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Moscow bans night-time vodka sales in health drive

2 Sep 2010 at 11:44am
Moscow banned night-time sales of vodka and other spirits on Wednesday, part of a nationwide drive to curb crime and disease linked with Russia?s national drink. The ban is among a series of tough measures to reduce alcohol abuse ordered last year by President Dmitry Medvedev as part of a fight to slow Russia?s persistent population decline. He called alcoholism a ?national disaster? that undermines public health and hampers the economy. A ban on retail sales of drinks with alcohol content of more than 15 percent between 10 p.m. and 10 a.m. came into force on Wednesday, a spokeswoman for Moscow City Hall?s retail department said. Bars and restaurants are not affected.

Babies Born Past Term Associated With Increased Risk of Cerebral Palsy

1 Sep 2010 at 9:48pm
While preterm birth is a known risk factor for cerebral palsy, an examination of data for infants born at term or later finds that compared with delivery at 40 weeks, birth at 37 or 38 weeks or at 42 weeks or later was associated with an increased risk of cerebral palsy, according to a study in the September 1 issue of JAMA. Cerebral palsy (CP), the most common cause of physical disability in childhood, with limitations that persist throughout life, is characterized by nonprogressive disorders of movement and posture. ?One of the strongest predictors of CP is preterm birth, with the risk of CP increasing steadily with earlier delivery. Although risk is lower among term births, about three-fourths of all infants with CP are born after 36 weeks. Within this range of term births, there are few data on the possible association of CP with gestational age,? the authors write. Dag Moster, M.D., Ph.D., of the University of Bergen, Norway, and colleagues examined the relation of CP risk with gestational age among term and postterm births using the Medical Birth Registry of Norway, which identified 1,682,441 children born in the years 1967-2001 with a gestational age of 37 through 44 weeks and no congenital anomalies. 

Action Needed to Eliminate Food Insecurity in the U.S

1 Sep 2010 at 9:22pm
The American Dietetic Association has published an updated position paper on food insecurity in the United States, calling for funding for food and nutrition assistance programs, increased nutrition education and efforts to promote economic self-sufficiency for all households and individuals. The paper calls access to food ?a basic human need and fundamental right,? defining food insecurity as ?limited or intermittent access to nutritionally adequate, safe and acceptable foods accessed in socially acceptable ways.? According to ADA?s position paper, food insecurity is prevalent throughout the country: More than 49 million people living in the United States experienced food insecurity in 2008. In addition, 5.7 percent of all households representing 17.3 million people including 1.1 million children, had ?very low food security,? defined by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as ?multiple indications of disrupted eating patterns and reduced food intake.?

10 minutes could prevent one-third of road deaths

1 Sep 2010 at 9:18pm
Spanish researchers have calculated the probability of dying in road accidents on the basis of the time taken for the emergency services to arrive. Their conclusions are clear ? reducing the time between an accident taking place and the arrival of the emergency services from 25 to 15 minutes would cut the risk of death by one-third. ?The average wait after an accident until the emergency medical services arrive is 25 minutes in Spain?, Rocío Sánchez-Mangas, co-author of the study and a researcher at the Autonomous University of Madrid (UAM), tells SINC. Her research, which has been published in the journal Accident Analysis and Prevention, is based on information taken from the database records of the Directorate General for Traffic (DGT), which contains exhaustive information on accidents, and another DGT study from May 2004, containing information about the time at which accidents take place, the calls made to the emergency services and their arrival at the accident site. Combining these two databases provided a sample of 1,463 accidents that took place on Spanish roads.

What Causes Childhood Strokes, and Is Stenting an Effective Treatment?

19 Aug 2010 at 6:27pm
University at Buffalo neurosurgeon Elad Levy, MD, implanted a stent in an artery inside the skull of a 14-year-old boy to prevent a stroke, a procedure thought to be the first conducted in an adolescent. The boy was home within one day and remains well at his nine-month evaluation. The boy?s injury, an ?intracranial arterial dissection,? a tear along the inside wall of an artery located inside the skull but outside the brain, is an important cause of stroke in young patients. To date, patients typically receive anti-platelet medication or anticoagulation therapy for this condition. However, neurosurgeons now can treat the dissection more effectively with the advent of self-expanding intracranial stents.

Obesity top threat to children?s health: poll

19 Aug 2010 at 6:16pm
Adults consider obesity the number one threat to children?s health in the United States and many believe the problem is getting worse, according to a new poll. Almost 40 percent of adults cited obesity as the biggest threat to youngsters and teenagers, followed by drug abuse, smoking, Internet safety and stress. ?The message about the dangers of obesity and the prevalence of the disease among children has really gotten through to the American public,? said Dr. Matthew M. Davis, director of the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children?s Hospital National Poll.

Novel autoantibodies identified in patients with necrotizing myopathy

19 Aug 2010 at 6:11pm
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have identified a subgroup of patients with necrotizing myopathy who have a novel autoantibody specificity that makes them potential candidates for immunosuppressive therapy. The complete study is published in the September issue of Arthritis & Rheumatism, a journal of the American College of Rheumatology. Myopathy is a term used to describe muscle disease. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) defines the inflammatory myopathies as a group of diseases that involve chronic muscle inflammation, accompanied by muscle weakness. The chronic inflammatory myopathies are idiopathic, meaning they have no known cause. They are thought to be autoimmune disorders, in which the body?s white blood cells (that normally fight disease) attack blood vessels, normal muscle fibers, and connective tissue in organs, bones, and joints. Distinguishing between immune-mediated myopathies and other necrotizing myopathies such as muscular dystrophies and self-limited toxic myopathies is crucial because only autoimmune muscle diseases respond to immunosuppressive therapy. Unfortunately, clinical evaluation and diagnostic tests sometimes fail to determine whether a necrotizing myopathy is immune mediated, resulting in undertreatment of autoimmune myopathies or inappropriate immunosuppression in patients who do not have an immune-mediated disease. 

Delaying fat digestion to curb appetite

19 Aug 2010 at 6:08pm
Institute of Food Research scientists have discovered an unexpected synergy that helps break down fat. The discovery provides a focus to find ways to slow down fat digestion, and ultimately to create food structures that induce satiety. ?Much of the fat in processed foods is eaten in the form of emulsions such as soups, yoghurt, ice cream and mayonnaise,"? said Dr Peter Wilde from the Institute of Food Research, an institute of BBSRC. ?We are unpicking the mechanisms of digestion used to break them down so we can design fats in a rational way that are digested more slowly.? If the digestion of fat is delayed and fatty acids are able to reach the ileum, the final section of the small intestine, their presence stimulates satiety-inducing hormones.

Black patients, women miss out on strongest medications for chronic pain

18 Aug 2010 at 9:14am
Black patients are prescribed fewer pain medications than whites and few women receive medications strong enough to manage their chronic pain, according to a study in the August issue of Journal of Pain. University of Michigan Health System researchers studied nearly 200 patients with chronic pain who sought help from a specialty pain center. Researchers analyzed the number and potency of medicines they were already taking and the adequacy of pain management. Younger men received better pain management, and the U-M found other racial and gender gaps in the pain care journey that suggests changes are needed beginning in primary care.

Moderate drinking, especially wine, associated with better cognitive function

18 Aug 2010 at 9:10am
A large prospective study of 5033 men and women in the Tromsø Study in northern Norway has reported that moderate wine consumption is independently associated with better performance on cognitive tests. The subjects (average age 58 and free of stroke) were followed over 7 years during which they were tested with a range of cognitive function tests. Among women, there was a lower risk of a poor testing score for those who consumed wine at least 4 or more times over two weeks in comparison with those who drink < 1 time during this period The expected associations between other risk factors for poor cognitive functioning were seen, i.e. lower testing scores among people who were older, less educated, smokers, and those with depression, diabetes, or hypertension. It has long been known that ?moderate people do moderate things.? The authors state the same thing: ?A positive effect of wine . . . could also be due to confounders such as socio-economic status and more favourable dietary and other lifestyle habits. The authors also reported that not drinking was associated with significantly lower cognitive performance in women. As noted by the authors, in any observational study there is the possibility of other lifestyle habits affecting cognitive function, and the present study was not able to adjust for certain ones (such as diet, income, or profession) but did adjust for age, education, weight, depression, and cardiovascular disease as its major risk factors. 

New screen offers hope for copper deficiency sufferers

17 Aug 2010 at 1:22pm
Copper deficiency diseases can be devastating. Symptoms can range from crippling neurological degeneration in Menkes disease ? a classic copper deficiency disease ? to brittle bones, anaemia and defective skin pigmentation in gastric bypass patients. Unfortunately, very little is known about how the body uses this essential nutrient. Knowing that melanocytes (the cells that give rise to hair, skin and eye pigmentation) are dramatically affected by the effects of copper deficiency, Elizabeth Patton from the University of Edinburgh, UK, and other colleagues from UK- and US-based labs decided to find out how melanocytes metabolise copper. Patton and her colleagues publish their results in Disease Models and Mechanisms on August 17, 2010 at http://dmm.biologists.org/. Patton explains that zebrafish are a valuable research tool because they are an intermediate organism between mammals and the simpler creatures that scientists routinely use to study genetic disorders. She usually uses zebrafish to understand how melanocytes develop and how these cells can give rise to malignant melanoma, a lethal form of cancer. Testing compounds that she hoped might prevent malignant melanoma symptoms in zebrafish, she was puzzled to find a compound that caused the fish to lose their characteristic zebra-stripe patterns. After spending months trying to determine why the fish lost their stripes, she crossed paths with Jonathan Gitlin, a copper deficiency specialist from Vanderbilt University, USA, and realised that the stripeless fish might have copper deficiency. To understand the molecular pathways involved in copper deficiency, Patton and Gitlin teamed up with Mike Tyers from the University of Edinburgh and developed an elegant method to probe copper metabolism in zebrafish.

Immune system gene linked with Parkinson?s: study

17 Aug 2010 at 12:36pm
A gene linked with the immune system may play a role in developing Parkinson?s disease, researchers said on Sunday, marking a possible advance in the search for effective treatments. They said a gene in the human leukocyte antigen region or HLA?which contains a large number of genes related to immune system function?was strongly linked with Parkinson?s disease. ?That means the immune system probably plays a role in your body developing Parkinson?s disease,? said Dr. Cyrus Zabetian of the University of Washington and Veteran?s Administration Puget Sound Health Care System, whose study appears in the journal Nature Genetics.

U.S. hopeful Pakistan can avert big cholera outbreak

17 Aug 2010 at 11:40am
A senior U.S. aid official said on Saturday he was optimistic a serious cholera outbreak could be averted in flood-hit Pakistan after emergency steps taken by international and Pakistani relief groups. At least one case of cholera was confirmed on Friday and several more were suspected, said Mark Ward, acting director of the U.S. Agency for International Development?s office for foreign disaster assistance. Epic floods have affected more than 14 million people in Pakistan. ?The good news is that we know where it is and we can get resources in there to help because of the disease early warning system,? said Ward, referring to a system set up by the World Health Organization to quickly detect any cases of cholera or other waterborne illnesses common in flooding.

Psoriasis tied to depression, suicide

17 Aug 2010 at 11:37am
People with the skin condition psoriasis are more likely to be depressed, anxious and thinking about suicide, than those without the problem, according to a new study of British adults. Researchers found that nearly one in ten people with mild psoriasis had been depressed at some point?more than twice as many as among people without the disease. And in severe cases, the depression rate rose even further. ?Psoriasis has a profound impact on patients? well being,? said Dr. Joel Gelfand, of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, who worked on the study. ?It?s likely that there are tens of thousands of extra cases of depression and suicidal thoughts due to psoriasis.?

Drug information from pharmacies found lacking

17 Aug 2010 at 11:35am
The information leaflets pharmacies give to customers along with their prescriptions vary widely in their content, and may often be difficult for people to read and understand, according to a new study. The findings, researchers say, argue for a standard approach to generating the pharmacy leaflets, including oversight by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). As it stands, the information on prescription-drug labels is regulated by the FDA, but the information leaflets dispensed by pharmacies are not. Private publishing companies provide the content for the leaflets, and then pharmacies?or their computer software vendors?determine the formatting of the leaflets, which includes picking and choosing what drug information to include or leave out. 

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