Posts Tagged ‘Doctorstehran’

If you are worried about garlic breath, drink a glass of milk, say scientists who claim it can stop the lingering odour.

In tests with raw and cooked cloves, milk “significantly reduced” levels of the sulphur compounds that give garlic its flavour and pungent smell.

The authors told the Journal of Food Science it is the water and fat in milk that deodorises the breath.

For optimum effect, sip the milk as you eat the garlic, they say.

Sulphur compounds in garlic make it smelly

Mixing milk with garlic in the mouth before swallowing had a higher odour neutralising effect than drinking milk after eating the garlic in the trial.

And full-fat milk provided better results than skimmed milk or just water, according to breath samples taken from a volunteer.

One of the compounds milk counteracts is allyl methyl sulphide or AMS.

This cannot be broken down in the gut during digestion, and so it is released from the body in the breath and sweat.

Although garlic is good for you – containing several vitamins and minerals – once eaten, it can cause bad breath and body odour lasting hours or even days.

Plain water, and some foods, such as mushrooms and basil, may also help neutralise garlic smells, the study authors Sheryl Barringer and Areerat Hansanugrum say.

But it is the mixture of fat and water together that works best, the Ohio State University team say.

“The results suggest that drinking beverages or foods with higher water and/or fat content such as milk may help reduce the malodorous odour in breath after consumption of garlic and mask the garlic flavour during eating,” they say.

BBC Health News

By Clare Murphy Health reporter, BBC News

People who do puzzles and crosswords may stave off dementia longer but experience a more rapid decline once the disease sets in, a study suggests.

While there has long been speculation that “exercising” your brain could protect against Alzheimer’s, there has been little evidence to back this up.

Now US researchers who followed more than 1,000 people suggest the more mentally active may delay the disease.

Could crosswords hold the key to delaying the onset of dementia?

But once symptoms appeared, decline was quicker, the research suggested.

The team from the Rush University Medical Center in Chicago recruited 1,157 people aged over 65 in the early 1990s.

They were given a maximum of five points based on how often they engaged in a variety of activities which involved processing information, including listening to the radio or watching TV, reading a book, carrying out a crossword puzzle or jigsaw, or going to a museum.

Slowing down, speeding up

They were then followed for an average of 12 years, with assessments every three years.

For each additional point those without a diagnosed cognitive impairment saw a 50% slower decline in their brain function, which was examined through a variety of tests.

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By Emma Wilkinson Health reporter, BBC News

Women who have had a miscarriage do not need to wait before trying to get pregnant again, say doctors.

A study by the University of Aberdeen of 30,000 women found that conceiving within six months offered the best chance for a healthy pregnancy.

The findings, published in the British Medical Journal, counter international guidelines that women should wait at least six months before trying again.

Women conceiving within six months of miscarriagehad the best chance of healthy pregnancy

Women who conceived within six months were less likely to have another miscarriage, termination or ectopic pregnancy, the figures showed.

Also, among those who went on to give birth, conceiving within six months was associated with reduced risk of Caesarean birth, a premature delivery or a low birthweight baby compared with those women who had conceived between six months and a year.

Around one in five pregnancies ends in miscarriage before 24 weeks, a risk that increases with age.

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