Recent Longevity News for the seven days ending 11/16/05.  You should consult your doctor if you are taking any medications.

Fish Oil-Statin Combo Packs Hard Punch - WebMD, 11/15/05 - "those who took high doses of EPA plus a cholesterol-lowering statin drug (either Zocor or Pravachol) were 19% less likely to suffer a variety of heart ailments, compared with those who took statins alone" - See Mega Twin EPA at iHerb.

Too much calcium may raise prostate cancer risk - Nutra USA, 11/15/05 - "men who consumed more than 2000mg of calcium per day nearly doubled their risk of developing prostate cancer"

• Adequate Vitamin D Status Appears More Important than High Calcium Intake for Maintaining Calcium Metabolism - Doctor's Guide, 11/8/05 - "vitamin D sufficiency may be more important than high calcium intake in maintaining desired values of serum PTH ... Vitamin D supplements are necessary to ensure adequate vitamin D status for most of the year in northern climates"
• Vitamin D Compounds May Fight Prostate Cancer - WebMD, 11/1/05 - "Vitamin D compounds may help slow or prevent prostate cancer ... Calcitriol "markedly reduced tumor burden over time,""
• Vitamin D May Lower Prostate Cancer Risk - WebMD, 2/18/04
• Vitamin D and prostate cancer prevention and treatment - Trends Endocrinol Metab. 2003 Nov;14(9):423-30 - "The association between either decreased sun exposure or vitamin D deficiency and the increased risk of prostate cancer at an earlier age, and with a more aggressive progression, indicates that adequate vitamin D nutrition should be a priority for men of all ages"

Unsaturated Fats Can Lower Blood Pressure, Study Shows - WashingtonPost.com, 11/15/05 - "Trading about 10 percent of carbohydrates in one's diet for beans and healthy fats, such as olive oil, can help control high blood pressure and improve blood cholesterol levels"

Lipitor falls short of Zocor in heart study - CNN, 11/15/05 - "High doses of Pfizer Inc.'s cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor failed in a high-stakes trial to help heart-attack patients significantly more than moderate doses of Merck & Co.'s rival Zocor" - See Zocor at SuperSaverMeds.com.

Fish Oil Supplements Improve Lipid Risk Factors in Obese Children - Medscape, 11/14/05 - "given 3 g of a daily fish oil supplement ... After 12 weeks, the researchers found that triglyceride levels in the control group did not significantly differ from baseline. In contrast, triglyceride levels in children treated with fish oil significantly decreased. However, differences in other lipid measures were not statistically significant" - See Mega Twin EPA at iHerb.

The Nude Mouse Tale: Omega-3 Fats Save The Life Of A Terminal Cancer Patient - Science Daily, 11/14/05 - "In 2000 he was told by his doctor he had only a few months to live ... But five years later, he is still alive, and has even gained a little weight ... It was a nutritional intervention, drastically increasing the patient’s intake of omega-3 fatty acids" - See Mega Twin EPA at iHerb.

Metformin-Associated Lactic Acidosis Can Be Aggravated by Antihypertensive Drugs in Diabetics - Doctor's Guide, 11/14/05 - "Concurrent use of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors (ACEIs) or angiotensin receptor blockers (ARBs) and metformin could aggravate the risk of metformin-associated lactic acidosis"

Low carb diets 'cut heart energy' - BBC News, 11/14/05 - "the energy stored in the heart was reduced by an average of 16% among those who followed a high fat, low carbohydrate diet ... One of the participants even noticed he could not manage his daily run while on the diet"

Supplements May Help Knee Arthritis - WebMD, 11/14/05 - "patients with more severe arthritis pain got significant relief from the glucosamine-chondroitin combination"

Natural Pain Duo Beats Celebrex - ABC News, 11/14/05 - "The natural supplements glucosamine and chondroitin appear to beat the leading prescription drug for very painful forms of arthritis"

Low selenium linked to higher risk of osteoarthritis - Nutra USA, 11/14/05 - "Those with the highest selenium levels faced a 40 per cent lower risk of knee osteoarthritis than those in the lowest-selenium group" - See iHerb selenium products.

Regular Exercise Keeps Brain Young - WebMD, 11/14/05 - "In people, that translates to a daily 30-minute walk or a light 1-mile run ... The DNA for these animals after two years looked as if it were from their younger counterparts of only about 6 months of age"

Seeking Long Life? Researchers Get Clues - WebMD, 11/14/05 - "Compared to those with low levels of physical activity, highly active men in the study lived 3.7 years longer and moderately active men lived 1.3 years longer. In women, the figures were 3.5 and 1.5 years"

Columbia Study Suggests Benefits Of Herbal Extract In Early Treatment Of Prostate Cancer - Science Daily, 11/13/05 - "Zyflamend®, a unique herbal extract preparation, suppresses the growth of prostate cancer cells and induces prostate cancer cells to self-destruct via a process called “apoptosis" - See Zyflamend at iHerb.

Olive Oil's Heart-Healthy Secret - WebMD, 11/11/05 - "the functioning of the inner lining of the small blood vessels of the fingers of the participants and the concentration of certain healthy components in the blood, such as nitric oxide, improved after the breakfast of high-phenolic olive oil"

Meta-analysis Results Suggest High-Dose Vitamin E Increases All-Cause Mortality - Medscape, 11/6/05 - "there are several theories about why vitamin E increases risk. One theory is that it increases bleeding risk, which would increase the risk of hemorrhagic stroke, while another theory suggests that at high doses vitamin E stops working like an antioxidant that mops up free radicals that attack cells that line blood vessels and instead becomes a prooxidant and actually promotes the production of free radicals ... Still another scenario suggests that high-doses of vitamin E tend to destroy other fat-soluble antioxidants"

Vitamin D: Important for Prevention of Osteoporosis, Cardiovascular Heart Disease, Type 1 Diabetes, Autoimmune Diseases, and Some Cancers - Medscape, 11/11/05 - "A multivitamin Containing 400 IU of vitamin D is inadequate to satisfy the body's requirement.[32] It is estimated that at least 1,000 IU of vitamin D per day is needed to satisfy the body's requirement" - See iHerb vitamin D products.

UCLA Scientists Use Statins To Overcome Learning Disabilities In Mice - Science Daily, 11/11/05 - "UCLA scientists used statins, a popular class of cholesterol drugs, to reverse the attention deficits linked to the leading genetic cause of learning disabilities"

Ginkgo may help fight ovarian cancer - MSNBC, 11/10/05 - "women who took ginkgo supplements had a 60 percent lower risk of ovarian cancer"

A New Weapon to Fight Prostate Cancer - Life Extension Magazine, 11/05 - "Scientists have shown that milk thistle extracts possess anti-cancer actions on human prostate carcinoma in vitro and in vivo. Many of the mechanisms by which silymarin compounds interfere with prostate cancer progression have been identified. The scientists who conducted the most recent study stated that, in addition to isosilybin B, there might be other silymarin compounds that are effective as well"

A Fatty Acid Found In Milk May Help Control Inflammatory Diseases - Science Daily, 11/8/05 - "CLA, which is synthesized by microbial fermentation in the rumen of dairy cows, exists naturally in a number of structural forms. Cook's team determined that one of the variants inhibits the COX-2 protein"

Abstracts from this week's Doctor's Guide Nutrition/Dietetics:

Glycaemic index, glycaemic load and risk of endometrial cancer: a prospective cohort study - Public Health Nutr. 2005 Oct;8(7):912-9 - "Our data suggest that diets with high glycaemic index or high glycaemic load may be associated with endometrial cancer risk overall, and particularly among obese women, premenopausal women and postmenopausal women who use hormone replacement therapy"

Breast cancer and dietary factors in Taiwanese women - Cancer Causes Control. 2005 Oct;16(8):929-37 - "Cases also consumed statistically significant less supplements such as vitamins and mineral than controls ... Our results indicate a strong protective effect of dietary supplements and a harmful effect of dietary fats on the risk of breast cancer among women in Taiwan"

Should older people in residential care receive vitamin d to prevent falls? Results of a randomized trial - J Am Geriatr Soc. 2005 Nov;53(11):1881-8 - "Older people in residential care can reduce their incidence of falls if they take a vitamin D supplement for 2 years even if they are not initially classically vitamin D deficient" - See iHerb vitamin D products.

Magnesium intake from food and supplements is associated with bone mineral density in healthy older white subjects - J Am Geriatr Soc. 2005 Nov;53(11):1875-80 - "Greater magnesium intake was significantly related to higher BMD in white women and men"

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