First of all I hope everyone that reads my blog (if anyone does) had a great thanksgiving. Now on to the post!
According to the article: Meditation: Heart Healthier Than Organic O’s? by treehugger.com sitting on your but for a few minutes a day may actually be good for your heart. Of course that doesn’t mean sitting in front of a computer or a television is now something you shouldn’t be ashamed of (because we all do it way too much). They are talking about transcendental meditation.
Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
This mediation technique was introduced in india around 1955 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi (1917-2008). It is the worlds most practiced form of meditation, and according to a study that was presented to the American Heart Association, it helps reduce the risk of heart problems.
The study followed 200 people over the course of five years. Those who meditated cut their risk for heart attacks, strokes and death in half, in comparison to the patients who were only given conventional nutritional and healthy lifestyle education.
(more…)
Filed Under: Medicine, Values by Aron Brown
No Comments »
Apligraf® living tissue treatment
The cell-based or “systems-based” healing techniques are still a growing field. There is not much research going on due to the unbelievable amount of regulations scientists have to go through in order to bring these techniques to patients. Enter Organogenesis, founded in 1985 they are the first company to have a living, allogeneic, cell based product approved by the FDA. This product is known as Apligraf®, and it is a “bi-layered bio-engineered cell based product” used in the treatment of venous leg ulcers and diabetic foot ulcers. These wounds for one reason or another do not heal on their own; however through the use of this product, a group of living cells working together (“systems-based”) with the body, “wounds previously unresponsive to treatment” will heal.
Apligraf® is a 44 square centimeter circular bio-engineered cell construct, which when placed on a wound integrates into the wound thus helping the wound to heal. Apligraf® has been used in over 200,000 patients. On average, each patient is treated with one to two applications of this living cell therapy.
Organogenesis is also looking into using Apligraf® for treating burn victims and epidermolysis bullosa “a rare genetic disease characterized by the presence of extremely fragile skin and recurrent blister formation, resulting from minor mechanical friction or trauma.”
(more…)
Filed Under: Genetic Research, Medicine, Science by Aron Brown
No Comments »
Abortion may be wrong, but its a choice.
As you may have guessed from the cartoon, I do not support abortion, I think it is a terrible thing to do. However I am Pro-Choice.
Does this seem weird? Probably, but I can’t bring myself to understand the pro-life side of things. Yah I get the whole, “It’s a human being” thing and again I agree. What I don’t get is how people can decide that they are right and others are wrong.
Now I am not saying that slavery is wrong, but it’s a choice, so those of you trolls that are thinking about combining what I said with the image caption, don’t try it. The difference here is that a slave is a human being where as the hard truth of the mater is that a fetus is a parasite by definition.
(more…)
Filed Under: Medicine, Politics, Values by Aron Brown
3 Comments »
Over at physorg.com they have just released a new article, Gene therapy repairs injured human donor lungs for the first time, about a new method of using a technique called ex vivo gene delivery to “deliver” the IL-10 gene into human donor lungs.
Credit: Dr. Marcelo Cypel
A team of scientists, in the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine, University Health Network have successfully used this new technique to repair injured human donor lungs!
The implications for this technology are staggering. As Dr. Keshavjee said “For the first time, we hope to improve the health of donor lungs that we could not have used before by using gene therapy to decrease inflammation and repair cells before transplantation.” Future research into this technology could help solve the two major problems that transplantation surgery face today.
(more…)
Filed Under: Genetic Research, Medicine, Science by Aron Brown
No Comments »