1 August, 2015

Rice varieties for diabetic patients identified

The central government on Friday said it has identified three rice varieties with low glycemic index (GI) values which are considered suitable for diabetic patients.

"Indian Institute of Rice Research under the aegis of Indian Council of Agricultural Research has identified three rice varieties with low glycemic index values," minister of state for agriculture, Sanjeev Kumar Balyan said in the Rajya Sabha.

According to the IIRR Hyderabad, Lalat GI - 53.17, BPT 5204 GI - 51.42 and Sampada GI - 51 are considered suitable for diabetic patients, Balyan said.

Any variety of rice with glycemic index less than or equal to 55 is considered diabetic-friendly, he added.

"Presently, these varieties are under cultivation in different states of India."

Source: www.timesofindia.com

01.08.2015

Isolation may increase suicide risk in women

Women who are married, have a large social network and participate in social or religious events are less likely to take their own lives as compared to those who are socially isolated, says a new study.

Women who are socially well integrated have a lower risk for suicide, the findings showed.

"Interventions aimed at strengthening existing social network structures, or creating new ones, may be valuable programmatic tools in the primary prevention of suicide," the study noted.

Alexander Tsai from Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston in the US, and coauthors estimated the association between social integration and suicide using data from 72,607 nurses (ages 46 to 71 years) who were surveyed about their social relationships beginning in 1992 and followed up until death or until June 2010.

The extent of social integration was measured on an index of seven items that included questions about marital status, social network size, frequency of contact with social ties, and participation in religious or other social groups.

Overall, there were 43 suicides from 1992 to 2010 and the most frequent means of suicide were poisoning by solid or liquid substances (21 suicides), followed by firearms and explosives (eight suicides) and strangulation and suffocation (six suicides).

The authors found that the risk of suicide was lowest among women in the highest and second-highest categories of social integration.

Increasing or consistently high levels of social integration also were associated with a lower risk for suicide.

The findings appeared online in the journal JAMA Psychiatry.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

01.08.2015

Thinking should become your capital asset no matter whatever ups and downs you come across in your life

A.P.J.Kalam

31 July, 2015

MCI under fire for not having anti-ragging cells

 A Supreme Court-appointed committee has pulled up the Medical Council of India (MCI) for not taking adequate measures to check incidents of ragging in medical colleges.

At its 17th meeting here recently, the anti-ragging monitoring committee noted that the medical colleges were the “hot-beds” for ragging of students in the country but the MCI was yet to set up an anti-ragging cell for receiving complaints from the students and facilitating their prompt redressal, official sources told Deccan Herald.

The committee, headed by former chief of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) R K Raghavan, asked the MCI to set up a dedicated anti-ragging cell to deal with complaint of students even as the council insisted that all grievances of students were being taken care of through a grievance redressal cell. The monitoring committee rejected the council’s counter argument over setting up of a dedicated unit to deal with the cases of ragging, noting that there was a huge difference between an anti-ragging cell and a grievance redressal cell.

It took note of reports of a large number of cases of ragging in various medical colleges including the one case of “mass ragging” of students at Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Ranchi of Jharkhand in January this year, saying “no concrete action” had been taken by the council in these cases including those reported in the past. “Medical colleges are hot-beds for ragging and the MCI has to set a good example by preventing ragging,” Raghavan told the representatives of the council who attended the meeting.

Though the incidents of ragging have significantly declined over the years, the menace continues to exist in country’s higher educational institutions, particularly in medical and engineering colleges.

As many as 42 cases of ragging were reported from various medical colleges from July to December in 2014 while the 2015 has witnessed 25 such complaints till June so far. One of the worst incidents of ragging was reported from the RIMS, Ranchi in January this year. 

Source: www.deccanherald.com

31.07.2015

'Fatty livers' bring down liver transplants by 25-30 percent: Govt

 

New Delhi: Nearly 30 per cent of all liver for transplantation is rejected because the donors have 'fatty livers', a disease which is likely to increase in future, the government today said.

Minister of State for Health Shripad Naik said that the prevalence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is considered to be a known cause of rejection for liver transplantation because of accumulation of fat in the liver.

"As per information received from Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences (ILBS), New Delhi, about 25-30 per cent of liver from live donors are rejected as a result of fatty liver.

"ILBS has also conveyed that from International studies, it is reported that of all the livers rejected from cadaver (brain dead) donors, 25-30 per cent were due to fatty liver," Naik said.

Fatty liver, or steatosis, is a broad term that describes the buildup of fats in the liver.

Most of the liver transplants in the country are living related where portion of liver used as a new graft is from a live person. The poor quality of liver to be used for transplant can lead to poor regeneration with an increased risk of adverse transplant outcome, the minister said.

"It is also believed that with the increase in obesity, diabetes and metabolic risk factors, the prevalence of NAFLD is likely to increase which can further add to increase in rejection rate of organs from live donors," Naik said.

He said that liver transplants in India have been increasing over the last few years, and an estimated 1,400 liver transplants were done in the country last year.

"However, the number of patients requiring liver transplant in the country is believed to be much higher," he added. 

Source: www.zeenews.india.com

31.07.2015

If you want to shine like a sun first burn like a sun

A.P.J.Kalam