There is now a special flu vaccine for people who are 65 and older, called Fluzone High-Dose.

As the name implies, Fluzone High-Dose contains more antigen than regular flu vaccines - four times the amount, to be precise. This vaccine was specifically designed for older people, as immune systems are less responsive as people age. The higher dose of antigen should ensure a higher response (meaning more protection against the flu).

It looks like there were more of the typical side effects (sore arm, headache, low fever) after the Fluzone High-Dose, compared to the regular flu vaccine. However, there were not more serious adverse events.

Be aware that there is also a regular Fluzone, so if you are interested in the Fluzone High-Dose, make sure you are very specific in this request.

Read more:

• Questions and Answers: Fluzone High-Dose Seasonal Influenza Vaccine
• FDA Information on Fluzone and Fluzone High-Dose

In my recent blog, Everyone , I mentioned that age is no longer a factor in getting a vaccine (last year, people over 65 were initially restricted from getting the H1N1 vaccine because of shortages) and that almost everyone should get a flu vaccine.

Here are the people who should NOT get a flu vaccine this year without talking to a doctor first:

• People who have a severe allergy to chicken eggs.
• People who have had a severe reaction to an influenza vaccination.
• People who developed Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) within 6 weeks of getting an influenza vaccine.
• Children less than 6 months of age (influenza vaccine is not approved for this age group), and
• People who have a moderate-to-severe illness with a fever (they should wait until they recover to get vaccinated.)

If you or a loved one falls into any of the above categories, talk to your doc about your options. Also, make sure that everyone that you are in close contact with (family members, co-workers) gets their vaccine, so that your "herd" is protected and cannot catch the flu and pass it along to you. This will reduce your vulnerability a great deal.

For more information, read what the CDC has to say: Key Facts About Seasonal Flu Vaccine

If you are reading this, you should probably get a flu vaccine this year, as should everyone in your family who is older than 6 months of age.

Last year, supplies were limited of both seasonal and H1N1 vaccines, so people older than 65 were told NOT to get H1N1 vaccines because of limited supplies and assumed immunity (see Q. I'm 65 years old. Why can't I get the Swine flu (H1N1) vaccine? blog from December 2009).

However, this year, there are plenty of vaccines (and the H1N1 vaccine is combined with seasonal flu vaccine) and the CDC is recommending that almost everyone (besides a very few specific groups) gets a flu vaccine (see CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices [ACIP] Recommends Universal Annual Influenza Vaccination).

Of course, if you are older than 49, you cannot get the nasal spray version of the flu vaccine (FluMist or LAIV) and must get the injection, which contains a killed virus.

Soon after I wrote my blog on Low-Fat vs. Low-Carb Diets for Weight Loss, I happened across a study that showed that low-carb diets can be great and they also can be harmful, depending on how you decide to interpret the rules.

A study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, entitled Low-Carbohydrate Diets and All-Cause and Cause-Specific Mortality discusses the results of two cohort studies (the Nurses' Health Study and Health Professionals' Follow-up Study). These are gigantic studies, where over 85,000 women and 44,500 men have been followed for over 20 years. The diet data was pulled out of a larger data set, based on food questionnaires that participants filled out.

Here's what the data said:

• Overall, low-carb diets seemed to be associated with a 12% increase in mortality (over regular diets, I am guessing).
• When the diet heavily relied on animal sources of fat and protein, there was a 23% increase in mortality (specifically, a 14% increase for cardiovascular-related deaths and 28% increase in deaths due to cancer).
• However (and this is exciting to me), when the low-carb diet included more vegetables for fat and protein, there was a 20% reduction in mortality (23% reduction in cardiovascular deaths).

Bottom line here is that it seems like low-carb diets (followers prefer to call them "lifestyles") are healthy, if they rely on beans, nuts and olive oil for proteins and fats. People who are "low-carbing" it by peeling the bread off of a Big Mac or eating more bacon instead of vegetables may be losing the same amounts of weight as the veggie-based people, but doing some harm along the way.