While compulsive gambling is only beginning to be addressed by mental health professionals, they must now face a new affliction: Internet addiction.
"The problem isn't widespread but we know of serious cases in which teenagers don't leave the house, don't have interpersonal relationships, and have been isolated in front of their computer screen for the past two or three years, and only speak in the language of the characters they play with in network video games," says Louise Nadeau, a professor at the Université de Montréal's Department of Psychology.
"In a few years we'll have couples in therapy because the Internet will have become their main occupation."
Nadeau is director of the new university institute on addiction. It was created last year by the Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux. The mandate of the institute is to conduct epidemiological studies on addiction, evaluate the services available to patients, guarantee state-of-the-art practices, and document new forms of addiction.
Health & Wellness
Mice given quercetin, a naturally occurring substance found in fruits and vegetables, were less likely to contract the flu, according to a study published by The American Physiological Society. The study also found that stressful exercise increased the susceptibility of mice to the flu, but quercetin canceled out that negative effect.
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| ©iStockphoto/Jack Puccio |
| Quercetin, a close chemical relative of resveratrol, is present in a variety of fruits and vegetables, including red onions, grapes, blueberries, tea, broccoli and red wine. It appears to protect against the flu. |
It appears that mind over matter may be the key to achieving sexual satisfaction, according to one study.
Researchers from the University of Southern California and Yale University reached this conclusion after studying the "satisfying" sex lives of cervical cancer survivors who had both ovaries removed.
Removing the ovaries, according to background offered in a study published in the July issue of the Journal of Women's Health, reduces or eliminates circulation of the hormone testosterone, which plays a factor in both male and female sexuality.
Researchers from the University of Southern California and Yale University reached this conclusion after studying the "satisfying" sex lives of cervical cancer survivors who had both ovaries removed.
Removing the ovaries, according to background offered in a study published in the July issue of the Journal of Women's Health, reduces or eliminates circulation of the hormone testosterone, which plays a factor in both male and female sexuality.
WASHINGTON - Having higher vitamin B12 levels may protect against brain shrinkage in elderly people, according to a study published on Monday.
The researchers called their findings striking, but said more information is needed before recommending that people take vitamin B12 supplements to guard against the loss of brain volume and possibly prevent declines in thinking and memory
The researchers called their findings striking, but said more information is needed before recommending that people take vitamin B12 supplements to guard against the loss of brain volume and possibly prevent declines in thinking and memory
"Californication" star David Duchovny made headlines for voluntarily entering rehab last week. But it wasn't for drugs or alcohol. It was for another dependency, one that affects millions of Americans but is seldom discussed: sex addiction.
Research engineers and sleep medicine specialists from two Michigan universities have joined technical and clinical hands to put innovative quantitative analysis, signal-processing technology and computer algorithms to work in the sleep lab. One of their recent findings is that a new approach to analyzing sleep fragmentation appears to distinguish fibromyalgia patients from healthy controls.
Joseph W. Burns, a research scientist and engineer at the Michigan Tech Research Institute (MTRI); Ronald D. Chervin, director of the University of Michigan's Michael S. Aldrich Sleep Disorders Laboratory; and Leslie Crofford, director of the Center for the Advancement of Women's Health at the University of Kentucky, report the results of their study in the current issue of the journal Sleep Medicine.
MTRI, a freestanding research institute acquired by Michigan Tech in 2006 and based in Ann Arbor, specializes in remote sensors that collect data, and in signal processing, using algorithms or computer programs to analyze and correlate the information the sensors gather. MTRI has developed an ongoing collaboration with the University of Michigan's sleep laboratory, one of the nation's leading clinical and research centers specializing in sleep medicine.
Joseph W. Burns, a research scientist and engineer at the Michigan Tech Research Institute (MTRI); Ronald D. Chervin, director of the University of Michigan's Michael S. Aldrich Sleep Disorders Laboratory; and Leslie Crofford, director of the Center for the Advancement of Women's Health at the University of Kentucky, report the results of their study in the current issue of the journal Sleep Medicine.
MTRI, a freestanding research institute acquired by Michigan Tech in 2006 and based in Ann Arbor, specializes in remote sensors that collect data, and in signal processing, using algorithms or computer programs to analyze and correlate the information the sensors gather. MTRI has developed an ongoing collaboration with the University of Michigan's sleep laboratory, one of the nation's leading clinical and research centers specializing in sleep medicine.
Colonies of hospital superbugs can make poisons similar to those found in rattlesnake venom to attack our bodies' natural defences, scientists heard September 8, 2008 at the Society for General Microbiology's Autumn meeting being held at Trinity College, Dublin.
The toxins are manufactured by communities of the hospital superbug Pseudomonas aeruginosa called biofilms, which are up to a thousand times more resistant to antibiotics than free-floating single bacterial cells.
"This is the first time that anyone has successfully proved that the way the bacteria grow - either as a biofilm, or living as individuals - affects the type of proteins they can secrete, and therefore how dangerous they can potentially be to our health," says Dr Martin Welch from the University of Cambridge, UK.
"Acute diseases caused by bacteria can advance at an astonishing rate and tests have associated these types of disease with free-floating bacteria. Such free-floating bugs often secrete tissue-damaging poisons and enzymes to break down our cells, contributing to the way the disease develops, so it is natural to blame them. By contrast, chronic or long-term infections seem to be associated with biofilms, which were thought to be much less aggressive," says Dr Welch.
The toxins are manufactured by communities of the hospital superbug Pseudomonas aeruginosa called biofilms, which are up to a thousand times more resistant to antibiotics than free-floating single bacterial cells.
"This is the first time that anyone has successfully proved that the way the bacteria grow - either as a biofilm, or living as individuals - affects the type of proteins they can secrete, and therefore how dangerous they can potentially be to our health," says Dr Martin Welch from the University of Cambridge, UK.
"Acute diseases caused by bacteria can advance at an astonishing rate and tests have associated these types of disease with free-floating bacteria. Such free-floating bugs often secrete tissue-damaging poisons and enzymes to break down our cells, contributing to the way the disease develops, so it is natural to blame them. By contrast, chronic or long-term infections seem to be associated with biofilms, which were thought to be much less aggressive," says Dr Welch.
Tampa, FL - Social psychology is the study of how people and groups interact. A new study in the journal International Studies Review shows how social psychology can help us better understand the puzzle of nuclear restraint and uses the case of Japan to illustrate social psychology on nuclear decision-making.
Human arteries play distinct roles in the immune system depending on their anatomical location, researchers at Emory University School of Medicine have discovered.
Their findings explain why vascular diseases affect different parts of the arterial network and could help doctors fine-tune the treatment of such diseases as atherosclerosis and vasculitis. Atherosclerosis causes heart attacks and strokes because it occurs preferentially in arteries supplying the heart and the brain.
Arteries can play an active role in sensing foreign invasion and bodily injury, because cells embedded in the arterial walls called dendritic cells act like smoke-sensing fire alarms for the immune system, says senior author Cornelia Weyand, MD. PhD, co-director of the Kathleen B. and Mason I. Lowance Center for Human Immunology at Emory University.
"All of our major arteries have this alarm system," she says. "To our surprise, we found that the arteries of the neck, the arms, the abdomen and the legs are triggered by different infectious organisms. Thus, each artery functions in a specialized way."
Their findings explain why vascular diseases affect different parts of the arterial network and could help doctors fine-tune the treatment of such diseases as atherosclerosis and vasculitis. Atherosclerosis causes heart attacks and strokes because it occurs preferentially in arteries supplying the heart and the brain.
Arteries can play an active role in sensing foreign invasion and bodily injury, because cells embedded in the arterial walls called dendritic cells act like smoke-sensing fire alarms for the immune system, says senior author Cornelia Weyand, MD. PhD, co-director of the Kathleen B. and Mason I. Lowance Center for Human Immunology at Emory University.
"All of our major arteries have this alarm system," she says. "To our surprise, we found that the arteries of the neck, the arms, the abdomen and the legs are triggered by different infectious organisms. Thus, each artery functions in a specialized way."
On what evidence can the fluoridation of Bolton's water supplies be justified?
For half a century assurances from the US Public Health Service that water fluoridation was safe have rested on the results of the 1945 Newburgh-Kingston Fluoride-Caries Trial, in which the health of children from the fluoridated town of Newburgh, New York, were compared for 10 years with children from neighbouring non-fluoridated Kingston.
Dr Harold Hodge had assured local citizens that the experiment had proved fluoridation safe and he urged it upon the entire country. He told Congress in 1954: "Health hazards do not justify postponing water fluoridation". And, in 1963, Dr Hodge sang the praises of Newburgh's dental health before the Supreme Court in Dublin, prescribing compulsory fluoridation for both children and adults in Ireland. This country recently reduced the recommended dosage of 4ppm to 0.7ppm, with no official explanation for the reduction.
For half a century assurances from the US Public Health Service that water fluoridation was safe have rested on the results of the 1945 Newburgh-Kingston Fluoride-Caries Trial, in which the health of children from the fluoridated town of Newburgh, New York, were compared for 10 years with children from neighbouring non-fluoridated Kingston.
Dr Harold Hodge had assured local citizens that the experiment had proved fluoridation safe and he urged it upon the entire country. He told Congress in 1954: "Health hazards do not justify postponing water fluoridation". And, in 1963, Dr Hodge sang the praises of Newburgh's dental health before the Supreme Court in Dublin, prescribing compulsory fluoridation for both children and adults in Ireland. This country recently reduced the recommended dosage of 4ppm to 0.7ppm, with no official explanation for the reduction.
