Functional Medicine

Functional medicine is an alternative modality that focuses on improving the physiological function as a primary method of improving the health of patients with chronic disease.

Therapeusis defines this approach as “personalized medicine” that deals with primary prevention and underlying causes, using your signs and symptoms, to ameliorate chronic conditions.

Functional medicine practitioners provide chronic care management with the belief that:

The Therapeusis program identifies 33 organ systems as a functional assessment based on the results that you enter through our questionnaires. The program will generate 3 areas of concern for the condition(s):

1. Immediate Concerns [Herbs-Vitamins-Minerals]

This is the organ system that is of immediate concern, contributing to your sign and symptoms. Conditions should improve with herbal tea(s), dietary reform, and correcting vitamin and mineral deficiencies.

2. Core Cause [Eclectic Remedy]

This is the organ system that must be dealt with in order to fully remedy the condition(s) and prevent a return of your symptoms. Homeopathic polycrests are known to be most suitable.

3. Anchor Initiators [Subconscious - Emotional]

The anchor point is where you arrived in early life that set the patterns and staging of the adult onset of symptoms. Memories, habits and life style adaptations have weighed in as “viewpoints” or aberrated thinking patterns resulting in unresolved conflicts, avoidance factors, and deep emotional issues. Anchor points are best treated spiritually with methods like counseling, hypnosis, PCT (photocognitive therapy), etc.

When your results are received, simply click on the organ link and retrieve a full explanation page of the gland/organ, diet and lifestyle changes that will improve the condition(s).

Sample results shown below.

Since it went on sale, I have been using Wolfram Alpha for a couple of days and I have to say it is an awesome research app.  It has been one of the App Store’s most notoriously expensive apps and it just got a price cut. Wolfram Alpha, which debuted last October for the fairly jaw-dropping price of $49.99, now sells for just $1.99 .

In case the name doesn’t ring a bell, Wolfram Alpha made headlines last year as a supposed Google killer, a search engine that could perform “computational knowledge” tricks far beyond any other service.

In other words, as CNET’s Rafe Needleman put it, “Google finds links. Wolfram Alpha finds answers.” My own take: It’s a search engine for math geeks.

In any case, there was widespread glee when Wolfram Alpha got the app treatment–followed by considerable head-scratching and some outright rage over its price. The $50 sticker seemed particularly insulting considering that you could enjoy much of the same functionality in your iPhone’s Safari browser–for free.

According to a Wolfram Alpha blog post, the price cut is part of a “new focus on ubiquity” for the tool. And in an extremely wise marketing move, anyone who purchased the Wolfram Alpha app for $49.99 (or its one-time sale price of $19.99) can request a refund.

What do you think? Is the app suddenly looking a lot more attractive at $1.99? OK, that’s a given, but now that it’s reasonably priced, think you’ll buy it? Hit the comments and share your thoughts.

If you are addicted to the App Store then we have the perfect app for you!  App Sniper not only allows you to track which apps are on sale, but it also notifies you when apps you’re interested in have gone on sale for the price that you want to buy it for.

Many developers drop their prices for only a few days or, in extreme cases, only a few hours in order to get additional sales and reviews. With AppSniper you can be guaranteed that you will never miss those great opportunities to pick up quality software at bargain prices.

The best part is that AppSniper will pay for itself with the first snipe or sale item that you buy!

For only $0.99 it can save you hundreds of dollars on future app purchases.

Byte Squared has released  a great new business and productivity app called Office², an office app for the iPhone and iPod touch that lets you edit Word documents and Excel spreadsheets in .doc and .xls formats. (Note that the app’s name is pronounced “Office Squared” )

Office² also provides integration with Google Docs, letting you edit Google Docs documents and spreadsheets from within the app. You can also access, move, and delete documents stored in Google Docs, iDisk and any WebDAV server.

The Office² word processor lets you view, create, edit and save documents in Word 97-2003 (.doc) format. It also supports character formatting, tables, images, searching of text within documents, undo and redo up to 100 undo levels, and auto-correction and auto-completion.

The Office² spreadsheet works with Excel 97-2003 (.xls) and handles multiple worksheets with unlimited rows and columns, searching and sorting of cells, cell formatting, cell types, and pane freezing among other spreadsheet necessities. Office² uses the iPhone’s touch screen effectively, letting you tap and drag to change row heights and column widths, and tap cells to compose formulas.

Additionally, Office² acts as a local file store, letting you store and view files of most types. Office² also integrates with Google Docs and MobileMe iDisk, giving you access to your valuable data, wherever you are.

Office² includes the following features:

WORD PROCESSOR FEATURES

• Word 97-2003 (.doc) compatability.
• Character formatting including bold, italic, underline, font face, size, color and highlight.
• Paragraph formatting including indent, left, right, center and distributed justification style.
• Bullets and numbering.
• Support for tables, and images.
• Full text search capability.
• Copy and paste.
• Undo and redo.
• Auto-correction and auto-capitalization.

SPREADSHEET FEATURES

• Excel 97-2003 (.xls) compatibility with support for multiple worksheets.
• Multiple cell types, including Numeric, Date, Time, Currency, Percentage and Text
• Cell formatting options, including bold, italic, text and background color, cell sizes and alignments.
• Merged cells, text wrapping and freeze panes.
• Copy/cut/paste operations.
• A range of functions, including date/time, math, statistical, string and trigonometric functions.
• Import/Export to and from desktop computer over wifi network.
• Tight integration with Google Docs, enabling direct editing of Google Docs spreadsheets.
• Access spreadsheet files stored in a MobileMe iDisk account or any other WebDAV-based server.

iPhone development company Bulkypix is coming up with some promising games for the iPhone and iPod touch.  Twin Blades is an addictive zombie shooting game in which your main object is to survive through different levels by either slashing or shooting zombies. The App Store has a ton of zombie shooting games but, Twin Blades offers an engaging and fast paced gameplay which gives it a fresh look.

Every kill earns you one heart and these can be used to buy weapon and character upgrades. Weapon upgrades feature different types of guns while character upgrades can be used to improve slash damage, amount of life, life storage and more.

The game supports local highscores and Open Feint, allowing you to share your highscores, unlock achievements and compare your performance with your friends.

Twin Blades is a fun, challenging and engrossing game that will keep you wanting for more!

Home movies don’t make themselves. Until now.

We have just opened our new online store to allow people to purchase many of the guides that have been written by our users and editing staff to show you how to do all kinds of cool stuff.

If you have a guide or tutorial that you would like to sell please contact us and let us know so that we can discuss setting it up in our store.

You can see what is currently available at www.stuffworks.com/cart

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard about a device with dual touch screens that folds up, but it’s the first time we’ve actually seen a working demo of one.  At its CES booth, MSI is showing off its own dual touchscreen tablet prototype and this one really works.

The device was shown in two sizes, a 7-inch and a 10-inch, though the 7-inch wasn’t working or powered on but the 10-inch unit was working. MSI was kind enough to remove the glass casing over it to let Laptop Mag do a  brief hands-on video on Friday and then, on Saturday, to provide a representative to walk them through the tablet’s features.

Tablet Features

The tablet has dual 10-inch capacitive touch screens running at 1024 x 600 each. It sports an Intel Menlow processor, which an MSI rep said was the 1.6-GHz Atom Z530, and runs Windows 7 ($75.99) home premium. The tablet uses an SSD drive (as opposed to a hard drive) which helps it stay slim and power efficient. The storage device that holds your OS, programs, and data.

A utility on the screen allows you to switch between a couple of different screen modes. By default each screen is treated as an independent desktop so a window that’s maximized on one side won’t carry over to the other. However, the utility lets you switch to single screen mode, where Windows see the two displays as one giant display that is effectively double the horizontal or vertical resolution. You can view either single or dual display modes in portrait or landscape orientations.

Viewing angles were a little poor on the demo unit as colors on one screen would be clear while the other appeared washed out if the screen was folded at certain angles. Our rep said viewing angles are a huge concern that MSI will resolve before bringing a product to market.

The capacitive display on the demo unit does not support multitouch, but tapping icons and scrolling through Web pages and PDFs worked well with a single finger swipe. For fast text entry, the tablet features a large, comfortable on-screen keyboard that, when activated, takes up the entire desktop of the bottom screen, assuming you position the tabet in portait mode. Amazingly, the keys offer tactile feedback that makes them feel more like a physical  thanks to built-in haptics technology. The MSI rep said that, in the future, users might be able to adjust the level of feedback to suit their tastes.

The system on display did not have a battery, but MSI told us that they are working hard to find a lightweight, high-capacity solution that will keep the weight of the unit low while providing 8 to 10 hours of battery life.

Future of the MSI’s Tablet

Even though the unit on display was a concept design without a name, MSI Director of Sales Andy Tung told Laptop Mag, the company is working hard to to turn the concept it into a shipping product, perhaps in time for the back-to-school season. None of the specs are certain to make it into the final product, the company still  has lots of work to do. We can imagine that a final product could have multitouch capability and 3G connectivity, two things the demo lacked. There’s no price yet, either, but Tung said they want the tablet to be extremely affordable.

Several journalists have started to call this device an eReader, but we have to squarely disagree. For certain, its design makes it ideal for reading long texts in portrait mode or placing a different page of a book on each screen in landscape mode. However, because it offers a complete Windows 7 experience, it’s also great for surfing the Web, checking e-mail, and viewing media. We can also imagine social media updaters and bloggers using it to update from the road. Some day soon, we may see bloggers sitting next to us at press events using an MSI dual screen tablet to live blog.

If you’d like to see the MSI dual screen tablet in action, check out the videos at Laptop Mag.

I love this game.  Skee-Ball has always been a favorite for my kids when we go to any arcade and this game brings all of the excitement to the palm of your hand with 3D graphics, great physics, and awesome prizes. A true American classic.  Everyone loves Skee-Ball! 

With a quick flick, roll the ball up the ramp and into one of the numbered holes for points, tickets, and unlockable achievements.

Win enough tickets and go on a shopping-spree for fun prizes like a set of vampire teeth, a Peruvian Flute Band CD, or even a custom ball to use in-game. Over 80 prizes in all.

Skee-Ball is easy to learn and easier to love: Play by simply flicking your finger across the screen or making a bowling motion. Tilt the iPhone/iPod touch to add spin. Simple to play, almost impossible to stop playing!

The NVIDIA PhysX engine delivers console-quality physics so the ball rolls and bounces hyper-realistically. Worldwide hi-scores let you see how your hoard of tickets compares to everyone else’s. The Plus+ Network lets you challenge friends with score tracking, achievements and leader-boards.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Skee-Ball is celebrating its 100th birthday, but has never felt more modern!

Rumor has it that the video website hulu.com is developing an iPhone app that will be released within an couple of months.

Anyone who has tried to watch any of the streaming tv apps that are currently available on iPhone has probably been fairly disappointed with what they found but if the rumors are true then we will be able to watch multiple mainstream tv shows and movies from anywhere right on our iPod or iPhone.

Hulu has many popular shows like White Collar, Monk, Stargate, House, etc.

I will post an update as soon as the tumors are confirmed.