1 February, 2018

Researchers develop a brain pacemaker to help Alzheimer’s patients

In a first, US researchers have developed a brain pacemaker that could slow down the decline in problem-solving and decision-making skills in patients with Alzheimer’s disease. The brain pacemaker, similar to a cardiac pacemaker device, consists of thin electrical wires that can be surgically implanted into the patients’ frontal lobes of the brains via deep brain stimulation. The findings, published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, showed that patients who underwent the deep brain stimulation had improvement in their cognitive, behavioural and functional abilities. “We have many memory aids, tools and pharmaceutical treatments to help Alzheimer’s patients with memory, but we don’t have anything to help with improving their judgments, making good decisions, or increasing their ability to selectively focus attention on the task at hand and avoid distractions,” said Douglas Scharre, neurologist at The Ohio State University.

The study found that targeting frontal brain regions can reduce the overall performance decline typically seen in people with mild or early-stage Alzheimer’s. “The frontal lobes are responsible for our abilities to solve problems, organize and plan, and utilize good judgments. By stimulating this region of the brain, the Alzheimer’s patients cognitive and daily functional abilities as a whole declined more slowly,” Scharre added. The same technology was successfully used to treat more than 1,35,000 patients worldwide with Parkinson’s disease, the researchers said.

“Our findings suggest that frontal network modulation to improve executive and behavioural deficits should be further studied in patients with Alzheimer’s disease,” said Ali Rezai, neurosurgeon at the West Virginia University.
According to the World Health Organisation, globally around 50 million people have dementia, and there are nearly 10 million new cases every year. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common form of dementia and may contribute to 60-70 percent of cases.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

01.02.2018

Love, Care and respect. The first two you give. The last one you earn..!

31 January, 2018

Diabetes, hypertension rates high in India: study

India is facing significantly higher rates of diabetes and high blood pressure, according to the first nationally representative study of these "major killers" involving more than 1.3 million people. The rates of diabetes and hypertension are high among middle-aged and elderly people across all geographic measures and sociodemographic groups in India, researchers found. The study, led by researchers at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, also found unexpectedly high rates of hypertension among young adults.

"Understanding how diabetes and hypertension prevalence varies within a country as large as India is essential for targeting of prevention, screening, and treatment services," said Pascal Geldsetzer, lead author of the study published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine. India, home to more than a sixth of the world's population, is in the midst of a rapid epidemiological transition, researchers said.

Rates of noncommunicable diseases have risen in recent decades and are likely to continue as India's population ages and urbanises, they said.

Meanwhile, many areas of India still face substantial burdens of infectious diseases and poor maternal and child health.

The researchers wanted to find out how the prevalence of diabetes and hypertension in India varied by state, rural vs urban location, and by sociodemographic characteristics such as education and household wealth.

They used health data collected from 1,320,555 adults across India between 2012 and 2014, which included plasma glucose and blood pressure measurements.

The findings showed that diabetes and hypertension were prevalent across all geographies and sociodemographic groups. The overall prevalence of diabetes was 6.1 percent among women and 6.5 percent among men; for hypertension, 20.0 percent among women and 24.5 percent among men.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

31.01.2018

Patience with family is love, Patience with others is respect. Patience with self is confidence

30 January, 2018

Eating green leafy vegetables may reduce stroke risk: Study

Consuming green leafy vegetables may be a novel way to reduce stress and lower the risk of experiencing a stroke, a study has found.

Intracerebral hemorrhage - bleeding within the brain - takes a high toll on working-age people in Nigeria and Ghana, with high blood pressure accounting for more than 90 percent of this often-lethal type of stroke.

According to the findings, people who ate more green leafy vegetables had 64 percent lower risk of experiencing a stroke. Researchers studied 682 patients (average age 53.7 years) who experienced brain bleeds.

Bleeding strokes accounted for 32.2 percent of all strokes in the study.

Of the bleeding strokes, 93.9 percent were determined to be related to high blood pressure, 7.2 percent to structural abnormalities such as a bulging weak area of a blood vessel, and much smaller percentages to other medical conditions or medication use.

The research was presented at the American Stroke Associations International Stroke Conference 2018. Comparing patients with high blood pressure-related brain bleeds to similar people in the same communities without stroke, the researchers found that the risks were 2.33 times as high in people with diabetes.

They found that risks were 2.22 times as high in people who reported more stress at home and work, 1.69 times as high in people with abnormal cholesterol levels and 10.01 times as high in tobacco smokers.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

30.01.2018

Attempt the impossible in order to improve your work

Bette Davis

29 January, 2018

Indore becomes the first city to offer non-surgical weight loss

Indore becomes the first city in the country to offer the non-surgical method of weight loss. City-based Mohak Bariatrics and Robotics one of the country's leading weight loss surgery center has come up with the modality, Endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty, a novel procedure which was performed for the first time in India at this hospital.

The procedure was performed by Dr. Mohit Bhandari and Dr. Manoel Galvao Neto from Brazil. The patient who was operated upon was 87 kg weight with BMI 32.7

The patient was a type 2 diabetic since last 5 years.

According to bariatric surgeon Dr. Mohit Bhandari, this is a non-invasive method for treatment of obesity. According to him, in this procedure capacity of the stomach is reduced by plication taking sutures all around the stomach to reduce its size.

Dr. Bhandari says patients can lose 15-25 kg depending on multiple factors through this procedure. He adds bariatric surgery is a more radical approach towards weight loss which incorporates both restrictive and Malabsorptive component.

We all need a bridge therapy between medical and surgical therapy and endoscopic sleeve gastroplasty is that option. The cost of the procedure will be around 2.5 lakh rupees.

Dr. Bhandari is one of the pioneers in bariatric surgery and has singularly performed more than 8000 bariatric and Robotic procedures which is one of the highest volume in Asia.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

29.01.2018

Have faith in your skills, doubt kills more dreams than failure

Suzy Kassem

27 January, 2018

Poor sleep in childhood may lead to cancer in adulthood

Is your child having a tough time sleeping properly? You may need to keep a check on his/her body mass index (BMI) as a new research suggests that there is a co-relation between the two and can lead to cancer in adulthood. “Childhood obesity very often leads to adult obesity. This puts them at greater risk of developing obesity-related cancers in adulthood,” said study lead author Bernard Fuemmeler, Professor and Associate Director for Cancer Prevention and Control at the Virginia Commonwealth University. For the study, researchers enrolled 120 children, with an average age of eight, whose mothers had participated in the Newborn Epigenetic Study both pre-birth and during early childhood. To track the sleep-wake cycle, the children wore accelerometers continuously for 24 hours a day for a period of at least five days. They found that shorter sleep duration, measured in hours, was associated with a higher BMI z-score (body mass index adjusted for age and sex).

Each additional hour of sleep was associated with a .13 decrease in BMI z-score and with a 1.29 cm decrease in waist circumference. More fragmented rest-activity rhythms and increased intradaily variability — a measure of the frequency and extent of transitions between sleep and activity — were also associated with greater waist circumferences. The study results, to be presented at Obesity and Cancer: Mechanisms Underlying Etiology and Outcomes, indicate that while sleep duration is important, examining markers of sleep quality may also be useful in designing childhood obesity prevention strategies. “Today, many children are not getting enough sleep. There are a number of distractions, such as screens in the bedroom, that contribute to interrupted, fragmented sleep. This, perpetuated over time, can be a risk factor for obesity,” Fuemmeler said.

“Because of the strong links between obesity and many types of cancer, childhood obesity prevention is cancer prevention.”

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

27.01.2018

Adversity is an inevitable part of life. Accept it, embrace it, overcome it

25 January, 2018

Babies’ exposure to high levels of air pollution in womb can lead to shortened lifespan

Babies’ exposure to high levels of air pollution in the womb may lead to a type of DNA damage, typically associated with aging, called telomere shortening, warned a study. Telomeres are the caps at the end of each strand of DNA that protect our chromosomes. Telomere shortening is the main cause of age-related breakdown of our cells and has been linked with cancer and heart disease, cognitive decline, aging, as well as premature death. Babies exposed to air pollution in utero showed higher levels of PAH-DNA cord adducts — a biomarker for exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, a toxic component of air pollution from coal plants.

Elevated levels of these adducts in cord blood were associated with shorter telomeres as well as with lower levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) — a protein involved in neuronal grown. “An individual’s telomere length at birth is known to influence their risk for disease decades later during adulthood,” said Deliang Tang, Professor at the Columbia University in the US. For the study, which appeared in the journal Environment International, the team analyzed telomere length in the umbilical cord blood of 255 newborns, born both before and after the closure of a coal-burning power plant in Tongliang, China in 2004.  In May 2004, high levels of air pollution in Tongliang prompted the government to shut down the local coal-burning power plant to improve community health. “Further follow-up is needed to assess the role telomere length plays in health outcomes in the context of early life exposure to air pollution,” Tang said.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

25.01.2018

Be the motivation, not the distraction

Rob Hill

24 January, 2018

'Love hormone' helps us understand social cues

Oxytocin - popularly known as the love hormone - plays a crucial role in helping the brain process a wide array of social signals, Harvard scientists have found.

The study suggests that oxytocin acts like a modulator in the brain, turning up the volume of certain stimuli while turning others down, helping the brain to make sense of the barrage for information it receives from one moment to the next.

In investigating the role of oxytocin in processing social signals, researchers from Harvard University in the US began with a prevalent behavior - the preference for male mice to interact with females.

Studies have shown that this behavior is not just social - it is actually hard-wired in the brains of male mice.

When male mice are exposed to pheromone signals of females, neurons in their medial amygdala showed increased levels of activation, researchers found.

When the same mice were exposed to pheromones of other males, those same neurons showed relatively little stimulation.

Armed with that data, researchers targeted the gene responsible for producing oxytocin - which was known to be involved in social interactions ranging from infant/parent bonding to monogamy in certain rodents.

Using genetic tools, they switched the gene off, and found that both males' preference for interacting with females and the neural signal in the amygdala disappeared.

"This is a molecule that's involved in the processing of social signals," said Catherine Dulac, professor at Harvard. "What we are trying to do is understand the logic of social interactions in one particular species," Dulac said.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

24.01.2018

Don’t make excuses, make improvements

Tyra Banks

23 January, 2018

Beware! Holding back a sneeze could lead to death

Do you often find yourself trying to hold back a sneeze by pinching your nose or clamping your mouth shut? Think twice before doing that, doctors have warned, saying it can be fatal. The warning has been meted out after stifling a sneeze left a 34-year-old man with a painful, ruptured throat.

The patient's symptoms were initially surprising for the team of emergency care doctors (which included those of Indian origin) at the University Hospitals of Leicester in the UK since spontaneous rupture of the back of the throat is rare, and usually caused by trauma, or sometimes by vomiting, retching or heavy coughing

The young man had developed a popping sensation in his neck which immediately swelled up after he tried to contain a forceful sneeze by pinching his nose and keeping his mouth clamped shut at the same time, according to doctors including Raguwinder S Sahota and Sudip Das. A little later he found it extremely painful to swallow and all but lost his voice.

When the doctors examined him they heard popping and crackling sounds, which extended from his neck all the way down to his ribcage - a sure sign that air bubbles had found their way into the deep tissue and muscles of the chest, which was subsequently confirmed by a computed tomography scan.

Due to the risk of serious complications, the man was admitted to the hospital, where he was fed by tube and given intravenous antibiotics until the swelling and pain had subsided. After seven days he was well enough to be discharged with the advice not to block both nostrils when sneezing in future.

"Halting sneezing via blocking nostrils and mouth is a dangerous manoeuvre and should be avoided," according to the doctors who published the findings from the case in the journal BMJ Case Reports. It may lead to numerous complications, such as air trapped in the chest between both lungs, perforated eardrums, and even rupture of a ballooning blood vessel in the brain, they said.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

23.01.2018

No one ever gets anything worthwhile by accident

Dorothea S. Kopplin

22 January, 2018

Egg + Coffee = recipe for weight loss

If you are trying to speed up your weight loss, then you may want to try adding an egg to your morning coffee, as according to a recent study, doing so helps. A team of researchers found that many gym-goers use caffeine for a pre-workout boost, but adding a raw egg to that cup of tea or coffee may help you more.

However, the practice of mixing raw egg and hot black coffee has been common among the Hungarian, Scandinavian, Vietnamese and even Minnesotan cultures for centuries, the Dailystar reported. Marc Bubbs, director of nutrition for the Canadian Men’s National Basketball Team, said, ‘The combo started to gain popularity as a pre-workout drink.’ ‘I’ve used egg coffee a few times before, doing some fasted cardio in the morning,’ Marc added.

Drinking raw egg could be dangerous as some are contaminated by the bacteria salmonella and which could cause you to throw up. However, raw eggs are safe in coffee, as the heat of the liquid may bring the temperature of the egg up enough to kill the bacteria – making it safer to consume.

As eggs need cooking at 160 degrees and the water in coffee preparation is roughly 200 degrees. Buying pasteurised eggs – which means they are heated to help destroy bacteria – can make egg coffee safer. ‘It was a nice boost, similar to Bulletproof Coffee, but with the nutrient-dense bonus of the yolk, compared to simply fatty acids,’ Marc added.

Many of the athletes he trains also enjoy a creamy cup of egg coffee and some will eat their eggs and enjoy their coffee as part of their training and recovery meals.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

22.01.2018

Don’t let yesterday take up too much of today

Will Rogers

13 January, 2018

Gardening may boost health and mental well-being in older adults

Indulging in gardening may not only keep older adults active but also boost their health and mental well-being, finds a study. The findings showed that older women who spend more than three hours on household chores a day and got less or more than seven hours of sleep a night were less likely to be in good health.  However, the researchers found that the similar criteria had no effect on the health of elderly men.  It is because older women spent more time doing repetitive housework like cleaning and cooking, while men spent time in gardening and maintenance work, which is mentally very stimulating, the Daily Mail reported.

‘The difference in the sexes’ health is probably to do with the type of housework women tend to do, which is a lot more repetitive and routine work, like cleaning and cooking. While this probably has some limited health benefits, it is not very physically active, is not really exercise and is not very stimulating mentally, which relates to physical health,’ Nicholas Adjei, researcher at the Leibniz Institute for Prevention Research and Epidemiology in Germany, was quoted as saying by the paper. ‘Men did much more active household chores, such as gardening and maintenance. The physical exertion is good for the health, with gardening involving digging, mowing and carrying soil. We think gardening and fixing things may also be more enjoyable than cleaning,’ Adjei added.

For the study, researchers looked at more than 36,000 pensioners, who reported about their daily activities and general health. Healthiness was calculated based on participants’ answers to a questionnaire, in which they rated their health on a five-point scale from ‘poor’ to ‘very good’. The results showed that even taking away sleep, which can impact people’s health, men appear healthier when doing jobs around the house.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

13.01.2018

You must do the things you think you cannot do

Roosevelt

12 January, 2018

Wastage of blood donated shocking

It is a matter of serious concern that a good part of the blood which is collected by blood banks in the country goes waste for various reasons. It is estimated that at least six lakh liters of blood is wasted every year. The National Human Rights Commission recently directed the union health ministry to probe the wastage of 28 lakh units of blood in the last five years. It also told the ministry to take immediate steps to prevent such wastage. The serious nature of the wastage can be imagined from the fact that the total collection of blood in a year is just over nine million units. The country annually needs about 12 million units, and it is doubly wrong to waste blood when the supply is far short of demand. States like Maharashtra, UP, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu are the worst offenders in the matter of wastage.

According to the union health ministry's information, given to Parliament during the last session, the wastage is due to deterioration during storage and expiry. The specific reasons are bacterial contaminations, infections, discoloration, failure to meet quality standards, etc. The lack of coordination between hospitals and blood banks is another reason. A health ministry report has admitted that most government-run blood banks are not regularly inspected and they do not comply with the best standards. Norms are not followed in the licensing of blood banks. It is estimated that only 55% of the blood banks have a valid license. The health ministry recently announced that about 80 blood banks would be started to add to the existing 2,800 in the country. It must be ensured that the old and new blood banks are technically equipped to preserve blood in the best conditions for as long as possible.

Blood has components like plasma, red cells and platelets and these also need to be stored efficiently. But only about 40% of the blood banks in the country have component separation facilities. The private sector fares better than government blood banks in this respect. Some blood banks have done well to install Nucleic Acid Test lab facility which can screen for some major infections like HIV and Hepatitis B viruses. The need for blood is increasing every year in the country. Supply, which is already short, is not catching up. Many needy patients do not get blood in time, and malpractices abound. So, the preservation of blood in the best conditions is very important. Both the government and private blood banks must invest more in technologies and expertise which will prevent wastage of blood.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

12.01.2018

In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different

Coco Chanel

11 January, 2018

Now, wearable sensors to track new babies' heart rates

Scientists have developed new wearable graphene-based sensors that could allow parents to keep track of their babies' heart and breathing rates with automatic updates to their smartphones. The sensors which the researchers describe as "the most sensitive liquid-based devices to have ever been developed" could also be transformative for anyone with life-threatening conditions such as sleep apnea.

Since graphene is cheap to produce, the new breakthrough should be affordable, they said. Physicists at the University of Sussex in the UK created a liquid made from an emulsion of graphene, water and oil, which conducts electricity. The team was inspired to create the new health monitor after the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation called for new affordable wearable health technologies for babies in situations where resources are scarce.

Graphene is a two-dimensional material made from carbon atoms that is strong, flexible and conductive. When a channel or tube holding the liquid is stretched, even by a small amount, the conductivity of the liquid changes. This means that the respiration rates and pulses of people wearing the device can be tracked. Since the new liquid technology is so sensitive, it picks up very small signals when attached to the body.

In order to monitor the pulses of babies at the moment, clunky sensors need to be attached to babies' tiny feet or hands, which often fall off, researchers said. The information is then relayed to a monitor by wires which can restrict the child's movement.

"Using the conducting liquid emulsions we have developed, we will produce cheap, wearable sensors based on graphene. The devices will be comfortable, non-invasive and can provide intuitive diagnostics of breathing and heart rate," said Professor Alan Dalton from the University of Sussex.

The researchers eventually want to developed a suit that a baby can wear, which will read-out all vital information wirelessly. "We hope to see this made available within two to four years," said Dalton.

"In the laboratory we have created a sensor that has the potential to drastically improve early detection of life- threatening symptoms such as sleep apnea or cardiac arrhythmia, where constant monitoring with conventional equipment is challenging outside of the hospital environment," Matthew Large, lead researcher on the project added.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

11.01.2018

Happiness is not a station you arrive at, but a manner of traveling

 Margaret B. Runbeck

10 January, 2018

Boy, who lost 22 liters of blood due to hookworms, now cured

Deworming therapy helped doctors cure a 14-year-old boy, whose intestines were infested with hookworms since the last two years and had sucked out 22 liters of blood. The rarely-used vitamin capsule-size endoscopy recommended by the doctors made it possible to diagnose the boy's problem.

According to doctors, the boy was referred to Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (SRGH) in August last year with complaints of passage of blood in his stool.

"The child was suffering from iron deficiency anemia for the last two years. He was being managed with repeated blood transfusions and received 50 units (22 liters) of blood transfusions in the last two years," said Anil Arora, Chairperson of Gastroenterology Department at SRGH.

Arora said the patient's diagnosis could not be established despite various repeated tests including esophagogastroduodenoscopy (EGD), colonoscopy and radiographic studies of the intestine. The patient's hemoglobin was low at 5.86. As the problem persisted and there was gastrointestinal bleeding, the doctor decided to go for the rarely-used Capsule endoscopy.

Capsule endoscopy is a procedure that uses a tiny wireless camera to take pictures of the digestive tract. A capsule endoscopy camera sits inside a vitamin-sized capsule that the patient has to swallow. Calling the findings "shocking", Arora said: "We could see multiple hookworms buried in the small intestine and were seen actively sucking blood with dancing movements.

"Sucked blood could be seen in the cavity of hookworms, giving a red color to them. White colored hookworms who had not yet sucked blood were seen lying quietly in the small bowel."

"After treatment, the child recovered and his hemoglobin increased to 11 gm/dl," said Arora, describing the health condition of the patient.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

10.01.2018

When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful

9 January, 2018

Taking paracetamol during pregnancy may harm daughter's fertility

Taking paracetamol - an over-the-counter treatment for pain relief - during pregnancy may impair the fertility of female offspring, a study has warned. Researchers reviewed three separate rodent studies that report altered development in the reproductive systems of female offspring from mothers given paracetamol during pregnancy, which may impair their fertility in adulthood.

Paracetamol, or acetaminophen, is commonly taken by pregnant women worldwide.

Recent studies have linked paracetamol use during pregnancy with disruptions in the development of the male reproductive system but the effects on female offspring had not yet been investigated.

David Kristensen and colleagues from Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark reviewed findings from three individual rodent studies that evaluated the effects of paracetamol taken during pregnancy on the development of the reproductive system in female offspring.

In rodents and humans, females are born with a finite number of eggs for reproduction in the future. In these reviewed studies, rodents given paracetamol during pregnancy, at doses equivalent to those that a pregnant woman may take for pain relief, produced female offspring with fewer eggs.

This means that in adulthood, they have fewer eggs available for fertilization, which may reduce their chances of successful reproduction, particularly as they get older.

"Although this may not be a severe impairment to fertility, it is still of real concern since data from three different labs all independently found that paracetamol may disrupt female reproductive development in this way, which indicates further investigation is needed to establish how this affects human fertility," said Kristensen.

Although there are parallels between rodent and human reproductive development, these findings have yet to be firmly established in humans. "As scientists, we are not in the position to make any medical recommendations and we would urge pregnant women in pain to consult with their general practitioner, midwife or pharmacist for professional advice," said Kristensen.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

09.01.2018

In life you need either inspiration or desperation

Tony Robbins

8 January, 2018

Asthma and food allergy in childhood can up the risk of anxiety in the future

If your child is suffering from chronic illness such as asthma or food allergy, he or she is more likely to develop anxiety or other mental health disorders, finds a study. The findings showed that anxiety disorders were most common, including separation anxiety, generalised anxiety and phobias, in kids with chronic illness such as asthma, food allergy, epilepsy, diabetes or juvenile arthritis. For the study, detailed in the journal BMJ Open, the team from the University of Waterloo surveyed children between the age of six and 16. According to parents’ responses to a standardised interview, 58 percent of children screened positive for at least one mental disorder.

Six months after diagnosis, the number of kids showing signs of a mental disorder dipped slightly to 42 percent. These findings show that risk for mental disorder is relatively the same among children with different physical conditions,” said Mark Ferro, Professor at Waterloo. “Regardless of their condition, children with physical and mental health problems experience a significant decline in their quality life within the first six months after receiving their diagnosis, indicating a need for mental health services early on,” Ferro added. The researchers found that age and gender had no impact on the results. A subset of kids self-reported on their own mental health.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

08.01.2018

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds

Francis Bacon

6 January, 2018

Alcohol damages DNA, increases cancer risk: study

Alcohol consumption permanently damages the DNA in stem cells, which in turn increases the risk of developing cancer, a study led by an Indian-origin scientist warns. Much previous research looking at the precise ways in which alcohol causes cancer has been done in cell cultures. However, in the new study, researchers used mice to show how alcohol exposure leads to permanent genetic damage.

Scientists at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology at the University of Cambridge in the UK gave diluted alcohol, chemically known as ethanol, to mice. They then used chromosome analysis and DNA sequencing to examine the genetic damage caused by acetaldehyde, a harmful chemical produced when the body processes alcohol.

The researchers found that acetaldehyde can break and damage DNA within blood stem cells leading to rearranged chromosomes and permanently altering the DNA sequences within these cells.

"Some cancers develop due to DNA damage in stem cells," said Professor Ketan Patel from the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology.

"While some damage occurs by chance, our findings suggest that drinking alcohol can increase the risk of this damage," said Patel, lead author of the study published in the journal Nature.

It is important to understand how the DNA blueprint within stem cells is damaged because when healthy stem cells become faulty, they can give rise to cancer, researchers said. The new findings help us to understand how drinking alcohol increases the risk of developing seven types of cancer including common types like breast and bowel, they said. The study also examined how the body tries to protect itself against damage caused by alcohol. The first line of defence is a family of enzymes called aldehyde dehydrogenases (ALDH).

These enzymes break down harmful acetaldehyde into acetate, which our cells can use as a source of energy. Worldwide, millions of people, particularly those from South East Asia, either lack these enzymes or carry faulty versions of them, researchers said.

When they drink alcohol, acetaldehyde builds up which causes a flushed complexion, and also leads to them feeling unwell, they said. In the study, when mice lacking the critical ALDH enzyme - ALDH2 - were given alcohol, it resulted in four times as much DNA damage in their cells compared to mice with the fully functioning ALDH2 enzyme.

The second line of defence used by cells is a variety of DNA repair systems which, most of the time, allow them to fix and reverse different types of DNA damage.

Source: www.deccanherald.com

06.01.2018

If you learn from defeat, you haven’t really lost