 |
submitted by /u/Tough_Gadfly [link] [comments] |
Researchers at Duke University Global Health Innovation Center found that the European Union and five other countries have already bought up 2.2 billion doses of potential vaccines. Poorer countries may be waiting until 2024 before they receive a vaccine
Researchers at Duke University Global Health Innovation Center found that the European Union and five other countries have already bought up 2.2 billion doses of potential vaccines. Poorer countries may be waiting until 2024 before they receive a vaccine
https://ift.tt/3kqVGab November 13, 2020 at 01:53AM https://ift.tt/1R552o9
Having a Growth Mindset Can Be a Game-Changer for Your Health
Ever heard the quote, “hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work?”
Originally said by NBA all-star, Kevin Durant, this is a perfect example of utilizing a growth mindset — meaning your success can be cultivated by your efforts. When you operate from the opposite perspective (called a fixed mindset) you believe your talents and abilities are predetermined. Either you’re good at something or you’re not. End of story.
Maybe you believe you’ll always have a layer of fluff around your middle because you never stick with anything. Or you avoid working out because everyone in your family is uncoordinated. Or you’re “so intelligent” but can’t seem to figure out how the heck to lose those last ten pounds. If that’s you, congratulations, you have a fixed mindset.
When you start viewing things through a more optimistic lens, you move into growth mindset territory. And that’s where the magic really happens.
Let’s Define Growth Mindset
You can’t talk about this term without acknowledging the famous Stanford University psychologist who coined it. Decades ago, Carol Dweck published research that kind of changed the world.1 In the study, Dweck and one of her colleagues gave puzzles to 400 fifth graders. After completing the first puzzle, the children were either praised for their effort or praised for their intelligence. The group who was praised with statements like “you must have worked so hard!” ended up choosing a more demanding puzzle next time around than the ones who were told “you must be so smart!”
Years later, Dweck and other researchers tested the theory again, following 373 seventh graders to find out whether or not mindset could predict their grades over the course of two years.2 In this study, they taught one group about the brain and how intelligence can be developed, while the other group had no intervention. As you might expect, students who adopted a growth mindset were more motivated and got better grades than their fixed-minded counterparts.
Students with a growth mindset not only believed that their abilities could improve through effort and persistence, they actually made it happen.
Examples of a Growth Mindset
- I’d like to get better at this
- Mistakes help me learn
- This has been a challenge, but I’m working on it
- I haven’t figured out how to do this yet
- This might take some time
Dweck’s research proved that changing a key belief about yourself can make a big difference. But clearly, it’s not just students who can benefit from this concept.
Microsoft CEO, Satya Nadellauses growth mindset tactics with his management teams to create an environment of constant learning…
Michael Jordan (who was initially cut from his high school basketball team and was passed up during the first two NBA draft picks) used it to persevere and become uber-famous…
I use it in my own health coaching practice to help my clients overcome their previous, self-described failures…
And you can too. You just need the right tools to shift your mindset.
So, What Causes a Fixed Mindset?
Anyone who shaped your childhood – parents, teachers, coaches – may have inadvertently had something to do with it. Research shows that the way children are talked to (both positively and negatively) can have a profound impact on their mindset. Maybe you were told that you were super talented growing up. Or that you were “so skinny” or “not strong enough” or some other trait-based comment.
This sends the message that what you can achieve is completely tied to something innate. On the other hand, if you were praised for your hard work, you might have gotten the message that your effort is what led you to your success. And that anything you want (looser clothes, better relationships, a better night sleep) is within reach.
Examples of a Fixed Mindset
- I’m a binge eater
- I just have a slow metabolism
- I’d never be comfortable doing that
- I’m bad at sticking to routines
- I’m a night owl
Regardless of your upbringing, you’re not stuck with what you’ve got.
Moving away from a fixed mindset requires you to take a deeper dive into your beliefs and stories, the way you talk to yourself, and the actions you take. Keep in mind, no one stays in a growth mindset all the time. You could be inherently growth-minded but get triggered into a fixed mindset state by certain people or situations.
How to Cultivate a Growth Mindset
The key thing to remember here is that attaining a growth mindset isn’t about ignoring your past. Actually, quite the contrary. It’s about leaning into learning — taking educated risks, gaining wisdom from the results, and surrounding yourself with people who challenge you to grow. These are six strategies I use to help my own clients work toward shifting their mindset.
1. Check your self-talk. These are the (conscious and subconscious) messages you send to yourself all day long, and they have the power to motivate you or limit you. Your brain’s job is to protect you, so it sometimes enables negative self-talk to keep you safely tucked inside your comfort zone. So, if you’re used to telling yourself “I’m not good at this” try reframing it as “I’m learning something new every day” and see how that feels. And don’t give up. Rewiring your brain’s neural pathways takes time.
2. View challenges as opportunities. Asking yourself, “What can I learn from this?” is a huge part of self-improvement. Unfortunately, it’s easier to focus on the perceived failures. And a lot of times it leads to giving up before you even get going. When you fear getting it wrong or making mistakes or just flat out taking it as a sign that you’re just not cut out for whatever it is you’re attempting, you’re missing out on a big opportunity to grow. The more you can test your abilities, the more you learn about yourself.
3. Stop looking for approval. Or more appropriately, stop doing things to avoid disapproval. If you’re a self-described people pleaser, you know what I’m talking about. Whether you’re attempting to eat healthier, move your body more, or take better care of yourself in general, looking for outside approval can lead you down a path of self-sabotage because you’re always waiting to see if you got it right. Or worse, never starting because of the overwhelming fear of that disapproval. Instead, work on your underlying beliefs about yourself (i.e. your stories) and learn to trust yourself enough to see what’s possible.
4. Use the word “yet” regularly. This is a really powerful way to begin switching from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. Using this word shows that while you might be struggling with something right now, it’s only because you haven’t gotten the hang of it yet. Try saying, “I haven’t conquered my sugar cravings yet” or “I haven’t woken up at 5am to meditate yet” and pay attention to what happens.
5. Develop more grit. According to Angela Duckworth, TED talk speaker and author of Grit: the Power of Passion and Perseverance, “grit is the tendency to sustain interest in and effort toward very long-term goals.” She adds that while people are born with different degrees of grit, it’s a trait that develops through experience. And that can lead to a growth mindset since grittier folks are more apt to stay the course even when they struggle, falter, or all out fail. Here are a few APA-approved ways to build more grit.
6. Appreciate the journey more than the destination. Your end goal might be to lose 15 pounds or get super ripped, but when you have a “journey mindset” as researchers call it, you benefit from the opportunity to learn and grow from your actions. Plus, studies show that you’re more likely to continue the new behaviours you’ve adopted even after you’ve reached your goal.
6 Strategies to Shift Your Mindset
I’ll tell you firsthand that believing your abilities are carved in stone will send you down a path of trying to prove yourself over and over again — and not learning from any of it. Even if you grew up with a fixed mindset, it’s never too late to grow. Do me a favor. Whenever you hear yourself say things like “I can’t stick with this” or “I’m terrible at sprints,” give these strategies a try:
- Check your self-talk
- View challenges as opportunities
- Stop looking for approval
- Use the word “yet” regularly
- Develop more grit
- Appreciate the journey more than the destination
What do you think? Do you have more of a Fixed Mindset or a Growth Mindset?
References
The post Having a Growth Mindset Can Be a Game-Changer for Your Health appeared first on Mark's Daily Apple.
A new Alzheimer’s drug: From advisory panel to FDA — what’s at stake here?
http://ifttt.com/images/no_image_card.png
It’s been more than 17 years since the FDA last approved an Alzheimer’s drug. Will Biogen’s drug, called aducanumab, end this drought? The FDA will decide by March 2021, based on its own analysis of clinical trial data and an advisory panel’s review of the evidence.
How does the drug work?
Aducanumab is a monoclonal antibody engineered in a laboratory to stick to the amyloid molecule that forms plaques in the brains of people with Alzheimer’s. Most researchers believe that the plaques form first and damage brain cells, causing tau tangles to form inside them, killing the cells. Once aducanumab has stuck to the plaque, your body’s immune system will come in and remove the plaque, thinking it’s a foreign invader. The hope and expectation is that, once the plaques are removed, the brain cells will stop dying, and thinking, memory, function, and behavior will stop deteriorating.
Will the FDA’s decision be important?
If aducanumab works, it would be the first drug that actually slows down the progression of Alzheimer’s. That means we could possibly turn Alzheimer’s from a fatal disease into one that people could live with for many years, in the same way that people are living with cancer, diabetes, and HIV/AIDS.
For researchers, it means that more than 20 years of scientific work, which suggests that removing amyloid from the brain can cure Alzheimer’s, may be correct. But many of us have begun to doubt this theory, because trial after trial has shown that amyloid could be cleared from the brain but clinical disease progression was not altered.
So, does the drug work?
I attended the day-long FDA hearing on November 6, 2020, and also independently reviewed all the publicly available data for aducanumab. There was one small (phase 2) clinical trial to assess efficacy and side effects, and two large (phase 3) clinical trials to assess effectiveness, side effects, safety, and how the drug might be used in clinical practice. The small phase 2 study and one of the large phase 3 studies were positive, meaning that the drug worked to slow down the decline of thinking, memory, and function that is usually impossible to stop in Alzheimer’s. The other large study was negative. Hmm… Is two out of three positive studies good enough? Biogen’s scientific team had many plausible explanations for why that one study was negative.
The advisory panel, however, was not convinced. They pointed out that phase 2 studies are always positive, because otherwise you wouldn’t move on to phase 3, so that study doesn’t count. They also pointed out that, although you can think of the positive phase 3 study as the “true” one, and try to understand why the negative one failed (which is what Biogen did), you could equally think of the negative study as the true one, and try to understand why the other one showed positive results.
The advisory council was concerned that there was “functional unblinding” in both studies, because large numbers of participants in the treatment group needed additional MRI scans and physical exams to deal with side effects, which did not occur in the placebo group. Hence, if you were asked to come in for an extra MRI scan, you knew that you were on the real drug. This knowledge may have influenced the responses subjects and their family members gave regarding how they were doing, which were the primary outcomes of the study.
Should the FDA approve it?
To determine if a drug should be approved, many factors need to be considered. First is whether it works and, as discussed above, there are questions regarding its efficacy. You also have to consider side effects and other burdens on patients, families, and society.
You first need an amyloid PET scan to be sure you have the amyloid plaques of Alzheimer’s. Then to take the drug, you need an intravenous infusion every four weeks — forever. Thirty percent of those who took the drug had a reversible swelling of the brain, and more than 10% had tiny brain bleeds. These side effects need to be watched closely by an expert neurology/radiology team who understand how to monitor for these events, and know when to pause or stop the drug.
Another factor to consider is the size of the benefit. Here, it was fairly small. Looking at the two objective measures, in the positive trial, the high dose made a 0.6-point change on the 30-point Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). On the 85-point Alzheimer’s Disease Assessment Scale–Cognitive Subscale-13 (ADAS-Cog-13), the high dose made a 1.4-point change. In the negative trial, the analogous results were -0.1 (worsening) for the MMSE and 0.6 for the ADAS-Cog-13.
Cost also needs to be considered; for aducanumab, this is estimated at $50,000 per year per patient. There are more than two million people with Alzheimer’s in the mild cognitive impairment and mild dementia stages. If one-quarter of those decide to take the drug, that’s $25 billion each year — not including the cost of the PET scans and the neurology/radiology teams to monitor side effects. Since most people with Alzheimer’s disease have Medicare, we will all share this cost.
Moreover, Dr. Joel Perlmutter, a neurologist at Washington University in St. Louis and member of the FDA’s advisory committee, argued that if the FDA approves aducanumab, fewer people would want to participate in a trial of a novel medication — and that would likely delay the approval of better medicines.
If it’s not approved, what other treatments are out there?
There are many other treatments for Alzheimer’s that are also being developed. Drugs that remove tau — the tangles of Alzheimer’s — are being tested. Treatments using flashing lights to induce specific brain rhythms may protect the brain. Other treatments change the microbiome of the gut or other parts of the body. Drugs are being developed which alter nitric oxide — a gas that has critical functions in brain health. Lastly, in my laboratory, we are developing strategies to help individuals with mild Alzheimer’s and mild cognitive impairment to remember things better, because, at the end of the day, that’s what matters most.
The post A new Alzheimer’s drug: From advisory panel to FDA — what’s at stake here? appeared first on Harvard Health Blog.
New Cause of COVID-19 Blood Clots Identified: A new study reveals the virus triggers production of antibodies circulating through the blood, causing clots in people hospitalized with the disease
New Cause of COVID-19 Blood Clots Identified: A new study reveals the virus triggers production of antibodies circulating through the blood, causing clots in people hospitalized with the disease
New Cause of COVID-19 Blood Clots Identified: A new study reveals the virus triggers production of antibodies circulating through the blood, causing clots in people hospitalized with the disease submitted by /u/mubukugrappa
[link] [comments] https://ift.tt/eA8V8J November 12, 2020 at 09:13PM https://ift.tt/1R552o9
[link] [comments] https://ift.tt/eA8V8J November 12, 2020 at 09:13PM https://ift.tt/1R552o9
Early-life events, such as the exposure to air pollutants, increases the risk of chronic lung disease in young adulthood, according to new results: The studies add to the growing evidence that chronic lung disease in adulthood can be traced back to childhood
 |
submitted by /u/mubukugrappa [link] [comments] |
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Popular Posts
|
