The EU Medicines Directive has decided that Orlistat, a weight-loss drug, can go on sale over the counter. You’ll be able to buy it without a prescription from pharmacies, and online. The difference between the over-the-counter version and the prescription variety will be the dose: the usual prescription strength is 120mg three times a day […]
Continue Reading →Can cereals reduce high cholesterol?
We have come a long way since the humble bowl of Corn Flakes. Kellogg’s signature cereal was famous for being best enjoyed with “ice cold” milk. Its latest cereal product, Optivita, is being sold along far more complicated lines. Current television advertisements for Optivita proudly proclaim that the cereal has been approved by Heart UK, […]
Continue Reading →Are big ears the secret of a long life?
Why do men’s ears get bigger as they age? I don’t know, I told my editor, but I shall try to find out. Medical school teaches you a lot of things but this wasn’t one of them. The resource most likely to help answer such ponderables is PubMed, an online resource that replaced the book-bound […]
Continue Reading →Why work is good for you
Getting out of bed on a January morning can be tough. It’s cold outside, it’s warm under the duvet and you’re tired after another late night. The very last thing you feel ready for is work. But we should ignore any negative messages our mind and body mischievously send us about having a lie-in – […]
Continue Reading →Stay healthy in 2009 (in 10 easy steps)
1 Expect a long life “If I had known I was going to live this long I’d have taken better care of myself.” It’s a quip attributed to, among others, Mark Twain, Jimmy Durante and George Burns – and one reason it’s so popular is that there’s truth in it. Burns cracked that joke on […]
Continue Reading →Pitfalls of a health column
When I suggested, a while back, that walking was fabulous for health, I thought I was giving readers of this column sound advice. All the evidence suggests that it’s good for mental, physical and environmental health, as well as being something many people find pleasurable. Who, I thought, could object? Well, the man who wrote […]
Continue Reading →World’s poorest left out from breakthroughs
Sometimes, it is easy to recognise a good idea. Oral rehydration solution, a simple sugar and salt formula, costs about 10 cents per packet. Since its development in the 1970s, it has saved millions of people, mainly in the developing world, from dying of diarrhoea. It could well have saved those in Zimbabwe who, in […]
Continue Reading →The President’s records
When it was announced that both the presidential candidates were allowing sight of medical information about them to be read and reported on by journalists, I was slightly perturbed. Sure, I could see that perhaps the knowledge that one had no outstanding concerns with their health might – might – have some kind of relevance […]
Continue Reading →‘Normal’ cholesterol: to treat or not to treat?
Much ado with a new paper published by the New England Journal of Medicine . This study was placebo controlled and focused on treating people with “normal” cholesterol but a high “c-reactive protein” (a marker of inflammation) with rosuvastatin (which is not a new statin as some media outlets have reported, but one already in use). Reports have […]
Continue Reading →Lonlieness and social cohesion
Help the Aged have released details of a survey today. They conclude that 1.4m older people in the UK feel socially isolated and that 1.25m are often or always lonely. I am often dubious about the way in which surveys are interpreted. However, the findings of this survey do bear out many of the sadder observations made in general […]
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