Mom's beware.....

Today, I wanted to focus on Mom....

I’m a firm believer, "as goes the health of Mom, so goes the health of the family."

As a guy, I tend to be more in-tune with men's health issues. However, since 60% or so of my clients are women, I closely follow research on women's health. In fact, one of the major topics we reviewed (in depth) during my Graduate work was the role of female hormones throughout the average lifespan.

There's been a lot of recent research on women's health issues and some of the scientific school of thought as changed over the last decade.

Women have found increasing professional opportunities over the last four decades. At the same time, recent research has found that today's woman continues to feel pressure to fulfill more traditional female roles in the home and raising children.

All of this has led to women struggling to retain their health as they work more and rest less. Unfortunately, the typical professional woman today with children is so busy that they struggle to make their health and fitness a priority.

In fact, in an alarming trend, researchers have found that strokes have increased by 300% in middle-aged women in the last 10 years alone!

That is a sobering statistic.... Why has this happened?

The answer seems to be the increasing obesity epidemic. Here's a link to a news story discussing these recent findings:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080220/ap_on_he_me/obesity_strokes

And on a slightly different tangent of women's health, there is continuous concern over the use of Estrogen Replacement Therapy (ERT).

A second landmark study has been conducted on the effects of female hormone replacement. You can read about it here:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080304/ap_on_he_me/hormone_risks_6

How about hysterectomies? Some experts believe that 2/3 of hysterectomies aren't needed? If the research continues to bear these latest statistics out, that means there have been a lot of unnecessary risks and good deal of pain that women have had to endure. Read the story here:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/HEALTH/03/03/healthmag.hysterectomy/index.html?section=cnn_latest

There's plenty more engaging, and sometimes troubling research regarding the current health of women in the United States today but that discussion is better left for another day.

Physicians continue to tell me, "people need to take the ultimate responsibility for their health".

Of course that’s pretty good advice no matter where your ovaries are located.

Til next time….