Foods To Avoid when Wearing Braces

Chewy Candies and Gum

Avoid chewy candies such as caramel and jelly beans, as well as gum. Craig Davis Orthodontics states chewy candies or gum can damage your orthodontic appliances. Another disadvantage is sugar content, which can cause tooth decay. Damage to your orthodontic appliances requires visiting the dentist.

Crunchy Chips and Cookies

You can continue snacking, but monitor the types of snacks. Avoid eating crunchy snacks, including chocolate chip cookies, popcorn and baked tacos. Exchange these crunchy snacks with healthier, softer snacks. ArchWired.com provides some soft food suggestions. Choose gelatin, plain ice cream or low-fat pudding to eat during the day.

Hard Breads and Hard Baked Goods

Eating hard breads can lead to scratches on your orthodontic appliances. ArchWired.com gives soft bread and baked goods options, such as buttered corn muffins. Additional food choices include fluffy banana pancakes or butter rolls for breakfast. Order soft bread and baked goods when dining at restaurants. Avoid ordering harder food items such as garlic toast.

Other Foods to Avoid

You want to avoid other foods when wearing your braces, including acidic foods, which can damage your tooth enamel. Lemons and limes are two types of acidic foods. If you are a hot tea drinker, exchange lemon juice for whole milk or cream. If you drink cold drinks, avoid ice cubs, which can create cracks where the cement bonds on your braces. Avoid other food choices such as hard peanuts or crunchy celery sticks.

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LASIK Eye Surgery

LASIK, which stands for laser in-situ keratomileusis, is a popular surgery used to correct vision in people who are nearsighted, farsighted, or have astigmatism.

All laser vision correction surgeries work by reshaping the cornea, the clear front part of the eye, so that light traveling through it is properly focused onto the retina located in the back of the eye. LASIK is one of a number of different surgical techniques used to reshape the cornea.

What Are the Advantages of LASIK Eye Surgery?

LASIK has many benefits, including:

• It works! It corrects vision. Around 90% of patients will have their desired vision after LASIK. An enhancement can further increase this number.

• LASIK is associated with very little pain.

• Vision is corrected nearly immediately or by the day after LASIK.

• No bandages or stitches are required after LASIK.

• Adjustments can be made years after LASIK to further correct vision.

• After having LASIK, most patients have a dramatic reduction in eyeglass or contact lens dependence and many patients no longer need them at all.

What Are the Disadvantages of LASIK Eye Surgery?

Despite the pluses, there are some disadvantages to LASIK eye surgery:

Changes made to the cornea cannot be reversed after LASIK.
LASIK is technically complex. Problems may occur when the doctor cuts the flap, which can permanently affect vision.
LASIK can rarely cause a loss of "best" vision. Your best vision is the highest degree of vision that you achieved while wearing your contacts or eyeglasses.

What Are the Potential Side Effects of LASIK Eye Surgery?

Some patients experience discomfort in the first 24 to 48 hours after LASIK eye surgery. Other side effects, although rare, may include:

• Glare

• Seeing halos around images

• Difficulty driving at night

• Fluctuating vision

• Dry eyes

How Should I Prepare for LASIK Eye Surgery?

Before LASIK eye surgery, you will meet with a coordinator who will discuss what to expect during and after the procedure. During this session, your medical history will be evaluated and your eyes will be fully examined. Likely initial tests include measuring corneal thickness, refraction, corneal mapping, air pressure, and pupil dilation. Once you have gone through the initial evaluation, you will meet the surgeon, who will answer any questions you may have. Afterwards, you can schedule an appointment for the procedure.

If you wear rigid gas permeable contact lenses, you should not wear them for at least three weeks before your evaluation. Other types of contact lenses shouldn't be worn for at least three days prior to the evaluation. Be sure to bring your eyeglasses to the surgeon so your prescription can be reviewed.

On the day of your surgery, eat a light meal before going to the doctor and take all of your prescribed medications. Do not wear eye makeup or have any bulky accessories in your hair that will interfere with positioning your head under the laser. If you are not feeling well that morning, call the doctor's office to determine whether the procedure needs to be postponed.

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Pinkeye

What Is Pinkeye?

Pinkeye -- also called conjunctivitis -- is redness and inflammation of the clear membranes covering the whites of the eyes and the membranes on the inner part of the eyelids. Pinkeye is most often caused by a virus or by a bacterial infection, although allergies, chemical agents, and underlying diseases can also play a role.

Is Pinkeye Contagious?

Viral and bacterial pinkeye are extremely contagious. It's easily spread through poor hand washing or by sharing an object (like a towel) with someone who has it. It can also spread through coughing and sneezing. Kids diagnosed with infectious pinkeye should stay out of school or day care for a short period of time. Allergic pinkeye (caused by seasonal pollens, animal dander, cosmetics, and perfumes) and chemical pinkeye (from chemicals or liquids, including bleach and furniture polish) are not contagious.

Symptom: Eye Redness

Redness of the eye is the typical, telltale symptom of pinkeye. Pinkeye is a common condition that is rarely serious and unlikely to cause long-term eye or vision damage if promptly detected and treated.

Symptom: Swollen, Red Eyelids

The symptoms of infectious pinkeye typically begin in one eye and involve the other eye within a few days. Symptoms of allergic pinkeye usually involve both eyes. Swelling of the eyelids is more common with bacterial and allergic pinkeye.

Symptom: Lots of Tearing

Viral and allergic pinkeye are known for causing more tear production than usual.

Symptom: Itchy or Burning Eyes

You would know it if you felt it -- that overwhelming itchy, burning feeling in the eyes, which is typical of pinkeye.

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Fruit, veggies key to older women’s diets

Older women who increased their consumption of fruits and vegetables and ate less dessert, sugar-sweetened beverages, meat, and cheese were the most likely to control their weight over time, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Education and the Graduate School of Public Health.

“With more than one-third of all Americans considered obese, it’s clear that standard behavioral obesity treatment is producing poor long-term results,” says Bethany Barone Gibbs, assistant professor in the Department of Health and Physical Activity at the University of Pittsburgh.

“We found that some important behaviors differ for long-term versus short-term weight control among women in their 50s and 60s, who are already at higher risk for weight gain.”

Barone Gibbs is the lead author of the study, which will be published in the September issue of the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

Researchers studied 465 overweight and obese postmenopausal women previously enrolled in Pitt Public Health’s Women on the Move through Activity and Nutrition (WOMAN) study and analyzed changes in eating habits and weight loss from the beginning of the study to six and 48 months.

The women were randomly assigned to either a lifestyle-change intervention group or a control group. The women in the intervention group regularly met with nutritionists, exercise physiologists, and psychologists, while women in the control group were offered occasional seminars over the study period focusing on general women’s health.

Participants in both groups self-reported their eating habits using a detailed questionnaire. At the end of the four years of the study, 57 percent of the intervention participants and 29 percent of controls had maintained at least a five-pound weight loss.

Women in both groups who decreased their consumption of desserts and sugar-sweetened beverages experienced a greater weight loss than those who did not in both the short- and long-term.

However, participants who decreased fried foods and eating out, and increased fish consumption had greater weight loss at six months; those who increased their fruit and vegetable intake and decreased intake of meats and cheeses were more likely to be successful at long-term weight loss.

Eating out and eating fried food had no apparent effect on long-term weight change.

“Behaviors like cutting out fried foods may work in the short-term, but may be too restrictive to continue for a long period of time. On the other hand, adding fruits and vegetables may be a small change that makes a difference over a period of many months or years,” says Barone Gibbs.

Researchers at Pitt Public Health conducted the WOMAN study from April 2002 to June 2008 to investigate whether a change in diet and lifestyle, along with a 10 percent reduction in body weight, could lower low density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol and triglycerides, and decrease cardiovascular disease.

“Four years later, the secondary data from the WOMAN study is still providing insight to those working to achieve better health,” says study co-author Lewis Kuller, professor emeritus in the Department of Epidemiology at Pitt Public Health.

“Focusing on eating behavior, rather than specific diets, may improve long-term weight loss programs.”

Collaborators in the study included Laura S. Kinzel from the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health, Kelley Pettee Gabriel from the University of Texas Health Science Center, and Yue-Fang Chang, from the School of Medicine at University of Pittsburgh.

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