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Supplementation with active hexose correlated compound increases survival following infectious challenge in mice. Ritz BW. Nutr Rev. 2008 Sep;66(9):526-31. Review. PMID: 18752476 DOI: 10.1111/j.1753-4887.2008.00085.x

A 22-y prospective study of fish intake in relation to prostate cancer incidence and mortality. Chavarro JE, Stampfer MJ, Hall MN, Sesso HD, Ma J. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008 Nov;88(5):1297-303. PMID: 18996866 Conclusion: These results suggest that fish intake is unrelated to prostate cancer incidence but may improve prostate cancer survival.

March 13, 2009 -- Whether you drive, take the bus, or bicycle, being in heavy traffic triples your risk of heart attack within one hour. Air pollution from car fumes is the likely culprit, suggest Annette Peters, PhD, and colleagues at the Institute of Epidemiology, Helmholtz Center, Munich, Germany. In a previous study, Peters and colleagues found that a sizeable proportion of heart attacks -- about 8% -- could be attributed to being in traffic. To follow up, the researchers interviewed 1,454 people who survived heart attacks. In the hour before their heart attack, many of the survivors had been in heavy traffic. Analysis of the data showed that these heart-attack-vulnerable people were 3.2 times more likely to suffer a heart attack if they'd been in heavy traffic in the previous hour.

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

Mice injected with cancer cells experienced significantly elevated levels of C-reactive protein, white blood cells, and lipid peroxidation compared with control mice. These levels were reduced in animals that received cisplatin and/or DHA. While treatment with 125 mg/kg DHA inhibited tumor growth by 38 percent compared to untreated animals, 250 mg/kg suppressed tumor growth by 79 percent, which was a greater effect than that of cisplatin alone (which was associated with a 55 percent reduction). The combination of DHA and cisplatin resulted in an 81 percent inhibition of growth, while reducing elevated white blood cell levels (leukocytosis) to normal levels. Treatment with the higher dose of DHA alone was associated with a similar reduction in white blood cells, which, when elevated, are associated with tumor growth. A strong relationship was observed between tumor growth and white blood cell levels as well as C-reactive protein levels. In another experiment with rats treated with cisplatin, the addition of 250 mg/kg DHA prevented lethal kidney toxicity in 88 percent of the animals that received it, while none of the rats that received cisplatin alone survived.