Eating your greens can change the effect of your genes on heart disease, say researchers
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A long-held mantra suggests that you can’t change your family, the genes they pass on, or the effect of these genes. Now, an international team of scientists, led by researchers at McMaster and McGill universities, is attacking that belief.
The researchers discovered the gene that is the strongest marker for heart disease can actually be modified by generous amounts of fruit and raw vegetables. The results of their study are published in the current issue of the journal PLoS Medicine.
“We know that 9p21 genetic variants increase the risk of heart disease for those that carry it,” said Dr. Jamie Engert, joint principal investigator of the study, who is a researcher in cardiovascular diseases at the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI-MUHC) and associate member in the Department of Human Genetics at McGill University. “But it was a surprise to find that a healthy diet could significantly weaken its effect.”
Child abuse in birds: Study documents ‘cycle of violence’ in nature
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For one species of seabird in the Galápagos, the child abuse “cycle of violence” found in humans plays out in the wild.
The new study of Nazca boobies by Wake Forest University researchers provides the first evidence from the animal world showing those who are abused when they are young often grow up to be abusers. The study appears in the October issue of the ornithology journal, The Auk.
“We were surprised by the intense interest that many adults show in unrelated young, involving really rough treatment,” said Wake Forest Professor of Biology Dave Anderson, who led the study with Wake Forest graduate student Martina Müller. “A bird’s history as a target of abuse proved to be a strong predictor of its adult behavior.”
Diabetes again linked to colon cancer risk
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A new research review confirms that people with diabetes have a somewhat increased risk of colon cancer—but the reasons for the connection, and what should be done about it, remain unclear.
Combining the results of 14 international studies, researchers found that overall, people with diabetes were 38 percent more likely to be diagnosed with colon cancer than those who were diabetes-free.
There was also a 20 percent increase in the risk of rectal cancer, though that appeared to be confined to men.
Exercise eases arthritis in obese mice even without weight loss
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Adding another incentive to exercise, scientists at Duke University Medical Center have found that physical activity improves arthritis symptoms even among obese mice that continue to chow down on a high-fat diet.
The insight suggests that excess weight alone isn’t what causes the aches and pains of osteoarthritis, despite the long-held notion that carrying extra pounds strains the joints and leads to the inflammatory condition.
Published Sept. 27 online in the journal Arthritis & Rheumatism, the findings are now being tested in people.
“What’s surprising is that exercise, without substantial weight loss, can be beneficial to the joints,” said Farshid Guilak, Ph.D., professor of orthopaedic surgery at Duke and senior author of the study. “Ideally, it would be best to be fit and lose a little weight, but this shows that exercise alone can improve the health of your joints.”
Well-Child Visits Suffer From Time Squeeze: Study
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Longer well-child visits for babies and toddlers make for happier parents because doctors can fit in more advice and answer more questions, a new study finds.
But most well-child visits last less than 20 minutes and pediatricians are getting even more time-crunched as health care systems look to cut extra expenses any way they can, researchers write in Pediatrics.
“The disability rates for children continue to increase, and the nature of disability is changing,” with more kids getting diagnosed with behavioral and developmental problems, lead author Dr. Neal Halfon, from the University of California, Los Angeles Center for Healthier Children, Families and Communities, told Reuters Health.
Healthcare Costs Expected to Increase by Lowest Rate in a Decade
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American companies will likely pay an average of 5.4 percent more for health benefits in 2012, marking the lowest increase in costs since 1997.
American companies will likely pay an average of 5.4 percent more for health benefits in 2012, according to national survey by benefits consulting firm Mercer. This would mark the lowest increase since 1997. However, employees can expect the cost of their health benefits to continue increasing at a faster pace than their earnings.
The annual survey included responses from almost 1,600 employers. The findings of the analysis reflect employer efforts to cut costs by such methods as offering employees lower-cost health plans having increased paycheck contributions and higher deductibles.
Without any cost-cutting measures, employer health benefit costs are expected to increase by 7.1 percent, on average, which is a decline of close to 2 percent when compared to average annual increases of around 9 percent annually over the last five years.
Johns Hopkins researchers pinpoint the cause of MRI vertigo
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A team of researchers says it has discovered why so many people undergoing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), especially in newer high-strength machines, get vertigo, or the dizzy sensation of free-falling, while inside or when coming out of the tunnel-like machine.
In a new study published in Current Biology online on Sept. 22, a team led by Johns Hopkins scientists suggests that MRI’s strong magnet pushes on fluid that circulates in the inner ear’s balance center, leading to a feeling of unexpected or unsteady movement. The finding could also call into question results of so-called functional MRI studies designed to detect what the brain and mind are doing under various circumstances.
To determine the mechanism behind MRI-induced vertigo, Dale C. Roberts, M.S., senior research systems engineer in the laboratory of David Zee, M.D., within the Department of Neurology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and his colleagues placed 10 volunteers with healthy labyrinths (inner tube-like structures in the ears that control balance) and two volunteers who lacked labyrinthine function into MRI scanners. They tracked vertigo not only by the volunteers’ reports, but also by looking for nystagmus, a type of involuntary eye movement that reflects the brain’s detection of motion - the kind of jerky eye tracking that a person on a merry-go-round might experience. Because visual clues can help suppress nystagmus, the researchers conducted their experiments in the dark.
Singing after stroke? Why rhythm and formulaic phrases may be more important than melody
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After a left-sided stroke, many individuals suffer from serious speech disorders but are often able to sing complete texts relatively fluently. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany, have now demonstrated that it is not singing itself that is the key. Instead, rhythm may be crucial. Moreover, highly familiar song lyrics and formulaic phrases were found to have a strong impact on articulation – regardless of whether they were sung or spoken. The results may lead the way to new rehabilitative therapies for speech disorders.
When a stroke damages speech areas in the brain’s left hemisphere, sufferers often have severe difficulties speaking – a condition known as non-fluent aphasia. Sometimes the inability to speak spontaneously is permanent. However, there are frequent cases of aphasics who are able to sing song lyrics and formulaic phrases relatively fluently. Until now, this astonishing observation has been explained by the fact that the right brain hemisphere, which supports important functions of singing, remains intact. Singing was thought to stimulate areas in the right hemisphere, which would then assume the function for damaged left speech areas. A treatment method known as Melodic Intonation Therapy is based on this idea.
South Korea sets sights on becoming stem cell powerhouse, again
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South Korea’s president vowed on Monday a series of regulatory reforms to help regain its place as a stem cell research powerhouse, trying to reclaim momentum five years after a cloning scandal.
President Lee Myung-bak said that by breathing new life into the industry, it could become “core new growth engine” for Asia’s fourth biggest economy along the same lines as its lucrative IT sector.
“Just a decade ago, Korea took the lead in stem cell research in the world along with the United States,” Lee said in a bi-weekly radio address.
United Nations Focus On Chronic Diseases
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Leading Australian chronic disease groups said today that this week’s historic United Nations summit on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) must mark the start of a united and continuous action in the fight against the rapid rise of major chronic diseases, such as heart disease, cancer, diabetes, stroke, kidney disease and chronic respiratory disease.
Major diseases like these represent an enormous social and economic burden for all nations, but those suffering the most are the low and middle income countries, whose health systems are ill-equipped to cope with this mounting epidemic.
A large proportion of this burden of disease is preventable through implementation of cost effective interventions, including strategies to control tobacco, salt reduction and food reformulation programs as well as encouraging individuals to be physically active on a daily basis.
Stroke centers no worse at weekend treatment
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Hospitals that have been designated as “stroke centers” may provide just as good care on the weekend as on weekdays, new findings suggest.
That’s important because previous studies have hinted that people who come to the hospital after having a stroke don’t do as well if they’re admitted over the weekend, when nurses and specialists might be stretched extra thin.
“This is a big concern among the physician community because we all know that not every hospital has the capacity to treat those patients on the weekend,” said Dr. Ying Xian, who studies stroke care at the Duke Clinical Research Institute in Durham, North Carolina and wasn’t involved in the new study.
Researcher launches teen contraceptive website
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Friends, the mainstream media and the internet, all potentially unreliable sources, continue to be the way America’s young adults find their health information. Research has found that while they trust health professionals and health educators, they often do not turn to them for information, especially when it comes to their sexual health.
In an attempt to provide a reliable and trustworthy source for reproductive health information for teenagers, one physician-researcher at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island has launched the website Ask A Doc RI.
“My thought was to bring the information to where the teenagers are, which is on the internet,” says Vinita Goyal, MD, MPH, of Women & Infants’ Center for Women’s Primary Care. “Ask A Doc RI contains a variety of information on contraception and local clinical resources where youth can seek health care.”
Regional differences in the care of acute stroke patients
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Considerable regional differences exist in the treatment of patients with acute cerebral infarction. This is the finding presented by Erwin Stolz and his co-authors in the current issue of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2011; 108[36]: 607).
The prognosis for patients with stroke largely depends on a rapid, standardized first response. Across the German federal state of Hesse, there are great differences in the time interval between symptom onset and admission to hospital or transfer to a specialist stroke unit. Percentages of patients who receive treatment with drugs that break down the blood clot (thrombolysis) also vary greatly, more than was expected. The average thrombolysis rate in patients admitted to hospital within 3 hours after the stroke was 19%, but rates varied regionally between 6% and 35%.
The authors base their study on data from the mandatory quality assurance program for stroke in Hesse. They argue that improvement is needed; in particular, they believe that treatment paths and care structures within individual hospitals must be analyzed more closely.
The breathtaking dance of plants
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The way in which plants space out the pores through which they breathe depends on keeping a protein active during stem cell growth, according to John Innes Centre scientists.
Plant pores, called stomata, are essential for life. When they evolved about 400 million years ago, they helped plants conquer the land. Plants absorb carbon dioxide through stomata and release oxygen and water vapour as part of the Earth’s carbon and water cycles.
Stomata need to be evenly spaced to maximise breathing capacity. But how they establish an even spatial pattern during plant growth has been a mystery.
What are Antioxidants and Why Do You Need Them?
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IFT Member Claudia Fajardo-Lira, PhD, Professor of Food Science and Nutrition at California State University-Northridge, explains the facts about antioxidants:
Q: What are antioxidants?
A: Antioxidants play an important role in overall health. They are natural compounds found in some foods that help neutralize free radicals in our bodies. Free radicals are substances that occur naturally in our bodies but attack the fats, protein and the DNA in our cells, which can cause different types of diseases and accelerate the aging process.
Q: What foods are the best sources for antioxidants?
