Every season it seems there is a new weight loss secret that becomes a great big hype machine. Last year is was Anatrim and Hoodia and right now it is Green Tea. I know that there are a lot of reasons to believe that green tea is very good for you but it is not a wonder drug for losing weight even if you mix it with caffeine and other chemicals as Enviga has. There is no such thing really as negative calories and there is a better way to look at weight loss by increasing your metabolism on a natural basis and reducing your calorie content by eating the right foods. ABC News has exposed this product and I am happy that they have.

The makers of Enviga bill the sparkling, caffeinated green tea as an energy drink designed to promote a healthy lifestyle. According to tests conducted by Switzerland’s University of Lausanne and Nestle, who manufacture the beverage along with Coca-Cola, drinking three 12-ounce cans of Enviga per day burns 50 to 100 calories.

Though it’s only available in New York City and Philadelphia now, early this year, the drink will hit store shelves nationwide.

Enviga gets its calorie-burning power from the combination of caffeine and EGCG, an antioxidant naturally found in green tea. Though its makers stand by the drink’s ability to burn calories, Nestle and Coca-Cola claim they’re not marketing Enviga as a weight loss product.

“This product seems ideal for folks that are exercising regularly, have a balanced diet, and are taking care of themselves. This is one more step. It would be great if the product was inspirational, but it’s not a weight loss product,” Coca-Cola spokesman Ray Crockett said.

Though Enviga is not marketed specifically as a weight loss product, some doctors and consumer advocates say that looking at the ads, it’s hard to think of anything else.
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Looking to make a change and lose some weight? I have reviewed the top diet on the internet and you can go and read over 200 comments people have made about why this diet has worked well for them, as well as some of the problems.

Tags: ABC, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, beverage, Center for Science, chemicals, Coca-Cola, contributor and associate professor, Darwin Deen, David Katz, director of sports nutrition, energy drink, Leslie Bonci, Nestle, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh Medical Center, Ray Crockett, spokesman, sports nutrition, Switzerland, Switzerland's University of Lausanne, the Public Interest, University of Pittsburgh, weight loss product, Yale University's School of Public Health

What is Glivec? It seems that w3e always hear cancer storeis and that there are not very many good news stories, not that I usually see anyway. Leukemia is a type of blood cancer that is often fatal and I had not ever heard of any drug therapies that were remarkable until I saw a news result today out of England that said that many people taking the drug Glivec are having amazing results. Here is some info on this Drug from Medical News Today.

Most patients who develop chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) can now expect to live more than 20 years from diagnosis if they are treated with the tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) Glivec (imatinib) according to haematologists involved in the IRIS (International Randomized Interferon versus STI571) study. Before availability of current treatments, median survival from diagnosis was 3.5 years.

Around 95 per cent of patients diagnosed with CML have the Philadelphia chromosome positive (Ph+) form that responds well to Glivec, said Professor John Goldman, professor of haematology at Imperial College, London. The chromosome is the result of translocation between the long arms of chromosomes 9 and 22. Part of the breakpoint cluster region (Bcr) gene from chromosome 22 fuses with part of the abelson leukaemia virus (Abl) gene on chromosome 9 producing the abnormal tyrosine kinase protein Bcr-Abl. It is this protein that causes the proliferation of white blood cells resulting in CML.

Four-year data from IRIS were presented at this year’s American Society of Hematology (ASH) meeting. More than 90 per cent of patients with Ph+ CML in the chronic phase, randomised initially to Glivec 400mg daily in the year 2000, were still alive and free of progression to advanced disease at 54 months, Professor Goldman said.

The study confirmed that patients who achieved a major molecular response within one year, ie, a more than 1000-fold reduction in residual leukaemia, fared best. Patients achieving a three-log reduction in Bcr-Abl transcript levels within oneyear were all free of progression to advanced disease at year four.
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Tags: advanced disease, American Society of Hematology, cancer, Chairman, diabetes, drug therapies, France, Francois Guilhot, Glivec What, Glivec-resistant, Hagop Kantarjian, Imperial College, John Goldman, leukaemia, Leukemia, London, Novartis, Philadelphia, professor, professor of haematology, professor of oncology, Texas, United Kingdom, University of Poitiers

I think most people reading this weblog know that I am a pretty big fan of meditation and because of this I tend to find and post articles about meditation more than I should. I found this article at Psychology today and thought I would post it in its entirety.

In the highlands of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, people look at life differently. Upon entering the local Buddhist monastery, there is a spectacular sculpture the size of a large oak. The intricate carving of clouds and patterns are painted in powerful colors. But as soon as winter gives way, this magnificent work will melt to nothing. The sculpture, in fact, is made of butter, and it is one of the highland people’s symbols of the transient nature of life.

And life here is not easy. Villagers bicycle to work before dawn and return home long after sunset. Many live with nothing more than dirt floors and rickety outhouses. Upon entering these modest mud-brick homes, you’ll find no tables or chairs — just a long platform bed, which sleeps a family of eight. However, when the people invite you in for tea, their smiles are wide and welcoming. How do they possess such inner calm in conditions we would call less than ideal?

When villagers cook, sew or plow the fields, they do so in a tranquil state. As an approach to life, weaving meditation seamlessly into almost every action throughout the day seems unfamiliar to Western cultures. Is there something we can glean from this way of life that will improve our own? The romantic notion of quitting everything and joining Tibetan monks on a mountaintop is not the only way to meditate. You don’t need to quit your job, give up your possessions and spend 30 years chanting. Recent research indicates that meditating brings about dramatic effects in as little as a 10-minute session. Several studies have demonstrated that subjects who meditated for a short time showed increased alpha waves (the relaxed brain waves) and decreased anxiety and depression.
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Tags: alpha waves, atherosclerosis, brain meditation, California, cancer, cardiovascular disease, Chicago, clinical psychologist, depression, Diana Adile Kirschner, energy, Fairfield, fight disease, Harvard Medical School, heart attack, heart disease, Herbert Benson, infertility, Iowa, Irvine, Mark Epstein, meditation, Monterey Park, MRI technology, New York City, pain, Philadelphia, psychiatrist, psychologist, Psychotherapy, Qinghai, Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, Rob Nairn, Roger Thomson, School of Management, Steven Hendlin, the American Journal of Psychotherapy, tibetan monks, welcome tool