Your Health: May 6, 2002

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HEART TO HEART Equality of the sexes, it seems, does not extend to matters of the heart. A new study suggests that men and women have strikingly different vulnerabilities to heart attack. For women, emotional stress from, say, divorce or the death of a loved one is more likely than physical stress to trigger sudden cardiac arrest. For men, the opposite is true. What accounts for the difference? Researchers suspect that levels of adrenaline, which can cause the heart to beat abnormally fast, probably shoot up in women when they're upset and in men when they're doing the heavy lifting.

THE MILKY WAY No one is saying you should rush out for a milk shake, but a controversial study suggests that consuming dairy products--especially milk and cheese--can reduce the risk of insulin-resistance syndrome, a precursor to diabetes. The researchers found that overweight young adults who ate dairy at least five times a day were 70% less likely to develop the problem. One reason: the lactose in milk and cheese is metabolized slowly and may help regulate blood-sugar levels. Better yet, you might try mixing some oatmeal with your milk. The combination of fiber and milk, say scientists, may reduce the risk of insulin-resistance syndrome even further.

--By Janice M. Horowitz

Sources: American Heart Association meeting; Journal of the American Medical Association