Welcome, my name is Dr. Warrick Bishop. I'm a cardiologist, an author and a keynote speaker. I'm CEO of the Healthy Heart Network. I'm all about trying to help people live as well as possible for as long as possible. Heart disease is huge in Australia. Every 20 minutes someone suffers a heart attack. Most of these could probably have been avoided if only we knew what to do. This podcast is all about helping you understand blood pressure, weight, cholesterol for better health. If you enjoy this podcast, I would be honored for a five-star review. You can share it with your family and friends. It may well save someone you love. Hi, my name is Dr. Eric Bishop and welcome to my podcast and videocast station. I do really appreciate you tuning in. Look, I thought I'd read something that came via Medscape, which is an electronic information platform that I'm connected to. They send out regular articles. This one's by Ralph Ellis, released in August 23. And I might read it because it's a nice little summary of blue light glasses and their efficacy. So, study questions if blue light blocking glasses really work. So, despite claims by their makers, blue light glasses probably don't reduce eye strain for people who spend a lot of time looking at computer screens or their phones. A new study says the glasses probably don't improve whereas sleep habits either, according to the study which was published. This week, blue light glasses are usually marketed as being able to filter out the potentially harmful effects of blue light from screens, such as eye strain, dry eyes, sleep problems. Interest in blue light glasses increased during the COVID-19 pandemic as more people stayed home and looked at their computers and phones. They're often prescribed by optometrists, in fact. The study, published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews on Thursday, looked at data collected from 17 clinical trials in six countries that recruited 619 people. Quote, We found there may be no short-term advantages with using blue light filtering spectacle lenses to reduce visual fatigue associated with computer use compared to non-blue light filtering lenses. Senior author of the review, Laura Downey, PhD, an associate professor of optometry and vision sciences at the University of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, said in a statement. Going on to say, it is also currently unclear whether these lenses affect vision quality or sleep-related outcomes and no conclusions could be drawn about any potential effects on retinal health. in the longer term. People should be aware of these findings when deciding whether to purchase these sort of spectacles. Researchers noted that one reason the glasses don't help is that the amount of blue light received from computer screens and other artificial sources is only about one thousandth of what people get from natural daylight. I didn't know that. That's a minuscule amount. On top of that, blue light lenses usually filter out only about 10-25% of that blue light. Quote ongoing, our findings do not support the prescription of blue light filtering lenses to the general population, Downey said. Eye experts say people can cut down on eye strain. by simply cutting down on the amount of time they look at screens, or by taking regular breaks. To improve sleep, stop looking at the screens for a few hours before bedtime. Researchers noted limitations in their analysis. None of the studies investigated contrast sensitivity, colour discrimination, discomfort glare, macular health, which the macular is that important, piece right at the back of the retina, which has the highest concentration of cells for vision, nor did it look at overall patient visual satisfaction. Also, the length of the different studies varied. More studies of the use of blue light glasses is needed, the researchers said. I've actually found this quite an interesting little one, particularly since some of the biohacking literature I've been reading points towards the benefit of blue light therapy, particularly in helping sleep. I think the really big take home for me was that our computer screens and TVs only expose us to one thousandth of what we would get during daylight hours and that the blue light filtering glasses only remove about 10 to 25 percent of that so-called problematic blue light the concept being that blue light is the light that triggers our wakefulness so we get it first thing in the morning if you imagine our evolutionary past we'd get it first thing in the morning and as the sunset we'd obviously be without it so a little bit of interesting Biohacking feedback there. Blue light therapy. Sorry, blue light glasses. Probably hold off on them for now. I'd like to read another article that came through on Medscape. This time by Batya Swift Yassir. And this was in early August. This particular article was on inhaling pleasant scents. during sleep was tied to a dramatic boost in cognition. So it turns out that inhaling a pleasant aroma during sleep has been linked to a dramatic improvement in memory, early research suggests. In a small randomized control trial, researchers found that when cognitively normal individuals were exposed to the scent of an essential oil for two hours every night, Over six months, they experienced a 226% improvement in memory compared with the control group who received only a trace amount of the diffused scent. In addition, functional magnetic resonance imaging, that's the magnetic resonance imaging that shows where blood's flowing and therefore the function of the brain, showed that those in the enriched group, those who got the aromas at night, had improved. functioning of the left uncinate fasciculus, an area of the brain linked to memory and cognition, which typically declines with age. In quotes, to my knowledge, that level of memory improvement is far greater than anything that has been reported for healthy older adults, and as we also found a critical memory pathway in their brains improved to a similar extent relative to unenriched older adults. Adults, senior investigator Michael Leon, PhD, professor emeritus, University of California, told the researcher, the Medscape journalist, turns out that the olfactory nerves, the nerves for smell, which sit... at the top of our nose are considered a brain's superhighway. Olfactory enrichment involves the daily exposure of individuals to multiple odorants, and this has been shown in mouse models to improve memory and neurogenesis, the investigators note. A previous study showed that exposure to individual essential oils for 30 minutes a day over three months induced neurogenesis. That means new nerves being formed in the olfactory bulb and the hippocampus. The olfactory system is the only sense that has a direct superhighway, if you like, input into the memory center areas of the brain. All the other centers have to reach the brain through other areas that you might call side streets of the brain and so consequently they have much less impact on maintaining the health of those memory centers. So think about that. The olfactory nerve sits right at the top of your nose and connects directly into your brain which is pretty amazing. The study looks like they used rose, orange, eucalyptus. For the study, the researchers randomly assigned 43 older adults aged between 60 and 85 to receive either nightly exposure to essential oil scents delivered via a diffuser or to a sham control with only trace amounts of odorants for a period of six months. The intervention group was exposed to a single odorant. delivered through a diffuser for two hours nightly, rotating through seven pleasant aromas each week. They included rose, orange, eucalyptus, lemon, peppermint, rosemary, and lavender. All participants completed a battery of tests before and after, and those exposed to those scents did remarkably better. Olfactory system function was assessed using sniffing sticks, allowing the researchers to determine if the olfactory enrichment enhanced group actually performed. Participants underwent functional MRI at baseline and again at six months, and this also showed a clear statistically significant benefit in the group who were exposed to the active sense. Well, it's all very exciting but very preliminary. I'm not sure about you. We've got plenty of research to be done to really confirm and nail this down. But for the sake of having a pleasant smelling bedroom, I'm certainly open to the possibility of putting some essential oils in the corner and running them most nights of the week. For now, though, I hope you've got something nice to smell for the rest of your day and perhaps even overnight. I'm going to wish you the very best. If you've got any queries or questions, please drop me a note. If you've got any ideas for future podcasts, you could let me know as well. Again, thank you for paying attention and listening. I do really appreciate you tuning in. So I wish you the very best. Please live as well as possible for as long as possible. Take care and bye for now. Hi. Ever wondered what your risk of heart attack is? You should. It's the single biggest killer in the Western world. We're talking one death less than every 30 minutes in Australia. One death less than every 60 seconds in the United States. Nine million deaths globally per annum. Well, how do you check your risk? Well, you can go to... www.virtualheartcheck.com.au You'll find out about your risk and what can be done beyond that to be even more precise.
