Doctor’s reminders boosts adherence to meds
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Even after a heart attack, people don’t always take the medicine prescribed for them - but a reminder from their doctor helps keep them on track, a study shows.
Follow-up patient mailings stressing the importance of taking beta-blocker pills after a heart attack increased adherence to these medications, the researchers report.
“The main finding was that 17 percent more patients were adherent with beta-blocker therapy following the intervention—this translates into one additional adherent patient for every 16 mailings,” lead author Dr. David H. Smith told Reuters Health.
Being underweight may raise diabetes risk
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Being underweight may place men and women over age 60 at increased risk for developing diabetes, Japanese researchers report.
“Older people who are underweight may need to take care of their poor nutrition status,” Dr. Toshimi Sairenchi noted in comments to Reuters Health.
To examine the association between underweight and diabetes risk, Sairenchi and colleagues collected information in 1993 from 39,201 men and 88,012 women who were between 40 and 79 years old and who did not have diabetes. They followed the men and women for an average of 5.3 years.
Diabetes linked to endometrial cancer risk
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Type 2 diabetes is associated with cancer of the lining of the uterus (endometrial cancer), regardless of the presence of most other risk factors, study findings suggest.
“A positive association has been observed in nearly all studies of type 2 diabetes in relation to the incidence of endometrial cancer,” Dr. Babette S. Saltzman, of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, and colleagues note in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
“Given the adverse effect of obesity on the incidence of both diabetes and endometrial cancer, investigators have adjusted for obesity in a number of these studies,” they note. “To varying degrees, all found that diabetes was independently associated with endometrial cancer.”
Drinking plus hormones may up breast cancer risk
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Even moderate drinking may raise the risk of breast cancer among postmenopausal women on hormone replacement therapy, new research suggests.
A number of studies have linked regular drinking to a higher risk of breast cancer; it’s thought that the risk reflects the effects of alcohol on women’s levels of estrogen and other hormones. Similarly, hormone replacement therapy (HRT) after menopause has been shown to raise the risk of breast cancer.
The new findings, reported in the International Journal of Cancer, suggest that alcohol and HRT may combine to further boost the odds of developing the disease.
Doctors not getting enough sleep: survey
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A new survey released by the American College of Chest Physicians’ Sleep Institute indicates that most physicians report needing at least 7 hours of sleep per night, yet they only get 6.5 hours on average.
“Call hours during training and in the practice of medicine desensitize physicians to the importance of sleep. The pervasive message is that sleep is optional or dispensable,” Dr. Barbara Phillips, Chair of the ACCP Sleep Institute, said in a statement. “Self sacrifice also may be seen as part of the lifestyle. This may impact physicians’ awareness of their own, and their patients’, sleep deprivation lifestyles.”
The findings come from an internet-based questionnaire sent to 5000 US doctors. A total of 581 doctors responded.
Metabolic syndrome: a risk factor for depression?
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A cluster of heart disease and diabetes risk factors known as the metabolic syndrome may be a “predisposing factor for the development of depression,” Finnish researchers report.
Dr. Hannu Koponen of Kuopio University in Kuopio, Finland, and colleagues followed a large group of middle-aged men and women living in central Finland for 7 years. At the start of the study in 1998, they checked for symptoms of depression using a standard instrument called the Beck Depression Inventory. They also assessed the presence of metabolic syndrome in the subjects, using established criteria.
Components of metabolic syndrome include high cholesterol and triglyceride levels, low levels of “good” HDL cholesterol, high blood sugar, high blood pressure, and excess belly fat.
Obesity chokes up the cellular power plant
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The machinery responsible for energy production in fat cells is working poorly as a result of obesity. Finnish research done at the University of Helsinki and the National Public Health Institute shows that this may aggravate and work to maintain the obese state in humans.
Studying rare cases of young (25 year old) identical twins with large differences in bodyweight a Finnish research group has shown that already in the very early stages of obesity, clear changes in the function of the cellular mitochondria can be observed. Mitochondria are responsible for the energy production in cells and their dysfunction may work to maintain and worsen obesity. Surprisingly, the genes most drastically affected by obesity were ones involved in the breakdown of a class of amino acids known as branched-chain amino acids. These changes in the obese twins were clearly associated with pre-diabetic changes in sugar metabolism and the action of the hormone insulin.
The research is published in the latest edition of the science journal PLoS-Medicine (published and freely available online 11th of March).
Emotional ‘bummer’ of cocaine addiction mimicked in animals
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Cocaine addicts often suffer a downward emotional spiral that is a key to their craving and chronic relapse. While researchers have developed animal models of the reward of cocaine, they have not been able to model this emotional impact, until now.
Regina Carelli and colleagues report experiments with rats in which they have mimicked the negative affect of cocaine addiction and even how it drives greater cocaine use. They said their animal model could enable better understanding of the emotional motivations of cocaine addiction and how to ameliorate them.
The researchers reported their findings in the March 13, 2008, issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press.
Study raises caution on new painkillers
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A new class of painkillers that block a receptor called TRPV1 may interfere with brain functions such as learning and memory, a new study suggests. The experiments with rat brain found that the TRPV1 receptor regulates a neural mechanism called long-term depression, which is believed to be central to establishing memory pathways in the brain.
The researchers said their findings also suggest that the function of TRPV1 in neural tissue may explain reported side effects of the anti-obesity drug Acomplia, widely used outside the U.S. While Acomplia has been approved in Europe, the FDA denied U.S. approval because of concerns that the drug increases risk of depression and suicide. The researchers, led by Julie Kauer, published their findings in the March 13, 2008, issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press.
TRPV1, or “transient receptor potential vanilloid 1,” is a pain receptor whose activation causes the pain in inflammation. The receptor is also triggered by noxious chemicals such as the chili pepper compound capsaicin.
Different use of brain areas may explain memory problems in schizophrenics
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The enduring memory problems that people with schizophrenia experience may be related to differences in how their brains process information, new research has found.
The Public Library of Science published the report by Vanderbilt University researchers Junghee Lee, Bradley S. Folley, John Gore and Sohee Park in the online journal PLOS One March 12.
“We found that schizophrenic patients use different areas of their brain than healthy individuals do for working memory, which is an active form of short-term memory,” Park said.
Study shows long-term weight control is achievable
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People who shed weight and want to keep it off might benefit from monthly personal contact interventions, researchers reported at the American Heart Association’s Conference on Nutrition, Physical Activity and Metabolism.
Results of the study will also be simultaneously published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
In a test of three ways that might help people maintain weight loss, those who received monthly personal counseling were best at keeping off unwanted pounds. Overall, 42 percent of the study members maintained at least a 4-kilogram (9-pound) weight loss for 30 months.
Gene Hunters Fine-Tune Marker for Common Obesity Gene
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Genomics researchers, seeking to replicate another group’s discovery of an important gene associated with obesity, have further refined the signal to a particular variant in DNA that may be more helpful in identifying this gene’s role in obesity in various human populations worldwide. The finding suggests that the gene variant, identified in DNA from African American children, may be a tag of an ancient mutation that first arose in Africa, where humans originated.
The research team, led by Struan Grant, Ph.D., and Hakon Hakonarson, M.D., Ph.D., both of the Center for Applied Genomics of The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, was studying the FTO gene, identified by a British group in 2007 as raising the risk of adult and childhood obesity. Although environmental influences are certainly important, family studies have indicated that obesity has a genetic component as well.
The research team, from Children’s Hospital and the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, reported its findings in the March 12 issue of the journal Public Library of Science ONE.
Revise guidelines for weight gain during pregnancy, says Saint Louis U. obstetrician
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Current recommendations for weight gain during pregnancy – developed by the Institute of Medicine (IOM) in 1990 – should be revised, according to an internationally recognized obesity expert and chairman of the department of obstetrics, gynecology and women’s health at Saint Louis University.
The editorial by Raul Artal, M.D., who has conducted extensive research on obesity during pregnancy, appears in the March issue of Expert Review of Obstetrics and Gynecology, an international medical journal.
Recommendations by the IOM, which are followed worldwide by obstetricians, encourage obese women to gain at least 15 pounds during pregnancy and specify no upper limit for weight gain. The IOM is a panel of national experts who provide advice on medical and health issues.
Glaucoma Associated With Increased Risk of Cardiovascular Death in Black Patients
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In a population of African origin, persons with diagnosed and treated glaucoma appeared to have an increased risk of death from cardiovascular causes, according to a study by Suh-Yuh Wu, and colleagues in the Departments of Preventive Medicine and Ophthalmology at Stony Brook University, the University of the West Indies, and the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. The study results are published in the March issue of Archives of Ophthalmology.
Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of visual impairment worldwide. The most common type, primary open-angle glaucoma, is especially prevalent in populations of African origin, including African-Americans, in which it is the foremost cause of blindness. According to Wu and coauthors, populations of African origin have higher rates of death from chronic disease than white populations and also tend to have and higher eye pressure (ocular hypertension).
Wu and colleagues studied 4,092 participants age 40 to 84 (average age 58.6) in the Barbados Eye Studies, which assessed a predominantly black population with similar ancestry to African-Americans. Initial visits occurred between 1987 and 1992. Height, weight and blood pressure were recorded. Interviews were conducted, and eye photographs and various eye measurements were taken, including eye pressure. Participants with specific findings were also referred for a comprehensive ophthalmologic examination.
Vaginal lubricants may impair sperm quality: study
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Of five vaginal lubricants tested in a study, only one did not significantly decrease the ability of sperm to swim (motility) or the integrity of chromatin—genetic material that makes up chromosomes, researchers found.
Between a third and a half of sexually active couples use vaginal lubricants, they explain, but a number of studies have reported a deleterious effect on sperm quality. “What can a woman use,” they ask, “to alleviate vaginal dryness while trying to conceive, without harming the sperm?”
To investigate, Dr. Ashok Agarwal from the Cleveland Clinic, Ohio and associates evaluated the effects of four commercially available vaginal lubricants (FemGlide, Pre~Seed, Replens, and Astroglide) on sperm motility and the effects of three lubricants (Pre~Seed, K-Y Jelly, and FemGlide) on sperm chromatin integrity.
