Engineering Good Health

Welcome to the Health & Benefit Trust Fund's Engineering Good Health headquarters!

You can find helpful information about your benefits, wellness tips and reminders, and the latest wellness and health news from around the internet.

We hope this information will help you better understand and use your benefits and improve your health.

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Exercising with osteoporosis: Stay active the safe way

local94news shared this story from All Mayo Clinic health information topics.

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"Prescription" to sit less, move more advised for mildly high blood pressure & cholesterol

local94news shared this story from American Heart Association.

American Heart Association Scientific Statement

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Kids, COVID & Vaccines: What to Know

local94news shared this story from WebMD Health.

More than 6.7 million children age 12-17 have received at least one vaccine dose. But new data is also raising concern about hospitalization rates in teens.

local94news shared this story from CNN.com - RSS Channel - App Health Section.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta tells us how disconnecting before we go to bed can help us live to 100.

Taking more steps daily may lead to a longer life

local94news shared this story from American Heart Association.

American Heart Association Epidemiology, Prevention, Lifestyle & Cardiometabolic Health Conference – Presentation 69

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Getting Sober: Finding Your Way

local94news shared this story from WebMD Health.

Getting sober isn't one-size-fits-all. People who've made the decision to quit drinking share what worked for them.

Opioids After Dental Work May Be Dangerous

local94news shared this story from WebMD Health.

A new study warns getting a prescription for an opioid painkiller from your dentist could put you or your family at risk for an overdose.

7 Expert Tips on Building Healthy Post-Pandemic Habits

local94news shared this story from AARP - Health.

Science-based advice on how to become a better you as we enter a post-pandemic world ... As COVID-19 vaccinations continue to roll out across the country and life slowly starts to return to normal,...

How Food May Improve Your Mood

local94news shared this story from NYT > Health.

The sugar-laden, high-fat foods we often crave when we are stressed or depressed, as comforting as they are, may be the least likely to benefit our mental health.

Heart-healthy lifestyle linked to lower risk of future cancers

local94news shared this story from Health & Medicine – Harvard Gazette.

In addition to lowering risk of heart disease, maintaining a heart-healthy lifestyle may pay off in lower risk for developing cancer, researchers from Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and other centers in the United States and the Netherlands have found.

Looking at the potential link between cardiovascular disease (CVD) and cancer among participants in two large population-based health studies, Emily S. Lau and Jennifer E. Ho from the division of Cardiology at MGH and their co-authors found that traditional risk factors for CVD, including older age, male sex, and current or former smoking were all independently associated with increased risk of the development of cancer.

In addition, they found increased levels of natriuretic peptides — markers of stress on the heart — also predicted higher cancer risk among study participants.

Although participants who already had a history of heart disease before the study or experienced a cardiovascular event such as heart attack or heart failure after joining the study were not found to be at increased risk of developing cancers, those who had ideal cardiovascular health at study entry had lower risk of future cancers, the investigators reported in JACC: CardioOncology.

“We found an association between a heart-healthy lifestyle and a lower risk of cancer, and the opposite is true: that a less heart-healthy lifestyle is also associated with higher risk of cancer, but we can’t prove that there is causation in this epidemiologic study,” says Lau.

Lau and colleagues evaluated data from 20,305 participants in two large community-based, long-term health studies: the Framingham Heart Study and the Prevention of Renal and Vascular End-Stage Disease (PREVEND) study. The participants were free of cancer at study entry.

The data included information on laboratory-proven cancers that occurred during the course of the study, CVD risk factors at study entry (including obesity, diabetes, high cholesterol and high blood pressure), cardiovascular risk as measured by the 10-year atherosclerotic (ASCVD) risk score, established diagnostic markers for CVD such as the naturally occurring substances natriuretic peptides and cardiac troponins, CVD at study entry, and the American Heart Association (AHA) Life’s Simple 7 cardiovascular health score, a patient-reported measure of heart-healthy lifestyles.

The researchers found that traditional CVD risk factors such as age, sex, and smoking status were each associated with cancer. In addition, each 5 percent increase in the estimated 10-year ASCVD risk score was associated with a 16 percent increase in risk for cancer, and participants who were in the highest third of natriuretic peptide levels had a 40 percent greater risk of developing cancer than those in the lowest third.

Although participants with CVD at baseline and those who had a cardiovascular event such as a heart attack or stroke during the study were not at higher risk of subsequent cancer, those who most closely adhered to the AHA recommendations at study entry (manage blood pressure, control cholesterol, reduce blood sugar, get active, eat better, lose weight, stop smoking) had lower risk of future cancers.

Co-authors of the study are Samantha M. Paniagua, Elizabeth Liu, Shawn X. Li, Katherine Takvorian, and James L. Januzzi Jr., all MGH; Manol Jovani, Johns Hopkins University; Navin Suthahar and Rudolf A. de Boer, University of Groningen, the Netherlands; Susan Cheng, Cedars Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles; Greta L. Splansky, Ramachandran S. Vasan, Martin G. Larson, and Daniel Levy, Framingham Heart Study; Thomas J. Wang, U. Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas; Bernard Kreger, Boston University School of Public Health.

Joint Pain, Aging, and Arthritis - Understand Your Pain

local94news shared this story from WebMD Health.

Creaking knees, hips, and ankles aren't necessarily normal aches and pains that come with age. Your pain might be arthritis. Luckily, medicine has a lot to offer --- from exercise and alternative supplements to medications and joint replacement.