| Don't miss any of Bottom Line's Daily Health News. Add our address, dailyhealthnews@edhn.bottomlinesecrets.com, to your Address Book or Safe List. Learn how here. February 14, 2011  In This Issue...
 Why is This One of the Fastest Growing Drinks in America? We absolutely love this juice. You can drink it without any guilt because not only does it taste great, but it’s actually good for you! This all-natural Aloe vera and cranberry juice is sugar-free, has only 8 calories and contains 5 grams of soluble fiber, which as you may know is the hard-to-get fiber. Listen to what people are saying:
This is not your typical health drink that you’ll have to psych yourself up to force down. So, what is this juice? Should You Carry a Condom? Full disclosure -- I am not going to tell you who this conversation was with, but I was recently talking to a middle-aged man I know well who is divorced and has been dating the same woman for eight months now. As a health journalist, I get asked some surprising questions... and he had one that I didn’t know the answer to. When, he wanted to know, would it be considered "safe" for him to stop using a condom? What a great question -- and what a great topic to write about for Valentine’s Day! So I took his question to Barbara Bartlik, MD, a psychiatrist, sex therapist and voluntary attending psychiatrist at Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx, New York, because she has become one of the sources with whom I regularly discuss our stories relating to sexuality. Dr. Bartlik’s answer to my friend’s question was "never"... and she acknowledged that she is taking an extreme (and probably unrealistic) position. But, she said, the chance of getting a sexually transmitted disease (STD), and the dangers to your health if you do get one, are far higher than even people in monogamous relationships realize. It’s a topic that Dr. Bartlik is quite passionate about. So Much Unprotected Sex! According to a recent study, there’s an awful lot of unprotected sex going on these days -- much more than even I realized! A recent Indiana University School of Health, Physical Education, and Recreation national survey of 5,865 individuals (ages 14 to 94) covering condom use in heterosexual sex found that singles are using condoms only about one-third of the time! That’s a lot of people engaging in risky behavior. Women tend to be more aware of the dangers of STDs, and Dr. Bartlik told me that she believes men are way undereducated on the topic of sexually transmitted infections. We went over the list of infections that can be transmitted by having sex without a condom -- all of which are nearly 100% preventable by wearing one. STD Dangers for Men Chlamydia. Testing for chlamydia (usually involving a cervical swab) is a routine part of a gynecological exam, so women are more likely to get tested and treated for chlamydia. But that’s not the case for men -- if they’re not told that they’ve been exposed, men may go on to infect other partners. Women with chlamydia who don’t get treated will often develop pelvic inflammatory disease (PID), which can result in scarring in their fallopian tubes that can cause infertility. Men with untreated chlamydia may eventually suffer urinary discomfort (itching, burning, discharge) and scarring of the prostate. Herpes. A common misperception, even among people who have herpes, is that there’s no danger of infection if there are no active sores. That’s not so -- herpes can be contagious even when the carrier of the virus has no visible sores. Human papillomavirus (HPV). HPV is among the most dangerous STDs -- in fact (depending on the type) one of the deadliest, because it often brings no symptoms and can increase the risk for oral and anal cancer in both genders... cervical cancer in women... and penis cancer in men. According to Dr. Bartlik, HPV infection is so rampant that a person who has had unprotected sex with three or more partners has probably been exposed to it. She told me that there are six million new genital HPV cases each year here in the US. Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Obviously, the stakes are high with HIV. Dr. Bartlik told me that, all other things being equal, in heterosexual sex, women are at higher risk for acquiring HIV than men (because men are more likely to be asymptomatic carriers, and the mucous membrane of the vagina is more vulnerable than the outer skin of the penis). But, she noted, "Even for the man, the risk is not zero." Chronic prostate infections. Acknowledging that this is anecdotal and not yet confirmed with research, Dr. Bartlik told me that she and other doctors are seeing more men with chronic prostate infections -- she and her colleagues believe that this may be related to bacterial infections picked up during unprotected sex. "Although I’m speculating, perhaps regular condom use might cut down on some of these bacterial infections as well as on the standard STDs," she told me. Should Committed Couples Use Condoms? I was surprised to hear that Dr. Bartlik believes that even couples who are in long-term, committed monogamous relationships ought to still use condoms. "The unexpected happens sometimes," she said, noting that it’s not unusual to hear that people who never intended to have encounters or even affairs end up doing so. According to The Kinsey Institute , about 20% to 25% of men and 10% to 15% of women have extramarital sex at least once during their marriages. "Most of the time, these are not discovered," she said. "Often, at the end of the affair, they simply pick up and continue with married life -- meaning unprotected sex with their spouse or partner." Does the idea of using condoms forever make you feel glum? Dr. Bartlik outlined a strategy that allows a committed couple to make a safe segue from using condoms to enjoying the full intimacy of having nothing between you.
Source(s): Barbara Bartlik, MD, a psychiatrist and sex therapist in private practice and voluntary attending psychiatrist at Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx, New York.  Shocking #2 Cause of Cancer An official at the American Cancer Society said that it's easy to avoid half of all cancers. However, an adviser to the American Institute for Cancer Research was even more optimistic when he said that nine out of 10 cancers are related to factors we control. Of course, their #1 piece of advice is "stop smoking." We all know that. But I bet you don't know the #2 cause of cancer. It's something totally under your control -- it's much easier than quitting cigarettes -- and it's the last thing you'd ever expect. I'll tell you about it in a moment. Do You Have Fat Near Your Heart? To paraphrase Shakespeare, how does fat hurt thee? Let us count the ways... and let us add yet another to an already long list. We already knew that fat is especially unhealthful when you have it around your waist, in the belly and/or nestled around your abdominal organs. Now, however, researchers at Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute in Los Angeles have discovered that fatty tissue surrounding the heart may be even more dangerous than fat in all those other places. Hurts the Heart In the study, published recently in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 2,137 subjects underwent a coronary artery calcium CT scan, which is a test commonly used to identify plaque deposits in heart arteries. Following these patients for the next four years, researchers found that those who had no symptoms of heart disease at the outset but who experienced a major cardiac event during the follow-up period had more fat around their hearts in the original scan than did study participants who did not develop cardiac problems. When I spoke with the study author, Daniel S. Berman, MD, chief of cardiac imaging and nuclear cardiology at the Mark S. Taper Foundation Imaging Center at the Institute, he told me that inflammatory substances in the fat surrounding the heart appear to have a direct impact on plaque in the arteries, increasing the likelihood that it will rupture and break off, thus triggering a heart attack. While fatty tissue around the heart has always shown up in calcium CT scans, clinicians have not considered its presence important. Now, said Dr. Berman, this study shows such information to be quite relevant and crucial for doctors to take into account when evaluating a patient’s heart risk. What About the Radiation Danger? If you’re wondering -- quite reasonably -- about the radiation risk involved with this test, Dr. Berman noted that this particular type of CT scan delivers a minimal dose of radiation, less than a person would typically get from the atmosphere over a one-year period of normal life in the US. He said that at present, the consensus in the medical community is that people with intermediate risk for heart disease (10% to 20% risk for heart attack over the next 10 years, based on the National Cholesterol Education Plan Risk Assessment Tool), should consider a coronary calcium scan to determine whether they have plaque in their coronary arteries. "The calcium scan is the most powerful tool we currently have to allow us to detect the earliest stage of coronary artery disease," Dr. Berman said, pointing out that heart disease is one of the most common causes of death in men and women. "Measuring the fat around the heart could add even further to this early prediction of preventable events." But don’t take it as gospel -- it’s best to discuss the risk/benefit of this test with your doctor first so you can make a well-informed choice about whether this test is best for you. Source(s): Daniel S. Berman, MD, chief of cardiac imaging and nuclear cardiology at the Mark S. Taper Foundation Imaging Center, Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, Los Angeles, and professor of medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. Be well,
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