Sports N Health

One of the biggest reasons why most smokers cannot quit smoking is because they feel that cigarette smoking helps them get rid of anxiety, boredom, loneliness, stress, and depression. For most of them, life without a pack of cigarettes is complete aggravation and boredom but that is far from the truth.

Some smokers even think that smoking helps them become more sociable and celebrate better on special occasions. There are many who think smoking helps them work faster and better and it is surprising to see how smoking has so many different and positive attributes for them even though they know that smoking is injurious to health and is reducing many years of their life.

If you want to stop smoking now, it is best to you tell all your near and dear ones so that they can remind you every time you try to bring one out of the pack and light it. Moreover, they will be extending help and emotional support to you as and when you need so. However, you should make it very clear to them that you do not want to hear jokes or have a laugh on you saying a quit to smoke. You may even consider joining a support group and should surely socialize with your non-smoking friends and avoid smoking friends for a while.

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Women experience more intense pain than men, according to the results of a study in which researchers examined pain scores from tens of thousands of patients in the United States.

“In many cases, the reported difference approached a full point on the 1-to-10 scale. How big is that? A pain-score improvement of one point is what clinical researchers view as indicating that a pain medication is working,” study senior author Dr. Atul Butte, a professor of systems medicine in pediatrics, said in the news release. “We’re certainly not the first to find differences in pain among men and women. But we focused on pain intensity, whereas most previous studies have looked at prevalence: the percentage of men versus women with a particular clinical problem who are in pain,” he said.

The findings were published in the Jan. 23 issue of the Journal of Pain.

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Having a legal abortion is safer than carrying a baby to term, according to a new study.

The study disclosed that the risk of death associated with a full-term pregnancy and delivery is 8.8 deaths per 100,000, while the risk of death linked to legal abortion is 0.6 deaths per 100,000 women.

“Regardless of one’s sentiments about abortion, legal abortion is very safe, and dramatically safer than continuing the pregnancy,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. David Grimes, a clinical professor in the department of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine at Chapel Hill. “There’s been a proliferation of these women’s-right-to-know pamphlets, and some of them are misleading, if not downright incorrect or patently wrong,” Grimes said.

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A new trial has indicated that the experimental cancer drug regorafenib appears to extend survival slightly in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer.

Researchers said Regorafenib is a so-called multikinase inhibitor that targets several of the ways cancer develops and grows.

“The drug was tested on patients with metastatic colorectal cancer who had progressed after standard therapies, meaning they had no treatment options available,” lead researcher Dr. Axel Grothey, a professor of oncology at the Mayo Clinic, said during a noon press conference at the Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium in San Francisco on Tuesday.

The trial was funded by the maker of regorafenib, Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals.

“The drug helped patients live longer,” said Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, deputy chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society. “But you have to keep in mind that these patients had advanced disease.”

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Premature ejaculation or quick discharge occurs in men of all ages and can be referred to as a condition in which the man loses confidence in his sexual performance and questions his masculinity that leads to lowered self esteem. It is worthwhile to note that premature ejaculation can happen in all sexual situations, including masturbation and during sexual encounters.

Medically, premature ejaculation (PE) refers to the inability to control one’s ejaculation or ejaculating before ready to or satisfy his partner or ejaculating before or within a very short time after penetration. However, the good thing to learn that PE is not a disease, illness, or condition and it is just that some men experiencing it have not yet learned the skills and techniques of controlling their sexual responses and ejaculation.

If you want to last longer in bedroom, you need to train yourself to think differently during sexual encounters. For this, you could try out focusing completely on pleasure of the woman and help her achieve the climax first. Doing so would not only help you boost your confidence, but you would also be able to satisfy her. It is also recommended that you try out new sex positions and locations as your body may have got so used to the existing ones that it ends up finishing a lot sooner than you want to.

Premature ejaculation exercises such as advanced breathing techniques, mental control skills, ejaculatory and pelvic muscle control skills, ejaculatory reflex control skills, sensual awareness skills, sexual technique skills, and understanding you sexual responses could help you in more than just a way.

It is important to note that premature ejaculation tends to be a lifelong problem that reduces self esteem levels and create relationship problems, until treated. In you want to treat premature ejaculation, it is best to seek medical advice so that you can easily form intimate relationships and get more out of lovemaking and other forms of intimacy.

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According to a new study of Hispanic children in southern California, babies who were breastfed longest and drank few or no sugary beverages were about half as likely to be obese as kids who were not breastfed or who consumed the most sugary drinks.

Breastfeeding is linked to a lower risk of obesity in children according to past studies but Jaimie Davis, the study’s lead author and a professor at the University of Southern California, said mothers will also give their babies and toddlers sugary drinks.

“What happens is that they’re breastfeeding and they’re often giving their kids juice or Gatorade,” said Davis. “They don’t realize it’s having the counter effect.”

The research was published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

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On Monday, a large group of U.S. doctors gave the green light for pediatricians to offer vaccines to close family members of babies who are too young to get shots themselves.

The strategy, known as cocooning, is aimed at blocking diseases from reaching the infant in the first place and is backed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“What it says is, if you choose to do it, this is ok,” said the AAP’s Dr. Herschel R. Lessin, who worked on the report. “They give flu shots in airports and pharmacies. There is really no reason why a licensed doctor can’t give them also.” “The goal here is to get everyone immunized,” said Lessin. “As pediatricians, we think immunization is the greatest thing in the history of mankind.”

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Venezuela is offering women the free removal of breast implants made by a bankrupt French company that used industrial silicone to make cheap prostheses associated with health risks.

The implants were made by the now defunct Poly Implant Prothese (PIP) and French authorities have been prompted by their unusually high rupture rate and urged women to have them removed.

“There was not, at any moment, official authorization. They were brought in illegally, and now those patients are running a risk,” Venezuela’s Health Minister Eugenia Sader said.

“There’s a lot of sensationalism and unscientific news, for example that they cause cancer, and that’s not been proved,” Reinaldo Kube, president-elect of the Ibero-American Federation of Plastic Surgery, told Reuters. “It is desire to speculate and to scare people.”

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Being in a committed relationship comes with a share of highs and lows. Society pressures and personal differences could easily turn a perfect relationship into a not-so-perfect one. However, things could be made happier with a few tips.

1. It is better to avoid false promises to change and rather make a serious attempt to correct them in the long run.
2. Fights are healthy for any relationship but getting carried away or making them a habit could ruin a relationship.
3. The tendency of refusing to accept blame is one of the biggest causes of relationship failures. Remember, you have nothing to lose with your partner.

Avoid these mistakes and enjoy happy, peaceful, and satisfying relationships.

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Q: I’m two months pregnant now. When will my baby move?

A: With any luck, right after he finishes college.

Q: How will I know if my vomiting is morning sickness or the flu?

A: If it’s the flu, you’ll get better.

Q: What is the most common pregnancy craving?

A: For men to be the ones who get pregnant.

Q: What is the most reliable method to determine a baby’s sex?

A: Childbirth.

Q: The more pregnant I get, the more often strangers smile at me. Why?

A: ‘Cause you’re fatter than they are.

Q: My wife is five months pregnant and so moody that sometimes she’s borderline irrational.

A: So what’s your question?

Q: How long is the average woman in labor?

A: Whatever she says divided by two.

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According to a new study that found first-rate treatment for cancer but insufficient primary care for other ailments, the U.S. healthcare system is more effective at delivering high costs than quality care.

The study disclosed Americans pay more than $7,900 per person for healthcare each year, which is far more than any other OECD country but still die earlier than their peers in the industrialized world.

From Reuters.com:

The cost of healthcare in the United States is 62 percent higher than that in Switzerland, which has a similar per capita income and also relies substantially on private health insurance.

Meanwhile, Americans receive comparatively little actual care, despite sky-high prices driven by expensive tests and procedures. They also spend more tax money on healthcare than most other countries, the study showed.

An “underdeveloped” U.S. primary care system is plagued by shortages of family doctors and high rates of avoidable hospital admissions for people with asthma, lung disease, diabetes, hypertension and other common illnesses.

The study was released on Wednesday by the 34-nation Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, or OECD.

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On Tuesday, a human rights group said it has filed claims with the United Nations seeking damages on behalf of more than 5,000 Haitian cholera victims and their families.

The claims filed by the Boston-based Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti argue that the United Nations and its peacekeeping force are liable for hundreds of millions of dollars for failing to adequately screen peacekeeping soldiers.

From news.yahoo.com:

“The sickness, death and ongoing harm from cholera suffered by Haiti’s citizens are a product of the U.N.’s multiple failures,” the complaint reads. “These failures constitute negligence, gross negligence, recklessness, and deliberate indifference for the lives of Haitians.”

Cholera has sickened nearly 500,000 people and killed more than 6,500 others since it surfaced in Haiti in October 2010, according to the Haitian Health Ministry. Evidence suggests that the disease was inadvertently brought to Haiti by a U.N. battalion from Nepal, where cholera is endemic. A local contractor failed to properly sanitize the waste of a U.N. base, and the bacteria leaked into a tributary of one of Haiti’s biggest rivers, according to a study by a U.N. appointed panel.

The Institute is also seeking a minimum of $100,000 for each bereaved family and $50,000 for each cholera survivor.

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Yahoo has begun to distribute an iPad magazine that illuminates ambitions of the Internet Company and the chronic hiccups that have thrown its fate into doubt.

Livestand, the free magazine, has intriguing potential as its software can be customized to pull a deep pool of content from Yahoo’s website and other participating publishers to cater to each user’s interests.

From news.yahoo.com:

But the magazine didn’t arrive until Wednesday, well behind Yahoo Inc.’s own timetable for the product and 19 months after Apple Inc. began selling the iPad.

Since its launch last year, the iPad has thrust tablet computers onto the cutting edge of both technology and media.

Yahoo is counting on Livestand to keep its brand and services relevant as more people embrace the iPad and other mobile devices to consume digital content. The company also hopes that the magazine’s customization tools make it easier to determine what each reader likes so advertisers can target their messages at people mostly likely to buy their products.

Livestand may become a key piece of Yahoo’s latest comeback attempt if Yahoo remains independent.

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Scientists revealed on Tuesday that they have been successful in transforming age-worn cells in people over 90 — including a centenarian — into rejuvenated stemcells that were “indistinguishable” from those found in embryos.

This technical feat opens a new path toward regenerative medicine, especially for the elderly, the researchers said.

From news.yahoo.com:

“This is a new paradigm for cell rejuvenation,” said Jean-Marc Lemaitre, a researcher at the Institute of Functional Genomics at the University of Montpellier and the main architect of the study.

“The age of cells is definitely not a barrier to reprogramming,” he told AFP by phone.

That human embryonic stem cells (ESC) can potentially become any type of cell in the body has long held out the tantalizing promise of diseased organs or tissue being repaired or replaced with healthy, lab-grown cells.

The technical feat was reported in the peer-reviewed journal Genes & Development.

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