Skinny fat: Being thin isn’t enough

Lindsey Vonn, the Olympic skier, challenged a flock ofcelebsatthe2013met Gala, saying they were half her weight but skinny fat, pointing out they lived on Diet Coke and lettuce, and lacked muscle. “Strong is beautiful,” she rightly insisted.

Skinny fat can happen if you’re not overweight but lose muscle mass and add flab, so your body’s healthy proportion of muscle to fat flips. All of us lose muscle mass as we age, if we don’ttakestepstopreserve muscle tone with resistance exercise and maintain a healthy weight.

A new study in the journal Clinical Interventions in Aging reports that for folks over 65, losing muscle mass and replacing it with high fat mass — even if they’re not overweight — is a slippery slope to dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. In fact, being thin and flabby is more damaging to cognitive abilities, including memory, speed of processing and decision-making, than being obese with muscle strength.

Thesmartestwaytoavoid muscle tone loss at any age is strength-building exercises for 20-30 minutes two to three times a week, using stretch bands or hand weights, and aerobic exercisefivedaysaweek.

Breakthrough treatment for prostate cancer

A new study in the U.K. tracked 625 men who received the beam-blasting therapy instead of more traditional radiation and/or surgery. Reporting results in the journal European Urology, the researchers found:

After five years, the cancer survival rate from HIFU was 100 percent. The cancer survival rate from surgery and radiotherapy also is 100 percent at five years.

Approximately, 1 in 10 men receiving HIFU needed further treatment; also the same as with other treatments.

The difference? The risk of side effects from the ultrasound therapy, such as urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction, are 2 and 15 percent, respectively. Other treatment options are associated with incontinence for 5 to 30 percent of patients and erectile dysfunction for 30 to 60 percent.

The Food and Drug Administration hasn’t yet approved the use of HIFU for prostate cancer treatment (it is allowed for prostate tissue ablation, meaning it can target benign prostate enlargement), but is considering it. However, some docs caution that approval will lead to extreme overuse, when most early-stage prostate cancer calls for active surveillance not treatment, even with ultrasound. So stay tuned.

Email questions for Mehmet Oz and Mike Roizen to youdocsdaily@sharecare. com.