The Symptoms of ADD/ADHD

The three main characteristics of ADD/ADHD are inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity. While many adults do not get diagnosed as children, the symptoms are often noticeable between the ages of three to seven years of age. Most children are not diagnosed until they reach school age, when they are involved in a structured setting and compared against a set of behavioral standards.

Inattention, hyperactivity and impulsivity as common ADHD/ADD symptoms:

Read More..

The Merits of Menopause

For most women, the "change of life" is not an easy one. The symptoms of menopause--mood swings, hot flashes and night sweats--can be intense, not to mention embarrassing, and in many cases they can interfere with daily life.

But there may be a healthy upside to those hot flashes, according to the latest research. It turns out that women who have these episodes in their 50s or 60s, the typical age range for menopausal symptoms, also have an 11% lower risk of heart disease over the next 10 years, compared with women who don't suffer the same symptoms. And because heart-disease risk increases in women's postmenopausal years as levels of the heart-protective hormone estrogen decline, this risk reduction is potentially lifesaving. Researchers don't know why the symptoms may reduce heart risk, but they theorize that the blood-vessel activity that occurs during flushing primes the heart and vessels to combat plaque buildup and hardening of arteries.

Read More..

NEW STUDY: CHOCOLATE DURING PREGNANCY LOWERS RISKS OF HYPERTENSION

As if anyone needed another reason to eat chocolate, new research published in the August 2010 issue of the Annals of Epidemiology suggests that chocolate may be good for both gestational hypertension (GH) and for preeclampsia.1

This, of course, goes hand-in-hand with a lot of other research regarding chocolate, most of which has been featured here on NaturalNews in the past. Gestational hypertension is physiologically related to some forms of generalized high blood pressure and heart disease symptoms, which have been shown to be lowered beneficially through chocolate consumption (especially chocolates based on real cacao).2

This latest study was conducted by researchers from the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Iowa College of Public Health and from the Center for Perinatal, Pediatric, and Environmental Epidemiology

Read More..

Late-Preterm Babies at Greater Risk for Problems Later in Childhood

Late-preterm babies -- those born between 34 and 36 weeks -- are at an increased risk for cognitive and emotional problems, regardless of maternal IQ or demographics, according to new research published by Michigan State University researchers in the current edition of the journal Pediatrics.

While late-preterm births (full-term pregnancies last at least 37 weeks) have been associated with such problems before, the study represents one of the most rigorous looks at the issue by accounting for other potential causes, said the study's lead author, Nicole Talge, a postdoctoral research associate in MSU's Department of Epidemiology.

"Previous studies reveal that babies born a little early are at-risk for short-term medical problems and possibly long-term behavioral and cognitive problems," Talge said.

Read More..