5 Quick Ways to Stop Back Pain

Roughly 8 out of 10 people suffer from back pain at some point during their lives. Women, in particular, are prone to posture and back problems—thanks to toting around outrageously heavy purses, going through pregnancy, or giving one-hip rides to kids. Whether you’re in the midst of fighting the ache or just want to prevent it, here are some expert-endorsed quick-and-easy ways to wage your war

What warning signs should you look for during your pregnancy? Call your doctor or midwife right away if you have:

Cramping.
Blood or other fluid from your vagina.
Belly pain.
An ache in your low back that doesn't go away.
Burning or pain when you urinate.
A bad headache.
Blurred vision.
A fever.
Sudden severe swelling of your feet, ankles, or hands.

What kinds of exams and tests will you have?

Your first prenatal exam gives your doctor or midwife important information for planning your care. You'll have a pelvic exam and urine and blood tests. You'll also have your blood pressure and weight checked. The urine and blood tests are used for a pregnancy test and to tell whether you have low iron levels (are anemic) or have signs of infection.

At each prenatal visit you'll be weighed, have your belly measured, and have your blood pressure and urine checked. Go to all your appointments. Although these quick office visits may seem simple and routine, your doctor is watching for signs of possible problems like high blood pressure.

In some medical centers, you can have screening in your first trimester to see if your baby has a chance of having Down syndrome or another genetic problem. The test usually includes a blood test and an ultrasound.

During your second trimester, you can have a blood test (triple or quadruple screen test) to see if you have a higher-than-normal chance of having a baby with birth defects. Based on the results of the tests, you may be referred to a geneticist for further discussion. Or you may have other tests to find out for sure if your baby has a birth defect.

Late in your second trimester, your blood sugar will be checked for diabetes during pregnancy (gestational diabetes). Near the end of your pregnancy, you will have tests to look for infections that could harm your newborn.

You're pregnant! What can you do to have a healthy pregnancy?

Now that you're pregnant, you may be happy and excited. You may be a little nervous or worried. If this will be your first child, you may even feel overwhelmed by all of the things you need to know about having a baby. There is a lot to learn. But you don't have to know everything right away. You can read all about pregnancy now, or you can learn about each stage as your pregnancy goes on.

During your pregnancy, you'll have tests to watch for certain problems that could occur. With all the tests you'll have, you may worry that something will go wrong. But most women have healthy pregnancies. If there is a problem, these tests can find it early so that you and your doctor or midwife can treat it or watch it to help improve your chance of having a healthy baby.

Taking great care of yourself is the best thing you can do for yourself and your baby. Everything healthy that you do for your body helps your growing baby. Rest when you need it, eat well, drink plenty of water, and exercise regularly.

You'll need to have regular checkups. At every visit, your doctor or midwife will weigh you and measure your belly to check your baby's growth. You'll also get blood and urine tests and have your blood pressure checked.

It’s important to avoid tobacco smoke, alcohol and drugs, chemicals, and radiation (like X-rays). These can harm you and the baby.

Try to keep your body temperature from getting too high [over 100.4 ° F (38 ° C) ]. Treat a fever with acetaminophen (such as Tylenol). Don't get too hot when you exercise. And don't get in a high-temperature hot tub or sauna.

How can you get ready for pregnancy?

If you're planning to get pregnant, you might already be thinking about which room to turn into the baby’s room and how to decorate it. And you might be thinking about all the baby clothes and gear like car seats that you'll need.

But you also can start to think about how to help yourself have a happy pregnancy and a healthy baby.

Even before you get pregnant, take these steps to make your pregnancy as healthy as possible:

See a doctor or certified nurse-midwife for an exam. Talk about the medicines and dietary supplements you take. Ask if you need any immunizations. Talk about any health problems or other concerns you have.
Do not take nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), such as ibuprofen or aspirin. These may raise your risk of miscarriage, especially around the time you conceive or if you use them for more than a week.1
Take a daily multivitamin or prenatal vitamin with 0.4 mg (400 mcg) of folic acid. This B vitamin lowers the chance of having a baby with a birth defect.
See your dentist. Take care of any dental work you may need.
Keep track of your menstrual cycle. This helps you know the best time to try to get pregnant. And after you are pregnant, you will be better able to help your doctor or midwife figure out when your baby is due and how it is growing.
Make healthy lifestyle choices. Eat a healthy diet. Avoid caffeine, or don't have more than 1 cup of coffee or tea each day. Avoid alcoholic drinks, cigarettes, and illegal drugs. Take only the medicines your doctor or midwife says are okay.
Exercise regularly. A strong body helps you handle the demands of pregnancy, childbirth, and recovery. Exercise also helps improve your mood.

If you are not sure when you are most likely to get pregnant (when you are fertile), use the Interactive Tool: When Are You Most Fertile

Fresh Fruits and Veggies

Pick: Fruit that is firm, with a taut, unblemished skin and no signs of bruising or wrinkles.
Store: Ripen at room temperature, until tender. Apricots can be kept for 2 days, maximum. Once plums are ripe, refrigerate up to 3 days.
Use: Cook with sugar (1 pound of fruit per 2 cups sugar) on the stove until thickened for a delicious jam.
Tip: Vitamin A–rich stone fruits work with savory dishes; try sautéing, grilling, or roasting them to serve with duck, chicken, or pork.

Blackberries and Raspberries
Pick: Plump, juicy berries with a shine (blackberries) or luster (raspberries), without any trace of mold or discoloration.
Store: If eating within 24 hours, store at room temperature; otherwise, wrap loosely in plastic wrap and refrigerate for up to 2 days. Wash just before using.
Use: Blackberries and raspberries are delicious raw or in baked goods, but they’re also a great addition to savory dishes.
Tip: To freeze antioxidant-packed blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, or cherries, wash and let dry completely, then place them in a single layer on a tray in the freezer until solid. Transfer to a zip-top bag and store in the freezer.

Common Drug Eases Restless Legs Syndrome

Some 5 percent to 10 percent of adults in the United States have restless legs syndrome (RLS), a disorder that causes people to feel a compelling need to move their legs, especially while lying down. The condition can have a substantial impact on sleep, daily activities and quality of life, researchers say.

“This is the first time this drug is being tried for RLS,” said Dr. Diego Garcia-Borreguero, director of the Sleep Research Institute in Madrid. “Pregabalin [Lyrica] is an effective drug for the treatment of RLS — it leads about 60 percent of patients into clinical remission.”

The drug improves both the sensation and motor symptoms of RLS, Garcia-Borreguero said.

He also noted that patients taking Lyrica had improved quality of sleep. “Other drugs for RLS had not been able to solve this problem,” he said. “They have not been able to improve sleep.”

This use of Lyrica is an off-label one, Garcia-Borreguero cautioned.

The findings were to be presented Wednesday at the American Academy of Neurology’s annual meeting, in Seattle.

For the study, Garcia-Borreguero randomly assigned 58 people with RLS to Lyrica or a placebo. Sleep studies were performed at the beginning and end of the 12-week trial.

Garcia-Borreguero found that almost 75 percent of patients taking Lyrica had RLS symptoms stop while taking the drug. Among those who continued to have RLS, their symptoms improved by 66 percent. Patients on placebo saw their symptoms worsen by 29 percent.

In addition, those taking Lyrica had better sleep compared with patients taking placebo. Patients on Lyrica had more slow-wave sleep, or deep sleep. They also spent less time in the lighter sleep stages compared with people taking placebo, Garcia-Borreguero said.

RLS presents as an urge to move the legs, often with unpleasant numbness, tingling or burning sensations. These symptoms increase during rest and are partially relieved through activity. Symptoms worsen at night and tend to progress with age.

The study was funded by Pfizer Inc., the maker of Lyrica.

Dr. Carlos Singer, director of the Movement Disorders Center at the University of Miami School of Medicine, thinks Lyrica provides an alternative to other drugs for RLS and may also have fewer side effects.

“You have another weapon to treat RLS,” Singer said. “This drug, to the best of my knowledge, has a very safe record,” he said. “I would definitely try it with patients.”

Urine Test for Heart Disease

A urine test to detect coronary artery disease has worked well in a small trial, German researchers report.

The test looks for fragments of the protein collagen, which plays a major role in blocking heart arteries, said study author Dr. Constantin von zur Muehlen, a fellow in cardiology at University Hospital Freiberg. He was scheduled to report the findings Wednesday at an American Heart Association meeting in Washington, D.C.

“Collagen forms a fibrous cap on the epithelium, the lining of the arteries,” Muehlen explained. “These fibrous caps produce collagen fragments.”

High concentrations of those fragments, called proteomes, in urine can signal atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries), which can lead to a heart attack, Muehlen said.

The urine test was done for 67 people with symptoms of coronary artery disease, he said. Two techniques to detect proteins, mass spectrometry and capillary electrophoresis, were used to find levels of 17 protein fragments that the researchers had identified as being associated with atherosclerosis.

When the results were compared to coronary angiography, an X-ray exam that is a standard method for diagnosing atherosclerosis, the urine tests were found to be 84 percent accurate, Muehlen said.

But a urine test to detect heart disease will not be developed quickly, he said. The German researchers have gone back to the laboratory, working with a strain of mice genetically engineered to develop coronary artery disease as they age.

“We went to this mouse model and found that, over time, the pattern of proteomes becomes more heavily expressed,” Muehlen said. “The older the animal, the more extreme the pattern will be.”

While he hopes to do a larger human study, no timetable for one has been set, Muehlen said.

More animal studies are needed to fill in knowledge gaps, he said. “We don’t know if stable regions of atherosclerosis produce more collagen than unstable regions,” Muehlen explained. Unstable collagen is more likely to rupture, blocking an artery completely.

This is not the first report of a urine test for coronary artery disease. In 2007, physicians at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston found that the presence of the protein albumin in urine of people with stable cardiovascular disease indicated an increased risk of death.

Albumin is normally found in blood, but not in urine. Leakage of albumin into the urine indicates damage to the blood vessels of the kidney, and so points to an increased risk of cardiovascular death, the researchers said.

The German study is “interesting, but I’d be cautious,” said Dr. Alan Daugherty, director of the Cardiovascular Research Center at the University of Kentucky.

“In general, it obviously would be desirable to be able to diagnose coronary artery disease without an angiogram,” Daugherty said. “There has been a tremendous amount of effort looking for biomarkers.”

But a good deal of work is needed to move the results of the study toward clinical use, he said. “We’ve been trying to do something like this for decades,” Daugherty noted.

Raise OF Swine Flu Alert

The World Health Organization on Wednesday raised the swine flu epidemic level from 4 to 5, signifying that a pandemic is imminent, and urged countries to implement their pandemic plans.

The warning underscored the concern of world health officials that the outbreak could trigger large numbers of deaths worldwide, even though there have only been eight confirmed deaths in Mexico — believed to be the source of the outbreak — and one in the United States, the Associated Press reported.

“It really is all of humanity that is under threat during a pandemic,” WHO Director General Margaret Chan said in Geneva, Switzerland. “We do not have all the answers right now, but we will get them.”

In Washington, President Barack Obama promised “great vigilance” in confronting the outbreak that has sickened nearly 100 people in 11 states and forced many schools to close.

All of the cases diagnosed in the United States have continued to be mild, federal health officials said Wednesday.

A 23-month-old Mexican boy who had traveled to Houston for medical treatment died Monday night, becoming the first fatality in the United States. And 39 Marines were confined to their base in California Wednesday after one came down with the disease.

Switzerland on Thursday became the latest country to report a swine flu infection — a 19-year-old student. The virus has also spread to Canada, New Zealand, Britain, Germany, Spain, Israel and Austria, the AP reported.

An estimated 170 deaths in Mexico are believed to have been caused by the never-before-seen virus, according to published reports. The new flu strain is a combination of pig, bird and human viruses, prompting worries from health officials that humans may have no natural immunity to the pathogen.

The WHO’s Phase 5 alert prompted Mexico to further restrict activity in that country in an effort to cut down on human-to-human infections, including a suspension of nonessential federal government activities, Mexican Health Secretary Jose Cordova said late Wednesday. Schools in Mexico had already been canceled until May 6, the AP said.

Mexico’s efforts may be paying off — the outbreak seemed to be stabilizing; confirmed swine flu cases doubled Wednesday to 99, but new deaths finally seemed to be stabilizing, the news service said.

Meanwhile, President Obama said Wednesday that U.S. public health officials were recommending that schools with confirmed or suspected cases of swine flu “should strongly consider temporarily closing so that we can be as safe as possible.”

Texas has postponed all public high school sports and academic competitions at least until May 11 due to the outbreak.

At a press briefing Wednesday morning, Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said there were 91 confirmed cases of infection with the swine flu virus in 10 states, with the one death. Sixty-four percent of the cases involve people under age 18, but patients range in age from 8 to 81, he said.

Kathleen Sebelius, the new secretary of U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS), said at the briefing that, “while we still don’t know what this virus will do, we expect to see more cases, more hospitalizations and, unfortunately, we are likely to see additional deaths from the outbreak.”

“Currently, the FDA [U.S. Food and Drug Administration] and the CDC are developing virus reference strains — the information that is necessary to develop a vaccine,” Sebelius said. “Today, there are a series of steps that HHS is taking in vaccine development. The process is more speedy than it has ever been before.”

The earliest a vaccine could be ready is this fall, said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

During a press briefing Tuesday, Besser had said that the cases of infection found in the United States so far continued to be mild, but more severe cases were expected, and “as we move forward, I fully expect we will see deaths.”

Besser said the incubation period for the U.S. cases is two to seven days, which, he said, “is typical for what you see with an influenza virus.”

Many of the swine flu cases in the United States come from a New York City high school, Besser said. Some students at St. Francis Preparatory School in Queens had traveled to Cancun in Mexico for a spring break trip, according to news reports.

As with the previously tested strains of the swine flu virus, new testing found that the pathogen remains susceptible to the two common antiviral drugs Tamiflu and Relenza, according to an April 28 dispatch from the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
U.S. Human Cases of Swine Flu Infection
(As of April 29, 2009, 11:00 AM ET)
States # of laboratory confirmed cases Deaths
Arizona 1
California 14
Indiana 1
Kansas 2
Massachusetts 2
Michigan 2
Nevada 1
New York City 51
Ohio 1
Texas 16 1
TOTAL COUNTS 91 cases 1 death

Breast Self-Exam Rates Go Up With Counseling

Women were 10 times more likely to do breast self-examinations if they took part in an brief intervention program that included one counseling session and two follow-up phone calls, a U.S. study has found.

The research involved more than 600 women, ages 40 to 70, who’d had a negative mammogram screening in the previous two months. They were given either dietary counseling with no mention of breast self-exams or a 30- to 45-minute counseling session about breast self-exam that included an educational video, practicing self-exam on a silicone model and a discussion of possible barriers to doing self-exams. This group also received follow-up phone calls one and two months later.

Before the study began, about 6 percent of the participants were doing at least five-minute self-exams every month using proper techniques.

A year later, 59 percent of the women in the self-exam counseling group were performing adequate self-exams, compared with 12 percent of those in the dietary counseling group.

“Many women avoid breast self-exams, because they are worried about doing them correctly,” the study’s lead author, Nangel Lindberg, an investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Research in Portland, Ore., said in a Kaiser news release. “However, our study showed that with a relatively simple intervention, women can learn the proper technique. And once they feel confident, they will continue to do their exams.”

Self-exams are one way for women “to participate in their own health care,” Lindberg said. “Self-exams allow women to become familiar with their breasts, so they can report any changes to their health-care providers.”

The study is in the American Journal of Health Promotion.

Early detection is an important factor in the success of breast cancer treatment. Each year in the United States, more than 200,000 women are diagnosed with breast cancer, and nearly 40,000 die of the disease, according to the American Cancer Society.

Breast Density in Young Women Offers Clue to Later Cancer Risk

Young women with dense breasts—as measured by the percentage of water in their breast tissue—may be at greater risk of developing breast cancer later in life than women with less-dense breasts.

According to a report in Lancet Oncology, breast cancer screening, which women typically start in their 40s and 50s, may be useful when started earlier in life. “The findings may lead us toward characterizing risk earlier then we do now and intervening to prevent breast cancer earlier than we do now,” says lead researcher Norman Boyd, MD, a scientist at the Campbell Family Institute for Breast Cancer Research at Princess Margaret Hospital in Toronto.

In the study, the researchers used MRIs to examine the breast tissue of 400 mother-daughter pairs, including younger women aged 15 to 30. All of the mothers also had mammograms.

The researchers found that the daughters’ breast density as measured by MRI was associated with their mothers’ breast density as measured by mammogram. The researchers also found that the younger the girls were, the greater the breast density and the percentage of water in breast tissue. For example, girls aged 15 to 19 had higher percentages of water in their breast tissue than those aged 20 to 30.

What’s more, the water percentage increased with height. Specifically, for each 5-centimeter difference in height among the daughters, there was a 3% increase in the percentage of water in breast tissue. Some previous studies have suggested that taller women are more likely to develop breast cancer than shorter women.

The link may be due to growth hormone—girls with higher levels of growth hormone are taller and have denser breasts.

Would blocking growth hormone help prevent or treat cancer? “There is evidence from animals and rats that blocking growth hormone may prevent cancer, but there is no direct evidence from humans yet,” Dr. Boyd says. That said, it is possible that measuring growth hormone in the blood of women may help predict future risk of breast cancer, he says.

“We have known for a while that breast density in adult women correlates with higher risk of breast cancer,” explains Marisa Weiss, MD, president and founder of the advocacy group breastcancer.org and the author of several books, including Taking Care of Your Girls: A Breast Health Guide for Girls, Teens, and In-Betweens. “The younger you are, the more dense the breast tissue is and the taller you are, the denser it is. But what we don’t know is if breast density changes,” says Dr. Weiss, who is the director of breast radiation oncology and breast health outreach at Lankenau Hospital in Wynnewood, Penn.

“The study captures just one moment in time,” she says. “We need more studies to understand what breast density means in girls and whether it changes as they grow.”

Swine Flu Infections Near 110 in U.S.

The number of confirmed swine flu cases in the United States has surpassed 100, federal health officials said Thursday, but the infections continue to be mild.

In response to the outbreak, scientists are racing to produce a vaccine for all Americans against the never-before-seen flu strain, but the shots — if needed at all — wouldn’t be available until fall at the earliest, federal health officials said.

“We think 600 million doses is achievable in a six-month time frame” from that fall start, Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary Craig Vanderwagen told lawmakers Thursday.

Meanwhile, the news out of Mexico — believed to be the source of the outbreak — offered some hope late Thursday as Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova said the number of new swine flu cases seemed to be leveling off.

“The fact that we have a stabilization in the daily numbers, even a drop, makes us optimistic,” Cordova said at a news conference. “Because what we’d expect is geometric or exponential growth. And that hasn’t been the situation.”

Still, Mexico braced for a shutdown of all non-essential services through Tuesday as authorities sought to limit further infections in that country, where the virus is suspected of causing 168 deaths so far.

In the United States, at a Thursday morning news conference, Dr. Richard Besser, acting head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said, “Today I am reporting 109 confirmed cases within the United States. We have 11 affected states. There are many more states that have suspect cases,” he added.

There are 50 confirmed cases in New York, 26 in Texas, 14 in California, 10 in South Carolina, two each in Kansas and Massachusetts and one each in Arizona, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada, and Ohio, Besser said. The age range of those infected is 22 months to 81 years, he said.

“Six of the cases have been hospitalized, including the unfortunate case we reported yesterday of the child in Texas who passed away,” he said.

The flu strain is a combination of pig, bird and human viruses, prompting worries from health officials that humans may have no natural immunity to the pathogen.

Besser said federal health officials “continue to be very aggressive in our approach and we will continue to do that until the situation tells us that we no longer need to do so. There’s no one action that is going to stop this. There is no silver bullet, but all the efforts — the efforts of government, the efforts of communities and the efforts of individuals — will help to reduce the impact on people’s health.”

“There are things people can do,” he said, including “handwashing, covering coughs, staying at home when they are sick.

The vaccine plan is to complete the production of seasonal flu vaccine for next winter and then switch to production of a vaccine for the N1H1 swine flu, if needed, Besser said.

All of the cases diagnosed in the United States continue to be mild, federal health officials said Thursday.

The swine flu outbreak has even touched the White House — an aide to Energy Secretary Steven Chu apparently got sick while helping arrange President Barack Obama’s recent trip to Mexico. The aide did not fly on Air Force One, however, and never posed a risk to the president, the Associated Press reported.

On Wednesday, President Obama said that U.S. public health officials were recommending that schools with confirmed or suspected cases of swine flu “should strongly consider temporarily closing so that we can be as safe as possible.”

Nearly 300 schools have been closed nationwide in response to the outbreak, according to news reports.

Texas has postponed all public high school sports and academic competitions at least until May 11 due to the outbreak.

On Thursday, Fort Worth, Texas, announced the temporarily closure of all district schools for its approximately 80,000 students, probably until May 12, after one student was found to be infected with swine flu and three others were suspected of suffering from the virus.

As with the previously tested strains of the swine flu virus, new testing has found that the pathogen remains susceptible to the two common antiviral drugs Tamiflu and Relenza, according to an April 28 dispatch from the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

On Wednesday, the World Health Organization raised the swine flu epidemic level from 4 to 5, signifying that a pandemic is imminent, and urged countries to implement their pandemic plans. And on Thursday, WHO said it would cease calling the virus “swine flu,” using instead its scientific name — H1N1 influenza A — to help reduce confusion over the danger posed by pigs. Pork consumption does not transmit infection.

Meanwhile, residents of Mexico prepared Thursday for a broad shutdown of services as officials urged businesses to close until Tuesday, to coincide with a long holiday weekend. Mexican President Felipe Calderon said in a televised address that only essential businesses such as supermarkets, hospitals and pharmacies should stay open, and only critical government workers such as police and soldiers would be on duty from Friday through Tuesday. School had already been canceled nationwide through Tuesday, The New York Times and the AP reported.

On Monday, a 23-month-old Mexican boy who had traveled to Houston for medical treatment died, becoming the first fatality in the United States.

Switzerland and the Netherlands have become the latest countries to report swine flu infections. In addition to Mexico and the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Britain, Germany, Spain, Israel and Austria also have confirmed cases, the AP reported.
U.S. Human Cases of Swine Flu Infection
(As of April 30, 2009, 10:30 AM ET)
States # of laboratory confirmed cases Deaths
Arizona 1
California 14
Indiana 1
Kansas 2
Massachusetts 2
Michigan 1
Nevada 1
New York 50
Ohio 1
South Carolina 10
Texas 26 1
TOTAL COUNTS 109 cases 1 death

Bump Lemonade

Prep: 10 minutes
Makes 8 8-ounce servings

8 ounces fresh lemon juice (about 5 lemons)
½ cup clover honey
64 ounces of cold water (8 cups)
Mint sprigs (optional)

1. After you’ve juiced all the lemons, set them aside. Place the honey in a heatproof container and microwave it for 30 seconds. It should be nice and liquidy. If not, put it back in for another 10 seconds (don’t do it for a full minute, or else it will get scalding hot).
2. Whisk the warm honey into the lemon juice. At this point, you can use the honey-lemon mixture as a concentrate, making a serving at a time and keeping the rest in a covered container in the fridge. Add ¼ cup of the concentrate to either cold water and ice for lemonade—sparkling water is a nice twist—or hot water for a soothing lemony beverage. Or you can add it to a big pitcher (filled up the rest of the way with water), add a mint sprig (optional), and pour yourself a refreshing glass.

Calories 71; Fat 0 g; Cholesterol 0 mg; Protein 0 g; Carbohydrate 20 g; Sugars 17 g; Fiber 0 g; Iron 0 mg; Sodium 1 mg; Calcium 10 mg; Folate 7 mcg; Vitamin C 14 mg

Party Food

Make appetizers healthier by lowering their fat and calorie content with these key tweaks.
Trim quiche by using half whole eggs and half egg whites. Load it with vegetables, too, so you feel full with a smaller slice.
Slim down crab dip by swapping out regular mayo for the low-fat kind.
Skinny up chicken sate by using low-fat peanut butter and reduced-sodium soy sauce. And choose skinless, all-white meat for chicken skewers.

Mental health

Mental health refers to an individual's emotional and psychological well-being. "A state of emotional and psychological well-being in which an individual is able to use his or her cognitive and emotional capabilities, function in society, and meet the ordinary demands of everyday life."

One way to think about mental health is by looking at how effectively and successfully a person functions. Feeling capable and competent; being able to handle normal levels of stress, maintain satisfying relationships, and lead an independent life; and being able to "bounce back," or recover from difficult situations, are all signs of mental health. The generally accepted definition of health is "a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity", used by the World Health Organization (WHO) since 1948

Physical health

Physical fitness refers to good body health, and is the result of regular exercise, proper diet and nutrition, and proper rest for physical recovery.

A strong indicator of the health of localized population is their height or weight, which generally increases with improved nutrition and health care. This is also influenced by the standard of living and quality of life. Genetics also plays a major role in people's height. The study of human growth, its regulators, and implications is known as Auxology.