Showing posts with label Health. Show all posts

Friday 31 January 2014

Ageing at 24 – a Grey Area?

Yesterday was a day like any other in the OISE office. Students were buzzing merrily around in the background, the sound of ringing phones and tapping keys filled the air. That was until I made a momentous discovery. Something caught my eye as I absent-mindedly ran my fingers through my hair – something silvery and wiry. And that was the horrifying moment when I realised it was attached to my scalp.

Panic stricken, my first instinct was to yank it out but I hesitated for fear that a multitude of grey hairs might grow back in its place, as the old wives’ tale warns. On the other hand I could hardly leave it hanging there as a testament to my premature senility. So I bit the bullet and gave it a tug.

Having now recovered from the initial shock, it seems that despite feeling horribly unprepared for this moment, I am not alone in finding my first grey hair in my twenties. According to an article by the Daily Mail (not usually my first port of call for reliable advice but nevertheless a source of comfort in my distress), women are starting to go grey at an increasingly early age. Whilst 20 years ago just 18 percent of women discovered their first grey hair before the age of 30, the figure now stands at around a third. Whilst many put this down to increased stress, the experts generally agree that it is genetic, rather than environmental factors which ultimately decide.

Whether you believe this pessimistic prognosis or not, our School Manager, Dorota, was quick to reassure me that with such a wealth of hair products available nowadays, finding a few grey hairs is ‘merely an inconvenience’. So if you, like me, are tempted to panic when the first grey hair strikes, I would encourage you to remain calm and keep your hair on.

Click here to read the Daily Mail's article on this subject

Thursday 10 October 2013

Are you getting enough sleep?

At OISE Oxford, many of our hard-working students have high-powered or pressured jobs which may take their toll on their sleep patterns. We therefore thought some of you may be interested to read about an experiment recently undertaken at the University of Surrey’s Sleep Centre to investigate the effects of having just one more hour’s sleep.

According to the Sleep Council, the average Briton gets around 6.5 hours sleep per night and in order to find out whether this was enough, researchers asked one group of volunteers to sleep for 6.5 hours per night for a week while a second group was asked to sleep for 7.5 hours. After a week the researchers took blood tests and asked the participants to switch sleep patterns to see what effects this would have.

Extraordinarily, computer tests revealed that cutting down on sleep by just one hour had marked effects on the participants’ mental agility. Furthermore the blood tests showed that over 500 genes, including genes associated with processes such as inflammation, immune response and response to stress, became more active. The team also saw increases in the activity of genes linked to diabetes and risk of cancer. The reverse happened when the volunteers added an hour of sleep.

Their conclusion therefore was that there are clear health benefits to having that extra hour in bed. A great excuse for a lie in if ever I heard one.