Zoomer Report

Do you ever complain that your job killing you? Turns out, it could be. According to a study from researchers at Harvard and Stanford, workplace stress could shorten your life by up to three years depending on your race, gender and educational level. The data show that people with less education are much more likely to end up in jobs with more unhealthy workplace practices that cut life span, and...

It’s something I worried about every time I had surgery. What if the doctor was on call the night before and was fatigued by the time I had my operation? Now research that followed the outcomes in nearly 39,000 cases here in Ontario found that patients having elective surgery during the day fare no better or worse if the doctor operating has worked the night before. The work tracked similar patien...

It’s practically an epidemic and it can really interfere with your life! Insomnia is notoriously difficult to deal with. But after reviewing a total of 20 studies, researchers say Non-drug talk therapy can help adults who lie awake in bed most nights. They came to the conclusion that instead of taking pills, insomniacs could benefit from techniques associated with cognitive behavior therapy. The e...

Do you want to get that healthy glow? The latest research finds that instead of going for a beach vacation, you should just eat more carrots, sweet potatoes and mangoes. A study in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior showed that eating a diet rich in fruit and vegetables gives you a more healthy golden glow than the sun. It’s thanks to substances called carotenoids – the antioxidants responsi...

We know that good nutrition has a role in staving off mental decline. Now it seems there’s an even easier way to boost your short term memory: drink more water. Or at least make sure you’re drinking enough. This, according to a new study from Britain, which tested how volunteers reacted to 30 degree temparatures for four hours. Half were allowed to drink 300 millilitres of water and half were not....

Here’s more evidence that walking is good for the brain. Specifically the hippocampus — a part of the brain important to the formation of memories — It usually begins to atrophy around 55 or 60. Now psychologists are suggesting that the hippocampus can be modestly expanded, and memory improved, by nothing more than regular walking. Researchers randomly assigned 120 healthy but sedentary men and wo...

Do you love listening to sad music, or do you hate it? Eminent music professor David Huron has a theory. And he’s using Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings to test it. He says people who enjoy sorrowful music are experiencing the consoling effects of prolactin, a hormone that is usually associated with pregnancy and lactation but that the body also releases when we’re sad or weeping. He figures peo...

Have you ever lost a friendship after your friend found a new love interest? Now research confirms it happens all the time. A study out of Oxford University found that on average, people shed one friend and one family member from their inner circles when they start a new romantic relationship. An anthropologist surveyed people aged 18 to 69 online about their friends and lovers. Participants were...

Do you ever feel like you need a coffee and a sweet to get through your work? Well, it turns out there’s a reason for that. The combination of caffeine and glucose can improve the efficiency of brain activity, according to a recent study that used MRI to identify the effects of these two substances. Participants were tested after drinking a study beverage containing either caffeine, glucose or the...

Do you worry a lot? That’s usually considered a bad thing. According to Dr. martin Rossman, a pioneer of mind/body healing, that's because most of us don't know how to worry well. He says we can learn to use worry to manage stress instead of causing it. Good worry is an adaptive survival function: we use our imaginations to anticipate potential dangers, then develop ways to avoid them. If our prim...

Here’s another reason being bilingual is a good thing. It can delay the onset of Alzheimer’s disease and its symptoms for between years. This is the surprise finding from researchers at Toronto's Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest. In a study of more than 100 bilingual patients and 100 monolingual patients, they found that the bilinguals experienced the onset of symptoms and were diagnosed with...

Here's something that may help older adults who are beginning to notice memory problems. It doesn't need a prescription, and you can do it at home... meditation. Researchers randomly assigned volunteers, with mild cognitive impairment, to either twelve weeks of meditation, and other yoga practices, or twelve weeks of memory enhancement training, which taught strategies for improving forgetfulness....

Here’s some news for guilt-stricken working parents. A surprising new study finds that mothers and fathers are doing a better job than they think, spending far more time with their families than did parents of earlier generations. The research from the University of California, San Diego, analyzed a dozen surveys of how Americans say they use their time, taken from 1965 to 2007. It found the amoun...

Have you checked the expiry dates on your medications and other products lately? Most people do it infrequently, but it’s a good idea to clean out your medicine cabinet twice a year. After the expiry date, medications start to lose their effectiveness, and so do products like sunscreen - so if you keep taking them you may not be getting the treatment or the protection you need. Some drugs even bec...

Can you be fat but fit? Over the last few years a number of studies have suggested that obese people who were regular exercisers were at no greater risk of premature death than normal weight people. Now Swedish researchers say that finding is a myth. Their study of 1.3 million men showed that obese people with high levels of fitness were 30 % more likely to die before slim unfit people. Scientists...

Here's a sobering finding that underscores the importance of getting enough sleep. A report, from the US "AAA" Foundation for Traffic Safety, finds that missing just an hour or two of shut-eye nearly doubles your chances of a car crash the next day. And getting behind the wheel after getting only four to five hours of sleep quadruples that risk. That's comparable to driving with a blood alcohol le...

Do you like to talk about the good old days? Do you take time to listen when elders do it? It turns out that speaking about important events in the past can go a long way to improve wellbeing for people in nursing homes. It’s called reminiscence therapy and an Australian gerontologist compared it to other types of interventions for people in long term care. She found that it was more effective tha...

How noisy is your workplace? Research shows that people who work in noisy environments now have a lot more to worry about than just hearing loss. A study out of the University of British Columbia has found that employees who endure chronic exposure to noise on the job are more than two times likelier to suffer serious heart disease and high blood pressure than those in quieter occupations. Researc...

What's the tone of your conversations? Surprisingly it makes a difference on whether or not it will provide you with mental benefits. A study finds, friendly discussions with other people can help solve common live challenges but conversations that are competitive in tone are not helpful. Researchers from the University of Michigan found that engaging in a short ten minute conversation, in which p...

Do you spend a lot of time reading texts and checking Facebook on your phone? If so, a leading orthopaedic surgeon says you may as well be carrying a big sack of potatoes on your head – because that’s the kind of stress you’re putting on your neck. In a paper published in Surgical Technology International , Dr. Kenneth Hansraj, explains that the average adult head weighs between 10 to 12 pounds wh...

Have you ever dreamed of getting back together with a former romantic partner who should have been perfect for you? Despite romantic depictions of that scenario, a study from Kansas State University finds this is unlikely to make you happy. When couples who break up and get back together – it’s called a cyclical relationship. Researchers analyzed information that cyclical and noncyclical couples p...

There’s an old saying – that music is the medicine of the mind. Now there’s research to back that up – specifically that musical training bolsters the aging brain. A study by Northwestern University researchers who compared adults aged 45 to 65 with and without musical experience. They found that lifelong musical training appears to help with at least two important functions known to decline with...

Do you like the people you work with? Your health may depend on it. A study published by the American Psychological Association found workers who have a good peer support system in the workplace live longer than those who don't. Researchers at Tel Aviv University followed 820 healthy adults for 20 years -- 1988 to 2008. The workers came from Israel's largest companies in finance, insurance, public...

Here’s some good news about getting older, out of Britain. A survey done for an insurance company of 1500 people finds that on average people over 50 lead fitter and more active lives than they did in their 20s. The findings show they’re benefitting from better diets, more exercise and increased free time to focus on their health. Now that they’re free of the pressures of career-building and raisi...

We all know that eating fish can prevent heart attacks and and improve blood pressure. Now there’s evidence it will also reduce the risk of heart failure….as long as it’s cooked right. Researchers tracked more than 84,000 postmenopausal women for an average of 10 years. They found that those whose diets included 5 or more servings of baked and broiled fish per week -- had a 30 percent lower risk o...