vendredi 30 juin 2017
jeudi 29 juin 2017
22 Strange Ways the Sun May Affect Your Body
mercredi 28 juin 2017
What Does Namaste Really Mean?
If you’ve ever taken yoga, then you know the two things that happen at the end of class. First, everyone does Savasana, aka the corpse pose, when you lie on your back in total relaxation. Once the class is sitting up again, you put your hands together at your heart or in front of your “third eye” (the center of your forehead between your eyes), bow, and say “Namaste.”
Saying Namaste at the conclusion of class is such a ritual, you may never have actually stopped to think about what that word really means—plus how it can shape your yoga practice, if not other aspects of your life. Here’s the deeper definition to Namaste that every yogi needs to know.
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The definition of Namaste
Namaste’s literal translation in Sanskrit is "Nama" (to bow), "As" (I), and "Te" (you). Put it all together, and it means “I bow to you,” explains Liza Pitsirilos, yoga and fitness instructor at Pritikin Longevity Center + Spa in Miami. Bowing forward as you say it underscores the depth and sincerity behind the term. “When you do this, you’re surrendering your head to your heart,” she explains.
Even though it’s just three short syllables, repeating Namaste is a crucial part of practicing yoga because it helps you take a step back and become more centered and present, which is what yoga is about. “We have such an active lifestyle focused on logic, reason, and problem-solving that it’s helpful to calm down an active mind by getting focused, so you’re not just jumping from thought to thought,” says Pitsirilos.
Not only does it help you dial back some of the crazy in life, but Namaste reminds you to acknowledge fellow students in class as well as the instructor. “In India, Namaste is also a greeting,” says Elisabeth Halfpapp, executive vice president of mind body programming at Exhale.
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When you use Namaste as a way to say hello or goodbye, you’re making an effort to actively connect to others. Sure, part of the reason you're at yoga class might be because the flows and poses help you challenge yourself and reach your fitness goals. Repeating Namaste, however, is a reminder that you and the people on the mats next to yours are all in this class, and this world, together and for a deeper purpose.
Saying Namaste and reflecting on its meaning also helps you learn a little about yourself—what your heart wants, what you really feel, and what direction you want to take in life. “We’re a society that today is in our heads, rather than coming from our heart," says Halfpapp. "When I teach, I instruct my students to make decisions from their heart and core, which are better known as your gut feeling."
Halfpapp also notes that Namaste can remind you to reflect on your gratitude and look at the bigger picture, in spite of whatever crappy things life might be flinging your way in the moment.
RELATED: How Expressing Gratitude Might Change Your Brain
How to practice Namaste in yoga class
If all of this sounds like a tall order—the dialing back, acknowledging others, keeping yourself in the present—that’s because we’re not really wired that way. It takes practice, which is why Namaste is recited at the very end of class. “You come out of Savasana with your mind more open and your body relaxed, and it’s at this point we’re more receptive to an exchange of Namaste,” explains Enilse Sehuanes-Urbaniak, yoga instructor at Red Mountain Resort in St. George, Utah.
Yet the more you practice and recognize the true meaning behind Namaste, the easier it will be to tap into that inner calm when you need it most. Exercising the mind is just like exercising the body: you build that muscle memory over time.
Because it’s so important, you should try your best to stay for the full class. Maybe you’re trying to beat the traffic or are already running late to meet friends for dinner, so you skip Savasana and Namaste. But rushing to your next appointment is completely contrary to the meaning behind Namaste. “There’s a saying that your class is only as good as your Savasana,” says Halfpapp. “That’s when your nervous system calms down and you absorb everything you did in class,” she says.
RELATED: 16 Perfect Yoga Gifts for Women
Next time you've got a class scheduled, stay through the end—and If you truly have to leave early, let your instructor know. Then take two minutes before you need to take off, come out of whatever pose you’re in and take a Savasana. You can say Namaste if you’d like, or just keep it in mind as you leave. If you think that sounds a little out there, we hear you. But give it a try, and you'll likely see how it makes a difference in how much more centered you feel.
How to live the principles of Namaste
Namaste can help change how you carry yourself in everyday situations. “Namaste creates a deep union of our spirits together in class. That’s the collective experience of the word,” says Pitsirilos. Think of it as a moment of inner peace, which can ripple outward and surprise you by dissolving tension or conflict in other areas of your life.
“Namaste is sending messages of peace to the universe," adds Halfpapp. It’s all about the positive energy you've created with Namaste. Friends, family members, and even coworkers can “catch” your sense of gratitude. If you have a hard time believing that this happens, consider how easy it is to feel down after hanging out with a friend who’s attitude is totally negative. Moods really are contagious.
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Namaste can enhance your relationships too. Remember that saying “I bow to you,” or Namaste, essentially tells someone that you’re really seeing them as the person they are. And that extra attention can make them feel special. “The next time you meet someone, I encourage you to do so wholeheartedly. Take a moment to look the person in the eye and really be conscious to see the person past the physical,” suggests Pitsirilos.
It’s completely different from saying "hey" to a coworker and going about your day or “talking” to a friend while checking your phone. You’re there with them in the moment, and not anywhere else. “The ultimate gift we can give each other is our full presence,” says Pitsirilos.
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mardi 27 juin 2017
lundi 26 juin 2017
'On the Last Day of High School, I Almost Died. CPR Saved My Life.'
This article originally appeared on Time.com.
It was the last day of high school. With one exam left to go, a group of us were sitting in the senior class hangout, some watching Netflix, some cramming for the test. I was braiding my friend Jackie Acierno’s hair. I’d gotten midway down her back when I started to feel dizzy.
I had been having similar spells for about six months, and though I’d run through the gamut of tests—ruling out low blood pressure and a brain tumor, among other things—my doctors still weren’t sure what was causing my occasional lightheadedness.
“Don’t worry. This happens to me,” I said, as I slumped onto the carpet. “Don’t call an ambulance.”
Jackie ignored my request. She immediately ordered someone to call 9-1-1 and asked someone else to go get the campus nurse. “I remember thinking: it’s better to be embarrassed for having overreacted than embarrassed for having done nothing,” Jackie says now. So when my pulse started to fade, my eyes rolling back into my head and my body completely limp, Jackie again sprung into action. Rather than wait “even five Mississippi seconds” for the paramedics to arrive, Jackie says, she started performing cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR)—something she’d learned at an EMT training class.
She sat beside me on the floor and, with one hand on top of the other, her fingers interlocked, Jackie started pumping her fists into my chest to the rhythm of, yes, “Stayin’ Alive.” It’s a form of hands-only CPR that leaves out the mouth-to-mouth part most people associate with the practice, and it’s what many major health groups encourage people to try in events such as this. Studies show it’s just as effective at saving lives, and it’s much easier to do, too.
Jackie kept at it until the school nurse, Pat Neary, made it to us with an automated external defibrillator (AED)—an electronic device that can be used to shock the heart back into action. Grasping the handles of the AED, the nurse applied a first shock to my heart. Nothing. Then she applied a second. Nothing. One more…still silence. Finally, on the fourth shock, my heart began to beat again.
By that point, a police officer was also on the scene. In the 25 more minutes it took for an ambulance to show up, they managed to keep my heart beating using only their hands. Ultimately, their quick thinking—and the CPR they performed—saved my life.
But here’s the thing: While they remain my personal heroes, there isn’t much to the physical act of performing CPR. It’s an arm workout, but it isn’t rocket science. In fact, you probably picked it up by reading through this article (but if you want a primer, read this).
What’s harder is doing what Jackie did: springing into action when someone falls to the ground. And while it may seem risky, there’s little reason to hesitate performing hands-only CPR on someone who may need it. First of all, it’s harder to break someone’s ribs than you think. And second, it’s better to risk doing unnecessary CPR than do nothing—and watch someone die.
But you have to move fast. Most experts agree that after just six minutes, a brain deprived of oxygen can be irreversibly damaged. If another four minutes go by, death is nearly certain. That means that if Jackie had waited for the paramedics, I likely wouldn’t be alive—and I’d almost certainly be brain-dead.
There are many causes of cardiac arrest—ranging from existing heart arrhythmia to being hit in the chest with a baseball. But regardless of the underlying condition, without CPR, 92% of people experiencing cardiac arrest die, and every minute that CPR is delayed, the survival rate decreases.
It’s been five years since my cardiac event, and my life feels far less fragile than it once did. After many more tests, doctors determined that my attack stemmed from a rare but manageable medical condition called hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (HHT), and I’ve had two successful surgeries to ensure it won’t happen again.
But no matter how secure I feel, there’s rarely a day that I wake up without thinking about Jackie and how her hands saved my life.
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Do You Still Need to Worry About Zika?
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This article originally appeared on Time.com.
Last summer, public health experts were on high alert due to the rapid spread of the Zika virus, which has now been proven to cause birth defects and other health problems in infants. Today, experts know far more about the virus than they did at the start of the outbreak. Here’s what you need to know now about Zika.
Should pregnant women worry about Zika while traveling?
Short answer: yes. “Our general advice is that if you are pregnant, you should not go to places where Zika virus transmission is ongoing,” says Dr. Lyle Petersen, director of the division of vector-borne diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). “It’s all a matter of risk. Obviously, if you are staying in an air-conditioned hotel, your risk may be less. However, are you willing to take that risk? We know the consequences of infection of the fetus are huge and lifelong.”
Petersen recommends people check the CDC website for guidance on what locations have active Zika transmission. The CDC updates this list regularly, sometimes on a daily basis. If an area is no longer on the list, Petersen says it’s considered safe to travel. Currently, the CDC recommends that if a pregnant woman or her partner travel to an area with Zika, the couple should use condoms every time they have sex or avoid sex for the rest of the pregnancy, even if they do not have symptoms of Zika.
Should women who plan to get pregnant avoid traveling to places with Zika?
Women who are planning to get pregnant, and their partners, should also pay attention to where they are traveling. The first trimester, during which women may not know they are pregnant, appears to be the most risky time when it comes to Zika-related health complications for infants down the line.
The CDC recommends that women who travel to areas with Zika who want to get pregnant in the near future wait at least eight weeks after their last possible exposure to the virus before trying to conceive. For male partners, the CDC advises waiting six months after the last possible exposure before trying to conceive. Using condoms is also recommended for the waiting period.
What if I am invited to a destination wedding in a place with Zika? Should I not go?
It may be challenging to get a firm yes or no from your doctor about whether or not you should travel for a major event, though the recommendations are not to go to places with active Zika transmission if you’re pregnant or want to be soon. “My job is to give guidance; I never tell people what to do,” says Dr. Richard Beigi, the chief medical officer of the Magee-Womens Hospital of University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. “But I think the travel warnings are there for a reason, and nothing has changed from last year other than the fact that we have more information that has validated that Zika causes congenital health problems. The overall risk is the same.”
Deciding to travel despite the risk is ultimately a personal decision. “I ask my patients, ‘Do you really need to go?’ For some people, the answer to that is yes, and that’s fine, and I give them the best advice I can,” Beigi says.
Should I worry about traveling to places that have the types of mosquitoes that can spread Zika?
The CDC recently reported that the types of mosquito that carry Zika, Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus, are appearing in more counties in the southern U.S. where they haven’t been before. But unless the mosquitoes are transmitting Zika, there’s a “very, very, very low risk,” Petersen says. “In all of the places where we have this kind of mosquito that can spread Zika virus, we also see the kinds of mosquitoes that can spread West Nile and other diseases,” says Petersen. “General mosquito precautions in the summer are important for everybody—not only pregnant women.”
How likely is it that I will get Zika?
Experts can’t give a definitive answer to a person’s chances of getting Zika if they travel to a place that has reported spread of the disease. But experts are getting closer to understanding the likelihood of adverse events should a pregnant woman get infected.
A recent study found that one in 10 pregnant women in the U.S. with a Zika infection had a baby with brain damage or other serious birth defects. The first trimester was the most critical time: 15% of women with confirmed Zika infection in the first trimester had babies with birth defects. Another study found similar numbers for women in U.S. territories, revealing that during their first trimester, nearly 1 in 12 had a baby or fetus with Zika-associated birth defects.
“Out of the data collected, it appears that 5-10% of the time a woman gets Zika during her pregnancy, there will be in impact,” says Beigi. “Most of the impact is a malfunction; some of it is miscarriage. Probably the absolute risk of you having a problem is not very big, but it’s not zero, and it’s hard to know.”
How bad will Zika get in the U.S. this summer?
It’s unclear how many cases of Zika will be expected in and outside the U.S. this summer, though experts say it could be lower than last year. “Based on historical evidence, we would expect that outbreaks this year throughout the Western Hemisphere are going to be less than they were the year before,” says Petersen. “It’s not going away, but since a lot of people have already been infected and are no longer susceptible to infection, it will lower the number of cases over time.”
So far in 2017, about 650 Americans have gotten Zika, though that it is considered an underestimate. Most people do not experience symptoms and will not know they have the virus.
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vendredi 23 juin 2017
Bats Are the Number-One Carriers of Disease
This article originally appeared on Time.com.
Understanding where new viruses come from is critical for preventing them from rapidly spreading among humans. When it comes to preventing the next pandemic, a new study suggests that bats may be public enemy number one.
In a new study published in the journal Nature, researchers at the nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance collected data on viruses known to infect mammals, which included about 600 viruses found in more than 750 species. They were then able to calculate the number of viruses from each species and identify characteristics that make the transmission to humans more likely. Living more closely to humans and being more closely genetically related to humans increased the odds of transmission.
Out of all the species assessed, bats carried the highest number of these viruses. Researchers are currently looking into why.
“A lot of people don’t realize that these viruses have been on the planet for a long time, and they are in populations of animals all around the world,” says study author Kevin Olival, associate vice president for research at EcoHealth Alliance. “What we did in this study is prioritize where we should look if we want to stop the next Ebola or Zika from emerging.”
All groups of mammals were found to carry viruses that can spread to humans, and areas around the world most at risk for carrying emerging viruses differed based on the mammal. For bats, these places are most common in South and Central America and areas in Asia. For primates, the areas with the higher risks are in Central America, Africa and Southeast Asia.
The study was funded as part of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Emerging Pandemic Threats PREDICT program, a project that seeks to identify new emerging infectious diseases that could become threatening to human health. Olival says his team hopes that scientists will use this research to identify regions and viruses to focus on for prevention efforts.
Bats don’t deserve all of the blame, however. The spreading of new diseases often involves activity from both animals and people, Olival points out.
“These diseases are not just randomly jumping into people,” he says. “We see time and time again that it is the human disturbances in the environment that are causing these diseases to emerge,” through activities like chopping down forest and hunting animals out of certain areas. “It is our interactions with these species that are causing diseases to jump.”
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jeudi 22 juin 2017
Why Your Bad Memory Isn't Such a Bad Thing, According to Science
You know those people who always boast about having a perfect memory? Maybe they shouldn't, because having total recall is totally overrated. That's according to a new paper in the journal Neuron, which concludes that forgetting things is not just normal, it actually makes us smarter.
In the new report, researchers Paul Frankland and Blake Richards of the University of Toronto propose that the goal of memory is not to transmit the most accurate information over time. Rather, they say, it’s to optimize intelligent decision-making by holding onto what’s important and letting go of what’s not.
RELATED: 8 Ways Sex Affects Your Brain
"It's important that the brain forgets irrelevant details and instead focuses on the stuff that's going to help make decisions in the real world," says Richards, an associate fellow in the Learning in Machines and Brains program.
The researchers came to this conclusion after looking at years of data on memory, memory loss, and brain activity in both humans and animals. One of Frankland’s own studies in mice, for example, found that as new brain cells are formed in the hippocampus—a region of the brain associated with learning new things—those new connections overwrite old memories and make them harder to access.
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This constant swapping of old memories for new ones can have real evolutionary benefits, they say. For example, it can allow us to adapt to new situations by letting go of outdated and potentially misleading information. “If you’re trying to navigate the world and your brain is constantly bringing up conflicting memories, that makes it harder for you to make an informed decision,” says Richards.
Our brains also help us forget specifics about past events while still remembering the big picture, which the researchers think gives us the ability to generalize previous experiences and better apply them to current situations.
“We all admire the person who can smash Trivial Pursuit or win at Jeopardy, but the fact is that evolution shaped our memory not to win a trivia game, but to make intelligent decisions,” says Richards. “And when you look at what’s needed to make intelligent decisions, we would argue that it’s healthy to forget some things.”
RELATED: 12 Unexpected Things That Mess With Your Memory
So what does that mean for those of us who frequently forget things we just read, people we just met, and where we put our keys? For one, we should stop being so hard on ourselves, says Richards—to a certain extent.
“You don’t want to forget everything, and if you’re forgetting a lot more than normal that might be cause for concern,” he says. “But if you’re someone who forgets the occasional detail, that’s probably a sign that your memory system is perfectly healthy and doing exactly what it should be doing.”
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Especially in today’s computers-at-our-fingertips society, Richards says, our brains no longer need to store information like phone numbers and facts easily found on Google. “Instead of storing this irrelevant information that our phones can store for us, our brains are freed up to store the memories that actually do matter for us,” he says.
Richards also recommends “cleaning out” your memory system on a regular basis by doing regular gym workouts. “We know that exercise increases the number of neurons in the hippocampus,” he says. Yes, that may cause some memories to be lost, he says—“but they’re exactly those details from your life that don’t actually matter, and that may be keeping you from making good decisions.”
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mercredi 21 juin 2017
We Want You!—Here’s How to Become a Health.com Contributor
At Health.com, our goal is to deliver up-to-the-minute news on all the latest trends in the wellness world—and we want your help. We're looking for writers to join our new contributor network. As a Health.com contributor, you'll receive story pitches from our editors straight to your inbox, your byline will appear on Health.com, and you will be compensated for your work. And you'll have the chance to share your story with millions of readers—whether it’s an essay about your weight-loss journey, a recipe for your favorite healthy Crock-Pot dinner, or a firsthand account of living with psoriatic arthritis, we want to hear about it.
You don't have to be a professional writer to contribute to Health.com. But we are looking for well-written, thoughtful pieces that demonstrate a passion for health and wellness and tell a unique story. We're particularly interested in essays that highlight cool new workout classes, positive body image, relationship challenges, nutritious meal ideas, healthy travel tips, or even your favorite products (such as that incredible, can’t-live-without-it retinol cream you just discovered).
Does this sound like you? Head to Health's Springboard page and select follow the prompts to create your account. Once you're part of our contributor network, you can answer our story requests, get paid for your work, and see your byline appear on Health.com.
We can’t wait to hear from you!
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mardi 20 juin 2017
Why Do I Hate the Sound of My Own Voice?
This article originally appeared on Time.com.
Have you ever recoiled at the sound of your own voicemail greeting, startled by what should be the most familiar of voices—your own? If so, then you’re not alone. It’s common to dislike the way your voice sounds in recordings, experts say. Here’s why.
You hear your own voice differently
When you hear people talking, sound waves travel through the air and into your ears, vibrating your ear drums. Your brain then transforms those vibrations into sound.
However, when you’re the one talking, your vocal cords and airways also vibrate. That means that you receive two sources of sound: the sound waves that travel into your ears from your own voice, as well as vocal cord vibrations.
“When we talk, it’s like everyone hears the sound through speakers, but we’re hearing it through a cave complex inside our own heads,” says Martin Birchall, professor of laryngology (the study of the larynx, or voice box) at University College London. “The sound is going around our sinuses, all the empty spaces in our heads and the middle part of our ears, which changes the way we hear sounds compared to what other people hear.”
People perceive their own voice to be the combination of those two sources of sound, but everyone else just hears the external stimulus. This is why when you listen to your voice in a recording, it sounds different than the voice you’re used to. You’re hearing only the external stimulus, rather than the combination of the two sounds.
People are bad at recognizing their own voice
Most people don’t sit around listening to the sound of their own voice independently from talking, so they can become detached from how they actually sound. One study, during which people were played recordings of their own voices, found that just 38% of people were able to identify their own voice immediately.
“When we hear our own voice in a recording, it can often feel surprising and disappointing,” Birchall says. “We get used to the sound we hear in our heads, even though it’s a distorted sound. We build our self-image and vocal self image around what we hear, rather than the reality.”
Birchall says this can be a particular problem for people with body or gender dysmorphia. “For people with gender issues, hearing that their voice sounds like someone of the opposite sex’s can be a really big issue,” he says. “We like to think that the way we are talking fits with our own gender identity and when we feel we are in the wrong body or our voice isn’t representative of who we are then that can be a major deal.”
You’re not necessarily stuck with your voice forever
If you’re really disturbed by the sound of your voice, you have options, Birchall says. First, you can go to see a properly trained voice therapist, which is different from a speech therapist. Voice therapists work with patients to improve their cadence and the rhythms of their pitch by doing specific exercises, like working on breathing patterns by getting them to blow bubbles through a straw. “It’s like physiotherapy, but for the voice,” he says.
If voice therapy is unsuccessful, people can seek seek specialist psychologist support. It’s also possible to make a person’s pitch higher or lower through surgery, which is a common part of gender reassignment surgery.
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jeudi 15 juin 2017
U.S. College Student Released From North Korea Has 'Extensive Loss of Brain Tissue' and 'No Signs of Understanding Language,' Say Doctors
This article originally appeared on People.com.
The 22-year-old college student who was released from imprisonment in North Korea in a coma likely suffered from cardiopulmonary arrest, which resulted in “extensive loss of brain tissue,” according to his doctors at the University of Cincinnati Health, who added that he shows “no signs of understanding language.”
In a press conference Thursday, Dr. Daniel Kanter, professor of neurology and director of the Neurocritical Care Program, said Otto Warmbier has “severe injury to all regions of the brain” and described his current condition as “unresponsive wakefulness."
After examining scans and tests, the specialists suspect he suffered from cardiopulmonary arrest, which means for some period of time he lost oxygen to his brain. They don’t suspect he suffered from a direct traumatic brain injury.
The doctors said they attempted to interact with him, but he had no consistent response. In their evaluation, they don’t feel at this time that he has any conscious awareness as he shows no signs of understanding verbal language and no purposeful movement.
The University of Virginia student was sentenced to 15 years of prison and hard labor for allegedly stealing a political propaganda poster from his Pyongyang hotel in January 2016.
He returned home to Ohio on Tuesday in a coma after being “brutalized and terrorized by the pariah regime,” his family said in a statement.
North Korea reportedly told a U.S. official that Otto contracted botulism and slipped into the coma after taking a sleeping pill. The country said they released the college student on “humanitarian grounds.”
Doctors have little information about what happened to him prior to his release as they’ve had no contact with North Korean medical authorities. But they said Otto shows no current signs of botulism.
Due to family wishes, they will not give out his prognosis.
In a tearful press conference on Thursday morning, Otto’s father, Fred Warmbier, said there’s “no excuse” for North Korea’s treatment of his son, adding that he fell to his knees and hugged him when he was carried off a plane on Tuesday night.
“We’ve been brutalized over the last 18 months with misinformation, no information,” he said. “We are proud of the fact that our family is basically happy, positive people and we’re going to stay that way and we’re thrilled our son is on American soil.”
“Otto, I love you and I’m so crazy about you, I’m so glad you’re home, you are such a great guy,” he continued. “My family has been rock solid throughout this, we have supported one another.”
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Cases of Legionnaires’ Disease Are Occurring Across the U.S. What Is It, and Are You at Risk?
You've probably been seeing an increase in Legionnaires' disease coverage in the news lately. Legionnaires' was blamed for the illnesses of four L.A. Fitness gym members in Florida late last month, and a New York City police officer is currently in the hospital recovering from Legionnaires' as well. (Fellow cops were warned not to shower at a precinct in East Harlem, where traces of the bacteria that causes the disease were found.)
Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a warning about risks associated with home water births, which have been linked to two 2016 cases of the disease. And yesterday, Michigan's top health official was charged with involuntary manslaughter for failing to alert the public about an outbreak, which some experts have linked to the contaminated-water crisis in the city of Flint. Twelve people died from the outbreak in 2014 and 2015.
RELATED: Beat 16 Summer Health Hazards
But wait, wait, wait. What is Legionnaires' in the first place? Back in 2015, after an outbreak in the South Bronx killed 12 people and sickened dozens more, Health broke down the basics and spoke with experts. Here's what you should know.
It's a serious form of pneumonia
From 8,000 to 18,000 people are hospitalized each year in the US with Legionnaires' disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It's an infectious disease, but unlike other things like influenza and the common cold, it doesn’t spread from person to person; people catch it by inhaling mist from water systems harboring Legionella bacteria. The first known outbreak occurred in 1976, at an American Legion convention in Philadelphia, which is where the name comes from.
Symptoms can show up two days to two weeks after someone is exposed, and can include fever, cough, chills, muscle aches, headache, fatigue, confusion, loss of appetite, and diarrhea.
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“It is a true bacterial pneumonia. That’s why it is severe, but at the same time it doesn’t make everyone ill, and it doesn’t kill everybody,” Hassan Bencheqroun, MD, an interventional pulmonologist and critical care specialist at Pacific Pulmonary Medical Group and an assistant clinical professor at the University of California, Riverside, explained to Health. “Those that develop the pneumonia and those that die from it are those that have risk factors.”
These risk factors include being 50 or older, having a chronic lung condition (such as asthma or emphysema), smoking cigarettes, taking medication that suppresses the immune system, and having an immune-suppressing illness.
RELATED: 10 Places With Measles or Other Outbreaks
The bacteria can grow in water tanks, spas, and air-conditioning systems
Legionella pneumophila is the strain responsible for 90% of cases of Legionnaires' disease. The bug lives in the condensers of large air conditioning systems, hot water tanks, whirlpool spas, cooling towers, even ornamental fountains. While low levels of the bacteria won’t lead to an outbreak, “it’s when it multiplies to the level that it would cause disease that we worry,” Dr. Bencheqroun said.
“Legionella is usually a rarer cause of pneumonia,” Belinda Ostrowsky, MD, director of epidemiology, stewardship, and infection prevention at Montefiore Health System in the Bronx, added in an interview with Health. “In the Bronx we can see clusters (increased number of cases) in the summer months. Clusters can also be seen at times due to specific environmental sources.”
In the 2015 outbreak, investigators determined that a cooling tower on top of a hotel was the source of the illnesses in the Bronx. To confirm that certain structures are the source of a particular outbreak, medical sleuths must match the DNA signature of the bacteria found at the source to the bacteria that’s making people sick.
RELATED: 14 Types of Food That Can Make You Sick
Antibiotics can treat the disease
Death rates from Legionnaires' disease range from 5% to 30%. Some patients will get better with just a few days of intravenous antibiotics, while others may need to spend 10 days to two weeks in the intensive care unit, according to Dr. Bencheqroun. “Most of these people have an incredible amount of inflammation in the lining of their lungs, so their oxygen level is very low,” he says. Some people may simply need some extra oxygen, while others may need to be on a ventilator.
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The good news, Dr. Bencheqroun said, is that inexpensive, very effective drugs for treating Legionnaires' disease are available. “We have excellent antibiotics that treat this pneumonia, and these antibiotics are not complex, third tier, only-accessible-to-the-rich kinds of antibiotics,” he said. “Most of the cases of Legionella pneumonia that we diagnose, we send home, and they restart their life with just a story to be told.”
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lundi 12 juin 2017
The Surprising Upside to Having a Frenemy
They're two of the biggest pop stars in the world, racking up armfuls of awards and selling out arenas for the past decade. But the rumors of bad blood between Katy Perry and Taylor Swift are legendary. Their rivalry apparently took a new turn, with Swift announcing late last week that her music is back on Spotify at the exact moment Perry's new album, Witness, dropped. Coincidence? Hmm.
Over the weekend, Perry extended an olive branch to Swift. "I forgive her and I'm sorry for anything I ever did, and I hope the same from her," Perry said on the Thrive Global Podcast. And while we're all for their cold war to thaw, there's an argument to be made for keeping things chilly.
That's because recent research points to the surprising benefits of having a frenemy and how it can up your game. “Competition can help you identify personal mental strengths and become aware of how your own actions relate to positive outcomes, progression and success,” says sports psychologist Caroline Silby, Ph.D., who regularly works with Olympians and other elite athletes. Here's more on the upside of having a rival.
RELATED: 5 Women Share Their Motivation Tips: Team Sports Foster Camaraderie
It enhances your motivation
Are you more liable to go to the gym if you have a supportive buddy there—or a competitive friend who makes it clear she's better than you? According to research from the University of Pennsylvania, competition is what keeps you showing up and acing your performance.
The study divided exercisers into two groups: one group was able to watch a scoreboard that ranked their workout class attendance, while the other group was asked to use online chat forums to encourage team members to work out—but they weren't tracked or ranked against one another. At the end of the experiment, class attendance rates were 90% higher among the competitive group.
“In a competitive setting, each person’s activity raises the bar for everyone else,” stated Damon Centola, Ph.D., associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and senior author of the study. “Social support is the opposite: a ratcheting-down can happen. If people stop exercising, it gives permission for others to stop, too, and the whole thing can unravel fairly quickly.”
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It makes you smarter and more creative
Competition doesn't just compel you to boost your physical performance; it forces you to focus on ways to improve in almost any situation, says Lori Scherwin, founder of career coaching firm Strategize That. This increases your cognitive skills and creativity. “You'll start thinking differently and expanding your imagination to do things better,” she says. Just ask anyone who’s ever stayed up all night perfecting a presentation and hopefully outshine a work rival . . . only to come up with a brilliant strategy and subsequently earn a reputation at the office for being an ideas person who pushes boundaries.
It helps you ID your strengths and weaknesses
When you’re trying to beat out a rival, you naturally take inventory of the habits and traits of yours that help you stand out, says Silby. That constant mental inventory in turn helps you identify areas where you excel and where you could use some improvement. “If you remember to keep yourself focused on doing your personal best, you'll stay focused on your own development and how you can grow and learn,” notes Scherwin.
RELATED: Why Serena Williams Cherishes Her Friendship With One of Her Biggest Rivals, Caroline Wozniacki
It tightens your relationships
It might seem counterintuitive to see competition as a relationship builder. But whether it's on the job, at the gym, or among your social circle, to get things done, you need to team with others, says Scherwin. “Pushing yourself to succeed will naturally gear you toward enhanced collaboration and position you as a leader with whom others want to associate.”
And though it sounds strange, your relationship with your rival can change as well by becoming more respectful. Competition can make you angry and resentful, but ultimately it pushes you both to succeed—and earn props from the other.
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vendredi 9 juin 2017
The FDA Wants This Opioid Drug Pulled From the Market
This article originally appeared on Time.com.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requested on Thursday that the drug Opana ER be pulled from the market — the first time the agency has taken steps to remove a currently prescribed opioid pain medication from the market because of its potential for abuse.
The request, at this time, is voluntary. Opana manufacturer Endo Pharmaceuticals said in a statement Thursday that the company “is reviewing the request and is evaluating the full range of potential options as we determine the appropriate path forward.”
In an FDA statement announcing the request, Dr. Scott Gottlieb, commissioner of food and drugs, cited the country’s ongoing opioid epidemic as a reason for the agency’s actions.
“We will continue to take regulatory steps when we see situations where an opioid product’s risks outweigh its benefits,” he said, “not only for its intended patient population but also in regard to its potential for misuse and abuse.”
Opana ER (extended-release) was approved in 2006 for the management of moderate-to-severe pain when around-the-clock relief is needed. Because of the increased risks of addiction and overdose with extended-release opioids, doctors are instructed to prescribe Opana ER only to patients for whom alternative treatment options are ineffective, not tolerated or otherwise inadequate.
In 2012, Opana ER was reformulated with the intention of making the tablets more resistant to manipulation for abuse by snorting or injecting. But the FDA determined that there wasn’t enough data to show the reformulation could meaningfully reduce abuse — and it declined Endo’s request to tout any abuse-deterrent properties on the label.
Now, the FDA says it has concerns that the benefits of the drug no longer outweigh its risks. Following the product’s reformulation, the agency says, data has shown a “significant shift in the route of abuse of Opana ER from nasal to injection.”
Injecting the drug has been associated with a serious outbreak of HIV and hepatitis C, as well as cases of a serious blood disorder.
“When we determined that the product had dangerous unintended consequences, we made a decision to request its withdrawal from the market,” said Dr. Janet Woodcock, director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, in the FDA’s statement. “This action will protect the public from further potential for misuse and abuse of this product.”
If Endo chooses not to remove Opana ER from the market, the FDA intends to formally withdraw approval. The agency says it will also continue to examine the risks and benefits of all approved opioid pain medicines, “and will take further actions as appropriate as a part of our response to this public health crisis.”
In its own statement, Endo acknowledged that the misuse and abuse of opioids have greatly increased in the United States. But it also stresses that the FDA’s request “does not indicate uncertainty with the product’s safety or efficacy when taken as prescribed.”
It also notes that, while an FDA advisory committee voted 18 to 8 that Opana ER’s benefits no longer outweigh its risks, more than half of the committee members expressed their preference that the drug remain on the market with new regulatory restrictions.
Although official government data for 2016 has not yet been released, preliminary data compiled by the New York Times shows that U.S. drug overdose deaths last year most likely exceeded 59,000 — the largest annual jump ever recorded.
Overdosing — on opioids as well as illicitly manufactured drugs — is now the leading cause of death among Americans under age 50, the newspaper reported this week.
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jeudi 8 juin 2017
mercredi 7 juin 2017
When to See the Strawberry Moon — and Where It Got Its Name
This article originally appeared on Travel + Leisure.
Later this week, stargazers will be able to spot the Strawberry Moon in the sky.
On Friday, June 9 at approximately 9:09 am ET, this month’s full moon will reach its peak. To most people, the moon will appear full the nights before and after its peak.
However, those looking for a giant strawberry in the sky will be disappointed. The Strawberry Moon — also referred to as the Rose Moon — won’t be tinged any particular color. The name instead relates to the fairly short season for harvesting strawberries that happens every June.
A red moon, which could also happen in other months, tends to occur when the moon is low in the sky or when there is a large amount of dust in the air.
The June full moon has a variety of different names in many different cultures. It can be referred to as the Green Corn Moon, the Planting Moon or the Birth Moon.
This year’s Strawberry moon will have one interesting feature, though. It will appear as a minimoon. A minimoon happens when the moon is at its furthest point from Earth (called the apogee). It will appear just a tad bit smaller in the sky — although most people won’t notice a difference in size.
To find out what time the Strawberry Moon will be most visible in your area, search for your city’s moonrise and moonset times.
The next minimoon won’t appear in the sky until July 27, 2018.
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mardi 6 juin 2017
The Secret to Deeper Happiness Is Simpler Than You Might Think
You just closed on the house of your dreams, your Facebook post is blowing up with likes—and you scored reservations at the hottest restaurant in town to celebrate. You’re ecstatic, right? Of course you are! Your brain is so lit up with dopamine, a key pleasure chemical, that it looks like a fireworks finale. But will all this make you happier? Sure, but only temporarily (sigh). According to a growing number of experts, those exhilarating, Instagrammable moments don’t permanently raise the setting on your day-to-day blissometer—and by chasing fleeting highs, you may be missing the opportunity for true joy, with a small j. "We live in a culture that tells us we’re supposed to be euphoric all the time, but that feeling isn’t sustainable," says life coach and sociologist Martha Beck, author of Finding Your Own North Star ($16; amazon.com). "Happiness—real happiness—is quieter and calmer, but that sense of peace is deeply satisfying and can sustain you through life’s challenges." Moreover, true happiness isn’t elusive. It’s available right now. You just have to know where to look.
RELATED: 6 Ways to Practice Hygge, the Danish Secret to Happiness
Pursue meaning, not happiness
Yes, it sounds downright un-American, but study after study has revealed a surprising truth about the pursuit of happiness: None of the stuff we think will lift our spirits—new cars, new homes, even winning the lottery—actually does the trick in the long term. “Paradoxically, studies have shown that people who have happiness as a goal tend to be less happy,” says Susan David, PhD, author of Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life ($27; amazon.com). In 2012, for instance, researchers reported on two studies that showed that wanting to be happy made people lonelier, possibly because striving to elevate your own joy can damage your connection with others. Also, a single-minded focus on positivity may leave you ill-equipped to cope with setbacks and heartbreak, an inevitable part of life. To avoid that trap, allow happiness to bubble up naturally by pursuing activities that dovetail with your values. "Having a strong sense of what matters to you, and letting your values guide your actions, can lead to greater happiness," notes David, who is also a psychologist at Harvard Medical School. To zero in on what you hold sacred, ask yourself, "What relationships do I want to build? What do I want my life to be about? If this were my last day on earth, how would I act to make it a great one?"
This type of self-reflection helps you make choices that infuse your life with meaning, adds Mallika Chopra, founder of Intent.com and author of Living with Intent: My Somewhat Messy Journey to Purpose, Peace, and Joy ($15; amazon.com). "When you feel like you’re living with a deeper sense of purpose, you’re answering the age-old question ‘Why am I here?’" she says. "There’s nothing more exciting or satisfying than feeling like you’ve found part of the answer.” The beauty of this approach is that you can start making values-driven choices today. While you might link happiness to a future goal (losing 10 pounds, getting married, landing a big job), you don’t have to wait for other factors to fall into place to call a friend who is going through a rough patch, write a postcard to your senator urging her not to cut funding for an important program, tutor an ESL student, or volunteer at a dog shelter. "The more you move toward your values, the more vital, meaningful, and happier your life will become," says David.
WATCH THE VIDEO: The Relationship Mistakes Happier Couples Are More Likely to Make
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Make your brain a sunnier place
When you get big hits of wow—from buying a new pair of shoes, for example, or eating crème brûlée—the brain releases the reward chemical dopamine, but over time you need more and more of those hits to get the same effect, explains Robert Lustig, MD, author of the forthcoming book The Hacking of the American Mind: The Science Behind the Corporate Takeover of Our Bodies and Brains. Meanwhile, stress reduces serotonin, the brain chemical linked to happiness. "As a result, the constant seeking of pleasure, whether it’s from shopping, drugs, sex, or food, makes it harder and harder to feel happy," he says.
So cut back on quick thrills (clicking on a flash sale, for instance) while taking steps to bolster happiness in your brain—or, as Chade-Meng Tan, author of Joy on Demand: The Art of Discovering the Happiness Within ($16; amazon.com) puts it, incline your mind toward joy. "As you go about your day, notice moments of joy when they come up and briefly give them your full attention," he suggests. "They happen all the time, but we tend to miss them because they’re fleeting and not intense."
Whatever gives you a little lift—a cold drink of water, the purr of your cat, the fluffy clouds overhead—give it your focus and let that sliver of happiness register in your brain. At the same time, consciously sprinkle in acts of kindness, compassion, and generosity, all of which lead to joy. Hold the elevator for a stranger, help a colleague with a project, or try this: Every hour throughout the workday, take a moment to wish one person in your life happiness. "I’ve taught hundreds of students this exercise, and they’ve said it changed their lives," says Tan, who is a Google pioneer. When you incorporate tiny hits of joy and gratitude into your day, you actually knit together and strengthen the neural structure in your brain linked to positivity. "By training your mind to incline toward joy," explains Tan, "eventually those joyful thoughts and feelings begin to occur effortlessly."
RELATED: 5 Mantras for a Happier, Calmer, More Confident You
Stay rooted in the right now
Anxiety and depression share a common source: They’re associated with allowing your mind to stray from the present. "Depression is brooding about the past, and anxiety is worrying about the future," says Dr. Lustig. As a result, learning to stay in the moment can be one of the most powerful things you can do to be mentally healthy. The best way to anchor yourself in the present? You guessed it: mindfulness meditation, or sitting and paying attention, moment by moment, to your thoughts, feelings, and sensations. The practice has been shown to increase gray matter concentration in the parts of the brain related to well-being.
Getting our om on also helps us handle less-than-joyful moods. A 2016 study at Michigan State University found that after a 20-minute guided session, meditation novices who were shown troubling photos were better at taming their negative emotions. And let’s face it—learning to cope with the tough stuff can go a long way toward making you happier. “As you start meditating and paying attention to your emotions, you notice that happiness and sadness are like a roller coaster—they both inevitably go up and down,” says Beck. “By teaching you to become a witness to your emotions, meditation allows you to get off the roller coaster and watch its movement from the safety of solid ground.”
In other words, you don’t take your emotions so personally, which allows you to see something truly profound: Sadness and adversity not only come with their own helpful lessons but also give color, contrast, and dimension to bliss. Without them, we wouldn’t appreciate—or even recognize—what "happy" feels like.
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lundi 5 juin 2017
vendredi 2 juin 2017
The Most Confident People in the Room May Steer You to a Bad Decision
Making group decisions among family, friends, or coworkers can be tough—especially when people have differing opinions, and some are more forceful about them than others.
Now, a new study in Nature Human Behavior reveals a common trap we tend to fall into with these situations: People often match their levels of confidence to the confidence levels of other people around them, even if those others have more—or less—expertise on the topic at hand.
RELATED: 10 Habits of Healthy Families
The study serves as a reminder that just because people seem sure of themselves, it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re right. It also shows that, for better decision-making, it’s important for all of us to communicate our own level of certainty accurately, and not get swept up in “infectious” group dynamics.
To investigate decision-making behaviors in groups, researchers from Iran and the United Kingdom performed a series of six experiments involving 202 participants. In each experiment, people were asked—individually, in pairs, and in group settings—to determine which of two screens displayed a hard-to-see visual target, and to rate how sure they were of their choice.
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The experiments were repeated several times, and participants received feedback about their accuracy and confidence levels. In the end, results showed that people adjusted their own confidence levels over time to match those of their fellow decision-makers. If they thought others’ confidence was higher, they tended to increase their own, and vice versa.
This works well when everyone in a group has similar experience and insight into a problem, the authors say. “Fortunately, that’s often the case,” they wrote in their paper, “as we tend to associate with friends, partners or colleagues with home we are likely to share traits.”
It can also be helpful when someone who really doesn’t know what they’re talking about nevertheless displays a lot of confidence; it can prompt others to speak up about their own opinions “in a way that better reflects their relative levels of expertise,” the authors wrote.
RELATED: Feel Confident at Any Age
But when some people have more expertise than others, this confidence-matching behavior can also be harmful, they say. It “can cause miscommunication about who is more likely to be correct,” they wrote in their paper, and “is one reason why groups can fail to make good decisions.”
That was seen in the study, too. “We found that even when an expert is paired with someone who lacks expertise, both participants will align their confidence levels levels so that their opinions will carry more equal weight," said Dan Bang, PhD, a postdoctoral research associate at University College London, in a press release. (Some of the “partners” in the study were actually computer simulations, which allowed the researchers to manipulate their decision-making accuracy.)
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Bang says it can be difficult for people to express their opinions with the appropriate level of confidence relative to others in the group if they don’t know whether those people are modest or overly self-assured. People may also resort to confidence matching, whether consciously or subconsciously, as a way to avoid conflict or diffuse responsibility, he adds.
The researchers say their findings shed light on how confidence shapes public opinion, especially around hotly contested topics like climate change, politics, and the economy. The findings also highlight how groups make decisions on an everyday basis—and why, when you really do feel confident that you know what you're talking about, you might want to convince other people to follow your lead.
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A MRSA Infection Cost Me $300,000—and Nearly Killed Me
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This article originally appeared on Time.com.
This essay is part of a TIME series on the growing effects of antimicrobial resistance: superbugs that may no longer be treated with standard-course antibiotics. In 2016, World Health Organization leaders called drug resistance a “major global threat” estimated to kill 10 million people a year in 2050. This is the story of Chris Linaman, who survived a severe infection of the bacteria MRSA, which occurs most frequently in healthcare settings. The infection was resistant to antibiotics used to treat it.
I’ve always been an active person, and in the spring of 2005 I was playing basketball with my friends when I tore my ACL in my left knee. I went in for a standard surgery and was recuperating quite well. So well, in fact, that my family decided to go on vacation for Memorial Day weekend.
It wasn’t until I returned home after the long weekend that things started to look suspicious. I woke up one morning and my knee felt strange. I bent down to feel it and realized my knee was hot to the touch, bright red and had swelled to the size of a melon. I called my doctor and told him what had happened. “I need to see you right away,” he said.
The doctors drew some liquid from my knee and confirmed that I had a MRSA infection: a bacteria known as Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which is resistant to many antibiotics. My wife met me at the hospital, and I underwent the first of four emergency surgeries.
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The doctors tried to clear the infection the best they could through surgery and lots of antibiotics. Eventually I was sent home to recover, and I was tasked with giving myself two to three daily intravenous doses of the antibiotic vancomycin. One afternoon I was napping in our living room, and my wife came in to wake me up for another dose of medicine. She discovered my face was so swollen that I was unrecognizable, and she struggled to shake me awake. When I finally came to, my temperature was 104 degrees. I felt like I was dying, and I said, “I feel like this is poisoning me.”
My wife is much smaller than I am, but we needed to get to the hospital ASAP. She put our children—who were four and two years old at the time—into their carseats, and she managed to drag and carry me to the car. I am 6’2” and 185 lbs. I don’t know how she did it. She says she was terrified.
At the hospital, the doctors told my wife that they were worried about my condition. If the infection had spread to my brain, she needed to prepare for the worst. I was not a good patient—I was scared to death—but thankfully the doctors were able to perform a spinal tap and confirm that the bug had not spread to my brain yet. I went in for another surgery and more antibiotics. Unfortunately, I started to have an allergic reaction to the vancomycin, and my entire outer layer of skin peeled off in sheets. Without that protective layer of my skin, I was vulnerable to further infections and needed to stay at home. I was in and out of consciousness for most of this time.
Ultimately, after several bouts of antibiotics and multiple surgeries, my MRSA infection cleared. But my body was completely wrecked. My muscles were so weak that I had to undergo physical therapy to get back to normal, and walking around the block became a milestone. The entire ordeal lasted four months, and we racked up $300,000 in medical costs. Without insurance and the support of our community, we could not have survived financially.
People from our neighborhood and church bought us groceries and mowed our lawn because we had no time to do it. One very generous family even paid the monthly mortgage payment on our home. It scares me to think about what could have happened to our family without this kindness. You can get a little infection like this and be in the hole financially for the rest of your life, or worse. There are an estimated 72,444 MRSA infections and 9,194 related deaths each year in the U.S.
The experience changed our lives in a profound way. We still embrace traditional medicine when needed, but our family practices more alternative medicine now. My daughter had her appendix removed, and I was scared throughout the surgery. I don’t want my children to go through what I went through.
RELATED: I Survived Flesh-Eating Bacteria—and It Changed My Life Forever
I’ve also become an advocate for the cause. In August 2006 I became a chef at Overlake Medical Center in Bellevue, Washington and I realized that I had a unique opportunity to address this issue head on. I began intensively studying the use of antibiotics in food production, which is one of the contributors to bacteria resistance. I was able to develop a new purchasing policy at the hospital so that we now only buy food from producers who are committed to reducing antibiotic use. We’ve gone from 19% of the meat we serve being classified as “reduced antibiotic use” in 2012 to 80% last year. In April, I joined the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Supermoms Against Superbugs initiative and met with policymakers in Washington to encourage them to make antibiotic resistance a priority. Currently, our country is headed full bore toward a post-antibiotics era.
Thankfully, I’ve been able to fully recover from my infection. I even made it my goal to complete a bike ride from Seattle to Portland—which I did about a year after my infection. Today the only physical evidence of the trauma are the scars on my leg and the fact that I still don’t have my ACL in my left knee. Now I have a story to tell, and I tell it as often as I can to warn people about superbugs. I don’t want anyone to experience what I did. I know I got lucky.
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jeudi 1 juin 2017
Here's Why a Man Died After Swimming With a New Tattoo
You would never think that going for a swim after getting a tattoo could kill you. But that's what happened to one man, and his story highlights the scary infection risk associated with getting inked that many of us blow off.
Shortly after getting a new tattoo on his calf, the unidentified 31-year-old took a dip in the Gulf of Mexico and contracted Vibrio vulnificus, a bacteria that typically lurks in seawater and in raw oysters. That led to septic shock (an infection in the blood), and cellulitis, a particularly aggressive bacterial infection of the skin. Despite efforts by doctors in a nearby hospital to treat him with high-powered antibiotics, he died days later.
This case, outlined in an article in the journal BMJ Case Reports, did have special circumstances. The man had chronic liver disease, which made him more susceptible to V. vulnificus. In fact, health guidelines stress that people with chronic liver disease—or any other condition that weakens the immune system, like HIV—should avoid swimming in the sea and eating raw oysters if they have an open wound.
Though most of us don't think of it this way, a new tattoo is an open wound, one that takes a couple of weeks to fully heal. And even for healthy people, fresh ink can be an entry point into the body for bacteria and other microbes, where they set up shop and can trigger a serious, even lethal infection.
RELATED: 9 Things That Can Hurt Your Liver
“Generally tattoos are not dangerous at all," explains Michele S. Green, MD, a dermatologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. But, of course, it’s a fresh wound. It’s a breach of the skin.”
Tattoos can actually be more dangerous than other cuts because they don't just present one opening through the skin. Thanks to the needle used to inject ink over what can be a fairly large surface area, a person with a tattoo can have several very small puncture marks, all of which can be routes into your system for germs.
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Besides bacteria like V. vulnificus, a person with a new tattoo can also pick up a staph infection, says Dr. Green. Staph too can be deadly. And of course, any procedure involving needles poses other risks, such as contracting tetanus, hepatitis B, and hepatitis C if those needles are contaminated.
Tattoos are also linked to dangers not associated directly with needles, including allergic reactions to dyes—especially colored dyes. They can also swell or burn during an MRI.
RELATED: How to Get a Tattoo Safely Removed
If you're considering getting new ink, cut your infection risk by keeping the bandage on for 24 hours and coating the tattoo with a topical antibiotic ointment, advises Dr. Green, as well as moisturizer. Don’t rub the area dry after washing; pat it gently.
Don’t swim right after a procedure—that means hot tubs in addition to pools and the sea, thanks to the risk of bacteria and other germs. These precautions are especially important for anyone who has a condition that affects their immune system, including diabetes, says Green.
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Finally, be smart about where you get your tattoo and who inks your skin. Go to a parlor that has the correct licenses from local and state health departments, and make sure the tattoo artist follows proper procedure. That means using sterilized needles that have just come out of a sealed package, and sterilizing all non-disposable equipment between customers.
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