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| HEALTH & FITNESS |
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Lifestyle can affect our eyes Exercises to avoid urinary incontinence How alcohol damages our health
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Lifestyle can affect our eyes Diabetes as a leading cause of blindness in India is well known. Eating lots of sweets on Diwali and other occasions can worsen diabetes/vision status. Good control of glycemia, blood pressure and possibly lipid levels and early detection and treatment of proliferative diabetic retinopathy and clinically significant macular edema remain the most important approach for preventing the loss of vision from diabetic retinopathy. Similarly, arrow or cracker injuries are related to a particular behaviour in children and adolescents, and are entirely preventable. Dry eye can be prevented to a great extent by taking precaution and care, and changing your lifestyle. How can you eliminate unhealthy lifestyle choices? Quit smoking When you smoke a cigarette you speed up the aging process of your cells by letting free radicals enter the body. These free radicals are highly unstable atoms that cause cellular damage and death. One way to combat free radicals is by eating a diet rich in antioxidants. However, the best way to protect your eyes is to quit smoking. Limit alcohol intake Binge drinking or adulterated alcohol can lead to eye problems. If you choose to drink alcohol, make sure that you drink not more than one peg a day and that there is no possibility of adulteration with methyl alcohol or other toxic agents . Avoid sugar and salt Sugary and starchy foods can lead to a spike in your blood sugar levels. These blood sugar highs can lead to the damage of your blood vessels in the retina as in uncontrolled diabetes mellitus. Studies have shown that diets that are low in starchy and sugary foods and high in healthy foods like leafy green vegetables can lead to lower rates of macular degeneration which is the leading cause of blindness in the elderly, besides diabetes. Similarly taking excessive salt puts load on your system and can lead to high blood pressure, which in turn can affect your retina. Spend time away from your computer and TV set Spending hours and hours in front of a computer screen can lead to eye-strain and fatigue. Your eyes aren’t meant to focus on objects up close for hours at a time. Take breaks from the computer every half an hour and focus on other things to reduce eye-strain. Lower stress levels Many people don’t realise that stress can have a negative impact on their eyesight. Stress increases the body’s production of adrenaline which can raise the pressure in your eyes. If the pressure in your eyes is too high it can lead to various eye problems, including glaucoma. Reduce fat intake Diets high in fat can lead to clogged blood vessels in the eyes as well as in the rest of the body. This can make it harder for blood to pass through your vessels into your eye and can deprive your eye of nutrients. This can greatly increase your risk of macular degeneration and block in the vessels of the retina and eventually blindness. Eat plenty of antioxidants Diets rich in antioxidants — lutein and zeaxanthin — can result in healthier eyes. You can find these eye-friendly antioxidants in leafy green vegetables like spinach and broccoli. If your diet doesn’t have the antioxidant levels that you need, consider using a supplement under the supervision of your eye doctor. Reduce the intake of sugary and fatty foods. Wear protective glasses The sun is very damaging to the delicate tissues inside the eye. When you go outside, make sure that you take your sunglasses along and that you wear them since this will help to protect your eyes from harmful ultraviolet rays. Similarly, use of eye protective glasses among workers in the unorganised and industrial sectors can provide valuable protection against injury/infection, etc. Get regular eye examination done One of the best ways to care for your eyes is to get them examined regularly. Regular eye examinations aren’t just important for those that use corrective spectacles. They can help your doctor to find and diagnose potentially blinding conditions like diabetes early which can help in better prevention and reduce the risk of blindness. Generally, it is recommended that an eye examination is conducted at least once annually. The writer is a Chandigarh-based eye specialist. |
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Exercises to avoid urinary incontinence In this day and age more and more people are becoming aware as regards the importance of physical fitness. However, this is still in its nascent stage in our country. Even individuals who are aware miss out on the intricate nuances. Attention is paid to strengthening upper and lower limbs as also to crunches to trim the belly, but pelvic floor muscles are left to fend for themselves. Strengthening the pelvic floor muscles is of great importance. If these are left weak these can lead to urinary incontinence — loss of bladder control. This may pose problems, hampering various activities (which are otherwise taken for granted). Symptoms may vary from mild leaking to uncontrollable wetting. Anyone could be afflicted, although its incidence is higher in old age. The myth is that dribbling/incontinence of urine is part of aging. The fact is that incontinence is never normal at any age except during infancy. The pelvic floor is a broad sling of muscles, ligaments and tissues which supports the bladder, bowel and uterus. Certain factors that affect these muscles are: Aging of the bladder muscles reduce the bladder’s capacity to store urine. Bladder control problems occur when muscles are too weak/too active. When bladder muscles which keep the bladder closed are weak, incontinence occurs while sneezing, laughing or lifting weight. This is called stress incontinence. When muscles become overactive, there is a strong urge for urinating, though there is very little urine in the bladder. This is known as urge incontinence or overactive bladder. Pregnant women too experience stress incontinence. This is the result of increased weight of an enlarged uterus. Stress encountered during vaginal delivery also weakens the muscles which control bladder. Weakness of the pelvic floor affects the vaginal muscles thereby reducing sexual pleasure. Enlarged prostate, prostate/bladder cancer can also lead to incontinence. Neurological disorders like Parkinson’s disease, stroke, brain tumour and spinal injury too can interfere with nerve signals involved during bladder control, causing urinary incontinence. Obesity — Being overweight lays undue pressure on the bladder and surrounding muscles weakening them. This causes the leaking of urine while coughing, sneezing, etc. Complications of chronic urinary incontinence include: Skin problems — constantly wet skin causes rashes, itching, skin infections, etc. Incontinence is a common cause for recurrent urinary tract infections. Individuals afflicted by urinary incontinence start shying away from attending social gatherings. This could disrupt their concentration at work or keep individuals awake at night, leading to fatigue. TREATMENT Bladder training entails learning to delay urination after the urge to do so. Initially hold off for 10 minutes every time one feels an urge to urinate. The primary goal is to lengthen the time between the trips to the washroom. This process should be continued till one is able to urinate every two to four hours. Bladder training may also involve double voiding — urinating, then waiting a few minutes and trying again. This exercise helps to empty the bladder more completely, avoiding overflow incontinence. Scheduled toilet trips means timed urination — going to the toilet clocking time rather than waiting for the urge/need to go, usually every two to four hours. Avoiding alcohol, caffeine too facilitates bladder control. Pelvic floor exercises strengthen pelvic floor and sphincter muscles thereby reducing stress leakage. Ideally, one should start exercises in a comfortable lying down position to get a feel of pelvic muscles. Once comfortable and aware of the technique, performing the same exercise in a sitting down position is the next step. The recommended practice is to exercise eight to ten times, three times a day (2006). If having problems with leaking urine, it’s a good idea to do as many as times daily and make pelvic floor exercises a part of life forever. Method — Imagine that one is trying to stop passing wind and flow of urine mid-stream at the same time without holding breath, tightening the abdomen or buttock muscles and squeezing legs. Fast and slow contractions Slow contractions help to increase the strength of pelvic floor. Lift pelvic floor muscles to a count of 10. Relax and rest for a count of 10. Repeat 10 times. Fast contractions help pelvic floor to cope with pressure — for example, while coughing, laughing, etc. This works the muscles that quickly shut off the flow of urine. Lift your pelvic floor muscles quickly. Hold the contraction for one second. Relax the muscles and rest for one second. Repeat 10 times. The writer is a former doctor/physiotherapist, Indian cricket team. |
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How alcohol damages our health The alacrity and vehemence with which drinking has been accepted in our society during the last few decades is a phenomenon which needs studying. Ninety per cent of men drink alcohol, 40-50 per cent have temporary alcohol-induced problems and 10-20 per cent of men and 3 to 10 per cent of women develop pervasive and persistent alcohol-related problems. These are figures relating to foreign countries. This is what we are trying to achieve desperately. Dangerous behavioural effects, tolerance and dependence on alcohol constitute a slow and body mechanism-aided phenomenon. Ethanol (the stuff we drink at parties) produces changes that, with persistent and increased usage, our body gets used to and adapts accordingly. The same way as Anna’s body adapts to fasting. It produces simultaneous changes in many neurotransmitters and also increases the fluidity of cell membranes. What the above statement means is that the body adapts to increased dosages of alcohol. How does this happen? First, after two weeks of daily drinking the liver can increase the rate of alcohol metabolism by as much as 30 per cent — metabolic or pharmacokinetic tolerance. This disappears as rapidly as it develops. The second level is cellular or pharmacodynamic tolerance. This is by complex changes in brain chemistry and is known as cellular or pharmacodynamic tolerance. Third, this happens even at the same alcohol concentration level in blood. Organisms (human beings) can learn to adapt their behaviour so as to function better than expected under drug influence (behavioural tolerance). The body systems that alcohol harms, depending on its intake, are: Brains — Behavioural changes, blackouts, sleep latency, peripheral neuropathy (nerve damage), alcohol-induced persisting amnestic disorders, progressive unsteady stance, cognitive problems manifested by the impairment of recent and past memory, severe anxiety and hallucination. Pancreatitis — A life threatening condition that can be caused by binging. Intestines — Gastritis, bleeding and a tear (Mallory Weiss syndrome). Liver — Hepatitis, sclerosis, cirrhosis and finally cancer. Heart — Modest doses of alcohol can have both deleterious and beneficial effects on the heart. A maximum of one or two drinks a day over long periods may decrease the risk of cardiovascular death. Chronic heavy drinking causes hypertension, heart muscle disease and cardiomyopathy. Binging on alcohol on a holiday causes what is known as a holiday heart condition which can lead to paralysis of one side of the body. This far and no further from what we all want to know. What is safe drinking a gentleman can do without phenomenally deleterious effects is two drinks every second day and four drinks on a particular day once in a month, considering all the known facts. Sir Winston Churchill died on the pot at 91 years of age with nicotine and alcohol in abundance in his blood stream, after coping with dangerously high levels of stress (remember World War II) while thin, with good non-imbibing habits, target-chasing CEOs of small and big firms flood the intensive coronary care units throughout the world. Truly strange and mysterious are the ways of life. The larger your heart, the less vagaries it faces. Not all chemicals are bad. Without chemicals such as hydrogen and oxygen, for example, there would be no way to make water, a vital ingredient in alcohol. The writer is a Ludhiana-based diagnostic expert.
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Our willpower depends on blood sugar levels Premature babies more likely to have autism Alkaline or pH diet helps in losing weight and in other ailments
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Lifestyle activities have been linked to many human illnesses — lung cancer with smoking; food-borne infection due to partially cooked food; obesity, heart disease, diabetes, etc, due to overeating and inactive life. Similarly, your eye-vision can also be affected from unhealthy lifestyle — smoking and drinking can bring about early cataract and macular degeneration. Dietary protein, vitamin A, niacin, thiamin, and riboflavin appeared to be protective against cataract in many studies.