Sunday, November 22, 2015


Nutritional psychiatry: Your brain on food
Posted By Eva Selhub MD On November 16, 2015 @ 9:00 am In Back Pain, Complementary and alternative medicine, Healthy Eating, Mental Health 
Think about it. Your brain is always “on.” It takes care of your thoughts and movements, your breathing and heartbeat, your senses — it works hard 24/7, even while you’re asleep. This means your brain requires a constant supply of fuel. That “fuel” comes from the foods you eat — and what’s in that fuel makes all the difference. Put simply, what you eat directly affects the structure and function of your brain and, ultimately, your mood.
Like an expensive car, your brain functions best when it gets only premium fuel. Eating high-quality foods that contain lots of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants nourishes the brain and protects it from oxidative stress — the “waste” (free radicals) produced when the body uses oxygen, which can damage cells.
Unfortunately, just like an expensive car, your brain can be damaged if you ingest anything other than premium fuel. If substances from “low-premium” fuel (such as what you get from processed or refined foods) get to the brain, it has little ability to get rid of them. Diets high in refined sugars, for example, are harmful to the brain. In addition to worsening your body’s regulation of insulin, they also promote inflammation and oxidative stress. Multiple studies have found a correlation between a diet high in refined sugars and impaired brain function — and even a worsening of symptoms of mood disorders, such as depression.
It makes sense. If your brain is deprived of good-quality nutrition, or if free radicals or damaging inflammatory cells are circulating within the brain’s enclosed space, further contributing to brain tissue injury, consequences are to be expected. What’s interesting is that for many years, the medical field did not fully acknowledge the connection between mood and food.
Today, fortunately, the burgeoning field of nutritional psychiatry is finding there are many consequences and correlations between not only what you eat, how you feel, and how you ultimately behave, but also the kinds of bacteria that live in your gut.
How the foods you eat affect how you feel
Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that helps regulate sleep and appetite, mediate moods, and inhibit pain. Since about 95% of your serotonin is produced in your gastrointestinal tract, and your gastrointestinal tract is lined with a hundred million nerve cells, or neurons, it makes sense that the inner workings of your digestive system don’t just help you digest food, but also guide your emotions. What’s more, the function of these neurons — and the production of neurotransmitters like serotonin — is highly influenced by the billions of “good” bacteria that make up your intestinal microbiome. These bacteria play an essential role in your health. They protect the lining of your intestines and ensure they provide a strong barrier against toxins and “bad” bacteria; they limit inflammation; they improve how well you absorb nutrients from your food; and they activate neural pathways that travel directly between the gut and the brain.
Studies have shown that when people take probiotics (supplements containing the good bacteria), their anxiety levels, perception of stress, and mental outlook improve, compared with people who did not take probiotics. Other studies have compared “traditional” diets, like the Mediterranean diet and the traditional Japanese diet, to a typical “Western” diet and have shown that the risk of depression is 25% to 35% lower in those who eat a traditional diet. Scientists account for this difference because these traditional diets tend to be high in vegetables, fruits, unprocessed grains, and fish and seafood, and to contain only modest amounts of lean meats and dairy. They are also void of processed and refined foods and sugars, which are staples of the “Western” dietary pattern. In addition, many of these unprocessed foods are fermented, and therefore act as natural probiotics. Fermentation uses bacteria and yeast to convert sugar in food to carbon dioxide, alcohol, and lactic acid. It is used to protect food from spoiling and can add a pleasant taste and texture.
This may sound implausible to you, but the notion that good bacteria not only influence what your gut digests and absorbs, but that they also affect the degree of inflammation throughout your body, as well as your mood and energy level, is gaining traction among researchers. The results so far have been quite amazing.
What does this mean for you?
Start paying attention to how eating different foods makes you feel — not just in the moment, but the next day. Try eating a “clean” diet for two to three weeks — that means cutting out all processed foods and sugar. Add fermented foods like kimchi, miso, sauerkraut, pickles, or kombucha. You also might want to try going dairy-free — and some people even feel that they feel better when their diets are grain-free. See how you feel. Then slowly introduce foods back into your diet, one by one, and see how you feel.
When my patients “go clean,” they cannot believe how much better they feel both physically and emotionally, and how much worse they then feel when they reintroduce the foods that are known to enhance inflammation. Give it a try!

Article printed from Harvard Health Blog: http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog

URL to article: http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/nutritional-psychiatry-your-brain-on-food-201511168626

Saturday, August 29, 2015

MD Degree Program in China- A New Reality                                                                      By: Najam Hasan
A Chinese Dream
President  Xi Jinping  said in his address to the nation that he wants to rejuvenate the Chinese nation to allow it to take its rightful place in the world by improvements of his people’s livelihoods through better education and healthcare services, more stable employment, a cleaner environment, the elimination of corruption and a stronger military.
A reality
Six hundred thousand (600,000) medical students are trained each year in Chinese medical universities but only one hundred thousand (100,000) actually become doctors, according to Professor Li Ling of the National Development Research Institute at Beijing University. In 49 listed medical universities in China more than 10,000 international students got admission to become medical doctors last year, the majority of them from South East and Central Asia. The financial contribution of these students is not significant to the Chinese economy, as these students are rather unprofitable when compared to what EU or North American students are prepared to pay for medical education. The other reason is, most Chinese universities are offering MBBS undergraduate degrees which is in line with the European medical education standards but not that of North America.
American medical education, on the other hand, is divided into two parts; 4 years of pre-med education with an undergraduate degree in human biology and 4 years of clinical training resulting in a graduate degree of Doctor of Medicine , MD. The United States Medical Licensing Exam (USMLE) is a pre-requisite to enter into an American residency for both domestic and foreign trained doctors planning to work in the United States. USMLE has also become a benchmark in other regions of the world as a medical doctor's professional qualification for employment. The USA faces a probable shortage of 90,000 medical doctor in this decade, cited by Dr. Darrell G. Kirch MD, president of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC). American healthcare providers prefer graduates with an MD degree and a US medical license for residency. This presents a unique opportunity to a nation that has had a message from its leader to lead in educational fields as a national pride and priority.
Number of applications in USA for 10 desired med school for 2014
Medical school (state)
Applicants (fall 2014)
14,648
13,536
13,016
11,286
10,981
10,204
9,882
9,713
9,412
8,656
*An average of 11,133 students applied at each above mentioned university. Available seats for enrollment in all cases were less than 10% of the applications received.
An average of 290 students were enrolled in 165 medical schools in 2014 but an average of 109 students graduated, totaling 18,078 for the year 2014.
*Source: Association of American Medical Colleges
Statistical data of Medical school enrollment vs. graduation
Year
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
Enrollment
42,721
43,919
45,266
45,224
48,014
Graduated
16,836
17,362
17,344
18,154
18,078
The following is a glance at the top 25 American medical schools, their tuition fees and enrollment per year.
Enrollment in the schools of medicine with the number of seats and tuition fee  
Ranking
Medical School
Tuition fee
Enrollment
#1
Boston, MA
$54,200 (full-time) 
726 
#2
Stanford, CA
$50,715 (full-time) 
473 
#3Tie
Baltimore, MD
$47,250 (full-time) 
461 
#3Tie
San Francisco, CA
$32,106 (in-state, full-time); $44,351 (out-of-state, full-time) 
664 
#5
Philadelphia, PA
$50,444 (full-time) 
655 
#6
St. Louis, MO
$56,212 (full-time) 
474 
#7
New Haven, CT
$53,540 (full-time) 
415 
#8Tie
New York, NY
$53,544 (full-time) 
648 
#8Tie
Durham, NC
$51,888 (full-time) 
430 
#10Tie
Chicago, IL
$47,673 (full-time) 
356 
#10Tie
Ann Arbor, MI
$31,154 (in-state, full-time); $48,862 (out-of-state, full-time) 
727 
#10Tie
Seattle, WA
$31,992 (in-state, full-time); $60,978 (out-of-state, full-time) 
938 
#13
Los Angeles, CA
$31,134 (in-state, full-time); $43,379 (out-of-state, full-time) 
749 
#14Tie
New York, NY
$47,650 (full-time) 
650 
#14Tie
Nashville, TN
$45,350 (full-time) 
429 
#16
Pittsburgh, PA
$48,792 (in-state, full-time); $50,014 (out-of-state, full-time) 
601 
#17
La Jolla, CA
$31,134 (in-state, full-time); $43,379 (out-of-state, full-time) 
502 
#18
New York, NY
$49,500 (full-time) 
406 
#19
Chicago, IL
$51,882 (full-time) 
687 
#20
New York, NY
$44,604 (full-time) 
556 
#21
Houston, TX
$19,650 (full-time) 
738 
#22
Chapel Hill, NC
$18,887 (in-state, full-time); $45,766 (out-of-state, full-time) 
827 
#23
Atlanta, GA
$49,500 (full-time) 
560 
#24
Cleveland, OH
$55,370 (full-time) 
864 
#25
Dallas, TX
$17,163 (in-state, full-time); $30,263 (out-of-state, full-time) 
953 

Source: US NEWS Medical school rankings.















An American Dilemma 
After earning a 4 years Bachelor's of Science in human biology, some students do not pass the MCAT exam, a prerequisite for admission into med-school. Even with passing the MCAT exam, most aspiring pre-med undergraduates do not get admission to med- school due  to very tough competition for a limited number of seats, as shown above. These students end up changing their career path, while a very small number seeks to study in the Caribbean Islands. The Caribbean Islands have very limited resources, few teaching hospitals, and have acquired a reputation of low academic training standards. This gives an opportunity to reputable Chinese medical schools to step up and seize the opportunity.
Doctor of Medicine (MD) Program in China   
China is a power to be reckoned with. A journey that started with the manufacturing of low end consumer goods has now embarked on missions in space and the development of important innovations. Xi Jinping's Top 5 priorities for the country include, "better education and healthcare services ". This is Chinese reality, not a dream. A graduate degree in medicine in clinical science is an inevitable response to this calling to compete in the healthcare field, so China can improve its own health care sector and play its role of an emerging superpower. An MD degree program coupled with USMLE training has the potential of thousands of American medical students being recruited each year. For all we know, this could be the next best thing China has to offer the world since green tea.
Program Development
The transfer of technology is what has made it possible for China to build the infrastructure for the largest network of bullet trains in the world. Duplicating and implementing an American MD degree curriculum is essential in setting a benchmark for excellence in health care education. Universities like MIT, Harvard and Yale are already hosting cohort programs with Chinese universities in business and technology. Collaboration in the medical field will be a natural fit and will help America and China to set the standards of education on an equal footing. This cooperation is essential and desperately needed by both countries. Matching a Chinese MD program with the American counterparts will make Chinese medical doctors more marketable to the US health care sector and will attract many American students to study in China. It is a win-win scenario. The American students are capable of paying higher tuition fees compared to other foreign students  while incurring a lower financial cost than at home.
Lead My World's role in the development of this academic program 
It is an undertaking for sure and a lot needs to be done to overhaul Chinese higher education system with fundamental changes in the culture of Chinese academia. Lead My World's educators and executives have  been actively engaged in Chinese education sector for over a decade. Lead My World (LMW) is a higher education pathway organization managing Medical Education and coaching programs at the International School of Capital Medical University, .Beijing, China and other institutions.  LMW management has developed academic curriculum in English language for Chinese schools, authored and contributes in MBBS coaching , USMLE training and the development of an MD degree program for Chinese medical universities. Lead My World has the necessary relations and partners both in the USA and Peoples Republic of China to launch and execute Public Health Degree programs with medical schools and HC training institutes . For information or comments  please contact the author, Najam Hasan.

 najam@leadmyworld.com or Najam@ccmu.edu.cn