Monthly Archives: July 2008
- July 28, 2008
- What makes self-tanner work?
The active ingredient in self-tanners (or “sunless tanners,” as they’re also called) is dihydroxyacetone (DHA). DHA is a colorless sugar that interacts with the amino acid arginine in the dead cells of the stratum corneum, the outermost layer of your epidermis, which is the outer layer of your skin. The interaction of the DHA with [...]
- July 26, 2008
- Does a calcium deficiency cause rough nails?
There are two facets of our anatomies that are basically dead. (By dead, I mean not sentient, not comprised of living cells, inanimate, muerto, y’know…dead.) Our hair and nails. (The parts we cut, shave, and clip.) And yet we seem to spend an inordinate amount of time worrying about these very parts…
Ironic, isn’t it? I [...]
- July 25, 2008
- Can you get toe fungus from a pedicure?
Is there danger lurking down at the local Happy Nails? The fungus among us is something doctors affectionately call onychomycosis, and it’s fairly common. Some 15 percent of us have it and almost half of people over the age of seventy suffer from this ailment, which causes the toenail-particularly on the big toe-to become thick [...]
- July 23, 2008
- Can you get herpes from a hot tub?
So, you settle in for a nice soak, without a care in the world. But is there danger lurking in the water?
Well, we don’t want to be the bearers of bad news, but if that whirlpool or hot tub isn’t properly cleaned or chlorinated, you could end up with a nice body rash. The Centers [...]
- July 18, 2008
- Why does your get thinner as you age?
As we get older, there are some unavoidable processes at work that age our skin. This is something we will all experience and there’s not really much we can do to prevent it. When a person ages, his or her epidermal cells-the cells at the outer skin layer-become thinner, which makes the skin appear noticeably [...]
- July 16, 2008
- Do growing pains really exist?
Growing up-in and of itself-is an enormous pain in the butt. The grades, the melodramatic infatuations, the looming necessity of earning a living… And hey, why do homework when , in five billion years, the sun is going to exhaust all its nuclear fuel and collapse into a dead, cold, shrunken cinder? And I didn’t [...]
- July 14, 2008
- Why does your voice change at puberty?
Ah, yes, what a dignified time of life-when, in the course of the same sentence, you can sound like Issac Hayes and Alvin the Chipmunk.
Your larynx is a hollow, tube-shaped piece of cartilage that is located at the top of your trachea (windpipe). There are two thin muscles-called vocal cords-that are stretched across the trachea, [...]
- July 12, 2008
- Does drinking milk really make you taller?
We know our response to this one is going to be greeted with howls of indignant protest from moms all over the world… But the answer is no.
There is no special “growth factor” in milk. Not that milk and other calcium-rich dairy products aren’t wonderfully nutritious. Calcium is essential for helping promote stronger bones. And [...]
- July 12, 2008
- Does falling in love really cause chemical changes in your brain?
Why does falling in love turn seemingly rational, even-keeled, considerate people into deranged, raving, volatile, self-centered psychos in dire need of an exorcism, especially teenagers?
Welcome to Cupid’s laboratory. There is indeed a biochemistry of love. Helen Fisher, an anthropology professor at Rutgers University-along with two colleagues, Arthur Aron and Lucy Brown-used an MRI machine to [...]
- July 5, 2008
- Does television really rot kids’ brains?
How many parents have gazed despairingly at their children who sit comatose in front of the TV for what seems like eons of uninterrupted viewing, their eyes glazed, their sallow faces awash in that bluish glow? Surely this is rotting their brains, wiping clean whole neural networks, all cognitive functioning flickering off, neuron by neuron [...]
- July 3, 2008
- Why should you breathe into a paper bag when hyperventilating?
This is a classic home remedy and something that we occasionally rely on in the emergency room, but not everyone who is hyperventilating should be given the bag. Hyperventilation is a fancy word for rapid deep breathing. It is usually caused by anxiety or panic, but many conditions can cause hyperventilation including: asthma, heart attack, [...]
- July 1, 2008
- Does washing your hands really prevent disease?
Do those instant hand sanitizers really work?
The answer is a resounding yes! Few things are as certain as this in medicine. There is no doubt that washing your hands can prevent disease.
The problem is getting people to do it. A study in the Annals of Internal Medicine looked at the rate of hand washing among [...]
