Blog List

According to new research, going to university for a long period of time and having a well-paid career is leading many women to delay having kids. The results of this is a huge rise in the number of pregnant women over forty. For the first time, the official count of pregnancies revealed that the number of women in their forties expecting children has overtaken the number of expectant mums in...

What appears to be a perfectly innocent gesture could be causing a lot more damage to your teen’s health than you think. According to a US head lice lice expert Mary McQuillan, the selfie sensation is the cause for the soar in head lice among teens. The California-based expert says she has seen a dramatic rise in the instances of lice among young people and thinks the ‘head-to-head- contact of...

Obesity levels in Europe are so common that the World Health Organisation fears it is becoming a ‘norm’ among teens. Nearly a third of teens weigh more than they should and in a report on obesity levels in over 50 countries, it was found that obesity rates among 11-year-olds were highest in Greece, Portugal, Spain and Ireland. “Our perception of what is normal has shifted; being overweight...

Australian nurse Beth Whaanga has had a lot of things happen to her body. As well as having two scars from a melanoma lumpectomy, she is also missing the lymph node on the underside of her left arm. When she was told she is a carrier of the BRCA2 gene, a gene that puts women at high risk for breast and ovarian cancer, she underwent double mastectomy and a total hysterectomy. Her body now tells a...

Many people don’t realise that serious clinical depression is very different to having the occasional ‘blues.’ It is a condition that will affect one in six people at some stage in their lives and make it harder for them to cope with daily struggles. But, new research showed that depression is a condition that could be prevented in boys by looking at saliva samples. UK researchers found that...

There’s a common misconception that as women grow older, they begin to lose interest in having sex. However, this is a myth often believed by those who don’t rate sex as being important to begin with. A new study showed that when it comes to love making, age is no barrier. Those who have a healthy sex life in middle age, continue to have a healthy sex life as they grow old. American researcher...

Since folic acid is a vitamin that occurs naturally in green vegetables but cannot be stored in the body, expectant mums and those trying to conceive have had no choice but to take it as a supplement. However, health experts think that making this vitamin a mandatory additive to food will ensure pregnant women are getting the right nutrients to prevent their little one from being born with spinal...

For a long time, parents have been guilt tripping themselves into thinking they are the reason why their little ones don’t eat many vegetables. However, it seems that genes have more to do with taste buds than upbringing. A study of over 2,500 children showed that a dislike to eating greens and certain foods has a lot to do with DNA. The researchers compared the eating habits of identical twins...

A study in an Irish hospital found that children are beginning to develop anorexia nervosa at a younger age. Published in this month’s Irish Medical Journal (IMJ), the study examined patients in Temple Street Children’s Hospital for six consecutive years and found that the average age has fallen from 14 to 13.5. The eating disorder, which is characterized by the fear of gaining weight, was...

It seems like the availability of unhealthy snacks in post-primary schools may be causing our children to be obese. The Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn thinks that secondary schools should not have vending machines that sell ‘junk food’ and plans to do something to change the current situation. The findings from a Lifeskills survey also found that the majority of schools across Ireland do...