Understanding the Mammogram Paradox
The mammogram paradox is that women who are harmed the most are the ones who claim the greatest benefit.
The mammogram paradox is that women who are harmed the most are the ones who claim the greatest benefit.
What is the risk-benefit ratio of the cancers picked up by mammograms and the cancers caused by mammograms?
For every life saved by mammography, as many as two to ten women are overdiagnosed and unnecessarily turned into breast cancer patients—and let’s not overlook all of the attendant harms of chemo, radiation, or surgery without the benefits.
Various health organizations offer clashing mammogram recommendations that range from annual mammograms starting at age 40 to eliminating routine mammograms altogether. Who should you trust?
Extracts of amla (Indian gooseberry) were pitted head-to-head against cholesterol-lowering statin drugs and the blood thinners aspirin and Plavix.
What are the risks and benefits of getting a comprehensive annual physical exam and routine blood testing?
What are the risks and benefits of getting an annual check-up from your doctor?
How can we properly cook beans?
A book purported to expose “hidden dangers” in healthy foods doesn’t even pass the whiff test.
Should we be concerned about high-choline plant foods, such as broccoli, producing the same toxic TMAO that results from eating high-choline animal foods, such as eggs?
Since white blood cell count is such a strong predictor of lifespan, what should we aim for and how do we get it there?
Since white blood cell count is a sign of systemic inflammation, it’s no surprise that those with lower white blood cell counts live longer.
Physical fitness authorities seem to have fallen into the same trap as the nutrition authorities, recommending what they think may be achievable, rather than simply informing us what the science says and letting us make up our own mind.
Having hypertension in midlife (ages 40 through 60) is associated with elevated risk of cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s dementia later in life—even more so than having the so-called Alzheimer’s gene.
Selecting foods to improve pelvic blood flow and decrease inflammation both immediately after a meal and for the long term may improve sexual functioning in men and women.
When done right, love may protect your lover’s life.
An extraordinary thing happened when those at high risk for heart disease were randomized to give blood—and it had nothing to do with their heart.
The current generation of American kids may be one of the first generations to be less healthy and have shorter lifespans than their parents.
The aspirin compounds naturally found in plant foods may help explain the lower cancer rates among those eating plant-based diets.
Seaweed salad is put to the test for hypertension.
We have tremendous power over our health destiny and longevity.
Only about 1 in 10,000 people live to be 100 years old. What’s their secret?
What can our nutrient requirements, metabolism, and physiology tell us about what we should be eating?
Despite less education on average, a higher poverty rate, and more limited access to health care, U.S. Hispanics tend to live the longest. Why?
We don’t have to choose between the lesser of two evils: skin cancer versus internal cancers from vitamin D deficiency.
Why do some recommend thousands of units of supplemental vitamin D when the Institute of Medicine set the recommended daily intake at just 600 to 800 units?
What do 56 randomized clinical trials involving nearly 100,000 people between the ages of 18 and 107 show vitamin D can do to our lifespan?
Those with higher vitamin D levels tend to have lower rates of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension, but is it cause and effect? Interventional trials finally put vitamin D to the test.
A cup a day of beans, chickpeas, or lentils for three months may slow resting heart rate as much as exercising for 50 hours on a treadmill.
To maximize our lifespan, the target resting heart rate may be one beat a second or less.
The reason greens are associated with a significantly longer lifespan may be because, like caloric restriction, they improve our energy efficiency.
Chlorophyll in our bloodstream after eating greens may react with wavelengths of sunlight that penetrate through our skin to reactivate the antioxidant Coenzyme Q10 (ubiquinol).
The burgeoning field of positive psychology is based on the understanding that mental health is not just about the absence of disease.
What can we eat to combat “inflamm-aging,” the chronic low-grade inflammation that accompanies the aging process?
Why do some drug-based strategies shorten the lives of diabetics and some diet-based strategies fail to decrease diabetes deaths?
The concept that heart disease was rare among the Eskimos appears to be a myth.
Why do heart attack rates appear lower than expected in France, given their saturated fat and cholesterol intake? Is it their red wine consumption, their vegetable consumption, or something else?
Diet and lifestyle improvements started even late in life can offer dramatic benefits.
The whole food is greater than the sum of its parts: how unscrupulous marketers use evidence that ties high blood levels of phytonutrients with superior health to sell dietary supplements that may do more harm than good.
What would happen if you centered your diet around vegetables, the most nutrient-dense food group?