Innholdsfortegnelse for Vol 3 Issue 68 i The Art of Healing

Virtual reality (VR) can identify early Alzheimer’s disease more accurately than ‘gold standard’ cognitive tests currently in use, suggests new research from the University of Cambridge. The study highlights the potential of new technologies to help diagnose and monitor conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease, which affects more than 525,000 people in the U.K. In 2014, Professor John O’Keefe of UCL was jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology of Medicine for ‘discoveries of cells that constitute a positioning system in the brain.’ Essentially, this means that the brain contains a mental ‘satnav’ of where we are, where we have been, and how to find our way around. However, the pen-and-paper cognitive tests used in clinic to diagnose the condition are unable to test for navigation difficulties. A key component of…

Imagine going into a shoe shop that only has one kind of shoe. You sit down, the attendant asks what shoe you’d like to try on, and no matter how you respond he returns with size 9 Dunlop Volleys. You look around and see all the other shoppers also trying on size 9 Dunlop Volleys. For some, the shoes are too small and for some they’re too big. For some, the shoes clearly rub. But no matter what the complaint, the attendant insists that this is the right shoe for everyone. It seems an unlikely scenario but in a way that’s what modern mass-produced medicine is like – one size fits all. Even when it doesn’t. However it wasn’t always like this. Tracey Baillie explains. There was a time before…

It hurts, I know. Whatever it is that you’re carrying right now, I know the weight of it is tiring and you want nothing more than to put it down, even just for a little while. We all have healing work to do. Maybe it’s the slow, heavy thump of grief. Or the shame that has scarred the edges of your belief in yourself (or someone else). Or the exhausting hustle of anxiety that never switches off. Or the void of lost hope that echoes around your chest. Maybe you don’t even have words for it. Some pain is too much for the limitations of language. Life hurts, and we can’t simply put it down when it gets too much. At some point, we will hit the ground from a…

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved. Helen Keller Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. Martin Luther King, Jr. I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness; I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too. I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, that peace and tranquility will return once more. Anne Frank The most authentic thing about us is our…

Following the G20 Leaders’ Meeting in Osaka early July 2019, leaders have committed to promote “healthy and active ageing through policy measures to address health promotion, prevention and control of communicable and non-communicable diseases … over the life course”. The International Longevity Centre UK (ILC-UK), the U.K.’s leading think tank on the impact of longevity on society, welcomes the G20 Governments’ commitment to focus efforts on prevention of ill health. Following the launch of the Prevention In An Ageing World program at the World Health Assembly in May 2019, ILC-UK has been calling on governments across the globe to make prevention a priority across the lifespan. Research by ILC-UK reveals that among those aged 50 and over in high and high-middle socio-demographic index countries, at least 16% of the total…

New research published in Obesity, has found that people with obesity are not only stigmatised, but are blatantly dehumanised. Obesity is now very common in most developed countries. Around one third of U.S. adults and one quarter of U.K. adults are now medically defined as having obesity. However, obesity is a complex medical condition driven by genetic, environmental and social factors. New research conducted at the University of Liverpool and led by Dr Inge Kersbergen and Dr Eric Robinson, examined whether stigmatising views about obesity may be more extreme than previously shown. The research examined whether people believe that individuals with obesity are less evolved and human than those without obesity. Methods Used More than 1500 participants from the U.K., U.S. and India completed online surveys to indicate how evolved they…

Atrial fibrillation has overtaken heart failure and heart attacks as the leading cause of cardiovascular hospitalisation, a South Australian study has found. Researchers analysed data collected over two decades by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare to establish the incidence and trends of common cardiovascular conditions between 1993 and 2013. “What our study showed is that from 1993-2013 hospitalisations for AF (atrial fibrillation) increased by 295 per cent,” said Gallagher. “That was compared to 73 per cent for heart attack and 39 per cent for heart failure.” Published recently in the journal Heart, University of Adelaide lead researcher Celine Gallagher found atrial fibrillation had the highest incidence of principal diagnosis in 2013 ahead of heart attack and heart failure. In 1993 it was heart failure followed by heart attack…

About seven years ago, I found myself in the emergency ward of my local hospital waiting to see the on-call psych team. My GP had sent me there directly from her office as she was concerned that I may be having suicidal thoughts. I wasn’t. Thankfully my Generalised Anxiety Disorder hadn’t taken me down that path - but it certainly was making life close to unbearable. My insomnia was debilitating; the constant stream of loud and intrusive thoughts in my mind were exhausting; the depersonalisation made it impossible to participate in things I’d once enjoyed; and I felt so incapable of functioning ‘normally’ that I’d had to leave my job. David McLaughlin is a writer and mental health advocate who writes frequently on the subject of anxiety and recovery. In…

Disruption in the wellness industry? Jane Kitchen, editor, Spa Business Handbook “Gen Z (born after 1996) are shaping up to be a globally-minded, philanthropic, individualistic generation. By 2019, they will account for 32 per cent of the world’s population. Baby Boomers still have a big influence on wellness however: they will help fuel the growth in wellness communities; they are transforming the wellness space in senior living; and they still have more disposable income than other generations. But it’s youth, as always, who will drive change, and this next generation is ready to do things differently.” Wellness will influence design, movement and guest services Andrew Gibson, wellbeing expert “In the coming years, a combination of factors will come together to provide a pivotal shift in the way society behaves when…

A Columbia University study has found that adversity early in life is associated with increased gastrointestinal symptoms in children that may have an impact on the brain and behaviour as they grow to maturity. The study was published in the journal Development and Psychopathology. “One common reason children show up at doctors’ offices is intestinal complaints,” said Nim Tottenham, a professor of psychology at Columbia and senior author on the study. “Our findings indicate that gastrointestinal symptoms in young children could be a red flag to primary care physicians for future emotional health problems.” Scientists have long noted the strong connection between the gut and brain. Previous research has demonstrated that a history of trauma or abuse has been reported in up to half of adults with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS),…

A new study has surprised the medical world, finding that smoking does not shorten the length of telomeres - a marker at the end of our chromosomes that is widely accepted as an indicator of ageing. The meta-analysis of 18 previously collected datasets led by researchers at Newcastle University was published in the Royal Society journal Open Science. The researchers chose to focus on smoking simply because there is more data available on the associations between smoking and telomere length than for any other unhealthy behaviour. The study confirms that while smokers do indeed have shorter telomeres (as many previous studies have shown), more importantly, there is no evidence that telomeres shorten faster in smokers compared to nonsmokers, as would be expected if smoking causes telomere shortening. The results suggest…

In The Conceptual Ecology of the Human Microbiome, published in the June 2019 issue of The Quarterly Review of Biology, Nicolae Morar and Brendan J. M. Bohannan examine in detail the different metaphors scientists use to describe the human microbiome. Because it appears that each view has both advantages and disadvantages, the authors suggest the pragmatic approach of considering all metaphors when exploring therapies for diseases and disorders. The human microbiome is the complex system of microorganisms on and in the human body that is crucial to many metabolic and immunity functions. Morar and Bohannan chose five of the most common ways scientists think of the human microbiome, examining the benefits that each conceptual framework offers in designing therapeutics, as well as the limitations of each. “Each of the common…

The legal system in action affects everyone in society. However, at times some people, such as parties to litigation (and their families), victims, offenders, witnesses and jurors, are more significantly affected by it than others. Law can affect people in different ways: economically, socially and in their relationships. So if follows that the law can also affect wellbeing. Michael S. King explains. Therapeutic jurisprudence does not assert that wellbeing promotion should be the law’s paramount role. However, it asserts that, like medicine, the law should as far as possible ‘do no harm’. Although much of therapeutic jurisprudence work relates to courts, its scope is much broader, originating in work undertaken by David Wexler and Bruce Winick in mental health law in the United States in the late 1980s. Since then,…

I can’t remember the exact day, but I remember exactly what happened – and most of all, how I felt. I was getting ready for work. I was on one of my starve-binge/starve cycles, and I felt enormous. I was chubby, about 10 kilos overweight, and bloated. My skirt was too tight. My jacket was uncomfortable on my ever-growing nana arms. Even pulling up my stockings was awkward. But I got dressed anyway, because I had to go to work. When I went to put my make-up on, I found I couldn’t even look in the mirror. If I was uncomfortable in my clothes, it was positively excruciating to look at myself. I was so fed up, distressed, anxious and irritable about the way I looked that I couldn’t stand…