A recent study has found that people who do puzzles and crosswords may hold off dementia for longer but experience a more rapid decline once the disease sets in. There has long been speculation that “exercising” your brain using brain training methods could protect against Alzheimer’s, but there has been hardly any evidence to back this up.

The research team were from the Rush University Medical Center in Chicago and they recruited 1,157 people aged over 65 in the early 1990s.

The study has come out with a conclusion that doing puzzles and crosswords does delay dementia, but can increase the disease once it has set in.

A relatively new idea (at least in the Western world) that is gaining popularity in the UK is Baby (or infant) Massage. This involves tactile rubbing simulation as a way of developing the child’s physical and mental development. Although it has been prevalent in the sub-continent and China for centuries, baby massage is only just starting to glean interest from new parents in this part of the world.

As a new parent myself, I was eager to find out more about the idea of baby massage and was annoyed to find that there were only a very few NHS clinics that ran this service. I was eager to try out anything that may aid in the development of junior and hope to find a private company or consultant that may teach this potentially invaluable skill. So I will be keeping an eye out in my part of the world (Manchester / Cheshire)!

UPDATE: I have found one! Baby massage in Manchester and Cheshire

Food allergies are common among adults and children and below I have given you some information you may not know.

Around 1 of 5 people in the UK have a food allergy but they may not all know about them.

Symptoms of food allergies can include:
Skin Reactions
Upset stomach (diarrhea, vomiting)
breathing difficulties
Swelling of eyes

Some people can outgrow their food allergy but more often than not you don’t and have to find a way of living with this even though that may be harder done than said.

If you think you may be allergic to a form of food go to see your doctors who can diagnose correctly and let you know how to deal with this.

I recently took the course to be the first aider at my work place and it was a lot harder than i thought it would be.

This course is aimed to give you training on what to do if there is an emergency at your workplace but this can also be used in your every day life as well.

The course takes 3 days to complete and you have a practical test at the end of the 3rd day, i was petrified at having to do a practical test but it was not that bad and i passed with flying colours.

I would recommend this course even if you are not the chosen 1st aider as it is a good skill to have.

People being admitted to Hospital for weight loss surgery shot up by 55% last year from 5000 people in 2007-2008 to almost 8000 people in 2008-2009.

There are lots of health risks from putting on weight eg, type 2 diabetes, hear disease so you can see why the NHS are not too happy about this because not only are they having to perform weight loss surgery (eg stapeling, gastric band) but they are now having to deal with all the other problems people are getting.

I am not sure how this can be as there is currently a credit crunch but hey what do i know.

Not many people have a good excuse to be fat so i dont feel sorry for all of them.

I was recently sick and decided to look online to see if i could figure out what was wrong with me before going to the Doctors and went on the NHS Direct website as it has a tool which enables you to check your symptons  and get advice on how to treat your illness.

if you do not have access to the internet you can call 0845 4647 and speak to someone who can give you the same information.

You can also get advice on the recent Swine Flu virus that was spreading around the UK and other countries.

I think this is an excellent website and i urge other people to try it instead of going to a Doctor for little illnesses which enables them to look after the really sick people.

I have been trawling the internet for some tips on how to have a healthier life and i have listed below the ones i think can be easy to maintain.

1. Cut down on alcohol
2. Try and walk 10,000 steps per day
3. Swap junk food for healthy food
4. Quit smoking
5. Get to bed earlier and get more sleep
6. Get the kids active to make you more active
7. Swap fizzy pop to water as it is recommended you drink 3 liters a day

I am not sure about you but i think the above are all easy to start and also to carry on with.

Let me know how you get on…

In the news today they are still banging on about the over reaction of the government on swine flu. In most cases yes I agree it was a complete failure and misprediction on the government and health chiefs. It was classed as a global pandemic and predicted to kill thousands of people in its supposed second wave in winter. Now the hundreds of thousands of pounds the governments spent on the vaccine have now gone to waste, where the money could have been used on much more urgent things like the N.H.S or helping the poor folks out in Haiti after the devastating earthquake.

The first reports from Tuesdays earthquake disaster in the epicenter “Port-au-Prince” has been said to be apocalyptic with thousands left dead and hundreds made homeless. The survivors of Tuesday’s earthquake have said “things have become very desperate” with food and fresh drinking water running low. However there were was still some signs of hope as rescuers, after digging for hours managed to pull a live woman from the twisted ruins of a luxury hotel where she was staying at the time of the earthquake. Onlookers have said “it’s a miracle she is alive” after spending nearly a week without food or water trapped under the rubble. It has been estimated that the death toll has now reached a staggering twenty to thirty thousand, which may increase dramatically as more are found during the clean up process.

If you have had gastric problems like me, you will always wonder if the cause could be ulcers, luckily for me this was not the case, but there are many people who do have a long history of ulcers. A recent study has found that the bacterium that causes stomach ulcers has been linked to causing gastric cancer. However this is nothing to be conserved about as this is not 100% proven as no one really knows how gastric cancer is caused at present, just the bacterium has been found in gastric cancer. I would recommend though getting you checked out at the doctors just to be sure.