Hot MedFax

It should probably come as no surprise.  But college athletes who have abusive coaches , cheat. Newswise.com reports that college athletes who have abusive coaches are more willing to cheat in order to win than players with more ethical coaches, according to new research published by the American Psychological Association and based on surveys from almost 20,000 student athletes at more than 600 colleges across the country. The study did not determine whether abusive coaches actively encouraged or permitted cheating by their teams, but there was a correlation between abusive coaches and an increased willingness by players to cheat in order to win.  “Ethical behavior of coaches is always in the spotlight,” the Web site quotes lead researcher Mariya Yukhymenko, PhD, a visiting research associate at the University of Illinois at Chicago. "Our study found several negative effects related to abusive coaches, including a willingness by players to cheat to win games....

I can certainly attest to this. I've been called a fascist and a jerk, and those are the nice ones!  A new study has found I'm not alone.  Anyone who publishes for a living will encounter nasty -- and sometimes even cruel -- comments on what they write. According to a Web site that reports on these things, one in five comments included some form of incivility, with name-calling as the most prevalent type, a recent study notes. “Many people just can’t seem to avoid the impulse to go after someone else,"  said Kevin Coe, assistant professor of communication at the University of Utah and one of the study’s authors. I've often wondered about the people who write these comments.  I'm sure some of them are those who disagree with what I, and others, write.  But some are just downright mean.  A fascist?  Really?  And I think that one came from a humorous op ed I wrote about road rage.  Another person commented that road rage just wasn't f...

This probably won't surprise the parents of many high school athletes but a new study has shown the incidence of concussions is exploding. According to newswise.com, the concussion rate in these athletes has more than doubled in the last seven years. Overall, the rate increased from .23 to .51 concussions per 1,000 athlete exposures. An athlete exposure is defined as one athlete participating in one competition or practice. A concussion is an injury to the brain that results in temporary loss of normal brain function. It usually is caused by a blow to the head, the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANNS) says. "The likelihood of suffering a concussion while playing a contact sport is estimated to be as high as 19 percent per year of play. More than 62,000 concussions are sustained each year in high school contact sports, and among college football players, 34 percent have had one concussion and 20 percent have endured multiple concussions." Concussions...

And at the other end , only one in four adolescents is physically active for 60 minutes a day, according to USA Today. Kids 12-15 would rather (like my son) curl up with Black Ops 2 (I know, I know, I'm a bad mother) than run around outside for hours, the way I did as a kid (and keep in mind, I wasn't in the least athletic!).  But times were different.  There were two other families in the neighborhood the same age as my brother and me and we climbed trees (well, not me) and played kickball on the turn-around at the top of the road and chased each other and the dogs (actually, the dogs chased us) and everything was fun and we could stay out till after dark in the summer, even in the woods that surrounded all our houses, without having to worry about the pedophiles or rapists or even just the dads who liked pretty young girls. But today kids are more interested in their computers, or hanging out at the mall (with very little of what the mall's for, in my opinion -- walk...

Who knew?  According to a new study , want to know the secret to being sexy and in shape at 70?  Play varsity sports in high school. Fit and healthy 70 year olds who don’t frequently visit the doctor have something unexpected in common – they played varsity sports in high school, newswise.com reports. "A new study tracked 712 World War II veterans who were healthy as young men – they had passed a rigorous physical exam when being screened for the military – and surveyed them 50 years later for behavior, background and personality factors that improved their health at 70," the Web site notes. “The most surprising result was those who played a high school sport reported visiting their doctor fewer times a year,” Simone Dohle of ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich) said at newswise.com. Dohle, along with Brian Wansink of Cornell University's Food and Brand Lab, conducted the study. “We found that many of those who were active on a team over 50 y...

Can they ever make up their minds?  First experts told us too many kids don't get enough exercise.  Now they're saying kids can get too much exercise. But let's clarify who we're talking about here.  A recent study says that kids who actively participate in exercise more than 14 hours a week could face negative effects on their well-being. Let's slow down and see what's going on.  The US Department of Health and Human Services recommends that young people aged between 6 and 17 years carry out at least 60 minutes of physical activity a day, equating to 7 hours a week.  The study, done in Switzerland and Canada, found that 14 hours is optimal for good health, according to medicalnewsdaily.com. But anything over that is where the problems supposedly begin.  Researchers surveyed over 1,000 teens between 16 and 20 in Switzerland. on their exercise regimes.  Slightly more than half were male, and about 9% of these were obese. The teenagers with ...