More research with nurses will give us more insight into how people age. from Health Day, March 1, 2012 Researchers are looking for 100,000 female nurses and nursing students to join the long-running Nurses’ Health Study, which has yielded insight into a wide range of health issues, such as the benefits of physical activity and … Continue reading
Tagged with medical research …
National Library of Medicine Director’s Podcasts
I’ve become quite a fan of the weekly Director’s podcasts from the National Library of Medicine (NLM). These mini radio programs are a terrific resource for people of all ages, but adult children and their parents will find they provide a helpful introduction to the National Library of Medicine and Medline Plus. The podcasts used to … Continue reading
What is a Meta-Analysis and How Does It Help Find Better Information?
If you are researching a course of treatment or a cause of disease for an aging parent, family member, or friend, the chances are that you will read scientific studies. Perhaps you will check PubMed, the National Institutes of Health site that has abstracts of all published scientific research. You can visit the National Library … Continue reading
Apropos of Distracted Driving, Children, and Cell Phones
In light of my previous post about the apparent extra protective layer that grandparents have when they drive their grandchildren around, I decided to post this BMW distracted driving advertisement. I believe that telephones and texting play a big role in parents’ accidents these days. I wrote a longer post about the this BMW video … Continue reading
Medical Histories Support Aging Parents and Their Families
What is more important for the personal health of an individual –a family history taken by a physician or genetic testing? According to an Associated Press article published in the Washington Post, while genetic testing has important uses, people should be aware that a thorough family history taken by a physician is what Cleveland Clinic geneticist, … Continue reading
An Alzheimer’s Statistic I Did Not Know
Writing in the October 27, 2010 New York Times, three prestigious AIDS advocates, including retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, call for a “man-on-the-moon” effort, setting a goal to stop Alzheimer’s, by the year 2020. Justice O’Connor, writing on the op-ed page along with medicine Nobel Prize winner, Stanley Prusiner (read his Nobel Price acceptance speech), and … Continue reading
Aging Parents: After a Stroke – Taking Prescribed Medications
If you find this post interesting you may want to read Aging Parents and Medications and Thoughts on Medications and Seniors, Part I. Anyone with a stroke survivor in the family knows how many details caregivers attend to immediately after the event. Coordinating many medications and rehabilitation services, as well as trying to surmise the extent … Continue reading
Aging Research at 11% Tells Only Part of NIH Story
Despite Aging Baby Boomers, N.I.H. Devotes Only 11 Percent to Elderly Studies, appears in the June 28, 2010 New York Times. I tend to agree with Dr. Francis Collins, NIH head, who points out that the 11 percent does not take into consideration research conducted on the conditions such as diabetes and heart disease — health problems … Continue reading
Causation vs. Association – the Basics
To those of us who are not scientists or epidemiologists two of the most confusing concepts in the universe are association and causation. Many of us are helping parents age as gracefully as possible in the midst of devastating diseases and are deeply frustrated that we cannot sort out the factors associated with an illness … Continue reading
As Our Parents Age So Do We 