Stopping smoking long term reduces bronchial epithelial remodeling in COPD
MedWire News: Ex-smokers with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) show less bronchial epithelial remodeling than current smokers with the lung disorder, study findings reveal.
The change in ex-smokers becomes more pronounced with increasing duration of smoking cessation, and significant 3.5 years after quitting.
COPD is associated with bronchial epithelial changes, including squamous cell metaplasia and goblet cell hyperplasia, which are partly attributed to activation of epithelial epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) expression.
Whereas smoking cessation is known to improve respiratory symptoms and slow lung function decline in COPD, so far no studies have looked at its potential to change epithelial features.
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MedWire News: Resistance training (RT) and endurance training (ET) both sustain and improve the effects of in-patient pulmonary rehabilitation in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), with little difference detected between the two training methods, a Norwegian study shows.
"The choice between RT or ET, or a combination, may be guided by individual needs, patient preferences and the availability of equipment," the authors write in the journal Respiratory Medicine.
Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) improves impairment and disability in patients with COPD. Physical training is a key aspect of PT, and is capable of generating significant improvements in health-related quality of life (HRQOL) on its own, the authors report. However, these benefits fade over time in the absence of physical activity.
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Advice For Nurses And Midwives For The Administration Of Botulinum Toxin, UK
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Vitamin E Could Help 40% Of Diabetics Ward Off Heart Attacks
After 18 months of treatment, people with the haptoglobin (Hp) 2-2 gene who took 400 International Units (IU) of vitamin E daily had more than 50 percent fewer heart attacks, strokes, and related deaths than Hp 2-2 patients who took a placebo pill. 40% of individuals with diabetes carry the Hp 2-2 gene.
The researchers will present the results on November 5 at the American Heart Meetings in Orlando, Florida. The full study will appear in the November 21 online edition of the journal Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology.
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Smoking May Affect Fertility Of Female Offspring
Smoking during pregnancy has many adverse effects on fetal development. A new study in mice by Andrea Jurisicova and colleagues at the University of Toronto, Canada, now adds the possibility that smoking before pregnancy or while breast-feeding might substantially decrease the fertility of female offspring to the long list of possible negative outcomes.
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Smoking Before And After Pregnancy Harms Daughters' Fertility
Researchers have identified the chemical pathway by which a mother's smoking before and after pregnancy might reduce her daughter's fertility by as much as two-thirds.
Cigarette smoking during pregnancy has been shown in studies to affect the fertility of a woman's offspring, but this is the first study to offer an explanation of the biology behind the effect, the scientists claim.
A team at the Samuel Lunenfeld Research Institute at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto investigated the impact of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), a byproduct of smoking, on mouse fertility.
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Opportunistic spirometry improves its use in primary care
MedWire News: Opportunistic testing by trained, visiting nurses improves spirometry compared with usual care, but fails to increase chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) diagnosis, a study indicates.
The results, reported in advance online by the journal Thorax, showed that COPD remained substantially underdiagnosed despite a significantly greater proportion of individuals at risk for COPD being tested and better techniques being applied with the opportunistic approach.
Spirometry is essential for the diagnosis of COPD, but presents difficulties in primary care, such as lack of access to reliable equipment, lack of training, patients' reluctance to travel, and financial disincentives, note Julia Walters (University of Tasmania, Australia) and team.
The researchers tested the impact of opportunistic spirometry by trained nurses on recognition of airflow obstruction in a 6-month study conducted at eight primary care practices.
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MedWire News: Patients with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) can attain peak oxygen consumption after 5 to 9 minutes of symptom-limited maximal cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET), as opposed to the 8 to 12 minutes proposed in the current guidelines, US research shows.
"These results may have important implications for the clinical application of CPET as it is commonly applied to patients with severe COPD," the authors write in the journal Chest."
CPET is often used in patients with COPD to tailor exercise prescriptions in pulmonary rehabilitation, evaluate responses to an intervention2, and aid in the construction of prediction rules for defining risk.
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Regular Exercise Reduces Risk Of Blood Clots
Researchers from Leiden University Medical Center in the Netherlands evaluated 7,860 people aged 18-70. Patients who had suffered their first blood clot in a leg vein or lung artery were compared with control subjects who had never experienced blood clots. 31 percent of the patients and 40 percent of the control group participated in sports on a regular basis.
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Babies Prefer Good Samaritans
In the first evidence of its kind to date, Yale researchers find that infants prefer individuals who help others to those who either do nothing, or interfere with others' goals, it is reported today in Nature."This supports the view that our ability to evaluate people is a biological adaptation-universal and unlearned," said the authors of the study.
Rapid Response Saves Children's Lives In Hospital
The first study to show that using rapid response teams (RRTs) proactively can reduce deaths and cardiopulmonary arrest rates in young patients is published in the November 21st issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
Chief clinical patient safety officer at Packard Children's Hospital, and assistant professor of pediatrics at Stanford University School of Medicine, Dr Paul Sharek, who co-authored the research, said that:
"Even in the hospital, sick children can deteriorate so quickly. They don't have the energy reserves or muscle mass that most adult patients have."
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MedWire News: Infants born to mothers who are obese before pregnancy face an increased risk for neonatal mortality, especially those born after premature rupture of membranes (PROM), Danish researchers suggest.
The researchers interviewed 85,375 pregnant women living in Denmark about factors including reproduction and lifestyle during the second trimester. Among the women, 3,857 were classified as underweight, 57,923 were considered to be of normal weight, 16,579 were overweight, and 7,016 were obese.
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MedWire News: Clinicians should advise women on appropriate postpartum contraception during their last trimester of pregnancy in order to avoid unintended conception during lactation, say researchers.
Lactation itself has a contraceptive effect, but for women who do not breastfeed exclusively, the return of ovulation is unpredictable; therefore, which contraception to use and when are crucial, the author notes.
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MedWire News: Researchers suggest that differential regulation of genes in eutopic human endometrial endothelial cells (HEECs) may enhance angiogenic activity during the peritoneal vascularization of ectopic endometrial lesions.
J. Lang (Peking Union Medical College Hospital, People’s Republic of China) and colleagues explored differences in gene expression profiles in HEECs from eutopic endometria of five women with and five without endometriosis.
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Is The Beauty Of A Sculpture In The Brain Of The Beholder?
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Add Fun To Life To Stay Young, Doctor Writes
"Living well and feeling good enough to do whatever you want to do throughout your lifetime is priceless," says Morley, who is coauthor of "The Science of Staying Young."
"I suggest little changes that involve good eating, such as including dark chocolate in your diet, drinking wine, socializing and adding simple exercises that anyone can do. It's more fun than most people think. Being proactive about living well and feeling better for the rest of your life, regardless of your current chronological age, doesn't have to be a chore."
Morley, who co directs Saint Louis University's Center for Aging Successfully, pushes those who want to stay young to add a little SPF spontaneous physical fun -- to their lives.
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New ANA Publication Places Environmental Health Concerns Explicitly Within The Scope Of Nursing Practice
Both as a call to action and a guide to practice, this book clearly presents the essential topics in a way suited to all nurses in their roles as health care advocates and providers. It articulates a set of ten environmental health principles, which frame the book's content. These principles can guide nurses in dealing with such issues and in providing nursing care in an environmentally healthy and safe manner. The book urges nurses to gain a working understanding of the connections between human health and environmental exposures-whether in the world at large or in health care facilities and work settings-and then shows how to integrate this knowledge into their practice.
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Researchers Knock Out HIV
Professor Jens Lundgren from the Faculty of Health Sciences in Copenhagen, together with other members of the research group EuroSIDA, have conducted a study, which demonstrates that the immune system of all HIV-infected patients can be restored and normalised. The only stipulation is that patients begin and continue to follow their course of treatment.
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Hearts May Be Strengthened By 'Runner's High'
It has long been known that the so-called "runner's high" is caused by natural opioids that are released during exercise. However, a UI study, which is published in the online edition of the American Journal of Physiology's Heart and Circulatory Physiology, suggests that these opioids may also be responsible for some of exercise's cardiovascular benefits.
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California RNs Will Oppose New Health Bill, Blast Forced Insurance, Threat To Seize Wages, Failure To Control Costs Or Set Comprehensive Benefits
"As more details continue to emerge, it is apparent that this proposal is riddled with flaws that could exacerbate the healthcare crisis for countless numbers of California families," said CNA/NNOC Executive Director Rose Ann DeMoro.
Individual mandate -- forcing Californians to buy insurance
"No matter how you dress up this proposal it still amounts to a huge windfall for the insurance industry, millions of new customers who may get virtually nothing in return," DeMoro said. And, anyone who fails to buy insurance would face "the draconian threat" of having the cost of insurance deducted from their paychecks. "Punishing the uninsured by seizing their wages to pad insurance company profits is not healthcare reform."
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Tweens Double Use Of Diabetes Drugs
The finding is included in a study of chronic medication use in children 5 to 19 reported today at the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association by researchers from the Saint Louis University School of Medicine and School of Public Health and pharmacy benefit manager Express Scripts. In addition to diabetes, utilization patterns for blood pressure, cholesterol, asthma and depression medications were also examined.
"Across every chronic medication class we examined over this four year period of time, children's use increased, with varying patterns of growth across males and females and age groups," said Emily R. Cox, PhD, RPh, senior director of research at Express Scripts.
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Body Fat Levels Closely Associated With Cancer Risk
The researchers searched through the databases of nine academic institutions worldwide, found half a million studies that took place since the 1960s, and selected the 7,000 most relevant ones.
The report, which included contributions from 21 of the world's most renowned scientists, includes 10 key recommendations. The WCRF says that the report contains the most authoritative advice that has ever been available - advice aimed at helping people reduce their risks of developing cancer. The World Health Organization and UNICEF were among the official observers while the report was underway.
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Radiation boost reduces breast cancer recurrence
01 November 2007
49th annual meeting of The American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology; Los Angeles, USA: 28 October - 1 November 2007
MedWire News: Breast cancer patients who receive an extra dose of radiation after undergoing lumpectomy and standard radiation treatment are more likely to be free from cancer 10 years after treatment, compared with those who do not receive the boost dose, say Dutch researchers.
"The study found that the largest benefits of the boost dose of radiation after standard breast conserving treatment is seen in young women, who have a higher risk for breast cancer recurrence to begin with," said Harry Bartelink (The Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam) at the recent 2007 meeting of The American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology in Los Angeles, USA.
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