Dick Clark Productions to develop primetime series with Chicken Soup for the Soul>>
SANTA MONICA, Calif. - Dick Clark Productions has inked a deal with Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC to develop a television series based on the best-selling books. The show will be co-hosted by Chicken Soup for the Soul co-founder Jack Canfield. Chicken Soup for the Soul is one of America's most recognizable brands; Harris Polls show that more than 88 percent of the American public knows the brand. One of the best-selling series of all time, Chicken Soup for the Soul has sold more than 112 million copies, with titles distributed in over 100 countries and translated into 40 languages. The jump to television will be aided by the fact that Chicken Soup for the Soul stories span a wide range of genres, allowing the brand to go beyond the demographic boundaries that limit most shows.
Orly Adelson, President, Dick Clark Productions stated: "The Chicken Soup for the Soul series of books always resonated with us as a property that has significant television potential. Now more than ever, there is a desire for uplifting, positive, and inspiring themes. This is what Dick Clark Productions hopes to bring to the screen through our partnership with Chicken Soup for the Soul."
In addition to his creative work with Chicken Soup for the Soul, Jack Canfield has also been very successful with other entertainment properties. Most notably, he was prominently featured in The Secret DVD, which has sold over 3.4 million copies and been translated into 17 languages.
The show unites two of the entertainment industry's top brands at a time when both are celebrating recent successes. Dick Clark Productions is fresh off another successful season of "So You Think You Can Dance" and "The American Music Awards" while Chicken Soup for the Soul is celebrating another milestone-passing the $1.3 billion mark in total retail sales.
"We have always believed that Chicken Soup for the Soul would attract a very large audience on television. We were just waiting for the right partner," said Robert D. Jacobs, a thirty year television veteran and now president of Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC. "We are thrilled to team up with the nation's leading production group, Dick Clark Productions, to develop this series, as they share our confidence in Chicken Soup for the Soul's ability to impact lives."
About Dick Clark Productions: Backed by a production team known for high production values and compelling storytelling, Dick Clark Productions produces the smash hit reality series "So You Think You Can Dance," along with some of the most legendary annual television specials in history: "The Golden Globe Awards," "The American Music Awards," "The Academy of Country Music Awards," "Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve with Ryan Seacrest," as well as a library that features four decades of American Bandstand and countless other television hits over the years.
About Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC: Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing, LLC, publishes all the latest titles in the famous Chicken Soup for the Soul book series which are distributed through Simon and Schuster, Inc. Chicken Soup for the Soul Publishing also licenses the right to use its famous trademark to high quality licensees through IMG, the world's premier licensing agent. The company is currently implementing a plan to expand into all media, is working with TV networks on several TV shows and is developing a major Internet presence dedicated to life improvement, emotional support and inspiration. In 2007, USA Today named Chicken Soup for the Soul one of the five most memorable and impactful books in the last quarter century. For more information visit: www.chickensoup.com.
Jonny Bowden, PhD, C.N.S. is a nationally known expert on weight loss and nutrition and natural healing. A popular and dynamic speaker who combines wit and humor with science, he’s appeared as a health and nutrition expert on MSNBC, CNN, FOX News, ABC, CBS and NBC and he has contributed material to over 50 national magazines and newspapers. Dr. Bowden is on the Editorial Advisory Board of Men’s Health, is an associate editor of Total Health Magazine and is a columnist for both Better Nutrition and Remedy Magazines. His advice on nutrition, weight loss, diet and supplements has been read by millions on iVillage.com and on America Online..
What you eat while you're pregnant may actually set the tone for your children's health habits. When researchers at the Royal Veterinary College in the U.K. fed pregnant rats the equivalent of rat junk food, their babies were born craving the bad stuff. They also ate twice as many calories as baby rats whose mothers weren't fed the junk food.
Many investigations of conditions from ADD to aggression to cognition problems and thinking have shown a connection to low levels of omega-3 fats. I think taking a high quality essential fatty acid supplement is one of the most important things a woman can do while she's pregnant. Your baby's brain is about 60% fat, most of it DHA one of the important omega-3 fats found in fish and supplements.
Moral of the story: when you're pregnant, you really are eating for two. If it's something you wouldn't feed to your baby, don't eat too much of it. What you eat- and don't eat- while pregnant matters a lot!
When the publishing company Thomas Nelson asked if I would like to review Karen James’ Holding Fast: The Untold Story of the Mount Hood Tragedy, I agreed to do so: after my wife passed away, I became interested in how others dealt with grief, and hence in Karen’s accounting of the loss of her husband Kelly.
When I began reading the book, I initially felt that it was getting off to a slow start. My type-A personality was looking to get into the details of the tragedy and how Karen coped with it, and instead she began with a background on her husband, their marriage, their faith, and their friends Brian Hall and Jerry Cooke (who lost their lives with Kelly). I soon overcame my impatience, though, because she did a great job of showing that these men were the kind of men you would like to have as friends. She also showed that these men were true experts at mountain climbing, and that their deaths were not due to the carelessness of inexperience. Their climb was difficult, indeed, taking them to a height of over two miles (11,000 feet), under torturous conditions. But, they had done such climbs many times before.
Karen writes very well. The book was an easy read, and she pulled me into the story quickly and kept me interested. She went into a lot of detail on her experience of the tragedy, including an accounting of being present during the rescue efforts. And, after then describing how she dealt with the grief, she goes into exceptional detail in a reconstruction of how the tragedy happened.
Someone who has not lost a loved one might not understand how she could go into so much depth in covering how her husband died. I can tell you from personal experience, though, that you very much want to know everything that happened when you lose a loved one. Up to a point, of course: you do not want to know if they died calling your name out, wondering why you could not prevent them from dying, wondering where you were, what was happening … That is something you think about, but really do not want to know.
But, you want to know as much else as you can. I recall spending a lot time going through Vickie’s hospital records and then getting one of her doctors to walk me through exactly what happened. Similarly, Karen went into great detail to piece together exactly what happened to Kelly, Brian, and Jerry. She even used his recovered cell phone and camera, along with all of the emails between them when they were planning the climb. She talked with the rescuers and was a very good “detective” in piecing the events together.
I was amazed that Karen did not blame anyone for the tragedy. She did not blame the rescue team for not being “quick enough,” she did not blame God, and it seems she did not blame herself. I think this is something other mourners can learn from her. It is natural to want to assign blame. I initially wanted to blame Vickie’s doctors. I certainly blamed God. And, I especially blamed myself for not being able to prevent her from dying. Such feelings of guilt and blame are destructive, though, and Karen shows that you can avoid it. I applaud her for that.
Karen’s ability to do this may have been related to her deep faith. Speaking of her faith, I am pleased for her that she was able to keep it throughout the ordeal and its aftermath. Not everyone can. My faith was shattered when Vickie died, and it took a long while to rebuild it, only to have it crumble again, and again. Now I fear it is like Humpty Dumpty in that the pieces cannot be put back together again. So, I am glad for Karen that she kept her faith … it can make a lot of difference in the grief. I hope she is able to continue to retain it. She wrote the book only a year and a half after the tragedy, so she still has a lot of grief to go through.
Should you buy this book? If you have lost someone very close to you, my view is that this book might do you some good. I cannot guarantee that it will. We all handle the loss of a loved one differently, but we can all learn from each other. I think we can learn from Karen that you can keep your faith, even through the worst of tragedies. And, we can all learn that we can bring some good out of the loss of a loved one, by honoring them. Karen did this through writing a book that honored her husband, and his friends Brian and Jerry. I honored Vickie through donations and through sharing my heart’s story with others. We cannot offset such tragedies, but we can bring some good from them. If we try.
Christopher P. Cannon, MD is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School in the Cardiovascular Division at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He is a senior investigator of the Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction (TIMI) Study Group, and over the past two decades has been the principal investigator for 10 international clinical trials in the area of heart attacks and prevention.Recent trials include PROVE IT-TIMI 22, which showed that “lower is better” for cholesterol and changed international guidelines, and CLARITY-TIMI 28 which showed that giving heart attack patients clopidogrel (Plavix) can prevent future heart attacks. Cited one of the “Best Doctors in Boston,” Dr. Cannon has published more than 500 articles in the field of heart attacks and cardiovascular prevention, and is the author or editor of seven books, including The Complete Idiot’s Guide to The Anti-Inflammation Diet.He is also the new Editor-in-Chief of Cardiosource and Cardiosmart.org.
Christopher Cannon--
The news was everywhere – a trial called JUPITER showed a dramatic reduction in heart attacks, stroke, and death using statins in people without a high cholesterol – but who had “inflammation.”Inflammation was measured using a simple blood test, C-reactive protein (CRP).When ‘otherwise healthy” people with no sign of heart disease took a strong statin – rosuvastatin (Crestor),they had a nearly 50% lower risk of heart attack or stroke and a 20% lower risk of dying – in just 2 years.Wow!
So – does this pertain to me?Do I need a CRP test to tell if I need a statin?(would be reasonable to ask your doctor).If I have a high CRP – I have inflammation – what is that?It has been described as irritation, or roughness inside the blood vessels – that make it more likely that cholesterol plaques (the blockages inside the blood vessels) will break open, and lead to a heart attack or stroke.What does this mean for my cholesterol?How low should mine be?(quick answer – the lower the better) All great questions!
So – some details on the study:JUPITER (Justification for the Use of Statins in Primary Prevention: an Intervention Trial Evaluating Rosuvastatin) looked to see whether intensive statin therapy (Crestor 20 mg will lower your bad cholesterol – low density lipoprotein or LDL – by 50%) would decrease the risk of developing a first major cardiovascular events among people who do not have a high cholesterol (that is their LDL had to be less than 130 mg/dl), but who were nonetheless at increased risk due to a high hs-CRP (≥2 mg/L).The trial randomized 17,802 men ≥55 years and women ≥65 years with no prior cardiovascular disease or diabetes (in whom statins are currently recommended) to rosuvastatin 20 mg/day or placebo. When starting out, the median LDL-C was just 108 mg/dl and hs-CRP was 4.3 mg/L;LDL-C was reduced by half down to 55 mg/dl.hs-CRP was reduced by 37%.
Results
There was a highly significant 44% reduction in the incidence of the primary endpoint of any cardiac event – a heart attack, stroke, hospitalization for worsening chest pain (called unstable angina), need for angioplasty or bypass surgery, or cardiovascular death - compared with placebo(a highly significant difference p < 0.00001).In looking at how many people developed a cardiac event, it was about 8 for a 1000 patient years of follow-up in the treated group compared with more than 13 in the placebo group. There was a significant 65% reduction in nonfatal heart attacks, (p < 0.00001), 48% reduction in nonfatal stroke (p = 0.003), 46% reduction in need for angioplasty or bypass surgery (p < 0.0001), as well as a significant 20% reduction in all-cause mortality (10 vs. 12.5 deaths per 1000 patient-years p = 0.02). All subgroups of patients analyzed showed significant reductions in the primary endpoint, including women.These results from JUPITER provide compelling evidence regarding the benefits of statin therapy in persons without high cholesterol but who are at enhanced risk because of increased inflammation. It also reinforces of the benefits of lowering LDL cholesterol – in this case in otherwise healthy people.
So – this trial really reinforces the benefits of statins in preventing heart attacks, strokes, and death.It looked at a new group of patients, who have high CRP levels but not high cholesterol, and doctors will begin thinking about exactly what patient should be tested, and who should be treated.The trial also reinforces the benefit of statins in general – that they are well tolerated, and have significant benefits.
Can Inflammation be reduced without drugs?
This is a good question!While it is great to see benefits from medications – it is certainly reasonable to try to avoid medication.This is a perfect example where diet and exercise can play a key role.We recently published a book on an Anti-Inflammation Dietin the Complete Idiot’s Guide series – that discusses ways to reduce inflammation via altering your diet and lifestyle.The key message is that through (non-radical) changes in diet one can reduce intake of foods that promote inflammation (e.g. saturated fats) and increase intake of foods that reduce inflammation (e.g. omega-3 fatty acids like in salmon, or flax seeds.Also, just aiming to eating a balanced diet, with less processed foods will make a huge impact in reducing inflammation.There have been several studies showing reducing in hs-CRP with some diets – thus strong evidence to support the idea of modifying diet can help.So – we have more things that we can do to improve our heart health!Targeting the usual risk factors is one step, but reducing inflammation looks like a new way to prevent heart problems!
Book Review: I Am Because We Are (PowerHouse Books, 2008) by Kristen Ashburn with a forward by Madonna
A FirstLook Feature
Recognized yearly, World AIDS Day raises global awareness of the spread of the disease.AIDS is caused by the transmission of HIV infection, and has killed more than 25 million people, approximately 2 million of them in 2007.It is estimated that 33 million are living with HIV, many of which do not have access to recently improved antiretroviral treatment and care.The worst hit region is Sub-Saharan Africa, home to 67% of the world’s HIV cases.World AIDS Day is a World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programmes for AIDS Prevention initiative, first begun in 1988.
Every day in Malawi, Sub-Saharan Africa, people die of AIDS.They are mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers.Who’s left?Orphans.More than 1 million of them.
I Am Because We Are is the powerful photo accompaniment to the film documentary by the same title.Photographed by the award-winning photojournalist Kristen Ashburn, the pictures portray the lives and deaths of the young left behind, in some cases to fend for themselves, and exemplifies the powerful truths of a people’s demise.
“I Am Because We Are” is an African philosophy known as Ubuntu.Incorporated by Nelson Mandela as a founding principle for the new South Africa, it has been described by Desmond Tutu to mean, “as the proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that we belong to a greater whole and are diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed.”In the forward, Madonna writes, “As my friend Bill Clinton defines it, Ubuntu means that what we have in common is more important than our interesting differences.”
Together, Kristen Ashburn and Madonna have outlined the purpose of I Am Because We Are as a book which will raise awareness of the continuation of the AIDS epidemic in Malawi, thus helping end the vicious cycle of poverty—disease—death---poverty, which begins anew with each orphan.Inside the book you’ll see the stark reality of a world without food, medicine, and education.Sure, we in the West know about AIDS in Africa, we read about it in the news, but the photos add an element of humanity to our fellow man by putting an individual’s name to each face.For each child’s photograph, a brief history, partially written in the child’s voice, explains how he or she became an orphan.More importantly, throughout the book, Madonna highlights what her organization, Raising Malawi has done to make a difference in each child’s life.
Though it is heart-breaking to see the photos of children’s lives interrupted, I Am Because We Are, is a poignant reminder that there are those who still do good, striving to change the inequities of the world with their talents and financial abilities.Proceeds from the sale of I Am Because We Are will be donated to Raising Malawi, a charitable organization founded by Madonna and Michael Berg, and will be used for their work with the orphans of Malawi.
Kristen Ashburn is a documentary photographer who has received numerous honors including a nomination for the28th Annual Emmy Awards (2007), NPPA- Best of Photojournalism (2oo7, 2006, 2003), the John Faber Award- Overseas Press Club of America (2006) and two World Press Photo prizes (2005, 2003). The Getty Grant 2006, Canon's Female Photojournalist Award in 2004, and the Marty Forscher Fellowship for Humanistic Photography 2003. In 2004 she was recognized as one of Photo District News '30 under 30 photographers' and participated in the prestigious World Press Photo "Joop Swart" Master Class. In 2003 she was a speaker at the TED Conferencewww.ted.com
She began to photograph the impact of AIDS in southern Africa in 2001. Ashburn's work has also taken her to Iraq a year following the US-led invasion; Israel and the Palestinian Territories, Sri Lanka in the immediate aftermath of the tsunami; Russia to cover the spread of MDR-tuberculosis in the penal system. Her work has appeared in many publications including Time, Newsweek, US New & World Report, Life and others.
