Category: Wellness

When planning a cruise, chances are, you’re picturing warm sun, salt air and blue seas as far as the eye can see. What you don’t want to picture, after the fact, is the memory of spending your cruise or the days following being miserably ill and turned off to America’s favorite affordable vacation option. Cruises…

Listen up! Noise is one of the most common causes of hearing loss and one of the most common occupational illnesses in the United States. According to the Better Hearing Institute, 10 million Americans have suffered irreversible hearing damage resulting from noise, and more than 30 million are exposed to hazardous noise levels every day.…

Nails are the windows into a body’s soul, says one health expert. “The nails offer many little clues to what’s going on inside you. Lupus patients get quirky, angular blood vessels in their nail folds. Psoriasis starts in the nails up to 10 percent of the time” and causes splitting and pitting of the nail bed, said Joshua Fox, M.D.,…

If you hang out in bars, clubs, restaurants or other open public spaces, you will likely see someone “vaping” — inhaling on an electronic cigarette and exhaling water vapor. It is a $3 billion a year industry in the U.S. Imagine, being able to light up anywhere and get your nicotine fix from a “cigarette,”…

Imagine, one day baring your back to your computer screen with your dermatologist looking on to show her the strange-feeling mole on your shoulder. Your dermatologist then makes a diagnosis of a growth that warrants a closer look, so you are transferred to the office receptionist to make an appointment. Telemedicine is Here and Now…

Usually, the words “surprise” and “insurance companies” have negative connotations when paired. Most of us are used to hearing “no” rather than “yes” when it comes to what’s covered. But there’s good news. Beyond the annual physical and some wellness benefits, there are some great advantages hidden deep in most policies, things that you’ll actually…

It’s called the “cruise-ship virus” by media looking for a catchy headline. But the norovirus is caught by more than vacationers – it’s the most common cause of stomach flu in the United States. Sometimes called acute gastroenteritis or viral gastroenteritis, the infection is tremendously contagious, hence its nickname for its propensity to sicken an…

Western medicine was largely created by the practice of carving up cadavers and trying to determine what caused their demise. However, ancient Chinese tradition, with its customs of venerating ancestors, did not believe in the practice of cutting bodies, so its treatments largely grew out of observation and outer-body experimentation. Out of those studies was…

MRSA is a staph germ. The acronym stands for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus, but by any name, it’s a germ that spells trouble. The biggest problem with MRSA is that it’s a so-called “superbug,” a bacterial infection that’s resistant to standard antibiotics. When acquired, it’s tough to get rid of, and if left untreated, can lead to…

Humans are tactile animals. Ever since we first developed opposable thumbs, we’ve enjoyed the thrill of rubbing our hands on each other as a way to stimulate the body and bring deep relaxation to the stressful human condition. The definition of massage that we use today comes from a French word that means “friction of…