23 March, 2020

Indian Council of Medical Research claims that India can conduct 10,000 Covid-19 tests a day

India is capable of conducting 10,000 coronavirus tests a day and conducted 5,000 tests last week, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), here on Sunday.

India is capable of conducting 10,000 coronavirus tests a day and conducted 5,000 tests last week, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), here on Sunday.

Speaking to the media, ICMR Director-General Balram Bhargava said the testing capacity could be increased above 10,000, if needed.

“In the last one week, we have tested 5,000 cases and the total could be around 15,000. It’s important that indiscriminate testing is not done. Those returning from abroad should go for isolation,” he said.

On indiscriminate testing, Bhargava said people were running for tests. “We ensure that unless there are symptoms, there should not be any test, but isloation,” he said and added, it was essential to understand the ailment.

“About 80 per cent of the people will experience cold-like fever and will recover. 20 per cent may experience cough, cold, fever, and some of them may need admission to hospital,” he said.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

23.03.2020

You don’t always get what you wish for; you get what you work for

March 2, 2020

Indians at higher kidney disease risk due to air pollution

Researchers have found that people living in countries with higher levels of air pollution such as India and China may face higher risks of developing kidney diseases. The findings may be especially important for parts of the world with higher air pollution where fine particulate matter levels are five to 10 times higher than in the US, the study said.

It’s known that breathing in air pollution can have detrimental health effects beyond the lungs, but few studies have shown how it impacts the kidneys, which act as filters for the blood. “As rates of chronic kidney disease rise worldwide, it is important to understand whether and how exposure to air pollution plays a role,” said study researcher Matthew F. Blum from the Johns Hopkins University in the US.

For the findings, published in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, the research team examined information on 10,997 adults across four sites in the US who were followed from 1996-1998 through 2016. The researchers estimated the monthly average levels of tiny particles of air pollution — called fine particulate matter — based on participants’ home addresses.

Fine particulate matter comes from a variety of sources including fossil fuel combustion, industrial processes, and natural sources, they said. The team found that exposure to higher amounts of fine particulate matter was associated with a higher degree of albuminuria — a marker of kidney dysfunction — as well as a higher risk of developing chronic kidney disease over time. According to the researchers, future studies should examine whether efforts to improve air quality yield health benefits, including reducing rates of chronic kidney disease.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

02.03.2020

Not only must we be good, but we must also be good for something

24 February, 2020

Curry leaves: This magic herb can promote your health in many ways

Commonly known as ‘kadi patta’, the local Indian curry leaves which are easily found in every household serve not just as an ingredient for cooking but can also be used in many different ways that benefit our health.

According to a report published in the Krishi Jagran, curry leaves are effective in controlling blood sugar levels, diabetes management, maintenance of gastrointestinal health and many more. Here are a few of them: –

1.      Diabetes Management

According to a health expert’s report in Krishi Jagran, regular consumption of curry leaves is known to lower the blood sugar levels as they come fully packed with antioxidants that help in the prevention of conversion of starch to glucose thus controlling the diabetes levels.

2.                  Beneficial in pregnancy

Another striking feature of the herb is that it eases nausea and uneasiness that pregnant women often go through. According to Krish Jagran, it stimulates the secretion of digestive enzymes that are known to ease the symptoms of vomiting and nausea.

3.                  Maintains gastrointestinal health

Digestive issues like indigestion, diarrhoea, and constipation can be healed through the consumption of curry leaves. Leaves come packed with digestive enzymes that further come with laxative properties and help in the regulation of laxative properties.

Curry leaves are one of the many magic herbs that are found and grown on the Indian soil. Herbs are used in several Indian delicacies.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

24.02.2020

Don’t let your victories go to your head, or your failures go to your heart

17 February, 2020

India aims to eliminate tuberculosis by 2025

The central government is working to eradicate tuberculosis (TB)from India by 2025 besides taking active measures to eliminate diseases like kala-azar and measles from the country, Union Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said on Saturday.

 “By 2025, we wish to eliminate tuberculosis from India. We have taken up an ambitious universal immunisation programme delivered to 100 per cent people all over the country,” the minister told media persons on the sidelines of the Rotary India Centennial Summit here.

He said to achieve the goal, the government’s programme ‘Mission Indradhanush’ is already operational.

“We are also working for the elimination of many other diseases in the country like Kala-azar and measles,” the minister said.

Referring to the Union government’s Ayushman Bharat scheme, he called it an “ambitious programmes, under which 1.5 lakh health and wellness centres will be set up across India by the end of 2022.

“So far, 30,000 are being set up and by March-end we will have around 40,000 centres”, he said.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

17.02.2020

Push yourself because, No one else is going to do it for you

10 February, 2020

Diabetes drug may increase your risk of heart failure

 “Our study suggests that when evaluating drug safety and performing meta-analyses focused on safety, individual patient level data (IPD) might be necessary to accurately classify all adverse events,” said the study researchers “By including these data in research, patients, clinicians, and researchers would be able to make more informed decisions about the safety of interventions,” they added.

Since 2007, studies have reported conflicting findings about whether rosiglitazone increases the risk of heart attacks. But these studies didn’t have access to the raw data from clinical trials and mostly relied on summary level data (e.g. results reported in publications and clinical trial registries), which are not as reliable when estimating the true safety profile of drugs.

Recent efforts by Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) – the maker of rosiglitazone – to make IPD available to external investigators, prompted a team of researchers to re-analyse the data and clarify some of the uncertainties about rosiglitazone’s cardiovascular risk. They analysed the results of more than 130 trials involving over 48,000 adult patients that compared rosiglitazone with any control for at least 24 weeks. IPD were available for 33 trials, which included 21156 patients; the remaining trials only had summary level data available.

When the researchers analysed the IPD from trials made available by GSK, they found rosiglitazone was associated with a 33 per cent increased risk of a composite cardiovascular event (heart attack, heart failure, cardiovascular and non-cardiovascular related death) compared with controls.

This was estimated from the 274 events among 11,837 rosiglitazone patients and 219 events among 9,319 control patients. These findings highlight the potential for different results derived from different data sources, and demonstrate the need for greater clinical trial transparency and data sharing to accurately assess the safety of drugs, the researchers added.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

10.02.2020

Don’t let your victories go to your head, or your failures go to your heart

3 February, 2020

Eating disorders linked to exercise addiction

Exercise addiction was defined as having an obsessive approach to fitness that could have a negative impact on someone’s health and social life. “It is known that those with eating disorders are more likely to display addictive personality and obsessive-compulsive behaviours,” said study lead author Mike Trott of Anglia Ruskin University in the UK.

 “We are also aware that having an unhealthy relationship with food often means an increased amount of exercising, but this is the first time that a risk factor has been calculated,” Trott added. The study, published in Eating and Weight Disorders, drew on data from nine studies covering a total of 2,140 people with a mean age of 25.

The researchers found that people displaying characteristics of an eating disorder are 3.7 times more likely to suffer from addiction to exercise than people displaying no indication of an eating disorder. “It is not uncommon to want to improve our lifestyles by eating healthier and doing more exercise, particularly at the start of the year. However, it is important to moderate this behaviour and not fall victim to ‘crash diets’ or anything that eliminates certain foods entirely, as these can easily lead to eating disorders,” Trott said.

According to the researchers, the study shows that displaying signs of an eating disorder significantly increases the chance of an unhealthy relationship with exercise, and this can have negative consequences, including mental health issues and injury. “Health professionals working with people with eating disorders should consider monitoring exercise levels as a priority, as this group have been shown to suffer from serious medical conditions as a result of excessive exercise, such as fractures, increased rates of cardiovascular disease in younger patients, and increased overall mortality,” Trott concluded.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

03.02.2020

Never say “I can’t” when “You can” is right in front of you

28 January, 2020

Dust in your home can make you antibiotic resistant

A study of Northwestern University (NU) found that bacteria living in household dust can spread antibiotic resistance genes, and the researchers believe these genes could potentially spread to pathogens, making infections more difficult to treat.

Bacteria can share many different types of genes as long as the genes have mobile segments of DNA. NU researchers were the first to find that antibiotic resistance genes in dust microbes have mobile capabilities, the Xinhua news agency reported. “We observed living bacteria have transferable antibiotic resistance genes,” said Erica Hartmann, an assistant professor of environmental engineering in NU’s McCormick School of Engineering.

Although it is rare for pathogens to live in indoor dust, they can hitchhike into homes and mingle with existing bacteria. “A nonpathogen can use horizontal gene transfer to give antibiotic resistance genes to a pathogen,” Hartmann explained. “Then the pathogen becomes antibiotic resistant.”

“Microbes share genes when they get stressed out,” Hartmann said. “They aren’t equipped to handle the stress, so they share genetic elements with a microbe that might be better equipped.” Hartmann recommends dusting with a damp cloth instead of using antimicrobial solutions, which can make bacteria more resistant to antibiotics.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

28.01.2020

You can’t win in life if you are losing in your mind

20 January, 2020

Doctors in India taking keen interest in preventive health through intermittent fasting

Experts said that intermittent fasting is a very old method used by people for weight loss and body cleansing. Today, people are becoming very health conscious and hence intermittent fasting has attracted 30-40% of the people, they said.

American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine along with Smart Group conducted India’s first anti-ageing International conference to the most cutting edge and futurists innovations in healthcare for preventive health.

“I am glad that doctors in India are taking a keen interest in preventive health seeking the benefits of intermittent fasting. Large numbers of people are opting for it, as it not only triggers weight loss but also helps the body to combat various chronic ailments. This technique has gained attention for its incredible effects on both weight loss and on diseases,” said Dr BK Modi, Founder-Chairman, Smart Group.

Once people start following the schedule of intermittent fasting are always recommended following it as the weight loss that occurs during the period, if left suddenly can also lead to tremendous weight gain. Also, disturb the hormonal balance and the digestive cycle, he said.

Preeti Malhotra, Chairman, Smart Bharat said: “Preventive health has had a profound effect on human longevity, awareness, mental wellbeing. Such practices are known to well regulate the lipids in the body thereby maintaining the glycemic index. Apart from being a weight loss remedy, it also helps in developing a more active lifestyle.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

20.01.2020

Happiness is not something ready-made. It comes from your own actions

13 January, 2020

Reducing fat in your tongue may help improve sleep apnoea

A research study in the American Journal of Critical Care and Respiratory Health showed that tongue fat maybe one of the main reasons for Obstructive Sleep Apnoea (OSA).

Dr Richard Schwab, a sleep specialist from Penn Medicine, told CNN Health: “The question then was if you reduce the fat in your tongue, does that improve your sleep apnoea? And the answer from our paper is yes.”

Obesity poses a risk for the onset of this medical condition that may lead to snoring and breathing difficulties for its patients during the night.

CNN Health reported that in previous research by Dr Schwab it was found that the study subjects who were obese and suffered from Obstructive Sleep Apnoea had tongues with higher fat percentages as compared to obese people who didn’t suffer from this condition.

A sleep specialist from the University of Southern California, Dr Raj Dasgupta, though not associated with this study, told CNN: “This study shows reducing excess fat, in general, can reduce tongue size.”

In this study, the researchers measured the effect of a 10 per cent reduction in weight on the upper airways of 67 obese OSA patients. These tests were carried out using MRI scanning.The scans showed that sleep apnoea scores improved by 31 per cent as a result of tongue fat reduction.

Dr Schwab explained: “In fact, the more tongue fat you lost, the more your apnoea improved.”OSA can have a wide range of damaging effects on its sufferers which includes brain white matter damage, hypertension, increased chances of heart disease, diabetes, stroke and it may even contribute to depression.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

13.01.2020

Forget what hurt you in the past. But never forget what it taught you

6 January, 2020

Diabetes can independently lead to heart failure

According to health experts in India, if poorly controlled, diabetes leads to cardiomyopathy resulting in progressive deterioration of pumping capacity of heart. “Diabetes is also a major risk factor for atherosclerosis and this eventually leads to blockage of coronary arteries. This leads to heart attack or myocardial infarction,” Satish Koul, HOD and Director Internal Medicine, Narayana Superspeciality Hospital, Gurugram, told IANS.

 “Due to myocardial infarction, the heart muscle becomes weak and eventually heart fails as a pump leading to congestive heart failure,” Koul added.

According to the current study, published in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings, researchers evaluated the long-term impact of diabetes on the development of heart failure, both with preserved ejection fraction – a measurement of the percentage of blood leaving the heart with each contraction – and reduced ejection fraction. They also looked at mortality in a community population, controlling for hypertension, coronary artery disease and diastolic function.

From an initial group of 2,042 residents of Olmsted County in US, 116 study participants with diabetes were matched 1:2 for age, hypertension, sex, coronary artery disease and diastolic dysfunction to 232 participants without diabetes.

Over the 10-year follow-up period, 21 percent of participants with diabetes developed heart failure, independent of other causes. In comparison, only 12 percent of patients without diabetes developed heart failure. Cardiac death, heart attack and stroke were not statistically different in the study between the two groups.

The study shows that diabetes is an independent risk factor for the development of heart failure in the community dwelling population.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

06.01.2020

Replace every negative thought with a positive one