Health Archive

  • French health agency: Try to limit your exposure to mobile phones if only because we don’t have enough data to say otherwise

    French health agency: Try to limit your exposure to mobile phones if only because we don’t have enough data to say otherwise

    Posted on October 16, 2009 | No Comments
    A group of researchers in France just recommended that we all limit our exposure to wireless devices, including mobile phones, Wi-Fi, and microwaves, because we really don't understand how prolonged exposure to them can affect us. That's particularly true with mobile phones, since they've really only been around for, what, 10 years? (Obviously there were available for longer than that, but Joe Public didn't buy his first phone till a little bit later.) You can't categorically say, based on 10 years of sometimes spotty data, that “phones are bad!” or “phones are good!” We simply don't know.

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  • VIDEO: Vioguard self-sanitizing keyboard uses UV light to kill germs

    VIDEO: Vioguard self-sanitizing keyboard uses UV light to kill germs

    Posted on October 12, 2009 | No Comments
    Short of just building a keyboard entirely of Purell, this is probably the next best thing. Priced at $899, you’ll probably never see the Vioguard self-sanitizing keyboard in your own home (unless you’re really a stickler for cleanliness) but it may find a home in various laboratories or other locations where proper disinfection is a top priority.

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  • Video game addiction is hard

    Video game addiction is hard

    Posted on October 5, 2009 | No Comments
    Good God. There's an article that was published on Green Pixels not too long ago that discussed video game addiction. It's your standard-issue “question” piece, where the writer asks a question—can video games be addictive?—and goes to a variety of experts, be they doctors, industry executives, and whatnot, and tries to ascertain their opinion. What's insane, however, is this retort (of sorts) by Neils Clark, who co-wrote the book Game Adiction: The Experience and the Effects, which was published in May. He also teaches at Digipen.

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  • Your “weight” for an internet-connected scale is over! Get it?

    Your “weight” for an internet-connected scale is over! Get it?

    Posted on September 30, 2009 | No Comments
    The “WiFi Body Scale” from French company Withings records your weight and BMI and automatically uploads it to a secure website, which would be a lot easier to make fun of if it weren’t for Wii Fit, which does that stuff but doesn’t upload it anywhere.

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  • ‘Yay! Scale’ may encourage unhealthy eating habits, poor money management

    ‘Yay! Scale’ may encourage unhealthy eating habits, poor money management

    Posted on September 28, 2009 | No Comments
    This is called the “Yay! Scale” – it’s a $55 scale that has no numbers. Instead, you’re greeted with esteem-building words like hot, lovely, cute, ravishing, and stuff like that.

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  • Portable media players will have a mandatory volume limiter in Europe soon

    Portable media players will have a mandatory volume limiter in Europe soon

    Posted on September 25, 2009 | No Comments
    It's expected that the European Commission will pass legislation that will require manufacturers to include a noise limiter on portable media players. This is being done, of course, because listening to said devices at extraordinarily loud volume levels is quite dangerous; up to 10 percent of users are in danger totally destroying their hearing by keeping the players on too loud.

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  • Not only is the Xbox 360 the greatest video game system of all time, but it can also save lives. So there.

    Not only is the Xbox 360 the greatest video game system of all time, but it can also save lives. So there.

    Posted on September 24, 2009 | No Comments
    Was it the PS2 or PS3 that was banned from Iraq because of fears that Saddam Hussein's regime would co-opt the system for nefarious ends? Or maybe I made that up? It doesn't matter. The point is that, yeah, your favorite video game system (well, maybe not the Wii) is pretty damn powerful little computer. So powerful, in fact, that it can be used rather effectively by doctors and researchers.

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  • It’s a bed! It’s a wheelchair! It’s a Panasonic!

    It’s a bed! It’s a wheelchair! It’s a Panasonic!

    Posted on September 18, 2009 | No Comments
    What will they think of next? Panasonic has developed a Transformer-like electronic bed that converts to a wheelchair while the person is in it.

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  • They have developed electronic contact lenses!

    They have developed electronic contact lenses!

    Posted on September 3, 2009 | No Comments
    Electronic contact lenses? Sure, why not? Developed by researchers at the University of Washington at Seattle, the lenses are kitted out with all sorts of built-in electronics and an LED. The uses right now for such lenses are fairly limited, but in the future you can expect things like internal body monitors (blood sugar level reporting is the given example), translation, and, yes, improved gaming. Oh, the days when being a low ping bastard was your biggest advantage!

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  • Crazy but real: Device lets blind people see using their tongue

    Crazy but real: Device lets blind people see using their tongue

    Posted on September 1, 2009 | No Comments
    Invention of the year? Quite possibly! It's the BrainPort, and it, in effect, gives blind people the ability to see by using the nerve endings on their tongue. It sounds weird, yes.

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  • First-of-its-kind Internet addiction treatment center opens in the U.S.

    First-of-its-kind Internet addiction treatment center opens in the U.S.

    Posted on August 20, 2009 | No Comments
    Raise your hand if you consider yourself an Internet addict. Go ahead, no one here will judge you. (How could we: all of us are online at least 12 hours per day.) The thing is, if you feel like your addiction actually represents a legitimate problem, fear not, for a new “detox” center, reStart Internet Addiction Recovery Program, has opened near Seattle. It's the first of its kind in the U.S., and it will “help internet and video game addicts overcome their dependence on gaming, gambling, chatting, texting and other aspects of Internet Addiction.”

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  • Qualcomm SSLS: Wireless + Medicine and how the iPhone ties them together

    Qualcomm SSLS: Wireless + Medicine and how the iPhone ties them together

    Posted on July 28, 2009 | No Comments
    Speaking at Qualcomm’s Smart Services Leadership Summit, Dr. Eric Topol’s introductory presentation is focused on the role of wireless devices in the medical field. Earlier this year at WWDC, Apple demoed the capabilities and value of the iPhone to the medical community for monitoring purposes. There are various medical devices in the works and already [...]

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