fibromyalgia, rheumatoid arthritis, or ankylosing spondylitis
• Torticollis (wryneck): Torticollis is caused by severe muscle tightness or a shortened muscle on one side of the neck, causing the head to be tilted to one side.
• Referred pain: Referred pain occurs when a problem in one place in the body causes pain in another place. For example, a problem with your jaw or your heart can cause neck pain.
• Infection or a tumor in the neck area.
  

Signs and Symptoms

Neck pain takes many forms. Signs and symptoms of neck pain may include:

• Pain in your neck that may be sharp or dull
• Stiffness in your neck
• Difficulty going about your daily tasks because of pain or stiffness in your neck
• Shoulder pain in addition to neck pain, in some cases
• Back pain in addition to neck pain, in some cases
  

Help yourself to prevent neck pain

Take frequent breaks: Don’t sit in one place for a long time, such as your car or at your desk.
Arrange some of the items in your office that cause inconvenience. This will force you to get up, stretch or walk around.

Maintain good neck posture:
Adjust the seat of your computer or desk chair so that your hips are slightly higher than your knees. Your head and neck will naturally follow in the correct position. While traveling in a car, airplane or train, place a small pillow or rolled towel between your neck and a head rest to keep the normal curve in your neck.

Avoid too many pillows:
Avoid sleeping with too many pillows or falling asleep in front of the television with your head on the arm of a couch.

Exercise: Treat your body to a consistent regimen of stretching and strengthening to balance your muscle groups. This protects your neck as well as helping your whole body. Walking at any pace is excellent exercise for your neck. The rotation of the spine provides a great natural workout for the neck muscles.

Eat smart and Drink water:

Good nutrition and staying well hydrated are not only important to stay healthy, but vital in the healing process.

Swim 2 Slim

Swimming is a great relaxing and helathy activity and for many it is a form of exercise. Swimming is one of the most popular forms of aerobic excecise, and an excellent activity for anyone who wishes to get fit and stay active.

Swimming recruits all the major muscle groups, including the shoulders, back abdominals, legs, hips, and glutes. Regular swimming builds Endurance, Muscle strength and Cardio-Vascular fitness. It can serve as a cross-training element to your regular workouts. Swimming with increasing effort gradually increases your heart rate and stimulates your muscle activity.

The density of the human body is approximately similar to that of water. The body is supported by the water and less stress is therefore placed on joints and bones. Since the buoyancy of the water protects the joints, exercise is a particularly good choice for people who are overweight or who are prevented from taking part in other activities because of injuries or other physical limitations. Therefore, swimming is frequently used as an exercise in rehabilitation after injuries or for the disabled. For most adults, the upper body is the weakest part of the body is the weakest part of the body. In swimming you can get an upper body workout and a lower-body workout, unlike running or biking or other activities like tennis, where you ge a good workout for just the legs. In addition, as with most aerobic exercises it is believed to reduce the harmful effects of stress.

Swimming helps you shape your body. It is effective to burn fat.

More effectively that the other exercises as the resistance in the water is a lot more that on the ground and a swimmer has to face tremendous pressure while swimming. That is the reason why a short span of swimming exercise can give the benefit of losing more fat as compared to the long term ground exercise.

Swimming helps pregnant women strengthen their abdominal and shoulder areas. It reduces the stress and stiffness because of carrying a baby. It improves blood circulation and keeps a good and balanced blood flow throughout the body.

Swimming consumes a large amount of calories. According to the latest studies a half and hour of swimming exercise can burn more than 1100 calories. So it can be considered as an ideal exercise for weight loss!

People who go and dip in the water will actually enjoy several benefits of swimming ---- physically, psychologically, emotionally, and socially. Physically, it gives a whole body conditioning, without giving any painful after effects of the exercises like strained muscles or overworked bones and joints or injuries. Psychologically, it gives the mind some moments of peace and calmness by just concentrating on the water and the strokes. Emotionally, it allows you to vent your anger, stress, or frustration by shouting underwater or punching and kicking the water, thus not hurting anyone. Socially, it serves as bonding times with family and friends or a time to meet new people.