Just One More Day! In a hospital, night never truly falls; there is only an anticipation of a beautiful new dawn. The sounds heard throughout the day gradually fade away, and the movement of people slows down. The lights in the corridors cast a glow of hope and faith against the darkness of the night. Outside the doors of the maternity ward, one might occasionally hear hurried footsteps. Somewhere, a baby cries; elsewhere, nurses converse. Then, everything falls silent once more... Yet, even in such stillness, a doctor’s mind is rarely at rest. That night, I, too, was far from calm. My thoughts were occupied by a pregnant woman. The baby growing within her was not yet ready to enter the world, but the amniotic fluid —which surrounds and protects the fetus —had begun to leak prematurely. The pregnancy was at about twenty-eight weeks; the baby still needed several more weeks inside the womb . But sometimes, nature attempts to open the door before the appointed time. In such moments...
The little engine that keeps your body young: Mitochondria: How to keep them healthy? Although it is still a matter of research whether mitochondria are the main cause of aging , experts say that human behavior has been proven to affect their health. What is beneficial for these small parts of our cells, it benefits the entire body. Regular exercise has been proven to improve the functioning of mitochondria. In a very important study, researchers biopsied human thigh muscles. After an eight-week training program, they found more and healthier mitochondria in the muscle cells than before. Although both endurance and resistance training were effective for this, the greatest benefits were obtained when they were combined. Daria Mauchly-Rozen , a professor of chemical and systems biology at Stanford University and author of the book “ The Life Machines: How Taking Care of Your Mitochondria Can Transform Your Health ,” sheds light on this issue. “Exercise causes a little bit of dam...