Category: 8. Health

Called the new gut-health glow-up, “fibermaxxing” is a nutrition trend based on boosting your daily fibre intake to help with weight loss or weight management, optimise digestion, and lower the risk of chronic diseases.

The TikTok hashtag #fibermaxxing has been used over 157 million times – according to video generator platform SendShort – and has been getting lots of attention on Instagram and YouTube.

While experts often criticise social media wellness trends, this one has won many health professionals’ seal of approval. Below, two experts explain why and how to tap into this trend for its many benefits.

Fibre is a type of complex carbohydrate found in plant foods that does not get digested or absorbed in our small intestine.

Seaweed and air-popped popcorn are good sources, too, she adds, though these are less commonly thought of.

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Some people with COVID are reporting a “razor blade throat,” but you don’t need to panic. It’s nothing new.

Here’s how you can protect yourself from a COVID infection:

If you do get sick, there are treatments available.

Please chooseI’m not a medical professional.Allergy and ImmunologyAnatomyAnesthesiologyBiostatisticsCardiac/Thoracic/Vascular SurgeryCardiologyCritical CareDentistryDermatologyDiabetes and EndocrinologyEmergency MedicineEpidemiology and Public HealthFamily MedicineForensic MedicineGastroenterologyGeneral PracticeGeneticsGeriatricsHealth PolicyHematologyHIV/AIDSHospital-based MedicineI’m not a medical professional.Infectious DiseaseIntegrative/Complementary MedicineInternal MedicineInternal Medicine-PediatricsMedical Education and SimulationMedical PhysicsMedical StudentNephrologyNeurological SurgeryNeurologyNuclear MedicineNutritionObstetrics and GynecologyOccupational HealthOncologyOphthalmologyOptometryOral MedicineOrthopaedicsOsteopathic MedicineOtolaryngologyPain ManagementPalliative CarePathologyPediatricsPediatric SurgeryPharmacologyPhysical Medicine and RehabilitationPlastic SurgeryPodiatryPreventive MedicinePsychiatryPsychologyPulmonologyRadiation OncologyRadiologyRheumatologySubstance Use and AddictionSurgeryTherapeuticsTraumaUrologyMiscellaneous

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has joined the efforts in combating the notoriously hard-to-diagnose diseases of extreme tiredness such as myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME) and long Covid.

In a new study, based on abnormal physical factors relating to ME, the researchers found 90 percent accuracy in identifying the cases of ME by using a new AI platform to spot markers for the condition from routine lab tests including for blood and stools.

These unprecedented findings offer a promising opportunity to identify and accurately diagnose a class of medical complexities that have for many years impaired patients and perplexed doctors.

According to Julia Oh, a Duke University microbiologist, who led the study in collaboration with researchers at The Jackson Laboratory biomedical research institute, “Our goal is to build a detailed map of how the immune system interacts with gut bacteria and the chemicals they produce.

“By connecting these dots we can start to understand what’s driving the disease and pave the way for genuinely precise medicine that has long been out of reach,” she added.

“The increasing use of AI in decoding chronic fatigue syndrome has proved a promising avenue of research in this domain,” explained Janet Scott, clinical lecturer in infectious disease at the MRC-University of Glasgow Centre for Virus Research.

“Instead of hunting for single causes, this approach could help us think about these complex conditions as network diseases. The problem may not be one broken component but disrupted communication between systems,” Scott said.

The ME conditions affect tens of millions of people globally. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), around 6 percent of those who contract Covid-19 then suffer long Covid and chronic fatigue syndrome. 

King Charles has been rewarding members of the royal family with special honours for their devotion and loyalty as he continues to make big strides to leave behind a meaningful legacy.

Prince Richard, the Duke of Gloucester – the first cousin to the late Queen Elizabeth II – continues to be a working royal in Charles’s reign. The 80-year-old took an important royal engagement on Thursday which could shape a bright future for the coming generation.

The royal was welcomed by the lord-lieutenant of Oxfordshire, Marjorie Glasgow, and received by Professor Irene Tracey, vice-chancellor of the University of Oxford to observed the two leading medical research centres of the university.

The tour was focused on Oxford’s global impact in vaccine development, disease prevention, and medical innovation.

“We were honoured to welcome His Royal Highness to Oxford today,” Professor Irene Tracey said. “His visit shines a light on the extraordinary work taking place across our laboratories and celebrates the people behind these efforts, including the young scientists shaping the future of medicine.”

The King, who is undergoing weekly cancer treatments, has been called out for promoting alternative medical treatments and homeopathy. Charles’s view on the practices were reflected in his move in 2023 when he appointed Dr Michael Dixon – who is pro-homeopathy – as head of the royal medical household.

Given the royal family’s support for modern medicine and advancements that have been taking place, it hardly suggests that the King only believes in alternative medicine. The Duke of Gloucester, who holds a key position with the monarch, making this visit is a significant indicator of such.

Serious liver disease is becoming more common among Americans who drink heavily, according to a new study from Keck Medicine of USC.

It’s not that more people are partying with alcohol. And it’s not that the drinkers are having more drinks. It’s that more of the people who drink regularly are becoming sick.

Over the last two decades, the share of heavy drinkers who have advanced liver scarring jumped from 1.8% to 4.3%. For women, more than 1.5 drinks per night, on average, is considered heavy drinking. For men, it’s 2 drinks.

“The fact that the risk not only increased but that it more than doubled — almost tripled — is really astonishing,” said Dr. Brian P. Lee, a liver transplant specialist at Keck Medicine of USC and lead author on the study.

It was published in the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology on Wednesday. Lee said he thinks patients might dramatically change their thinking and behavior if they had this information.

The increase in illness was seen especially in women, older people and those with conditions like obesity or diabetes.

Three USC researchers analyzed national health data from more than 44,000 adults surveyed between 1999 and 2020 in a well-known national heath study known as NHANES. Of those, 2,474 were heavy drinkers according to the definition of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism — 20 grams of alcohol per day for women and 30 grams for men, roughly the equivalent of 1.5 and 2 drinks.

They found a more than twofold increase over the two decades in significant liver fibrosis, a condition where healthy liver tissue is replaced by stiff, fibrous tissue — like a sponge hardening into leather. If left unchecked, this can eventually lead to liver failure or cancer.

By comparison, non-heavy drinkers saw a much smaller increase, from 0.8% to 1.4% over the same period.

This rise in liver damage is especially troubling because many people don’t realize anything is wrong until the disease is advanced. “Liver disease is silent,” Lee said. “Most people won’t, even if they have [advanced liver scarring], have any symptoms at all.”

Drinking patterns did not change much over the study period. But the health profiles of heavy drinkers did. Rates of metabolic syndrome — a cluster of conditions including obesity, diabetes, and high blood pressure — increased from 26% of people, to nearly 38%. Demographics shifted too: heavy drinkers became more likely to be women, people over the age of 45, and those living in poverty.

“We’re showing with this study that the picture of the American drinker is changing dramatically,” Lee said. “You have more women who are drinking heavily, more ethnic minorities who are drinking heavily, and these are groups that are known to have a higher sensitivity to alcohol in causing liver damage.”

Other factors may also be at play, said Dr. Sammy Saab, medical director of the Pfleger Liver Institute at UCLA, who was not involved in the study. People could be consuming different types of drinks, or at different times. “Have we moved away from beer, wine, to hard cocktails? Have we moved away from drinking with food, where the food absorbs some of the alcohol you consume, versus drinking without food where alcohol is better absorbed?” Saab asked.

Then there are cultural changes, he said. “In the old days, if you drank, you’d still have to drive home, but now we’ve got Uber, we have Lyft,” he said, which may remove some deterrents to heavy drinking.

The current definition of heavy drinking in the U.S. may actually be too lenient, Lee said, especially compared to evolving global standards. Canada, for example, now advises no more than two drinks per week to minimize health risks.

“In the U.S. right now, we consider heavy drinking to be eight drinks or more per week for women and 15 or more for men — but that’s quite high,” he said. “We’ve shown in prior studies that you can develop liver disease at lower quantities than the U.S. threshold.”

The study’s findings highlight the need to rethink long-held assumptions about alcohol-related liver disease, and Lee hopes it can be used to develop more effective screening methods for early detection.

The paper raises a lot of good questions, Saab said, serving as a call to action for researchers and clinicians to better understand this increase in alcohol-associated liver disease — and how to stop it.

People who want to feel younger, look fitter, or perhaps slough off a little layer of belly fat have been turning to an increasingly popular kind of treatment — one you can get without a prescription.

They’ve got obscure names like BPC-157, tesamorelin, and cerebrolysin. All it takes is a tiny needle and a little clear vial filled with injectable molecules.

Welcome to the world of peptides.

“Absolutely everybody’s asking for it, the field is popping,” Dr. Florence Comite, a longevity doctor who serves concierge medicine clients in New York City, told Business Insider.

The peptide landscape is so large that it almost defies definition. The prescription drugs Ozempic and Mounjaro, often used for weight loss, are peptides. So is insulin. There are peptides in skin creams, hair products, and high-end serums marketed to women to reduce fine lines and stimulate collagen. The wildly popular fitness supplement creatine? Also a peptide.

Then, there are the gym bro shots, said to boost muscle, burn fat, stimulate testosterone, and aid recovery.

Demand for peptide injections — something that biohackers and longevity-seekers have already been quietly using in the shadows for decades — is booming. Patients in pockets of the country saturated with peptides, like Beverly Hills, San Diego, Silicon Valley, and Manhattan are increasingly asking their doctors: “should I try peptides?”

Many physicians aren’t sure what to say because there isn’t a ton of great evidence around about how much peptides can really do. Plus, the FDA has been cracking down on peptide compounders in recent years. They worry that the hype is outpacing good evidence.

How peptides boost your body

Unlike most pills that doctors prescribe, peptides live in a more slippery area, between drug and bodily substance.

A peptide is a chain of organic compounds — specifically, amino acids — that stimulate natural processes. Depending on which amino acids a peptide is made of, and how it is used, the molecule can have all kinds of impacts on how our hormones operate. Peptides can improve fertility in both men and women, tamp down inflammation, remove dangerous visceral belly fat, or help build muscle. Others are thought to help improve sleep quality, even possibly improve brain health.

“What’s great about peptides is that they mimic the body,” said Comite, who has been working with peptides since she was a research fellow at the National Institutes of Health over 30 years ago.

Since most peptides are too fragile to be formulated as pills, they are often packaged as a clear liquid in a little vial. Users learn to inject their peptides using a very fine, short needle, right at home.

The popularity of peptides has soared on their reputation as ostensibly “natural” products. The idea being that, unlike other drugs or steroids, peptides are a safer choice because they’re just stimulating your body to do its own thing.

Taking growth hormones, for example, comes with a suite of undesirable potential side effects, like an increased risk of cancer and type 2 diabetes. What if you could just take a peptide that would stimulate your own growth hormone to make you stronger, leaner, and more energetic?

“The theory is that even if you use a growth hormone stimulating peptide, your body’s only going to be able to make so much growth hormone,” Dr. Sajad Zalzala, a longevity physician and one of the cofounders of AgelessRx, said. “Kind of like a check valve already in place. Again, that’s the theory.”

The peptides gym bros take to get chiseled muscles

One darling peptide of gym bros and longevity fiends alike is a substance called BPC-157. It’s known as the “Wolverine” shot for its perceived ability to heal you up and regenerate your body real fast like the Marvel character, Logan, after a big fight.

B-P-C stands for “body protection compound.” BPC-157 was first derived from stomach juices. It’s being investigated to treat inflammatory bowel diseases, including Crohn’s and ulcerative colitis. But the reason that athletes like it is because it’s thought to reduce inflammation and improve blood flow — and perhaps do even more.

There are a few other super popular peptides:

Tesamorelin, an injectable peptide, is prescribed to HIV patients to reduce excess belly fat. Sermorelin is supposed to help with sleep and recovery. CJC-1295 binds to growth hormone receptors in the body, and people often take it alongside impamorelin, which stimulates the hypothalamus. The two in tandem are said to deliver better muscle gains.

On Reddit and YouTube people share how they “stack” different peptides like this, taking multiple different kinds with the goal of boosting the effects of each.

One snag: The FDA is making peptides harder to access

Peptide fans get their shots at clinics and med spas — or, for less money, online.

Increasingly, people are ordering peptides that are labeled “for research only,” meaning they are supposed to be used by lab workers for experimentation, and were never meant to be put into human bodies.

That’s partly because the FDA crackdown on peptides has intensified in recent years, just as pharmaceutical compounding (a sort of acceptable way to get knock off medications) has surged in popularity, with people seeking cheaper versions of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro. At the beginning of 2022, the FDA had a list of four peptides that they said “may present significant safety risks” and should not be compounded. By the end of 2023, there were 26.

Comite thinks the FDA crackdown is a shame. She is finding it harder and harder to source compounded liquid BPC-157. She often uses a patch form of BPC-157 on herself, placing it over sore areas or injuries. Recently, she tore a calf muscle, so she’s been using it there, but she also just likes how taking a little bit of it keeps her active and moving.

“I use it almost every day,” she said. “It’s amazing for joints and everything — at a very tiny dose.”

Zalzala, who doesn’t usually prescribe peptides, ordered some topical BPC-157 recently when his wife had a knee injury. “My wife says it works,” he said, though he cautioned that it’s hard to really know if that’s true without more proper research.

Bracken Darrell, the CEO of VF Corporation and one of Comite’s patients, is also a BPC-157 convert. A self-proclaimed “basketball nut,” he’s on the court about three days a week. On the days when he doesn’t pick up a ball, he’s out cross-training on a bike or lifting weights.

So when he tore his meniscus about four months ago, he was worried. Under Comite’s supervision, he started taking liquid BPC-157 about three to four times a week.

He told BI it was “weird” at first, learning to inject the needle into an area of skin near his knee. But, pretty soon, it was just part of his routine.

“I believe it helped a lot, but it’s hard to know for sure,” he said. “There are people with a severely torn meniscus who don’t ever play basketball again, and I’m back — I certainly wouldn’t conclude that’s because I’m taking BPC-157, but at a minimum it didn’t hurt. And it sure seems like it helps.”

Proceed with caution, doctors say

Even longevity doctors who prescribe and use peptides regularly agree that some folks are overdoing it, and that could be dangerous.

“Proceed with caution, because you have to know the source and you have to know it’s active,” Comite said. “It’s not like Lowe’s or Home Depot where you can get stuff and you can fix the plumbing.”

In reality, the evidence for peptides is still murky. There are no big, randomized clinical trials like what we have for prescription drugs or vaccines. The current hype is based on anecdotal evidence, a few small human studies from decades ago, and rodent studies.

“People wanna take the peptides because they’re not from big pharma, they’re not mainstream medicine, they gotta be better than those cockamamie doctors,” Dr. Eric Topol, a cardiologist and longevity expert, said recently on the Dax Shepard podcast. “Where’s the data?”

For people who are using peptides, experts shared two pieces of advice:

Comite urges patients to start slow. A common mistake people who are dosing themselves make is thinking that “if a little bit is good, then a lot must be better,” she said. That’s not the case.

“Taking mega doses of tesmorelin along with testosterone causes your organs to overgrow,” Comite said. Sometimes she’ll see a toned gymgoer with a potbelly, and wonder whether that’s due to an enlarged liver or spleen.

Darrell recommends testing your peptides with an independent lab so you know what you’re getting is both real and uncontaminated.

Zalzala says his company started thinking about offering peptides a few years back, due to consumer demand, but they haven’t yet. There are just so many peptides out there, and it’s hard to tell which might be the very best.

Some of the most research-backed ways to have an impact on your longevity and fitness are still the simplest anyway: eat decent amounts of fiber and protein regularly, work out — at least a couple sessions with weights each week, and cut back (or ideally, eliminate) liquid sugar in your diet like juice and soda.