Testing It Up

Longevity is always a million-dollar question. Apart from finding the Fountain of Youth, what can one realistically do in order to live a long and happy life?

A study conducted by researchers at Brigham Young University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have an answer, and it is a whole lot simpler than what some may think. The “recipe for longevity,” as shared in a feature on Time.com, consists of staying away from cigarettes and having “lots of friends.”

The study involved the gathering and analysis of data from 148 studies regarding health outcomes and social relationships. This translated to data from more than 300,000 men and women who participated in those studies.

An analysis of this data showed that people with poor social connections had higher odds of death – 50 percent, on average – in the follow-up period of the study, when compared with those who had healthy social ties. According to the researchers, this rate is about as significant as the mortality difference that is noticeable between those who have taken a liking to lighting up cigarettes and those who do not smoke.

Lead author Julianne Holt-Lunstad, an associate professor of psychology at Brigham Young University, was quoted by Time: “This is not just a few studies here and there. I’m hoping there will be recognition from the medical community, the public health community and even the general public about the importance of this.”

The research review was released on Tuesday by the Journal PLoS Medicine.

Erick Shepheard could not have thought that it would be his last day on earth, ironically on the first day of the year 2008. He was shot twice, on the chest and on his head. He died instantly and the sole witness — and shooter — is no less than his wife, Cindy.

Last Monday, Cindy Shepheard’s trial began at the St. Clair County Circuit Court with Assistant State’s Attorney Judy Dalan and defense attorney Rick Roustio. The defense pointed out that what Cindy did on January 1, 2008 was an act of self defense. They said that Erick was so angry with his wife because of her cocaine addiction and was about to be violent. It was not the first time Erick would hurt her for the same reason, and so she had no choice but to shoot him before he can get to her.

Dalan later told the jury that after Cindy shot her husband twice, she left their house together with her kids and stayed the night at her in-laws without telling them what had happened. In an attempt to cover up the scene, she went back to their house next day and burned it down, with the body of Erick still inside. When autopsy results were revealed, there was no soot in Erick’s lungs which allowed prosecutors to conclude he did not die in the fire. Erick Shepheard was dead before the incident happened, and his wife is now trying to get-away with first-degree murder.

Under the Illinois’ state laws, first-degree murder need not have any primary motive to be proven, yet in this particular case, there is a $100,000 at stake for Erick’s beneficiary, if ever he died a violent death. The beneficiary is Cindy Shepheard, and it looks like it’s going to help nail the case on her. Her defense lawyers’ job just got a little more complicated, and proving it was all for self-defense might be harder than they first thought.

A woman from Chattanooga, Tennessee was sentenced to 42 months in prison on Monday, after faking breast cancer, according to a feature by The Associated Press.

Hamilton County Criminal Court Judge Don Poole also sentenced 39-year-old Keele Maynor to 10 years of probation, and ordered her to start monthly restitution payments of $300 once she is released.

Poole was quoted as having given the following comment: “It seems like to me some confinement is necessary… I have problems with somebody who shaves their head and says they have cancer.” He also reportedly told Maynor that he found her offenses “reprehensible”.

Maynor is accused of accepting donations of sick leave and money, as well as cancer patient support services, over a period of five years. During this time, Maynor had claimed that she was suffering from breast cancer. Maynor, however, said that she had felt unloved and had kept up the act of having terminal cancer in order to get attention. She shared that she had been emotionally abused by her mother as a teenager, and was sexually abused by a stepbrother.

According to Assistant District Attorney Neal Pinkston, the sentence fitted Maynor’s offenses, which included deceiving friends and co-workers, as well as support groups. The report mentioned the Breast Cancer Network of Strength. Maynor was made the beneficiary of a “black and pink” benefit, which conducted a silent auction in her behalf. She received $4,000 from the event, which she said she used to buy Christmas presents for her children.

Maynor said during her testimony: “I will spend the rest of my life trying to make my wrong right.”

Things are definitely getting worse for “Real Housewives” star Danielle Staub. After the sex tape scandal featuring her and her ex, she’s now in a drug-related mess involving an ex-con asking her to pay up $100,000 for the time he spent in jail because of her.

Staub’s past continue to haunt her, this time putting her in a very dangerous situation. Reports say that a certain Danny Aguilar bailed Danielle out in a drug deal that went bad in the 80’s. According to Danny, he paid the drug dealers so that they wouldn’t kill Staub. Aguilar and Staub were involved in a kidnapping case due to a drug deal gone bad.

When authorities finally caught up with the duo, Staub was charged with cocaine possession and extortion. She went into a plea bargain with the prosecutors to testify against Aguilar. As a result, Aguilar served 15 years in jail, and Danielle was just given 5 years probation and drug testing. All the other characters in their story got convicted too, and Staub was the only one who ran free.

When Aguilar called Staub on Sunday, he asked for her to pay up for the money he used to save her life from drug dealers, which she didn’t take in good-naturedly and instead called him a stalker. She contacted the police and 15 minutes after he placed the call to Staub, an officer called him up informing him that stalking is a crime in New Jersey, and that Staub can press charges against him.

The reality star is in various awful situations. Last week, her ex, seen opposite her in the sex tapes, slammed her with a defamation of character and harassment case when she denied knowing that their sexcapades were taped. She is also taking legal action against her co-stars in the show for physically attacking her in a previous episode.

The results of a study published in the online edition of the American Journal of Epidemiology showed that the time people spend sitting down can be associated to increased mortality risk, according to a feature on msnbc.com.

This risk, according to the study, seems to be unaffected by the amount of physical activity done by the individual – which means that the effect of the length of time one spends sitting down will be the same even if one hits the gym regularly.

The term “sitting down” was qualified to mean as time spent sitting outside of work, though the amount of couch time within work (in number of hours) was not defined in the feature.

Researchers from the American Cancer Society (ACS) conducted an analysis of survey responses of more than 123,000 men and women who were enrolled in the 1992 Cancer Prevention II study of the ACS. The test population consisted of individuals who had no history of heart attack, cancer, stroke or emphysema.

The study looked into the amount of time that the participants spent sitting down as well as the level of physical activity that they were engaged in, and related this with mortality. The period considered by the study covered 13 years, from 1993 until 2006.

Researcher Alpa Patel shared: “Prolonged time spent sitting, independent of physical activity, has been shown to have important metabolic consequences, and may influence things like triglycerides, high density lipoprotein, cholesterol, fasting plasma glucose, resting blood pressure, and leptin, which are biomarkers of obesity and cardiovascular and other chronic diseases.”

After taping and shooting schedules were shelved early this year for the lack of A-listers in their roster of celebrities, Celebrity Rehab is finally on all systems go for their upcoming season. Expected to be in the show are reality stars, former teen heartthrobs and naughty party girls that will surely make it interesting for a lot of viewers and can hopefully boost the ratings of the program.

Jeremy London from “Party of Five” heads the list. Also included are former “Hills” star Jason Wahler, former supermodel Janice Dickinson, 70’s heartthrob Leif Garret, socialite Frankie Lons and Jason Davis,  and alleged Tiger Woods’ mistress, Rachel Uchitel.

Dr. Drew Pinsky hosts the show which will feature the celebrities in a 21-day program to battle out their addictions. The Pasadena Recovery Center, where majority of the show takes place, has become popular among stars who want to save their tarnished reputations. No fixed date has been set on when shooting will start but it will have its airtime this year.

One celebrity who has sparked the interest of both Celebrity Rehab and “Celebrity Apprentice” was Rachel Uchitel. Celebrity Rehab in particular eyed her for the show as reports surfaced about her affair with Tiger Woods which had the element of drugs as fuel. Her decision to appear on Rehab has cost her a stint in Donald Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice” and that Trump is no longer interested to get her to jump ship.

As far as all the other casts are concerned, all of them have publicly battled their drug addictions that led them to the program. London recently made headlines when he confessed that he was kidnapped by two men and was ordered to do drugs. Wahler and Garrett have been in DUI cases and Dickinson has openly discussed her addictions to the public.

A report on The Washington Post shared that the Department of Veterans Affairs has released a directive that changes current policy regarding the use of medical marijuana among veterans.

Before the release of the new guidelines, veterans’ groups expressed concern that a veteran who is using medical marijuana may be denied pain medication by VA facilities. This concern extends to the possibility that veterans caught using medical marijuana may be barred from enjoying VA benefits.

In a letter addressed to the group Veterans for Medical Marijuana Access, Dr. Robert A. Petzel, the VA’s undersecretary for health, clarified that in states where medical marijuana can be used legally, veterans who may be taking medical marijuana through other physicians will not be denied pain medication. Dr. Petzel wrote: “If a veteran obtains and uses medical marijuana in a manner consistent with state law, testing positive for marijuana would not preclude the veteran from receiving opioids for pain management [in a VA facility].”

Dr. Petzel clarifies further that a VA physician can choose to change a patient’s treatment plan should he or she feel that there is a risk for adverse interaction with other drugs. He also mentioned in his letter that “the discretion to prescribe, or not prescribe, opioids in conjunction with medical marijuana, should be determined on clinical grounds.”

The directive, however, does not allow VA doctors to prescribe medical marijuana.

The new guidelines apply to fourteen states where medical marijuana is legal, namely: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

It was all Judy Mendoza could take. She was driving towards their garage when all of a sudden, her 12-year-old son Ryan came out from their front door, ran towards her and threw himself on the hood of her car asking her to just kill him. Ryan decided on that day that he no longer wants to live with his illness: severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).  For Judy, it was too much suffering to see her son wanting to die, and she finally decided to do whatever it takes to cure him. She took the one way that perhaps many others would not: medical marijuana.

In her state, the use of marijuana is considered legal when administered by a doctor. Instead of the typical marijuana consisting of dry leaves being smoked, medicinal marijuana comes in a liquid form (a “tincture”) which is then mixed on food or can be directly applied under the tongue of the patient for a more rapid effect.

True enough, after Ryan’s first encounter with marijuana, his condition greatly improved. He was able to go to the beach and just be normal like any other boy of his age. A year earlier, Judy swears no one can take him for he feared that a tsunami might strike him.

Marijuana has been classified as an illegal drug, and so it has never been tested for its medicinal benefits. Dr. Lester Grinspoon, a professor at the Harvard Medical School, says that there’s no guarantee that it can be effective for OCD or other diseases, but it cannot be harmful as it is remarkably non-toxic.

The effect of marijuana to the brain is still a subject that needs to be further assessed. While further testing is still a thing to be done, it becomes irrelevant for those who favor its administration, especially for parents who only wish to end what their child might be enduring for the longest time.

Parents are often faced with the challenge of identifying youthful curiosity from a possible drug or alcohol problem. Experts would often warn that overreaction to little details can push something small into a thing of complication.

A simple way to deal with such issues is by talking to your child. This was suggested by Partnership for Drug-Free America executive vice president Sean Clarkin, who further states that although asking your child if something is wrong would often solicit a “nothing” response, it opens  the doors of communication between a parent and a child.

Here are five signs that experts say indicate a possible problem with your child:

1. A sudden change in your child’s appearance, activities, and set of friends. Teens might often embark on patterns of change, but when a specific change continues in over a few months, it might be time for a talk with your child.

2. Unidentified language being used by your child. If you encounter words like Dex, skittling, tussing, robo-tripping and triple Cs on your child’s phone, you better start familiarizing with teenage drug lingo. Here’s one example that might freak parents out: G2G. P911. And I’m :#) – which translates to “Got to go. Parent alert. And I’m wasted.”

3. There are bottles that disappear faster than before in your medicine cabinet. A report from The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration estimates that 3.1 million people, with an age range of 12-25, embark on cough medicine and prescription drugs to get high and has been a cause for 12,000 emergency room visits in 2004.

4. Another family member has a substance abuse problem. The influence that another member of the family has on your child should not be taken for granted. Parents must know how to separate troubled family members to avoid influencing the children.

5. The gut feeling that something is really wrong. Though parents should not be prone to their intuitions, it would be better if your child gets upset if you approach them than not doing anything at the soonest time to prevent anything bad from happening.

With Mexico’s spiraling rate of narcotics abuse, rehab centers in the country have become killing zones and recruitment centers for fatal drug wars.

The existence of cartels has become very difficult for drug addiction treatment facilities. These clinics are converted into crime incubators as they become hideouts of cartel members after committing crimes against members of their cartel nemesis. This would often result to retaliation from the other group which usually leaves no one alive in the facility when they attack.

Although there is an increase in the number of rehab centers in the country, most of them do not register with the government. The more troublesome part is that these centers are run by former addicts, and they only ask a minimal amount from family members of those entered into their facility, which is why more people come to them for treatment. These clinics incorporate beatings as part of therapy, and hygiene and security are never put into place. This would make any addict more vulnerable to committing crimes.

The demand for rehab centers are on the rise in Mexico. An estimated 1.7 million people in the country are into cocaine addiction, adding up to 27.6 tons of the substance used every year. From 2002, figures have tripled as some 3 million citizens do marijuana and an astounding 3.9 tons of heroin are distributed annually in the area.

The most recent act of violence done in a rehab center was one where assailants armed with AK-47 automatic rifles attacked the Faith and Life clinic in Chihuahua City. They lined up 19 people and brutally executed them. Reports have surfaced that the attackers were from the Loz Aztecs, a gang working with the Juarez cartel and those that they killed were from the rival Sinoloa cartel.