Latest Stories

Latest Stories

Virginia Tims-Lawson

Blood pressure management: Why winter can derail it

If you’ve managed to keep your blood pressure under control despite all the factors working against you, I’ll bet you never imagined the weather could throw a big kink into your readings…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Study finds exercise has ‘mind-blowing’ effect on genetic cancer risk

Study after study has already proven exercise to be one of the most valuable weapons in the battle against cancer. But what about people who are genetically predisposed and carry much greater odds? To quote one researcher, it was mind-blowing…

Joyce Hollman

Why late nights lead to blood sugar trouble

Can avoiding diabetes really be as simple as switching from a night owl to a morning person? The science says the difference can be substantial. But if your circadian rhythm or job makes that hard, you’re not doomed…

Jedha Dening

5 reasons you need more folate over 50

The health problems certainly seem to stack-up on us as we age… And one reason is because of changes in the body that affect nutrient absorption. In mature adults, more commonly known deficiencies include vitamin D and B12. But folate is one nutrient that’s equally important and often forgotten. Here are 5 ways it can help you age better…

Joyce Hollman

How a fat-burning hormone could keep Alzheimer’s away

Alzheimer’s is a devastating disease for which there still isn’t an effective treatment. Experts say the newest drugs carry risks far higher than any noticeable benefit. Wouldn’t it be nice to have another way to slow Alzheimer’s, one much less likely to cause a brain bleed that may already be supporting your health?

Carolyn Gretton

The supplement that may soon fight tooth decay

Dental caries, or tooth decay, is one of the oldest and most common diseases known to man. Yes, it’s a disease and its damage goes far beyond your mouth. So we brush and floss and try to avoid the sugar that kicks it off. But a powerful phytonutrient just may make caring for our teeth easier…

Carolyn Gretton

How fitness influences Afib and stroke risk

The most dangerous outcome of atrial fibrillation is stroke. People with this heart rhythm disorder have five times the stroke risk of their peers. How can you avoid being one of the 40 million worldwide with Afib? Research says a low level of fitness should do the trick…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Fast-working over-the-counter ED gel gets FDA approval

The famous little blue pill helped men with ED discover they no longer had to suffer in shame or silence. In just 30 minutes you could get your sexy back. But thanks to a newly approved gel, spontaneous romance is back, and coming to a pharmacy near you.

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

The little-known drug danger people with obesity face

Over the years, we’ve learned that obesity carries higher levels of health risks. But a shocking and little-known obesity-related danger comes from a surprising source: medication that’s rendered ineffective or unsafe by increased body fat…

Joyce Hollman

6 ways to bake heart-healthy holiday sweets

Holiday baking is going into full swing. That means lots of butter and sugar, right? If you’ve been reading here for a while, you know that it isn’t the butter that will kill you. It’s the sugar. Here are seven ways to enjoy holiday sweets without heart attack danger…

Easy Health Options Staff

Halloween horror diet scares away calories

Sitting through a horror movie can make you scream and sweat. Even better, it activates metabolic activity that can burn calories from dipping into the bowl of candy you got for the trick-or-treaters! Here are the top 10 calorie-burning horror movies…

Virginia Tims-Lawson

The weird connection between constipation and blood pressure

Having constipation can be uncomfortable. But its effects on the body don’t just impact the gut. Constipatiion and hypertension are two conditions where the conditions and their treatments can team up to make matters much worse…

Carolyn Gretton

Ignoring these bathroom symptoms can cut your life short

If you’re a man in your 50s or older, you may have experienced frequent urination and problems emptying your bladder. You may think it’s just a part of aging you have to put up with. But research shows the consequences of ignoring lower urinary tract symptoms can be dire…

Jenny Smiechowski

Tis the season for high risk heart trouble on Christmas Eve

You’re just about to tackle the last of the of unwrapped presents when you feel tightness in your chest. A heart attack? On Christmas Eve? It’s more common than you think. So if you experience pent-up emotions this time of year, or plain old stress, time to manage them…

Joyce Hollman

Mistletoe: From Christmas tradition to cancer treatment

Hanging mistletoe is a popular holiday tradition. But mistletoe extract has gotten the attention of researchers as a potent anticancer agent. It’s already shown promise in treatment resistance cancer, so what’s next?

Carolyn Gretton

Blood pressure: The one thing you should take lying down

You may think your high blood pressure is managed well. Better yet, your readings may indicate you’re in the clear. But did you try measuring your blood pressure lying down? It’s taken 25 years to get the data, but this is going to change the way we monitor our blood pressure, for good reason.

Joyce Hollman

What giving up fats and carbs does to your life expectancy

Which is more important: a perfect body or a long and healthy life? That’s the kind of question that can make you go hmmm, because we think they’re one and the same. Healthy weight, healthy body, healthy life, right? Not if you’re going to extremes to get there.

Joyce Hollman

Why glaucoma may be the sneakiest sight stealer

You probably get a yearly checkup. But when was the last time you had your eyes examined? As we age, several conditions can degrade our eyesight. Glaucoma is one of them. And new research has found you could be suffering that damage right now — without any obvious telltale signs.

Carolyn Gretton

The natural ingredient that resists fatty liver disease

Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease can be a setup for severe liver disease, diabetes and heart disease. There’s no treatment, so exercise and diet changes are recommended. But it just got a lot easier to resist a fatty liver and improve metabolism…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Women and the long-term effects of chronic fatigue syndrome

Certain diseases affect women disproportionately, like chronic fatigue syndrome. Though the medical establishment recognizes the condition, they can offer little help. But the world’s largest study of the disease reveals why it’s important to try to manage your symptoms better now than later…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

6 odd signs of heart disease

We’re conditioned to think of high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol and even shortness of breath when it comes to heart disease. But, there are outward signs, too. Here are the six signs you should look for…

Carolyn Gretton

How your smartwatch or fitness tracker can make you sick

These days, a lot of folks are wearing smartwatches and fitness trackers to get healthy. These electronics monitor heart rate and blood pressure or help us meet step goals. But, surprisingly, there’s a dark side about them that can actually make you sick…

Joyce Hollman

7 habits proven to reduce breast cancer recurrence

For a breast cancer survivor, the emotional repercussions are twofold: on the one hand, there’s relief. On the other hand, there’s the fear it can reappear at any time and without warning. These 7 habits can put your mind at ease…

Joyce Hollman

Blue legs syndrome: The latest long COVID symptom

Long-haulers are people previously infected with COVID-19 who continue to live with symptoms like fatigue, headaches, brain fog and shortness of breath. But COVID isn’t the only virus that can affect the body in strange ways, and blue legs don’t get much stranger…

Carolyn Gretton

How naked mole rats may help us live longer and cancer-free

Nake mole rats live nearly 10 times longer than other rodents of similar size and have shown resistance to age-related diseases including cancer, neurodegeneration, cardiovascular disease and arthritis. And their secret may help us do the same…

Joyce Hollman

Flavanols: Heart health support that’s ‘official’

Guidelines have long been established for vitamins to help us avoid deficiencies. But bioactive compounds, nutrients that go beyond basic nutrition and are studied for their potential to prevent disease, are different. And flavanols have just become official…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

The diabetes drug that blocks prostate cancer progression

Prostate cancer is ofen considered manageable and slow growing. But that’s not always the case. When it metastasizes, a deadly battle can ensue. But a common denominator between cancer growth and glucose metabolism means a common drug may stop it…

Joyce Hollman

In the dark: The scary truth about drug approvals

When a major university looked into the FDA’s challenge of balancing speed and safety for drug approvals, they discovered the scary truth about how little your doctor or you may ever know about the safety and efficacy of the medicine you take.

Carolyn Gretton

The link between your mouth, strep and coronary artery disease

No one likes the idea of gum disease. Unfortunately, half the world suffers from this affliction and it poses a serious threat to heart health. Unraveling this mysterious connection may have a lot to do with specific bacteria strains in the mouth…

Carolyn Gretton

How vitamin D powers up a cancer-fighting gene

Does vitamin D supplementation help protect against or fight cancer? So far, the connection has been promising enough that scientists continue to explore and strive to understand it. The latest? Its effect on a gene that can keep cells from becoming malignant…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Two popular herbs reveal recipe for anti-cancer compounds

We often forget that Mother Nature’s medicine cabinet often holds the answer to so many of the illnesses that we suffer from. The latest: two popular Italian herbs that could go from farm to table to cancer treatment…

Carolyn Gretton

Phytic acid: The antinutrient found in healthy foods

We tend to see phytic acid as something to avoid because of its reputation as an antinutrient. But this plant-based substance isn’t all bad. In fact, it has some health benefits that could offset its potential for causing mineral deficiencies. So let’s dig into the conundrum…

Carolyn Gretton

The ancient spice that tackles a modern-day plague: Chronic inflammation

Chronic inflammation is linked to a host of problems, from obesity to autoimmune conditions to depression. So researchers are exploring ways to directly target inflammation in people at risk. It turns out a long-used ancient anti-inflammatory spice could help with these modern-day problems…

Joyce Hollman

Health risks that could decrease if dentists talked to doctors

The connection between gum disease and more serious health problems is no secret. But recent large-scale research has painted a more comprehensive picture, and it’s not pretty. It’s time to stop thinking of the mouth as an independent system of its own…

Joyce Hollman

When women practice self-compassion, their hearts benefit

If you’ve cracked open a magazine or gotten online, you’ve seen lots of terms you might chalk up to New Age fads or practices, like “self-care” and “mindfulness.” News flash: beyond helping with stress, one specific practice made improvements to women’s hearts that could be seen in their arteries…

Joyce Hollman

Black beans: Potent ingredient for insulin resistance

Insulin resistance is when a body’s response to the hormone insulin is impaired and glucose in the blood cannot be used for energy. The next step is usually diabetes. Beans and legumes are great for people with insulin resistance, but black beans just may take the cake…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

3 rules to overcome chronic pain from a Survivor champion

Chronic pain is a fact of life for over 20 percent of adults. And if you’re part of that one in five, you know just how much of an impact that pain can have on your ability to work, play and simply enjoy your life. But what if you could learn to “reframe your pain” to better manage it? Pain science says it works.

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Stroke warning: The significant impact of anger and exertion

Stroke is a leading cause of disability and death worldwide. Many health conditions can increase risk for stroke including high blood pressure and diabetes, but when researchers looked closer, they found two common things happening in the hour before a stroke that pushed those risks over the edge.

Easy Health Options Staff

Why poor sleep causes heartburn (and vice versa)

We all need a good night’s sleep. That’s a gut feeling for most people. But sometimes discomfort within the gut is what hurts our ability to get deep, restful sleep. To make matters worse, it tuns out the process can occur in reverse: Sleep disorders are believed to trigger the stomach, too…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Stress: What it does to your DNA to speed aging

Science has discovered how to go beyond chronological age (the number of years you’ve lived) to measure biological age (the rate at which your cells age) using epigenetic clocks. They track chemical changes in DNA that not only helps predict health but also lifespan. And they’re finding too many of us aging faster thanks to the same culprit…

Dr. Elizabeth Klodas MD, FACC

The only 4 cholesterol foods you should avoid

Which is worse for your heart: an egg or a hot dog? Think about it. Since the amount of cholesterol in a food doesn’t always correlate with raising your cholesterol, which high cholesterol foods are the worst culprits for elevating bad cholesterol levels? The doctor says it’s these four…

Carolyn Gretton

3 dietary molecules linked to aggressive prostate cancer

While most men with prostate cancer recover completely, the outlook is grim for the handful diagnosed with an aggressive form of the disease. But research has identified three molecules — and the foods they come from — showing that the place to start to change your fate is your gut…

Virginia Tims-Lawson

The good deed that shows up in your blood work

There’s growing evidence that many of the worst and most chronic diseases, including coronary artery disease, diabetes and even Alzheimer’s may be riding the same steed: inflammation. But there’s a simple, non-medicated fix that works so well at dousing it, you can see the proof in your blood work…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Study finds a handful of heavy metals clogging major arteries

Some experts have said that at least 31 percent of the cardiovascular disease burden in the world could be avoided if environmental pollutants were eliminated. So when researchers looked at the association between toxic heavy metals and the body’s major arteries, they were shocked, but not surprised…

Joyce Hollman

Discovery shows how omega-3s help prevent stroke

Hardening of the arteries is a dangerous factor that can increase a person’s risk for stroke. It’s associated with chronic inflammation that damages blood vessels and hinders self-repair from mechanisms called resolvins. That’s where omega-3s come into the picture…

Joyce Hollman

An urgent reason to pamper your liver: Air pollution

Fatty liver disease isn’t new. What is new is learning its impact on metabolic health is so strong it’s now called Metabolic-associated liver disease, and that with every breath you take, you’re increasing your odds of the most common indication for liver transplantation. Start here to reduce your risks…

Joyce Hollman

Why giving up saturated fats can lead to heart trouble

Are you a label reader? Do you review the fat content of almost every product before adding it to your grocery cart? We’re not judging but we do want to share some new evidence that will blow all your concerns about saturated fats and heart trouble out of the water — and make life easier…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

One more risk of too little exercise: Pneumonia

Winter is here, and you know what that means: Your chances of getting sick and ending up with pneumonia are higher than at any other time of the year. And if you still haven’t gotten the message about the harms of a couch potato lifestyle, you’re missing out on the easiest intervention that works across all age groups.

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

For women, hormones could wreak havoc on arteries

When it comes to your arteries, you want the consistency of a wet noodle, not an uncooked piece of pasta. Otherwise your risks go up for heart problems. Yet, age isn’t the only thing that can stiffen our arteries. From birth control pills to menopause, women face a unique risk that can have serious consequences…

Carolyn Gretton

The vitamin deficiency that doubles risk for heart trouble

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the No. 1 cause of death worldwide. And though we’re familiar with the three main risk factors for CVD — high cholesterol, high blood pressure and smoking — research has uncovered another, less-obvious factor that can double your risk for heart trouble…

Carolyn Gretton

Eat this dairy daily to lower blood pressure by almost 7 points

If you have high blood pressure, you know it’s tough to get your readings down to normal levels, even with medication. One popular food known for health benefits could tank it by 7 points…

Carolyn Gretton

Experts may have found ‘fountain of youth’ in tiny seed

We’ll do just about anything we can to extend our lifespan, whether it’s following an anti-aging diet or exercise regimen — or as involved as using hyperbaric oxygen therapy. In all those efforts, there’s one goal scientists continue to chase: the ability to swallow one pill to stop aging. And they are inching ever closer…

Joyce Hollman

What you should know about peripheral artery disease

Peripheral artery disease, or PAD, is similar to coronary artery disease. Both involve a buildup of plaque inside the arteries, which slows the flow of blood that nourishes all parts of the body and increases risk for blood clots. Scary thing is, it’s considered a “silent disease.” Here’s what to watch for…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Good news for your bones if you’ve passed menopause

Saying the word “menopause” immediately conjures up images of hot flashes, night sweats and bones becoming frail and prone to fracture. However, while menopause isn’t always a walk in the park, everything post menopause isn’t always bad news…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

12-year study finds 8 foods to beat cognitive decline

More evidence is stacking up that, when it comes to keeping your brain at its best, what you eat counts. According to research that spanned 12 years, there are eight foods you’ll want to make a part of your regular diet if you want to ward off cognitive impairment and dementia as you age — and one to avoid like the plague…

Joyce Hollman

Got 10 hours? Use it to turn metabolic syndrome around

Metabolic syndrome is a cluster of symptoms affecting one-third of American adults that increases risk for diabetes, heart disease and stroke. If you have excess belly fat, high cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar, you may be one of them. If you’ve got 10 hours, you can turn it around before it’s too late.

Jenny Smiechowski

Reversing age-related brain shrinkage is easier than you think

As you get older, the size of a certain vital organ becomes more and more important — your brain. That’s because, typically, the older you get, the smaller your brain volume gets. And if this shrinkage gets too out of hand, you end up with a serious cognitive impairment like dementia.

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

Why cool temps could slow down autoimmune diseases like MS

By definition an autoimmune disorder is one in which your own immune system goes haywire, attacking the healthy tissue in your body, causing the disease. MS is one such disease. New research shows its symptoms may be improved and progress prossibly slowed with a change of temperature. Here’s why…

Dr. Adria Schmedthorst

New way walnuts improve cholesterol discovered

From controlling type 2 diabetes to stopping cancer in its tracks, if you want to stay in tip-top shape, nuts could be your ticket to a longer, healthier life. And it looks like the benefits of walnuts just keep stacking up, especially where heart health is concerned…

Joyce Hollman

How to tell if it’s age-related memory problems or Alzheimer’s

Memory problems can be unnerving, especially when we get older. It’s easy to begin second-guessing everything and wondering whether you’re simply forgetful or if something worse is happening — like Alzheimer’s. How can you tell the difference? Here are a few things to take note of…

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