Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association had the facts in abstract form and you are invited to look at their numbers or purchase the full study which involves our subset of diabetic women without the obvious "lose weight" advice. We can do this and we suggest that we all take the advice to watch something funny on TV for thirty (30) minutes each day with surprising results. Begin listening at three minutes and fifty seconds (3:50) into the podcast.
"The findings, presented at the Experimental Biology conference in New Orleans, show that after one year the group prescribed laughter saw a 26 per cent rise in their good cholesterol. Patients who took the medication without any extra laughter had just a 3 per cent rise. The group watching comedy programmes also saw a drop of 66 per cent in the amount of harmful C-reactive proteins, which increase the risk of heart disease, in their bodies. While the control group also saw a fall in the amount of the proteins, it was much smaller at 26 per cent over the course of the year." How do you know what makes a person optimistic? Food Consumer found from the study: "Optimism was described as expecting that good, rather than bad, things will happen. The nearly 100,000 participants were asked such questions as "In unclear times, I usually expect the best," or, conversely, "It is safer to trust no one."
Does it really make that much of a difference? If you asked that question don't count yourself as an "up" person. WebMD translated the figures: "Optimistic African-American women had a 33% lower risk for death than African-American women who were pessimists. Among white women, the survival advantage for optimists was 13%. African-American women who scored highest for hostility and cynicism were 62% more likely to die than African-American women who scored lowest." Don't worry be happy!
No comments:
Post a Comment