April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

A new study from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reveals that nearly 29 million Americans who say they don’t smoke in their apartments could still be exposed to secondhand smoke coming from other parts of the building.

According to the CDC team, secondhand smoke can cause disease and premature death in non-smokers. Secondhand smoke potentially affects about 44 million Americans living in multi-unit housing each year. This includes 27.6 million to 28.9 million with smoke-free apartments or condos. As one might expect, this number varies from state to state. Approximately 27,000 residents of Wyoming have been exposed due to multi-unit housing, in contrast to the almost 5 million apartment dwellers exposed in California.

“It’s a big deal. … There’s air seepage between one unit and another,” through insulation, cracks and power outlets, says Tim McAfee, director of CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. Even the finest ventilation systems don’t protect apartment dwellers, McAffee told USA Today, who are “involuntary exposed to secondhand smoke.”

Many who are affected this way aren’t aware of it, says McAfee. The extent may be significant as well. McAfee says the only real solution is building wide smoking bans.

“A quarter of all Americans live in some form of multi-unit housing, and these individuals and families are potentially exposed to secondhand smoke that enters their home from somewhere else,” according to McAfee.

“There had been individual studies done looking at effects of secondhand smoke in apartments, but this is the first time that we had tried to figure out how it all hangs together nationally,” he added.

Smoke-free laws have been enacted across the nation in the last decade, but most of them apply to public spaces such as work places, restaurants, bars and parks. Very few states or municipalities have enacted smoking laws to cover multi-unit housing.

Landlords and public housing authorities in many areas, however, are adopting smoke-free policies. Such policies lower fire risks and cleaning costs for the owners, as well as meet rising consumer demands for smoke-free living environments. According to HealthDay reporter Steven Reinberg, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development is encouraging smoke-free public housing around the country.

Recent surveys have shown that 80% of Americans don’t smoke and most favor smoke-free housing. Some condo owners, however, have raised objections to smoking bans in their buildings after they bought their property.

One-quarter of Americans — 79.2 million — live in multi-unit housing, according to Census data accumulated between 2006 and 2009. Out of these, about 62.7 million of them don’t smoke in their apartments, however, the remaining 16.5 million do. The number of people living in apartments varies by state as well; West Virginia boasts only 10% of their population in apartments while almost 52% of New York citizens are apartment dwellers.

The CDC team combined their data with two previously peer-reviewed studies conducted between 2007 and 2010. The earlier studies found that 44% to 46.2% of apartment residents said they were exposed to secondhand smoke in their living space during the last year.

Tom Glynn, director of cancer science and trends at the American Cancer Society, says this is the first study to estimate how many Americans are at risk from secondhand smoke because they live in multi-unit housing. Glynn notes that of those at risk, one-third (26 million) are either children or seniors over 65. Both are groups that are particularly vulnerable to illnesses caused by secondhand smoke.

“We already know that more than 43,000 nonsmokers in the USA die every year — primarily from lung cancer and heart disease — due to their exposure to secondhand smoke,” Glynn told USA Today. He adds that exposure to secondhand smoke also sickens millions of people by causing bronchitis and ear infections. The American Cancer Society says that secondhand smoke has been linked to cancers of the voice box and throat, brain, bladder, rectum, stomach and breast, as well as childhood leukemia.

Danny McGoldrick, vice president of research for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, advocates making apartment buildings smoke-free.

“While the majority of multi-unit housing residents make their homes smoke-free, nearly half of them are affected by infiltration of smoke from other residents,” he told HealthDay. “Owners of multi-unit housing can protect their tenants from the harms of secondhand smoke and save on maintenance and insurance costs by making their properties smoke-free.”

Brian King, who led the CDC research team, cautions that the findings of their study have limits. He notes that the data used are the most recent available, but are still several years old. More Americans may now live in apartment buildings that ban smoking. McAffee commented that such bans may be rare now, but he expects them to gain in popularity.

A related CDC study released last month found that ventilation at five major U.S. airports that have designated smoking areas does not protect non-smoking passengers from secondhand smoke. The pollution levels near — within 39 inches — smoking areas are five times higher than levels at airports that ban smoking entirely. The levels of secondhand smoke inside the smoking areas, including bars and restaurants, were 23 times higher than at airports with full smoking bans.

The findings of this study were published in the journal Nicotine & Tobacco Research.

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

Adding whole eggs as part of a weight loss diet may have positive effects for you all around, but particularly if you suffer from metabolic syndrome.

Metabolic syndrome is a combination of at least three of the following factors: a large waistline, high triglycerides, low HDL cholesterol, high blood pressure and elevated blood sugar.

Individuals experiencing this condition have a variety of risk factors that increase the likelihood of developing diabetes and cardiovascular disease, but the latest research published in the journal Metabolism suggests adding eggs to your diet could help avoid these.

For the recent study, researchers looked at middle-aged men and women with metabolic syndrome who consumed either three whole eggs or an equivalent amount of egg substitute daily.

Although participants eating the whole eggs were consuming twice as much cholesterol as they had at the beginning of the study, researchers found no effects on total blood cholesterol after 12 weeks on the diet. All of the participants, including those consuming whole eggs, had improved lipid profiles with decreases in plasma triglycerides and increases in HDL cholesterol.

“Eating egg yolks was actually associated with enhanced health benefits in these high-risk individuals,” Dr. Maria Luz Fernandez, lead study author and Professor at the University of Connecticut, said in a statement. “Subjects consuming whole eggs had greater increases in HDL cholesterol and more significant reductions in the LDL/HDL cholesterol ratio than those who ate the cholesterol-free egg substitute.”

According to a report by the United States Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service, eggs have 14 percent less cholesterol and 64 percent more vitamin D than previously thought. One large egg provides varying amounts of essential vitamins and minerals, including nutrients that aren’t found in other foods. The yolk contains many of these nutrients, which are antioxidants that may prevent macular degeneration and consequent age-related blindness.

Although eggs only contain small amounts of these nutrients, researchers indicate that lutein and zeaxanthin from eggs may be more bioavailable than from more concentrated sources like supplements.

According to another study published in Food and Function, daily consumption of egg yolks was associated with increase in plasma lutein, zeaxanthin and β-carotene in people with metabolic syndrome.

Weight management is crucial in preventing and managing chronic disease like metabolic syndrome. Also, all-natural, high-quality protein helps to build muscle and allows people to stay energized, which assists with weight management.

“Management of chronic disease takes a coordinated effort with diet and lifestyle,” Dr. Dixie Harms, a nurse practitioner specializing in diabetes care, said in a statement. “A balanced breakfast including high-quality protein plus regular physical activity can help put individuals on a path to a healthier lifestyle.”

Researchers suggest that for a nutritious breakfast, one should pair eggs with fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low-fat dairy foods.

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

A new study of Canadian women, which can be found in the latest edition of American Journal of Public Health, bodes well for the institution of marriage.

Three researchers from St. Michael´s Hospital in Toronto have found that childbearing women who are married suffer less domestic abuse, substance abuse or post-partum depression around the time of their pregnancy than women who are living with a partner or those who do not have a partner.

The study also revealed interesting details about the length of time a couple lives together, with long time periods of cohabitation translating into better outcomes.

“What is new in this study is that for the first time we looked at the duration of unmarried cohabitation and found the shorter the cohabitation, the more likely women were to suffer intimate-partner violence, substance abuse or post-partum depression around the time of conception, pregnancy and delivery,” said co-author Marcelo Urquia, an epidemiologist at the hospital´s Centre for Research on Inner City Health.

“We did not see that pattern among married women, who experienced less psychosocial problems regardless of the length of time they lived together with their spouses,” he added.

According to the study, unmarried women who had lived with their partner for less than two years showed an increased risk for experiencing at least one of the three problems. However, that level of risk decreased the longer the couple lived together.

The study was based on data from the nationwide 2006—2007 Canadian Maternity Experiences Survey, which examined a cross-section of more than 6400 childbearing women. The participants were categorized into cohabiting women, who were married, or non-married women living with a partner and non-cohabiters, who were single, divorced, or separated women. The cohabiting women were also categorized according to the duration of cohabitation: two, three to five, or over five years.

After analyzing the data, the researchers found 10.6 percent of women suffered partner abuse, substance abuse, or post-partum depression. They also found 20 percent of unwed women who were cohabitating suffered from at least one of the three pre-determined psychosocial conditions. Single women fared the worst statistically, with 35 percent suffering at least one of the conditions and 67 percent for those women who separated or divorced in the year before birth of the child.

Urquia said the data didn´t allow for a determination of whether either type of abuse was the cause for the separation or the result.

He also noted that understanding the differences among the various categories of child-bearing women is becoming more important as the number of children born outside of wedlock has increased. He cited previous research that said 30 percent of children in Canada are born to unwed couples, up from 9 percent in 1971. In some European countries, babies born out of wedlock each year are beginning to outnumber those born to married couples.

In their conclusion, the researcher suggested the results of their study could be used to advise future research or policies pertaining to at-risk women.

[Watch Video: Using Dogs To Sniff Out A Diagnosis]

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Humans have relied on dogs for millennia. Since first being domesticated some 15,000 years ago, dogs have been “man´s best friend” through thick and thin. We have used dogs for work, for sport and for play. They have provided invaluable services to mankind, providing their unique skills as police dogs, seeing-eye dogs, and perhaps their greatest attribute as hunting dogs.

Dogs have played just as an important role in the medical field, being trained as medical response dogs, not only to guide the blind, but also to detect personal medical emergencies before they occur. Many dogs can be trained to hone in their ability to detect an imminent epileptic attack or to alert their diabetic masters of dangerously high or low blood sugar levels.

For the most part, dogs trained in such fields rely on one keen sense to assess the situation: smell. A dog´s sense of smell is much greater than a human´s. This is because its olfactory bulb is forty times bigger than a human´s. A bigger olfactory bulb means more smelling power, and a typical dog has more than a hundred thousand times greater sense of smell than a human.

And it is this sense of smell that attributes to a dog´s ability to sniff out a particular infective component that causes many hospital acquired infections.

A new study, published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ), has found that dogs can sniff out Clostridium difficile with significant accuracy in samples of feces as well as in the air around patients in the hospital. Using a detection dog, researchers were easily able to identify sick patients, based on the dog´s keen sense of smell.

Earlier studies have established that detection dogs can detect certain types of cancers, which are verified by the new findings, implying promising potential for hospitals to better screen patients to prevent C. difficile outbreaks.

C. difficile most commonly affects older people who have recently had antibiotic treatment in the hospital, but it can also start in the community, especially in nursing homes and rehabilitation facilities. Symptoms of C. difficile range from mild diarrhea to life-threatening bowel inflammation.

Such is why early detection is vital to prevent transmission, as well as treat patients who have the infection. Current methods to diagnose C. difficile can be quite expensive and take time, which can delay treatment for up to a week or longer. So for dogs to be able to detect the component, it could save a lot of headaches down the road.

Diarrhea due to C. difficile has a distinct smell, and since dogs have a highly superior sense of smell, researchers from the Netherlands decided to investigate to see whether a dog could be trained to detect that unique odor.

The researchers, from VU University Medical Centre in Amsterdam, turned to a two-year-old beagle called Cliff, which was new to the detection game, for their research. Cliff was trained to detect the component in stool samples as well as in patients with the infection. He was trained to recognize the presence of this particular scent while sitting or lying down.

After two months of training, Cliff underwent a test to see if his abilities were founded. For the test, the dog smelled 50 C. difficile-positive and 50 C. difficile-negative samples. He was able to detect all 50 positive samples, and correctly identified 47 of the 50 negative samples. This gave him a score of 100 percent sensitivity and 94 percent specificity. Sensitivity calculates the proportion of positives correctly chosen and specificity calculates the proportion of negatives correctly chosen.

Once the tests proved conclusive, the researchers took the study to the field. Cliff was taken into two hospital wards to use his sense of smell on patients. Out of 270 negative controls, he correctly identified 265 (about 98 percent). He correctly identified 25 of 30 cases (83 percent) of positive controls.

The authors noted Cliff was quick and systematic, reviewing a whole hospital ward for the presence of patients with C. difficile in less than 10 minutes.

While the study was profound, the researchers acknowledge there are some study limitations, such as the unpredictability of using an animal as a diagnostic tool and the potential for spreading infections via the dog. And still, some unanswered questions remain.

However, the team said the study does demonstrate that a detection dog can be trained to identify C. difficile with a high degree of accuracy, both in stool samples and in patients.

“This could have great potential for C. difficile infection screening in healthcare facilities and thus contribute to C. difficile infection outbreak control and prevention,” the study authors conclude.

Connie K. Ho for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

Researchers from the University College London (UCL) recently revealed that they had identified over 200 genes for Crohn´s Disease, a chronic bowel condition. The scientists believe that knowledge about genetic factors of complex diseases will help in understanding patients´ symptoms and providing better treatment.

The study looked at the entire human genome, and the findings are featured in a recent edition of The American Journal of Human Genetics. The paper described how the team of investigators was able to develop a new way of for determining and mapping gene locations for inherited diseases that are complex in structure. As a result, they were able to find a multitude of additional genes for Crohn’s Disease. The findings are important as the illness currently affects about 100 to 150 individuals out of every 100,000 people.

“The discovery of so many gene locations for Crohn’s Disease is an important step forward in understanding the disease, which has a very complicated genetic basis. We hope that the method we have used here can be used to identify the genes involved in other diseases which are similarly complex, for example different cancers and diabetes,” explained the study´s senior author Dr. Nikolas Maniatis, a researcher from the Department of Genetics, Evolution, and Environment at UCL, in a prepared statement.

In the past, researchers have had difficulty in dissecting the genetic components of Crohn´s Disease as result of the many genes involved and their intricate interactions with the environment. To help with this study, the data for the research project was provided by the Wellcome Trust Case Control Consortium (WTCC), with genetic information pooled from 1,698 patients. Based on the difficulty of determining these genes, scientists relied on larger cohorts of patients in the hope that more data sets would produce better results. The results of the study show that it is sometimes better to track smaller, better defined groups to understand how individuals inherit complex disease and the components that can improve personalized treatment.

“The discovery of so many additional genes for Crohn’s and much more precise locations within the gene-regions was partly because of the highly informative genetic maps of the human genome that we have used in our approach to locating the genes involved,” continued Maniatis in the statement. “The success of our work was also attributable to the fact that we were able to subdivide patients by disease presentation. Data stratification can help sort out the genetics, and before long genetics will be able to sort out patients.”

The team of investigators also found evidence which demonstrates that specifically clinical sub-groups of patients will have varied risk genes.

“Some genes are likely to have a large effect and some small, but not all genes will act the same way in all patients. We can combine all this information with that obtained by others from examining cellular and molecular changes to sort this out. This will ultimately lead to more personalized strategies for treatment,” concluded the study´s co-author Dallas Swallow, a professor with the Department of Genetics, Evolution & Environment at UCL, in the statement.

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

A health crisis has been developing around the world for decades. Despite life expectancies climbing for both men (11 years) and women (12 years) worldwide, we are paying for this added buffer with more mental and physical illnesses, according to the biggest-ever study of the global burden of disease.

The study, collaborated on by nearly 500 international researchers, and published in the journal The Lancet, has produced the most comprehensive database of the world´s health ever attempted. The database shows stark changes that have taken place over the last 40+ years, with rapid decline in premature deaths from infectious diseases and malnutrition among the most ambitious revelations.

But in place of malnutrition, the world is now faced with an even bigger problem: a world that eats too much. The Global Burden of Disease Study 2010 (GBD 2010) has found that the health of populations could be even more adversely affected by over-eating as they had as a malnourished society. Still, the success of tackling malnutrition has driven down nutrition-related deaths by two-thirds since 1990, with less than a million by 2010.

And with nations like the US and Europe–countries that have long been prosperous–continuing to see gluttonous behaviors, other countries that are increasing in prosperity are following suit, adding to the health crisis of ballooning waistlines.

The irony behind the revelation is simple: avoid premature death but live longer and less healthy. In essence, the study outlines not what is killing us, but rather what is making us sicker.

The GBD 2010 study is a collaborative project led by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington. Findings of the massive study are being announced on 14 December at the Royal Society in London. The Lancet is dedicating, for the first time in its history, an entire triple issue to this one study, which covers seven scientific papers and accompanying commentaries assessing the world´s biggest health threats and challenges. The study not only assesses the threats, but also looks into ways to address them.

Other health issues covered in the multi-level study include consequences of high blood pressure, which is now considered the top health risk factor with the greatest toll worldwide, according to experts.

Smoking and alcohol use are also top health concerns and have even surpassed child hunger as the second and third leading global health risks globally. These are the top risks among 43 that have been outlined in the GBD 2010 study.

At one time childhood diseases and malnutrition were the leading causes of death around the world. Prior to 1990, the biggest contributor to the world´s health burden was premature mortality–driven by more than 10 million deaths in children under the age of 5–but now the disease burden is caused mainly by chronic diseases such as musculoskeletal disorders, mental health conditions, and also injuries. And the longer we live, the worse the problems become and the more we suffer.

Now, most deaths in the world are due to heart disease and stroke, which killed an estimated 12.9 million people in 2010, nearly 25 percent of all deaths for that year. High blood pressure is responsible for 9.4 million deaths and about 7 percent of all disability. Smoking ranks second with 6.3 million deaths, and alcohol is third with 5 million deaths worldwide. Alcohol is also a major issue in Europe, where it causes almost a quarter of all disease.

Physical inactivity and poor diet–particularly those with high levels of sodium and low levels of fruit consumption–were responsible for 12.5 million deaths in 2010.

Despite the transition in deaths from childhood disease and malnutrition to heart attack and stroke, people are still living longer, but with less years being healthy. In the two decades prior to 2010, men´s life expectancy rose by 4.7 years while a woman´s increased by 5.1 years. But of those extra years, nearly a year was in poor health, suggesting that illness and disability are taking a greater toll on our lives than 20 years ago.

While the trend is similarly felt throughout the world, women in four countries–Japan, Singapore, South Korea and Spain–have a healthy life expectancy greater than 70 years. In no country do men enjoy the same healthy lifespan. However, men in Afghanistan, Jordan and Mali are the only men globally that have longer life expectancies than women.

Women in Japan have the longest life expectancy, living on average to the age of 86. The average longest life expectancy for men comes from Iceland, where they enjoy an 80-year life expectancy.

This finding that people are living longer but unhealthier could lead experts to reconsider the way health systems work around the world.

“We’re finding that very few people are walking around with perfect health and that, as people age, they accumulate health conditions,” Dr Christopher Murray, director of IHME at the University of Washington, said in a statement. “At an individual level, this means we should re-calibrate what life will be like for us in our 70s and 80s. It also has profound implications for health systems as they set priorities.”

“Overall we’re seeing a growing burden of risk factors that lead to chronic diseases in adults, such as cancer, heart disease and diabetes, and a decreasing burden for risks associated with infectious diseases in children,” said Professor Majid Ezzati of the School of Public Health at Imperial College London, one of the study’s senior authors. “But this global picture disguises the starkly different trends across regions. The risks associated with poverty have come down in most places, like Asia and Latin America, but they remain the leading issues in sub-Saharan Africa.”

In the study, researchers estimated both numbers of deaths attributed to each risk factor and disability-adjusted life years (DALYs), which takes into account both years of life lost and years lived with disability.

“We looked at risk factors for which good data are available on how many people are exposed to the risks and how strong their effects are, so that our results can inform policy and programmatic choices,” said Associate Professor Stephen Lim at IHME.

The risk factor that showed the greatest increase in health burden was high body mass index (BMI). In 1990, high BMI ranked as the 10^th greatest risk factor; it was up to sixth by 2010. During that year, more than 3 million deaths were attributable to excess body weight, nearly triple that attributable to malnutrition. In Australia and southern Latin America, high BMI is the leading risk factor.

Still, the major health problems we see from risk factors are not killing us early, they are just making us more ill. We now live in a world with more health problems than ever before–a world with severe pain, impaired mobility, visual and hearing impairment, and a host of mental health disorders that weren´t that big of an issue just 20 years ago.

The study, which was funded exclusively by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, involved more than 480 researchers from 302 institutions and 50 countries. It is the largest collaboration to ever work on a study on such a large scale.

Professor Ezzati said while the health issues today are vastly different than what we were dealing with before the 1990s, there are a number of actions that can be taken to address the growing host of problems worldwide.

“The good news is there are lots of things we can do to reduce disease risk,” he said. “To bring down the burden of high blood pressure, we need to regulate the salt content of food, provide easier access to fresh fruits and vegetables.”

We also need to “strengthen primary healthcare services,” said Ezzati. “Under-nutrition has come down in the ranking because we’ve made a lot of progress in many parts of the world. This should encourage us to continue those efforts and to replicate that success in Africa, where it’s still a major problem.”

There have been several major improvements in global health over the years, most notably in children´s health. Child mortality has dropped nearly 60 percent from 1970 to 2010.

While child mortality has decreased, there has also been a startling 44 percent increase in the number of deaths among adults aged 15 to 49 between 1970 and 2010. This is partly because of increases in violence such as homicide and traffic accidents and the AIDS epidemic, the researchers said.

Lastly, the study also made note that the burden of household air pollution from the burning of fossil fuels such as coal or wood has also dropped significantly. Although in south Asia unclean cooking and heating fuels remains a leading risk factor for illness and death.

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Food allergies are a deadly reality for many people who must be careful about what they eat despite often lacking information on how something was prepared.

In an effort to give assistance to food allergy sufferers, a team of UCLA researchers has developed a lightweight smartphone attachment called the iTube, which is designed to detect allergens in food samples using the phone’s built-in camera.

The UCLA team said the iTube attachment and corresponding app could become a convenient and cheap substitute for the complex and bulky equipment currently available to perform the same tests.

“We envision that this cell phone—based allergen testing platform could be very valuable, especially for parents, as well as for schools, restaurants and other public settings,” said Aydogan Ozcan, the UCLA team leader and associate professor of electrical engineering. “Once successfully deployed in these settings, the big amount of data – as a function of both location and time – that this platform will continuously generate would indeed be priceless for consumers, food manufacturers, policymakers and researchers, among others.”

According to the team´s report in the journal Lab on a Chip, the device weighs less than two ounces and it analyzes the allergen-concentration in a food product by performing a test known as a colorimetric assay. The team was able to successfully test the iTube using commercially available cookies, which they tested for peanuts and other allergens.

To begin the testing process, food samples are emulsified in a test tube with hot water and an extraction solvent. After several minutes, the sample is mixed with several other reactive liquids, in a process that takes about 20 minutes.

Once the sample is ready, the system uses the phone´s camera to check for allergen concentration. The iTube platform then digitally converts the camera´s raw images into concentration measurements of allergens, as detected in the food samples. The system is able to calculate the quantity of a variety of allergens, including peanuts, eggs, gluten and hazelnuts, in a sample on the scale of parts per million.

After testing a food sample for allergens, the results can be tagged with a time and location stamp, and be uploaded directly to iTube servers. This would allow users to create a personalized testing archive that could provide additional resources for allergic individuals, possibly via social networking.

The researchers said they hoped to construct a statistical allergy database that could be used for future studies or even food-related policies on a local, national or global scale. Ultimately, the database could be a useful tool for restaurants, food production and consumers alike, they added.

Affecting about 8 percent of young children and 2 percent of adults, food allergies have been a growing concern in the public forum. Some allergic reactions can cause severe swelling and even death.

Despite some consumer-protection laws that mandate the labeling of ingredients in pre-packaged foods, cross-contamination still occurs during manufacturing and transportation.

Increased public awareness has led to the proliferation of allergen free food products, including those that are egg and gluten-free.

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Distracted behavior is a burgeoning problem in our society, largely due to mobile technology. While distracted driving is arguably the most dangerous when it comes to mobile use, another type of distraction is quickly becoming a safety concern.

A new study, published online in the journal Injury Prevention, warns that distracted walking is quickly becoming just as much of a hazard as distracted driving.

The researchers found that texting while crossing the street was the riskiest activity, with pedestrians four times more likely to ignore oncoming traffic and disobey traffic signals while checking their devices.

The study also found that texters took much longer to cross a street than those who do not text while doing the same task. The findings of the study have prompted the authors to suggest a low tolerance approach may be needed to keep pedestrians from partaking in such dangerous activities.

The study is based on the behaviors of more than 1,000 pedestrians crossing 20 busy road intersections in Seattle during the summer of 2012. The authors followed pedestrians at different times during the day to see when distracted pedestrians are most likely to be out and about.

While distracted texting was the top problem seen in the study, the authors, led by Dr. Beth Ebel, of Harborview Injury Prevention & Research Center at the University of Washington, other comparable distractions were talking on the phone, listening to music, talking to others and dealing with children or pets.

Ebel and her colleagues made nearly half of their observations in the morning between 8 and 9 am. They found that just over half of the people observed were between 25 and 44.

The team found that 4 out of 5 pedestrians were alone and about 80 percent of them obeyed the traffic signals, with 94 percent of them crossing at the appropriate time. However, only one in four pedestrians followed the full safety routine, which includes looking both ways before crossing the street.

Furthermore, nearly one in three of the pedestrians observed were doing something distracting while crossing the street: 11 percent were listening to music, 7 percent were texting and 6 percent were talking on the phone.

And the average distracted street-crosser took about 0.75 to 1.29 seconds longer than those with no distractions. While those listening to music were among the fastest distracted pedestrians to cross the road, the researchers found they were less likely to look both ways before doing so. People with children and pets were nearly three times as likely to cross without looking both ways.

However, according to the researchers, texting was potentially the most risky behavior. Texters took the longest to cross the road–nearly 2 seconds (18%) longer to cross a busy three or four lane street than those who were not texting at the time. And this group of people was nearly four times as likely to ignore traffic signals, to cross at the middle of an intersection, or fail to look both ways before stepping into traffic.

“Texters were four times less likely to cross the road safely, by looking both ways and obeying the lights. They took a constellation of risks of the kind that put people at high risk of being seriously injured,” Ebel told Mail Online´s Jenny Hope in an interview. She noted that young teenagers and young adults were the worst offenders.

“The observers were student researchers and they were taken aback by what they were seeing. It made them think, and I believe schools should conduct this kind of exercise to make children aware of the risks of being distracted,” she added.

There is increasing concern about the near trance-like state people adopt when they are using their mobile devices. Psychologists have adopted names for the condition, calling it “divided attention” or “inattentional blindness.”

Safety campaigners have become increasingly aware of the issue and are worried about the safety of pedestrians in these areas. Advertising campaigns similar to those getting people to wear their seat belts and avoid texting while driving might work here as well, Ebel said.

But people who use their mobile devices are prey to “compulsive behavior” which is not necessarily rational, she added. “They may feel they are safer than other people while texting – they are capable of doing it while crossing the road.”

“The trouble is when the phone rings they answer it wherever they are, and don´t realize they need full concentration in a situation which is potentially dangerous,” she added.

Ebel and her colleagues point out that accidents involving vehicles and pedestrians injure 60,000 people and kill 4,000 every year in the US, and just like distracted driving, distracted walking can be equally as dangerous. And as hand held devices become increasingly more popular as they are quickly taking over as the mainstream form of media, the dangers will likely increase, leading to further injuries and death, they suggest.

“Ultimately a shift in normative attitudes about pedestrian behavior, similar to efforts around drunk-driving, will be important to limit the“¦risk of mobile device use,” conclude the researchers.

Connie K. Ho for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

While many may find enjoyment from eating fatty foods like ice cream and French fries, it can be quite difficult to remove them from our diet.

Researchers from the University of Montreal recently explored this difficulty and discovered that unhealthy food can trigger changes in brain chemicals before the onset of obesity. As such, it is possible that quitting a fatty or sugary habit can cause depression and withdrawal symptoms.

The team focused on researching biological reasons for obesity as well as associated diseases like type 2 diabetes, some cancers, and depression. In particular, the scientists believe that going on a diet may sometimes feel like going through a drug withdrawal for individuals.

The research team from the University of Montreal´s Faculty of Medicine and the CRCHUM hospital Research Centre looked at one group of mice that consumed a low-fat diet (with 11 percent of calories made up fat) and another group that consumed of a high fat diet (with 58 percent of calories made up of fat). The study was conducted over a six-week period with the team of investigators monitoring how the various food types affected the mice.

Then, the scientists evaluated the relationship of food along with emotions and behavior with scientifically validated methods. They also examined how the brains of the mice changed in response to the food. The mice that had been on a higher-fat diet showed anxiety and their brains had been changed by their experiences.

“By working with mice, whose brains are in many ways comparable to our own, we discovered that the neurochemistry of the animals who had been fed a high fat, sugary diet were different from those who had been fed a healthy diet,” noted Dr. Stephanie Fulton in the prepared statement. “The chemicals changed by the diet are associated with depression. A change of diet then causes withdrawal symptoms and a greater sensitivity to stressful situations, launching a vicious cycle of poor eating.”

In particular, the researchers explored the molecule dopamine and how it allows the brain to provide good feelings when rewarded. When the brain feels rewarded, it encourages individuals to pursue specific actions. This chemical is found in both mice and humans. The scientists explained how the CREB molecule manages the activation of genes that are involved in the functioning of the brain. The CREB also aids the formation of memories.

“CREB is much more activated in the brains of higher-fat diet mice and these mice also have higher levels of corticosterone, a hormone that is associated with stress. This explains both the depression and the negative behavior cycle,” continued Fulton in the statement. “It’s interesting that these changes occur before obesity. These findings challenge our understanding of the relationship between diet, the body and the mind. It is food for thought about how we might support people psychologically as they strive to adopt healthy eating habits, regardless of their current corpulence.”

The findings from the study were recently published in the online edition of the International Journal of Obesity. Funding for the project was provided the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, the Canadian Diabetes Association, as well as the Research Council of Canada.

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Vision loss that has been associated with diabetes has been on the incline in the US, with a 20 percent increase seen in less than 10 years. As prevalence of diabetes is also on the rise, and is now being seen more and more in younger people, health experts are worried that a growing number of people are going to suffer from vision problems–notably nonrefractive vision impairment (NVI).

Publishing the results of a new study in the December 12 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), David Friedman, from the Wilmer Eye Institute of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, said the findings are dramatic, “and they’re kind of the tip of the iceberg of what’s coming ahead.”

Nonrefractive vision impairment (NVI), which includes glaucoma and cataracts, cannot be corrected with glasses, and typically requires laser therapy or surgery. In some cases the condition can lead to permanent vision loss, especially if the problem is not identified and treated early on.

“It is estimated that more than 14 million individuals in the United States aged 12 years and older are visually impaired (<20/40). Of these cases, 11 million are attributable to refractive error. In the United States, the most common causes of nonrefractive visual impairment are age-related macular degeneration, cataract, diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma, and other retinal disorders,” according to background information in the article.

Previous studies have shown that visual impairment is common in persons with diabetes. And as the prevalence of diabetes diagnosis has climbed from 4.9 percent in 1990, to 11.3 percent in 2010, the prevalence of vision loss is also expected to rise.

Fang Ko, MD, also of Johns Hopkins, led a study to assess the prevalence of NVI and factors associated with risk of visual impairment. The study included data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), a representative sampling of the US population.

For the study, Ko and colleagues had a total of 19,951 participants 20 years and older fill out questionnaires, conduct lab tests, and undergo physical examinations. The participants were used in two separate study experiments: 9,471 in the first experiment from 1999-2002 and 10,480 in the second, which ran from 2005-2008.

Using a visual acuity of <20/40 as a guideline for vision impairment, the team found that prevalence of NVI increased 21 percent, from 1.4 percent in 1999-2002 to 1.7 percent in 2005-2008. They also discovered that visual impairment increased 40 percent among non-Hispanic Whites 20-39 years old (from 0.5 percent to 0.7 percent).

In the analysis, the study team factored in older age, poverty, lower education level and diabetes diagnosed 10 or more years ago. Among these risk factors, only diabetes has increased in prevalence between the two time periods in the study. Diabetes prevalence increased 22 percent overall from 2.8 percent to 3.6 percent; and 133 percent among non-Hispanic Whites 20-39 years old (0.3 percent to 0.7 percent).

While the study cannot prove that diabetes was behind the rise in vision impairment, the other factors that were associated with NVI were either the same or better in the latter study population compared to the earlier one.

“The only (association) that got worse and got dramatically worse is diabetes, and not just diabetes, but diabetes for a long time,” Friedman told Genevra Pittman of Reuters Health.

“If the current finding becomes a persisting trend, it could result in increasing rates of disability in the U.S. population, including greater numbers of patients with end-organ diabetic damage who would require ophthalmic care,” wrote the study authors. “These results have important implications for resource allocation in the debate of distribution of limited medical services and funding. Continued monitoring of visual disability and diabetes, as well as additional research addressing causes, prevention, and treatment, is warranted.”

Vision problems related to diabetes develop when fluid accumulates in the retina, causing blurriness. Also, blood vessels grow in the back of the eyes due to lack of oxygen, further complicating the matter.

Friedman noted that the type of vision loss measured in the study isn´t blindness, but would make it harder for people to live independently and would force a lot of people to either give up driving or have restrictions in place.

David C. Musch, PhD, MPH, and Thomas W. Gardner, MD, MS, both of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, wrote in an accompanying editorial that the results “are indeed meaningful, considering the cohort of young people for whom a milieu of sociodemographic and lifestyle factors have led to increased risk of type 2 diabetes and its consequences, which include nonrefractive visual impairment.”

“This report should send an important message to pediatricians, family practitioners, internists, and ophthalmologists who already are seeing an increase of type 2 diabetes among their younger patients, and should alert public health planners, who need to prepare for the effects on the health care system,” they continued. “The findings of Ko et al should also stimulate funding for new and ongoing efforts to prevent the underlying causes that lead to diabetes and its complications such as obesity-prevention programs aimed at children and adolescents.”

“This is probably only one of a number of signs that will be evident in the near future if we continue to have young children and adolescents be overweight and obese,” Musch said in a Reuters Health interview, noting that more children and adolescents are being diagnosed with what used to be considered “adult onset” diabetes.

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Everyone knows that smoking is bad for their health. Studies have shown that even moderate to light smokers are taking a huge risk by lighting up. Now, a new study tracking the health of 101,000 US nurses In the Nurses´ Health Study over three decades further shows that smoking is deadly.

The study, published in the American Heart Association´s (AHA) journal Circulation: Arrhythmia & Electrophysiology, has found that smoking more than doubles a woman´s risk of sudden cardiac death. And even those who smoke only one cigarette a day are nearly twice as likely to die. Those who are long-term smokers are at the greatest risk, but those who can quit can reduce the risk significantly over time.

Sudden cardiac death is the leading cause of heart-related deaths in the US and is responsible for up to 400,000 deaths every year.

“Cigarette smoking is a known risk factor for sudden cardiac death, but until now, we didn’t know how the quantity and duration of smoking effected the risk among apparently healthy women, nor did we have long-term follow-up,” said study lead author Roopinder K. Sandhu, MD, MPH, a cardiac electrophysiologist at the University of Alberta´s Mazankowski Heart Institute.

Most of the participants in the study were white, and all were between 30 and 55 at the start of the study. On average, those who smoked reported that they started the habit in their late teens. During the course of the thirty-year study, 351 participants died of sudden cardiac death.

In women under 35 who die of sudden cardiac death, the association is more often than not linked to family medical history. But in older women, such as those in the study, sudden cardiac death is more readily attributable to factors such as smoking. In the 351 sudden cardiac deaths in the study, 75 were among current smokers, 148 were among recent or past smokers and 128 were non-smokers.

After taking other heart risk factors into account, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and family history of heart disease, Sandhu and colleagues found the women who smoked were more than twice as likely to die suddenly as those who never smoked. And for every five years of continued smoking, that risk rose 8 percent. Even those who smoked less than 14 cigarettes per day had a nearly two-fold increase in risk of sudden cardiac death.

The women who see the biggest benefit are those who quit smoking and remain smoke-free for 20 years, with risk of sudden cardiac death falling to that of someone who never smoked.

“What this study really tells women is how important it is to stop smoking. The benefits in terms of sudden cardiac death reduction are there for all women, not just those with established heart disease,” said Sandhu. “It can be difficult to quit. It needs to be a long-term goal. It’s not always easily achievable and it may take more than one attempt.”

“This study shows that smoking just a couple of cigarettes a day could still seriously affect your future health,” Ellen Mason, senior cardiac nurse at the British Heart Foundation, told the BBC´s Michelle Roberts in an interview. “As we approach the New Year, many of us will be making resolutions and giving up smoking will be top of the list for lots of people.”

“If you’re thinking of quitting and need a nudge, this research adds to the wealth of evidence that stopping smoking is the single best thing you can do for your heart health,” noted Mason.

The evidence is supported by a recent study in The Lancet of 1.2 million women that found those who gave up smoking by the age of 30 would almost completely avoid the risks of dying early from tobacco-related diseases.

“This is an important study because it links smoking to sudden cardiac death in those unfortunate women who don´t make it to the hospital,” Nieca Goldberg, MD, medical director of the women’s heart program at New York University´s (NYU) Langone Medical Center, told WebMD´s Jennifer Warner.

“The study shows that even modest levels of smoking can increase the risk of sudden cardiac death,” added Goldberg, a spokesperson for the American Heart Association. “People should know that just one cigarette is too much.”

Nicotine is believed to have some immediate effects that can lead to life-threatening irregular heartbeats and sudden cardiac death. And cigarette smoke is known to cause scarring of the heart tissue. This effect can persist for long after a person quits smoking and is a contributor to the risk of sudden cardiac death.

“Cigarette smoking is an important modifiable risk factor for sudden cardiac death for women both with and without heart disease,” Sandhu said. “Women shouldn´t wait until the development of heart disease to quit.”

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

According to a new study published in the journal Radiology, a combination of a few diagnostic tests could improve prediction of Alzheimer’s disease.

More than 35 million people around the world are living with Alzheimer’s disease, according to the World Health Organization. This disease is incurable and the prevalence is expected to double by 2030.

“Although there is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, there are four symptomatic treatments that might provide some benefits,” coauthor P. Murali Doraiswamy, M.D. and professor of psychiatry at Duke University Medical Center, said in a statement. “So developing the right combination of diagnostic tests is critical to make sure we enable an accurate and early diagnosis in patients, so they can evaluate their care options.”

The team combined diagnostic tests, including imaging and cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers, and found by doing so, it can improve prediction of conversion from mild cognitive impairment (MCI) to Alzheimer’s disease.

The study looked at 97 patients with MCI from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative. They analyzed baseline MRI and FDG-PET results, as well as cerebrospinal fluid proteins and compared these to cognitive outcomes at two to three years.

Findings from the study showed combining MRI, FDG-PET and cerebrospinal fluid data with routine clinical tests significantly improved the accuracy of predicting conversion to Alzheimer’s disease. The combined testing reduced false classification rate from 41.3 percent to 28.4 percent.

“In an ideal world, you’d obtain all information available–regardless of cost or number of tests–for the best prediction of cognitive decline,” Jeffrey R. Petrella, M.D., associate professor of radiology at DUMC, said in a statement. “However, there’s a trade-off between adding testing–some of which may add little new information–with the inconvenience, cost and risk to the patient.”

FDG-PET contributed more information to routine tests than cerebrospinal fluid or MRI.

“Though all the tests added some unique information,” Dr. Petrella said. “FDG-PET appeared to strike the best balance, adding the most prognostic information for patients with mild cognitive impairment.”

The researchers say additional long-term studies are still needed in order to further validate the data.

“Because new treatments are likely to be most effective at the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s disease, there is great urgency to develop sensitive markers that facilitate detection and monitoring of early brain changes in individuals at risk,” Petrella added.

Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Amgen, a giant biotechnology company, said it plans to pay $415 million to acquire a gene-hunting company.

Amgen said on Monday it plans to purchase deCODE Genetics, a company based in Iceland and known for discoveries such as finding that the genetic nature of human disease was far more complex than thought.

The two companies hope the deal will be symbolic, as deCODE receives a well-financed partner, and Amgen capitalizes on new research brought on by the gene-hunting business.

DeCODE studied the local population in Iceland to identify genetic variations linked to schizophrenia, cancer and other diseases. In the past year, the company published a study identifying a rare mutation that protects people from getting Alzheimer’s disease.

DeCODE has had trouble building a sustainable business, and filed for bankruptcy protection back in 2009. The company was bought out of bankruptcy in 2010 by Saga Investments. An issue for the gene-hunting company has been finding a way for it to make money from its discoveries.

Amgen, the world’s largest independent biotechnology company, said it can use deCODE’s findings and technology to its advantage, according to a report by the New York Times.

The Times wrote that Dr. Sean Harper, Amgen´s executive vice president for research and development, said drugs based on human genetic discoveries have a better track record than those based on animal studies.

“This is a magical moment when it comes to the possibility of utilizing genetics,” Kari Stefansson, Amgen’s chief executive officer, told Business Week. “I have been dreaming of a moment when we can have an impact on health care through genetics.”

The transaction doesn’t require regulatory approval, and is expected to be completed by the end of the year.

Amgen acquired Micromet Inc earlier this year for $1.16 billion, helping it to add an experimental leukemia drug to its repertoire.

Eric Schmidt, an analyst with Cowen & Co., wrote to Business Week and said that it is way too early to know whether things will work out in favor of the companies. He added that the answer to that may come in 10 years from now.

[ Watch the Video: Teens and Tweens Should Get Tested for Hearing Loss ]

redOrbit Staff & Wire Reports – Your Universe Online

Parents strongly favor required hearing screenings for children and teens under the age of 18, according to results released Monday from the University of Michigan´s National Poll on Children’s Health.

The poll asked the parents whether they´d support requirements for hearing screening, and where they would prefer to have the screenings conducted.

The results showed that two-thirds of parents support hearing screenings across all ages. Broken down by age group, 77 percent of the parents said they support required hearing screenings for 2- to 3-year-olds, 82 percent support the screenings for 6- to 7-year-olds, 71 percent supporting screening 10- to 11-year-olds and 67 percent supporting screening for 16- to 17-year-olds.

“Screening in preschool and elementary school-age children is routine in many states. That screening is very effective at identifying children with hearing loss that can impact communication. Screenings can help get children the treatment they need before they experience delays in speech, language, and learning,” said Jaynee Handelsman, Ph.D., director of pediatric audiology for the University of Michigan C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital, which directed the poll.

“What was surprising about the poll results was the overwhelming support for required hearing screening for older children and teenagers,” Handelsman said.

“Hearing screening for tweens and teens is uncommon. However, as the parents in our poll recognize, children in these age groups may develop hearing loss as time goes on, possibly from extended listening to loud noise, such as through personal, portable listening devices like MP3 players.”

The poll results are encouraging, Handelsman said, because they show parents recognize the need for continual screening.

This is important because a student might pass the hearing tests as a kindergartener, but develop hearing loss or hearing problems later in life.

Exposure to loud music through earbuds, headphones and personal audio devices can be damaging, but the duration of sound can be just as damaging, Handelsman explained.

If children are constantly bombarded with sound — from music players, computers, televisions, video games — they reach a point where they’ve simply heard too much.

“We really wanted to know how parents felt about requiring hearing screenings, and no one had asked the public about this before,” said Dr. Marci Lesperance, division chief of pediatric otolaryngology at the University of Michigan Health System.

“Hearing screenings are usually managed through public health departments, and as government budgets are squeezed, funding for these screenings is at risk.”

“Hearing loss is an invisible disability, and does not result in hospitalization if untreated – but the costs can be social, emotional, and educational.”

The results of the poll also revealed that parents are more likely to prefer the primary care office for hearing screenings in preschoolers and 6- to 7-year-olds, but prefer school-based screenings for tweens and teens.

The full C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health can be viewed here.

Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Perfection is something that all humans strive for at one time or another, be it scoring a perfect 100 on a test, making the perfect soufflé, having the perfect play in basketball, or even landing the perfect job. For others, perfection is a state of well-being–as in being perfectly healthy. While achieving perfect health may be plausible in sense of how one feels, new research shows that, at the genetic level, nobody will ever be perfect.

Researchers from the UK have found that, on average, a normal healthy person has no less than 400 potentially damaging DNA variants known to be associated with disease traits. In a study, these researchers also showed that one in 10 people is expected to develop a genetic disease as a result of carrying these variant genes.

Scientists have long known that all people carry some harmful genetic variants, but this is the first time researchers have been able to quantify how many variants each person has on average, and also list them. The study authors said this figure is likely to increase as more powerful genetic studies discover rare genetic variants more efficiently.

While most of these genetic variants are considered “silent” mutations and do not affect health, the team said they can cause problems as they pass down through generations. Some of the more harmful genetic variants found were linked to cancer and heart disease.

Dr. Yali Xue, lead author of the research from Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute at Cambridge, said: “For over half a century, medical geneticists have wanted to establish the magnitude of the damage caused by harmful variants in our genomes. Our study finally brings us closer to understanding the extent of these damaging mutations.”

The evidence comes from the 1,000 Genomes Pilot Project, which has been mapping normal human genetic differences, from tiny changes in DNA to major mutations. The researchers also gleaned data “from the Human Gene Mutation Database (HGMD), a detailed catalogue of human disease-causing mutations that have been reported in scientific literature,” said Xue.

Xue and his colleagues compared the genomes of 179 participants, who were healthy at the time their DNA was sampled, with a database of human mutations compiled at Cardiff University. The research found that along with the 400 average variations, most people also have two DNA changes known to be associated with disease.

“Ordinary people carry disease-causing mutations without them having any obvious effect,” said Dr. Chris Tyler-Smith, a lead researcher on the study from Wellcome. “In a population there will be variants that have consequences for their own health.”

This research gives insight into the “flaws that make us all different, sometimes with different expertise and different abilities, but also different predispositions in diseases,” study coauthor Prof. David Cooper of Cardiff, said in an interview with the BBC´s Helen Briggs.

“Not all human genomes have perfect sequences,” he said in the interview. “The human genome is packed with pervasive, architectural flaws.”

“In the majority of people we found to have a potential disease-causing mutation, the genetic condition is actually quite mild, or would only become apparent in the later decades of life,” Cooper said in a separate statement. “We now know that normal healthy people can possess many damaged or even completely inactivated proteins without any noticeable impact on their health. It is extremely difficult to predict the clinical consequences of a given genetic variant, but databases such as HGMD promise to come into their own as we enter the new era of personalized medicine.”

The work to catalog disease-causing variants has been ongoing for more than two decades, yet the work is still far from complete. Disease variants are extremely rare for the most part and comprehensive searches for such mutations have so far only scratched the surface.

But as DNA sequencing becomes more common in humans, geneticists must determine ethical ways to go about handling sensitive data. For this latest study, researchers anonymized the samples so as not to offer participants any information as to whether or not they may be at risk for a particular genetic disorder.

Tyler-Smith said currently there is no clear answer for what is ethical and what is not when it comes to sharing genetic variation data and potential incidental findings with volunteers in their study.

“All of our genomes contain flaws; some of us will carry deleterious variants but will not be at risk of acquiring the associated disease for one reason or another. For others, there will be health consequences, and early warning could be useful, but might still come as an unwelcome surprise to the participant,” he concluded.

This study is published in the American Journal of Human Genetics.

April Flowers for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Finding the exact genetic code that programs the ear´s machinery for responding to sound waves and converting them into electrical impulses in the inner ear has been something of a holy grail for the scientists who study the genetics of hearing and deafness.

A new study from The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI) has brought this search to fruition by identifying a critical component of the ear-to-brain conversation. This component is a protein called TMHS, a critical player in the ear´s so-called ℠mechanotransduction channels´. These channels convert the signals from mechanical sound waves into electrical impulses which are then transmitted to the nervous system.

The findings of this study were published recently in the journal Cell.

“Scientists have been trying for decades to identify the proteins that form mechanotransduction channels,” said Ulrich Mueller, a professor in the Department of Cell Biology and director of the Dorris Neuroscience Center at TSRI. The results suggest a promising new approach toward gene therapy.

The team was able to place functional TMHS into the sensory cells for sound perception in newborn deaf mice. This laboratory experiment allowed the researchers to restore the function of these cells.

“In some forms of human deafness, there may be a way to stick these genes back in and fix the cells after birth,” said Mueller.

Previous studies have found specific genetic forms of this protein in people with common inherited forms of deafness. This new discovery would also seem to suggest the first explanation for how these genetic variations affect hearing loss.

Receptor cells deep in the ear collect vibrations and convert them into electrical signals and are the physical basis for hearing and mechanotransduction. These signals run along nerve fibers to areas in the brain where they are interpreted as sound. This basic mechanism evolved early in the history of life on Earth, and structures nearly identical to the modern human inner ear have been found in the fossilized remains of dinosaurs that died out 120 million years ago. Almost all mammals today share the basic inner ear structure.

Mechanical vibration waves travel from a sound source to hit the outer ear, propagate down the ear canal into the middle ear and strike the eardrum. A delicate set of bones is moved by the vibrating eardrum, communicating the vibrations to a fluid-filled spiral in the inner ear known as the cochlea. The moving bones compress a membrane on one side of the cochlea, causing the fluid inside to move.

Specialized hair cells inside the cochlea have symmetric arrays of extensions known as stereocilia protruding out from their surface. The moving fluid inside the cochlea causes the stereocilia to move, which in turn causes proteins known as ion channels to open. Sensory neurons surrounding the hair cells monitor the opening of the channels. When those neurons sense some threshold level of stimulation, they fire off communicating electrical signals to the auditory cortex of the brain.

Hearing involves many structures and is such a complex process that there are hundreds and hundreds of underlying genes involved. There are many ways it can be disrupted as well.

Long before birth, hair cells form in the inner ear. Humans are born with a finite number of these hair cells, as they do not regenerate themselves throughout life. Many, if not most, forms of deafness are associated with defects and loss of these hair cells. Genetic forms of deafness emerge when those hair cells are unable to transduce sound waves into electrical signals.

Scientists have identified dozens of genes linked to hearing loss over the years. Some of these genes have been identified from genetic studies involving deaf people and some from studies with mice, which have inner ear structures remarkably similar to humans.

A clear picture of how these genes interact to form the biological basis of hearing has been missing, however. Though scientists have known that many of these genes are involved in deafness, they haven’t been able to account for the various forms of hearing loss. However, the picture is becoming clearer since the discovery of TMHS, which plays a role in a molecular complex called the ℠tip link´.

Several years ago, it was discovered that the tip link caps the stereocilia protruding out of hair cells. The tip links connect neighboring stereocilia at the top, bundling them together. When they are missing, the hair cells become splayed apart.

The tip links do more than maintain the structure of these bundles, however, they also house the machinery crucial for hearing — the proteins that physically receive the force of a sound wave and transduce it into electrical impulses by regulating the activity of ion channels. Mueller’s lab previously identified the molecules that form the tip links. But the ion channels and the molecules that connect the tip links to the channels remained elusive. Mueller says that scientists have been searching for the exact identity of the proteins responsible for this process for years.

The new study reveals that TMHS is one of the lynchpins of this process. TMHS is a subunit of the protein-based ion channel that directly binds it to the tip link. If the TMHS protein is missing, hair cells that are otherwise completely normal lose their ability to send electrical signals.

Mueller’s team demonstrated this using a lab technique that emulates hearing with cells in the test tube. Sounds are imitated by vibrations that are deflected off the cells, and the cells can be probed to see if they can transduce the vibrations into electrical signals. What these tests showed is that with TMHS, this ability to transduce disappears.

This, say the researchers, is a crucial puzzle piece in understanding the genetic basis of hearing and hearing loss.

“We can now start to understand how organisms convert mechanical signals to electrical signals, which are the language of the brain,” concluded Mueller.

Connie K. Ho for redOrbit.com — Your Universe Online

One out of 5 U.S. adults take aspirin on a daily basis. With this in mind, scientists from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn) set out to study “aspirin resistance” and discovered that resistance to low-dose aspirin therapy is not all that common. Experts say this calls into question the common practice of using blood and urine screens to test for aspirin resistance.

According to The New York Times, the study was partially funded by aspirin manufacturer Bayer and the results of the study were recently published in the journal Circulation. Aspirin has been used for years for its benefits in the prevention of heart disease. For people who have suffered a heart attack, taking low-dose aspirin can help reduce the possibly of a second heart attack by approximately one fifth.

Previous prevention studies have found that, for patients who have never had a heart attack, taking low-dose aspirin can reduce the risk of having a heart attack about the same amount as the risk of causing the person´s stomach to bleed.

“The incidence of true aspirin resistance is vanishingly small, and the idea of testing for it is seriously undermined by this study,” commented Dr. Garret FitzGerald, director of the Institute for Translational Medicine and Therapeutics at UPenn, in an article on Philly.com.

In the study, the researchers looked for patients who had a genetic resistance to aspirin. They examined 400 healthy volunteers who considered themselves to be truly resistant to the advantages of using aspirin due to their consistently weak anti-clotting ability. They also looked at two tests that were thought to diagnose a patient´s aspirin resistance. One screening technique was a blood test and another was an FDA-approved urine test that looks for an indirect marker of platelet stickiness.

The scientists did not find “aspirin resistance,” but they did discover people who had “pseudoresistance” based on aspirin´s ability to possibly protect the stomach. As such, neither screening test was supported in the study.

“When we looked for aspirin resistance using the platelet test, it detected it in about one-third of our volunteers,” explained Dr. Tilo Grosser, a research assistant professor of Pharmacology at UPenn, in a prepared statement. “But, when we looked a second time at the incidence of aspirin resistance in the volunteers, the one-third that we measured who was now resistant was mostly different people. Nobody had a stable pattern of resistance that was specific to coated aspirin.”

The team of investigators also decided to compare the result of coated aspirin along with regular uncoated aspirin in a volunteer subgroup. They found that the coating slowed down the absorption compared to the uncoated aspirin, which caused a false view of aspirin resistance for people who were taking the coated aspirin. Coated aspirin is more expensive than the cheap, generic version of uncoated aspirin, but the coated aspirin did not prove to decrease the possibly of serious stomach bleeds as compared to uncoated aspirin.

“These studies question the value of coated, low-dose aspirin,” remarked FitzGerald, an expert on blood clotting, in the statement. “This product adds cost to treatment, without any clear benefit. Indeed, it may lead to the false diagnosis of aspirin resistance and the failure to provide patients with an effective therapy. Our results also call into question the value of using office tests to look for such resistance.”

Others have contested the results of the study.

“Obviously, this study was in healthy volunteers, so it’s a bit difficult to make a direct translation to patients with a stroke or cardiac event,” said Brian Bartolomeo, market development manager for Accumetrics, the company that makes the blood tests.

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

Snoring can be more than just an annoyance–if untreated it can have the same effect on the cardiovascular system as diabetes, according to new research from a Romanian medical doctor.

The research, which was presented this week at the at EUROECHO and other Imaging Modalities 2012 conference by Dr. Raluca Mincu, showed that the nighttime breathing disorder is a sign of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a condition known to cause a variety of illnesses and disorders, and can also lead to serious accidents.

OSA has been closely associated with cardiovascular disorders, including increased risk of hypertension, arrhythmia, obesity, myocardial infarction, and stroke.

“There are not enough studies in the medical literature on early cardiovascular dysfunction in patients with OSA, when active steps can be taken to prevent progression to heart failure,” Mincu said. “Because OSA leads to so many cardiovascular disorders, we compared early cardiovascular dysfunction in OSA patients and patients with diabetes mellitus, which is a typical risk factor for cardiovascular disease.”

In the study, 20 patients with moderate to severe OSA (and no diabetes), 20 patients with treated type 2 diabetes mellitus, and 20 healthy patients were assessed for their arterial function. All five metrics used to measure arterial stiffness were significantly higher in the OSA and diabetes mellitus groups compared to the control group. The OSA and diabetes groups also showed poor endothelial function.

“Patients with moderate to severe OSA had endothelial dysfunction and higher arterial stiffness than controls, and their results were similar to patients with diabetes mellitus,” Mincu explained. “This suggests that OSA is associated with a high risk for cardiovascular disease.”

“Patients in the OSA and diabetes groups had a higher intima-media thickness (IMT), which shows that their arteries are remodeled in a pathological way,” she added.

Mincu said her research shows that people who snore should not consider it a simple nighttime nuisance.

“Patients should realize that behind snoring there can be a serious cardiac pathology and they should get referred to a sleep specialist,” she said. “If they are diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea, they are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease and need to adopt a heart healthy lifestyle to reduce that risk.”

Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is the typically prescribed treatment for sleep apnea and many people resist it because the treatment requires the sleeper to wear a mask, which can be unpleasant. Another problem with CPAP is that it only provides a continuous airflow and does not treat the underlying cause of OSA.

“Although OSA treatment with (CPAP) is inconvenient — it requires sleeping with a mask — patients should use it because it can reverse the parameters measured in our study,” Mincu said.

The Romanian doctor said she hopes her study spurs additional research and dialogue surrounding the treatment of OSA.

“Our study is a signal for cardiologists, pneumologists and general practitioners to work together to actively diagnose obstructive sleep apnea, administer the appropriate treatment (CPAP) and assess arterial function,” she said. “This will help avoid progression of early cardiovascular dysfunction through to heart failure, the final stage of heart disease.”

Brett Smith for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online

In a study that´s bound to be popular with red wine drinkers, British researchers from the University of Leicester have found that resveratrol, a chemical found in the popular beverage, could reduce the risk of cancer.

Using laboratory models, the scientists were able to suggest that a daily dose of resveratrol, equivalent to two glasses of red wine, can decrease the risk of bowel cancer by 50 percent. Based on these calculations, the researchers now plan to stage clinical trials to find the optimum dose for supplements of the red grape skin extract.

“A lot of people take resveratrol as a supplement, but at the moment we don’t know how it works or on whom it can work until we have more information — we don’t even know the best dose you should take,” said Karen Brown, a member of the University’s Cancer Biomarkers and Prevention Group. “It has been shown that high doses of resveratrol may potentially interfere with other medication.”

“At the University of Leicester, we want to see how resveratrol might work to prevent cancer in humans,” she added. “Having shown in our lab experiments that it can reduce tumor development we are now concentrating on identifying the mechanisms of how resveratrol works in human cells.”

The prospective health benefits of resveratrol have been acknowledged in the past, and the chemical even inspired an international conference in 2010.The researchers from Leicester revealed their findings this week at the sequel to that original conference: Resveratrol 2012.

“This is the second conference that brings together all the world experts in resveratrol,” said Brown, one of the conference organizers. “We have got a fantastic line up covering cancer, heart disease, diabetes, neurological diseases and life extension.”

The conference features new findings culled from the last two years of research and is expected to show the chemical´s impact on battling cancer, heart disease and diabetes. The findings will be presented in over 65 lectures, presentations and posters by different researchers from around the world. The gathering is also expected to prompt recommendations for the coming year’s scientific research on resveratrol.

“With all the exciting new studies that are being done – especially the clinical trials – I hope we’ll have a clearer picture in the next few years,” Brown said.

Resveratrol has a long history of being linked with cancer prevention. In 1997, researchers reported that mice that were given a known carcinogen resisted the development of skin cancer after topical applications of the chemical. Several other animal studies have shown similar results, including those involving gastrointestinal and mammary tumors.

Several other animal studies have touted the benefits of resveratrol as well. In 2006, Italian scientists found that supplements of the chemical extended the life of a typically short-lived fish by 56 percent. In 2008, Cornell University scientists found that resveratrol conveyed neuroprotective effects in animal brains. The chemical has also been found to have anti-inflammatory, antiviral and testosterone-boosting effects in a host of other studies.

The results of these studies have given rise to the marketing of resveratrol supplements, which have not been proven effective by robust clinical trials.