Forever young...

I want to live forever young!! Do you remember the song? I think everyone at some point of our lives  think about this, and one of the most important aspects to look forever young is to have a healthy and good looking skin but, would it be possible over 50’s. Well, maybe now it is.

Scientists have studied marine animals for years, and a recent study published in the online journal PLOS ONE could be the answer to our prayers. The study showed that sea cucumbers and sea urchins have the ability of changing the elasticity of collagen inside their bodies which would be the key for maintaining a vigorous appearance. And although they seem to be totally different from us, scientists have confirmed that our skin may work pretty similar to theirs.

The thing is: sea cucumbers and sea urchins contain genes encoding peptides that cause accelerated softening of collagen in their body wall, and as soon as scientist can understand how this process works specifically, they will be able to isolate these peptides and try them in humans’ skin.

But this is not the only benefit we can get from these creatures; the study also showed the existence of another peptide pretty similar to a hormone called calcitonin, which regulates our bones to remain them strong.

So now you choose, would try these peptides?

Acupuncture: an effective treatment or a placebo?

It has been a big debate among doctors about the real effects that acupuncture has on patients. Some doctors say it is nothing but a placebo effect, while others ensure it has veritable effects. 

Through time, studies haven’t been able to present convincing results about the effectiveness of acupuncture. Anyway, the popularity of this alternative medicine, which involves inserting needles into specific points in the body, has increased considerably during the last years. Recently, some studies have shown that acupuncture have effects, but only modest effects. This result doesn’t give a clear answer to the main question and the debate keeps going.

The important issue is to have instructed professionals applying the acupuncture to patients. All kind of medicines have side-effects if they are performed or supplied by inexpert people.

What doctors agree with is -an effective treatment or a placebo- acupuncture has helped since ancient times to cure different types of pains such as chronic pains, back pains or headache, chemotherapy nausea and vomiting and in postoperative dental pain addiction, stroke rehabilitation, menstrual cramps, tennis elbow, fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis, carpal tunnel syndrome, and asthma. In all these cases, this treatment may be useful as a whole alternative medicine or as an assistant treatment.

After all, what is more important: Whether the treatment is helping people or not, or the technical data?