Interesting Sites about Health and Lifestyle

Learn about Medical Conditions from Merck

Condition Guides on MerckSource provide you with condition-specific health information and resources. Using their pull down menu, you can check out everything from asthma to urinary track infections. You will also find links to other medical authorities for the condition including:

• A.D.A.M. Health Illustrated Encyclopedia
  Get clear, concise information on disease, injury, nutrition, medical tests, first aid, and more. Plus, it's loaded with illustrations to enhance your experience.
• Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary
  Use the same medical dictionary that healthcare professionals have relied on for years. You'll find advanced definitions for over 115,000 medical terms.
• HealthMapSM Platform
  Use these unique maps to learn about specific aspects of a disease or medical condition.
• Merck Manual—Home Edition
  Access the essential health reference guide The Merck Manual—Second Home Edition. Discover in-depth information on all of your health and medical concerns.

How-to Videos on the Web

Once upon a time, how-to guides on the web were just numbered lists and badly-drawn diagrams. Now those guides have gone multimedia. Expert Village has more than 17,000 videos. A recent sample had on line videos about growing day lilies, leveling a laser line tool, and how to sail with the wind. You can also browse categories of videos including: automotive, beauty and fashion, crafts, and many more. A similar offering from the UK is called VideoJug. VideoJug mixes user generated clips with professionally made content. Videos are accompanied by a text version, and you can download clips to your iPod.

Some things you should tell your doctor

Approximately 70% of those between 50 and 65 have either situational or routine use of complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) . But fewer than one third of those users mention that fact to their primary care physician. CAM is defined as diverse medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not presently considered to be part of conventional medicine. CAM includes products and practices such as herbal supplements, meditation, chiropractic care, and acupuncture. In a research study by the National Institute of Health, the common reasons given for not discussing CAM use with personal care physicians were:

• The physician never asked (42%)
• The respondents did not know they should (30%)
• There was not enough time during the office visit (19%)

CAM products may interact with traditional medications. You need to tell your doctor about their use. If you want additional information about CAM and the NIH study of its use, you can read the entire report and background information at: Complementary and Alternative Medicine: What People 50 and Older Are Using and Discussing with Their Physicians. Another excellent reference on CAM and traditional medicine is discussed in this article from the Post Bulletin and this Mayo Clinic book on alternative medicine.

You can't avoid aging, but you should know what to expect

Of course aging is a natural process and the alternative is not good. But, as you begin to see that gray hair or those smile lines on your face, what else is happening inside your body as you age. The Mayo Clinic article on aging provides a good overview of how your body is changing. You will get information on normal changes to your bones, heart, senses, and systems. There is a quiz to check your knowledge about aging and reference articles on taking care of yourself so that you age well.

Wikipedia - A valuable research and Q&A resource

Begun in 2001, Wikipedia is a popular online encyclopedia reference tool with over 2,000,000 entries in over 200 languages. Wikipedia allows users to add and edit entries.The peer review process and the knowledge quality makes wikipedia a valuable research and answer resource. In addition to searching for articles on topics of interest, the home page of Wikipedia has several fun items like: news, what-happened-today-in-history, interesting facts, and a featured picture.

Wikipedia is managed by a nonprofit parent organization, The Wikimedia Foundation. The content of Wikipedia is a collaborative effort. Thousands of people have contributed information. You can learn who is responsible for the most recent versions of any given page by clicking on the "Page history" link. Wikipedia has become one of the most extensive information libraries available on the Internet. Although there may be biases or errors in content, the extensive checks and balances minimize this possibility. Guidance on using Wikipedia is provided by Sorin A. Matei, an assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Purdue University, he suggests:

• Read the text carefully. Misspelling or poor grammar in Wikipedia entries could indicate that the information was added by a sloppy contributor.
• Check for missing well-known features of a particular story or concept.
• Value statements or citations that aren't credited are almost always suspicious.
• When Wikipedia entries justify value or factual statements by making reference to specific sources, the authority of the sources should always be checked.
• The Wikipedia label "controversial" posted at the top of the article might indicate that the topic has created conflict and debate.

A Little Science and A Lot of Fun

Learning is good. Even as you move out of the fast lane, you should enjoy learning about new and interesting topics. Now you have some help from Indiana University. They have put together short (2 minute) presentations on a wide variety of science subjects. You can read the brief text or listen to a broadcast of the information. There is a library of 100's of presentations that include titles like: "Mapping Wildfires", "Vitamins", "An Educated Palate", and "Sleeping with Plants". And, those are just on the first page.

Cooking techniques from the pros

If you enjoy cooking and learning new things about food preparation, you probably have several, maybe even several hundred cook books. However sometimes the descriptions and illustrations are not enough to get the techniques down. Well now there is Epicurious TV right there on your computer. You can log in to see demonstration videos, learn about selecting wines, or tour the kitchens of famous chefs.

Technology in small bites / bytes

Keeping up with technology is challenging especially when you are busy and surfing the web or checking our the latest gadget news just does not fit your schedule. Here is some quick, friendly help from Kim Komando. Kim has a weekly call in radio show about technology. She also has a web page full of news, downloads, advice, and cool site recommendations. Then there are her free newsletters about the goings on in the tech world. You can subscribe to the newsletter for free or just read the short news flashes on her website.

Alternating Currents is the website of Barbara Brown, a freelance writer with over 20 years experience. She focuses her freelance writing on providing information articles for small business and service websites.

© 2008 bmbrown