Group items tagged

ScienceDaily (May 12, 2009) - Taking folic acid supplements for at least a year before conception is associated with reduction in the risk of premature birth, according to a study by Radek Bukowski (from the University of Texas Medical Branch, United States of America) and colleagues. Although most pregnancies last about 40 weeks, many babies (for example around 12% in the United States) are born before 37 completed weeks of pregnancy. Babies born prematurely are less likely to survive than full-term babies and are more likely to have breathing difficulties and learning or developmental disabilities. Currently, there are no effective methods of prevention or treatment of premature (preterm) birth, but previous studies have suggested that lower concentrations of folate (folic acid) are associated with shorter duration of pregnancy. Bukowski and colleagues therefore tested this idea, by analyzing data collected from a cohort of nearly 35,000 pregnant women. The results of this study showed that taking folate supplements for at least one year before conception was associated with a 70% reduction in spontaneous premature birth between 20 and 28 weeks (a reduction from 0.27% to 0.04%), and a 50% reduction between 28 and 32 weeks (reduction from 0.38% to 0.18%), as compared to the rate of preterm birth when mothers did not take additional folate supplementation. Folate supplementation for less than a year before conception was not linked to a reduction in the risk of premature birth in this study, and folate supplementation was not associated with any other complications of pregnancy. In a related commentary also published in this week's PLoS Medicine, Nicholas Fisk from the University of Brisbane, Australia, and colleagues (who were not involved in the original study) say "Methodologically, the study has several strengths... It is based on a huge dataset, with prospective recording of dietary supplements and potential confounders, and gestational age determined accu

SEATTLE, April 30 -- The epilepsy drug levetiracetam (Keppra) does not appear to be effective for prevention of chronic daily headache, researchers said here. Levetiracetam drug achieved a 3.9% increase in headache-free performance over placebo, but the trend did not reach statistical significance, Roy Beran, M.D., of the University of New South Wales, and colleagues reported at the American Academy of Neurology meeting.

Not enough vitamin D: health consequences for Canadians.\nSchwalfenberg G.\nCan Fam Physician. 2007 May;53(5):841-54. Review.\nPMID: 17872747 \n

Evidence continues to pile up that the sunshine vitamin protects against much more than bone-softening rickets. Vitamin D, also found in milk and oily fish, is becoming king, from fighting colds to preventing cancer. Investigators at the Medical University of South Carolina shut down part of a National Institutes of Health study that left nursing mothers and infants deficient, even though the mothers received the maximum safe amount of vitamin D allowed by the Institute of Medicine.\n\nBut here's the kicker. New research suggests we're not getting nearly enough, and recommended levels may be woefully inadequate.

Increased intakes of vitamin K2, but not vitamin K1, may decrease the risk of coronary heart disease in postmenopausal women, says a new study.\nFor every 10 microgram increase in the amount of vitamin K2 consumed, researchers from the Netherlands report a 9 per cent reduction in the risk of developing coronary heart disease (CHD).

I stumbled on one of the growing number of local media stories on the power of vitamin D. \nIn one story, a purported "expert" was talking about the benefits of "high-dose" vitamin D, meaning up to 1000, even 2000 units per day. \nI regard this as high-dose---for an infant. \nJudging by my experiences, now numbering well over 1000 patients over three years time, I'd regard this dose range not as "high dose," nor moderate dose, perhaps not even low dose. I'd regard it as barely adequate.

see more articles reviewed on my blog: drjohndc.tumblr.com

ScienceDaily (May 12, 2009) - The more pills a dialysis patients takes, the worse their health-related quality of life, according to a new study. The findings indicate that increasing the number of medications to control patients' disease may interfere with their ability to enjoy normal activities. Kidney disease patients undergoing dialysis must take more pills than most patients with other chronic diseases. While these medications are important for controlling patients' disease, at some point taking too many pills (with their ensuing side effects) may negatively affect patients' health-related quality of life, or their perceived physical and mental health. Rajnish Mehrotra, MD and Yi-Wen Chiu, MD (Los Angeles Biomedical Research Institute), and their colleagues conducted a study to see if "pill burden" affects dialysis patients' health-related quality of life. They studied 233 chronic dialysis patients from three clinics in different geographic areas in the United States. The investigators found that patients took an average of 19 pills a day and that a quarter of the patients took more than 25 pills a day. Patients with a high pill burden had lower perceived physical health. Medications called phosphate binders, which control the level of phosphorous in the blood, accounted for about half of the daily pill burden. Sixty-two percent of the patients did not take these medications as directed. The more phosphate binders a patient was prescribed, the less likely they were to take their medications as directed and the less likely they were to have their blood phosphorous levels under control. These findings indicate that increasing the number of prescribed pills does not seem to improve control of phosphorous levels and may come at the cost of poorer health-related quality of life. The authors note that any attempts to tackle dialysis patients' pill burden must address the number of phosphate binders a patient is prescribed on a daily basis. Dr. Mehrotra has re

Vitamin D: It's Not Just For Bones Anymore. A presentation professor David Feldman

The panel selected to analyze the health claims is being criticized for not including the medical researchers whose work prompted intense scientific interest in the nutrient in the first place. "If you were publicly in favour of vitamin D, you were not included, and I find that outrageous," said Reinhold Vieth, a professor in the department of nutritional sciences at the University of Toronto, and one of Canada's leading experts on the nutrient.

Cirrhosis of liver is not a new name for all of us, we all have heard about this somewhere or the other. This is a severe condition of liver and simply means liver not functioning properly. When the cells in the liver get reduced in number, the liver contracts in size and thus digestive system gets affected and overall the p

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - New research suggests that low vitamin D levels in the body are associated with thinking or "cognitive" impairments in older men, but whether vitamin D supplements can help is not yet known. In the study, an investigation of European men, subjects with low levels of vitamin D scored worse on a standard test of cognitive ability than did their peers with normal levels, Dr. David M. Lee, from the University of Manchester, UK, and co-researchers found. Although, the authors emphasize, the difference in scores was not that great.

Active Hexose Correlated Compound (AHCC) is an alpha-glucan rich nutritional supplement produced from the mycelia of shiitake (Lentinula edodes) of the basidiomycete family of mushrooms, and should not be confused or used as a drug or medicine.[1][2] AHCC was originally designed to lower high-blood pressure. However, researchers at Tokyo University found AHCC's influence upon the innate immune system highly beneficial and published the results in 1992, though not in the commonly indexed scientific literature. In this study, researchers found that AHCC significantly increased natural killer (NK) cell activity in cancer patients, and also enhanced the effects of killer T-cells, and cytokines (interferon, IL-12, TNF-alpha

[Egg intake and cardiovascular risk] Schärer M, Schulthess G. Ther Umsch. 2005 Sep;62(9):611-3. Review. German. PMID: 16218496 The egg - rich in proteins, unsaturated fatty acids, vitamins and minerals - should be part of our nutrition, and it is not justified to recommend a general limitation of egg intake. However, we do not advice unbalanced high egg consumption. A cardioprotective diet is characterized by high variability and contains plenty of fruits, vegetables, and complex carbohydrates.

Fish consumption and risk of major chronic disease in men. Virtanen JK, Mozaffarian D, Chiuve SE, Rimm EB. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Dec;88(6):1618-25. PMID: 19064523 doi:10.3945/ajcn.2007.25816 Conclusions: Modest fish consumption was associated with a lower risk of total cardiovascular disease, consistent with cardiac mortality benefits but not with total cancer or overall major chronic disease; n-6 fatty acid consumption did not influence these relations.

Valimaki VV, Loyttyniemi E, Valimaki MJ.\nVitamin D fortification of milk products does not resolve\nhypovitaminosis D in young Finnish men.\nEur J Clin Nutr. 2006 Nov 29; [Epub ahead of print]\nPMID: 17136043 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

ScienceDaily (May 13, 2009) - Do biofuels always create smaller carbon footprints than their fossil-fuel competitors? Not necessarily, finds a paper published in Elsevier's Environmental Impact Assessment Review. The article reports that in the UK, the carbon footprint for charcoal grilling is almost three times as large as that for LPG grilling. (Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), often referred to as propane, is a mixture of mostly propane and butane)

MedWire News: Eating two eggs a day, as part of an energy-restricted weight-loss diet, does not increase levels of 'bad' or total cholesterol, results of a UK study show.

SAN DIEGO, May 20 -- The effects of exposure to secondhand smoke in childhood may persist for decades, a researcher said here. In a large cohort of nonsmokers, early signs of emphysema were noticeable on CT scans among those who had lived with one or more smokers in childhood, according to Gina Lovasi, Ph.D., of Columbia University. Those signs -- a significant increase in the number of "air-like spaces" -- were not accompanied by any clinical symptoms, Dr. Lovasi said at the annual meeting of the American Thoracic Society.