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4 Health Benefits Of Cycling Riding a bicycle, whether indoors or outdoors, can provide an excellent and affordable workout for people of all ages. Like most physical activities, it can also protect against obesity, heart disease, diabetes, low mood, etc. Here are four reasons to take up cycling on a regular basis. 1. Builds muscle and bone Whether you are cycling uphill or on level ground, the activity uses muscles in your shoulders, gluteus muscles in the buttocks, the quadriceps in the thighs, and more during the power phase. And during the recovery phase, hamstrings in the back of the thighs and the flexor muscles in the hips are used. The activation of several muscles can, in turn, also help with building healthy bones and preventing bone loss. "Resistance activities, such as pushing pedals, pull on the muscles, and then the muscles pull on the bone, which increases bone density,"  said  Dr. Clare Safran-Norton, a physical therapist at Bri...

  Asthma Linked To Infertility In Women: How Inflammation From The Condition Impacts More Than Just Your Lungs People suffering from asthma may also experience health issues in major organs not connected to the respiratory system due to inflammation that the condition causes. A  study  conducted at Bispebjerg University Hospital in Denmark determined that women with asthma are, on average, less fertile than women without asthma. "Our results shed light on the complex interactions between fertility and asthma,” said lead author Dr. Elisabeth Juul Gade in a  press release . “Although we observed women with asthma experiencing longer waiting times to pregnancy, our findings suggest that if women take their medication and control their asthma, they can reduce this delay.” Dr. Gade and her colleagues from the university recruited 15,000 female twins, under the age of 41, who lived in Denmark. Women were divided into those who suffered from asthma and those who di...

Secondhand Smoke Exposure Doubles Risk Of Hospital Asthma Readmission For Children Hospital statistics suggest that children exposed to secondhand smoke are significantly more likely to be readmitted within a year of being admitted for asthma, providing additional evidence that more efforts to limit exposure stand to alleviate a significant burden on public health. Dr. Robert Kahn, a director at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center and senior author of the new study, said in a  press release  that the alarming figures also illuminate a cost-effective way for pediatricians to fine-tune interventions and customize treatment for respiratory problems like asthma. By measuring levels of cotinine, the main breakdown product of nicotine, care providers will be able to spot a significant health factor in patients who may otherwise not report it. "The ability to measure serum and salivary cotinine levels presents the possibility of an objective measure that can be obtai...

Flesh-Eating Bacteria Early Signs: How To Know If You're Infected And What To Do Fever, chills and sudden sores all over your body — it sounds like the type of fatal disease affecting mankind in an apocalyptic movie. But the illness is real when someone is infected with flesh-eating bacteria. The condition known as necrotizing fasciitis, in which an infection rapidly kills the body’s soft tissue, comes when dangerous bacteria enters the bloodstream. One of the most recent cases was in September in Ocean City, Maryland, where a man was cleaning crab pots when Vibrio vulnificus bacteria got into a cut on his leg.  DelmarvaNow  reported  that the man, Michael Funk, fell ill within hours. “Days later, ulcerated and full of lesions, it was ‘like something out of a horror movie,’ his wife, Marcia, told the newspaper. The flesh-eating bacteria was in his bloodstream.” Funk died four days after getting the cut. Read:  How Your Body Fights Off a Fungus When one of t...

Causes Of Rheumatoid Arthritis: Gum Disease Bacteria Triggers Joint Inflammation, Latest Research Suggests Brushing your teeth, flossing, and rinsing regularly helps you maintain a healthy smile, and ward off gum disease. The accumulation of mouth bacteria not only affects your oral health, but also your joint health. A recent  study  in  Science Translational Medicine  found bacteria that causes gum disease may also trigger the onset of inflammation in rheumatoid arthritis (RA). “This research may be the closest we’ve come to uncovering the root cause of RA,” said Maximilian Konig, lead author, and a former Johns Hopkins scientist now at Massachusetts General Hospital,  in a statement . Read More: Smokers Who Overconsume Salty Foods Are At Twice The Risk For RA RA is an autoimmune condition where the body's immune cells attack the joints, which typically starts with the small joints of the hands and feet, causing inflammation, swelling, pain and stiffn...

Phantom Pain: Tricking The Human Brain May Ease Pain Of Missing Limbs   Scientists might one day be able to treat phantom limb pain with engineering instead of drugs. When people lose a limb or a piece of one, they often experience pain that appears to originate from the body part that is missing. “It can feel like a variety of things, such as burning, twisting, itching or pressure,” the  Amputee Coalition  explains. The phantom pain can last anywhere from minutes to years after an amputation. And those amputations, which  affect about 2 million people  in the U.S., are not just caused by trauma, but also result from cancer, diabetes and other diseases. There may be hope, however, for people with the chronic — and largely untreatable —  pain condition. A study published in  Nature Communications  suggests rewiring in the brain is what causes the phantom pain and that it can be alleviated with the help of artificial intelligence. Relate...

Have Insomnia? Researchers Identify Brain Circuit Responsible For Wakefulness, Sleep The way brain circuits control sleep-wake cycles and consciousness is considered an enigma in modern neuroscience. An understanding of these systems is crucial for any chance of developing better therapies for sleep issues, so intensive experimental research in the area is wanted. Alongside fellow researcher Carolina Gutierrez Herrera and a team from Germany, Antoine Adamantidis has made an important discovery in the field: a new brain circuit in mice whose activation causes rapid wakefulness while its inhibition deepens sleep. Mammalian sleep has been divided into two separate phases: The non-rapid eye movement sleep (a light sleep) and  REM sleep  (a deep, dreaming state). Scientists have identified brain structures important to the system before, but the precise underlying mechanisms, like the onset, maintenance, and termination of sleep and...