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Morbidly Obese Woman Rotted In Chair

February 5, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Priscilla Frieberger, 61, spent the last three weeks of her life literally stuck to a brown cloth recliner, in a horribly cluttered home that she shared with her sister, an Indiana prosecutor says.

“She was morbidly obese, got sick and couldn’t get out of her chair — and her sister left her there like that for three weeks,” Dearborn County prosecutor Aaron Negangard said. “The paramedics couldn’t get her removed from the chair because she was stuck — she was rotting, basically, in the chair.”

Frieberger’s sister, Vickie Holdcraft, was indicted Friday on charges of reckless homicide, three counts of neglect and two counts of perjury for allegedly making false statements to a grand jury, Negangard said. The charges stem from Frieberger’s death on Oct. 2; as of late Friday, Holdcraft had not yet been arrested, the Dearborn County Sheriff’s Office said. [Read more...]

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Why Obesity May Not Be All Bad

February 4, 2012 by · 1 Comment

It’s well known that being fat can be a fast track to diabetes and heart disease.

But now Sydney doctors say some obese folk are less at risk from the two potentially deadly illnesses than others – and they’ve launched a new study to find out why.

Experts at the Garvan Institute, the medical research facility at Sydney’s St Vincent’s Hospital, say there are “healthy obese people” whose insulin works just as well as in someone who is lean.

These same people also appear to be less at risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. [Read more...]

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Obesity Could Be Infectious

February 3, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

We’ve heard obesity can be “spread” between friends when we copy each other’s eating habits, but a new study in mice suggests obesity could actually be infectious.

That’s right, infectious. As in, something you can catch.

In the study, mice engineered to have a particular immune deficiency developed fatty liver disease and got fatter when fed a Western-style diet. But strikingly, when these immune-deficient mice were put in the same cage as healthy mice, the healthy mice started to come down with symptoms of liver disease, and also got fatter. [Read more...]

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Drink Milk ‘To Boost Brain Power’

February 2, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

No matter how old you are, drink at least a glass of milk everyday if you want to sharpen your mental skills, say researchers.

A new study has claimed that drinking a glass of milk daily not only boosts one’s intake of much-needed nutrients, but it also positively impacts one’s brain power and mental performance, the ‘International Dairy Journal’ reported.

According to the researchers, certain nutrients in dairy products, such as magnesium, could play a role in staving off memory loss. Moreover, dairy foods also help protect against heart disease and high blood pressure, which in turn maintains the brain’s ability to properly function. [Read more...]

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Adventuring Can Spur Creativity On Job

January 31, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

What would you do if you had extra time off and a wad of cash to accomplish something on your bucket list?

That’s the opportunity Ray Clark is offering longtime employees at The Marketing Arm.

Anyone who has been with the Dallas-based marketing and promotions agency for at least seven years is being rewarded with seven days off and $2,500. Those who have made it to Year 15 or beyond get a 15-day bonus and $5,000 to do something they’ve longed to do but didn’t have the time or money for.

“This is something I came up with, but it got wildly embraced,” says Clark, who announced the unexpected perk to start off 2012 with a bang. “This has created quite a buzz.” [Read more...]

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Why Do Some People Never Get Depressed?

January 30, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Confronted with some of life’s upsetting experiences – marriage breakdown, unemployment, bereavement, failure of any kind – many people become depressed. But others don’t. Why is this?

A person who goes through experiences like that and does not get depressed has a measure of what in the psychiatric trade is known as “resilience”.

According to Manchester University psychologist Dr Rebecca Elliott, we are all situated somewhere on a slidling scale.

“At one end you have people who are very vulnerable. In the face of quite low stress, or none at all, they’ll develop a mental health problem,” she says. [Read more...]

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Genetic Tests On Lung Cancer May Someday Guide Treatment

January 29, 2012 by · Leave a Comment

Lung cancers are not all the same. Part of the difference is in the cancer’s genetics.

“There can be genes that predict that you’re more likely to respond to chemotherapy. Genes that predict a greater risk of spread to other parts of the body,” explains Dr. Jane Raymond, a cancer specialist at Allegheny General Hospital.

Of the two major types of lung cancer, small cell and non-small cell, the more common is non-small cell. Surgical removal of the tumor is often standard, but what about chemotherapy and radiation? [Read more...]

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