If I Can

If I can stop one heart from breaking,

I shall not live in vain;

If I can ease one life the aching,

Or cool one pain,

Or help one fainting robin

Unto his nest again,

I shall not live in vain.

-BY Emily Dickinson

This is way way cool!

Best Ways To Avoid The Office Bug

Best Ways To Avoid The Office Bug
Allison Van Dusen

Every year you watch as colds and the flu pass from co-worker to co-worker, hoping you're not next on the office's hit list--and then you end up getting sick anyway.

A weak immune system or plain bad luck might be to blame. But it's more likely that you and your colleagues unknowingly have a few bad habits that make it easy for a virus and its accompanying misery to spread in your office.

If you want to avoid falling victim this year, infectious disease specialists say extra vigilance about hand hygiene, among other precautions, might do the trick.

In Pictures: Best Ways To Avoid The Office Bug

"We know that some years (viruses) are more severe than others," says Dr. Neil Fishman, associate professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and director of the Department of Healthcare Epidemiology and Infection Control for the University of Pennsylvania Health System. "But it's not impossible to totally avoid getting sick."

Top Targets
In order to understand how to avoid the office bug you first need to know what you're up against when cold and flu season strikes. While cold viruses are present year round, the number rises as the weather cools. Cold, dry air drains the normal amount of mucus we carry in our nasal passages, making it easier for viruses to attach to the tissues in your nose, Fishman says. We also tend to spend more time indoors during the winter months-ordering in lunch instead of going out, for instance--increasing our chances of contact with someone who is sick.

There's a good chance you'll run into infected people in your office, in particular, because taking a sick day isn't considered a possibility by some people. In a 2007 CCH survey of more than 300 human resource executives in U.S. organizations, 38% said presenteeism, when sick employees show up for work, was a problem in their organizations. In addition, 87% said those employees usually have illnesses like colds or the flu, according to CCH, a provider of tax and business law information and software solutions. Past research led by Walter "Buzz" Stewart, director of the Geisinger Center for Health Research, has estimated that presenteeism costs U.S. businesses $150 billion per year in productivity.

Just how easily can a cold spread? If you're one of those types who desperately tries to avoid sitting next to a sniffling, sneezing and wheezing colleague during a meeting, you've got good reason.

"If you had X-ray vision," says Dr. William Schaffner, professor and chair of the Vanderbilt Department of Preventive Medicine and vice president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, "you would see a cloud of viruses around them. Every time they exhale, respiratory viruses come out, extending about three feet, creating a cloud around them."

But that's not the only way you could fall ill. Research out of the University of Virginia Health System in 2006 showed that people infected with rhinovirus, the cause of half of all colds, can contaminate common objects, such as light switches, which can infect others. To make matters worse, the day before you actually come down with a cold you're already excreting virus. In other words, the co-worker who hovered over your desk the other day or borrowed your ID badge could be sick but not have symptoms yet.

Handy Advice
Ask an infectious disease specialist how not to get sick, no matter where you are, and they'll tell you one thing over and over: wash your hands thoroughly and frequently. Most organisms are more easily transmitted through hand contact than sneezes, says Dr. Bill Sutker, medical director of infectious diseases at Baylor University Medical Center at Dallas. Once we come into contact with a virus, all we have to do is rub our noses, scratch the area around our eyes or touch our mouths and we're in trouble.

You should also try to avoid touching your face with unwashed hands, but that can be harder than it sounds. If you have an itch on your face, you tend to scratch it without stopping to think about whether your hands are clean.

What are your tips for staying healthy during cold and flu season? Weigh in. Post your thoughts in the Reader Comment section below.

If you've got a lot of door handles in between your office's bathroom sink and your desk, consider trying the old method of using a paper towel as a protective barrier for your hand or keep a bottle of hand sanitizer on your desk. Since not everyone spends the recommended 15 seconds scrubbing, an alcohol-based gel is a good back-up method, Sutker says.

Unfortunately, your best bet for boosting your immunity also does not come in pill or powder form. Most doctors agree there's not enough evidence to recommend people take products packed with vitamin C or Echinacea to ward off the office bug. You'd be much better off regularly taking a multivitamin and focusing on some of the cornerstones of good health, such as regular exercise, proper nutrition and a good night's sleep, says Dr. Len Horovitz, a pulmonary specialist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York. While some genetics are involved, your immunity is basically a function of how healthy you are overall.

Of course, no matter how strong your immune system is or how many precautions you take you may not be able to avoid every cold that passes through the halls of your office. But it's always worth a shot.

Source: Forbes.com

How To Be A Healthier Single

How To Be A Healthier Single
Allison Van Dusen,

In Depth: How To Be A Healthier Single

Regardless of your marital status, you've probably heard about or read one of the countless studies showing the health benefits of marriage.

Overall, research indicates that married people are healthier than those who are divorced, widowed, never married or cohabitating. Happily married couples, in particular, may have lower stress levels, better sleep quality and even the upper hand when it comes to aging well and living longer, among other factors.

So what are singles doing wrong?

In Depth: How To Be A Healthier Single

The question isn't entirely easy to answer, mostly because the reasons why marriage may provide a positive health effect aren't completely clear--though much of it is likely due to the benefits of social support. And not all singles are alike when it comes to nutrition and exercise due to varying ages and personal situations: A 20-something single may be working 60-hour weeks and hitting bars instead of the gym, while a single parent may be struggling to get dinner on the table, let alone a low-fat, vitamin-rich one. But health experts say that, as a group, singles may have one thing in common.

"You don't take as good a care of yourself when it's just you as when there's somebody else around," says Karen Miller-Kovach, a registered dietitian and chief scientific officer for Weight Watchers International (nyse: WTW -news - people ). "I don't think that many people with a spouse and family will pull out a bag of Doritos and say, 'Here's dinner,' whereas if you're single, after a long day, you might."

Plan For Healthy Eating
To prevent this nutrition-lacking scenario, singles need to plan. That means buying chicken or lean ground meat and dividing it into portions, freezing what you don't need right away, Miller-Kovach says. Cooking meals for the week on Sundays will help singles, especially parents, avoid at least a few nights of oily Chinese takeout. If you live alone and you're tired of buying family-sized portions of fruits and vegetables that you never finish, hit the grocery store's salad bar and dish out only what you need.

Singles also have to stock their pantries and fridges with healthy convenience foods that will make it easy to create low-fat feasts. Jim White, a Virginia Beach, Va.,-based spokesman for the American Dietetic Association and owner of Jim White Fitness, suggests keeping fat-free shredded cheese, salsa and Triscuits on hand for instant healthy nachos. Romaine lettuce--a great source of vitamin A, vitamin C and folate--is the perfect bed for a defrosted, pan-grilled turkey burger. And try using Portobello mushroom caps, instead of an English muffin or store-bought crust, as the base for mini pizzas.

Beyond what's on your plate, there's something to the way you eat it, says Dr. Richard Liebowitz, vice president of medical affairs for NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and a specialist withEverydayhealth.com. While the Mediterranean Diet is believed to improve heart health because of its high content of fruits, vegetables, fish, nuts and whole grains, there's a social component to it too. The people of Crete, Greece and southern Italy, whose traditional eating habits are the basis for the diet, treat dinner as a communal event, not a timed one.

"When there's no social event around it, dinner is just another chore you need to get out of the way," Liebowitz says.

To break the habit of shoveling down your food and start enjoying the experience of eating, try to invite more friends over for meals or head to a restaurant by yourself. (Bring a book if you feel self conscious.) If you hate eating alone, a growing number of Web sites, such as meetup.com, can help you connect with a group in your city for dinner or cocktails.

Stay Social, Skip The Drinks
While single people, with the exception of parents, tend to have time to exercise, their social lives can sometimes get in the way. But hanging out in bars doesn't mean you have to veer away from your healthy diet. For years, White says he would go out with friends and order water instead of a beer to avoid feeling lousy that night as well as the next morning. His buddies often gave him a hard time but he didn't let it bother him. White also counsels single clients to skip the typical dinner-and-a-movie date in favor of something more physical.

Marley Oldham, a 21-year-old senior at Texas A&M University who trained with White this summer, recently gave the technique a try by going on a first date with a friend at First Landing State Park in Virginia. Instead of staring at a movie screen and eating a bucket of calorie-laden popcorn, the two hiked trails and relaxed.

Do you consider yourself a healthy single? What's your secret? Tell us about it in the Reader Comments section below.

"I wasn't too focused on how I looked or what he was thinking," Oldham says. "We were just enjoying the activity."

More time-strapped single parents can get moving by sneaking exercise into a family activity. Shirley Archer, the newly named IDEA Fitness Instructor of the Year and author of Fitness 9 to 5, suggests a group bike ride. Or, like Archer, you can get creative and patch together a circuit training program in your backyard. Hers consists of pool tethers, a jump rope, hand weights, an exercise bike, a jogging in-place station and a mat or stability ball for abdominal crunches. Archer's stepchildren, ages 7, 12 and 15, use it frequently.

Whatever method you choose, the important thing is to make your health a priority now. The stronger a single's commitment to healthy habits, Archer says, the more likely he or she is to stick with them--a plus, regardless of marital status.

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