Health News Tidbits –
February 2006
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Drugs/Meds
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Food/Diet
Lifestyle
Public Health
Magnesium may lower risk of colon cancer -
New research indicates that a diet rich in magnesium may lower the risk of colon cancer, supporting previous studies inversely linking intake of the mineral to the disease.
Researchers from the School of Public Health at the University of Minnesota, found that diets rich in magnesium reduced the occurrence of colon cancer.
A previous study from Sweden (Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 293, pp. 86-89) reported that women with the highest magnesium intake had a 40 per cent lower risk of developing the cancer than those with the lowest intake of the mineral. The research is important because dietary surveys show that a large portion of adults do not meet the RDA for the mineral, found naturally in green, leafy vegetables, meats, starches, grains and nuts, and milk. The new research, published in the February issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology (Vol. 163, pp. 232-235), used a food frequency questionnaire to assess dietary nutrient intake of 35 196 women with an average age of 61. During the 17 years of follow-up, three per cent of the women developed colorectal cancer. The hazard ratio, a measure of the risk, was statistically 25 per cent lower for the volunteers with the highest intake of magnesium (more than 356 mg per day). This is still less than than the RDA for magnesium: 320 mg per day for women and 420 mg per day for men. The protective mechanism of magnesium is not clear but the researchers suggest that reductions in insulin resistance, oxidative stress, and cell proliferation could be possible.
Courtesy of nutraingredients.com
Deficiency in vitamin D may increase cancer risk -
According to a study published in the American Journal of Public Health, correcting vitamin D deficiency could significantly lower the risk of several types of cancer (specifically colon, breast, prostate, and ovary). According to researchers, the vitamin may block the growth of new blood vessels that allow cancer to thrive. In addition, vitamin D may buffer rogue cells from healthy cells within tissue, thus stunting its growth.
Steve - vitamin D is a very hot topic at the moment, and for good reason. The authors in this study suggest supplementing the diet with 800-1000IU vitamin D per day. As we have mentioned earlier, you must be very careful when supplementing with vitamin D because of its toxicity in large doses. Besides what you are getting dietarily from vitamin D, you must monitor how much/little sunshine you are getting on a daily basis (for cold weather regions, the late spring and summer only apply). Please seek the advice of a trained professional when supplementing with vitamin D.
Vitamin D supplements may help pregnant women -
Vitamin D supplements for pregnant women could reduce osteoporosis in their children, according to research published on Friday. The British study showed that children whose mothers lacked Vitamin D during pregnancy grow up to have weaker bones. A lack of Vitamin D is common in women of child-bearing age. Professor Cyrus Cooper and a team from Southampton General Hospital in southern England studied almost 200 children born in 1991 and 1992. Their body size and bone mass were tracked up to the age of nine. The study, published in The Lancet medical journal, showed that women who took Vitamin D supplements or who were exposed to higher levels of sunshine during pregnancy were less likely to be deficient in the vitamin. "These findings provide evidence that maternal Vitamin D status during pregnancy influences the bone growth of the offspring," Cooper said.
Courtesy of Reuters
Steve - like we said last week when another vitamin D study showed reduced cancer risk, make sure you consult a health professional before supplementing with vitamin D, especially if pregnant. We are huge proponents of it, but too much can be toxic. You need to take a dose that is right for you as an individual.
Drugs/Meds -
Cough Syrups ineffective -
According to a committee of the American College of Chest Physicians, over-the-counter cough syrups do little to relieve coughs. Either the products contain drugs in too low of a dose, or contain combinations of drugs that have never been proven to treat coughs.
The committee goes so far to discourage the use of the medicines altogether, because their use as a first remedy can prolong diagnoses of coughs more serious, such as whopping cough.
Journal Chest, January 2006
Steve - I found this in our archives.
Cough Medicines Have No Benefit -
Night-time cough and sleep quality were not better with cough mixtures than with a simple, non-medicated syrup. Echoing the results of this study, the British Thoracic Society said "Cough medications don't do any harm to people who take them, but...neither do they have any medical benefits beyond those of non-medicated syrup." Pediatrics 7/6/04
This season's flu virus resistant to two standard drugs -
Doctors should stop prescribing two standard antiviral drugs to treat or prevent this season's influenza because the predominant strain has quickly become resistant to them, federal health officials said Saturday. The standard drugs are amantadine and rimantadine. Instead, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended that doctors prescribe two newer antiviral drugs, oseltamivir (Tamiflu) and zanamivir (Relenza), and said ample supplies were available.
The new findings concern only the strain of influenza causing regular seasonal influenza, and not avian influenza or pandemic influenza, said the centers' director, Dr. Julie L. Gerberding. She said 91 percent of the human influenza A (H3N2) virus samples isolated in her agency's laboratories this flu season were resistant to both amantadine and rimantadine. A (H3N2) is this season's dominant strain. The agency's influenza surveillance program studies samples from state health departments.
Courtesy of The New York Times
Drug firms eye fat profits from obesity -
Sanofi-Aventis SA's Acomplia, or rimonabant, which could be approved by U.S. regulators as early as next month, is the first of a new wave of treatments that may spell fat profits for some pharmaceutical companies, with sales tipped by analysts to top $3 billion a year. Another two experimental drugs from Arena Pharmaceuticals Inc and Alizyme Plc, with different mechanisms of action, have also produced promising clinical results in recent weeks, prompting some investors to start laying big bets on weight-loss medicine. It is a risky area, however. Slimming pills have had a chequered history, due to modest effectiveness and adverse side effects -- most notoriously with the diet drug combination "fen-phen," which was linked to heart-valve problems and has cost Wyeth more than $21 billion in provisions related to patient claims. Jonathan de Pass, chief executive of specialist consultancy Evaluate, calculates there are now 26 new drugs in clinical trials for obesity and a further 32 in early-stage development. The potential market is large in every respect. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates more than 1 billion people in the world are overweight and, if current trends continue, that number will reach 1.5 billion by 2015. Of the current total, more than 300 million already rank as obese, putting them at substantial risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, respiratory problems and some cancers. Dr Timothy Armstrong of the WHO's department of chronic diseases believes medication can help only a very small minority of patients and will not impact the overall obesity epidemic. "It's not a panacea," he said. "Drugs don't have a role in preventing obesity in the wider population, where interventions around physical activity and diet are far more cost-effective." Today, there are two main obesity medicines on the market -- Roche Holding AG's Xenical, which works by limiting fat absorption, and Abbott Laboratories Inc's Meridia/Reductil, which suppresses appetite. Both can have adverse side effects, however. Xenical can cause excess gas and oily discharge, while Meridia may increase blood pressure. As a result, sales of both drugs are modest, at $460 million and $300 million respectively in 2004. Side effects for the anticipated Acomplia could also be an issue. While patients on Acomplia have lost around 7 kg (15 lb) in body weight over two years, concerns remain about its potential impact on mood. By Ben Hirschler, European Pharmaceuticals Correspondent, Yahoo News
Steve - You cannot fault the drug companies for trying. They need to meet the demands of their shareholders and there is A LOT of money to be made in treating obesity.
Let's wade through the morass for a while.
You must ask yourself three questions before choosing this route:
Is losing 15 pounds in two years worth it? There is no guarantee that you will lose the weight, a clear risk of side effects, and a considerable out of pocket expense (chances are your insurance company will not pay for obesity treatment). Are you ready to be on the treatment for the rest of your life? That's what the powers that be are pushing for. They will want to prove that along with weight reduction, the medication will prevent every disease imaginable (i.e., pushing statin medication for alzheimer's prevention).
When you want to go off the pills, what are you going to do?
These are serious questions to consider. If you decide to try one of these treatments, don't be a guinea pig! Wait at least 1-2 years after it has been on the market. Remember Vioxx? It took the public over 4 years to find out the damage it caused.
We understand that medication will always be a minute percentage of obesity-reduction therapy, but one still needs to ask the hard questions and be cautious!
Vitamin-rich diet cuts risk of vision malady -
A vitamin-rich diet lowers the risk of contracting macular degeneration, the leading cause of blindness among the elderly in developed countries, according to this week's issue of the
Journal of the American Medical Association. The eight-year study involved more than 4,000 older residents of Rotterdam, in the Netherlands. It found those whose diets included more than the median levels of vitamins C and E, beta carotene and zinc had a 35 percent lower risk of developing macular degeneration, compared with those whose diets provided a below-median level of any of the four
nutrients. Participants with a below-median consumption of all four of the nutrients had a 20 percent higher risk of macular degeneration.
The fish saga continues -
In response to the growing conern over mercury in fish, the FDA published newly released testing of 25 fish varieties.
Not surprisingly, fish such as ahi tuna (a sushi staple) and chilean sea bass (a restaurant staple), both large fish that have long lifespans, showed higher levels of mercury than smaller fish that have shorter lifespans.
The results also showed that 6% of canned light tuna tested had high levels of mercury, although, still within what is considered a legal limit.
Bonnie - so where does this leave us? As we have said all along, stay away from the larger fish that have the longest lifespan. Focus on eating small fish with shorter lifespans such as sardines. Fatty fish such as salmon and halibut are fine. With regard to tuna, once or twice weekly maximum (for pregnant women and children follow the FDA's recommendations) for adults is fine.
Reasons to buy organic -
According to a February Consumer Reports article, buy these organic items as much as posssible: apples, baby food, bell peppers, celery, cherries, dairy, eggs, imported grapes, meat, nectarines, peaches, pears, poultry, potatoes, red raspberries, spinach, and strawberries.
Consumer Reports draws upon data showing extremely high pesticide, hormone, and/or antibitoic residues in the aforementioned foods especially. Studies have shown that kids' pesticide exposure quickly drops after switching from a conventional to organic diet.
AHA downplays soy's benefits -
An American Heart Association committee reviewed a decade of studies on soy's benefits and came up with results that are now casting doubt on the health claim that soy-based foods and supplements significantly lower cholesterol, according to its statement in the journal Circulation.
The findings could lead the Food and Drug Administration to re-evaluate rules that currently allow companies to tout a cholesterol-lowering benefit on the labels of soy-based food.
Nutrition experts say soy-based foods still are good because they often are eaten in place of less healthy fare like burgers and hot dogs. But they don't have as much direct benefit as had been hoped on cholesterol, one of the top risk factors for heart disease.
The FDA in 1999 started allowing manufacturers to claim that soy products might cut the risk of heart disease after studies showed at least 25 grams of soy protein a day lowered cholesterol. A year later, the Heart Association recommended soy be included in a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol.
But as more research emerged, the Heart Association decided to revisit the issue. The committee members reviewed 22 studies and found that large amounts of dietary soy protein only reduced LDL, or ``bad'' cholesterol, about 3 percent and had no effect on HDL, or ``good'' cholesterol, or on blood pressure.
Steve - Bonnie and I were never a proponent of the FDA allowing soy heart health claims in 1999. Soy has its place in the food supply, but only as a complementary food. The FDA, the American Heart Association, and major food manufacturers that jumped on the bandwagon and put soy in EVERYTHING are in a quandry. Soy is literally everywhere and in everything. Not only is it one of the three most allergenic food staples (milk and wheat being the other two), it is one of the most heavily sprayed crops (if not organic). In addition, soy is not very bioavailable protein (in general, plant based proteins are far inferior in bioavialblity than animal protein).
The studies on soy have been a mixed bag mainly because soy is tolerated differently depending on the individual's genetic makeup.
Now that soy is a major food staple worldwide, and has a huge amount of political clout, it is going to be very difficult to make it a "complementary" once again. Of course, you can count on the dairy industry to do all it can to make this happen.
Stress in the workplace = heart disease -
Stress in the workplace is a major factor in the development of heart disease and diabetes, a study says. Stress has long been linked to ill health, but the British Medical Journal study may have identified the biological process for the first time. The study of 10,000 civil servants found a link between stress and metabolic syndrome, which involves obesity and high blood pressure.
E SF Lead researcher Tarani Chandola said: "Employees with chronic work stress have more than double the odds of the syndrome than those without work stress, after other risk factors are taken into account.
This relationship meant that the more stress someone suffered, the more likely they were to suffer metabolic syndrome symptoms. The researchers said that, for example, men who suffered chronic work stress were twice as likely to develop the syndrome as men who had no exposure to stress. Women with chronic stress were also more likely to suffer from metabolic syndrome, although they formed only a small group in the study. The researchers said one possible explanation for the result may be that prolonged exposure to work stress affects the nervous system. They also suggested that chronic stress may reduce biological resilience, thus disturbing the body's physiological balance.
Courtesy of BBC News
Public Health -
Statistics from 2005 America's Health Rankings -
The yearly report is funded by the United Foundation for Health, in partnership with the American Public Health Association and Partnership for Prevention. It is
available in pdf format at this URL - http://www.unitedhealthfoundation.org/shr2005/ahr05_email.pdf. Highlights include:
Since 1990, there has been a 99% increase in the prevalence of obesity, 40% decrease of infectious disease, 30% decline in smoking, and 18% decrease of cardiovascular death. Since 2004, there has been a 1% increase in obesity, 6% decline in smoking, 6% decrease of infectious disease 28 countries have healthy life expectancies that exceed the U.S., the highest being Japan, which can expect to have five additional years of life.
Highlights from Am Coll Clin Nutr -
-In a multiple regression analysis of 168 prepubertal girls aged 4–8 y living in the southeastern United States, Vitamin D status was adequate in the children. There was a fluctuation in levels depending on season (fall/winter the levels dipped a bit lower), but were still normal.
Steve - as we have said many times, in warmer climates, increasing vitamin D intake is not as crucial as it is for those living in colder climates. Even though we have heard many wonderful things about vitamin D lately, we are not one size fits all. In short, consult with a health professional before supplementing with vitamin D.
-Iron from purified soybean ferritin is well absorbed and may provide a model for novel, utilizable, plant-based forms of iron for populations with a low iron status.
-In a community-based, cross-section of 7137 men, 4585 premenopausal women, and 2248 postmenopausal women aged 25–64 y, a study found risks of osteoporosis, osteopenia, and nonspine fractures were significantly higher for subjects with higher percentage body fat independent of body weight, physical activity, and age. Thus, fat mass has a negative effect on bone mass in contrast with the positive effect of weight-bearing itself.
-A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled intervention study including thirty-seven healthy, nonsmoking postmenopausal women aged 50–70 y were randomly assigned to 1 of 5 groups. They consumed a daily dose of mixed carotenoids (ß-carotene, lutein, and lycopene; 4 mg each), 12 mg of a single carotenoid (ß-carotene, lutein, or lycopene), or placebo for 56 d. The results indicated that carotenoid supplementation decreases DNA damage and that a combination of carotenoids (4 mg each of lutein, ß-carotene, and lycopene), an intake that can be achieved by diet, or a larger dose (12 mg) of individual carotenoids exerts protection against DNA damage.
Steve - translation...eat your veggies, fruits, supplement if you have to for
Prostate Cancer Screening Questioned -
Even though this study was relatively small (1,002 men), researchers found that from 1991-1998, the men who were alive were no more likely to have been screened than the men who died of prostate cancer.
Archives of Internal Medicine, January 9, 2006
Steve - I found these in our archives.
Prostate Cancer Screening Treatment Questioned -
According to a report published in the October 5th issue of the British Medical Journal, men who receive prostate cancer screening and treatment do not gain a survival benefit compared to men who do not undergo screening and treatment. The investigation covered two different groups of men -- 94,000 in Seattle, WA (in which the PSA testing rate was 5.4 times higher than men in CT, biopsy rate was more than double, and were five times more likely to have their prostate removed) and 120,621 in Connecticut. Despite the more intensive prostate action in Seattle, the number of men who died from prostate cancer in the two groups over the total 11-year period was nearly equal. 11/2002
Prostate Cancer Over treated -
According to a study in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 29-44% of men who used a PSA blood test to find prostate cancer over a ten year period were "over-diagnosed." Those patients may have received surgery or radiation treatment for prostate cancer that would never have progressed so far that it threatened their health. Prostate cancer is a slow moving disease that will never become life threatening. In addition a recent Journal of Clinical Oncology study showed that PSA blood test, the supposed "gold standard" for prostate cancer screening, was virtually useless in detecting it. 8/2002
Prostate Cancer Screening Flawed -
Prostate-Specific Antigen, known as PSA, a common blood test used to detect prostate cancer, misses up to 82% of cancers in men younger than 60 and 65% in those older than 60. The new study found that the levels used to trigger a biopsy are too high.
New England Journal of Medicine 7/24/03
Study Questions PSA Prostate Tests -
Almost a third of men over 75 undergo prostate screening, but a new study says there is no evidence that screening men this age would be beneficial to them. The senior author of the study says that autopsies on elderly men show that 30 to 70 percent will have prostate cancer, but they died of something else. The author goes on to say that most men with elevated PSAs do not have prostate cancer. J Nat Cancer Inst 12/3/2003
Prostate Cancer Overused -
Half of all prostate cancers picked up by PSA blood screening are irrelevant, according to a Canadian study. The report estimates that 50% of men aged 55 to 67 who are diagnosed with prostate cancer from a yearly PSA screening would not have shown symptoms of the disease during their lifetime. From the study's calculations, it was suggested that the PSA will find cancer on average 12.3 years before you would ever suffer from it or show symptoms. Journal of the National Cancer Institute 6/18/03
Standard Prostate Test Often Misses Cancer -
15% of older men with supposedly normal PSA readings have prostate cancer anyway - some with aggressive tumors. The study, which appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, conducted with the help of funding and personnel from the National Cancer Institute, is one of several recent studies questioning the efficacy of PSA tests. NEJM 5/27/04
Mental Health Linked to Diet change -
Changes to diets over the last 50 years may be playing a key role in the rise of mental illness, a study says. Food campaigners Sustain and the Mental Health Foundation say the way food is now produced has altered the balance of key nutrients people consume. The report, Feeding Minds, pointed out the delicate balance of minerals, vitamins and essential fats consumed had changed in the past five decades. Researchers said the proliferation of
industrialized farming had introduced pesticides and altered the body fat composition of animals due to the diet they are now fed. For example, the report said chickens reach their slaughter weight twice as fast as they did 30 years ago, increasing the fat content from 2% to 22%. The diet has also altered the balance of vital fatty acids omega-3 and omega-6 in chickens which the brain needs to ensure it functions properly. In contrast, saturated fats, consumption of which has been increasing with the boom in ready meals, act to slow down the brain's working process. The report said people were eating 34% less vegetables and two-thirds less fish - the main source of omega-3 fatty acids - than they were 50 years ago. Such changes, the study said, could be linked to depression, schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Alzheimer's disease.
Steve - Boy, we could not have said it better ourselves.
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