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Asparagus is so good for you and so is garlic. There are so many healthy micronutrients in both foods. If you want to try our favorite Cool-jams way to prepare fresh asparagus, try this recipe. Even asparagus haters will love this one! Enjoy

Serves 4

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. Coat the head of garlic with 1 tablespoon olive oil, salt, and pepper. Place on a baking sheet, and roast 45 minutes in the preheated oven, until golden brown. Once the garlic is roasted, cut the head in half horizontally, exposing all the

We came across an interesting study recently regarding hot flashes. Can Chinese herbs help?

It seems that a  mix of certain traditional Chinese herbs thought to have weak estrogen-like activity might help ease menopausal hot flashes, a small clinical trial suggests.

But the herbal mix, dubbed Jiawei Qing’e Fang, is not widely available. And while the new study suggested some benefits, it had enough limitations that the true effects of the herbs are still unclear, according to an expert not involved in the work.

For the study, reported in the journal Menopause, researchers in China randomly assigned 72 women to either take Jiawei Qing’e Fang everyday for eight weeks, or use a placebo mix of starches that were made to look, taste and smell like the herbs.

All of the women were relatively young —

• DR. ROBERTA WATTLEWORTH, chairwoman of the family practice department at Des Moines University, writes a monthly column for Health.Even though it is a normal part of life, menopause is a strange and daunting event for women. It is often misunderstood, feared or ignored. It is hoped the following information will help you understand what it is and how to deal with it.

  What is menopause?Every woman is born with a set number of eggs in her ovaries. These eggs remain immature and inactive until puberty. At this point, the pituitary gland stimulates the ovaries to cause some eggs to mature and be released from the ovaries. The egg(s) travel down the fallopian tubes, through the uterus, and out the vagina if fertilization does not take place. During this trip, the hormones estrogen and progesterone are produced in varying quantities by

Sleep apnea is a relatively common disorder affecting up to 19 million people in the U.S., most cases going undiagnosed. It is most common in adults 45 to 65 years old, more common in men and increased in women after menopause. It is also found in about 2-3 percent of children. Although not recognized as a disorder until the 1900s, a character in Charles Dickens’ “The Pickwick Papers” had the clinical picture of sleep apnea, and thus Pickwickian syndrome was an early name for the malady.

There are three types of sleep apnea — obstructive, central and mixed. Although they have different causes, people with all these types of sleep apnea repeatedly stop breathing during sleep. There are no specific blood tests for this condition.

Central sleep apnea is the less common form. It occurs when the area of your brain that controls breathing doesn’t send the correct signals to

We all know that sleep often becomes more difficult as we age. Some of us who’ve accumulated a certain number of birthday cards know this first hand! We also know that our circadian “clocks”—an internal mechanism that keeps us on a 24-hour, night-day cycle—function less well with age, and this contributes to sleep problems that can plague older adults, including:

• Difficulty falling asleep
• Trouble staying asleep
• Problems with daytime alertness

In addition to difficulty with nightly sleep, as we age we’re less likely to be able to cope with disruptions to our night-day routines, including difficulty adapting to time-zone changes, or working non-traditional hours, late at night or early in the morning.

Sleep is a critical factor in our long-term health and well being: studies show that it can play an important role in extending health and longevity and lack of sleep, in turn, can pose

Hormone replacement therapy may work slightly better than soy at reducing menopausal hot flashes, a new study says.

Women who took such hormones had fewer hot flashes, on average, than women who took soy – and both had fewer than those who took a placebo, or “dummy pill.”

“The bottom line for someone who is very disturbed by hot flashes and night sweats, the best treatment is hormones, and the next tier would be soy,” said Dr. Gloria Bachmann, professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey.

However, a 2002 landmark study by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) found that such treatments can increase the risk of breast cancer, heart disease and stroke. That means that if women do take hormones, Bachmann told Reuters Health, it should be the lowest

You are enjoying a night out with friends when it starts; first you feel flush, then a sensation of warmth crawls down your body. Soon you begin perspiring and you feel as if everyone around you can tell what is happening — another hot flash. An estimated three out of four women experience hot flashes  associated with menopause and nearly all would agree they are a nuisance, but experts say there could be an upside to having hot flashes

New research released February 24 in the online edition of the journal Menopause suggests that women who suffer from hot flashes and night sweats may be at lower risk for cardiovascular disease, stroke and death.

“While they are certainly bothersome, hot flashes may not be all bad,” said Northwestern Medicine endocrinologist Emily Szmuilowicz, MD, who is lead author of

There are so many issues we face as we go through menopause. We all know about the hot flashes, night sweats and memory issues, but another huge problem is the loss of bone density resulting in osteoporoisis. A growing body of research suggests that consuming polyphenols, like those found in green tea, may help g to the National Osteoporosis Foundation (NOF). Researchers, many of whom were involved with both studies, concluded that drinking green tea may be an effective way for postmenopausal women with osteoporosis to slow bone loss and even improve bone mineral density. Of the 10 million Americans suffering from osteoporosis, four in five are wo">postmenopausal women preserve bone density and slow the onset of osteoporosis.

In a new study spearheaded by scientists at the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, mature women who were given daily doses of green

Why would anyone take tamoxifen if the side effects are so dreadful?

In some breast cancers, oestrogen can cause tumour cells to grow: tamoxifen blocks the activity of oestrogen in the breast tissue and stops growth of the cancer. It is standard treatment after  breast cancer surgery. When a woman is diagnosed with the disease, she is tested to see if her tumour is ‘oestrogen positive’. If it is, she can take tamoxifen. It is a tablet taken every day for five years after the operation, which has been shown to significantly increase chances of survival in the ten years after surgery.

So what are the downsides?

Minor side effects include nausea, diarrhoea and headaches. The more serious side effects come from tamoxifen blocking oestrogen in the body. In pre-menopausal women menopause-like symptoms – hot flushes, night sweats, mood swings and depression – come on suddenly and dramatically

Interesting news about help for hot flashes. It seems that an extended-release version of the seizure and pain drug gabapentin may be one step closer to becoming the first approved nonhormonal treatment for menopause-related hot flashes.

In a manufacturer-funded study, the drug Serada proved to be more effective than placebo for preventing hot flashes and reducing their severity.

The study was presented in Chicago at the annual meeting of the North American Menopause Society (NAMS).

Hormone therapy is the only FDA-approved treatment for hot flashes related to menopause, but many women are reluctant to undergo hormone therapy because its long-term use has been linked to an increased risk for breast cancer and stroke.

Gabapentin Side Effects

In earlier studies, immediate-release gabapentin was shown to be an effective treatment for hot flashes. But side effects, including dizziness and daytime sleepiness, were commonly reported by users.

Michael Sweeney, MD,