Entries by Chet Zelasko

The Super Bowl and the Avocado

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We’re used to seeing just about anything in a commercial played during the Super Bowl—plenty of beer commercials, of course, and every snack food known in the Hall of Refined Foods. But avocados? Fruits and vegetables have never taken center stage on Super Bowl Sunday but this year, they were front and center. Avocados from Mexico sponsored what was called the first produce ad in Super Bowl history. Imagine that. Billions of people being exposed to ads about a fruit! While savory in flavor, avocados are technically a fruit, not a vegetable.

The ad itself was a take . . .

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Breast Cancer: A Professional’s Story

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Since I began this series on Tuesday, many more readers have shared their stories. Please keep them coming; I will share more of them at some point. Paula asks that I thank the many people who have told their stories and wished her well; they all help maintain the positive attitude that aids healing.

I chose this response because it’s from a healthcare professional who is a survivor; she raises some important issues that you should know more about. Please read this final story from a breast cancer survivor because it’s really designed for you from someone who . . .

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Breast Cancer: A Man’s Story

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We usually think of breast cancer as a woman’s disease. For the most part, that’s true, but men get breast cancer as well. An estimated 2,360 or about 1% of all the diagnosed new cases of invasive breast cancer were estimated to be found in men in 2014. We’re more aware of breast cancer in men after some famous men talked about their experience with the disease: Edward Brooke, former U.S. Senator for Massachusetts; Peter Criss, Kiss drummer; Ernie Green, former NFL football player; Rod Roddy, announcer for The Price is Right, and Richard Roundtree . . .

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Breast Cancer: Your Stories

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When Paula took over the message January 17 and told you about her experience with breast cancer, it produced a great number of responses. Most people wanted to let her know that she was not alone and that they were survivors as well. In my opinion, a few of the responses absolutely needed to be shared, so that’s what I’m doing this week. I’m not going to identify the people in any way, but they know who they are.

Why do this? Because every day, some reader, maybe you or maybe someone in your family, will get . . .

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Why Optimism Isn’t Enough

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In the messages this week, we’ve looked at a study that examined an optimistic mental state along with health metrics related to cardiovascular health. I left you with a question on Thursday:

Do you simply need to maintain a positive mental attitude to have great heart health?

I told you I think there’s more to it. Let’s begin by talking about something called The Stockdale Paradox.
The Stockdale Paradox
You might remember Vice-Admiral Jim Stockdale as a third-party candidate for Vice President in 1992. Before that, he was a Navy pilot who was shot down . . .

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Optimism and Heart Health: The Results

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Tuesday I told you about a study on optimism and cardiovascular health and gave you the details of how the study was done. Today let’s look at the results.

The researchers compared over 5,000 subjects’ level of optimism to their scores on the Life’s Simple 7 assessment of heart health. The subjects were divided into quartiles of optimism, from most to least. When researchers compared the top quartile (highest level of optimism) to the bottom quartile (lowest level of optimism), the optimists were 51% more likely to have an intermediate rank of heart health and 92% more . . .

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Optimism and Heart Health

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Every day, I check the health headlines to see the latest research in medicine, nutrition, and fitness. Recently an intriguing headline said “Optimistic People Have Healthier Hearts”; I’ve seen that type of statement before and it makes sense. The problem is that pencil and paper tests on mental health and attitude and the occurrence of heart disease are not metrics based on hard numbers like blood pressure, but I think this study did it right.

In 2000, researchers began the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) of over 6,000 subjects aged 52–84. Data were collected for 11 . . .

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Paula’s Turn: I’m a Survivor!

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For a week in October, I had breast cancer. But maybe I should start at the beginning. In September I got my usual mammogram and was called back for more images, which had happened before so I wasn’t worried. But this time, the radiologist saw something and recommended a biopsy. An ultrasound-guided core biopsy was […]

Coping with Radiation Damage

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At some point in the future, people are going to look back at this time of cancer treatment as barbaric, but it’s the best we have today and we can’t use undiscovered treatments. However, we can help limit the damage radiation may cause to healthy tissue.

I may sound like a broken record, but it all starts with eating more vegetables and fruit; they contain vitamins, minerals, and phytonutrients in the proper proportions to help your body. Cruciferous vegetables and berries are better choices but all are great. Green tea has phytonutrients that are beneficial if you can . . .

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Breast Cancer: Radiation Therapy

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Last week’s messages sparked questions related to breast cancer, so this week we’ll look at an improvement in radiation therapy for breast cancer that’s been in the news recently.

The most important thing to understand is that there are many different forms and degrees of breast cancer. The only way to understand the type of breast cancer you may be facing is to discuss it with your physicians. Some of the terms are estrogen-positive or -negative, invasive or contained, HER2-positive or -negative, and many more. If you don’t understand the words, get a full . . .

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