New Barriers to Care Depression is a scourge, widely considered the second greatest cause of health disability worldwide. It has always been tough to treat. New studies show it having a worse course the older we get. Yet new governmental regulations are making the possibility of adequately treating depression in older folk so onerous less […]
Purpose Driven Sleep
Does sleep have a purpose? Certainly. Sleep is like food. Without sleep, animals die. During sleep we reorganize our brains, consolidate memories, grow skin, rejigger hormones, rebuild tissues. In sleep we continuously remake the internal information that makes us us. But does having a purpose make for better sleep? Purpose Driven Sleep Meaning matters. If people have a sense of […]
Who Is Aging?
Why We Age What does it mean to be youthful? To live long? To live and work productively? The question is so loaded that each individual may offer a different answer – at different times of day. But doctors have their own metrics, and lifespan is one favored endpoint. They want to know how stuff […]
What’s Wrong With Immortality?
Endless life – what people won’t do to achieve it. Over twenty two hundred years ago the great Qin Shuangdi, the Tiger of Qin, unifier of seven kingdoms into the first Chinese empire, tried mightily to extend his life. The alchemists’ mercury pills did not work. Most historians suggest the attempt at immortality ended his reign, his […]
Does Depression Age You? (12/2/13)
The Tale of the Telomeres If you ever get depressed, you will age much faster. Or at least that’s what some recent articles proclaim. The latest – a study from Amsterdam of 2400 people and their genes – looked at their telomeres, the “buffers” of DNA sequences at the end of chromosomes which prevent them […]