5 STUDIES YOU MAY HAVE MISSED

What's the latest in health research?  What is being found out lately that can help you with your health?  Here's the latest, provided by CNN:

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Here's a roundup of five medical studies published this week that might give you new insights into your health, mind and body. Remember, correlation is not causation – so if a study finds a connection between two things, it doesn't mean that one causes the other.

That car comes with an obesity feature
Canadian Medical Association Journal
Do you own a car? A computer? A TV? You're probably moving less, sitting more and buying bigger pants than someone who doesn't.
After analyzing data from more than 150,000 people in several countries, researchers said owning all three was associated with a 31% decrease in physical activity, 21% increase in sitting and a 3.54-inch increase in waist size. They also found a 400% increase in obesity and a 250% increase in diabetes among owners of these items in low-income countries.

While this might seem like a "no duh," the results foreshadow some significant health problems for developing countries. "With increasing uptake of modern-day conveniences... low- and middle-income countries could see the same obesity and diabetes rates as in high-income countries," says lead study author Scott Lear.
You should practice seeing better
Journal: Current Biology
You hit the gym to improve your physical fitness, and do Sudoku to increase your cognitive abilities. So why wouldn't you be able to improve your eyesight with a little practice?
After doing a visual training program for 25 minutes a day, four days a week, for two months, seven baseball players at the University of California, Riverside, improved their eyesight to 20/7.5 - meaning they were able to read text from three times farther away than someone with 20/20 vision.
"The goal of the program is to train the brain to better respond to the inputs that it gets from the eye," said study author Aaron Seitz. "As with most other aspects of our function, our potential is greater than our normative level of performance."
Seitz believes the program helped the university baseball team bat better during their season. Maybe the Houston Astros will sign up next.
You're more likely to get tested when you're tired
Journal of Consumer Research
This seems counterintuitive, right? We know our self-control diminishes as we use it - meaning you're more likely to eat a cookie if you've already turned down a brownie and a piece of cake. But in five experiments, researchers found people make better decisions about their health when they're feeling tired or run down.
For example, in one experiment, people with a family history of kidney disease who felt "depleted," were more likely to indicate they'd get tested after reading a warning message than those who were feeling fine.
Apparently when our bodies are weak, we're more worried about our overall well-being. That's when consumers start to value products that emphasize safety features, such as sunscreen, the study authors concluded.
A pizza herb could stop norovirus
Journal of Applied Microbiology
Yep, the infectious vomiting disease that sickened hundreds on cruise ships this year could be taken down by America's favorite food. More specifically, it could be taken down by carvacrol, a substance in oregano oil that gives the herb its distinctive smell and flavor.
Scientists at the University of Arizona found carvacrol breaks down the norovirus' tough outer layer, which would allow another antimicrobial substance to enter the inner part of the virus and kill it.
Unfortunately, loading up on pizza before your next cruise won't help, the study authors say. You need a highly concentrated amount of carvacrol, and eating that would cause a burning sensation and numbness in your tongue. Instead, the researchers recommend more research to see if the substance can be used in sanitizers or disinfectants.
Read more from Medical Daily
Watch for signs of stroke during a storm
Presented at the International Stroke Conference
Researchers at the Yale School of Public Health analyzed the medical records of 134,500 stroke patients and matched them with local weather data. The scientists found large temperature changes and higher humidity were associated with an increase in stroke hospitalizations, and that lower average annual temperatures were linked with more stroke hospitalizations and higher stroke mortality rates.
“This study suggests that meteorological factors ... may be stressors that increase stroke risk," study author Judith Lichtman told Forbes.

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