Health & WellnessS

Magnify

Watchdog investigates Miss Bimbo website

A website criticised for encouraging young girls to embrace plastic surgery and dieting is being investigated by a communications watchdog over claims that it has breached rules about targeting children with premium rate phone lines. PhonepayPlus is examining claims that the Miss Bimbo game exploits children's naivety and contains content that parents would feel unsuitable for children.

Light Saber

Cosmetic surgeons fear laser rule change is risk to patients' health

Government plans to drop the regulation of lasers used by beauty salons for cosmetic treatments, such as the removal of wrinkles, hair and tattoos, would pose a serious risk to patients' health, doctors said yesterday.

Leading cosmetic surgeons said that the proposals, set out by the Department of Health, would allow anyone without qualifications to start using lasers and other light techniques.

Red Flag

Big Belly Boosts Risk of Later Dementia

NEW YORK - Having a big belly in your 40s can boost your risk of getting Alzheimer's disease or other dementia decades later, a new study suggests.

It's not just about your weight. While previous research has found evidence that obesity in middle age raises the chances of developing dementia later, the new work found a separate risk from storing a lot of fat in the abdomen. Even people who weren't overweight were susceptible.

People

Children who bully also have problems with other relationships

Students who bully others tend to have difficulties with other relationships, such as those with friends and parents. Targeting those relationships, as well as the problems children who bully have with aggression and morality, may offer ideas for intervention and prevention.

Those are the findings of a new study that was conducted by scientists at York University and Queens University. It appears in the March/April 2008 issue of the journal Child Development.

The researchers looked at 871 students (466 girls and 405 boys) for seven years from ages 10 to 18. Each year, they asked the children questions about their involvement in bullying or victimizing behavior, their relationships, and other positive and negative behaviors.

Wine

Mounting evidence shows red wine antioxidant kills cancer

Rochester researchers showed for the first time that a natural antioxidant found in grape skins and red wine can help destroy pancreatic cancer cells by reaching to the cell's core energy source, or mitochondria, and crippling its function. The study is published in the March edition of the journal, Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology.

The study also showed that when the pancreatic cancer cells were doubly assaulted -- pre-treated with the antioxidant, resveratrol, and irradiated -- the combination induced a type of cell death called apoptosis, an important goal of cancer therapy.

The research has many implications for patients, said lead author Paul Okunieff, M.D., chief of Radiation Oncology at the James P. Wilmot Cancer Center at the University of Rochester Medical Center.

People

The Conflict of Reward in Depression

In Love and Death, Woody Allen wrote: "To love is to suffer...To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer." The paradoxical merging of happiness and suffering can be a feature of depression. Biological Psychiatry, on April 1st, is publishing a new study of regional brain activity using functional magnetic resonance imaging, which may help further our understanding of how happiness and suffering are related in depression.

Eye 1

Seeing may be believing -- but is it the same as looking?

If you see something, it's because you're looking at it, right? A recently published study examined this question and established that while people do tend to notice objects within their gaze, it is the assumptions they make about their environment that affects their perceptions. This study gives insight into how the brain and the eye work together to interpret everyday observations.

The study "If I saw it, it probably wasn't far from where I was looking," reflects the work of a group of researchers led by E.M. Brenner, PhD of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. The article recently appeared in the Journal of Vision, published by the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology.

Bulb

Too much information? Study shows how ignorance can be influential

In the current issue of The RAND Journal of Economics, USC researchers provide a challenge to the classic economic model of information manipulation, in which knowing more than anybody else is the key to influence.

Instead, economists Isabelle Brocas and Juan D. Carrillo present a situation - commonly observed in real life - in which all parties have access to the same information, but one party still manages to control public opinion.

For example, a pharmaceutical company such as Merck may be obliged to make public the findings of all studies related to a new drug. Preliminary trials may indicate no short-term side effects, and the company may elect not to perform follow-up trials before releasing the drug on the market.

Bulb

A link between antidepressants and type 2 diabetes

While analyzing data from Saskatchewan health databases, Lauren Brown, researcher with the U of A's School of Public Health, found people with a history of depression had a 30 per cent increased risk of type 2 Diabetes.

Brown then studied the medical history of 2,400 people who were diagnosed with depression and were taking antidepressants to determine whether there was a clear correlation between that disease and type 2 Diabetes.

People

Running Words Together: The science behind cross-linguistic psychology

While communication may be recognized as a universal phenomenon, differences between languages -- ranging from word-order to semantics -- undoubtedly remain as they help to define culture and develop language. Yet, little is understood about similarities and differences in languages around the world and how they affect communication. Recently, however, two studies have emerged that aid in our understanding of cross-linguistic distinctions in language usage.