Based on raw data supplied by the Fremont Street Center for Healthy Aging, the Morningside Heights based Health & Well Being Project has uncovered a possible link between time spent on the porch swing and the mysterious increase in the antithrombogenicity of Mother's blood.
Early in August, the Kaiser Coagulation Clinic, which tests Mother's blood every two weeks, found she no longer needed as high a dose of bloodthinner. Her blood had begun thinning itself. Marcie and Margaret were quizzed closely about changes in Mother's life habits. Had her diet changed? Had her activity levels changed? Was she under a lot of stress?
Everything in Mother's life has changed, of course. But it changed in February when Marcie and Margaret arrived, and the Fremont Street Center for Healthy Aging opened for business. Nothing had recently changed, and this change in her blood was recent. Marcie and Margaret kept saying "No" to all the questions from the Coagulation Clinic. Everyone was bewildered.
I reported this development to Sarah R. , at the Health & Well Being Project in Manhattan. Famous for its fish oil research, the Health & Well Being Project specializes in non-medical life style change as an avenue to increased health. Sarah pointed out that there had been a drastic life style change in Mother's daily routine. The porch swing now meant that Mother was spending up to two hours a day in (shaded) sunlight.
She hypothesized that the increase in exposure to sun resulted in an increase in Vitamin D which had significantly changed Mother's blood levels.
Quick perusal of existing literature on her part revealed a study, done on mice, where it was proved that Vitamin D "played a pivotal role" in determining levels of antithrombogenicity (ability to fight clotting).
The take home lesson here: go outside and get some sun.
Mother had been improving her blood levels with every minute she spent outside, sitting on the swing.
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