I’ve done posts on laughter yoga here and here and here. Lots of therapeutic benefit to laughter. Today’s link is to a brief video in the Telegraph.
Video: Yoga laughter is the best medicine – Telegraph (Video) A Filipino counselor Paolo Trinidad has been teaching laughter yoga to inmates and members of the public as therapy for stress and loneliness in the Philippines. — Trinidad says simulated laughter can provoke real laughter, inducing endorphins – neurotransmitters that produce a feeling of wellbeing.
The Healthy Skeptic has the below great post appropriate for almost anyone who has ever been considered for a psychiatric diagnosis. Many people who have been on psychiatric meds, maybe even most people, develop some degree of insulin resistance if not full blown metabolic syndrome.
Many people also end up on psych meds because they already have blood sugar issues and/or thyroid problems to begin with as those issues are often neglected when seeing a psychiatrist for the first time. If those things were first addressed the “psychiatric” issues sometimes evaporate. Blood sugar irregularities can manifest as mood problems in lots of people. This is often not recognized by conventional medicine until the issue becomes extreme. Regulating blood sugar as well as having a healthy thyroid can balance mood and one’s general sense of well-being. So this post is important for anyone with a psych diagnosis on or off medications.
The Healthy Skeptic · Thyroid, blood sugar & metabolic syndrome
According to the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists, 27 million Americans suffer from thyroid dysfunction – half of whom go undiagnosed. Subclinical hypothyroidism, a condition in which TSH is elevated but free T4 is normal, may affect an additional 24 million Americans. Taken together, more than 50 million Americans are affected by some form of thyroid disorder.
Metabolic syndrome (MetS), also affects50 million Americans, and insulin resistance, one of the components of metabolic syndrome, affects up to 105 million Americans. That’s 35% of the population. Metabolic syndrome has become so common that it’s predicted to eventually bankrupt our healthcare system. Both metabolic syndrome and insulin resistance are risk factors for heart disease and diabetes, two of the leading causes of death in the developed world.
With such a high prevalence of both thyroid dysfunction and metabolic syndrome, you might suspect there’s a connection between the two. And you’d be right. read the rest
And Provigil is in the news again. It was being considered by the FDA for jet-lag. A potentially dangerous drug used so cavalierly…not all that unusual or surprising unfortunately. It was wisely rejected though we don’t know exactly why. I imagine there are people using it off label for such in any case.
Chronic Indication Disorder: Restrictions On Provigil // Pharmalot
European regulators just announced a decision that may keep Cephalon execs awake at night, but taking their own Provigil sleep-disorder pill may not be such a good idea. Here’s the scoop: the European Medicines Agency yesterday recommended restricting Provigil (modafinil) to treat sleepiness associated with narcolepsy, but not idiopathic hypersomnia, excessive sleepiness associated with obstructive sleep apnea and chronic shift work sleep disorder. — Why? Safety concerns over psychiatric disorders, skin and subcutaneous tissue reactions (see statement). There is an irony here made clear on Cephalon’s unbranded web site – The Wake Up Squad. Among those who work odd shifts and may have trouble sleeping are cops. You wouldn’t want a cop developing a psychiatric disorder now, would you? Remember, these folks carry guns.
Everything matters 