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	<title>Acne Einstein</title>
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	<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com</link>
	<description>Rational advice on alternative and natural acne cures</description>
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		<title>Study Finds No Difference Between Proactiv, Murad And Maxclarity</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-finds-no-difference-between-proactiv-murad-and-maxclarity/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-finds-no-difference-between-proactiv-murad-and-maxclarity/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 08 May 2013 06:22:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Topical treatements]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Benzoyl peroxide]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[maxclarity]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[murad]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[proactiv]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1088</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Recently published study shows no difference between Proactiv Solution, Murad Acne Complex and MaxClarity acne treatments – at least as far as results and side-effects are concerned. You could almost say that people with acne are superstitious. Many hold this weird belief that they just have to find the perfect product for their skin, and then they will finally get clear. The market happily complies and has produced countless acne treatments where the only difference is found on the label. The thing is that your skin doesn’t care about the label; it cares about the ingredients in the product. While this may seem like an obvious point, people often miss it. They may start off trying Proactiv, and when that fails they move on to Murad. When Murad doesn’t bring results they try yet another product. But if you strip away labels and packaging you would be hard-pressed to tell the difference between these products, because the formulations are very similar. And you shouldn’t expect wildly different results from products with very similar formulations. A paper recently published in the Journal of Drugs in Dermatology confirms this. The paper reports of two studies comparing MaxClarity to Proactiv and MaxClarity to Murad. These were split-face studies, where the participants applied one product on the left side of the face and the other product on the right side. The results show a similar reduction in acne with all the products. Unfortunately the abstract doesn’t give details on how much acne went down. Another paper on MaxClarity showed about 60% reduction in pimple count. While a comprehensive review paper showed about 40% reduction in acne with benzoyl peroxide alone and about 50% reduction with the combination of benzoyl peroxide and salicylic acid. I would expect the results fall into that ballpark. The point I want to make is there was no difference in results or side-effects between all 3 products. Insanity is going the same things and expecting different results A quote attributed to Einstein says “Insanity is doing the same things over and over and expecting different results”. The same could be said here. The chances of getting different results from products with very similar formulations are very slim indeed. And any difference noted most likely comes down to other factors, such as dietary changes or stress levels. So don’t be insane. Do something different. Topical antioxidants are something new, and something that’s quite likely to make a difference on your skin. And if you are looking for product recommendations, see Exposed Skincare. It combines the proven effect of benzoyl peroxide with topical antioxidants.<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>Upgrade Your Happiness With This 2-Minute Exercise</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/upgrade-your-happiness-with-this-2-minute-exercise/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/upgrade-your-happiness-with-this-2-minute-exercise/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 03 May 2013 11:53:37 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Stress and emotional health]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[gratitude]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1073</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[An influential psychology paper shows how 2-minute gratitude exercise can upgrade your happiness and emotional life. Gratitude is one of those words that makes me cringe. It’s been polluted by decades of self-help peddling and nonsense. Regular readers know I’m not a big fan of alternative medicine, mainly because they are more dedicated to their own ideology than finding out what really works. The same can be said of the self-help movement. Fortunately, the quest for happiness and wellbeing doesn’t lie on the shoulders of self-help gurus. Psychology researchers are actively trying to uncover the keys to happiness and emotional wellbeing. Today I want to talk about a seminal paper on gratitude. The paper showed that regular gratitude exercises have consistent positive effect on emotional health and wellbeing. And you can get the results with as little as 2 minutes per day. Gratitude exercise increases happiness In a paper (PDF) Dr. Robert Emmons from the University of California described 3 studies his research group did on gratitude. In the first study the participants were divided into 3 difference groups: gratitude, hassles and control (neutral). Once a week for 10 weeks, the participants were then asked to write a brief report (just a few lines). For each group the instructions given were: Gratitude. There are many things in our lives, both large and small, that we might be grateful about. Think back over the past week and write down on the lines below up to five things in your life that you are grateful or thankful for. Hassles. Hassles are irritants—things that annoy or bother you. They occur in various domains of life, including relationships, work, school, housing, finances, health, and so forth. Think back over today and, on the lines below, list up to five hassles that occurred in your life. Control. What were some of the events or circumstances that affected you in the past week? Think back over the past week and write down on the lines below the five events that had an impact on you. The researchers tracked results with a weekly questionnaire that queried the emotional status of the participants. After 10 weeks, the people in the gratitude group felt about 10% more optimistic about their future and life as a whole. They also reported more positive emotions and fewer negative emotions as compared to the other two groups. As expected, the group that focused on hassles showed more negative emotions than the other groups. The gratitude group also experienced fewer physical symptoms of illness and were more likely to give aid when requested. The gratitude group also averages almost 1.5 hours more exercise per week than the other two groups. These aren&#8217;t mind blowing results, but considering that the participants did the exercise only once a week, I would call these results impressive. Study 2 – Daily practice The second study was similar to the first study, except for a few differences. The participants were asked to do the exercise daily for 2 weeks, and the control group from the first study was replaced by downward social comparison group, with the following instructions: It is human nature to compare ourselves to others. We may be better off than others in some ways, and less fortunate than other people in other ways. Think about ways in which you are better off than others, things that you have that they don’t, and write these down in the spaces below. The reason for changing the control group was to see if the effect was really due to gratitude or ‘just feeling better than others’. The results clearly show increase in happiness depends on gratitude. The social comparison group didn&#8217;t report any change in happiness, whereas the gratitude group again reported better mood. As in the first study, focusing on daily hassles reduced happiness. The difference between the gratitude and the hassles groups was larger in the second study than in the first study. This suggests that daily gratitude practice gives better results than weekly practice. That in itself is not surprising, but there are limits to this. Another study compared practicing gratitude 3 times a week with once a week. Those who did the gratitude exercise once a week were happier than those who did it 3 times a week. This could be down to habituation. The gratitude practice becomes just another routine you do and loses its purpose. So if you are going to do gratitude exercises, do them like you mean it. Don’t just write stuff down while your mind wonders somewhere else – probably worrying about daily hassles. Pay attention to what you are doing, and do your best to feel something (other than boredom). In this study there were no changes in exercise volume or other health behaviors – perhaps due to short time span. Study 3 – People with chronic health problems The third study was similar to the study 2, but again with a few changes. The time span was extended from 2 weeks to 3 weeks. And instead of healthy college students, the participants were adults with neuromuscular disorders. While neuromuscular disorders are not fatal they can cause wasting of muscles, spasms or even paralysis – so people suffering from them have a good reason to be unhappy with their lives. The gratitude group completed a similar report than in the studies 1 and 2. The control group didn&#8217;t write any report, they were simply asked to fill the emotional state questionnaire once a day. The results show that gratitude exercises work even when people have a very good reason for being dissatisfied with their lives. The gratitude group showed significant increase in happiness and reduction in overall negative emotions, whereas the control group showed the opposite results (decrease in happiness, more negative emotions). Aside from happiness, the gratitude group also reported more satisfaction with their lives, felt more optimistic about the upcoming week, and felt more connected with others. They also slept almost 10% more and reported less physical pain. Simple 2-minute gratitude exercise Now that we&#8217;ve established that gratitude [...]<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Study Shows How To Breathe Yourself Happy</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-shows-how-to-breathe-yourself-happy/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-shows-how-to-breathe-yourself-happy/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 22 Apr 2013 06:33:39 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Stress and emotional health]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Uncategorized]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[anxiety]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[stress]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1061</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Controlling stress and emotions is one of the hardest challenges for acne patients. It’s not like someone checks with you whether you want to get stressed or whether you want to have a bout of depression with your ice cream. Stress and emotional responses are largely involuntary, and damage control after the fact is often the best you can do, that is, if you remember to do it. Practices like meditation can, over long term, change your habitual reactions, but this takes a lot of time and effort. Fortunately, a study titled Respiratory feedback in the generation of emotion offers new hope. It showed that different emotions are associated with different breathing patterns. The study found that people breathe differently when they are angry to when they are happy, and that if you match your breathing pattern to the one associated with happiness, you start to feel happier. I’ve written earlier how your emotions respond to what your body does, for example forcing yourself to smile makes you feel happier. Breathing is another one of these feedback loops between the mind and the body, technically known as peripheral feedback. Change your breathing, change your emotions The study was done in two parts. In the first part the participants were asked to generate few specific emotions (joy, anger, fear, and sadness) by changing their breathing patterns and recalling memories that trigger those emotions. Afterwards they were asked to fill a questionnaire that queried attributes of breathing (depth, frequency, regularity, etc). The breathing pattern associated with each emotion was remarkably consistent across all the participants. Furthermore, these patterns were consistent with the patterns observed in other studies where emotions were elicited with movies. This suggests there’s ‘a signature breathing pattern’ associated with each emotion. In the second part of the study the researchers wanted to see if changing breathing patterns also changes emotional state. And indeed it does. A second group of participants was asked to modify their breathing patterns based on the findings from the first part of the study.  So every participant was asked to do happiness breathing, anger breathing, etc. They were then asked to fill a questionnaire to elicit their emotional state. The researchers found that each breathing pattern reliably shifted emotions towards the emotion associated with the pattern. So happiness breathing made people happier and anger breathing made them feel angrier. Signature breathing patterns Here are the breathing patterns used in the second part, so you can try this at home: Joy: &#8220;Breathe and exhale slowly and deeply through the nose; your breathing is very regular and your ribcage relaxed.&#8221; Anger: &#8220;Breathe and exhale quickly through the nose; slightly deeper than regular breathing amplitude. Your breathing is slightly irregular with some tremors and your ribcage is very tense.&#8221; Fear: “Breathe and exhale quickly from the top of your ribcage; with normal amplitude. Your breathing is slightly irregular with some tremors and your ribcage very tense.” Sadness: “Breathe and exhale through the nose with a normal amplitude and pace. Your ribcage is slightly tense, and there are some sighs in your expiration.” I would add to the list the laughter pattern. Breathe in fairly deeply through the nose and exhale through the mouth in small ‘bursts’, like what happens when you laugh (ha, ha, ha, ha…). Gives you control over your emotions I’m the first one to admit that breathing alone won’t cause massive shifts in your emotional state. So don’t expect to be flooded with ecstatic joy if you try the ‘joy pattern’. But it starts shifting your emotional state, and this breaks the hold stress or negative emotion may have on you. Most importantly, this should work reliably and consistently and thus give you some measure of control over your emotional state. If you practice and turn this into a daily habit, I’m sure this could help your skin a lot. Stress is one of the things that can aggravate acne. Stress, depression and anxiety all release a neurotransmitter known as substance P. While there are no human studies on acne, one study showed that injecting substance P into the skin triggered a psoriatic flare – even in people not prone to getting psoriasis. Cell culture studies have also shown that skin cells respond to substance P by producing more sebum. In conclusion, there is some truth to the time-worn advice to take a deep breath. It turns out that we breathe and do different things with our bodies when we experience different emotions. You can get more control over your emotions by taking advantage of these feedback loops between the mind and the body. Did you like this article? Then subscribe to my newsletter and get notified when I publish the next one; just enter your email into the form below. And make sure to check out my book Clear for Life for a complete solution to acne. Finally, did you try these techniques? How did they work for you? Do you know any other ways to keep control of your emotions? Please share in the comments below. Related off-site articles Negative Emotions In Response To Daily Stressors Can Take A Toll On Long-Term Psychological Well-Being (medicalnewstoday.com) Mindfulness And Emotional Well-Being (medicalnewstoday.com)<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>New Study Shows Probiotic Supplements Reduce Acne</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/new-study-shows-probiotic-supplements-reduce-acne/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/new-study-shows-probiotic-supplements-reduce-acne/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 20 Apr 2013 06:48:09 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Gut issues]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[antibiotics]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[probiotics]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1053</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[According to a new study published at the Journal of cutaneous medicine and surgery, probiotic supplementation may fight acne and reduce side-effects from oral antibiotics. This is going to be a rather short post as the details of the study are in short supply. But this is an important topic, so I figured you should know about this. Anyway, in the study the researchers divided 45 18- to 35-year old women into three groups. The group A got a probiotic supplement, the group B got an oral antibiotic (minocycline) and the group C got both (antibiotic + probiotic). The participants were followed for 12 weeks. Unfortunately the study abstract doesn’t give out detailed results and the full-text version is not available online (when will these people move to the digital age…). But here’s what we have: All the groups showed statistically significant improvements at week 4 and kept improving with the subsequent follow up visits at weeks 8 and 12. At weeks 8 and 12 group C showed statistically significant improvements over the other groups. This means their acne had reduced more than in the other groups. The abstract made no mention of the differences between groups A and B. Looks like the group B (antibiotics) got somewhat better results than the group A (probiotics). We can infer this from the fact that, when compared to the group C, the group B had higher ‘p-value’ than the group A. But it’s likely that groups A and B got similar results with the antibiotic group showing little bit better results. The people (13%) from the group B had to stop the study as they developed vaginal candidiasis. Presumably nobody in the other groups withdrew. The study authors conclude: Probiotics may be considered a therapeutic option or adjunct for acne vulgaris by providing a synergistic antiinflammatory effect with systemic antibiotics while also reducing potential adverse events secondary to chronic antibiotic use. I’m not surprised that taking probiotics helps acne. There’s fairly good evidence to suggest a link between gut issues and skin problems. Another recent study showed a correlation between Helicobacter pylori infection (in the stomach) and acne rosacea, as did this review of the subject. Probiotics can help with gut problems, but they are by no means a magic bullet and fully addressing gut issues usually takes more than a supplement. Still, they have a role to play, and it’s encouraging to see some clinical evidence backing them. Probiotics can help with gut problems, but they are by no means a magic bullet and fully addressing gut issues usually takes more than a supplement. Still, they have a role to play, and it’s encouraging to see some clinical evidence backing them. Points to take home: If you take oral antibiotics, then make sure to also take a probiotic supplement. You’ll likely get better results and suffer fewer side-effects. It’s possible probiotic supplements help with acne, but I wouldn’t bet my house on it yet. To say for sure, we need more evidence from better quality studies. Related off-site articles Can Probiotics Help When Antibiotics Are Needed? (smartlivingnetwork.com)<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
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		<title>Flax Bread Recipe, A Skin Friendly Bread Substitute</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/flax-bread-recipe-a-skin-friendly-bread-substitute/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/flax-bread-recipe-a-skin-friendly-bread-substitute/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 16 Apr 2013 11:25:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Diet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[flaxseeds]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[recipe]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1037</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Giving up bread is probably one of the hardest dietary changes for many acne patients. Most people in Western cultures have grown up eating bread. As food it’s easy, convenient, portable and fast, and that’s why we are so addicted to it. Unfortunately bread can be a real disaster for your skin. As far as your body is concerned most breads are not that different from sugar. The carbohydrates are digested and absorbed quickly, and in people with insulin resistance this can cause insulin spikes, which of course makes hormonal acne go crazy. Most bread also contains gluten, which can be a problem for some people. Luckily there are bread substitutes that give you the taste and feel of bread (or thereof) without harming your skin. Today I wanted to share one such recipe with you: flaxseed bread. One of the best things about this bread is that you can go from raw ingredients to warm bread at hand in just 15 minutes. This version of flax bread also tastes fairly similar than ‘real’ bread. Another good thing is that you can do this in a microwave oven – a real plus if you live in a part of the world where ovens are not that common. Here’s what you need: 1 cup flaxseeds ½ cup chopped walnuts ½ tsp baking powder ½ tsp baking soda ½ tsp salt 2 large eggs (I use omega-3 eggs to improve the fatty acid balance) 2 tbsp olive oil 2/3 cup water 1 tbsp vanilla (I used liquid vanilla extract) And here’s what you do with them: Grind the flaxseeds and chop the walnuts In bowl #1 mix all the dry ingredients In bowl #2 beat the eggs lightly and mix with the other wet ingredients Until you get something like this. Then combine everything in bowl #3. Grease a microwave casserole or another microwave safe dish (I use olive oil). The dish should be about 8 inch in diameter, so that when you pour in the mixture it doesn’t get too thick, or deep (0.5 to 1 inch is good). Pour everything into the greased dish. I have some dish made of silicone, it&#8217;s oven and microwave safe. Nuke with full power for 5 to 6 minutes. And you should get something like this. You can also try adding some cinnamon to give this a bit of a different flavor. This recipe yields about 10 servings. Here are the nutrition facts for a single serving (according to nutritiondata.com): 173 kcal 15g fat 2g saturated fat 4.4g omega-3 3.6g omega-6 7g carbohydrates 5g protein And here’s the food summary from nutritiondata.com As you can see, this bread is 72% fat and only 15% carbs, and most of the fat is either mono- or polyunsaturated, so this is very good for blood sugar and insulin levels. Not to mention that it tastes good and is ready in 15 to 20 minutes. Related articles Paleo Herbed Bread (recipesrevised.wordpress.com)<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>3 Ways To Indulge In Sweets Without Harming Your Skin</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/3-ways-to-indulge-in-sweets-without-harming-your-skin/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/3-ways-to-indulge-in-sweets-without-harming-your-skin/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 15 Apr 2013 11:21:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Diet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[insulin]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1014</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[People with acne occasionally face difficult challenges, sugar for example. There’s no doubt that sugar contributes to acne, so you should do your best to avoid it. On the other hand humans seem to come hardwired with sweet tooth, and I’m sure you&#8217;ve faced times when sugar cravings become almost overwhelming. In this post I’ll share a few ways you can indulge your sweet tooth without harming your skin (at least that much). So you can have your cake and eat it too. Fruits and smoothies Fruits are nature’s candy. They have sugar to ease those cravings, but because of all the fiber most fruits fall into low to medium GI range. Some good low GI fruits include: Apples and pears Cherries Berries: blueberries and strawberries Citrus fruits, like grapefruits and oranges Grapes You can also turn fruits into healthy smoothies. Try the following recipes: Banana chocolate shake 1 or 2 bananas ½ cup of coconut milk or 1 cup of soy milk (or other milk substitute) 1 ½ tablespoons of cocoa powder Banana strawberry smoothie 2 bananas 1 ½ cup of coconut milk (or other milk substitute) Handful of mild tasting green, leafy vegetables (optional) Handful or two of strawberries (frozen or fresh) While these recipes call for bananas that have somewhat higher GI, sugar absorption is blunted by the other ingredients, so are still easy on blood sugar level and don’t cause massive insulin spikes. If you make the smoothies with coconut milk they are high in fat and calories and thus make for excellent meals. Artificial sweeteners You can also substitute sugar for artificial sweeteners. Artificial sweeteners taste sweet but have no or negligible effect on blood sugar level. Artificial sweeteners are a controversial subject in the natural health industry, with some people claiming they can cause a wide range of health problems, especially neurological problems. I personally don’t find such claims very credible. Most of the controversy surrounds aspartame. Yet, the research on safety of aspartame has been reviewed by food safety authorities of several countries who have all accepted aspartame into the food supply. For the allegations against aspartame to be true, all the food safety authorities need to willingly conspire against their own people and suppress ‘damaging information’ from the public. Furthermore, and more importantly, it assumes that scientists working on food safety issues are either part of the conspiracy or too stupid to notice the dangers of aspartame. I find this highly unlikely. The problem with this is that a scientist who would ‘expose’ the dangers of aspartame would gain instant reputation and authority. Despite these incentives, and relative simplicity of showing aspartame is dangerous, nobody has convincingly demonstrated it. That’s why I don’t put much stock in such claims. Reduce overall carbohydrate intake The total insulin burden on your body depends largely on how much carbohydrates you eat. The more carbohydrates you eat, the more your body needs to produce insulin, and the more prone you are to getting acne (huge oversimplification, but serves our purpose for now). So what you could do is to make your meals mostly of fat and protein and then have something sweet for dessert, perhaps the banana chocolate shake from above. Since your meals are low in carbohydrates having something sweet after the meal won’t overload your body with carbohydrates and insulin. That’s it, with these three tips it’s possible to occasionally indulge your sweet tooth without damaging your skin. What’s your favorite way to satisfy sugar cravings without harming your skin? Share in the comments below! Related off-site articles On Dispelling Rumors of a Sweeter Death (kentuckychemistry.wordpress.com) Lift weights to lower blood sugar? White muscle helps keep blood glucose levels under control (sciencedaily.com)<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>Science Shows Coffee May Reduce Acne</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/science-coffee-reduce-acne/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/science-coffee-reduce-acne/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 08 Apr 2013 05:41:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Diet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hormones]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[insulin]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[insulin resistance]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=1003</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Research shows that drinking coffee regularly reduces insulin and blood sugar levels while caffeine does the opposite. The likely implication is that coffee can protect against acne whereas other caffeinated drinks could be bad for your skin. In this post I’m going to explain what the science says about the effect of coffee and caffeine on acne, and what this means to you. Brief on insulin-acne connection Let’s start with a brief recap on how insulin and high blood sugar level contributes to acne. When blood sugar level increases the pancreas responds by releasing the hormone insulin. Insulin in turn stimulates the release of other acne-causing hormones, such as insulin like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) and androgens. These hormones increase sebum production and skin cell growth, leading to blocked pores and acne. For more detailed explanation, please see the hormonal acne post. The implication is that anything that has a persistent negative effect on insulin level (i.e. causes insulin resistance/increases insulin level) can be bad for your skin. This is the reason sugar and milk cause acne. Coffee has well-documented effects on both blood sugar and insulin levels, and these are the most likely mechanisms by which it affects acne. So let’s see what the science says about the effect on coffee on blood sugar health. The effect of regular coffee consumption on blood sugar health One of the most impressive studies I found was a Dutch study on older people. The study included 1312 over 50 years old Dutch people. The researchers administered an oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT) at the start of the study and another one 6 to 7 years later.  OGTT measures how well your body handles sugar and involves drinking a cup of water with 75 grams of sugar (for reference 20 oz/590 ml bottle of Coke has 65g of sugar) and having blood sugar and insulin levels measured 2 hours later. Caffeine consumption was tracked with a food frequency questionnaire. The study showed that regular coffee consumption was very good for blood sugar health. This image shows the incidence of impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) vs. coffee consumption. The blue bars indicate the percentage of people who developed impaired glucose tolerance (IGT) during the study. IGT is diagnosed when your blood sugar level remains abnormally high at the 2 hour mark of the OGTT. It means your body had trouble clearing sugar from bloodstream and indicates insulin resistance. The red line shows risk ratio between groups, with the 2 or fewer cups per day being the reference point. Those who drank 7 or more cups per day had risk ratio of 0.44, so they were 56% less likely to develop IGT than those who drank 2 or fewer cups per day. Makes sense? The paper also contained an interesting table that showed the change in blood sugar health parameters when daily coffee consumption goes up by 5 cups. Note that negative values mean improvement, as negative values refers to lower, and thus better, values. 2-hour glucose -8.8% Fasting glucose -0.8% 2-hour insulin -19.7% Fasting insulin -5.6% Insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) -6.3% Source: Coffee consumption and incidence of impaired fasting glucose, impaired glucose tolerance, and type 2 diabetes: the Hoorn Study. The ‘2-hour’ values refer to measurements in OGTT and thus represent what happens after a meal. Those are fairly significant improvements, especially the nearly 20% lower insulin level. This is by no means an isolated result, 19 out of 22 such studies show similar results. So there’s overwhelming evidence to show that drinking coffee regularly lowers blood sugar and insulin levels, and thus is indirectly good for acne. Caffeinated beverages may have the opposite effect Though drinking coffee is good for blood sugar and insulin levels, caffeine alone may have the opposite effect. There has long been a paradox in coffee research. Epidemiological studies (like the Dutch study above) show protective effect from coffee, but short-term studies where participants are given caffeine almost uniformly show caffeine causes insulin resistance and higher blood sugar level. The implication is that caffeine in coffee impairs glucose tolerance but over time something else in coffee offsets this negative effect. It could be the antioxidants in coffee or something else, scientist haven’t figured it out yet. From this you could conclude that decaffeinated coffee is the best choice. It, presumably, still has the beneficial substances in coffee but has minimal amounts of caffeine. A 2006 study showed this indeed is the case. In this study 11 participants got regular coffee (RCOF), decaffeinated coffee (DECAF), a caffeine pill (CAF), or a placebo pill (PL) on 4 separate occasions. 60 minutes later OGTT was administered. Here are the results: Source: The Glucose Intolerance Induced by Caffeinated Coffee Ingestion Is Less Pronounced than That Due to Alkaloid Caffeine in Men. Note that in those graphs the time ‘0 min’ refers to when caffeine/coffee/etc. was ingested, and time ’60 min’ when the sugar drink was given. As you can see, ingestion of decaffeinated coffee resulted in the lowest blood sugar and insulin levels and ingestion of pure caffeine resulted in the highest levels, with regular coffee being in the middle. And we are not talking about small differences here. The researchers calculated ‘area under curve’ figures (a good estimate of total amount of insulin or glucose in the blood during 2 hours) for all the cases. Compared to RCOF, DECAF resulted in about 50% less glucose in the blood during the 2 hours, and a whopping 69% reduction when compared to CAF. In the case of insulin, DECAF resulted in 23% lower insulin load than RCOF and 38% lower when compared to CAF. This was a very small study (only 11 participants), but I’m using it as an example for two reasons: bigger studies on caffeine have shown similar results, and it’s one of the few studies that compared regular coffee, decaffeinated coffee, pure caffeine and placebo. Implications The conclusion from this line of research is that consuming caffeine before a meal results in higher [...]<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>How Stupidity And Irrationality Prolongs Your Suffering And Wastes Money</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/how-stupidity-and-irrationality-prolongs-your-suffering-and-wastes-money/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/how-stupidity-and-irrationality-prolongs-your-suffering-and-wastes-money/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 01 Apr 2013 09:36:24 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical thinking]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=983</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Let me start this post by making a bold claim. Critical thinking is by far the most important skill you can learn, as far as getting over acne is concerned. I believe that critical thinking is more important than understanding diet and nutrition. And ignorance and lack of critical thinking adds years to your misery. In fact, if a drug would have the same side-effects as ignorance, it would be pulled out of the market and people would sue the company to bankruptcy. I got the inspiration for this post while reading a comment on a recent post, Debating Homeopathy Part II, at the Neurological blog. The commenter recounted how his earlier ignorance led him to believe in homeopathy. This got me to thinking how ignorance and lack of critical thinking about acne just prolongs suffering and ends up wasting tons of time and money. In this post I want to offer some remedies and to cover a few common ways we &#8216;get it wrong&#8217;. I should say that when I talk about ignorance I don&#8217;t mean stupidity. The ignorance I speak of has no bearing on intelligence or any other personal characteristics. The ignorance I&#8217;m talking about is actually the &#8216;default mode&#8217; of the human brain. Evolution hardwired the human brain to jump to conclusions and recognize patterns where none exists, called patternicity. What we didn&#8217;t evolve were critical thinking skills. Brain-power is expensive, and critical thinking just wasn&#8217;t important for the survival of our ancestors (I&#8217;m assuming). Hence evolution resulted in believing, rather than critical thinking, being the default response to new information. The problem is that today we are bombarded with an endless torrent of information, much of which is pure nonsense. And this is where the default mode of the brain gets you into trouble. In the about me page I told the story of how I spent 8 years trying all sorts of alternative and natural treatments. While I learned, sort of, a lot during this time, most of the 8 years was wasted on trying highly implausible treatments that, in retrospect, had no chance of working. All because the critical thinking faculties in my brain were in massive #FAIL mode. The point of this post is not to attack your personal beliefs or anything like that. I hope that you can learn from my mistakes and cut the time it takes you to get over acne. I also hope to point out that skepticism is not a dirty word &#8211; as it&#8217;s often portrayed in the alternative and natural health circles. Being skeptical means looking at evidence with an open mind, as much as humanely possible, and being willing to change your beliefs when they are shown wrong. With that in mind, let&#8217;s go and see a few common ways we tend to get it wrong &#8211; and suffer for it. I worked for me This is the mother of all fallacies. Because when you &#8216;see something with your own eyes&#8217; it&#8217;s hard to dismiss it. This stems from the fact as humans we fancy ourselves as unbiased and impartial observers. We like to think that we see reality as it is, without any distortions or biases. Furthermore, many people like to think their brains as infallible supercomputers. The reality, unfortunately, is not so kind to our collective delusions. The human brain, on its default mode, is extremely bad at coming to impartial conclusions. We tend to see patterns in meaningless noise and then come up with explanations to those patterns. The face on Mars is a good example of this. Looked from a certain angle, it really looks like there&#8217;s a face on Mars, but in reality it&#8217;s just a coincidence of how light and shadows plays on the terrain. And when you look at it from a different angle there&#8217;s really nothing there. Many people take this just as an amusing curiosity, but conspiracy theorists take this as &#8216;evidence&#8217; that there&#8217;s life on Mars and that the government conspires to hide The Truth (I sometimes wonder if we are talking about the same government that couldn&#8217;t hide president&#8217;s blow job??). Sure, the face on Mars is an extreme example, but the same principle applies to more everyday moments. Acne tends to be somewhat cyclical, meaning it waxes and wanes of time. Let&#8217;s say that you count your pimples every day for a month and find that on average you have 5 pimples, so this is your baseline acne severity. But you also have good times and bad times. Let&#8217;s say that during good times you only have 1 or 2 pimples, but on bad times you can have as many as 10 to 15. This natural variation happens without you doing anything. Fooled by regression to mean During one of the bad times you freak out and decide &#8216;you gotta do something about this&#8217;. So you go online and find Pimple Vanish 2000 cream and Detox Vacuum 5000 supplement. The seller claims they are clinically-proven, and the website features tens and tens of happy testimonials. Thinking this must be legit you decide to order a few month&#8217;s supply. Two weeks goes by and behold your acne is going away. &#8220;It&#8217;s a miracle!&#8221;, you write to the manufacturer (who promptly adds your email as another &#8216;testimonial&#8217;). Most people would conclude that Pimple Vanish 2000 and Detox Vacuum 5000 combination really works. Not so fast. It&#8217;s possible that the remedies worked, but you can&#8217;t conclude it from your experience. It&#8217;s at least as likely, if not even more so, that your acne just reverted to the &#8216;baseline&#8217;. It&#8217;s called regression to mean and it&#8217;s one of the reasons anecdotal observations (testimonials, user reports, etc) are inherently unreliable. After your acne goes through a good phase it eventually cycles to another bad phase. That&#8217;s when people post to forums that the treatment &#8216;stopped working&#8217; or that acne somehow became resistant to the treatment. In short-term observations it&#8217;s impossible to tell regression to mean apart from real improvement. They both look real, but regression to mean is just an illusion caused [...]<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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		<title>Study Shows Chocolate Aggravates Immune Response Against Acne Bacteria</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-shows-chocolate-aggravates-immune-response-against-acne-bacteria/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-shows-chocolate-aggravates-immune-response-against-acne-bacteria/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 27 Mar 2013 10:17:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Diet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[News and research]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bacteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[chocolate]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[diet]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[inflammation]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=975</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Recently published study found that eating chocolate increases the immune response against acne-causing bacteria. This could explain why chocolate seems to cause acne for some people. I really don’t like this study. My family was just visiting from Finland and they brought some chocolate over, knowing how I like it. Most of it is still in the fridge, tempting me, and in my mind I’m imagining relaxing and savoring moments with a good book and chocolate. Then the %*#*$! Dutch researchers publish a study showing chocolate is bad for my acne! Could they not wait until I had finished the chocolate?? Some people just have no manners, lol. Anyway, back to the point. The researchers showed that exposure to chocolate primes human blood cells to having much stronger immune response against Propionibacterium acne (P. Acnes) or Staphylcoccus aureus bacteria. The study had two parts. In the first part they took blood cells from volunteers with acne and grew them either in a growth medium or in chocolate. Then they added the two bacteria into the mix and measured how much inflammatory cytokines the cells produce. Cytokines are sort of signaling or communication molecules. The ones measured in this study act as sort of alarm signals for the immune system. They attract immune system killer cells into the area. Here are the results from the first part: Source: Chocolate consumption modulates cytokine production in healthy individuals As you can see, cells cultivated in chocolate medium showed much, much stronger immune response. In the second part of the study they asked the volunteers to eat 50g of milk chocolate for 4 days. The researchers then collected blood cells from the volunteers and stimulated them with the two bacteria. Here are the results. Source: Chocolate consumption modulates cytokine production in healthy individuals As expected, the results are not as clear cut as in the first part, but we still see a clear increase in some of the measured cytokines. Before refers to values before the 4 days chocolate diet and after, well, after the chocolate diet. The lines represent values for each study participant; there were only 7 in this very small study. As you can see, there’s always a lot of noise in measurements like these, but the figures b and e show a statistically significant difference from before and after. It’s hard to know what to make of this yes, as this was such a small study. If the results hold up in larger studies, this could be one explanation for why chocolate causes acne. Ugh, these results make me depressed. I guess that means I have to raid the fridge for some delicious chocolate. Reference: Chocolate consumption modulates cytokine production in healthy individuals<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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<a class='yarpp-thumbnail' href='http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-rosemary-extract-may-reduce-acne/' title='Study: Rosemary Extract May Reduce Acne'>
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<a class='yarpp-thumbnail' href='http://www.acneeinstein.com/change-your-bacteria-cure-acne/' title='Change Your Bacteria – Cure Acne?'>
<img width="120" height="120" src="http://www.acneeinstein.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/bacteria-acne-study-120x120.jpg" class="attachment-yarpp-thumbnail wp-post-image" alt="bacteria-acne-study" /><span class="yarpp-thumbnail-title">Change Your Bacteria – Cure Acne?</span></a>
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		<title>Study: Rosemary Extract May Reduce Acne</title>
		<link>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-rosemary-extract-may-reduce-acne/</link>
		<comments>http://www.acneeinstein.com/study-rosemary-extract-may-reduce-acne/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 26 Mar 2013 06:20:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Seppo</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[News and research]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bacteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[inflammation]]></category>
		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.acneeinstein.com/?p=962</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[A recently published study showed that rosemary extract can reduce bacterial inflammation linked to acne. Research is still preliminary, but given the role inflammation plays in acne this could be beneficial in acne. If you’ve been reading my earlier posts, you probably already know the role inflammation plays in acne. The best scientific evidence available shows that inflammatory damage to sebum is the trigger that starts the acne formation process. It creates an ideal environment for P. Acnes bacteria to colonize the blocked skin pore. Toxins in the bacteria cell walls irritate the skin and exponentially increase inflammation. This turns a blocked pore into an aggravated pimple. Researchers in Taipei Medical University in Taiwan showed that rosemary extracts can counter this bacterially aggravated inflammation. Using mice, they found that injection of rosemary extracts into mice ears reduced swelling and inflammatory response to P. Acnes bacteria. This effect is not restricted to rosemary. The same researchers showed that wild bitter melon extracts also work. A cell culture study showed similar results with vitamin B3. This is potentially interesting for people with acne. At least two studies have shown that acne patients have a much stronger inflammatory response to P. Acnes bacteria than people with clear skin. Why this happens is not yet known. Studies have shown higher expression (read: activity) in genes related to inflammation in people with acne. Recently I also wrote about a study that showed people with acne may have ‘bad’ strains of the bacteria as opposed to ‘good’ strains in people with clear skin. Regardless of the mechanism, tempering the inflammatory response to P. Acnes bacteria should reduce inflammatory acne. Back to the Taiwanese study. If you are at all familiar with how scientific research works, then you know that this study isn’t much to write home about – at least yet. First, this was an animal study, and what happens in animals doesn’t always translate to humans. Second, this didn’t even look at acne. This study looked at a mechanism behind acne. This showed it’s plausible that rosemary could treat acne, but plausible is not the same as effective. So don’t go running to buy those rosemary essential oils just yet. I normally wouldn’t even mention a study like this, but this looks like one of those studies the media could latch on and start hyping – depending on how active the University PR department is. So I just wanted to give you a heads up. On a totally unrelated matter, my apologies for not writing anything for a while. Last week we got married with my girlfriend and my family came over from Finland (I live in Thailand). Needless to say, things have been rather hectic over the past few weeks, and I’m happy to get back to normal life.<div class='yarpp-related-rss'>
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