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Prevent Back Pain Before you go: Ship your luggage to your destination in advance. Save time—and your spine—by going to www.luggagefree.com and scheduling a pickup. Your bags can be delivered within 24 hours in the United States. Added perk: On most trips you can include your liquid toiletries without worrying about them being confiscated from your carry-on. (If you send your stuff a few days ahead, the rate will be less expensive—as low as $1....

It kills more women than breast cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, and diabetes. If that’s not enough to get your attention, consider this: More women than men die from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, or COPD. Smoking is the primary cause of COPD, an umbrella term that covers chronic bronchitis, emphysema, and other diseases that involve progressive damage to the lungs. “It used to be an all-boys party,” says Neil Schachter, MD, medical director of the respiratory care department at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City....

Wake up feeling like a zombie? This is the breakfast for you: Prep in the evening, let sit overnight, and just top with strawberries and almonds once you’re vertical in the AM. Even better: Its 9 g of protein and 6 g of fiber will stick with you all the way to lunchtime. MORE: The Five Biggest Mistakes You’re Making at Breakfast Serves 1 1 c unsweetened almond milk½ c oats1 tsp honey2 strawberries, sliced½ Tbsp sliced almonds In jar, combine oats, almond milk, and honey....

A: Canola oil and applesauce, rather than a stick of butter, are smart swaps that still keep cake moist. And opting for the deep flavor of antioxidant-rich cocoa powder and a butter-blend spread allows you to cut back on the chocolate and sugary frosting without sacrificing taste. When you crunch the numbers, our solution has 39% fewer calories, 33% more fiber, 50% less sat fat, and 62% less sugar. So here’s to having your cake and seconds, too!...

“Even if you don’t exercise, if you ate really well you could probably look like an athlete and be fairly healthy,” says Todd Astorino, PhD, an exercise scientist at the University of California, San Marcos. But if your diet is poor, no amount of exercise will make up for that, Astorino adds. (Join Prevention’s 21-Day Challenge to lose weight and feel amazing by summer!) A new editorial appearing in the journal BMJ doubles down on Astorino’s comments....

Four major supplement retailers—GNC, Target, Walmart, and Walgreens—have been accused of selling store-brand herbal supplements in New York that were either entirely void of the labeled substance or found to contain unlabeled ingredients, according to a press release from New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman. The findings come from DNA testing of 7 herbal supplements—echinacea, ginseng, St. John’s Wort, ginko biloba, garlic, valerian root and saw palmetto—performed by the Attorney General’s Office....

A UK-based study team recruited a dozen people clinically diagnosed with severely low D levels. For two weeks, each person received a 20,000-IU megadose of vitamin D3 (a form of vitamin D) every other day. The researchers recorded each participant’s muscle function and general fatigue levels at the start and end of the study period. Here’s what they discovered: After the super shot of D, two different measures of cellular muscle function improved by roughly 20%....

Yet another reason to add some sizzle between the sheets: A frisky romp might very well improve your long-term memory, thanks to a surge of feel-good brain chemicals. A recent German study of 32 older adults found that participants shown a series of photos recalled 20% more images six hours after taking Levodopa—an amino acid that triggers the release of the chemical dopamine—compared to those given a placebo. “Dopamine affects proteins in the hippocampus, an area of the brain important for long-term memory,” says lead study author Rumana Chowdhury, a PhD candidate at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London....

Craving the exotic? Look for PitayaPlus Dried Pitaya snacks. Pitaya, also known as dragonfruit, has a tangy taste, protein, and plenty of fiber. If you’ve got the munchies, snack on crunchies: pieces of pineapple, mango, apple, and pear that are freeze-dried to a crisp without added sugar. [sidebar] Getting your apple a day doesn’t get any easier (or tastier) than popping a couple of handfuls of Bare Fruit Bake-Dried Cinnamon Apple Chips....

Physical activity—from running and lifting weights to laughing and lifting your water glass—accounts for 15% to 30% of the energy you use, the study authors say. (You use the rest eating and digesting food, or just staying alive; it takes a lot of energy to keep all your body’s systems running.) When you break down all your calorie-burning movements, the study indicates your small non-exercise activities could add up to thousands of extra calories expended each day....

New research published in the journal PLoS One finds that electronic-collar training seriously stresses dogs out. In a British study of 61 dogs, canines who received e-collar training to curb common bad behaviors—like chasing cars, joggers, or wildlife—showed more distress sign,s such as yawning and panting, than dogs that were trained with rewards-based methods. MORE: 4 Ways You’re Driving Your Pet Crazy “In the dog’s mind, e-collars are an ‘act of God’ type of correction since the dog doesn’t know where it came from, versus a pull on a leash that the dog can associate with a handler,” says Andrew Horan, a certified canine training and behavior specialist....

5 Lame Excuses That Shouldn’t Keep You From Exercising You’re sick: Having a cold isn’t always a reason to skip a workout, but sometimes being sick means you should skip exercise. To figure out if you should sweat it out, use the above-the-neck rule: if your symptoms are confined to normal above-the-neck symptoms of the common cold, like sneezing, coughing, and sniffling, you can still exercise (and may feel better because of it)....

In the first lifelong canine diet-restriction study, researchers discovered that Labrador retrievers fed 25% less food than their siblings in a control group had a median life span of nearly 2 years longer. The conclusion among participating scientists: Less food in the bowl adds more—and healthier—years to dogs’ lives. Researchers at the Purina Pet Institute in St. Louis, in collaboration with scientists from several major universities, published results of this 14-year study that shows that a dog’s median life span can potentially be extended by 15% when the dog is kept to its ideal body condition by carefully monitoring food intake....

Researchers from the Nestle Research Center in Switzerland used electrical neuroimaging to map out whether images of high- or low-calorie food affected the brain differently. When study participants viewed high calorie food images such as pizza and pastries, they reported the taste of what they were eating to be more pleasant, compared to when they looked at pictures of low-calorie foods, like melon and beans—even though they were eating the same thing....

Okay, so maybe an appointment with your doctor will never be quite as exciting as a massage or a girl’s night out. But if you routinely dread visits to your MD, then it might be time to consider whether you and your doctor really mesh: Previous research has indicated, for instance, that an unfriendly doctor can actually increase our perception of pain. Plus, feeling uncomfortable during an appointment might mean you ask fewer questions, share less vital information, or don’t comply with your doctor’s directives....

How many times have you devoured the entire box of mac and cheese (Come on, you tell yourself, it’s not that much), only to scan the label and realize you just consumed 2.5 servings of the stuff? Foiled again by the food label! It’s tough to avoid, according to a new study commissioned by the FDA and published in the Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. In an effort to determine which design conveyed health information the most clearly, researchers redesigned food labels and tested them against standard ones....

Look In The Mirror Smile. Frown. Be happy. Be sad. Be serious. Practice moving your teeth and lips in private so that you’ll be more confident in front of other people, says Murrell. Practice Talking “Having dentures is like having a prosthetic limb,” says Jerry F. Taintor, DDS. “You have to practice using it to use it well.” Say your vowels. Recite your consonants. Read aloud to yourself, he says. Listen to your pronunciation and your diction and correct what doesn’t sound right....

In the 100-day study, mice that were fed a high-fat diet and given a solution of 50% grapefruit juice throughout the day gained 18% less weight than mice on a high-fat diet that drank water spiked with sweeteners with same caloric content as the juice. Along with gaining less weight, the grapefruit-drinking mice showed a 13-17% reduction in blood glucose levels and 3x lower insulin levels. MORE: The 25 Best Weight Loss Tips Of All Time Pretty cool, right?...