Friday, 21 April 2017

Rinsing The Nasal Saline Solution Reduces Ear Infections In Children

Rinsing The Nasal Saline Solution Reduces Ear Infections In Children.
Rinsing the nasal space with a saline liquid has become a popular way to try to compress allergy symptoms and sinus infections in adults, and now a new study suggests that this simple therapy might also help prevent ear infections in young children. In the small Canadian study, 10 children who received an typical of four nasal irrigations four days a week had no discrimination infections during the three-month study period, while only three of those who weren't given nasal washes had no consideration infections.

So "Saline irrigations are simple, low-cost and have few, if any, side effects," the cramming authors wrote. "Our results suggest that nasal irrigations could effectively prevent recurrent otitis media". Otitis media is the medical while for ear infections.

Such infections are the leading cause of hearing depletion in children, according to the study. Standard treatment for bacterial ear infections is antibiotics. However, there's growing bear on that repeatedly using antibiotics to treat ear infections might lead to antibiotic resistance.

In an stab to find an alternative to antibiotics, researchers from Sainte-Justine Hospital in Montreal reviewed the information on saline nasal rinses in adults and discovered that irrigating the nasal cavity can break nasal swelling and discharge after surgery and that nasal irrigation is often being used to reduce sinus symptoms in adults. "The impression behind a saline rinse for ear infections is that you have a lot of germs in the back of your nose and throat where the Eustachian tube connects.

If you can embrocation out those germs on a regular basis, you could potentially reduce the multitude of ear infections," explained Dr Richard Rosenfeld, chair of otolaryngology at Long Island College Hospital in New York City and the rewriter of the journal Otolaryngology - Head and Neck Surgery. To survive if saline irrigation would have a positive effect on the rate of appreciation infections, the researchers recruited 29 children between the ages of 6 months and 5 years who had been referred to the otolaryngology clinic at Sainte-Justine Hospital because of periodic ear infections.

Friday, 14 April 2017

New Immune Reserves To Fight Against HIV

New Immune Reserves To Fight Against HIV.
Scientists reveal they've discovered conceivable new weapons in the war against HIV: antibody "soldiers" in the inoculated system that might prevent the AIDS virus from invading human cells. According to the researchers, these newly found antibodies lock with and neutralize more than 90 percent of a group of HIV-1 strains, involving all notable genetic subtypes of the virus. That breadth of activity could potentially move research closer toward advancement of an HIV vaccine, although that goal still remains years away, at best, experts say.

The findings "show that the exempt system can make very potent antibodies against HIV," said Dr John Mascola, a vaccine researcher and co-author of two imaginative studies published online July 8 in the record Science. "We are trying to understand why they exist in some patients and not others. That will hand us in the vaccine design process".

Antibodies are warriors in the body's immune system that utilize to prevent infection. "Neutralizing" antibodies bind to germs and try to disable them, explained Ralph Pantophlet, an immunologist and aide-de-camp professor at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada.

Toddlers Fall From High Chairs

Toddlers Fall From High Chairs.
Young children are falling out of momentous chairs at alarming rates, according to a unknown safety study that found high chair accidents increased 22 percent between 2003 and 2010. US difficulty rooms now attend to an average of almost 9500 capital chair-related injuries every year, a figure that equates to one injured infant per hour. The elephantine majority of incidents involve children under the age of 1 year. "We recognize that these injuries can and do happen, but we did not expect to see the kind of increase that we saw," said burn the midnight oil co-author Dr Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio.

And "Most of the injuries we're talking about, over 90 percent, include falls with babies toddlers whose center of gravity is high, near their chest, rather than near the waist as it is with adults. "So when they be defeated they topple, which means that 85 percent of the injuries we see are to the head and face". Because the surrender is from a seat that's higher than the traditional chair and typically onto a hard larder floor, "the potential for a serious injury is real. This is something we really straits to look at more, so we can better understand why this seems to be happening more frequently".

For the study, published online Dec 9, 2013 in Clinical Pediatrics, the authors analyzed dirt collected by the US National Electronic Injury Surveillance System. The figures concerned all high chair, booster seat, and rational chair-related injuries that occurred between 2003 and 2010 and involved children 3 years obsolete and younger. The researchers found that high chair/booster chair injuries rose from 8926 in 2003 to 10930 by 2010.

Roughly two-thirds of inebriated chair accidents involved children who had been either repute or climbing in the chair just before their fall, the study authors noted. The conclusion: Chair restraints either aren't working as they should or parents are not using them properly. "In latest years, there have been millions of great chairs recalled because they do not meet current safety standards. Most of these chairs are reasonably sound when restraint instructions are followed, but even so, there were 3,5 million high chairs recalled during our sanctum period alone.

Monday, 13 March 2017

Worries About Job Losses Increase The Chances Of Heart Attack And Stroke

Worries About Job Losses Increase The Chances Of Heart Attack And Stroke.
Women who have taxing jobs with toy supervision over their busy days are at higher danger for heart attacks or the need for coronary bypass surgery, new on suggests. Furthermore, worrying about losing one's job also raised the odds of having cardiovascular bug risk factors such as high blood pressure and higher cholesterol levels - but not present heart attacks, stroke or death, the researchers said. The study, presented Sunday at the annual meet of the American Heart Association in Chicago, breaks new turf for being one of the first to look at the effect of work-related stress on women's health.

Most previous studies have focused on men and, yes, those studies found that problem stress upped males' odds for cardiovascular disease, too. Women comprise inefficiently half of the US workforce today, with 70 percent of all women holding some benevolent of job, said study senior author Dr Michelle A Albert, an associate physician at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. Albert and her colleagues looked at more than 17000 female trim professionals, with an average age of 57, who showed no signs of cardiovascular ailment at the beginning of the study.

Participants responded to statements about how draining their job was, such as - "My proceeding allows me to make a lot of decisions on my own" or "My job requires that I master new things" or "My job requires working very fast. Job strain involving intellectual demand and decision latitude are tied into the concept of skill, how you are allowed to be at your job, is your contribution repetitive, does it require you to work at a fast pace".

Over 10 years of follow-up, the researchers distinguished that women with high job strain - demanding jobs over which they had little control - were more meet to be sedentary and to have high cholesterol. They were also at almost double the risk for a heart attack and at a 43 percent higher peril to undergo a bypass procedure. The researchers found no significant link between role strain and either stroke or risk for death.

The Problem Of Treating Patients With Heart Disease Who Do Not Respond To Plavix

The Problem Of Treating Patients With Heart Disease Who Do Not Respond To Plavix.
Higher doses of the blood-thinner Plavix were no better at preventing empathy attacks, blood clots or passing than the recognized lower dose in patients who had received artery-opening stents, late research shows. The higher dose - double-barrelled the usual amount - was tested in patients with "high platelet reactivity," meaning they failed to counter to the drug at lower doses. Plavix (clopidogrel) helps prevent clots from forming in patients who have gloomy platelet reactivity and who have had stents inserted to prop open blocked arteries.

But the further study "doesn't support" physicians using the higher, 150-milligram dose of Plavix after stenting, according to enquiry lead author Dr Matthew Price, who presented the findings Tuesday at the annual encounter of the American Heart Association in Chicago. So, the study leaves an important question unanswered: How to entertain heart patients who don't respond well to Plavix? "It remains variable to some extent," said Dr Abhiram Prasad, an interventional cardiologist with the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. "It's an conspicuous study to have done but the key issues are that a significant proportion of the patients remained with serious platelet reactivity even after being on the higher dose".

Previous, smaller studies had indicated that Plavix might have more of an effect if the amount was doubled. "Platelet reactivity varies widely," noted Price, director of the Cardiac Catheterization Laboratory at the Scripps Clinic in La Jolla, Calif. He explained that numerous studies have shown that a squiffy reactivity plane is associated with poorer outcomes after angioplasty and/or stenting. But until now, a sharp rise in the dose of Plavix "has not been tested in a large randomized clinical trial".

Spread Of Menthol Cigarettes Among Young People

Spread Of Menthol Cigarettes Among Young People.
The engagement over menthol-flavored cigarettes heats up again Thursday as a US Food and Drug Administration warning panel continues a series of hearings on whether to debar the cigarettes. The FDA's Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee consists of nine members and includes doctors, scientists and notorious fettle experts. The tobacco industry is represented by three non-voting members. The body has until next March to report its menthol findings to the US Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Much of the argumentation centers on research that shows that children are particularly drawn to menthol cigarettes, with nearly 45 percent of smokers superannuated 12 to 17 using them, according to a 2009 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Most unprincipled teenaged smokers - and 82,7 percent of black full-grown smokers - favor menthols, the same survey found. "The manufacturers would have you believe there is not a scintilla of demonstrate that menthol is more dangerous than other cigarettes to the individual smoker, but we do not agree," said Ellen Vargyas, habitual counsel for the American Legacy Foundation, a smoking prevention and cessation organization in Washington, DC, founded with funding from the watershed 1998 Master Settlement Agreement between the tobacco enterprise and state governments.

And "Over 80 percent of African-American smokers smoke menthol, and African-American smokers have the highest rates of lung cancer. We also distinguish African-Americans with lung cancer are more apt to to die from lung cancer," she told HealthDay. In addition, the popularity of menthols among younger, newer smokers suggests that maybe the minty taste does encourage subjects to start, perhaps by masking the harsh taste of regular cigarettes. "We know the younger you are and the newer the smoker you are, the more expected you are to smoke menthol. There is a very strong correlation between being a teenaged smoker and menthol cigarettes".

That's no coincidence, for example smoking opponents: The tobacco earnestness has long targeted youth and minorities for menthol cigarette marketing, even manipulating menthol import in different brands in an effort to recruit new smokers among youth, according to the US National Cancer Institute and the Harvard School of Public Health. The contend over how menthols should be regulated was endure discussed in July, during the second round of hearings held by the tobacco products advisory committee.

Friday, 10 March 2017

Lung Cancer Remains The Most Lethal Cancer

Lung Cancer Remains The Most Lethal Cancer.
New recommendations from the American Cancer Society about that older in touch or former heavy smokers may want to look upon low-dose CT scans to help screen for lung cancer. Specifically, that includes those old 55 to 74 with a 30 pack-year smoking history who still smoke or who had quit within the past 15 years. Pack-years are a amount made by multiplying the number of packs of cigarettes smoked a epoch by the number of years of smoking. "Even with screening, lung cancer would remain the most lethal cancer," said Dr Norman Edelman, supervisor medical officer at the American Lung Association.

He esteemed the cancer society guidelines are similar to the ones from the lung association. The restored recommendation follows on the results of a major US National Cancer Institute study, published in 2010 in Radiology, that found that annual CT screening for lung cancer for older inclination or old smokers cut their death rate by 20 percent.

Edelman stressed that the study does nothing to change the episode that smoking prevention and cessation remain the most important public health challenge there is. "Screening is not a velocity to make smoking safe from cancer deaths, and certainly does nothing to prevent smoking-related deaths from lasting obstructive pulmonary disease and heart disease".

The cancer society recommendations also highlight smoking cessation counseling as a high priority and stress that CT screening is not an alternative to quitting smoking. CT screening should only be done after a colloquy between patients and their doctors so people fully understand the benefits, limitations and risks of screening. In addition, screening should only be done by someone efficient in low-dose CT lung cancer screening, the cancer organization stressed.

The United States Ranks Last Compared With The Six Other Industrialized Countries

The United States Ranks Last Compared With The Six Other Industrialized Countries.
Compared with six other industrialized nations, the United States ranks wear when it comes to many measures of blue blood salubrity care, a new report concludes. Despite having the costliest vigour care system in the world, the United States is last or next-to-last in quality, efficiency, access to care, high-mindedness and the ability of its citizens to lead long, healthy, dynamic lives, according to a new report from the Commonwealth Fund, a Washington, DC-based private cellar focused on improving health care. "On many measures of health system performance, the US has a hanker way to go to perform as well as other countries that spend far less than we do on healthcare, yet cover everyone," the Commonwealth Fund's president, Karen Davis, said during a Tuesday matutinal teleconference.

And "It is disappointing, but not surprising, that regardless of our significant investment in health care, the US continues to lag behind other countries". However, Davis believes rejuvenated health care reform legislation - when fully enacted in 2014 - will go a elongate way to improving the current system. "Our hope and expectation is that when the measure is fully enacted, we will match and even exceed the performance of other countries".

The report compares the performance of the American vigorousness care system with those of Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. According to 2007 facts included in the report, the US spends the most on health care, at $7,290 per capita per year. That's almost twice the bulk spent in Canada and nearly three times the compute of New Zealand, which spends the least.

The Netherlands, which has the highest-ranked robustness care system on the Commonwealth Fund list, spends only $3,837 per capita. Despite higher spending, the US ranks most recent or next to last in all categories and scored "particularly inexpertly on measures of access, efficiency, equity and long, healthy and productive lives".

The US ranks in the mid-point of the pack in measures of effective and patient-centered care. Overall, the Netherlands came in first on the list, followed by the United Kingdom and Australia. Canada and the United States ranked sixth and seventh.

Speaking at the teleconference, Cathy Schoen, major failing president at the Commonwealth Fund, pointed out that in 2008, 14 percent of US patients with hardened conditions had been given the wrong medication or the wrong dose. That's twice the indiscretion rate observed in Germany and the Netherlands.

Wednesday, 8 March 2017

An Effect Of Hormone Therapy On Breast Cancer

An Effect Of Hormone Therapy On Breast Cancer.
Although several overweight studies in latest years have linked the use of hormone therapy after menopause with an increased danger of breast cancer, the authors of a new analysis claim the evidence is too limited to confirm the connection. Dr Samuel Shapiro, of the University of Cape Town Medical School in South Africa, and his colleagues took another air at three eminently studies that investigated hormone therapy and its credible health risks - the Collaborative Reanalysis, the Women's Health Initiative (WHI) and the Million Women Study. Together, the results of these studies found overall an increased jeopardize of breast cancer centre of women who used the combination form of hormone therapy with both estrogen and progesterone.

Women who have had a hysterectomy and use estrogen-only group therapy also have an increased risk, two of the studies found. The WHI, however, found that estrogen-only remedy may not increase breast cancer risk and may actually decrease it, although that has not been confirmed in other research. After the WHI scrutinize was published in July 2002, women dropped hormone cure in droves.

Many experts pointed to that decline in hormone therapy use as the reason breast cancer rates were declining. Not so, Shapiro said: "The declivity in breast cancer extent started three years before the fall in HRT use commenced, lasted for only one year after the HRT dab commenced, and then stopped". For instance between 2002 and 2003, when large numbers of women were still using hormone therapy, the numeral of new breast cancer cases fell by nearly 7 percent.

In taking a bearing at the three studies again, Shapiro and his team reviewed whether the evidence satisfied criteria superior to researchers, such as the strength of an association, taking into account other factors that could influence risk. Their conclusion: The fact is not strong enough to say definitively that hormone therapy causes breast cancer. The go into is published in the current issue of the Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care.

Thursday, 2 March 2017

Doctors Discovered A Link Between Alcoholism And Obesity

Doctors Discovered A Link Between Alcoholism And Obesity.
People at higher endanger for alcoholism might also impression higher odds of becoming obese, new contemplate findings show. Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis analyzed material from two large US alcoholism surveys conducted in 1991-1992 and 2001-2002. According to the results of the more fresh survey, women with a family history of alcoholism were 49 percent more liable to to be obese than other women. Men with a family history of alcoholism were also more likely to be obese, but this association was not as offensively in men as in women, said first author Richard A Grucza, an assistant professor of psychiatry.

One exegesis for the increased risk of obesity among people with a family history of alcoholism could be that some masses substitute one addiction for another. For example, after a person sees a close allied with a drinking problem, they may avoid alcohol but consume high-calorie foods that stimulate the same reward centers in the perception that react to alcohol, Grucza suggested.

In their analysis of the data from both surveys, the researchers found that the element between family history of alcoholism and obesity has grown stronger over time. This may be due to the increasing availability of foods that interact with the same percipience areas as alcohol.