Volleyball was Kyle Pitman’s secondary sport, but it was hard to tell with his effort and influence on the court.

With temperatures on the rise, it’s important to stay hydrated and replenish your electrolytes. Whether you exercise intensely or your child participates in an outdoor sport or you’re a construction worker with a physically demanding job, you’re at risk of dehydration and loss of electrolytes.

It’s signed, sealed and delivered. The home of your dreams is now a reality and you’re ready to decorate, entertain, and nest. Then suddenly, the dream turns into a nightmare. The air conditioning unit crashes — right in the middle of the July swelter. When else?

Besides pulse, respiratory rate, and blood pressure, a patient’s temperature is also considered a “vital sign.” The thing that makes a person’s temperature vital is that the body’s homeostasis, or ability to maintain all functions optimally, depends upon a certain range of heat. Most everyone can recite that the average body core temperature is 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit with a healthy range being anywhere from 97 to 99 degrees. Temperatures that vary below or above this average create an internal atmosphere that is not conducive to the various systems’ functioning. The term “fever” generally refers to anything over 99 degrees. In order to maintain the healthful range, the body has a regulating system that kicks in much like any thermostat. If the core temperature starts to rise, we begin a cooling mechanism through sweating. If the core temperature starts to decrease, shivering will initiate warming through muscle contractions.

Plot-twisting puzzlers are a bubble market in the movies these days, with an arms race of "Inception"-like reality reversals that flip like a coin until dizzy audiences lose all interest in how it lands.

Sorry, but Nancy Pelosi is wrong. We do have a spending problem and the heart of the matter is our inability to control medical costs. Spending on health care now consumes an astonishing 18 percent of our total economic output. Rising Medicare and Medicaid costs are the main drivers of our national debt crisis. Yet health care costs continue to shoot up relentlessly.

A new study about the prevalence of mercury in fish should give consumers food for thought. According to the Biodiversity Research Institute report, “Fish samples from around the world regularly demonstrate mercury concentrations exceeding human health advisory guidelines.” Because both mercury pollution and fish supplies are global — 75 percent of the fish consumed in the U.S. is imported — no one country can solve this widespread problem.

When people think of Jewish film, their minds tend to jump right to two subjects: religion and the Holocaust. While the Greater Phoenix Jewish Film Festival certainly embraces those subject matters, executive director Jerry Mittelman ensures that they make up only a slice of the wide spectrum of films the fest has to offer.

The University of Arizona College of Medicine Phoenix has named Dr. Dean Coonrod, MD, as chair of the executive committee of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology for the downtown Phoenix medical college.

Last week children returned to school after two weeks of winter recess. Two weeks of fun and frolic are over. The excitement of the season, treats, family reunions, unscheduled activities, late bedtimes, and no early morning hustle of getting ready are all in the past. The return to school brings a different routine requiring a disciplined approach.

The headache, sometimes handy as an excuse, more often than not, a very real, annoying discomfort. For some, it is a pain that is debilitating and in some rare instances a headache could signal an emergency medical situation.

Are you constantly struggling to reach or maintain healthy weight? Do you experience cravings for specific foods? What about unexplained joint pain, skin problems or headaches? If so, the cause is highly probably related to the food(s) you’re eating.

More than 300 million people worldwide experience severe or debilitating headaches. Migraines alone affect 9 percent of the U.S. population and cost $1 billion a year in direct medical expenses. The incidence of individuals who suffer migraine headaches has increased by 50 percent within the last 20 years with 75 percent of migraine sufferers being women.

Acupuncture gets a thumbs-up for helping relieve pain from chronic headaches, backaches and arthritis in a review of more than two dozen studies — the latest analysis of an often-studied therapy that has as many fans as critics.

From elementary to college students, many use backpacks to help carry everything from books to food and more throughout the school day, but could those backpacks be putting our children’s bodies in harm’s way? Backpacks can actually be especially taxing on the back, neck and shoulders if worn incorrectly.

Microsoft has announced the launch date for the new Windows 8 as the last week in October. Big deal, huh?

Water is one of the most important nutrients and often overlooked for detoxification, losing body fat, and optimal health. Your body is approximately 70 percent water, your brain tissue approximately 75 percent water, and your blood is 83 percent water.

By the time summer’s over, many families can’t wait for school to start. Working parents have struggled to find camps or babysitting, kids are bored and teachers fret over “summer slide” — the academic losses that research shows hits kids from poor families hardest.

An elderly East Valley man died this month after contracting West Nile Virus, becoming the first human fatality of the year from this disease.

Five hospitals sit within an easy drive of my Indianapolis home. It’s comforting to know, considering that my wife will deliver our second child in late August.

Arizona’s first human West Nile Virus case for the year has been confirmed in Maricopa County.

New York •  Amazon.com wants “.joy,” Google wants “.love” and L’Oreal wants “.beauty.”

New York •  Amazon.com wants “.joy,” Google wants “.love” and L’Oreal wants “.beauty.”

Concussion awareness has grown immensely in the past few years with the NFL and NHL taking steps to prevent concussions, including supplementary discipline for hits to the head.