Health News Updates

People with history of heart attack or stroke usually take a low-dose aspirin every day, which helps prevent heart attacks in future. But if you’ve never had a heart attack (or stroke), the risks of taking a daily low-dose aspirin outweigh the benefits, according to a U.K. report published in Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin.

Almost 50 million Americans take low-dose (325 mg. per day or less) aspirin to prevent heart problems. Some do even though they don’t have heart disease or a history of heart attack or stroke, as primary prevention.

American Diabetes Association (ADA) recommends low-dose aspirin for primary prevention in people with diabetes who are at risk for cardiovascular disease, but this will be changing.

“Because of some recent studies suggesting that the benefit is not very large, and because aspirin can also have risks (intestinal bleeding or hemorrhagic stroke), the January 2010 recommendations will recommend it mostly for higher-risk people than was the case in the past, when it was recommended for people with more moderate levels of risk and above,” says Dr. M. Sue Kirkman, the vice president of clinical affairs for the ADA.
The Researchers of the new analysis say there’s not enough evidence to give good reason for the routine use of low-dose aspirin to prevent heart disease in apparently healthy people, including those with elevated blood pressure or diabetes.

Kirkman stresses that people with diabetes who is taking aspirin–and have no history of heart attack, should talk to their doctor and see if he or she recommends continuing the therapy.

Aspirin can cause gastrointestinal bleeding and other problems–some of them serious. People who take aspirin daily are two to four times as likely to have upper gastrointestinal problems, such as an ulcer with complications, than those not taking aspirin (even if the aspirin is buffered or has a protective coating to limit stomach problems).

The American Heart Association recommends daily low-dose aspirin for people who have had a heart attack, for those with heart disease–related chest pain known as unstable angina, or those who have had a clot-related stroke (or those who have had mini strokes, episodes that suggest a stroke is imminent). In general, the risk of heart attack has to be 10 percent within the next decade to warrant daily aspirin use, the group says.
In 2004, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory panel rejected the idea of using aspirin for primary prevention.

“Do not take daily aspirin on your own, “.This review emphasizes the need for a recommendation by your physician and dialogue about the benefits and risks. Risks include gastrointestinal bleeding and a small, but potentially devastating, risk of bleeding in the brain.

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There are many weight control products available in the market. E .g., Diet cookies and the advertising reads like watch 10 pounds melt away.tis tempts many consumers to eat those cookies with different formulae.

The wonderful ingredients vary from one brand to another — in one case it’s amino acids, in another it’s soy pulp, which absorbs all the liquids you wash the cookies down with and leaves you feeling full. But in all cases, the cookies are priced as if they were largely gold: $279 for a 35-day supply of Smart for Life cookies, for example.

The the reason weight is lost, is that the quantity limits the dieter to a handful of cookies and just one meal per day, for a total daily calorie load of 800 to 1,200. Limit yourself to that caloric intake, and it matters little what you eat — you will lose weight.

But you also get under nourished and develop different ailments like gallstones, weakened kidneys, potassium deficiency, dizziness, heart palpitations and eating disorders.

Nutritionists and dietitians are generally critical of the whole diet cookie concept, and make the following points:

You simply can’t meet your body’s nutritional requirements with a half-dozen cookies and one meal per day, even with vitamin supplements on the side
To maintain weight loss you must stick to a healthy long-term eating pattern, and cookies plus dinner doesn’t qualify
Gimmick diets, especially one-word diets, have a deplorable track record over time
So, however attractive the “cookie diet” may sound, it’s almost certainly a waste of time and money.
Think of it as the Really-chewy-cookie-that-you-never-get-around-to-swallowing Diet
Our old friend chewing gum, on the other hand, gets a thumbs-up as a possible weight-loss aid, based on a University of Rhode Island study, which found that after participants chewed sugarless gum in the morning, they reported feeling less hungry and consumed 68 fewer calories at lunch.

Moreover, the simple physical act of chewing boosted the rate at which they expended energy by approximately 5 percent. According to the test subjects, gum chewing also seemed to reduce fatigue and the effort requited to perform tasks.

The study estimates that, between the energy expended and the fact that the chewer isn’t snacking instead, the net effect of an hour of sugarless gum chewing could be a “savings” of 62 calories.

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Day light saving time schedules may change easily but it charges on mental and physical capacities.The extra hour of sleep you’ll get in most parts of the country might be restful, but the end of Daylight Saving Time could spell trouble for your body clock, a sleep expert says.

Dr. Atul Malhotra, medical director of the sleep disorders research program in the division of sleep medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, explained in a hospital news release that there are ways to prevent the time change from disrupting your sleep habits.

For most people, the time shift in the spring is more problematic because an hour is “lost” rather than “gained,” but for those who are disrupted by any change in schedule, Malhotra offered these coping tips:

1. Stay away from caffeine and other stimulants, especially during the days before and after the time shift, and avoid napping for a few days because it can disrupt your sleeping at night.
2. Sleep through that extra hour if you can instead of trying to get things done.
3. Don’t drive if you feel sleepy because of the time shift. Consider taking public transportation for a few days to give your body time to adjust.
4. Relax, avoid stress and remember to take your regular medications over the weekend of the time change.
5. Take 15 to 30 minutes to wind down before heading off to bed.
6. Keep your room dark, quiet and cool; ear plugs and eye masks can help.
7. Keep in mind that time in front of screens — the computer or television varieties — before bedtime can disrupt sleep.
8. Don’t work or study right before bedtime, in order to allow yourself to relax.

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Aranesp designed to combat anemia appears to increase the risk of stroke in patients with diabetes and kidney disease without significantly improving their quality of life. Use of Aranesp should be reserved for the most seriously ill rather than trading off between treating anemia and developing stroke.

Darbepoetin alfa, sold as Aranesp and known as an erythropoiesis-stimulating agent (ESA), is often given to diabetic patients with kidney disease and slight anemia.

“The benefits we assumed would have by treating anemia were less striking and the risks were more striking,” said lead researcher Dr. Marc A. Pfeffer, a professor of medicine in the cardiovascular division of Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.
The report was published in the Oct. 30 online edition of the New England Journal of Medicine to coincide with its scheduled presentation at the annual meeting of the American Society of Nephrology in San Diego.

For the study, Pfeiffer’s team randomly selected more than 4,000 patients with diabetes, chronic kidney disease and anemia to receive Aranesp or placebo. During the study, 632 patients receiving Aranesp died or suffered a cardiovascular event, compared to 602 of the patients receiving placebo.

As well, 101 patients taking Aranesp had a fatal or non-fatal stroke compared with 53 of the placebo patients, the researchers found. Moreover, patients taking Aranesp reported only a little improvement in their weakness, the researchers noted.

In previous studies, Aranesp and a similar drug, epoetin alfa, sold as Procrit or Epogen, were linked to increased risk of death in cancer and stroke patients.
Pfeffer believes that people with more severe kidney disease, such as those on dialysis, might still find Aranesp beneficial and the risk acceptable.

“But this use of ESAs exceeded the data,” he said. “Now we have the data, and we will revisit how the drug is used now.”

Dr. Phillip Marsden, a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto and author of an accompanying journal editorial, said these findings mean that doctors and patients will have to discuss whether or not to start the medication.

Dr. Ajay Singh, clinical chief of the renal division and director of dialysis at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, said this “landmark study” raises the fundamental question of whether epoetin or darbepoetin should routinely be used in treating anemia of chronic kidney disease.
“Earlier studies raised the specter of increased risk with ESA treatment. This study definitively confirms that there is meaningful risk with routine use of ESAs,” said Singh, also an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
“In my own practice, I will be cautious in using ESAs for most patients with chronic kidney disease, balancing risk with benefits and reserving treatment largely for patients who need frequent blood transfusions or who are candidates for a kidney transplant,” he said.

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A new gene therapy procedure to restore function in lungs damaged during harvesting from donors could make more of the organs available for transplanting, Canadian researchers reported. New procedure could sharply augment the supply of functional lungs by preventing and possibly repairing organs damaged during harvesting. The process also may increase acceptance by the recipient.
Currently, only about 15% of potential donor lungs are used because the rest are too damaged to implant. The new technique, which has not yet been tested in humans, could prevent that damage or even reverse it, potentially expanding the supply of lungs sharply.

Lung transplants are the definitive therapy for many end-stage lung diseases such as emphysema and cystic fibrosis, but they are fraught with problems. Because lungs are more likely to be rejected by recipients’ bodies than other organs, the five-year survival rate is only about 50%, lower than that for heart, liver or kidney transplantation.

And because of the shortage of donor lungs, an estimated 234 people in the United States died last year while waiting for a lung transplant, according to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network. About 1,800 people in this country are now on the waiting list for a lung, the agency said.

The problem in both cases is inflammation caused by insufficient amounts of an immune molecule called lL-10. Donated lungs are immediately chilled on ice, which destroys any IL-10 that may remain in the lungs, allowing substantial damage to occur before the organ can be implanted. And a lack of the molecule after transplantation increases the likelihood that inflammation will damage the organ and induce rejection.

“Anything that can decrease inflammatory processes would make them more suitable for transplantation and also impact the recipient’s ability to reject the organ,” said Dr. James McPherson, a thoracic surgeon at Marina Del Rey Hospital who was not involved in the research. “This looks very promising.”

To circumvent inflammation, Dr. Shaf Keshavjee and Dr. Marcelo Cypel of the University Health Network in Toronto and their colleagues developed a two-pronged approach.

First, they devised a domed chamber that keeps the lungs at body temperature, preserving IL-10, and that pumps a solution containing oxygen and nutrients through the lungs to keep them alive. That alone prevented the lungs from deteriorating and improved the success of transplants in animals.

The researchers then performed gene therapy on the lungs, using a defanged adenovirus to deliver a gene that is the blueprint for IL-10 into the lung tissue. The gene was quickly taken up by the cells and began producing the molecule, which reduced inflammation. “We’re transducing the cells in the lung to become little IL-10 factories,” Keshavjee said in a statement.

The team reported Wednesday in the new journal Science Translational Medicine that they used the technique to remove lungs from pigs — whose metabolism is similar to that of humans — perfused them in the domed chamber for 12 hours, then successfully reimplanted them.

The procedure “not only may result in improved preservation of lungs before transplantation but also may repair lungs otherwise not suitable for transplantation,” Dr. David S. Wilkes of the Indiana University School of Medicine wrote in an editorial accompanying the report.

Keshavjee said the team hopes to begin human trials in a year or so.

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A recent study discovered an antibody that can reduce the major internal bleeding often reported following traumas.

According to the study published in Nature Medicine, a protein known as histone is responsible for the major internal bleeding seen after traumas such as battlefield injuries, bullet wounds and car crashes.

The newly-discovered monoclonal antibody can block the action of histones and therefore be used to treat diseases and serious injuries.

“When a patient is suffering from severe bleeds, these antibodies could prevent multi-organ failure,” said lead researcher Charles Esmon.

Under normal circumstances, the histone protein is normally located in the nucleus, aiming to keep DNA tightly packed and consequently form the characteristic double helix.

When the cell is damaged through injury, infection or disease, the histone is released into the blood system, leading to uncontrolled bleeding by killing the lining of blood vessels.

The Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation (OMRF) team is optimistic that its findings will help develop new treatments to save those suffering from injuries, infectious diseases and diabetes.

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The decline in fitness as you grow older usually speeds up after the age of 45, new research shows.
This study implies at the rising number of older adults in the United States and the explosion in the sedentary lifestyle, overweight and aging population.

“The Social Security Administration actually has an aerobic capacity threshold. If you’re below the threshold, you are considered disabled,” said study author Andrew Jackson.
This means more people could qualify for government disability benefits at a younger age, further draining an already strained economy.

This study group included 3,429 women and 16,889 men aged 20 to 96 who had undergone two to 33 health exams with lifestyle counseling between 1974 and 2006.

Reductions in cardio respiratory fitness (CRF) were not seen as a straight downward line. Instead, after the age of 45, the slope became much steeper, accelerating even further with increases in body-mass index (BMI), smoking and lower levels of physical activity.

“We’ve known that, as you age, your aerobic capacity goes down, and the exercise physiology literature indicates it’s a linear relationship. We found that this is not the case,” said Jackson, who is professor emeritus of health and human performance at the University of Houston. “It makes sense to me. When things aren’t working right, we tend to go down at faster rates. This was true for both men and women [although the rate of decline was faster for men than for women].”

Taking care of yourself could make you, in a sense, younger than you are.

“If you were overweight, inactive and smoked, your aerobic capacity would be lower at a given age as compared to other people who were healthy weight, active and nonsmokers,” Jackson said. “The data showed that if people had that advantage when they were in their 30s and 40s and maintained that lifestyle, their aerobic capacity as they aged was, in fact, higher.”

“It could delay the age when these health problems start to spring up,” he continued. “If people are very overweight, inactive and smoke, they might see these health problems in their 50s and 60s, whereas people who maintain a healthy lifestyle, it’s going to be more like their 70s, 80s and possibly even their 90s.”

“You have to exercise. It’s now becoming established fact, and if you don’t incorporate it, you’re going to see the effects. You will get sicker sooner,” added Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, director of women and heart disease for Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City and a spokeswoman for the American Heart Association. “Exercise is the most potent medication around, and the Social Security Administration agrees with me.”

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People can avoid Backaches and pains by consuming Vitamin D in their diet.

The study showed that patients with chronic back pain usually had insufficient levels of vitamin D and when proper vitamin D supplementation was provided, the pain either vanished or helped to a great extent.

According to Dr Stewart B. Leavitt, MA, Executive Director of Pain Treatment Topics and author of the report vitamin D or sunshine vitamin are essential for calcium absorption and bone health.

And deficiency can result in a softening of bone surfaces, called osteomalacia, which causes pain. The lower back seems to be particularly vulnerable.

A study involving 360 patients with chronic back pain, all of them were found to have inadequate levels of vitamin D and after taking vitamin D supplements for 3 months, symptoms were improved in 95 pct of the patients.

Vitamin D supplements interact with very few medicines or other agents, and are generally safe unless very high doses are taken daily for a long period of time.

However, it is always wise to check with a healthcare professional before starting a new dietary supplement.

In conclusion, Leavitt stresses that vitamin D should not be viewed as a cure for all back pain conditions, and it is not necessarily a replacement for other pain-relief treatments.

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Geneva, The World Health organization (WHO) reported Friday that 414,945 A(H1N1) flu cases have been confirmed and about 5,000 deceased.

The international organization also noted that the Americas is still the most affected with 160,129 cases and with higher number of deceased (3,539).

This region is followed by the Pacific and Southern Asia.

The statement also informed that infection is higher in Great Britain, Belgium, Holland and Norway among European countries.

It also emphasized how in warm areas of the southern hemisphere no activity of the A(H1N1) virus was detected.

Experts insisted on the need to step up personal hygiene measures and keep a good diet.

For preventing the risk of getting sick the most important thing is to wash your hands frequently for at least 20 minutes, noted the source.

It is also important to cover your mouth with a handkerchief when sneezing or coughing and throw them away immediately. Avoid close contacts contact with sick people and alert those affected with the disease to go to the doctor as soon as possible.

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