Month: November 2013

Kids Who Get More Sleep May Consume Fewer Calories

Getting adequate sleep may not just ward off attention and behavioral problems in kids — a small new study suggests it could also affect the amount they eat.

 Researchers from Temple University found that when kids slept more than their usual amount for a week, they consumed fewer calories, had lower fasting levels of the hunger- and weight-regulating hormone leptin, and even weighed less.

“Given all of its documented benefits, in many ways, you can’t lose in promoting a good night’s sleep,” study researcher Chantelle Hart, an associate professor of public health at the university’s Center for Obesity Research and Education, said in a statement.

The three-week study, published in the journal Pediatrics, involved 37 kids between ages 8 and 11, about a quarter of whom were obese or overweight. For the first week, all the kids were asked to sleep their normal amount each night. For the second week, kids were assigned to either sleep 1.5 hours more than their normal amount, or 1.5 hours fewer than their normal amount. In the third week, the kids who were assigned to sleep less in the second week were asked to sleep more, while kids assigned to sleep more in the second week were asked to sleep less. Their sleep time was measured using wrist actigraphs.

Researchers found there was a difference of two hours and 21 minutes of sleep time between the “sleep less” condition and the “sleep more” condition. During the week the kids slept more, they consumed 134 fewer calories a day, on average, and also weighed half a pound less than the week when they slept less. They also had lower fasting levels of leptin during the week they slept more.

“Most of the difference in kcal intake occurred during the additional three hours that children were awake during the decrease condition with children reporting 103 kcal/day more during this time,” the researchers noted in the study.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, school-aged children (ages 5 to 12) should get between 10 and 11 hours of sleep a night. Younger children need even more shuteye; preschoolers, for instance, should get 11 to 13 hours a night, and toddlers need 12 to 14 hours of sleep per 24-hour period.

Source: http://huff.to/1cGGkGl

Demand for doctors will grow as population in US

Driven by an aging population and increased access to health insurance, the U.S. will need more doctors by 2025, says a new study.

The expected rise in demand varies by state and medical specialty, according to the study’s lead author.

“What’s happening at the state level can be very different than what’s happening at the national level,” Timothy Dall told Reuters. He is a managing director at the research and information service firm IHS in Washington, D.C.

The new study, published in Health Affairs, looks at future demands for primary and specialized health care providers. Those specialists include cardiologists, neurologists and urologists.

The researchers used a computer model to estimate future health care demand by taking into account a growing and aging population and increased access to health insurance due to the Affordable Care Act – commonly known as Obamacare.

The U.S. Census Bureau projects the country’s population will increase by 9.5 percent between 2013 and 2025. The Congressional Budget Office also estimates that an additional 28 million people will have health insurance by 2023.

The researchers found the expected increase in doctor demand was largely attributed to a growing number of diseases among an older population. Obamacare, on the other hand, was linked only to an increase of a few percentage points.

Overall, the researchers found the demand for primary care or family doctors will grow by 14 percent by 2025. That’s less than the expected growth among some medical specialties.

Dall and his colleagues estimate that demand for vascular surgeons – who perform bypass surgeries and insert stents, for instance – will increase by about 31 percent and demand for cardiologists will increase by 20 percent.

But those estimates vary by state.

For example, though the demand for cardiologists is estimated to grow by 51 percent in Nevada, demand in West Virginia is only estimated to grow by 5 percent.

Dall cautioned that the estimates are subject to change based on health care delivery systems and behaviors.

For example, Dr. Reid Blackwelder, president of the American Academy of Family Physicians, said conditions that would drive people to see specialists are largely preventable with adequate primary care. Focusing on prevention and primary care would be expected to shift demand toward family doctors.

“As we start to recognize the foundational nature of true primary care and prevention, we’re going to need more primary care providers to be that foundation,” Blackwelder told Reuters.

Blackwelder, who was not involved with the new study, is also affiliated with East Tennessee State University’s James H. Quillen College of Medicine in Johnson City.

“The bottom line is that care delivery patterns will change,” Dall said.

He told Reuters the new study can’t say whether the U.S. will experience a shortage of doctors by 2025.

Previously, the Association of American Medical Colleges estimated that the U.S. doctor shortage will grow to more than 130,000 by 2025.

“It’s important that we continue to update projections and not wait a decade before we update them because things are continually changing,” Dall said.

Read More: http://bit.ly/175VG8U

Teens who eat lots of chocolate tend to be slimmer

Another study appears to find benefits from eating chocolate: researchers from the University of Granada in Spain analzying data on European teenagers found a strong link between high chocolate consumption and low levels of body fat.

Dr. Magdalena Cuenca-García, of the Department of Medical Physiology in Granada University’s School of Medicine, and colleagues report their findings in a recent online issue of the journal Nutrition.

The researchers are part of the HELENA study group, which is collecting and analyzing data about the diets, fitness and various health measures among European adolescents.

Previous studies have already found that regular chocolate consumption is linked to leanness in adults. There is also evidence that eating chocolate may reduce cardiovascular disease risk.

Eating chocolate ‘may help youngsters stay slim’Chocolate squares

Researchers from Spain have found that teens who eat chocolate have lower levels of total fat and fat around the middle than those who abstain.

The Spanish researchers decided to use the HELENA data to see if the same could be said of teenagers.

They analyzed records on 1,458 adolescents from nine European countries who were aged from 12 to 17 and who had completed computer-based questionnaires asking them to recall what they had eaten in the previous 24 hours on 2 non-consecutive days.

The records also contained information from which they could assess participants’ BMI, waist circumference, body fat measures and activity levels.

The results showed that higher chocolate intake among the teenagers were linked with lower levels of total fat and fat around the middle, regardless of other factors (including exercise).

The researchers in this study did not examine why chocolate appears to help the youngsters stay slim, but some previous studies have suggested it could be something to do with the flavonoids it contains.

Flavonoids are a group of polyphenolic compounds known to have numerous beneficial biochemical and antioxidant effects. For example, they appear to protect against cardiovascular disease through antioxidant, anti-clotting and anti-inflammatory properties.

“It’s also possible that flavonoids in chocolate may decrease blood concentrations of bad cholesterol and reduce blood pressure,” says Dr. Susanna C. Larsson, of Sweden’s Karolinska Institute, where she and her team conducted a study of Swedish men that found chocolate consumption may also lower stroke risk.

Many researchers say it is dark chocolate that is good for the heart, but Dr. Larsson says, surprisingly, that 90% of the chocolate eaten in Sweden – as they also found in their study – is milk chocolate.

Source: http://bit.ly/18UTv2v

Malaria cases hit 40-year high in US

Nearly 2,000 people were diagnosed with malaria in the U.S. in 2011, a 40-year high for the infection, health officials reported Thursday.

 Most were among U.S. residents or citizens and virtually all cases were brought back from other countries, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported. People need to watch out for the mosquito-borne infection, the CDC cautioned.

“In 2011, 1,925 malaria cases were reported in the United States,” CDC said in a statement.

“This number is the highest since 1971, more than 40 years ago, and represents a 14 percent increase since 2010. Five people in the U.S. died from malaria or associated complications.”

In 1970, 4,247 malaria cases were reported in the U.S., almost all of them among U.S. military personnel. That was the height of the Vietnam War. In 1971, 3,180 cases were reported.

In 2011, just 91 cases were in military personnel. Soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen deployed in malaria-ridden zones are now given drugs to prevent infection. New York City had the most cases in 2011, with 238 cases, the CDC team said.

Almost all the cases were imported, 69 percent of them from African countries where malaria is common. One of the infected people got the parasite through a blood transfusion, two babies were born infected and one case cannot be explained.

The malaria parasite is spread by mosquitoes and can live for years in the human body. When a mosquito bites an infected person it can pick up parasites and then transmit them to someone else – meaning malaria can be introduced by an infected traveler. It also means blood transfusions can transmit infections – that’s happened in 97 cases since 1963, CDC says.

“Malaria isn’t something many doctors see frequently in the United States thanks to successful malaria elimination efforts in the 1940s,” CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden said in a statement.

“The increase in malaria cases reminds us that Americans remain vulnerable and must be vigilant against diseases like malaria because our world is so interconnected by travel.”

Malaria killed 660,000 people globally in 2010. Symptoms include fever, headache, back pain, chills, sweating, muscle pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and cough.

“Malaria is preventable. In most cases, these illnesses and deaths could have been avoided by taking recommended precautions,” said Dr. Laurence Slutsker, director of CDC’s division of parasitic diseases and malaria.

CDC lists drugs approved to treat and prevent malaria. They include Malarone, chloroquine and the antibiotic doxycycline. There’s no vaccine yet.

Another drug, mefloquine hydrochloride, sold under brand names including Lariam, Mephaquin or Mefliam, can cause severe side effects including hallucinations and is considered a drug of last resort. The Food and Drug Administration strengthened warnings about the pill in July.

Source: http://nbcnews.to/1801hIQ

Strep throat home test ‘could save thousands of doctor’s visits’

Researchers have created a home test for strep throat that they say is almost as accurate as laboratory tests and could eliminate the need for doctor’s visits for sore throat. This is according to a study published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.

 Strep throat is a type of sore throat caused by a bacteria called Streptococcus pyogenes, also known as group A streptococcus (GAS).

This form of bacteria is highly contagious and can be spread through airborne particles when an infected person coughs or sneezes, or through touching infected surfaces.

When a patient visits their physician complaining of a sore throat, they may have a laboratory test carried out to determine whether their sore throat is bacterial or viral. However, a laboratory test may be unnecessary for patients who are deemed as low-risk for strep throat.

The research team from Boston Children’s Hospital and the University of California, San Diego, says the newly created strep home test involves a scoring system that determines whether a patient’s sore throat is viral or bacterial, potentially eliminating the need for doctor’s visits.

The home scoring is based on a patient’s personal health information that is provided by them directly and an assessment of any recent strep encounters within the general population.

The patient’s scores are then compared to traditional “Centor” scores used in laboratory tests to determine whether a patient has strep throat. If a patient’s score shows the likelihood of strep throat to be less than 10%, they are deemed as low-risk.

Doctor’s visits ‘could be reduced by 230,000 a year’

To determine whether the home strep test is accurate, the researchers analyzed 71,776 patients aged 15 years or older who had pharyngitis (sore throat) between 2006 and 2008.

Of these patients, 48,089 were tested for strep throat using laboratory tests at a health clinic, while 23,687 used the home strep test.

Of the patients who were tested during doctor’s visits, 11,614 (24%) tested positive for group A streptococcus pharyngitis, while 5,728 (24%) tested positive using the home test.

From these results, the researchers estimate that if patients aged 15 years or older with sore throats who scored less than 10% on the home strep test avoided visiting the doctors for the “Centor” test, this could reduce doctor’s visits in the US by 230,000 each year and reduce the number of patients prescribed “unnecessary” antibiotics for strep throat by 8,500 each year.

Commenting on their findings, the researchers say:

“The model, based on history and recent, local disease patterns without physical examination information, could help clinicians and patients estimate the likelihood of disease before a clinical encounter and help steer these patients to timely, appropriate care when needed.

In some instances, patients unlikely to have GAS pharyngitis might avoid, or at least delay, an emergency or outpatient visit.”

Researchers have ‘overestimated specificity’

However, in an editorial linked to the study, Robert M. Centor, from the University of Alabama, says that the researchers have “overestimated the specificity” of the home strep test.

“Derivation models almost always give better results than validation data sets,” he says. “We should use the specificity that they found in their validation data as a more accurate estimate of how this model would work in the future.”

He adds that although the goals of the researchers are “admirable,” he doubts that the home test approach is practical or cost-saving for patients, and he details other areas in which savings could be made, such as using recommended generic antibiotic treatment for pharyngitis rather than more expensive options.

Source: http://inagist.com/all/397635658690224128/

Mediterranean diet linked to longer lifespan

Britons who are looking for healthy diet plans following the festive period may want to look to the Mediterranean, after research found that the traditional diet promotes longevity.

 The much-celebrated dietary regime focuses on vegetables and fish, with fewer animal-based products such as meat and milk.

Scientists at Sweden’s Sahlgrenska Academy analysed data on thousands of 70-year-olds, some of whom followed a Mediterranean diet while others ate a regular diet with a greater emphasis on meat products.

They found that people who ate a Mediterranean diet were 20 per cent more likely to live longer than those who did not.

Researcher Gianluca Tognon revealed: “This means in practice that older people who eat a Mediterranean diet live an estimated 2.3 years longer than those who don’t.”

He concluded that a Mediterranean diet “is linked to better health, not only for the elderly but also for youngsters”.

People who are interested in following a traditional Mediterranean diet in the new year should increase their intake of fruit and vegetables, avoid processed foods and eat plenty of healthy fats from fish, nuts and olive oil.

Source: http://bit.ly/1aoDh20

Preterm birth rate drops to 11.5%

The number of premature babies born in the US dropped to 11.5% in 2012 – a 15-year low, according to the March of Dimes Premature Birth Report Card. However, the change was not enough to alter the overall grade given to the nation – that remains a “C.”

There is no room for complacency, as March of Dimes points out 1 in 9 babies – 450,000 a year – are born too soon.

March of Dimes defines preterm birth as before 37 weeks of pregnancy, and babies born too soon have higher rates of death and disability than full-term babies.

Early babies may face serious and sometimes lifelong health issues – including breathing problems, developmental delay, vision loss and cerebral palsy.

Even babies born at 37-38 weeks have a higher risk of health problems than those born at 39 weeks. Physicians from the University of Buffalo highlighted this in a recent study reported inMedical News Today.

As well as the health implications, there are the financial costs. As March of Dimes President Dr. Jennifer L. Howse explains:

“A premature birth costs businesses about 12 times as much as an uncomplicated healthy birth. As a result, premature birth is a major driver ofhealth insurance costs not only for employers.”

The National Center for Health Statistics says that the national preterm birth rate peaked in 2006 at 12.8%. Since then, March of Dimes estimates that 176,000 fewer babies were born preterm – with a potential saving of $9 billion in health and societal costs.

Dr. Howse continues:

“Although we have made great progress in reducing our nation’s preterm birth rate from historic highs, the US still has the highest rate of preterm birth of any industrialized country. We must continue to invest in preterm birth prevention because every baby deserves a healthy start in life.”

Since 2003, March of Dimes has been campaigning to reduce premature births nationally and has set a goal of 9.6%. Across the US, only six states – Alaska, California, Maine, New Hampshire, Oregon and Vermont – met this target and achieved an “A” grade.

Top marks for state with highest birth rates

March of Dimes singles out California’s achievement as being particularly noteworthy, pointing out that not only does it have the highest birth rate of all the states – with 500,000 births each year – it also has a racially diverse population living in urban, suburban and rural communities.

According to the Report Card, the grade ranges were established in 2011 using a specific formula. Scores were then rounded to one decimal point, resulting in the following scoring criteria:

Grade     Preterm birth rate

A             Less than or equal to 9.6%

B             Higher than 9.6% but less than 11.3%

C             Greater than or equal to 11.3% but less than 12.9%

D             Greater than or equal to 12.9% but less than 14.6%

E              Greater than or equal to 14.6%

March of Dimes 2013 Report Card shows that 31 states saw improvements in their preterm birth rates, with the grades breaking down as follows:

  • Six states achieved grade A
  • 19 states achieved grade B
  • 17 states and the District of Columbia received grade C
  • Five states achieved grade D
  • Three states – Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama – and Puerto Rico received grade F.

Non-Hispanic black infants remain at greatest risk of preterm birth at 16.8%, although this number has fallen from 18.5% in 2006. And while the gap between blacks and whites is narrowing, preterm birth rates among non-Hispanic black  babies is still more than 1.5 times higher than non-Hispanic whites.

March of Dimes also looked at some contributing factors to early birth and noted reductions in the number of women of childbearing age who smoke in 35 states. They also recorded reductions in the percentage of uninsured women of childbearing age in 37 states, as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

Source: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/268339.php

 

Mowing The Lawn is good for your heart

We all know we’re supposed to exercise daily, but precious few of us do. And it only seems to get harder with age.

There’s a reason to try harder, though. Tacking more years of good health on to your life may be as simple as mowing the lawn more often and engaging in other everyday physical activities.

Researchers in Sweden measured the health of almost 4,000 60-year-olds in the late 1990s. A dozen years later, they checked back in. The people who had been active but not “exercising” at age 60 had a 27 percent lower risk of heart attack and stroke over that time, and a 30 percent lower risk of death.

The most active people also had trimmer waists, and better HDL cholesterol, triglycerides and blood glucose levels, considered risk factors for heart disease and diabetes.

That’s compared to people who are sedentary, which tends to become more common as people age.

What kind of activity does it take to get those kinds of numbers? Things like mowing the lawn, housework, fix-it projects, and gardening, bicycling, for a nice Scandinavian touch, “gathering mushrooms or berries.”

That last one got me thinking of my 92-year-old dad, who gathered 15 pounds of chanterelle mushrooms just a few weeks ago near his home in Oregon. Dad also mows the lawn, cleans the gutters and fixes the roof. He grows roses, tomatoes and grapes, too.

You could say he does this because he’s cheap. He’s a child of the Great Depression after all. Or maybe he’s just restless. Either way, he’s in good shape, or if he’s jogged even once in his life, it’s news to me.

Other recent studies on non-mushroom-gatherers have found similar health benefits for the kind of simple daily activity that doesn’t require Spandex pants, including walking or biking for transportation instead of driving.

The Swedish researchers also looked at people who were doing the kind of moderate-to-vigorous activity that we’re all supposed to be doing for 150 minutes a week, according to federal guidelines. Regular exercisers had better blood pressure numbers than non-exercisers. When it came to cardiovascular health and risk of death, they didn’t lower their risk any more than the active non-exercisers, unless they were getting a lot of high-intensity exercise, more than 30 minutes three times a week.

The study was published online in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

This study doesn’t prove that being active is what made these people healthier, of course. It could be they were more active because they were healthier to begin with and then stayed that way. But the researchers tried to account for that by excluding people who already had heart disease and other health problems.

Other recent reports showing that being sedentary is pretty much a death sentence, mowing the lawn sounds less like a chore and more a gift of life.

Source: http://inagist.com/all/395295874374701056/

Swaddling babies can cause hip problems, surgeon warns

A pediatric orthopedic surgeon is warning about the potential for hip problems in babies now that swaddling has made a comeback.

Nicholas Clarke of Southampton University Hospital in England wrote in the Archives of Disease in Childhood that swaddling can be safe, so long as it doesn’t prevent the baby’s legs from bending up and out at the hips – a position that allows for the natural development of hip joints. The legs must not be tightly wrapped, he wrote.

He noted nine of 10 infants in North America are now swaddled in the first six months of life, and demand for swaddling clothes soared by 61% in the U.K. between 2010 and 2011.

Swaddling is used to soothe a baby and help them sleep, but pulling the blanket around the baby too tightly could cause hip misalignment, which could turn into osteoarthritis later in life, Clarke said.

Source: http://bit.ly/1f1HVrL

10 Reasons to Give Up Diet Soda

When taken at face value, diet soda seems like a health-conscious choice. It saves you the 140-plus calories you’d find in a sugary soft drink while still satisfying your urge for something sweet with artificial sweeteners like aspartame, saccharin, and sucralose. But there’s more to this chemical cocktail than meets the eye.

It confuses your body

Artificial sweeteners have more intense flavor than real sugar, so over time products like diet soda dull our senses to naturally sweet foods like fruit, says Brooke Alpert, RD, author of The Sugar Detox. Even more troubling, these sugar stand-ins have been shown to have the same effect on your body as sugar. “Artificial sweeteners trigger insulin, which sends your body into fat storage mode and leads to weight gain,” Alpert says.

It could lead to weight gain, not weight loss

Diet soda is calorie-free, but it won’t necessarily help you lose weight. Researchers from the University of Texas found that over the course of about a decade, diet soda drinkers had a 70% greater increase in waist circumference compared with non-drinkers. And get this: participants who slurped down two or more sodas a day experienced a 500%greater increase. The way artificial sweeteners confuse the body may play a part, but another reason might be psychological, says Minnesota-based dietitian Cassie Bjork. When you know you’re not consuming any liquid calories, it might be easier to justify that double cheeseburger or extra slice of pizza.

It’s associated with an increased risk of type 2 diabetes

Drinking one diet soda a day was associated with a 36% increased risk of metabolic syndrome and diabetes in a University of Minnesota study. Metabolic syndrome describes a cluster of conditions (including high blood pressure, elevated glucose levels, raised cholesterol, and large waist circumference) that put people at high risk for heart disease, stroke, and diabetes, Bjork explains.

It has no nutritional value

When you drink diet soda, you’re not taking in any calories—but you’re also not swallowing anything that does your body any good, either. The best no-calorie beverage? Plain old water, says Bjork. “Water is essential for many of our bodily processes, so replacing it with diet soda is a negative thing,” she says. If it’s the fizziness you crave, try sparkling water.

Its sweetener is linked to headaches

Early studies on aspartame and anecdotal evidence suggests that this artificial sweetener may trigger headaches in some people. “I have several clients who used to suffer from migraines and pinpointed their cause to diet soda,” Bjork says.

It’ll ruin your smile over time

Excessive soda drinking could leave you looking like a Breaking Bad extra, according to a case study published in the journalGeneral Dentistry. The research compared the mouths of a cocaine-user, a methamphetamine-user, and a habitual diet-soda drinker, and found the same level of tooth erosion in each of them. The culprit here is citric acid, which weakens and destroys tooth enamel over time.

It makes drinking more dangerous

Using diet soda as a low-calorie cocktail mixer has the dangerous effect of getting you drunk faster than sugar-sweetened beverages, according to research from Northern Kentucky University. The study revealed that participants who consumed cocktails mixed with diet drinks had a higher breath alcohol concentration than those who drank alcohol blended with sugared beverages. The researchers believe this is because our bloodstream is able to absorb artificial sweetener more quickly than sugar.

It’s associated with depression

A recent study presented at a the American Academy of Neurology meeting found that over the course of 10 years, people who drank more than four cups or cans of soda a day were 30% more likely to develop depression than those who steered clear of sugary drinks. The correlation held true for both regular and diet drinks, but researchers were sure to note that the risk appeared to be greater for those who primarily drank diet sodas and fruit punches. Although this type of study can’t prove cause and effect, its findings are worth considering.

It may be bad for your bones

Women over 60 are already at a greater risk for osteoporosis than men, and Tufts University researchers found that drinking soda, including diet soda, compounds the problem. They discovered that female cola drinkers had nearly 4% lower bone mineral density in their hips than women who didn’t drink soda. The research even controlled for the participants’ calcium and vitamin D intake. Additionally, a 2006 study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that cola intake (all kinds, not just diet) was associated with low bone-mineral density in women.

It may hurt your heart

Just one diet soft drink a day could boost your risk of having a vascular event such as stroke,heart attack, or vascular death, according to researchers from the University of Miami and Columbia University. Their study found that diet soda devotees were 43% more likely to have experienced a vascular event than those who drank none. Regular soda drinkers did not appear to have an increased risk of vascular events. Researchers say more studies need to be conducted before definitive conclusions can be made about diet soda’s effects on health.

Source: http://www.health.com/health/gallery/0,,20739512_last,00.html