Health & WellnessS


Heart

Mental stress reduces blood flow to the heart in patients with gene variation

University of Florida researchers have identified a gene variation in heart disease patients who appear especially vulnerable to the physical effects of mental stress - to the point where blood flow to the heart is greatly reduced.

"Searching for the presence of this gene may be one way to better identify patients who are at an increased risk for the phenomenon," said David S. Sheps, M.D., a professor and associate chairman of cardiovascular medicine at UF's College of Medicine and the Malcom Randall Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

Those with the gene variation are three times more likely to experience dangerous decreases in blood flow to the heart - a condition doctors call ischemia - than heart disease patients without it. Ischemia increases the chance these patients will suffer a heart attack, heart rhythm abnormalities or sudden death, UF researchers report in the April 14 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine.

Evil Rays

Living in a World of Unfamiliar Voices

Imagine not being able to tell your son's voice from that of a complete stranger. Welcome to the life of a 60-year-old British woman known as KH. Although a handful of people have reportedly lost the ability to recognize voices after a stroke or other brain damage, researchers believe KH is the first documented case of someone who never developed this ability in the first place.

The case came to light a few years ago when KH read an article in New Scientist magazine about people who can't recognize individuals by face. The article struck a chord, and she contacted the magazine, explaining that she had an analogous voice-recognition problem. For as long as she could remember, the voices of even her closest relatives were indistinguishable. New Scientist contacted Bradley Duchaine, a cognitive neuroscientist featured in the article, and Duchaine invited KH to visit his lab at University College London.

Pills

Snoring pill may let partners breathe easy

A daily pill could help to give a good night's sleep to thousands of Britons - and their long-suffering partners - by managing the common disorder which causes heavy snoring, scientists believe.

Researchers have started trials for a pill to help to manage obstructive sleep apnoea syndrome (OSA), a condition that causes people to stop breathing intermittently during sleep, often making them excessively tired and moody.

About one in 20 middle-aged men and one in 50 women lose sleep because of severe forms of OSA, which occurs when the upper airway becomes narrow as the muscles relax naturally during sleep. This reduces oxygen in the blood and impairs restful sleep, although the sufferer may not wake up fully.

Umbrella

School Condom Availability

An increase in reported sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), including HIV/AIDS, among adolescents has prompted many communities to take action to protect their youth. One proven method is to provide comprehensive sexuality education along with school based programs that make condoms available to sexually active youth. Numerous national health organizations have adopted policies in support of school condom availability as a component of comprehensive sexuality education.

Syringe

Vaccine 'causing' deadly pneumonia increase

London - Cases of a life-threatening form of pneumonia that affects the young are rising rapidly in Britain. It now affects around 1,000 children a year. The cause of the increase is unknown but experts fear a vaccine in the immunisation programme could be contributing. This severe pneumonia infects the lining of the lungs called the pleura, making it hard to breathe. It requires hospital admission to drain the chest cavity. The children affected are frightened and in pain and many undergo surgery to scrape out the contents of the pleura ~ a process called surgical debridement. Child health specialists say cases of the pneumonia, known as serotype 1, have risen tenfold in a decade. They warn that a vaccine against pneumococcal disease called Prevenar, introduced in 2006, could be fuelling the rise.

Telephone

High mobile use puts us at risk of brain tumours

NEW DELHI: India could see several cases of brain tumour over the next two-to-three years due to constant use of mobile phones say neurologists, as they debate a recent Australian study that says a correlation does exist between the two.

Australian neurosurgeon Dr Vini Khurana's study predicts that the fallout of heavy mobile phone use would be visible soon as the nation's love affair with mobile phone climbs to dizzying heights.

In his research, Khurana says heavy usage of cell phones for a period of 10 years or more doubles the chances of brain tumour. It also, he adds, has larger public health ramification than asbestos and smoking.

Comment: Guess what the conclusions of the telecom companies' study will be?


Bug

Dengue epidemic overcomes Rio de Janeiro state

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil. A deadly dengue fever epidemic has sickened tens of thousands and claimed at least 80 lives since the start of the year, and it shows no signs of slowing.

Fear of infection has forced thousands of tourists to cancel vacations to the city of Rio de Janeiro and pushed many residents indoors rather than risk being bitten by the striped Aedes aegypti mosquito that transmits the disease.

Comment: There is another dengue epidemic in the Philippines at the moment.


Extinguisher

Flashback 50 Reasons to Oppose Fluoridation

Dr. William Hirzy:
"In summary, we hold that fluoridation is an unreasonable risk. That is, the toxicity of fluoride is so great and the purported benefits associated with it are so small - if there are any at all - that requiring every man, woman and child in America to ingest it borders on criminal behavior on the part of governments."


1) Fluoride is not an essential nutrient (NRC 1993 and IOM 1997). No disease has ever been linked to a fluoride deficiency. Humans can have perfectly good teeth without fluoride.

2) Fluoridation is not necessary. Most Western European countries are not fluoridated and have experienced the same decline in dental decay as the US (See data from World Health Organization in Appendix 1, and the time trends presented graphically here). The reasons given by countries for not fluoridating are presented in Appendix 2.)

3) Fluoridation's role in the decline of tooth decay is in serious doubt. The largest survey ever conducted in the US (over 39,000 children from 84 communities) by the National Institute of Dental Research showed little difference in tooth decay among children in fluoridated and non-fluoridated communities (Hileman 1989). According to NIDR researchers, the study found an average difference of only 0.6 DMFS (Decayed Missing and Filled Surfaces) in the permanent teeth of children aged 5-17 residing in either fluoridated or unfluoridated areas (Brunelle and Carlos, 1990). This difference is less than one tooth surface! There are 128 tooth surfaces in a child's mouth. This result was not shown to be statistically significant. In a review commissioned by the Ontario government, Dr. David Locker concluded:

"The magnitude of [fluoridation's] effect is not large in absolute terms, is often not statistically significant and may not be of clinical significance" (Locker 1999).
4) Where fluoridation has been discontinued in communities from Canada, the former East Germany, Cuba and Finland, dental decay has not increased but has actually decreased (Maupome 2001; Kunzel and Fischer,1997,2000; Kunzel 2000 and Seppa 2000).

Newspaper

Brain region linked to financial worries identified

Stanford University researchers say that they have found people having higher levels of anticipatory worry to do better in a financial game during a study.

Gregory Samanez-Larkin, a psychology graduate student at Stanford, has revealed that the studys results were based on brain scans of activity in a part of the brain called anterior insula, which enables people to sense or monitor danger to a certain extent.

The researchers said that the subjects had "a higher fidelity when it comes to making economic decisions, when the anterior insula was more active.

"They were better at predicting what might happen," Live Science quoted Samanez-Larkin as saying.

He said that the participants learnt to avoid losses while playing the same game several months later.

"I wouldn't call it intelligence. (Instead), it's a sort of expertise," he added.

Comment: One naturally wonders how this information would be abused should it get into the wrong hands.


Syringe

Dengue in Zambo City 'beyond epidemic level of 2005, 2007'

ZAMBOANGA CITY, Philippines -- The Zamboanga City Health Office said the number of dengue cases here have gone so high this year that they surpassed the number of cases recorded during the first quarter of 2005 and 2007.

Dr. Rodelin Agbulos, city health officer, told the Inquirer on Friday that more people were still catching the mosquito-borne virus.