The Radiance of Knowing

So…Just What the Heck is Snoring, Anyway?

Technically, snoring is defined as any resonant noise from the respiratory tract that emerges during sleep.

Biologically, snoring refers to a vibration in the airway connecting the nose and the mouth; a vibration that can emerge through the mouth, the nose, or (as some non-snorers are painfully aware), it can emerge through both!

As you can sense, the more narrow the airway, generally speaking, the more intense the vibration; and ultimately, the louder the snore.

You may also be wondering why snoring only seems to emerge at night; after all, people literally use their airway every moment of their life; so why is snoring a nocturnal dilemma?

The answer to this is found in looking at the tissues within the airway. This tissue is very soft, and at night becomes relaxed; its similar to how some muscles, like biceps, become relaxed at night since the body does not require them.

As the throat (and its subsequent tissue) relaxes during sleep, the wind tunnel/airway becomes narrower and hence, snoring occurs.

Why Do Some People Snore Louder than Others?

This, too, is the reason why some people snore louder than others; and why the actual tone and pitch of one snorer may be rather different than another.

The actual snoring sound that emerges is dependant upon the force of wind that is being pushed through the (narrowed) airway. As you can envision, the more potent the force of wind (i.e. the faster the speed of the wind), the louder the snoring.

This is also why even babies can snore; but its often not considered snoring in the conventional sense, because an infants force of wind through their wind tunnel is so mild, that it can easily be ignored (though this can lead to complications; infant snoring can often be a symptom for a breathing and/or respiration problem, including allergy).

However, while snoring affects people of both genders and of all ages, it typically does afflict more men than women. There are a few reasons for this.

Snoring Tends to Favor Men

Overall, mens necks tend to be larger than womens necks; and thus there may be more fleshy tissue in there just waiting to combine with air flow and cause snoring.

Another reason is that women produce the hormone called Progesterone, which is considered by some medical experts to be an aid in reducing or preventing snoring. In fact, there are some anti-snoring treatments that involve Progesterone therapy for snoring men.
Factors that Increase and/or Lead to Snoring

There are several health and lifestyle factors that contribute to snoring; and this is true for both men and women, since snoring is a condition that does affect both genders (though surveys suggest that men snorers outnumber women snorers by a ratio of 2:1).

Some of the major health and lifestyle factors that can contribute to snoring include:

< Allergies, which can clog the airway and trachea

< Allergy medications, which can dry the nasal cavities

< Cold and Flu, which can similarly clog the airway (this is why some people experience snoring only when theyre suffering a cold or flu)

< Thickened tissues in the nasal passages, which can sometimes result from some surgeries unrelated to snoring

< Overuse of nasal sprays which irritate the nasal passageway

< Enlarged adenoids and/or tonsils

< Goiter (swelling of the an ineffective thyroid gland in the neck)

< A disproportionately large tongue that blocks airflow

< Ineffective regulation and neural control of mucus membranes

< Obesity and excess weight (leading to an enlarged neck and excess soft tissue in the trachea)*

< Excess gut/belly (relatively decreasing the size of the lungs)*

< Drinking alcohol**, which:

o sedates the throat muscles and causes them to collapse
o dilates blood vessels which swells up throat tissue

< Cigarette smoking, which inflames the upper airway

< The normal aging process, which can simply lead to a loss of muscle tone in the neck and thus snoring

* Since relatively more men tend to experience an excess gut, this is one reason why more men tend to experience snoring than women.

** Any medication (prescribed, over the counter, or illicit) that leads to excessive relaxation can lead to snoring.

So while we’ve looked at what snoring is, and what (rather common) factors and variables lead to/increase snoring, there still remains a very important element to focus upon: just how devastating is snoring? I answer this rather ominous question in my next article.

V.Anantha Krishnan is a webmaster of Top Ranked eBooks. You will find great ebooks on various topics here.
News about sleep Apnea & Snoring is published Everyday with fresh content on his website at http://www.ebook-retailers.com/wp1/index.php.

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How marketing is spoiling Hoodia.

Let’s be frank. Much of the western World is getting fat - well, let’s be totally frank, obese!

Increasingly the only exercise we get is the walk from the armchair to the fridge, or the car to the office. We probably get a bit more when we’re out buying the food for the fridge - but then we’re so mesmerised by advertising, we buy more fatty unhealthy foods than were going to in the first place - so any benefit we gained by the exercise is gone …

Depressing? It may be, but it’s more and more a fact for many of us. About 1 in 3 people are classed as being obese. That means being 30 lbs over a healthy weight, which puts you at risk of developing diabetes, heart disease, cancer, arthritis and other diseases. About 112,000 deaths were blamed on obesity in the USA in 2000, the most recent year for which figures are available.

So when what promised to be a great treatment for one of the western world’s fastest growing disease turned up - Hoodia Gordonii - it was bound to cause a marketing battle.

If you are one of the healthy majority (for now), and have great email spam filters, you may missed the excitement on the discovery of Hoodia Gordonii. Identified by the South African Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in the 1960’s, Hoodia was shown to have a great potential as a natural, side-effect free appetite suppressant.

South African Kalahari Bushmen have been using this cactus-like plant (it’s actually a succulent, but the marketing boys find it hard to spell succulent, and have called it a cactus) for generations as a way of controlling hunger on hunting trips. The CSIR, lacking the resources to develop the plants potential, set about working with a UK company called Phytopharm to identify the active ingredient in Hoodia Gordonii. They did, and named this ‘miracle molecule’ P57 (it was Phytopharm’s 57th ‘discovery’).

Phytopharm since partnered with Unilever (after a failed partnership with Pfizer), to commercialise Hoodia, and expect to have products to the market place in 2008.

So if Phytopharm and Unilever have no products on the market, where are all these Hoodia supplements coming from?

Well the CSIR hold a patent to P57, which they licensed to Phytopharm. The patent is for the use of the active ingredient, not the plant. Simply, that means that no company can extract the P57 from the plant and put it in another product. The Hoodia supplements that you see now, are made from the whole plant, so are not infringing the patent.

So the situation we see now is an increasing number of companies selling their own branded Hoodia supplements as fast as they can before the ‘big boys’ start - with some unfortunately resorting to extremely dubious marketing techniques.

What is ‘dubious’ marketing?

• Comparison Sites.
Type ‘Hoodia’ in to a search engine, and you’re bound to find some of these. These are the sites that list Hoodia products and give them a ranking according to certain criteria they have decided on.
Now this would be a great idea - apart from the fact that I have yet to come across a site that isn’t directly or indirectly run by the manufacturer of the product listed at number one!

• Pure is Best.
Many of the sites selling Hoodia only supplements, qualify their products by stating that Hoodia supplements containing added ingredients are of lower quality, and not as effective as their own products.
Absolute rubbish.
Hoodia ‘complexes’ (that is a supplement containing Hoodia and other ingredients), if properly formulated can be as good, if not better than pure Hoodia supplements.
By working the ‘pure is best’ emotional triggers, these companies are slandering perfectly effective and in many cases, better value for money products.

• C.I.T.E.S.
Or to give it it’s full name, “Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna”. Hoodia Gordonii is a protected species. That means that the export of it is regulated, with companies required to obtain a C.I.T.E.S. certificate before export.
You’ll have seen great play made of ‘We have a C.I.T.E.S. … the others don’t … Don’t trust companies without one …. Blah blah”. From discussions I’ve had with importers of Hoodia powder in to the USA, many of these certificates are fake. In fact, some of the legitimate companies don’t want to post their certificates on their web sites anymore, for fear of rogue websites stealing them for their use!

• Extract
Some companies claim that they sell an extract which is more powerful than non-extract products. (What is an extract? An extract is a concentrated from of a herb, that is derived after the crude herb has been mixed with water, alcohol, or another solvent and distilled or evaporated.).
No one is selling Hoodia Gordonii extract, as it would be violating the patent held by the CSIR.

• 100% Pure Hoodia Gordonii
How can they sell 100% pure so cheap? Simple - there are selling you 100%. They’re using the whole of the plant, rather than the ‘heart’ of the plant which contains the active ingredient. As the ’skin’ of the Hoodia can account for as much as 40% of the weight, your 100% pure may only be 60% pure and not quite the bargain that you imagined.

Now the last thing I want to do is to put you off buying Hoodia. One, the genuine stuff works, and two, I’m a wholesaler for the stuff. But as the marketing boys can’t seem to play fair, I think it’s only right that we get a few facts right.

So what should you be looking for before buying …

First impressions count.
Does the website look professional.
Have they got a contact email address?
Email them with some questions.
Or, if they have a telephone number, call them up.
After all, genuine Hoodia isn’t cheap, so isn’t the cost of a call worth it?

Documentation.
This is tricky now. A few months ago I would say insist on the C.I.T.E.S. etc., but now it’s not as easy. Does the site give you confidence?
Some companies are offering to mail out copies of their documentation with your order. Take this as a positive sign.

Complex.
Don’t be put off by Hoodia complexes. The chemists who devise these formulas have much more faith in the complexes than the pure Hoodia products alone, as they target more of the body.

Money Back Guarantee.
This is probably the most important.
If a company believes in its product, it offers a guarantee.

And finally … Hoodia is no ‘magic pill’ in the sense that you can loose 100lbs overnight. It’s best used as part of a regime of diet change, exercise and confidence building. If you sincerely want to lose weight, Hoodia is a fantastic resource than can make it much simpler for you to stick to your slimming plan.

Above remember, if you fail to plan, you are planning to fail …

Vic Carrara is a wholesaler and retailer for several herbal extracts, including Hoodia Gordonii. You can find out more by visiting http://www.hoodiacactusdietpills.co.uk

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Hoodia Gordonii is an unambitious little South African desert cactus type plant that has a big future ahead of it. A gift from the native San people who live in the Kalahari Desert in South Africa, this tiny plant the natives’ call “Xhoba” has already began impacting the world of weight loss with its extraordinary hunger stopping traits. What the Aboriginal San Bushmen have known for a long time and the rest of us are merely beginning to realize is that Hoodia has appetite suppressant qualities distinguished by plant scientists and named P57. This P57 active element has been examined, tested and identified to have the power to reduce calorie intake by up to 1,000 calories a day.
So will any South African cactus do when it comes to helping you to stay away from snacks? Indeed not, don’t go to the local florist and buy yourself a desert cactus to eat. Of the succulent and asclepiad genus there are 2,000 species of ascleoiadaceae, divided into 300 genera, half from the succulent category. Hoodia Pseudolithos and Trichocaulon are members of the Trichocaulon sub-section from the Kalahari Desert region of S. Africa that touches Angola, Botswana and Namibia. Hoodia Gordonii is the name of the cactus you will want to get but don’t plan on taking a outing to the South Africa and getting some Hoodia cacti for yourself; the Hoodia desert cactus are under strict control by the S. African government. It is considered an endangered plant and only Hoodia cactus farmers with certification may produce and sell the Hoodia.
Can Hoodia affect the world’s obesity problem and help the planet be a slimmer place? Business organizations including, Council for Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR), Phytopharm, Pfizer and most recently Slim Fast all believe so. All of these companies have banked on Hoodia’s success and together have invested millions of dollars, wanting to corner the marketplace on weight loss. Looking at Hoodia’s journey from Xhoba, plant of The San Bushmen to being today’s miracle plant for weight loss we need to first look at where Hoodia’s been over the past thirty plus years. The greatest amount of time, CSIR analyzed Hoodia to isolate the molecule p57, once they eventually obtained it; they then sold the rights of p57 to Phytopharm. In 1998 The Phytopharm Company leased marketing rights to Pfizer, who invested thirty-two million only to subsequently drop out of the scene because p57 was too expensive to synthesize as a pill. Pfizer’s situation has now been taken over by The Unilever Corporation, the parent company of Slim Fast. Slim Fast at present plans on delivering a Hoodia weight loss supplement to nutritional stores in a couple years.
Almost a year ago, on November of 2004, the Hoodia plant contracted big media coverage when CBS’s Sixty Minutes did a show on Hoodia’s appetite suppressant qualities. With the 60 minute TV exposure, Hoodia was now wanted plant by dieters all-round the globe. People having a hard time staying on their diets desired Hoodia now, not in a couple of years, the secret was out and Hoodia was becoming an indispensable plant. I’m sure after that 60 minutes program was aired, numbers of dieters looked into moving to the Kalahari Desert and making themselves a tiny Hoodia garden of their very own. Luckily, as it is today there isn’t a reason to go to that extent, where there is a consumer need; there are many businesses happy to fill that request. There were a few businesses that were informed of Hoodia before the news coverage broke and were in the right place at the right time. It didn’t take long though for numerous other organizations to create associations with South African Hoodia Gordonii growers and get Hoodia supplements into stores.
Nowadays there are numerous brands marketing both Hoodia powder form and extracts; how long will the Hoodia plant supply last is the question on dieter’s minds right now. The Hoodia Gordonii succulent is a very hard plant to grow; the plants need very much care and management with irrigating, temperature and sunshine. Where it stands today there are only a couple of Hoodia harvesting centers in the South Africa and the Hoodia plant takes two to three years before it’s ready to be exported. Taking this into account, the multi-million dollar question is, for how many months can the Hoodia succulent plant export continue? Because of this situation buyers should be aware if the Hoodia they are getting has been independently tested and certified to be pure Hoodia Gordonii from South Africa. A few of the companies that have been certified authentic are Desert Burn, Hoodoba Hoodia and the Hoodia Max Brand. There are companies out there taking advantage of the great demand and interest in Hoodia and supplying a low quality product. For more information about Hoodia go to http://hoodiagordonii.totalink.com

Andrew Aitaken is a contributing writer for the Totalink Net Directory. For more information about Hoodia Gordonii Weight Loss visit Totalinks Hoodia Gordonii Weight Loss Directory.

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It really hurts when someone comments against our looks. Even an extremely obese lady is proud of her appearance. But if her figure is mocked at by one of her friends in the college premises or at a ceremonial reception, she might be overwhelmingly sensitive and very depressed. She might be disheartened in such a way that if the word obesity faintly reaches her ears for the second time, she would try out even a banned drug to eliminate that curse out of her life without caring to think over the potential repercussions. It would be overwhelmingly pressing in her to succumb to any medicine or drug on which she can lay her hands by browsing the internet or by scanning the pages of the nearest newspaper or magazine.

Models and actresses are the idols that hog the limelight. They appear at the forefront of newspapers. Accompanying their embellished photos are detailed descriptions on the clothes they wear, the food they eat, the pills and tablets they take to acquire the perfect slim & sexy figure.The figure-conscious beauties, under the influence of their ignorance, get hooked to those drugs, toss down in huge amounts for trimming and slimming their waists and lead themselves to perdition.

But doesn’t it seem ridiculously absurd to believe in the theory of losing twenty or thirty kilos by swallowing one or two pills haphazardly without any medical prescription or recommendation by a physician? Well, the Liz Hurley dream is reasonable but not the ways and the means to achieve it. It requires perseverance and effort to achieve something. Things never happen overnight. There is a process in life which the girls in their 20s refuse to understand and thus accelerate their own annihilation. The youngsters decline to look after prescriptions from physicians before using drugs for weight loss, are fed on the anxiety of not being able to enhance their images in front of their peers and take medications capable of posing serious harm to their system whenever and wherever they are accessible.

Methods prove effective when utmost care is taken in their utilization and when they are used and applied in the conventional way. Quick, prompt and fast are the words on which the generation X bestows trust. They want immediate action and sudden relief from the problems that threaten to ensnare them, work on these difficulties with little knowledge on how to proceed and in the process end up relying those friends and peers for suggestions who are no better than themselves.

Meridia, the weight loss drug, has been banned in Italy due to the death of several patients.Fenfluramine Hydrochloride and Dexfenfluramine Hydrochloride are made to exit from the market after repeated complaints of their severe side-effects. But the girls who continuously dream of perfect hips, thighs and waists are not taking lessons, and digging their own graves.So, what would be the outcome if things continue to proceed in this way? Of course, it would not be a nice one. So, you Liz Hurleys! The time has arrived to seriously contemplate over this burgeoning trend of using drugs against obesity without proper considerations. Think it over if you care for yourselves. Think before you administer drugs to your system; look before you leap.

The writer is a freelancer who writes on various aspects of health like weightloss,and obesity. Visit http://www.phentermine-effects.com for more tidbits on the subjects.

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Diabetes affects around 16 million Americans and about 800,000 new cases are diagnosed each year. Diabetes attacks men, women, children and the elderly. It spares no race.

Diabetes is the leading cause of kidney failure, blindness in Adults and amputations. It is a major risk factor for heart disease, stroke, and birth defects and it shortens life expectancy by up to 15 years. So you can see what I am up against. It is up to me to make sure that none of these things ever happen to my daughter. My daughter Ashley has Diabetes Type 1. She will be 10 years old March 15th. Ashley has been a diabetic for 5 years.

Five years ago I was totally overwhelmed by all that information. I felt helpless and depressed. I was sure this was a death sentence for my daughter. This was because of my total ignorance of Diabetes. A person can live a full life with Diabetes. It just takes some extra care. A good diet plays an important part in a Diabetics life. They need to put together a meal plan with their doctor & dietitian. My daughter has several meals a day. She has breakfast, a snack, lunch, a snack, dinner & another snack. She has these meals at the same time every day. This is important. It helps keep her body on a schedule and her blood sugar regulated. Skipping meals and snacks may lead to large swings in blood sugar readings. To keep blood sugar levels near normal a Diabetic must balance the food they eat with the insulin the body gets from injections and with physical activities. Blood sugar monitoring gives you the information you need to help with this balancing. Near normal blood sugar readings will help you feel better. Normal is between 70 and 120. They will also reduce your chances of complications.

Lets talk about how a Diabetic needs to eat. Everyone needs to eat nutritious foods. Our good health depends on eating a variety of foods that contain the right amount of Carbohydrate, Protein, Fat, Vitamins, Minerals, Fiber and Water. Carbohydrate, Protein and Fat are found in the food that you eat. They supply your body with energy. Your body needs insulin to use this energy. Insulin is made in the pancreas. If you have Diabetes, either your pancreas is no longer producing insulin or your body can’t use the insulin it is making. So your blood sugar levels are not normal.

Starch and Sugar in foods are Carbohydrates. You can find starch in breads, pasta, cereal, potatoes, beans, peas and lentils. Natural sugars are in fruits, milk and vegetables. There are added sugars in desserts, candy, jam and syrup. All of these Carbohydrates can affect your blood sugar. When you eat Carbohydrates they turn into glucose and travel in your bloodstream. Insulin helps the glucose enter the beta cells in your pancreas where it can be turned into energy and stored. Eating the same amount of Carbohydrate daily at meals and snacks can help you control your blood sugar levels. Protein is in meats, poultry, fish, milk and other dairy products, eggs, beans, peas and lentils. Starches and vegetables have small amounts of protein. The body uses protein for growth, maintenance and energy. Your body needs insulin to use the protein you eat.

Fat is in margarine, butter, oils, salad dressings, nuts, seeds, milk, cheese, meat, fish, poultry, snack food, ice-cream and desserts. There are three different types of fat. Monounsaturated, polyunsaturated and saturated. Everyone should eat less saturated fats found in meats, dairy products, coconut, palm or palm kernel oil, and hardened shortening.

Saturated fats can raise your blood levels of cholesterol. The fats that are best are the monounsaturated fats found in canola oil, olive oil, nuts, and avocado. The polyunsaturated fats found in corn oil, soybean oil, or sunflower oil are good too. After you eat fat it travels through your bloodstream. You need insulin to store fat in the cells of your body. Fats are used for energy.

So you can see what a big role insulin plays in your body. Good diet is very important for a Diabetic. Excersize is also very important. A Diabetic can live a healthy full life if they do three things. Eat healthy, Excersize, and inject the right amount of insulin. It takes dedication and hard work. But in the end it is totally worth it because it is your life.

Devoting her last 8 years to Diabetes Education, Kimberly maintains her website ElviraDarkNight.com and publishes the Living Life as a Diabetic Newsletter as well as dispatches donated Diabetic supplies to needie individuals without Health Insurance. Kim would like to personally invite you to become informed on issues of Health, Nutrition & Diabetes.

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