Eddy's Good News: Cheese that could be good for you & new studies into dementia and music

Virgin Radio

23 Aug 2022, 09:28

Every day during his show on Virgin Radio, Eddy Temple-Morris brings you Good News stories from around the world, to help inject a bit of positivity into your day!

Be sure to listen each day between 10am and 1pm (Monday - Friday) to hear Eddy's Good News stories (amongst the finest music of course), but if you miss any of them you can catch up on the transcripts of Eddy's most recent stories below:

Monday 22nd August 2022

Potentially great news for cheese lovers who may have abandoned their love for the sake of their cholesterol levels and scientists have found a cheese that might actually be good for you!

Say hello to Jarlsberg, the cow cheese from Norway which has been part of a study into how cheese affected the health of 66 women, average age 33.

They gave each participant a 50 gram chunk of cheese every day, half of them got Jarlsberg and the other half got camembert, so they were both winning on a taste level. Both cheeses have a similar fat and protein content but what was really interesting was the vitamin and cholesterol readings and their bone density: Those who ate Jarlsberg showed increased levels of vitamin K2 after 6 weeks and showed signs of bone strengthening. Their cholesterol levels were pretty low too. They switched cheeses half way through and those who’d been on the camembert saw their cholesterol levels tumble when they switched to Jarlsberg! Obviously more research is needed, this was all women, so we need to see what happens in men, but this looks like a cheesy win!

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org

Some encouraging news from the US and Canada and a new study into dementia that shows how those with dementia can use music to reconnect with memories.

Say hello to the team of researchers at Northwestern University who’ve been taking a deep dive into the relationship between music and degenerative brain conditions like Alzheimers. We’ve all heard of, or experienced with people we know or love, someone who can’t remember anything but who can play the piano or guitar, or sing along to their favourite song and get all the lyrics spot on.

That’s because our brains are hardwired to remember music in a totally different way than we remember experiences or words. There’s a direct link to the pleasure centres of our brain, through our auditory system and into our reward system. A complex and multi layered team of music therapists, neurologists and geriatric psychiatrists have found that by making personal playlists for each patient, with music they love, each subject could access their medial prefrontal cortex and the neural pathways there were comparatively clear. This gives us hope that we can harness this in further research and treatment. Fingers crossed and watch this space.

Via: goodnewsnetwork.org