Let’s get fit, or at least help someone you love get fit. Seriously the holiday season is almost here and it is a great time to start your fitness program. My sister live in Orange County and asked me to help her find a trainer. I began my search by typing in Orange County personal training and complied a list for my sister to contact and get some personal one-on-one feedback. She has not been feeling well for the last few months and has been off work so I was very concernced about her and wanted to help. Sometimes all someone needs to get fitness-motivated is a friendly helping hand from a loved one. Now she works out weekly with help from Chris McCombs who is a local Orange County fitness trainer and by this time next year she intends to meet her goal of weight loss and fitness. I am glad I could be involved in this important part of her life.

One of the hottest technologies for people using cannabis for medical conditions is a vaporizer. Vaporization is a technique used to avoid the irritating respiratory toxins found in marijuana smoke. This is achieved by heating cannabis to a temperature so that the psychoactive ingredients evaporate without causing combustion.

There are many types of vaporizers on the market and doing some research on what the best one for you budget is a good idea. When I looked I found many types including cheap lightbulb vaporizers and the more expensive volcano type vaporizer. This is a great technology for those needing to take medicinal cannabis.

This past year has been a real rollercoaster for me and my goal of weight loss. I was going to the gym on a regular basis but was not able to lose any weight. The truth is that I know my diet was the culprit because I have two young kids and we tend to have fast food 2 or 3 times a week. There is also a lot of fatty snacks around the house and even though I buy them for the ‘kids’ I always break-down and find myself munching on them late at night.

Here is what I did to drop 10 pounds over the course of two months and have kept it off so far (6 months later):

I was going to the gym two and sometimes three times per week and riding the stationary bike for 35 minutes and working out for half an hour with weights once a week. Since that level of exercise combined with my current diet kept me stabilized but unable to lose weight I added 1 extra workout a week and made sure to stuff the fridge with a lot of tasty fruit and low fat yogurt and low-fat pretzels for snacking. In just two months I lost 10 pounds and probably also added a couple of pounds of muscle. Most importantly I feel great and now have the confidence that I can lose more weight and eventually get down to my targeted weight goal.

I guess the moral of my story is that sometimes small changes can have enormous effects over the long-term and losing weight does not always involve a strict weight loss diet but can be achieved by making common sense decisions combined with healthy eating and exercise choices.

According to a survey published on Nov. 1 in the journal Health Affairs, one-third of U.S. adults believe that the U.S. health-care system has to be rebuilt completely—double the percentage who want a dramatic overhaul in the six other nations whose residents took part in the survey. The U.S. ranked dead last on the question whether more than minor system changes were needed.

The nonpartisan New York City-based Commonwealth Fund, which studies health-care issues, interviewed 12,000 adults in Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Britain, Australia, and the U.S. this spring to get a handle on actual patient experiences and perceptions. The results paint a damning picture of user satisfaction with the American health-care system and could provide fodder in a Presidential campaign where health care is expected to play a major role (BusinessWeek.com, 9/17/07). All the countries in the survey except the U.S. have universal health coverage, and the percentage of GDP the U.S. spends on medical care is about twice as high as the other six.

Despite their country’s higher spending, U.S. patients were the only ones to report serious problems paying bills (19%). Plus, 30% of patients paid $1,000 or more out-of-pocket over the past year, while the percentage of patients laying out that much in the other six ranged from 4% (Britain) to 19% (Australia). Nearly two out of five U.S. adults and 42% of those with chronic illnesses skipped medications or did not see a doctor when sick because of cost. Those rates are much higher in the U.S. than in any other country.

“The U.S. often stands out [in the survey] for negative care experiences,” says lead author Cathy Schoen, Commonwealth Fund senior vice-president. In a Commonwealth study released last year, the U.S. received low grades (BusinessWeek.com, 9/21/06) in outcomes, quality of care, access to care, and efficiency, compared with other industrialized nations.

According to Schoen, the more negative or costly the experience, the more negative the overall perception of the health-care system. Dissatisfaction with the U.S. system crosses socioeconomic lines, too. Both high- and low-income respondents had similarly negative views of the U.S. health-care system, Schoen notes.

Though they’re not happy with aspects of the system, U.S. residents are about as confident as those of other nations that they would get high-quality care and the best drugs and medical technology. The Netherlands consistently scored higher in all three categories. Still, U.S. patients can’t count on speedy access to care; 51% said they could not get an appointment (BusinessWeek.com, 6/22/07) the same or the next day when they were sick. Only Canada scored worse, with 64% saying they had to wait.

Once in the health-care system, 32% of U.S. patients suffered medical mistakes, the highest rate of the seven nations. That could be because the U.S. ranked last when it came to their doctors having access to their medical records at the time of an office visit.  I saw the movie Sicko so this survey comes as no suprise to me.  I am glad I am a Canadian.

Sometimes when facing the challenge of a serious illness it help to read stories of triumph. Dealing with mesothelioma is one of those diseases and Paul Kraus was not ready to give up his fight with this deadly cancer.

Mr. Kraus offers practical advice on what he did to beat the odds so that others can too. So don’t lose hope, keep fighting.

My friend Jim, the dentist called me up last week and asked it I could help him do a little research into dental practice management software. It seems the software solution he had been using for the past 9 years was no longer being supported and was causing him headaches in the office.

I am a bit of a software geek and was able to help him locate some excellent dental software. He is forever grateful and I expect to be seeing the Yankees quite a few times next season with his field level seasons tickets.

I realize plastic surgery is not for everyone but my wife has been wanting to have her breasts ‘done’ for years. After 3 kids and as gravity worked it’s magic she was feeling sort of in the dumps. This year we are expecting a substantial tax return so I decided to give her an anniversary present that she (and I) could truly appreciate for a long-time to come.

I started by searching the web for local surgeons using the keywords, Indiana breast augmentation. After checking out their websites and talking to them on the phone I set up a consultation for my better half. If you are looking to get surgery somewhere else just do a search online because it is the quickest way to find out information, for example if you are in another state, say Miami, just type in “Miami Plastic Surgery” and you will get lots of search results you can pour through.

I can’t wait to surprise her next week!

Teenagers who feel relaxed after their first drags on a cigarette are most likely to become addicted to smoking, a sign that some people’s brains are more susceptible to nicotine, researchers have discovered.  This is bad news in the fight for teenage smokers.

While peer pressure and other factors may lead young people to try smoking, it is the brain’s response to that first dose of nicotine that likely most determines who gets addicted, according to DiFranza’s report published in Pediatrics, the journal of the American  Experiencing a feeling of relaxation in response to the first cigarette was the strongest predictor of addiction, the study found.

The study said one theory suggests nicotine suppresses pathways in the brain that generate the feeling of craving, which is experienced as relaxation. That in turn creates a craving for nicotine when the drug is absent.

Over the four years of the study between 2002 and 2006, 11 interviews were conducted with each of 1,000 teenagers attending public schools in six Massachusetts communities.  Of the 217 who tried smoking during the study, nearly one-third reported feeling relaxed after inhaling for the first time, and two-thirds of them became addicted to smoking.

Overall, 83 of the 217 participants who tried cigarettes became smokers.  Other risk factors for addiction among first-time smokers was a depressed mood, a novelty-seeking personality, and familiarity with “Joe Camel,” the animated character used to advertise Reynolds American Inc’s Camel brand, the study said.  “The Joe Camel campaign was discontinued in August of 1997 as our subjects entered 2nd grade (around age 7), suggesting that the deleterious effects of cigarette advertising persist long after the exposure,” the study said.

Among the traits that protected students from becoming addicted were being involved in extracurricular activities which is not surpising because they are probably more rounded individuals which inturn would help them make better life choices.

Heavy smokers with knee arthritis may be experiencing an early sign of a difficult-to-treat lung cancer, research shows.   Researchers at Prato Hospital in Italy reviewed the case files of 296 patients with inflammation in one knee between 2000 and 2005.

In just under 2 percent of these patients, the mild knee arthritis was accompanied by non-small cell lung cancer. All patients were middle-aged men who had been heavy smokers for most of their lives. Once the cancer tissue was surgically removed, the knee pain cleared up as well.

About 85 percent of all lung cancers are non-small cell lung cancer, according to the American Cancer Society. Unless it is caught early, non-small cell lung cancer is difficult to treat. It spreads to the bones in one in five cases and is well advanced by the time it is diagnosed in half of all cases.  Writing in the September issue of The Annals of Rheumatic Diseases, the researchers noted that early warning signs such as knee pain could lead to earlier diagnosis and more successful treatments.  My knees have been hurting but I haven’t had a cigarette for almost 20 years!

Establishing a Routine: A Necessary Element for Weight Gain Success

While planning is important for gaining weight and muscle, by itself it’s not enough to lead you to successful weight gain for the long term. Having a routine is also a necessity. You are going to be making some major changes to your lifestyle, and these types of changes don’t come naturally. Our bodies and minds resist change. If given the chance, we’ll resort back to old habits in a second. That’s why the key is to replace those old habits with new habits, so that these changes become the norm. Routine is the only way to make that happen to ensure you put on weight.

Dietitians have found that it takes 60 to 90 days for a routine to become a habit. That means if you are truly committed to gaining weight, then you need to be committed to a routine. Each time you break that routine, you are delaying the formation of a habit and making it harder on yourself.

Don’t get me wrong, routines aren’t easy to live with, especially if they require us to make major changes. However, if you are willing to make the commitment, then, in the end, you’ll realize that the sacrifice, effort, and energy were all worth it. After all, anything that is worth doing isn’t going to be easy.

For more gaining weight tips and articles, check out the GainingWeight.info blog.