Preventive Medicine

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More than half of American women over the age of 60 take vitamin D and calcium supplements, but the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force said this week that they're probably wasting their money. In a new recommendations from the federal government's expert panel on preventive medicine, the task force says that most postmenopausal women should not take vitamin D and calcium to reduce their risk of bone fractures. The dosages assessed were 400 international units (IUs) of vitamin D3 and 1,000 milligrams of calcium per day. The conclusions are based on an analysis of six randomized trials designed to study the health effects of vitamin D and calcium supplements.

It seems it never ends. Once you've set up a portfolio, conventional wisdom says, you're supposed to rebalance it--reevaluating annually, looking at what's gotten out of whack and shifting money away from the winners and toward the losers. Guess what? Going through the hassle of rebalancing wouldn't have made a heck of a lot of difference to your portfolio's performance over the last two decades. Nonetheless, rebalancing is a sound strategy and still may prove helpful.

Re "French unveil 75% supertax," Sept. 29 The article forgets to mention what the French get in return for their high tax rates. All French citizens have access to nearly free medical care, and in emergencies, doctors make house calls. The French get paid maternity leave for 16 weeks and free medical leave to take care of a sick relative. Nurses visit homes for free, private day care is heavily subsidized and parents receive a subsidy for every child born. Single parents get an additional allowance.

Exercise can help older people avert a form of arthritis that can turn ordinary activities such as getting out of bed into a painful, perhaps impossible, chore, a study finds. Those who regularly walked or did weight training were less likely to lose abilities to perform activities of daily living, such as getting out of bed, the study says.

Childhood vaccinations and anti-smoking counseling for adults are the most effective preventive medicine, says a new study that ranks medical services based on how many lives they save and how much they cost. The findings also suggest that some of the best preventive measures--such as screening for colon cancer and warning teenagers about drugs--are reaching surprisingly few Americans.

To stay healthy when you travel abroad, divide the world into three regions: Region I. Good Health Standards: most of Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Japan. Region II. Fair Health Standards: Greece, Spain, Portugal, southern Italy, Eastern Europe, Israel, Singapore, South Africa, the islands of the Caribbean (except Haiti and the Dominican Republic). Region III. Unreliable Health Standards: Mexico, Central and South America, Africa, most of Asia, Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

A ground-breaking safety proposal--a plan intended to protect all employees in California from the rapidly spreading ailments known as cumulative trauma disorders--comes under its first public scrutiny today. The proposed standard, the subject of a hearing in Los Angeles, marks the first comprehensive effort by any state to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome, bursitis and other physical problems linked to repetitive on-the-job activities.

"Age fast, age slow--it's up to you." That's the message of Dr. Kenneth H. Cooper, the man who coined the term "aerobics" with the publication of his 1968 best-seller of the same name. Cooper, founder and president of the Aerobics Center in Dallas, brought his message to the Crystal Cathedral on Friday, the final day of the three-day "Prime Time: A Possibility Thinkers Conference for Retired Persons (and Those Anticipating Retirement)."

The use of alternative treatments for serious illnesses got a major boost Tuesday when one of the nation's largest health insurers said it would reimburse the costs of a non-surgical therapy for heart disease. The therapy, which uses a vegetarian diet, exercise, meditation and support groups to reverse the disease, was developed by Dr. Dean Ornish, an internist and director of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute in Sausalito. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co.

As a parent, I never wished popularity on my children; it takes a lot of work to stay on top. And researchers have come up with a reason I hadn't thought of: Popular kids are more likely to smoke cigarettes, they say. The conclusion, published Wednesday in the Journal of Adolescent Health, is based on surveys among teenagers in ninth and 10 th grades at seven predominantly Latino high schools in the Los Angeles area. It confirms previous studies about high school students in the U.S. and Mexico.

Americans eat too damn much. And we all pay a rising cost for this gluttony in the form of higher insurance premiums and lost productivity. A study last year by the Society of Actuaries calculated the total economic cost of an overweight and obese population in the United States and Canada at about $300 billion a year (with 90% of that figure attributable to America's dietary issues). Now comes word from the American Journal of Preventive Medicine that, if current trends continue, about 42% of the U.S. population will be obese by 2030.

The Obama administration's willingness to defend insurance coverage for family planning services against attacks from conservatives and religious groups is good news for women and for the health of the nation. Last year, the administration first proposed that, like other preventive medical goods and services, contraception and general family planning coverage should be available under the healthcare reform law without a co-payment or deductible. Not just churches but many of their affiliated organizations protested — with the backing of conservative Republicans — that they should not have to pay to provide insurance coverage for medical services that run counter to their beliefs.

Going to see the doctor for a checkup usually includes a chat about diet and exercise, especially if the patient is overweight. But those talks may not have any influence on shedding pounds, says a new study -- unless the doctor was motivating and empathetic. Conversations between 40 primary care physicians and 461 of their overweight or obese patients were recorded by researchers who wanted to see if weight was mentioned by the doctor and, if so, in what manner. Overall, doctors talked about weight in 69% of appointments, and that conversation took up an average 3.5 minutes, or 15% of a typical 20-minute visit.

"Is there an app for that?" When it comes to consumer healthcare applications for smart phones, the answer, increasingly, is yes. There are now close to 6,000 consumer health apps, according to a review published in March by mobihealthnews, which reports on the mobile health industry, and more are being added every day. Many are free, or cost $1 to $10 to download. Some physicians are concerned about the reliability of the medical information provided by many of these apps, which offer advice and information on a wide array of health topics, including how to find a doctor, first aid for an emergency and exercise instructions.

Setting the pace Getting 10,000 steps per day roughly coincides with the latest U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recommendation that adults get a minimum of 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week. The key word here is "moderate" -- not all steps meet that requirement. Shuffling around the kitchen making dinner is hardly equivalent to racing to catch a bus or walking an energetic dog. Any movement is good, of course, but to make the steps count as beneficial as possible, they should be fairly sustained.

At least 40% of the estimated 50 million annual deaths worldwide could be prevented by improved health systems, drugs and vaccines and "a healthier lifestyle and education," according to a report Sunday by the World Health Organization. More than 1 billion people--or one-fifth of the world's population--are suffering from disease at any one time, and 46.5 million of the total deaths are directly related to illness, the organization said. Although the global death rate has decreased from 10.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. In 1984, Japan began screening the urine of 6-month-old infants for neuroblastoma, the most common type of solid tumor in young children. The test was simple and could show signs of cancer long before clinical symptoms arose. Hundreds of infants went through the ordeal of diagnosis and treatment, but it didn't reduce the number of tumors, including deadly ones, found later. Almost none of the tumors caught by screening turned out to be dangerous -- and more of the screened children died from complications of surgery and chemotherapy than from the cancer itself.

Healthcare giant Johnson & Johnson is jumping into the increasingly hot vaccine business by taking an 18% stake in Dutch biotechnology company Crucell and focusing more on preventive medicine. Under the deal, Johnson & Johnson is spending 301.8 million euros ($440 million) for new shares of Crucell in a deal focused initially on developing a universal vaccine or treatment against influenza from Crucell's genetically engineered antibody technology.