Too much sitting not linked to increased death risk - study

LONDON -- Sitting for long periods is not associated with an increased risk of dying, according to a study recently released by the University of Exeter.

These findings challenge previous research suggesting that the act of sitting itself causes harm even when people routinely walk a lot or do other exercise. The findings also contradict recommendations by Britain's National Health Service (NHS) that remaining seated for too long is bad for your health, regardless of how much exercise you do.

The study followed more than 5,000 participants for 16 years. The participants provided information on total sitting time and on four other specific types of sitting behavior: sitting at work, during leisure time, while watching TV, and sitting during leisure time excluding TV. They were also asked to provide details on daily walking and time spent engaged in moderate to vigorous physical activity.

The study showed that over the 16-year follow-up period none of these sitting measures influenced mortality risk.

The findings overturned current thinking on the health risks of sitting and indicated that the problem lies in the absence of movement rather than the time spent sitting itself, researchers said.

Any stationary posture where energy expenditure is low may be detrimental to health, be it sitting or standing, according to the researchers.

"Our findings suggest that reducing sitting time might not be quite as important for mortality risk as previously publicized and that encouraging people to be more active should still be a public health priority," said lead author Dr. Richard Pulsford from the University of Exeter.

The study has been published in the International Journal of Epidemiology.

source: interaksyon.com

Quitting smoking makes you happier, says UK study

PARIS - Moderate or heavy smokers who quit tobacco get a boost in mental wellbeing that, for people who are anxious or stressed, is equivalent to taking anti-depressants, a study said Thursday.

British researchers examined 26 published investigations into the mental health of smokers.

They looked at standardized scorecards for symptoms of anxiety, depression, stress and quality of life, derived from questionnaires completed by volunteers.

The smokers were 44 years old on average and smoked between 10 and 40 cigarettes a day. They were questioned before they tried to give up smoking and again after their attempt -- an average of six months later.

Those who succeeded in quitting reported reduced depression, anxiety and stress and had a more positive outlook on life compared with those who continued smoking.

"The effect sizes are equal or larger than those of anti-depressant treatment for mood and anxiety disorders," said the study, published by the British Medical Journal (BMJ).

Quitters who had been diagnosed with psychiatric disorders enjoyed a similar improvement.

Lead investigator Gemma Taylor of the University of Birmingham's School of Health and Population Sciences said she hoped the findings would dispel a widespread misconception about smoking.

"It's a common myth that smoking actually is good for your mental health -- 'smoking relieves stress,' 'smoking helps you relax,' 'smoking helps you enjoy things' -- and that common myth is really hard to overcome," Taylor told AFP in a phone interview.

But actually, the study showed that "when you stop smoking and you break the nicotine withdrawal cycle, your mental health improves."

Taylor pointed to a mainstream theory in tobacco addiction research: that a smoker's psychological state fluctuates throughout the day as a result of exposure to nicotine.

The sense of calm or wellbeing from a cigarette is followed immediately afterwards by classic withdrawal signs of a depressed mood, anxiety or agitation.

Smokers, though, tend to misattribute these symptoms and blame them on stress or other factors.

And because nicotine has a calming effect, they perceive that cigarettes improve their mental health.

Smoking is already blamed for a wide range of physical diseases and disorders, ranging from cancer, blindness and cardiac problems to diabetes, gum disease and impotence.

The UN's World Health Organization (WHO) estimated last July that tobacco kills almost six million people each year, a toll that will rise to eight million annually in 2030.

About four out of every five deaths will occur in low- and middle-income nations, it said.

Despite a decline in smoking prevalence in some nations, in overall terms the number of people smoking today is greater than in 1980, due to population growth, according to a paper published last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

source: interaksyon.com

Gym not for you? Easy home tasks also help heart - study

PARIS - Mowing the lawn or washing the car are among simple activities that can reduce the risk of heart attack or stroke by almost 30 percent in people over 60, researchers said Tuesday.

A study in Sweden found that older people who were physically active around the house stayed healthier longer than couch potatoes -- regardless of whether they also did any kind of "formal" exercise like jogging or going to the gym.

"A generally active daily life was, regardless of exercising regularly or not, associated with cardiovascular health and longevity in older adults," said the study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

While the health risks of prolonged sitting and the benefits of regular exercise have both been well documented, the contribution to good health of "non-exercise physical activity (NEPA)" is not fully understood.

For the study, researchers screened nearly 4,000 Swedish 60-year-olds in 1997-99 and tracked their health for an average 12.5 years.

The participants recorded how frequently they performed certain activities, including doing home repairs, cutting the lawn or hedge, car maintenance, going hunting or fishing, cycling, and gathering mushrooms or berries.

The researchers found that people with high levels of physical activity, excluding formal exercise, had a 27 percent lower risk of contracting cardiovascular disease compared with inactive people, and a 30 percent lower risk of death from all causes during the study period.

The results were "not significantly different" from those for people who did do regular formal exercise but had low NEPA levels, the study said.

Those who did both had the lowest risk.

"Promoting everyday NEPA might be as important as recommending regular exercise for older adults" -- boosting individual and population health as the demographic shifts towards an ever-older population in many parts of the world, the study said.

The researchers factored in other lifestyle factors that could influence the results, including alcohol intake, education level, smoking habits, and diet.

And they warned that care should be taken applying the findings in cultures that may have different physical activity habits and levels.

source: interaksyon.com

Dogs help sniff out ovarian cancer in Pa. study

PHILADELPHIA  — Researchers trying to develop a diagnostic tool for ovarian cancer are hoping dogs' keen sense of smell will lead them down the right path.

An early detection device that combines old-fashioned olfactory skills, chemical analysis and modern technology could lead to better survival rates for the disease, which is particularly deadly because it's often not caught until an advanced stage.       




Using blood and tissue samples donated by patients, the University of Pennsylvania's Working Dog Center has started training three canines to sniff out the signature compound that indicates the presence of ovarian cancer.

If the animals can isolate the chemical marker, scientists at the nearby Monell Chemical Senses Center will work to create an electronic sensor to identify the same odorant.

"Because if the dogs can do it, then the question is, Can our analytical instrumentation do it? We think we can," Monell organic chemist George Preti said.

More than 20,000 Americans are diagnosed with ovarian cancer each year. When it's caught early, women have a five-year survival rate of 90 percent. But because of its generic symptoms — weight gain, bloating or constipation — the disease is more often caught late.




About 70 percent of cases are identified after the cancer has spread, said Dr. Janos Tanyi, a Penn oncologist whose patients are participating in the study. For those women, the five-year survival rate is less than 40 percent, he said.

The Philadelphia researchers will build on previous work showing that early stage ovarian cancer alters odorous compounds in the body. Another study in Britain in 2004 demonstrated that dogs could identify bladder cancer patients by smelling their urine.

Dr. Leonard Lichtenfeld, deputy chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society, said while the canine concept has shown promise for several years, there haven't been any major breakthroughs yet.

"We're still looking to see whether something could be developed and be useful in routine patient care, and we're not there yet," said Lichtenfeld, who is not involved in the study.

Cindy Otto, director of the Working Dog Center, hopes to change that with the help of McBaine, a springer spaniel; Ohlin, a Labrador retriever; and Tsunami, a German shepherd.

"If we can figure out what those chemicals are, what that fingerprint of ovarian cancer is that's in the blood — or maybe even eventually in the urine or something like that — then we can have that automated test that will be less expensive and very efficient at screening those samples," Otto said.

Ovarian cancer patient Marta Drexler, 57, is heartened by the effort. Drexler describes herself as a textbook case of the disease not being detected early enough because she had no symptoms.

After two surgeries and two rounds of chemotherapy, Drexler said she didn't hesitate when Dr. Tanyi, her physician, asked her to donate tissue to the study. Last week, she visited the Working Dog Center to meet the animals whose work might one day lead to fewer battles like hers.

"To have the opportunity to help with this dreadful disease, to do something about it, even if it's just a tiny little bit of something, it's a big thing," said Drexler, of nearby Lansdowne.

The ovarian cancer detection study is being funded by an $80,000 grant from the Madison, N.J.-based Kaleidoscope of Hope Foundation.

source: philstar.com

Study ties higher blood sugar to dementia risk

Higher blood-sugar levels, even those well short of diabetes, seem to raise the risk of developing dementia, a major new study finds. Researchers say it suggests a novel way to try to prevent Alzheimer's disease — by keeping glucose at a healthy level.

Alzheimer's is by far the most common form of dementia and it's long been known that diabetes makes it more likely. The new study tracked blood sugar over time in all sorts of people — with and without diabetes — to see how it affects risk for the mind-robbing disease.

The results challenge current thinking by showing that it's not just the high glucose levels of diabetes that are a concern, said the study's leader, Dr. Paul Crane of the University of Washington in Seattle.

"It's a nice, clean pattern" — risk rises as blood sugar does, said Dallas Anderson, a scientist at the National Institute on Aging, the federal agency that paid for the study.

"This is part of a larger picture" and adds evidence that exercising and controlling blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol are a viable way to delay or prevent dementia, he said.

Because so many attempts to develop effective drugs have failed, "It looks like, at the moment, sort of our best bet," Anderson said. "We have to do something. If we just do nothing and wait around till there's some kind of cocktail of pills, we could be waiting a long time."




    About 35 million people worldwide have dementia; in the United States, about 5 million have Alzheimer's disease. What causes it isn't known. Current treatments just temporarily ease symptoms. People who have diabetes don't make enough insulin, or their bodies don't use insulin well, to turn food into energy. That causes sugar in the blood to rise, which can damage the kidneys and other organs — possibly the brain, researchers say.

The new study, published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine, just tracked people and did not test whether lowering someone's blood sugar would help treat or prevent dementia. That would have to be tested in a new study, and people should not seek blood-sugar tests they wouldn't normally get otherwise, Crane said.

"We don't know from a study like this whether bringing down the glucose level will prevent or somehow modify dementia," but it's always a good idea to avoid developing diabetes, he said.

Eating well, exercising and controlling weight all help to keep blood sugar in line.

The study involved 2,067 people 65 and older in the Group Health Cooperative, a Seattle-area health care system. At the start, 232 participants had diabetes; the rest did not. They each had at least five blood-sugar tests within a few years of starting the study and more after it was underway. Researchers averaged these levels over time to even out spikes and dips from testing at various times of day or before or after a meal.

Participants were given standard tests for thinking skills every two years and asked about smoking, exercise and other things that affect dementia risk.

After nearly seven years of follow-up, 524, or one quarter of them, had developed dementia — mostly Alzheimer's disease. Among participants who started out without diabetes, those with higher glucose levels over the previous five years had an 18 percent greater risk of developing dementia than those with lower glucose levels.

Among participants with diabetes at the outset, those with higher blood sugar were 40 percent more likely to develop dementia than diabetics at the lower end of the glucose spectrum.

The effect of blood sugar on dementia risk was seen even when researchers took into account whether participants had the apoE4 gene, which raises the risk for Alzheimer's.

At least for diabetics, the results suggest that good blood-sugar control is important for cognition, Crane said.

For those without diabetes, "it may be that with the brain, every additional bit of blood sugar that you have is associated with higher risk," he said. "It changes how we think about thresholds, how we think about what is normal, what is abnormal."

source: philstar.com