Category: Health & Medicine

Keeping the important things prioritized

 KFC Vs Popeyes: Who Has The Healthier Fried Chicken?

Let’s be realistic: Most of us don’t see fried chicken as health food. That said, if you’re trying to make healthier choices, there are some differences between the chicken at KFC versus Popeyes. Two nutritional values you’ll want to pay attention to here are saturated fat and sodium.

Going with the classic bone-in pieces as an example, KFC’s Original Recipe chicken breast will get you around 390 calories with 4 grams of saturated fat. Meanwhile, Popeyes Signature chicken breast is close with 380 calories, but double the saturated fat at 8 grams. The numbers are almost the same for chicken thighs, where KFC has a fractionally higher 4.5 grams of saturated fat, and 8 grams at Popeyes.

Saturated fat is singled out here because it’s linked to high levels of so-called “bad” cholesterol, which is what can lead to clogged arteries. The American Heart Association recommends that saturated fat makes up no more than 6% of your daily calories (around 13 grams per day), so a piece from Popeyes eats up over half of that, and you’ll blow past it with your second piece (and remember, that’s without factoring in any other meals you might eat that day).

As for sodium, both chains eat up most of the Heart Association’s recommended daily intake of 1,500 milligrams: KFC clocks in at 1,190 milligrams in a breast piece. At Popeyes, it depends on whether you get regular (1,048 milligrams a piece) or spicy (1,330 milligrams). Although a small amount of sodium is necessary, excessive sodium is linked to high blood pressure and reduced kidney function.

Other chicken items, and the verdict

Of course, there are other chicken items at KFC and Popeyes: sandwiches are a popular choice, and there’s a clearer distinction here. KFC’s Classic Chicken Sandwich has 650 calories, 35 grams of fat (of which 4.5 grams are saturated); Popeyes’ Classic Chicken Sandwich brings 700 calories, 42 grams of fat and a much-higher 14 grams of saturated fat. It also has 1.5 grams of trans fat, a fat type that can raise bad cholesterol and is considered to be a fat type to avoid.

As a side note, we’re not assessing the chicken here on calorie count alone, since they don’t give useful nutritional information; nutritional values like fat, protein, sodium, sugar, and so forth are more relevant (in the case of fried chicken, sugar is negligible, so it’s irrelevant). Protein is relevant, but both chains have a similar amount per piece.

Dietitians have called out KFC’s well-seasoned breading as a concern due to the sodium it adds to the chicken, but Popeyes uses palm oil for frying, which ups the saturated fat. So although the Colonel is not exactly a health food king, KFC’s chicken is nonetheless a bit healthier than Popeyes, based on the saturated and trans fat content; for sodium, Popeyes is marginally better, but only if you avoid the spicy blend. Of course, if health is a serious concern, grilled chicken would be better, but neither chain offers that, despite reports that KFC occasionally serves it.

An old flame of mine passed away several years ago from this, so it strikes pretty close

Researchers Test a New Way To Find Pancreatic Cancer Before It’s Too Late.

An experimental blood test could help detect early pancreatic cancer and precancerous changes, guiding decisions about further testing.

People at high risk of pancreatic cancer are often monitored with imaging and other tests that can be invasive, expensive, and limited in their ability to catch the disease early. An experimental blood test called PANXEON could give doctors another way to look for cancer while it is more treatable and potentially curable.

In an international study led by researchers at City of Hope, PANXEON correctly identified stage 1 and 2 pancreatic cancer 87% of the time. The study, published in Nature Medicine, evaluated the test in nearly 1,800 patients across the United States, Europe, and Asia to see whether earlier promising results would hold up across different clinical settings.

Finding pancreatic cancer early remains a major challenge. About 90% of patients are diagnosed at advanced stages, when their cancer has already spread. The disease has the lowest survival rate of any cancer, with just 14% of patients living five years after diagnosis.

Detecting precancerous changes in the pancreas

PANXEON also detected more than 64% of cases of high-grade dysplasia, an advanced precancerous condition of the pancreas often described as “stage 0” pancreatic cancer. Detecting these changes could help doctors determine which pancreatic cysts need active monitoring or intervention before invasive cancer develops.

“A stage shift is not just a statistic,” said senior author Ajay Goel, Ph.D., AGAF, chair of the Department of Molecular Diagnostics and Experimental Therapeutics at City of Hope. “The earlier we find pancreatic cancer, the greater the chance that meaningful intervention is still possible.”

More false positives in high-risk groups

The study included people with inherited genetic risk, a family history of pancreatic cancer, pancreatic cysts, or chronic pancreatitis, which is persistent inflammation of the pancreas. These are also the groups most likely to benefit from a blood test that helps guide further evaluation. Goel said testing PANXEON in these patients, rather than comparing cancer patients only with healthy controls, was a key distinction from earlier research.

The test’s rate of false positives depended on the group being tested. It incorrectly flagged cancer in 3% of people without cancer in low-risk groups and 16% of those in high-risk groups. Goel said PANXEON could help identify high-risk patients who need additional evaluation, alongside imaging and other diagnostic tests.

“Pancreatic cancer remains so deadly largely because we find it after the window for cure has begun to close,” Goel said. “For patients, these findings represent progress toward finding pancreatic cancer before symptoms appear and while more treatment options remain available.”

Previous efforts to develop blood tests for early pancreatic cancer detection have fallen short. PANXEON takes an approach that combines three biological signals, or biomarkers, in a blood sample.

Two involve microRNAs, small molecules that help regulate gene activity. The test measures both circulating microRNAs and exosomal microRNAs, which are carried inside tiny packages released by cells. It also measures a protein called CA19-9.

Artificial intelligence combines those measurements into a single score estimating the patient’s risk. PANXEON is the first investigational test to bring these three biomarkers together, an approach Goel identified as another feature that distinguishes it from earlier tests.

“Most biomarkers tell you one part of the story. Combining multiple biological signals gives us a clearer picture of what may be happening in the pancreas,” he said.

Reference: “Liquid biopsy for early detection of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma” by Caiming Xu, Alessandro Mannucci, Haiyong Han, Ruben M. Munoz, Derek Cridebring, Sourat Darabi, Yuji Toiyama, Yoshinaga Okugawa, Gagandeep Singh, Mustafa Raoof, Joon Oh Park, James Lin, Gregory Idos, Michael J. Demeure, Erkut Borazanci, Douglas B. Evans, Susan Tsai, Eunsung Jun, Carlos Becerra, Scott A. Celinski, Laleh Melstrom, Vincent Chung, Guixin Zhang, Dong Shang, David L. Bartlett, Mitsuro Kanda, Song Cheol Kim, Valsamo Anagnastou, Giulia Martina Cavestro, John S. Bolton, Ali H. Zaidi, Daniel Von Hoff and Ajay Goel, 16 September 2026, Nature Medicine.
DOI: 10.1038/s41591-026-04625-x

Supported by The National Institutes of Health / National Cancer Institute (CA72851, CA181572, CA184792, CA187956, CA202797, CA214254, CA271443), and the Italian Association for Cancer Research (start-up #32233).

Your Coffee Habit Could Actually Help Slow Aging.

Your morning coffee is supposed to speed things up: wake you up, sharpen your focus and put a little pep in your step. But new research suggests that it could also do the opposite to your biological clock — potentially slowing the pace of aging.

Caffeine appears to trigger an ancient cellular energy system involved in growth, stress and DNA repair, new research says — processes very closely tied to aging. With science linking more health benefits to caffeine, from better heart health and a lower risk of dementia,this pathway might just be the key force behind it.

The research, published in the scientific journal Microbial Cell, examined the effect of caffeine on fission yeast cells. These single-celled organisms share biological features with human cells and are often used to study basic cellular functions.

What did researchers find? Caffeine seems to activate a cellular system, AMPK, that helps cells sense when energy is low. The AMPK process “kicks in to help them cope” with depleted energy, said senior author Dr. Charalampos (Babis) Rallis, Reader in Genetics, Genomics and Fundamental Cell Biology at Queen Mary University of London, in a news release.

Caffeine, Dr. Rallis explained, “helps flip that switch.”

When caffeine works with AMPK, researchers found that a handful of cellular processes seem to reap the benefits. That includes cell growth, stress responses and DNA repair. The last one is especially intriguing. DNA damage naturally builds up as you age, and if cells can’t fix it, you’re more likely to develop disease. Anything that helps with that repair process — like, potentially, caffeine — could keep you healthier as you age.

Of course, the study doesn’t show that drinking coffee will make you live longer, per se. More so, it shows that caffeine activates a system, shared by yeast and human cells that regulates energy, stress, growth and repair — which all contribute to the way cells age.

And beyond your morning cup of coffee or tea, the study also opens up new pathways for research. Dr. John-Patrick Alao, the postdoctoral research scientist who led the study, said future inquiries could explore “how we might trigger these effects more directly — with diet, lifestyle, or new medicines.”

In the meantime, we have another clue to how caffeine gives our bodies a boost, far beyond the morning perk-up we know and love.

Surprisingly, Ich Bin has attained the age mentioned in Psalm 90.
Now we see how my strength holds out.

Well, the CT scans show that the ‘lesion’ or whatever it is, in my right lung hasn’t changed in the past 6 months. The thoracic/vascular surgeon says that as far as been his experience, if it was cancer, some sort of change would have been seen by now. So, I get  1 more CT scan in 6 months and if there’s no change………see ya. 

Coffee May Protect the Liver in More Ways Than Scientists Realized

Coffee’s apparent liver benefits may extend beyond caffeine.

Liver disease often develops quietly, with fat buildup, inflammation, and scarring progressing for years before symptoms appear. A new Cedars-Sinai Health Sciences University study suggests that one of the world’s most common beverages may be linked to a lower risk of that damage: people who drank more coffee had fewer cases of cirrhosis, liver cancer, and liver-related death.

Published in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, the research went beyond tracking coffee intake and diagnoses. Investigators combined more than a decade of health records with liver MRI scans and blood protein analyses, uncovering biological clues that may help explain how coffee is associated with healthier liver tissue and reduced disease risk.

“Previous studies suggested that coffee might benefit the liver, but most were smaller or looked at only one piece of the puzzle,” said hepatologist Hyunseok Kim, MD, MPH, PhD, assistant professor of Medicine at Cedars-Sinai and corresponding author of the study. “We followed hundreds of thousands of people for more than a decade and looked at their health outcomes along with liver MRI scans and blood protein analyses. Together, those findings help explain the biological mechanisms behind coffee’s association with better liver health.”

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People think that the “T” in “PT” (Physical Therapy) stands for Therapy.
It doesn’t.
It stand for TORTURE.

And, again, we should thank God for his creating Papaver Somniferum.

Previous health risks linked to the beef debunked.

Eating beef every day may not be as harmful as once thought.

Red meat has long been tied to risks to cardiometabolic health, including heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. The conditions affect more than 160 million Americans, including over 36 million living with Type 2 diabetes.

However, having 6-7 ounces of beef every day – a slightly smaller portion than a typical ribeye steak – does not affect risk factors for Type 2 diabetes, researchers at Indiana University say.

“Results from this gold standard randomized controlled trial build on existing scientific evidence that shows eating beef as part of a healthy dietary pattern supports heart health and does not adversely impact measures of blood sugar regulation or inflammation,” Kevin Maki, an adjunct professor in the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, said in a statement.

“When beef is consumed as part of a healthy dietary pattern, it helps fill essential nutritional gaps and does not adversely impact the cardiometabolic risk profile compared to poultry,” he said.

The trial in prediabetic adults was fairly small, including seven women and 17 men between the ages of 18-74.

Researchers first measured their levels of the hormones insulin and glucagon, as well as insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas.

Then, participants ate two meals a day that each contained 3-3.5 ounces of cooked beef or poultry over the course of a 28-day period.

The meals included fajitas, stew, burgers, burritos, and a stir fry.

After a 28-day break, they did it again.

There were no differences for beta cell function or insulin sensitivity after these periods.

“The study findings suggest that regular beef intake does not adversely affect metabolic or inflammatory risk factors compared with poultry in an at-risk prediabetic population,” Indika Edirisinghe, a professor of food science and nutrition at Illinois Institute of Technology, said.

Three of the guideline’s authors had financial relationships with the association, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine reported.

Appy Polly Loggies, O my Readers,  for the paucity of posting today. I drove AK to and from the eye surgeons today so he could get his detached retina reattached, and was simply worn out.

Interesting

Experimental drug shrinks advanced kidney tumors, clears cancer in one patient.

A new Phase I clinical trial provides proof of concept for a potential therapy for treatment-resistant cancers, particularly kidney cancer. In the new study, published in Cell Reports Medicine, researchers tested a novel kind of immunotherapy in individuals with different types of cancer.

In a subset of patients with advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma, the most common and an aggressive form of kidney cancer, the drug successfully reduced—and in one patient completely cleared—the cancer in a subset of patients.

“We studied a very hard-to-treat population,” says David Braun, MD, Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine (medical oncology), of pathology, and of urology, the Louis Goodman and Alfred Gilman Yale Scholar, and the study’s lead author. “The fact that this drug was clinically active and leading to some responses is really encouraging.”

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Today is a rather ‘big’ day for me, as I’ll be spending most, if not all the morning, being CT & MRI scanned. Those who know, know.

Suspicion confirmed……..

Your Morning Coffee Is Reshaping Your Gut. Here’s What Scientists Found.
So fix yourself a cup of brew in the morning and chug it down, knowing it’s changing you for the better.

It’s been a while since scientists began to reach a consensus that whatever’s going on in your gut microbiome is vital, as it plays a major role in both physical and mental well-being. Those billions of microbes are sensitive, constantly shifting in response to diet and lifestyle. Now, a team of researchers says that one of the most common daily habits among billions of people worldwide can radically reshape your gut microbiome: drinking coffee.

A study published in Nature Communications tracked 62 adults through phases of normal coffee use, a forced two-week break, and a controlled reintroduction of either caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee. The goal was to understand how coffee interacts with the gut-brain axis, the communication network linking digestive microbes and the brain.

They found that habitual drinkers had distinct gut microbiomes compared to nondrinkers, with certain bacterial strains more abundant than others. When the study participants stopped drinking coffee, the patterns began to ebb and flow like ocean tides, with strains that were abundant before now retreating as others that were scarcely found reemerged.

This happened whether the coffee was caffeinated or not. That is a more important detail than it seems on the surface, since many of the changes were tied to the plant compounds in coffee called phenolic acids, which can influence how gut bacteria function and what chemicals they produce. A lot of those chemicals contain compounds that influence or affect the range of bodily functions, from brain signaling and gut health to body inflammation.

Coffee Causes Huge Changes In Your Gut Microbiome

Coffee’s effects show up in the billions of microscopic microbes in your gut, and in your behavior, too. Coffee drinkers were noted to be more impulsive and emotional. Yet after a two-week break, both of those measures dropped. When the coffee was reintroduced, the outcomes started to split.

People drinking caffeinated coffee had reduced anxiety and lower stress hormone levels, which sounds counter to what I would expect. Decaffeinated coffee drinkers also saw some benefit after the break, having shown stronger associations with improved sleep, memory performance, and fewer errors on learning tasks.

Coffee drinkers had a lower baseline of inflammatory markers, which is great. But those levels increased in the absence of coffee, then improved again once the coffee returned, regardless of whether it was caffeinated. If you want to reduce body inflammation, drink coffee in any form.

The point is, coffee doesn’t just wake your sleepy butt up in the morning. It is actively changing the complex biological ecosystem within your body, thus influencing how you think, how you feel, how you react to external stimuli, and, overall, how you function day to day.

So fix yourself a cup of brew in the morning and chug it down, knowing it’s changing you for the better.

Breakthrough to Strengthen Bones Could Reverse Osteoporosis.

esearch points to a key bone-strengthening mechanism at work in the body, which could be targeted to treat the bone-weakening disease, osteoporosis.

Led by scientists from the University of Leipzig in Germany and Shandong University in China, the 2025 study identified the cell receptor GPR133 (also known as ADGRD1) as being crucial to bone density, via bone-building cells called osteoblasts.

Variations in the GPR133 gene had previously been linked to bone density, leading researchers to turn their attention to the protein it encoded.

The team ran tests on mice in which the gene was either absent or could be activated using a chemical called AP503.

In the absence of the GPR133 gene, the mice grew up with weak bones, resembling the symptoms of osteoporosis. However, when the receptor was present and activated by AP503, bone production and strength improved.

Watch the video below for a summary of the findings:

Sorry for the paucity of posts. I precipitated myself down a whole flight of stairs and spent most of yesterday in an E.R. getting X-rayed and CT scaned.

I’ve broken two ‘minor’ bones and been laying in a powered recliner chair for most of the day, and will be doing the same for awhile.

So, please bear with me as I recover