You can smell out dangerous
illnesses
Even
diseases have particular smells. Hard to believe?
If we look
into a thrilling research, humans are able to smell sickness in someone whose
immune system is highly active within just a few hours of exposure to a toxin.
‘There may
be early biomarkers for illness in the form of volatile substances coming from
the body,’ explained Mats Olsson of Karolinska Institutet in Sweden.
To test
this hypothesis, Olsson and his team injected eight healthy people with either
lipopolysaccharide (LPS) – a toxin known to ramp up an immune response – or a
saline solution.
The
volunteers wore tight t-shirts to absorb sweat over the course of four hours.
Participants
injected with LPS did produce a noticeable immune response, as evidenced by
elevated body temperatures and increased levels of a group of immune system
molecules known as cytokines, said the study published in the journal
Psychological Science.
Now, the
researchers asked a separate group to smell the sweat samples from t-shirts.
They rated
t-shirts from the LPS group as having a more intense and unpleasant smell than
the other t-shirts.
That is,
the greater a participant’s immune response, the more unpleasant their sweat
smelled, the study noted.
‘While the
precise chemical compounds have yet to be identified, the fact we give off some
kind of aversive signal shortly after the immune system has been activated is
an important finding,’ said the researchers.
People
with diabetes, for example, are sometimes reported to have breath that smells
like rotten apples or acetone.
Being able
to detect these smells would represent a critical adaptation that would allow
us to avoid potentially dangerous illnesses.
Source: http://health.india.com
25.01.2014
If your spouse has diabetes, you
chances of having it rises by 26%
You are at
a higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes if your spouse has it.
According
to a new research led by an Indian-origin scientist at the McGill University
Health Centre (MUHC) in Montreal, Canada, living together under one roof could
also imply sharing diabetes.
‘We found
a 26 percent increase in the risk of developing type 2 diabetes if your spouse
also has type 2 diabetes,’ says senior author Kaberi Dasgupta, an associate
professor of medicine at McGill University.
‘This may
be a platform to assist clinicians to develop strategies to involve both
partners. Changing health behaviour is challenging and if you have the
collaboration of your partner it’s likely to be easier,’ she added.
Dasgupta’s
team wanted to see if risk behaviours like poor eating habits and low physical
activity could be shared within a household, said the study published in the
journal BMC Medicine.
They
analysed results from six selected studies that were conducted in different
parts of the world and looked at key outcomes such as age, socio-economic
status and the way in which diabetes was diagnosed in over 75,000 couples.
Most of
the studies relied on health records which may not always accurately record
diabetes.
Those that
used direct blood testing suggested that diabetes risk doubles if your partner
has diabetes. A strong correlation with pre-diabetes risk was also found.
‘When we
look at the health history of patients, we often ask about family history. Our
results suggest spousal history may be another factor we should take in
consideration,’ said Dasgupta.
According
to Dasgupta, spousal diabetes is also a potential tool for early diabetes
detection.
‘The
results suggest that diabetes diagnosis in one spouse may warrant increased
surveillance in the other,’ stressed Dasgupta.
Moreover,
it has been observed that men are less likely than women to undergo regular
medical evaluation after childhood and that can result in delayed diabetes
detection.
As a
result, men living with a spouse with diabetes history may particularly benefit
from being followed more closely, the study concluded.
Source: http://health.india.com
25.01.2014
The naked
truth is always better than best dressed lie
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