Five months before Allen Manly retired from his job in June as a high school guidance counselor, he underwent training that could go a long way to keeping his brain – and his skills – sharp. He signed up for hours of orientation to be a health care volunteer. A growing number of researchers believe volunteering may actually be doing Manly a lot of good -- maybe even delaying dementia and prolonging his life.

(Continue reading in HealthZone.ca)

Photo: This woman started a running club for the homeless, after giving up her Wall Street career. (Woman Leaves Corporate World to Run With the Homeless -Video)

In a "dramatic" breakthrough that has positive implications for Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, researchers have transformed ordinary mouse skin cells directly into functioning nerve cells, bypassing the need for stem cells or even stemlike cells and greatly speeding up the field of regenerative medicine.

The research, from Stanford’s Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine , could make it possible to someday take a sample of a patient's skin and turn the cells into a tailor-made transplant to treat brain diseases such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, or heal damaged spinal cords.

(Continue reading the story at Reuters.com)

Nearly 700 lives were saved last year thanks to a record number of organ donations. Organ donations rose 17 percent in 2009, two years after the province-wide Organ Donation Strategy was introduced.

Last year, thanks to 218 deceased donors, 691 life-saving organ transplants took place, decreasing the number of deaths among people on the waiting list by nearly 24 percent. There was also an unprecedented number of tissue donations -- up 24 per cent from 2008.

(Continue reading in the Health Zone.ca)