Great Home Remedies

Eye drops will remove redness not only from your eyes but also from red blemishes. Freeze a drop in a spoon, place frozen over blemish and hold, it will shrink swelling.

Neosporin can help remove and heal acne overnight.

Toothpaste (white paste) will help heal acne breakouts.

Clay masks will draw out the black heads that tend to gather around the nose, by dehydrating the top layer of skin.

Cuticle scissors work well to trim those little nose hairs.

Fingers: Your most trusted tool. Can apply everything with them. (So, you don't have an excuse when you forget your kit). Concealer- the heat in your fingers will help melt a thick concealer into place (especially under the eyes). Can blend cream blushes. Apply lip balm or gloss on lips. Don't forget to clean your hands when going from one application/color to another.

Dab a Q-tip into Jell-O cherry flavored powder and apply to lips. Let sit for five minutes and lick it off. Will give your lips a natural red coat.

Toothbrush and Vaseline will exfoliate and plu
mp up your lips.

Eucerin lotion over lips provides soothing therapy and holds lip color.

Try applying a yellow eye shadow as a primer on your lips. It will warm up and change any lip color.

Vaseline added to any shadow can make a gel blush or lip stain.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO) - is a great makeup remover. Use a damp washcloth to remove the excess…it will clean and moisturize all in one.

Parsley will help freshen your breath from the inside. Parsley contains chlorophyll, which is found in Certs and Clorets.

Honey and baby oil combined and rubbed on the body will make it incredibly soft. Be sure to rinse it off before leaving the bath.

Milk will add a smooth texture to the body; try adding some to your next bath.

A quick weight loss tip: Take two garlic tablets and two papaya enzymes before every meal. You can lose up to 5 lbs in one week.

Instead of shaving cream, use hair conditioner to shave your legs. It will leave them silky and smooth, as well as save you a moisturizing step.

Rub sea salt over face and body. It will give an invigorating feeling.

Gently rub baking soda (3/4 cup mixed with 1/4 cup water) for three minutes on face and rinse off. A great, inexpensive exfoliator.

Adding about 1/2 box of baking soda to the bath will also soothe itching skin, irritation and a sunburn.

Epsom salts will ease aching muscles and swelling.

Lemon juice will whiten brittle fingernails.

Orange slices added to your bath will provide a natural and easy aromatherapy.

Fruit Jell-O will take away foot odor. Submerge your feet into a fragrantly colored bucket and enjoy.

Lemon, lime, honey, & yogurt can lighten age and sun spots. Mix the juice from 1 lemon, 1 lime, 2 tablespoons of honey and 2 ounces of plain yogurt. Massage into desired spots at least once a week.

Lemons and powdered milk can act like an exfoliator and skin rejuvenator. Mix a paste with the juice of 2 lemons to 1 cup of powdered milk and the water necessary to get a thick paste. Let stand for 20 minutes, and then use the paste to gently massage off dead skin around the knees and elbows. The area will be naturally softened and bleached.

Caffeine is the main ingredient in those expensive cellulite creams. Your regular caffeinated coffee grounds (used from this morning) can be rubbed into those annoying cellulite areas. Since this can get a bit messy, try doing it in the bathtub or shower.

Herbal wraps are easy to make. Create your own, similar to the ones offered at the expensive spas, by using 1 cup corn oil, 1/2 cup grapefruit juice and 2 teaspoons of dried thyme. Combine the ingredients and work the mixture into the thigh, hip and butt areas. Cover the areas with a plastic wrap, locking in the heat from your body. To accelerate the results, lay a heating pad for several minutes over the desired areas.

Vitamins E, A or C capsules (in gel form) from your local drug store, can be used instead of the costly creams with these ingredients in them. Prick open the capsule and add it to your moisturizer. You’ll get all the benefits of the expensive creams without the extra chemicals or expense.

Hydrogen peroxide applied with a cotton ball makes a terrific astringent.

Pepto Bismol is a great face mask for sensitive skin. The same way it coats and soothes the stomach, it gently caresses the skin. Apply straight from the bottle with a cotton ball. Allow it to dry and rinse with cool water. It’s soothing and refreshing.

Vodka & Lemon tones up tired skin. (1/4 cup Vodka and juice from one lemon) Dab on face, neck and chest area with cotton. Not necessary to rinse off. It will evaporate with the air. The less rubbing, the better. Mix a bit extra (with some sugar) and have a cocktail.

Hairspray sprayed eight inches from face with eyes and mouth closed will create sealer for your makeup.

Baby wipes are a fast and inexpensive way to remove makeup. We use them for the celebrities on the set all the time.

Mud Mask/Wrap: Kitty Litter (100% natural clay only), without additives or chemicals. Combine 1 tablespoon clay with water to create a muddy paste. Apply to face, let dry and slightly harden. Then rinse off with warm water and washcloth. It's easy and refreshing and will feel just like those expensive spa mud masks.

Crush cucumbers into a pulp, and pat over face and neck. Good for oily skin and to unclog pores.
Sweet almond oil will moisturize extra dry skin, help lashes grow and can remove makeup. Will also sooth sunburned skin.

Lemon juice will dry up and help get rid of a pimple.

Crisco oil will remove makeup and moisturize your skin. It can even be used to treat psoriasis and eczema.

Drug-eluting Stents Found Safe, Superior To Bare Metal Stents, Study Suggests

Drug-eluting stents were safe and superior to bare metal stents in preventing death and heart attacks among 262,700 "real-world" patients enrolled in a nationwide registry of cardiovascular disease, according to researchers from Duke University Medical Center.

The findings were presented today at the i2Summit at the American College of Cardiology's 58th Annual Scientific Session. They also appear online in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

The study is the largest of its kind to date and may end years of controversy over the safety of the devices.

"We hope these findings will finally lay to rest any doubt about the safety of drug-eluting stents," says Pamela Douglas, M.D., a cardiologist and member of the Duke Heart Center at Duke University Medical Center and the lead author of the study. "Our results clearly show that drug-eluting stents are indeed safe."

Stents are small tubes that can prop open blocked coronary arteries. The earliest versions were made of bare metal mesh, but later models were designed to release a medication that could suppress restenosis, or the growth of new tissue that could cause the artery to clog up again. Physicians have been debating their relative merit for years.

After initially proving more effective than bare metal stents in preventing restenosis, drug-eluting stents suffered a setback when recent clinical trials found them associated with higher long-term death rates. Those findings led to warnings from the Food and Drug Administration and confusion over which option is better.

Douglas and colleagues followed patients over age 65 enrolled in the National Cardiovascular Data Registry who had received stents from 2004 through 2006. Most of the patients had received a drug-eluting stent; only 17 percent were implanted with the bare metal variety. Investigators matched the patients' data with their Medicare claims and followed them for two and one-half years, measuring rates of death, heart attack, stroke, bleeding and the need for additional artery-opening procedures.

They found that over the 30-month period, patients in the drug-eluting stent group had a 25 percent reduction in death and 24 percent reduction in heart attacks, when compared with those who received bare metal stents, but no significant difference in the incidence of stroke, major bleeding or need for additional artery-opening procedures.

Douglas says the study is important on several fronts. "First, the data show that over a two and one-half year follow up, drug-eluting stents are safe among patients in a real-world, highly variable environment. Patients who enroll in clinical trials are generally younger, healthier and on fewer medications that the population at large, and that means that clinical trials can generate findings that may not hold up in larger, more variable, community populations," says Douglas.

"In addition, we believe this is the first time that anyone has been able to link so much clinical data with Medicare claims. What that essentially has given us is an excellent model for future post-marketing evaluation," says Douglas, who adds that such studies may be particularly attractive to payers, health care policy makers and anyone interested in health care reform who needs real-world data, as opposed to that generated by clinical trials.

The study was funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and the ACC's National Cardiovascular Data Registry.

Colleagues from Duke who helped with the study include senior author Eric Peterson, Lesley Curtis, J. Matthew Brennan, Ghazala Haque, Kevin Anstrom, Eric Eisenstein, David Dai, David Kong, Bradley Hammill and David Matchar. Additional co-authors include Ralph Brindis, of Kaiser Permanente and the American College of Cardiology; and Art Sedrakyan, of the Agency for Healthcare Quality Research.

Drug-eluting Stents Found Safe, Superior To Bare Metal Stents, Study Suggests

Drug-eluting stents were safe and superior to bare metal stents in preventing death and heart attacks among 262,700 "real-world" patients enrolled in a nationwide registry of cardiovascular disease, according to researchers from Duke University Medical Center.

The findings were presented today at the i2Summit at the American College of Cardiology's 58th Annual Scientific Session. They also appear online in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

The study is the largest of its kind to date and may end years of controversy over the safety of the devices.

"We hope these findings will finally lay to rest any doubt about the safety of drug-eluting stents," says Pamela Douglas, M.D., a cardiologist and member of the Duke Heart Center at Duke University Medical Center and the lead author of the study. "Our results clearly show that drug-eluting stents are indeed safe."

Stents are small tubes that can prop open blocked coronary arteries. The earliest versions were made of bare metal mesh, but later models were designed to release a medication that could suppress restenosis, or the growth of new tissue that could cause the artery to clog up again. Physicians have been debating their relative merit for years.

After initially proving more effective than bare metal stents in preventing restenosis, drug-eluting stents suffered a setback when recent clinical trials found them associated with higher long-term death rates. Those findings led to warnings from the Food and Drug Administration and confusion over which option is better.

Douglas and colleagues followed patients over age 65 enrolled in the National Cardiovascular Data Registry who had received stents from 2004 through 2006. Most of the patients had received a drug-eluting stent; only 17 percent were implanted with the bare metal variety. Investigators matched the patients' data with their Medicare claims and followed them for two and one-half years, measuring rates of death, heart attack, stroke, bleeding and the need for additional artery-opening procedures.

They found that over the 30-month period, patients in the drug-eluting stent group had a 25 percent reduction in death and 24 percent reduction in heart attacks, when compared with those who received bare metal stents, but no significant difference in the incidence of stroke, major bleeding or need for additional artery-opening procedures.

Douglas says the study is important on several fronts. "First, the data show that over a two and one-half year follow up, drug-eluting stents are safe among patients in a real-world, highly variable environment. Patients who enroll in clinical trials are generally younger, healthier and on fewer medications that the population at large, and that means that clinical trials can generate findings that may not hold up in larger, more variable, community populations," says Douglas.

"In addition, we believe this is the first time that anyone has been able to link so much clinical data with Medicare claims. What that essentially has given us is an excellent model for future post-marketing evaluation," says Douglas, who adds that such studies may be particularly attractive to payers, health care policy makers and anyone interested in health care reform who needs real-world data, as opposed to that generated by clinical trials.

The study was funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and the ACC's National Cardiovascular Data Registry.

Colleagues from Duke who helped with the study include senior author Eric Peterson, Lesley Curtis, J. Matthew Brennan, Ghazala Haque, Kevin Anstrom, Eric Eisenstein, David Dai, David Kong, Bradley Hammill and David Matchar. Additional co-authors include Ralph Brindis, of Kaiser Permanente and the American College of Cardiology; and Art Sedrakyan, of the Agency for Healthcare Quality Research.

New Mexican Health-care Program Successful At Reducing Crippling Health Care Costs

Seguro Popular, a Mexican health care program instituted in 2003, has already reduced crippling health care costs among poorer households, according to an evaluation conducted by researchers at Harvard University in collaboration with researchers in Mexico.

The study was designed and led by Gary King, David Florence Professor of Government and director of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard. The results are published in the current issue of The Lancet.

"The success of Seguro Popular in reducing catastrophic health expenditures is remarkable," says King, "not least because governmental money spent on the poor in many countries rarely reaches the intended recipients."

King's study of about 500,000 people is the largest-ever randomized health policy experiment. It features innovative research designs and statistical methods he and his colleagues developed that increase what we learn from an evaluation while simultaneously saving a great deal of money. The design includes several failsafe components that preserve the experimental randomization even if politics or other problems intervene, including those which have ruined most previous large scale public policy evaluations. The approach is now being implemented or considered for evaluations of many other public policy programs around the world.

Passed in 2003, Seguro Popular was developed to provide health care to 50 million Mexicans who otherwise lack coverage. Voluntary enrollment in the program, at no cost to the poor, provides access to health clinics, drugs, regular and preventative medical care, and the money to pay for it all. The program's primary goal is the reduction of catastrophic health expenses, those exceeding one-third of a household's yearly disposable income.

About a half a million people in 118,569 households were included in this study, which was conducted over 10 months. In the treatment clusters, 44 percent of households reported participating in the program, compared to 7.3 percent in control communities, which was approximately as expected. Among participating households, those suffering catastrophic health expenses were reduced by almost 60 percent, contributing to a 30 percent reduction in catastrophic health expenses across treatment communities.

The evaluation also highlighted areas in which the program was ineffective. Contrary to prior non-randomized studies, the researchers found no increase in utilization of health services, although longer-term research may show an increase. Health outcomes will also take longer to show an effect.

Before the program was instituted, 174 communities were paired up based on having similar background variables, such as the health of the community, size, and the number of schools. Then one community within each pair was randomly chosen to receive treatment: Families were encouraged to enroll in Seguro Popular, health facilities were built or upgraded, and medical personnel, drugs, and other supplies were provided. In the other community within each pair, no changes were made.

"One advantage of this design is that if one of the communities was to drop out of the study, due to interventions by politicians or for other reasons, the paired community would be removed as well, and the balance between the treated and control groups would not be affected. In contrast, classical randomized experiments are destroyed when even one community is lost. The matched pair design also decreased the margin of error to as little as one-sixth of what it would be with traditional experimental methods," says King. "That's the equivalent of collecting many more respondents, or randomizing throughout many more communities, for the same cost."

Seguro Popular in Mexico covers about the same number of people as are uninsured in America. King points out that there may be lessons for other countries to learn in the success of Seguro Popular.

King's co-authors were Emmanuela Gakidou of the University of Washington; Kosuke Imai of Princeton University; Jason Lakin, Clayton Nall, and Nirmala Ravishankar of Harvard; Ryan Moore of Washington University in St. Louis; Manett Vargas of the Ministry of Health in Mexico; Martha María Téllez-Rojo and Juan Eugenio Hernández Ávila of the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico; Mauricio Hernández Ávila of the Ministry of Health in Mexico and the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico; and Héctor Hernández Llamas of Conestadistica. Gakidou, Imai, Lakin, Nall, Ravishankar, Moore, and Vargas are all King's current or former students and affiliates at the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Sciences.

The research was funded by the Mexican Ministry of Health, the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico, and the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Science.

Partner Behavior Better Predicts STD Risks

Risky behaviors such as not using condoms or having sex with multiple people put young adults at risk for contracting sexually transmitted diseases, but perhaps not as much as the characteristics of their sexual partners, University of Florida researchers say.

The findings, which UF and University of Pittsburgh researchers report in the April issue of Sexually Transmitted Diseases, could help health-care providers better screen patients for STD risks, said Stephanie A. S. Staras, Ph.D., a UF assistant professor of epidemiology and health policy research in the UF College of Medicine.

"If you are choosing high-risk partners, you are much more likely to have an STD, even when we account for your condom-use patterns," said Staras, the lead author of the study. "The theory is simple: You need to have sex with someone who has an STD to get an STD. Based on the prevalence of STDs in the United States, it seems like the public may not fully understand their risk."

The study examined the sexual activities, partner characteristics and STD diagnoses of 412 subjects between the ages of 15 and 24. Among the subjects whose partners were categorized as high-risk, half were diagnosed with an STD. By comparison, about 40 percent of the young adults whose own behaviors were labeled as high-risk were diagnosed with an STD.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 19 million people in the United States contract STDs each year. About half of them are between the ages of 15 and 24.

Health-care providers often ask patients about their own sexual behaviors, but inquiring only about a person's own behaviors may cause some patients to slip through the cracks, Staras said. For example, some subjects in the study reported very low-risk behaviors but were having sex with very high-risk partners.

Adding a few simple questions about partner characteristics during STD screenings could help providers catch more patients who need to be tested and educated about condom use and other protective measures, Staras said.

"Partner selection is an area of STD prevention that could complement what we are already doing with promoting condom use, and could possibly really help people," Staras said. "If somehow we could convince individuals to incorporate this information in a meaningful way into their decision-making, then we could reduce STDs."

UF researchers measured five specific characteristics to gauge how risky certain partners were. These characteristics included whether the partner has a problem with marijuana or alcohol, was at least five years older or younger, had been in jail, had sex with other people in the past year or had an STD in the past year.

The researchers then created a composite, totaling up the number of negative partner characteristics for each subject and comparing them against the number of each person's own individual risky behaviors, which ranged from how often they used condoms to how many people they had sex with.

Overall, researchers found considering all of the partner characteristics together was the strongest predictor for STDs. Young adults whose partners had five or more risk characteristics were three times more likely to have an STD than those whose partners had no more than two characteristics.

Of these characteristics, the most telling were if a partner already had an STD and if a couple had an age difference of more than five years. Subjects whose partners were five years older or younger than them were more than twice as likely to be diagnosed with an STD than those whose partners were around the same age, the researchers found.

"It's all about the risk of the partner and sometimes we forget that," said Richard A. Crosby, Ph.D., the DDI endowed professor and chairman of the department of health behavior at the University of Kentucky and a co-director of the Rural Center for AIDS/STD Prevention.

But Crosby, who was not involved in the UF study, said it's also important for people to remember that the risks mentioned in the study are just generalizations, not set-in-stone giveaways for STDs.

"From a public health perspective, it's important to understand these findings," he said. "From a practical and prevention perspective, we still need to rely on people using valid methods of protection to avoid being infected or infecting."

New Mexican Health-care Program Successful At Reducing Crippling Health Care Costs

Seguro Popular, a Mexican health care program instituted in 2003, has already reduced crippling health care costs among poorer households, according to an evaluation conducted by researchers at Harvard University in collaboration with researchers in Mexico.

The study was designed and led by Gary King, David Florence Professor of Government and director of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard. The results are published in the current issue of The Lancet.

"The success of Seguro Popular in reducing catastrophic health expenditures is remarkable," says King, "not least because governmental money spent on the poor in many countries rarely reaches the intended recipients."

King's study of about 500,000 people is the largest-ever randomized health policy experiment. It features innovative research designs and statistical methods he and his colleagues developed that increase what we learn from an evaluation while simultaneously saving a great deal of money. The design includes several failsafe components that preserve the experimental randomization even if politics or other problems intervene, including those which have ruined most previous large scale public policy evaluations. The approach is now being implemented or considered for evaluations of many other public policy programs around the world.

Passed in 2003, Seguro Popular was developed to provide health care to 50 million Mexicans who otherwise lack coverage. Voluntary enrollment in the program, at no cost to the poor, provides access to health clinics, drugs, regular and preventative medical care, and the money to pay for it all. The program's primary goal is the reduction of catastrophic health expenses, those exceeding one-third of a household's yearly disposable income.

About a half a million people in 118,569 households were included in this study, which was conducted over 10 months. In the treatment clusters, 44 percent of households reported participating in the program, compared to 7.3 percent in control communities, which was approximately as expected. Among participating households, those suffering catastrophic health expenses were reduced by almost 60 percent, contributing to a 30 percent reduction in catastrophic health expenses across treatment communities.

The evaluation also highlighted areas in which the program was ineffective. Contrary to prior non-randomized studies, the researchers found no increase in utilization of health services, although longer-term research may show an increase. Health outcomes will also take longer to show an effect.

Before the program was instituted, 174 communities were paired up based on having similar background variables, such as the health of the community, size, and the number of schools. Then one community within each pair was randomly chosen to receive treatment: Families were encouraged to enroll in Seguro Popular, health facilities were built or upgraded, and medical personnel, drugs, and other supplies were provided. In the other community within each pair, no changes were made.

"One advantage of this design is that if one of the communities was to drop out of the study, due to interventions by politicians or for other reasons, the paired community would be removed as well, and the balance between the treated and control groups would not be affected. In contrast, classical randomized experiments are destroyed when even one community is lost. The matched pair design also decreased the margin of error to as little as one-sixth of what it would be with traditional experimental methods," says King. "That's the equivalent of collecting many more respondents, or randomizing throughout many more communities, for the same cost."

Seguro Popular in Mexico covers about the same number of people as are uninsured in America. King points out that there may be lessons for other countries to learn in the success of Seguro Popular.

King's co-authors were Emmanuela Gakidou of the University of Washington; Kosuke Imai of Princeton University; Jason Lakin, Clayton Nall, and Nirmala Ravishankar of Harvard; Ryan Moore of Washington University in St. Louis; Manett Vargas of the Ministry of Health in Mexico; Martha María Téllez-Rojo and Juan Eugenio Hernández Ávila of the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico; Mauricio Hernández Ávila of the Ministry of Health in Mexico and the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico; and Héctor Hernández Llamas of Conestadistica. Gakidou, Imai, Lakin, Nall, Ravishankar, Moore, and Vargas are all King's current or former students and affiliates at the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Sciences.

The research was funded by the Mexican Ministry of Health, the National Institute of Public Health in Mexico, and the Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Science.

Partner Behavior Better Predicts STD Risks

Risky behaviors such as not using condoms or having sex with multiple people put young adults at risk for contracting sexually transmitted diseases, but perhaps not as much as the characteristics of their sexual partners, University of Florida researchers say.

The findings, which UF and University of Pittsburgh researchers report in the April issue of Sexually Transmitted Diseases, could help health-care providers better screen patients for STD risks, said Stephanie A. S. Staras, Ph.D., a UF assistant professor of epidemiology and health policy research in the UF College of Medicine.

"If you are choosing high-risk partners, you are much more likely to have an STD, even when we account for your condom-use patterns," said Staras, the lead author of the study. "The theory is simple: You need to have sex with someone who has an STD to get an STD. Based on the prevalence of STDs in the United States, it seems like the public may not fully understand their risk."

The study examined the sexual activities, partner characteristics and STD diagnoses of 412 subjects between the ages of 15 and 24. Among the subjects whose partners were categorized as high-risk, half were diagnosed with an STD. By comparison, about 40 percent of the young adults whose own behaviors were labeled as high-risk were diagnosed with an STD.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 19 million people in the United States contract STDs each year. About half of them are between the ages of 15 and 24.

Health-care providers often ask patients about their own sexual behaviors, but inquiring only about a person's own behaviors may cause some patients to slip through the cracks, Staras said. For example, some subjects in the study reported very low-risk behaviors but were having sex with very high-risk partners.

Adding a few simple questions about partner characteristics during STD screenings could help providers catch more patients who need to be tested and educated about condom use and other protective measures, Staras said.

"Partner selection is an area of STD prevention that could complement what we are already doing with promoting condom use, and could possibly really help people," Staras said. "If somehow we could convince individuals to incorporate this information in a meaningful way into their decision-making, then we could reduce STDs."

UF researchers measured five specific characteristics to gauge how risky certain partners were. These characteristics included whether the partner has a problem with marijuana or alcohol, was at least five years older or younger, had been in jail, had sex with other people in the past year or had an STD in the past year.

The researchers then created a composite, totaling up the number of negative partner characteristics for each subject and comparing them against the number of each person's own individual risky behaviors, which ranged from how often they used condoms to how many people they had sex with.

Overall, researchers found considering all of the partner characteristics together was the strongest predictor for STDs. Young adults whose partners had five or more risk characteristics were three times more likely to have an STD than those whose partners had no more than two characteristics.

Of these characteristics, the most telling were if a partner already had an STD and if a couple had an age difference of more than five years. Subjects whose partners were five years older or younger than them were more than twice as likely to be diagnosed with an STD than those whose partners were around the same age, the researchers found.

"It's all about the risk of the partner and sometimes we forget that," said Richard A. Crosby, Ph.D., the DDI endowed professor and chairman of the department of health behavior at the University of Kentucky and a co-director of the Rural Center for AIDS/STD Prevention.

But Crosby, who was not involved in the UF study, said it's also important for people to remember that the risks mentioned in the study are just generalizations, not set-in-stone giveaways for STDs.

"From a public health perspective, it's important to understand these findings," he said. "From a practical and prevention perspective, we still need to rely on people using valid methods of protection to avoid being infected or infecting."