12, May 2014

Now smart phones can keep track of lung and heart diseases

Suffering from chronic lung and heart diseases? If scientists have their way, you may soon turn your cell phone into a sophisticated medical device to monitor your condition with an app. The GaitTrack app can keep track of a patient’s heart and lungs by analysing the way he/she walks. 

GaitTrack uses eight motion parameters to perform a detailed analysis of a person’s walking pattern, which can tell physicians much about a patient’s cardiopulmonary, muscular and neurological health. After temperature, blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate and blood oxygen level, gait, or the pattern of walking, is considered the ‘sixth vital sign.’

Gait speed involves several systems of the body working together in coordination, so changes in gait can be a sign of trouble in one or more systems. The researchers used GaitTrack to administer six-minute walk tests to 30 patients with chronic lung disease and found that it monitored more accurately – and more cheaply – than the medical accelerometers.  

In addition, they discovered that analysis of the gait data could predict lung function with 90 percent accuracy, within an age group. The researchers are now testing GaitTrack in larger trials within health systems and it could be available for download within months.

‘Population health measurement is the key to making health care viable. If you could just measure what people were doing all the time, then you could get enough information to make rational decisions,’ said Bruce Schatz, a professor of computer science at the University of Illinois in the US.

The findings appeared in the journal Telemedicine and e-Health.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

12.05.2014

Woman with heart transplant gives birth after a decade

A Chilean woman, who had a heart transplant in 2004, has given birth to a baby at the same hospital in Vina del Mar city where she was operated upon 10 years back, medical officials said.

‘There are very few such cases in the world, there can’t be more than 30 or 40 women who have had heart transplants and have successfully given birth afterwards,’ Ernesto Aranguiz, head of cardiovascular surgery at the Gustavo Fricke Hospital, told media Saturday. Daillana Llanos, 29, is in excellent condition, as is her daughter who was born in her mother’s 37th week of pregnancy, he said.

The woman had her heart transplant in November 2004 due to dilated cardiomyopathy, soon after having her first baby girl. 

Daillana’s heart ‘stopped functioning as an effect of giving birth to her daughter’, Aranguiz said. ‘We received her in very extreme condition but fortunately we had a donor and with that the chance to give her a new heart.’

During her second pregnancy, the patient was under permanent observation at the hospital, said Gabriel Andwanter, head of the fetal medicine unit. Daillana ‘was very nervous about the effect of the immunosuppressant drugs’, he said. ‘Fortunately, there was no problem, an elective caesarean section was planned and the final result has been very satisfactory,’ he said.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

12.05.2014

Calcium pills won’t harm your heart

You can probably pop those calcium supplement pills for bones without worrying much about how they would affect your heart. A new study shows that calcium supplement intake need not necessarily increase the risk of cardiovascular diseases in women.

Previous studies had suggested that calcium supplements may increase the risk of cardiovascular disease but the data has been inconsistent. Researchers examined supplemental calcium use and incidents of cardiovascular disease in a prospective cohort study of 74,245 women. The women did not have cardiovascular disease or cancer at the start of the study.  

They were followed for 24 years to document the risk of heart attack and stroke. Calcium supplement intake was assessed every four years. ‘Our study has several distinct strengths compared to prior studies including the large number of participants and long term follow up,’ said Julie Paik from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the US.

The researchers found that at the start of the study, women who took calcium supplements had higher levels of physical activity, smoked less and had lower trans fat intake compared to women who did not take calcium supplements. During the 24 years of follow up, there were 2,709 heart attacks and 1,856 strokes.  

The study appeared in the journal Osteoporosis International.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

12.05.2014

Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer

10, May 2014

Bad cholesterol can help cancer spread, scientists warn

Sydney: Cholesterol is not just bad for your heart. According to an alarming research, “bad” cholesterol helps cancer spread around the body.

This is because cholesterol regulates the machinery that controls the movement of cells in the body.

Most of the cells in our bodies stick to neighbouring cells through the help of molecules on their surface known as integrins that helps cells stick together.

“Bad cholesterol (low-density lipoprotein or LDL) controls the trafficking of tiny vessels which also contain these integrins, and this has huge effects on the ability of cancer cells to move and spread throughout the body,” Thomas Grewal, an associate professor from University of Sydney, was quoted as saying.

Unfortunately, integrins also help cancer cells that have broken away from a cancerous tumour to take root elsewhere in the body.

In contrast, high levels of “good" cholesterol keeps integrins inside cells and may, therefore, protect against cancer cell spread.

Malignant cancer cells are known to take up increased amounts of bad cholesterol, Grewal noted in a paper published in the journal Cell Reports.

According to Grewal, people with common cancers such as breast, prostate, lung and liver cancers often have low LDL levels because the cholesterol has been absorbed by the cancer cells which need it to grow and spread.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

10.05.2014

Satisfied with steps taken by Pakistan: WHO officials

  

Islamabad: WHO has been quite satisfied with the initial steps taken by the Pakistan government to stop wild poliovirus from spreading outside its borders, its polio chief Elias Durry said.

Durry, who is currently in Britain, said Thursday that he knew Pakistan was doing a lot to prevent the export of polio, Dawn online reported Friday.

"It is very difficult to say that we have approved Pakistan's request, but I believe that 15 days is not a long time. But Pakistan should continue to take steps to ensure that the international community is not affected by the poliovirus," he was quoted as saying.

"I’ve learned that polio vaccination is now underway in the polyclinic in the federal capital, which is a positive step," WHO's Pakistan Country Director Nima Saeed Abid said.

"WHO is committed to facilitating the government of Pakistan and will continue supporting all the steps taken to implement WHO recommendations to protect the world from polio," he added.

A WHO report said the polio virus was being exported from three countries -- Pakistan, Cameroon and Syria.

The organisation declared it mandatory for people from these countries to receive the polio vaccine before they are allowed to go abroad.

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

10.05.2014

Failure is not our only punishment for laziness, there is also the success of others

Jules Renard

9, May 2014

ICU at home - at a fraction of the cost

Imagine a fully functional ICU in the comfort of your home and at a fraction of the cost - Rs.7,000 to Rs.10,000 per day against Rs.25,000 to Rs.50,000 per day in a hospital. It's a reality in the national capital.

"Such services are up to the mark and cost-effective. As compared to a hospital, the cost of an ICU at home service is half. Additionally, the patient gets all the necessary treatment, equipment and infrastructure required," Gaurav Thukral, head of Health Care at Home, who left his job as an internal medicine doctor at Fortis to launch the project last year, said.

Seventy-year-old Satish Kaushik vouches for the benefits of a facility like this.

Admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of a hospital for over two months following a severe heart stroke, the prolonged stay only served to make him more distraught.

Unable to walk around much, he was confined to a bed and was bogged down by the fear of not ever being able to return home. The surging rent was another major cause of worry.

Even the doctors were unsure about the duration of his stay and told his family members they could take him back at their own peril, as without the benefit of an ICU, his life was at risk. The stress pushed Kaushik deeper into depression.

However, things changed for the better after a family friend pointed to a healthcare at home service. The service set up an entire ICU at Kaushik's home and helped him shift back.

Since then, not only is he able to spend time with his family members, there is also a marked improvement in his health.

Many such organisations providing health care at home have mushroomed in the national capital. They are not only comparatively affordable but also increase the chances of improving a patient's health as they spend time with their family members, unlike in a hospital.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

09.05.2014

Portable chip to run blood tests in a jiffy

Days are not far when doctors would run blood tests for you almost instantly on a piece of plastic about the size of a credit card!

Yes, these labs-on-a-chip would not only be quick - results are available in minutes - but also inexpensive and portable.

"They could be used miles from the nearest medical clinic to test for anything from HIV to diabetes. As powerful as they may be, they could be far better," said Shiyan Hu, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Michigan Technological University.

"In a very short time, you could test for many conditions. This really would be an entire lab on a chip," he added.

Generally, a lab-on-a-chip can run no more than a test or two. That is because the chips are designed manually.

"If the lab-on-a-chip were made using computer-aided design, you could run dozens of tests with a single drop of blood," Hu said.

With Ph.D. student Chen Liao, Hu developed an inexpensive software that routes droplet of blood or other fluid through each test on the chip efficiently while avoiding any chip contamination.

"The materials are very cheap and the results are more accurate than a conventional lab's," the duo said.

Their work has been featured in the journal titled IEEE Transactions on Nanobiosciences.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

09.05.2014

Just do what must be done. This may not be happiness but it is greatness

George Bernard Shaw

8, May 2014

Avoid swallowing ‘bacteria’ from pool water in summer

Love to take that evening dip in the neighbourhood swimming pool in this frying summer? Go take one but beware of swallowing pool water as this may be abound with bacteria and parasites. And do not go by the smell of chlorine as it does not mean that it is devoid of bacteria and dirt.  

‘That smell is actually chloramines, a substance that results from a mix of chlorine and bacteria, urine and sweat. A really healthy and clean pool would not have an odour at all,’ Christopher Ohl, a professor of infectious diseases at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in North Carolina, was quoted as saying. The bacteria in the pool make things worse for kids.  

‘Warm, shallow water and kids in swim diapers can create a perfect breeding ground for water-borne infections, even though the water is chlorinated,’ she warned. Kids who have recently had any gastrointestinal illness should be kept away from water. Harmful germs such as E coli bacteria and parasites cryptosporidium and giardia spread when there is not enough chlorine in the pool or the pH levels are too low. People may get infections such as diarrhoea, stomach cramps, weight loss, nausea, vomiting and dehydration.  

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

08.05.2014

Coming soon — the touchless toilet which will keep you germ-free

The perfect restroom addition to anyone worried about germs, the latest Kohler toilet flushes with a simple wave of the hand. Available as a complete toilet or as a do-it-yourself kit for enhancing your existing flush system, it does away with the light beam sensors that are becoming commonplace in public conveniences in favor of something rather more refined and high-tech: electromagnetic sensing.

Conventional automated conveniences flush when a light beam is broken. That’s great in theory, but in practice it means that a slight movement while seated is enough to trigger the flush. With Kohler’s system, holding a hand directly above the sensor interrupts a projected electromagnetic field instead, and that interference is what activates the flush. The whole thing is powered by 4 AA-sized batteries that should last for up to a year. Kohler says that it was motivated to develop the technology in response to its customers’ growing concerns about hygiene in the home, and particularly in the bathroom.

‘Homeowners are of course worried about the hygiene and health of their family members, and the toilet trip lever is an obvious area of hygienic concern,’ said Brian Hedlund, marketing manager of Kohler toilets and bidets. ‘In a recent study of 800 U.S. consumers, we found that 51 percent of people surveyed are paranoid about germs in the bathroom. When looking at that same sample group but focusing on moms with children, that number jumps up to 65 percent.’

Kohler hasn’t confirmed pricing for the toilet with the technology integrated, but the touchless flush kit for adapting an existing system will cost $99 when it goes on sale later this year. And, apart from changing the batteries when they run out of juice, the system requires no other maintenance.

Source: www.thehealthsite.com

08.05.2014

That man is success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much

Robert Louis Stevenson

7, May 2014

Checking work emails after office hours lead to stress

Have you developed a habit to check emails after office hours on your cell phone? You are heading towards 'stress bomb' that can explode anytime. According to a latest Gallup poll, using cell phones and tablet to read and send work emails outside office hours can dramatically improve your stress levels.

The findings revealed that nearly half of workers who frequently email for work outside of normal working hours report experiencing stress "a lot of the day". Also, nearly 62 percent of workers said they have employers who expect them to check emails frequently outside of working hours.

Gallup interviewed 4,475 working adults, aged 18 and older, in the US. The survey found that time spent working remotely outside of working hours has similar problems. Nearly 47 percent of those who work remotely at least seven hours per week reported a lot of stress the previous day compared with 37 percent experiencing stress who reported no remote work time.

Workers who leverage mobile technology more often outside of work are much more likely to be stressed on any given day. "Such behaviours can both positively and negatively influence employees' well-being in the long run," the researchers added.

Source: www.dnaindia.com/health

07.05.2014

What your hair says about your health

If you notice abnormal hair fall, or growth, or excessive dryness of your hair and scalp and dandruff that refuses to clear, you need to contact a trichologist as soon as possible. Hair problems are the first sign that something is going wrong with you internally.

Different hair conditions such as dull hair, split ends, greasy hair can be early warning signals for a variety of different problems or deficiencies. Therefore, problems with our hair should be taken seriously, because they are reflective of problems within.

Dry & brittle hair could be a sign of deficiencies in protein, vitamin A, zinc, essential fatty acid & Thyroid Issues Oily & greasy hair means deficiencies in zinc, folic acid & Vitamin B 6 deficiency Coarse hair means deficiency in Protein &Vitamin A and possible hypothyroidism

Split ends could be a sign of anaemia, iron deficiency & deficiencies in vitamin B6, magnesium, or zinc

Premature greying could be a sign of stress, hormone issues & deficiencies in B vitamins, copper, or folic acid

Scalp disorders such as dandruff, seborrhea, psoriasis) may be due to fungal infection, Stress or deficiencies in B vitamins, zinc, essential fatty acid.

Source: www.timesofindia.com

07.05.2014

You must do what others don’t

 to achieve what others won’t

Harry Rollins

6, May 2014

Smiling can help fight memory loss

Washington: A new study has revealed that humor and laughter can help lessen the damage that stress hormone cortisol has on memory and learning ability in the elderly.

According to the researchers at Loma Linda University, there was a significant decrease in cortisol concentrations among both groups who watched a funny video and showed greater improvement in all areas of the memory assessment when compared to controls.

Gurinder Singh Bains said that their findings offer potential clinical and rehabilitative benefits that can be applied to wellness programs for the elderlyand the cognitive components, such as learning ability and delayed recall, become more challenging as people age and are essential to older adults for an improved quality of life.

The researchers said that the less stress one has the better their memory, as humor reduces detrimental stress hormones like cortisol that decrease memory hippocampal neurons, lowers the blood pressure, and increases blood flow and mood state.

The study revealed that the act of laughter-or simply enjoying some humor-increases the release of endorphins and dopamine in the brain, which provides a sense of pleasure and reward and the positive and beneficial neurochemical changes, in turn, make the immune system function better. 

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

06.05.2014

Gardening offers much needed health benefits to younger adults

Washington: Researchers have said that gardening can not only enhance home and community landscapes and provide low-cost food sources, the level of physical activity required also offers a multitude of health benefits to young adults.

Studies have confirmed that engaging in gardening can lower cholesterol and blood pressure, and increase psychological well-being.

Researchers from Konkuk University and Hongik University in Seoul, South Korea, published a study in HortTechnology that evaluated the intensity of gardening activities for adults in their 20s.

Study's lead author Ki-Cheol Son said that the exercise intensity of physical activity may differ between age groups and fitness levels, and there was not enough data on the metabolic equivalents of gardening tasks in different age groups to develop a garden exercise program for maintaining or improving health conditions.

Fifteen university students in their 20s participated in the study in South Korea. Each subject performed 10 common gardening tasks in a high tunnel and in a nearby grassy area with a vegetable garden and weeds.

The subjects visited the garden plot twice and performed five gardening tasks during each visit; each task lasted for 5 minutes and was followed by a 5-minute rest. Subject wore a portable telemetric calorimeter and respired into the facemask during the gardening tasks and resting periods so researchers could measure their oxygen uptake.

The subjects also wore a heart rate monitor to record heart rate data during the gardening tasks and resting periods via radiotelemetry.

The research team evaluated the data and determined that all 10 gardening tasks were "moderate- to high-intensity" physical activities for the research subjects. Planting transplants, mixing growing medium, watering, harvesting, sowing, hoeing, mulching, raking, and weeding were all classified as "moderate intensity", while digging was a found to be a "high-intensity" activity and was the most intense task in study. 

Source: www.zeenews.india.com/health

06.05.2014

SUCCESS is the product of STRUGGLE

5, May 2014

Lack of stem cell donors killing patients

Two-year-old Garvit Goel had to wait for over one year to get a donor for stem cell treatment for cure of his thalassemia, a life-threatening blood disorder. But Garvit, hailing from Panipat in Haryana, was lucky to get a donor. Thousands of patients die in India every year as it is very difficult to get stem cell donors in the country, unlike in Western countries.

Garvit had undergone blood transfusion immediately after he was detected with thalassemia at a hospital here when he was just six months old. The doctors at the BLK Super Speciality hospital suggested stem cell transplantation as cure for his disease. Goel’s sibling was not a matched donor and for his parents, getting a donor outside the family was a herculean task.

Finally after a year-long struggle, the parents with the help of doctors could get in touch with Datri, an NGO which helps patients get donors for stem cell therapy.

‘We found a suitable donor for Garvit in Datri database and performed the unrelated peripheral blood stem cell transplant in April last year. Garvit is doing fine,’ said Dr Dharma R Choudhary, director, BLK Super Specialty. The donor, 34-year old Sumeet Mahjan who is working with a Bangalore-based software company, had registered himself with Datri when one of his colleagues’ child was diagnosed with Leukaemia.

Dr Vinod Raina, one of India’s leading oncologists, said India was lagging far behind in its requirement of stem cell donors to treat life-threatening diseases like cancer as around 500 such transplants take place annually compared to a requirement of 50,000.

Experts said it was not easy for patients to get possible match for stem cell therapy as for every patient, at least 20,000 donors are required to be searched. Chief of Hemato-oncology and Transplantation department in Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Institute and Research Centre Dr Dinesh Bhurani said there are a large number of patients having blood disorders.

They have to wait for long to find stem cell donor. ‘Firstly, there is lack of awareness, most people don’t even know that there is a need for donor for bone marrow transplant.
‘Secondly, there is a fear factor. Most people are sceptical to become a donor thinking that it will have adverse effect on their health,’ he said. Raina, Director of Medical Oncology and Hematology at Fortis Memorial Research Institute, said the US had a registry of 22 million donors in a population of 317 million, but in India the figure was a poor 40,000 donors in a population of 1.2 billion.

Raina said both government and private sector have to work hand-in-hand to create a registry of donors on the lines of similar networks in the US, UK and Germany. Dr Mammen Chandy, director at Tata Medical Centre, Kolkata, said thousands of patients die every year in India as there were not enough donors for stem cell and bone marrow. He said the treatment cost Rs 25-30 lakh and often most of the patients cannot afford the treatment. Chandy said stem cell donation is just like blood donation and there was a need to improve awareness among people about it. ‘We need to ramp up medical infrastructure for offering stem cell therapy. We need more transplantation centres, more trained physicians,’ said Chandy.

Source: http://health.india.com

05.05.2014

‘You cannot lose weight by just dieting and exercising’

A new research has found that controlling how much you eat and doing lots of physical activity is not enough when it comes to shedding off the kilos.

Dr. Claude Bouchard, Professor at the Texas A and M University Institute for Advanced Study (TIAS), said that when someone says of an obese person, ‘They should just eat less and exercise more,’ he says if it were that simple, obesity wouldn’t be the worldwide epidemic that it is. Bouchard, director of the Human Genomics Lab at Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La., studies the genetics of obesity and believes there are dozens of factors involved in determining whether or not a person becomes overweight or obese.

Bouchard asserted that obesity is a complex problem because there are so many drivers and approaches focus on only a few and forget that while we control them there is compensation taking place elsewhere; there are other drivers that come into play. He divides those drivers into four categories: social, environmental, behavioral and biological. Social factors include less access to nutritious foods, more recreational eating, powerful and constant advertising, large food portions, poor school meals, eating on the run, food pricing and fewer meals cooked at home. Our physical environment affects eating habits as well, said Bouchard, such as the absence of sidewalks, reliance on automobiles, building design and environmental pollutants. Behavioral factors such as spending less time in strenuous activity, taking medications known to increase body weight, the absence of breast-feeding, eating corn fructose syrup, an increase in sedentary jobs and high-fat diets. And biological factors such as genetics, viruses, gut microbiota, adipose tissue (body fat) biology, and metabolic rates can all affect weight and many are not within a person’s control.

Bouchard explained that the biology is very complex and the response to environmental, social and behavioral factors is conditional on the genotype of an individual. ‘Your adaptation to a diet or a given amount of exercise is determined by your genes,’ he asserted. More research is needed, he said, but there is a strong probability that diet and exercise programs for weight control or disease prevention will one day be tailored to an individual’s genetic makeup.

Source: http://health.india.com

05.05.2014

The best way to see faith is to shut the eye of REASONS

Benjamin Franklin