How Does Stress Effect Health And Wellness?

It can start early in the morning when you get stuck in rush hour traffic. It only becomes exacerbated at work. Then back home at night dealing with your children's travails of the day. It is stress. And it is present in almost all of our lives. What are the consequences of this widespread stress? How does stress effect health?

Stress can have serious effects on both our mental and physical health. These manifestations can take immediate effect, or they can be delayed in their impact. The most salient example of the latter is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The most common immediate effects are increased blood pressure and rapid heartbeat.

So widespread is the problem, that studies have shown a substantial majority of both doctor's office visits as well as serious maladies can at least partially be attributed to underlying stress. Seeing the magnitude of the problem, we are well served to fully explore and understand how stress impacts our overall health.

A large part of the problem is that stress can exist without respite creating conditions which are always present. These are referred to as chronic conditions. Some, including high blood pressure, are especially nefarious resulting in very serious consequences. There are many contributors to high blood pressure including those relating to diet, but stress is high on the list.

Most of the physical manifestations of stress which result in adverse health effects relate to the body's production of adrenaline. This hormone serves to prepare the body for any potential danger. One's senses are heightened, the heart pumps blood and the oxygen it contains faster, and the pupils change to allow sharper vision.

When appropriate, this bodily response can save your life. However, when triggered by the stresses of everyday life it can be deadly. High blood pressure has been tied to heart disease, stroke and other potentially life threatening events. Adrenaline can be helpful and of course exciting, but it can also be a deadly enemy.

In addition to physical effects, stress can have significant mental health impacts. Everyone reading this knows that stress does not ordinarily coincide with happiness. Stress limits one's patience, causes sudden mood changes, and serves to disrupt both family and work relationships. These effects can prove to be equally detrimental as physical ones.

It is present, and will most probably remain so, among all of us. As the world more emerges into the technological age, it is projected stress will rear its head all over the developing world to match the levels seen in America. Many more will be asking the question of how does stress effect health.

How Stress Affects Health - Austin Wellness

Health and Wellness Business

The health and wellness business is one of the hottest business opportunities in the 21st century! It is simply all about capitalizing and taking advantage of the current trends, and when it comes to business, a health and wellness business is definitely more than a good idea. Aside from that, the health and wellness industry is showing no signs of getting weak as there are now more and more people getting concerned with their health!

There is a lot to be gained from a health and wellness business. If not, the industry would not be one of the hot topics discussed in magazines, newspapers, televisions, radios, and even in offices. The health and wellness industry is one explosive trend and you cannot afford to miss the opportunity to take advantage of it!

According to statistics, the health and wellness industry is at the moment an industry worth 200 billion dollars! If you pass up the chance to get even a small piece of that pie, then clearly business is not for you. However, if you are business minded, then you would definitely start a health and wellness business! If for some reason what the statistics are saying about the current value of the industry has not convinced you, know what these statistics have projected the industry to cost in the future. Apparently in the year 2010, the health and wellness industry will rise to become a $1 trillion industry! So if you are interested, start your own health and wellness business now and begin reaping the benefits!

One of the main reasons as to why the health and wellness industry is undergoing such an explosive growth is that more people are trying to delay the aging process. Baby boomers are continually becoming popular and their demand for medical care is ever increasing. A health and wellness business particularly in the baby boomers department can be the best decision you ever made in your life! Even if you do not go to the baby boomer market, you can still find lots of opportunities. There are many more products and services that are highly craved for by consumers.

Dorothy Miller makes her living selling Waiora products, proprietary whole-food blend of freeze dried fruit and botanical extracts in capsules or drink mix powders to help reduce the signs of aging.

Hardball - Bush Vetoes Children's Health Insurance Bill

Helping Children Start A Healthy Life

BECAUSE her husband is unemployed, Xioma Hernandez has no insurance to cover routine medical expenses for her 7-month-old daughter, Laura -- and no choice, she said, but to take the baby to a public health clinic. Mrs. Hernandez held the infant in her lap recently as she waited to see a doctor at the county-run Pediatric Treatment Center here, one of three in Westchester. Laura was to be immunized against the hepatitis B virus, a sometimes deadly infection that attacks the liver and is prevalent in the Dominican Republic, where Laura was born. A Place for Vaccinations

Mrs. Hernandez and two other mothers in the waiting room knew only a few words of English. Speaking through a translator who works as a nurse's aide, they said they had brought their children here because they could not afford a private doctor. They also said that long waits and limited hours would not deter them because it was important that their children be inoculated against diseases like polio, mumps, measles and whooping cough.

For every vaccinated child, however, statistics show that there may be as many who are not, at least not until they enter school, when parents are required to show proof of immunizations.

County health officials, frustrated in efforts to see that more preschool children are immunized, welcomed President Bill Clinton's announcement earlier this month of a plan to spend $300 million or more next year to increase the number of children who are vaccinated.

The officials recommend that children receive inoculations before they are 2. Not only is that about the time when natural immunities passed along from mother to child wear off but it is also the time when some diseases are especially dangerous in infants and very young children. Plan May Provide Some Impetus

"In one sense, there's nothing new about the President's plan," said Dr. Harold N. Adel, the county's deputy commissioner for community health services. "We've long recognized that immunization is a prime responsibility."

"But the approach now coming out of D.C. may provide some added impetus," he said. "Despite our efforts, we are painfully aware of the number of children who are not inoculated."

Nationwide, it is estimated that about 50 percent of children younger than 5 are vaccinated. For the state, not including New York City, that figure is 56 percent.

In Westchester the rate is probably above the national average, although separate statistics are not maintained, said Dr. Mark S. Rapoport, the County Health Commissioner.

"Westchester is probably better off, compared to a city like Detroit, for example," he said. "We have a fairly well-to-do population here. But still, there are those who are not plugged in to any health-care system." Illegal Aliens Wary

Some children -- especially those of undocumented aliens -- often do not receive immunizations during the critical preschool years even though county clinics do not require pay stubs and will not reveal information about clients to the Immigration and Naturalization Service.

Nevertheless, those who have entered the country illegally are wary and often avoid contact with all public agencies, even at the expense of their children's health, officials said.

In some cases, parents who are deterred by the high cost of inoculations at a private doctor's office -- up to $275, not including office visit fees -- do not, as an alternative, go to a public health clinic, where there is no charge for vaccinations.

And some private doctors, discouraged by the high costs of stocking the serums, are "simply going out of the vaccination business," said Dr. Guthrie S. Birkhead, medical director for the State Health Department's immunization program. He said the doctors are referring their patients elsewhere.

"It splits up a child's health care, and that's when things can fall through the cracks," Dr. Birkhead said. 'Herd Immunity'

Other children -- those of homeless people and migrant workers, for example -- have a sporadic record of immunizations, with some never being vaccinated. In other cases, though, children are vaccinated over and over again as their parents travel from place to place and from one clinic to another, often failing to keep the children's health records.

On Encouraging A Healthy Life Style

LEAD: The reply by R. S. McCord (''Some Suggestions for Better Health'') gave a grossly simplistic view of modern health care. The health care professionals he listed may not be able to help every patient 100 percent of the time, but then physicians can't either.

The reply by R. S. McCord (''Some Suggestions for Better Health'') gave a grossly simplistic view of modern health care. The health care professionals he listed may not be able to help every patient 100 percent of the time, but then physicians can't either.

Perhaps he is unaware of the services these people provide or maybe he has had an unsuccessful experience with one or several of them. Although he may not believe their services to be cost effective, the patients they have helped (including the truly ill) would take the opposite stand.

Send an alcoholic to his general practitioner and see what he has to offer him. And what do you suppose an M.D. would do for a patient with marital and family problems? I doubt that you could find an M.D. willing or able to go through all the channels and effort to find a nursing-home bed for a hospitalized patient.

What about the victims of automobile accidents? After their broken bones have been set will the physicians assist them in restoring strength and range of motion? After their severed spines are surgically stabilized, who will teach them how to function in a world that still caters to the able-bodied?

In this age of specialization, his naive solution is highly unrealistic. Even if physicians had the desire to learn the skills and to offer the services the so-called medical fringe provide, I doubt there would be enough physicians to fulfill the needs (especially for the same money the fringe does it for).

Office Labs: Future of personal health concept