Health for life

UPDATE: We did it! We raised the $200! Thank you so much to everyone who donated!

Sweet readers! We’re going to try something a little new today, and we’d love your help in making it happen, if at all possible.

Leigh and I have two friends, Betsy and Dolinda. For a few years now, these lovely ladies have been working closely with the Ubushobozi Project, an organization based in Rwanda that offers vocational skills training to impoverished, orphaned and/or head-of-household teenage girls, many of whom have very little chance of continuing their educations and/or making steady livings. One of the girls enrolled in Ubushobozi 17-year-old Aline.

Here she is!


Aline has been with Ubushobozi since 2008. Her parents have been gone for a long, long time, both under some pretty terrible circumstances. So, she takes care of her two sisters, Diane, 12, and Olive, 19. Aline also provides meals for several local children, and even allows them to sleep in her home. “She will feed five to six village kids at a time with just one big plate - just a giving, good, good, person,” says Betsy.

This is her kitchen.


Betsy says: “She must cook outside and when it rains, she either goes to an elderly friends house nearby to cook or, quite often, she cant cook at all and she and her sisters dont eat.”

We were thinking that we’d love, love to get Aline a new kitchen - a charcoal burner, some serving dishes, and a few cooking implements. The whole deal, plus labor, would run about $200 USD – less than a stand mixer.

And sweet readers, we’d love your help.

Think of it! Together, we can make a direct, wonderful difference in Aline’s life, not to mention all the people she feeds on a regular basis.

Here are some things to know:

• To donate, head to the Ubushobozi Donation Page (linked) and click "Donate" on the right hand side. Then, enter your information in PayPal, and on the 2nd page, write "For Alines Kitchen" in the "message" box. (I tried it! It works!)
• All 100 percent of your donation will be directly applied to Aline’s kitchen - labor and materials (tin, mud bricks, wood, etc.). Nothing goes towards administrative fees.
• Any donation amount - $5, $10, $20 – is totally great. No need to break the bank.
• We have until April 21.

Once we raise the fundage, Aline will photograph the entire process, from construction to the first meal she cooks, and I’ll post it on CHG. When Betsy mentioned the idea to Aline, she replied that, “Everyone come visit her new kitchen to eat. She will cook for everyone.”

What do you guys think? Let’s do this thing! As the Ubushobozi girls would say, “Everybody happiness!”

Low levels of the "sunshine" vitamin D appear to increase a childs risk of anemia, according to new research led by investigators at the Johns Hopkins Childrens Center. The study, published online Oct. 10 in the Journal of Pediatrics, is believed to be the first one to extensively explore the link between the two conditions in children.

The researchers caution that their results are not proof of cause and effect, but rather evidence of a complex interplay between low vitamin D levels and hemoglobin, the oxygen-binding protein in red blood cells. The investigators say several mechanisms could account for the link between vitamin D and anemia, including vitamin Ds effects on red blood cell production in the bone marrow, as well as its ability to regulate immune inflammation, a known catalyst of anemia.

To capture the interaction between the two conditions, researchers studied blood samples from more than 10,400 children, tracking levels of vitamin D and hemoglobin. Vitamin D levels were consistently lower in children with low hemoglobin levels compared with their non-anemic counterparts, the researchers found. The sharpest spike in anemia risk occurred with mild vitamin D deficiency, defined as vitamin D levels below 30 nanograms per milliliter (ng/ml). Children with levels below 30 ng/ml had nearly twice the anemia risk of those with normal vitamin D levels. Severe vitamin D deficiency is defined as vitamin D levels at or below 20 ng/ml. Both mild and severe deficiency requires treatment with supplements.

When investigators looked at anemia and vitamin D by race, an interesting difference emerged. Black children had higher rates of anemia compared with white children (14 percent vs. 2 percent) and considerably lower vitamin D levels overall, but their anemia risk didnt rise until their vitamin D levels dropped far lower than those of white children. The racial difference in vitamin D levels and anemia suggests that current therapeutic targets for preventing or treating these conditions may warrant a further look, the researchers say.

"The clear racial variance we saw in our study should serve as a reminder that what we may consider a pathologically low level in some may be perfectly adequate in others, which raises some interesting questions about our current one-size-fits-all approach to treatment and supplementation," says lead investigator Meredith Atkinson, M.D., M.H.S., a pediatric kidney specialist at the Johns Hopkins Childrens Center.

Untreated, chronic anemia and vitamin D deficiency can have wide-ranging health consequences, including organ damage, skeletal deformities and frequent fractures, and lead to premature osteoporosis in later life.

Long known for its role in bone development, vitamin D has recently been implicated in a wide range of disorders. Emerging evidence suggests that low vitamin D levels may play a role in the development of certain cancers and heart disease and lead to suppressed immunity, the researchers note.

Anemia, which occurs when the body doesnt have enough oxygen-carrying red blood cells, is believed to affect one in five children at some point in their lives, experts say. Several large-scale studies have found severe vitamin D deficiency in about a tenth of U.S. children, while nearly 70 percent have suboptimal levels.

Women eating a high-calcium diet and taking calcium supplements adding up to more than 1,400 milligrams a day may be running nearly twice the risk of dying from heart disease, a large Swedish study suggests.

Both men and women take calcium supplements to prevent bone loss. The new findings come on the heels of another recent study that found a similar increased risk of death related to calcium intake among men.

"Many older adults increase dietary intake of calcium or take calcium supplements to prevent bone loss and there had been speculation that increased calcium intake with or without vitamin D could improve cardiovascular health," said Dr. Gregg Fonarow, an American Heart Association spokesman who wasnt involved in the study.

However, a number of recent studies have suggested that higher dietary intake or calcium supplementation may not only not improve cardiovascular health -- they may be associated with increased risk for cardiovascular events and mortality, said Fonarow, a professor of cardiology at University of California, Los Angeles.

The new report was published in the Feb. 12 online edition of the BMJ.

To see if calcium supplements raised the risk of dying from heart disease, a team led by Dr. Karl Michaelsson, a clinical professor in the department of orthopedic surgical sciences at Uppsala University in Sweden, analyzed data collected on more than 61,000 women enrolled in a study on mammograms.

Over 19 years of follow-up, nearly 12,000 women died -- almost 4,000 dying from cardiovascular disease, about 1,900 from heart disease and 1,100 from stroke, the researchers found.

The highest rates of death were seen among women whose calcium intake was higher than 1,400 milligrams a day, the researchers noted. On the other hand, women who took less than 600 milligrams of calcium a day were also at an increased risk of death.

Moreover, women taking 1,400 milligrams of calcium a day and also using a supplement had even a higher risk of dying than women not using supplements, Michaelssons group found.

All in all, women getting more than 1,400 milligrams of calcium a day were more than twice as likely to die than women getting 600 to 999 milligrams a day, the researchers said.

The U.S. Office of Dietary Supplements recommends 1,000 to 1,200 milligrams of calcium a day for most adults.

According to the study authors, diets very low or very high in calcium can override normal control by the body, causing changes in blood levels of calcium.

Rather than worry about increasing calcium intake of those getting enough through their diet, emphasis should be placed on people with a low intake of calcium, the authors suggest.

Taylor Wallace, a representative of the supplement industry, faults this study because, he said, it was not specifically meant to address calcium supplements and heart disease.

"We are comparing apples and oranges," said Wallace, who is senior director for Scientific & Regulatory Affairs at the Council for Responsible Nutrition. He noted that in the new study, the data that researchers used to draw their conclusions looked at diet and cancer, not whether calcium supplements were bad for the heart.

"Still, there is not a single human cause-and-effect study that demonstrates a hazard for calcium either from the diet or supplements and cardiovascular disease," he said.

Although the new study tied total calcium intake to increased risk of death from heart disease in women, it didnt establish a cause-and-effect relationship.

Wallace did say its important to know how much calcium a person is getting from diet and supplements. "It is important to talk with your doctor to make sure you are getting the right amount for you," he said.

For his part, heart association spokesman Fonarow said: "While further studies are needed, calcium supplements should be used only after caul consideration of whether the potential benefits in terms of bone health outweigh the potential cardiovascular risks."

If you catch the flu, a cold, or develop an infection, your blood sugar may go up. Having diabetes requires a little more attention during those times. The National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases recommends the following when youre sick:

• Check your blood glucose every 4 hours. Write down the results.
  
  
• Keep taking your diabetes medicines. Even if you can’t keep food down, you still need your diabetes medicine. Ask your doctor or diabetes educator whether to change the amount of diabetes medicine you take.
  
  
• Drink at least a cup (8 ounces) of water or other calorie-free, caffeine-free liquid every hour while you’re awake.
  
  
• If you can’t eat your usual food, try drinking juice or eating crackers, popsicles, or soup.
  
  
• If you can’t eat at all, drink clear liquids such as ginger ale. Eat or drink something with sugar in it if you have trouble keeping food down.
  
  
• Test your urine for ketones if:
  • your blood glucose is over 240.
    
  • you can’t keep food or liquids down.
  
  
• Call your health care provider right away if:
  • your blood glucose has been over 240 for longer than a day.
    
  • you have moderate to large amounts of ketones in your urine.
    
  • you feel sleepier than usual.
    
  • you have trouble breathing.
    
  • you can’t think clearly.
    
  • you throw up more than once.
    
  • you’ve had diarrhea for more than 6 hours.

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