Staying Healthy Archive

Stretching before one gets out of bed has many benefits. It can release the body’s "feel good" chemicals, lubricate the joints, and help people maintain their range of motion. Before stretching, one should move the muscles a little by flexing the joints. This will help get blood flowing to the muscles and make them more amenable to stretching. Any stretch done in bed should be hold for 30 to 60 seconds if possible, without bouncing.

Sleep-maintenance insomnia common complaint among women at midlife

You wake up and look at the clock: it's 3 a.m. You tell yourself you've got to get back to sleep, but thoughts about yesterday's troubles, the coming day's challenges, and all those "must-do's" race through your mind. You toss and turn and worry about not getting enough sleep. Maybe you doze off for an hour or so, but when the alarm clock gets you up for the day, you're far from rested.

Insomnia — inability to get the sleep you need to wake up refreshed — is the most common sleep complaint in the United States. It often takes the form of sleep-maintenance insomnia — that is, difficulty staying asleep, and in particular, waking too early and struggling to get back to sleep. Like difficulty falling asleep at the beginning of the night, called sleep-onset insomnia, sleep-maintenance insomnia is more common in women than in men.

Hospital delirium is common and often goes unrecognized

When Mary, age 84, was hospitalized for a hip replacement, everything went well until a complication landed her in the intensive care unit (ICU) and she began behaving oddly. She thought she was in a hotel, reported that a cartoon character had died in the bed next to hers, struggled at night to escape nonexistent intruders, and complained that the staff was ignoring the rats infesting her room. After a psychiatric consult, Mary was given medication to calm her and help her sleep, and eventually she started acting more like her old self.

"We stayed with her day and night, and the delirium cleared once she was back in a regular room. Now we can laugh about it, but she remembers little about those weeks," says her daughter-in-law.

Harvard fitness expert Michele Stanten takes you through a simple exercise to tighten your abs, strengthen your back, and improve your balance.

Harvard fitness expert Michele Stanten takes you through a simple exercise to tighten your abs, strengthen your back, and improve your balance.

Harvard fitness expert Michele Stanten takes you through a simple exercise to tighten your abs, strengthen your back, and improve your balance.

Timing may improve potency and help you cope with side effects.

We all want our medicines to be as effective as possible, and that requires effort on our part. It may be necessary to avoid taking pills with certain foods or drinks, and to check that medications won't interfere with each other.

And in some cases, it may be important to take a drug at a particular time of day. This approach, known as chronotherapy, is gaining attention as research suggests a relationship between when we take medications and how well they work.