30 Sep/Oct 2017 oxygenmag.com.au
By Virginia PelleyFold your
way fitter
Columbia University
researchers concluded
that every $1,300 spent
on bike lanes correlated
with benefits equal to
one quality-adjusted life
year for each of the city’s
residents, according
to a study in Injury
Prevention. Get in on the
life-improving action
with the FIT folding
bike from Montague.
montague bikes.com,
$640 and up.DON’T LET YOUR
JOB KILL YOU
New research suggests cardiovascular disease has less to
do with ageing than it has to do with modern industrialised
society — that is, our jobs. Work stressors keep us in 'fight or
flight' mode, a physiological response to perceived threats.
When our bodies are flooded with stress hormones that
they aren’t able to discharge, it has a prolonged effect on
our health, explains Dr Peter Schnall, a professor of
medicine at the University of California, Irvine, professor of
public health at UCLA and lead author of the study
published in the International Journal of Health Services. “If
this goes on for years, the body eventually resets the
thermostat, or raises blood pressure, to manage all that
stress,” Dr Schnall says. “This can lead to thickening of
arterial blood vessels, which contributes to heart disease
risk.”
To learn more about preventing and managing job
stress, check out the site for the government’s Workplace
Health and Safety regulator in your state.We’ve been told for decades to avoid foods high
in saturated fat to reduce our risk of heart
disease. But it turns out that sugar might also
pose a significant risk to the heart. In fact,
the sugar industry encouraged scientists to
downplay the risk, suggests a paper published
in JAMA Internal Medicine. A review of internal
documents revealed that the sugar industry paid
scientists to highlight research linking
saturated fat to heart disease in research
published in the New England Journal of
Medicine in 1967. At the same time, this new
paper suggests, the sugar industry urged
scientists to de-emphasise research that
supported sugar’s negative effects on heart
health.
When you eat sugar, your fat cells release
leptin, a hormone that tells you that you’re full
and to burn fat, explains Dr Holly Andersen,
director of education and outreach at the Ronald
O. Perelman Heart Institute at New York-
Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical
Center. “Eat too much sugar, and your body
becomes leptin-resistant,” Dr Andersen says.
Bottom line? Minimising both sugar and
saturated fat is your best bet for staying
healthy longer.Sweet heart
Is sugar worse for your heart than fat?
PER
CENT
That’s how many of
us wish we got more
rest, according to a
worldwide survey of
18,000 people
conducted by
Durham University
researchers in the
UK. If you find it hard
to quit scrolling
through your phone
before bed, enable
Night Shift on your
phone to cut the blue
light emitted by
electronics that keep
you awake. Visit
support.apple.com
to find out how.Thrive HEALTH
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