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Tuesday, December 09, 2014
Eczema Cases Rising Among U.S. Children: Report
Eczema is a chronic condition that usually starts in childhood, and causes patches of skin to become dry, inflamed and often intensely itchy.
And, studies have shown, eczema seems to be on the rise.
Based on a household survey by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the prevalence of eczema among kids younger than 18 rose between 2000 and 2010: from around 9 percent to 17 percent among black children; from 5 percent to 10 percent among Hispanic kids; and from around 8 percent to almost 13 percent among white children.
"We don't know for certain why that is," said Dr. Anna Bruckner, one of the authors of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) report.
Greater awareness of eczema and higher rates of diagnosis are likely part of it, according to Bruckner, who directs pediatric dermatology at Children's Hospital Colorado.
"But the incidence of the [eczema] is probably increasing, too," she said.
The AAP detailed the best ways to manage atopic dermatitis, more commonly known as eczema, in a report released online Nov. 24 in the journal Pediatrics.
The treatments described in the AAP report are not new, Bruckner said. But since so many kids have eczema -- and there are so few pediatric dermatologists -- all pediatricians need to be up to speed on the skin condition, according to Bruckner.
A pediatric dermatologist who reviewed the report agreed. "Pediatricians really need to understand this condition, and how to manage it," said Dr. Ana Duarte, director of pediatric dermatology at Miami Children's Hospital.
For most children with eczema, topical treatments and careful skin care are enough to control the condition, according to Bruckner.
Topical steroids are the mainstay for treating inflammation. Low-potency products, like hydrocortisone, usually work well -- but parents often hesitate to use them, Bruckner noted.
"There are a lot of misconceptions about the safety of [topical steroids]," she said. Oral or high-potency topical steroids can cause side effects like thinning of the skin, or even growth retardation, Bruckner pointed out -- but the milder products needed for most cases of eczema are safe.
View the original article here
Early Trial Promising for Ebola Vaccine
The success of the phase I clinical trial for the vaccine paves the way for field-testing it in the Ebola-stricken West African nations of Liberia and Sierra Leone as early as January, said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
The genetically engineered vaccine caused no major side effects in 20 healthy adults who received a dose in September at the NIH Clinical Center in Bethesda, Md., the researchers report in the Nov. 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
The vaccine also created an immune system response in humans very similar to that of monkeys who, once inoculated, survived lab tests that exposed them to potentially fatal doses of Ebola, Fauci said.
"All in all, one can say this is a successful vaccine, from the standpoint of phase I," Fauci said. "Now the critical question is, will it work?"
Ebola has killed more than 5,450 people during the West African epidemic, according to the World Health Organization. In response, international efforts to develop a preventive vaccine have accelerated.
The current vaccine, developed by the Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and GlaxoSmithKline, is based on a virus called chimpanzee-derived adenovirus, which causes a common cold in chimps but has no effect on humans.
Researchers have spliced portions of Ebola's genetic material into the chimp virus, to trick the immune system into creating Ebola-attacking antibodies without exposing the body to the virus itself.
The clinical trial enrolled volunteers aged 18 to 50. Ten volunteers received a low-dose injection of the vaccine, while another 10 received the same vaccine at a higher dose.
Within a day of vaccination, two people who got the higher dose developed a fever, which was "short-lived and easily handled," Fauci said.
View the original article here
Early Puberty Linked to Increased Risk of Depression in Teens
Early puberty was linked with a number of factors associated with depression, such as poor self-image and high anxiety levels, according to the researchers. Early puberty was also linked to social problems, such as conflict with family and peers, and having friends who were prone to getting into trouble, the study found.
Although the study found an association between early puberty and these factors, it's important to note that the study wasn't designed to show that early puberty was the cause of these issues.
"Only some teens are vulnerable to the effects of early maturation, particularly those with more disruption in their families and less support in their peer relationships," study leader Karen Rudolph, a psychology professor at the University of Illinois, said in a university news release.
The study also found that early puberty was associated with an increased risk of depression in boys as well as girls.
"It is often believed that going through puberty earlier than peers only contributes to depression in girls," Rudolph said. "We found that early maturation can also be a risk for boys as they progress through adolescence, but the timing is different than in girls," she added.
"In girls, early maturation seems to trigger immediate psychological and environmental risks and consequent depression," Rudolph said. "Pubertal changes cause early maturing girls to feel badly about themselves, cope less effectively with social problems, affiliate with deviant peers, enter riskier and more stressful social contexts and experience disruption and conflict within their relationships."
Initially, boys who entered puberty early had much lower rates of depression than girls, but had similar rates by the end of the study's fourth year.
"While early maturation seemed to protect boys from the challenges of puberty initially, boys experienced an emerging cascade of personal and contextual risks -- negative self-image, anxiety, social problems and interpersonal stress -- that eventuated in depression as they moved through adolescence," Rudolph said.
The study followed 160 youth for four years. It was published online in the journal Development and Psychopathology.
View the original article here
Dairy and Diabetes Risk: New Thinking?
Although experts say it’s too soon to draw clear conclusions, the findings seem to run counter to current advice to people with diabetes, who are generally told to pick low- or non-fat dairy products.
Recent studies on how dairy products might lower diabetes risk don't all reach the same verdict. Nor do they agree about exactly which types of dairy and which fat contents are best.
Some studies have found that yogurt has a strong effect on cutting diabetes risk, but not other dairy products.
What's clear is that dairy products benefit more than our bones, says Michael Tunick, PhD. He's a research chemist at the Agricultural Research Service at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
He reviewed recent research on dairy goods and health in a report published in November in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry. Besides preventing diabetes, lowering blood pressure, and reducing heart disease risk, he found research showing dairy products can even prevent tooth decay, obesity, and cancer.
''Diabetes prevention may be an added benefit that is unexpected," he says.
Last year, researchers pooled the results of 17 different studies that had looked at dairy foods and type 2 diabetes. Those who ate dairy products, including low-fat dairy and cheese, had a lower diabetes risk than those who did not.
More recently, Harvard researchers looked at the diet habits of more than 289,000 health professionals, including nurses and doctors. They also checked the results of 14 published studies looking at dairy and diabetes risk.
In this research, yogurt emerged as the star. While other types of dairy were not linked with a substantial drop in diabetes risk, yogurt was. The study didn't focus on one particular type of yogurt, beyond “plain” or “flavored.”
Eating a serving a day of yogurt lowered diabetes risk by about 19%, the researchers reported in November in BMC Medicine.
In another recent study, Swedish researchers looked separately at low-fat and high-fat dairy. They reported that men and women who ate eight or more servings of high-fat dairy products daily had a 23% lower risk of getting type 2 diabetes, compared to those who had one or less serving daily.
They found no link with low-fat dairy and diabetes, a finding that some experts say warrants more study.
View the original article here
Daily Statin Might Raise Your Risk for Cataracts: Study
While statins such as Zocor, Crestor and Lipitor protect many people from heart attack and stroke, they may raise the odds of developing the vision problem by 27 percent, the researchers report.
But the risk of developing cataracts -- a clouding of the lens of the eye -- is insignificant compared with the benefits of these drugs, said lead researcher Dr. G.B. John Mancini.
"The benefits of statins are far outweighed by any small risk for cataract surgery," said Mancini, a professor of medicine at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver.
"However, the indication for statin use should be solid from the outset and fully understood by patients," he added.
Mancini said this study can't prove that statins cause cataracts. "Careful observations in clinical trials are needed to support or refute this association," he said.
Dr. Mark Fromer, an ophthalmologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, said cataracts are very common. "In one's lifetime, the chance of developing a cataract is 100 percent," he said.
"The goal is we want to keep you alive long enough to get one, and that's where statins come in," he said. "Statins increase the length of life by decreasing strokes and heart attacks."
Cataracts can be treated with surgery that is "quick, painless and 99.9 percent successful," Fromer said. "So, since you are going to get a cataract anyway, you might as well take your statin -- it's in your best interest."
The study was published in the December issue of the Canadian Journal of Cardiology.
For the study, Mancini's team used the British Columbia Ministry of Health database from 2000 to 2007 and the IMS LifeLink U.S. database from 2001 to 2011. In all, they looked at more than 207,000 adults with cataracts and more than 1.1 million without them.
Among people in the Canadian database, those who took statins for at least a year had about a 27 percent increased risk of developing cataracts that needed surgery, compared with people not taking statins. The increased risk for patients in the U.S. database was only 7 percent, but that was still statistically significant, the researchers said.
Common Knee Surgery May Boost Arthritis Risk, Study Suggests
The procedure repairs tears in the meniscus, a piece of cartilage that acts as a shock absorber. There are two in each knee, and they stabilize the knee joint. Meniscal tears are one of the most common knee injuries, and surgery is often performed to reduce pain and improve joint function, the researchers said.
In their study, the scientists used MRI scans to look at 355 knees with arthritis, and compared them to a similar number of knees without arthritis. The average age of the patients was about 60 and most were overweight.
All 31 knees that were operated on to repair meniscal tears developed arthritis within a year, compared with 59 percent of knees with meniscal damage that did not have surgery.
Cartilage loss occurred in nearly 81 percent of knees that had meniscal surgery, compared with almost 40 percent of knees with meniscal damage that did not have surgery, the study found.
The study was to be presented Wednesday at the Radiological Society of North America annual meeting in Chicago.
Even though surgery to repair meniscal tears is common, "increasing evidence is emerging that suggests meniscal surgery may be detrimental to the knee joint," study author Dr. Frank Roemer, from Boston University School of Medicine and the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany, said in a society news release.
"The indications for meniscal surgery might need to be discussed more carefully in order to avoid accelerated knee joint degeneration," he suggested.
An alternative to surgery is physical therapy to help maintain and restore knee muscle strength and range of motion. Ice and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medications (NSAIDs) are also used to treat pain and symptoms, according to the release.
Consumers Will Pay More Out Of Pocket Next Year For Specialty Drugs
Americans with health coverage – including those who buy it through government insurance exchanges and Medicare beneficiaries – are likely to pay more out-of-pocket next year for so-called “specialty drugs,” which treat complex conditions, according to two studies from consulting firm Avalere Health.
More than half of the “bronze” plans now being sold to individuals through federal and state marketplaces for coverage that begins in January, for example, require payments of 30 percent or more of the cost of such drugs, Avalere said in a report out Tuesday. That’s up from 38 percent of bronze plans this year.
In “silver” level plans, the most commonly purchased exchange plans, 41 percent will require payments of 30 percent or more for specialty drugs, up from 27 percent in 2014.
As the cost of prescription medications rise, insurers are responding by requiring patients to pay a percentage of specialty drug costs, rather than a flat dollar amount, which is often far less. Insurers say the move helps slow premium increases.
But “in some cases this could make it difficult for patients to afford and stay on medications,” Avalere CEO Dan Mendelson said in a written statement.
While there is no standard definition of such drugs outside of the Medicare program, they are often expensive medications used to treat serious, chronic illnesses, such as multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, hemophilia, some cancers and hepatitis C. While lists of specialty drugs can differ by insurer and by policy type, drugs can include arthritis treatments Enbrel and Humira, cancer drugs Gleevec and Tarceva, hepatitis C treatment Sovaldi and MS drugs, Betaseron and Copaxone.
While they add up to only about 1 percent of all prescriptions written, specialty drugs account for 25 percent of spending on all drugs – an amount expected to rise rapidly, according to various studies.
An earlier Avalere analysis found that for the first time since Medicare’s drug program began in 2006, all of the stand-alone drug insurance plans place some drugs into specialty “tiers.” Two thirds of those plans require patients to pay a percentage of the costs of drugs in those tiers, rather than a flat dollar payment. Medicare plans can place a product into a specialty category only if the price negotiated with the drugmaker exceeds $600 a month.
Could a 'Mediterranean' Diet Extend Your Life?
Researchers found that the regimen -- rich in whole grains, vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, fish and olive oil -- appears to be associated with longer telomere length, which are indicators of slower aging.
Telomeres are located on the ends of chromosomes -- much like the plastic tips on the end of shoelaces. According to geneticists, telomeres prevent chromosomes from fraying and scrambling the genetic codes they contain. These bits of genetic material naturally shorten with age, but they tend to shorten more slowly in healthy people.
Shorter telomeres have long been associated with a greater risk of age-related diseases and a shorter life span, experts say.
The new study was led by Immaculata De Vivo, an associate professor at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, in Boston. Her team looked at data from more than 4,600 participants in the ongoing Nurses' Health Study, which has been tracking the health of U.S. nurses since 1976.
The participants were given a score of 0 to 9 on how closely they followed a Mediterranean diet, with a higher score indicating greater adherence to the regimen.
After adjusting for other factors, the researchers concluded that telomeres aged more slowly for every point a person went up on the scale.
However, the intake of individual food items in the Mediterranean diet was not associated with telomere length, which shows the importance of overall eating patterns on health, De Vivo's team said.
"To our knowledge, this is the largest population-based study specifically addressing the association between Mediterranean diet adherence and telomere length in healthy, middle-aged women," the researchers wrote. "Our results further support the benefits of adherence to the Mediterranean diet for promoting health and longevity."
According to De Vivo's team, prior research has linked the Mediterranean diet with better heart health, as well as a lowered risk for chronic disease and death.
The study, published Dec. 2 in the BMJ, was not designed to prove that the Mediterranean diet slowed the shortening of telomeres; it could only show an association.
CDC Endorses Circumcision for Health Reasons
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Tuesday released its first-ever draft guidelines on circumcision that recommend that doctors counsel parents and uncircumcised males on the health benefits of the procedure.
The guidelines do not outright call for circumcision of all male newborns, since that is a personal decision that may involve religious or cultural preferences, Dr. Jonathan Mermin, director of the CDC's National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD and TB Prevention, told the Associated Press.
But "the scientific evidence is clear that the benefits outweigh the risks," Mermin said.
Circumcision involves the surgical removal of the foreskin covering the tip of the penis. Germs can collect and multiply under the foreskin, creating issues of hygiene.
Clinical trials, many done in sub-Saharan Africa, have demonstrated that circumcision reduces HIV infection risk by 50 percent to 60 percent, the CDC guidelines note. The procedure also reduces by 30 percent the risk of contracting herpes and human papilloma virus (HPV), two pathogens believed to cause cancer of the penis.
The guidelines do point out that circumcision has only been proven to prevent HIV and sexually transmitted diseases in men during vaginal sex. The procedure has not been proven to reduce the risk of infection through oral or anal sex, or to reduce the risk of HIV transmission to female partners.
The scientific evidence is mixed regarding homosexual sex, the guidelines say, with some studies having shown that circumcision provides partial protection while other studies have not.
Circumcision does reduce the risk of urinary tract infections in infants, according to the CDC guidelines.
The most common risks associated with the procedure include bleeding and infection.
Male circumcision rates in the United States declined between 1979 and 2010, dropping from almost 65 percent to slightly more than 58 percent, according to a CDC report issued last year.
The new draft guidelines mirror an updated policy on circumcision released by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2012.
Brain Scans Yield Clues to Future Stroke Risk
The study included more than 2,000 people who had CT scans of the brain within 24 hours of suffering a mild, non-disabling stroke or a transient ischemic attack, which are sometimes called "mini-strokes." Of those patients, 40 percent had brain damage due to a lack of sufficient blood flow (ischemia).
Compared to people who didn't have an interruption in blood flow to part of their brains, the risk of another stroke within 90 days was almost three times higher in those with new brain damage due to poor blood circulation (acute ischemia), according to the researchers.
The study also found that the risk of another stroke was more than five times higher in people with previous brain damage from ischemia (chronic ischemia) in addition to the damage from the recent stroke.
The risk was also nearly five times higher in people with damage from insufficient blood flow along with any type of small blood vessel damage in the brain, according to the study. An example of small blood vessel damage is the narrowing of the small vessels (microangiopathy) in the brain.
The study also found that the risk of another stroke was about eight times higher in those people who had recent damage from ischemia and chronic ischemia, as well as small blood vessel damage.
While slightly more than 3 percent of all the patients in the study had another stroke within 90 days, the rate was 25 percent among those with all three types of damage to the brain, the researchers found.
"During the 90-day period, and also within the first two days after the initial attack, patients did much worse in terms of experiencing a subsequent stroke if they had additional areas of damage along with acute ischemia," co-senior author Dr. Jeffrey Perry, an associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of Ottawa in Canada, said in a news release from the American Heart Association.
"These findings should prompt physicians to be more aggressive in managing patients with transient ischemic attack [mini-stroke] or non-disabling stroke who are diagnosed with acute ischemia, especially if there is additional chronic ischemia and/or microangiopathy," he added.
Measures to prevent another stroke include heart monitoring or medications that lower blood pressure and cholesterol, or drugs to prevent blood clots, the researchers suggested.
The study was published online Dec. 4 in the journal Stroke.
Monday, December 08, 2014
BPA in Canned Goods May Raise Your Blood Pressure: Study
BPA previously has been linked to a variety of ills, including heart problems, developmental problems in children and high blood pressure. The chemical is widely used in products ranging from plastic bottles and food containers to dental fillings and cash register receipts. In cans, BPA is used as a lining, the researchers said.
"We found that drinking two canned beverages increased systolic blood pressure by 5 mm Hg," said lead researcher Dr. Yun-Chul Hong, director of the Environmental Health Center at Seoul National University College of Medicine in Korea.
Putting that in perspective, he said a 20 mm Hg increase in systolic blood pressure doubles the risk for heart disease. The systolic blood pressure number is always the first of two numbers given in a blood pressure reading.
"Because these results confirm findings from other studies, doctors and patients, particularly those with high blood pressure or heart disease, should be aware of the possible risks from increased blood pressure when consuming canned foods or beverages," he said.
Previous research has shown that BPA in containers can leach into food and beverages.
Since BPA acts like the hormone estrogen, Hong thinks it raises blood pressure as it interacts with cells in the heart and blood vessels that are sensitive to estrogen.
For the study, Hong's team had 60 men and women, aged 60 and up, drink soy milk from either cans or glass bottles on three occasions. The researchers assessed participants' blood pressure and heart rate two hours after drinking the soy milk and also tested their urine for BPA.
Urine tests showed a 1,600 percent increase in BPA among those who drank from cans, compared with those who drank from glass bottles. Soy milk was chosen for the test because it has no known ingredient that elevates blood pressure, the researchers said.
The report was published online Dec. 8 in the journal Hypertension.
Babies Still Sleeping With Soft Bedding Despite SIDS Risk: CDC
Use of soft bedding among parents declined sharply from 1993 through 2000, but has mostly leveled off since the early 2000s, the study found. The American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended since 1996 that infants be placed in sleeping environments without any soft surfaces or objects that might trap air, the study noted.
"Soft bedding has been shown to increase the risk of SIDS. Soft objects and loose bedding -- such as thick blankets, quilts and pillows -- can obstruct an infant's airway and impose suffocation risk," said lead author Carrie Shapiro-Mendoza, a senior scientist in the Maternal and Infant Health Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
About 16 babies per 100,000 died from accidental suffocation during sleep and 53 per 100,000 died from SIDS in 2010, according to background information in the study.
The researchers analyzed the results of the National Infant Sleep Position survey. This poll was conducted by phone annually between 1993 and 2010. Over that time, nearly 19,000 parents of children younger than 8 months answered questions about their baby's sleep environment. Most respondents were white mothers, nearly half had a college education, and about half had a previous child, according to the study.
The researchers found that the use of bedding for infants declined from an average of 86 percent between 1993 and 1995 to an average of 55 percent between 2008 and 2010. Most of that decline, however, occurred before 2000.
The findings were reported online Dec. 1 in Pediatrics.
The most common use of bedding occurred among teen mothers, more than 80 percent of whom used bedding. Not having a college education and younger mothers in general were also linked to more frequent use of bedding. Minority mothers were more likely than white mothers to use soft bedding, the study reported.
Are Routine Ultrasounds for Women With Dense Breasts Worthwhile?
Although dense breasts are a known risk factor for breast cancer, this increasingly common strategy doesn't appear to improve survival much but does "substantially" boost costs and false-positive results, researchers found.
"Performing ultrasound for all women with dense breasts after a negative mammogram would produce relatively few benefits," said study researcher Brian Sprague, assistant professor of surgery at the University of Vermont.
In the United States, at least 19 states require doctors to notify women of their breast density after undergoing a mammogram, according to background information in the study. Those with dense breasts may then be advised to talk to their doctor about supplemental testing.
Legislation mandating such notification nationwide is also under consideration, the study says.
"Be aware that screening ultrasound may lead to unnecessary biopsies," Sprague said. "There is a small chance it could save your life, but there is a much greater chance you will have a false-positive result."
Breast density is categorized on a scale of 1 to 4, with 1 deemed mostly fatty breasts and 4 being the least fatty and most dense breasts. About 45 percent of women aged 40 to 74 have dense breasts, Sprague found in previous research.
Dense breasts have more fibrous and glandular tissue than fatty tissue, which can also make it difficult for a radiologist to detect cancer on a mammogram. Dense tissue, like cancer, shows up white on the mammogram. Fatty tissue is dark, so any cancer is more visible.
For the study, published in the Dec. 9 online issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine, Sprague and his team used a computer-based simulation model to look at three scenarios. In one, women got routine mammograms only. In the second, women with category 4 breast density got a mammogram and an ultrasound. In the third scenario, Sprague grouped categories 3 and 4 together.
Using information from breast cancer surveillance databases, the researchers looked at how many breast cancer deaths could likely be prevented by adding ultrasound and how many biopsies would occur after a false-positive ultrasound. They also evaluated potential costs.
Antacids May Improve Head and Neck Cancer Survival
The researchers examined the effects that two types of antacids -- proton pump inhibitors and histamine 2 blockers -- had on head and neck cancer patients. More than two-thirds of the nearly 600 patients in the study took one or both types of the antacids after their cancer diagnosis.
Acid reflux -- commonly known as heartburn -- is a common side effect of chemotherapy or radiation treatment, according to the researchers. Proton pump inhibitors include drugs such as Prilosec, Nexium and Prevacid, while histamine 2 blockers include drugs such as Tagamet, Zantac and Pepcid.
Compared to patients who didn't take antacids, those who took proton pump inhibitors had a 45 percent lower risk of death, according to the researchers. They also found that those who took histamine 2 blockers had a 33 percent lower risk of death.
The study is published in the December issue of the journal Cancer Prevention Research.
"We had suspicions that these medications somehow had a favorable impact on patient outcomes. This led us to review our large cohort of patients and screen them for common medications, focusing on antacids. In fact, our study did show that people taking antacids are doing better," study author Dr. Silvana Papagerakis, research assistant professor of otolaryngology--head and neck surgery at the University of Michigan Medical School, said in a university news release.
It's not clear why antacids may improve survival. But, the researchers have started looking for answers to that question.
"Currently, patients might be on and off of this medication according to their symptoms of acid reflux. We believe this medication can also be beneficial at stopping cancer progression. Perhaps longer duration of treatments may have significant effect in terms of outcome survival," Papagerakis said.
"What this study makes clear is these medications may be more beneficial to the patients than just controlling side effects," Papagerakis added.
The researchers also want to investigate if the use of antacids by people with reflux disease or with precancerous lesions might reduce their risk of developing head and neck cancer.
View the original article here
Friday, December 05, 2014
Peanut Protein in Dust May Raise Allergy Risk
In a new study, published online Nov. 18 in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, being exposed to peanut protein in house dust doubled the chance of having a peanut allergy. In children who have eczema, the risk of having peanut allergy was even higher.
Researcher Helen Brough, from the department of pediatric allergy at King's College London, U.K., and colleagues note that eczema "is often cited as the first step in the allergic march."
They say that exposure to peanut proteins in dust through eczema-inflamed skin can trigger a peanut allergy.
How peanut allergies develop is not yet clear, says Carla M. Davis, MD, a specialist in children's allergies at Texas Children's Hospital in Houston. There is still plenty of controversy in the field, she says.
For instance, some researchers are testing a "patch" for people who already have a peanut allergy that would introduce the allergen through the skin to build tolerance. That seems to contradict the findings in this study, she says.
The researchers found out how much peanut protein infants were exposed to by measuring dust vacuumed from the patients' living rooms.
The researchers studied 359 children who had a high risk of developing a peanut allergy because they were already allergic to cow's milk or eggs, or had moderate or severe levels of eczema and had allergies to those foods.
"This study adds to the growing body of evidence that exposure to peanut via a damaged skin barrier [as in ezcema] may increase the risk of peanut allergy,” Brough says in a news release.
Several co-authors report receiving support from the Immune Tolerance Network, the Wellcome Trust Intermediate Clinical Fellowship, DBV Technologies, Dyax, and Hycor Biomedical. One co-author is a minority stockholder in Allertein and Mastcell Pharmaceuticals. Another has stock options with DBV Technologies. Several co-authors report receiving royalties from UptoDate. One co-author is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for DBV Technologies. Several co-authors report consultancy arrangements or having received payments for lectures from one or more of the following companies or groups: Novartis, Abbott Laboratories, Dow AgroSciences, McNeill Nutritionals, Merck, Schering Plough, GLC Research, ExploraMed Development, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals; Unilever; Allertein Therapeutics; Danone Research Institute; Anaphalaxis Campaign; and the National Peanut Board. ThermoFisher Scientific, UCB, Pfizer, Sodilac, Nestle Nutrition, and GlaxoSmithKline.
View the original article here
Researchers Find Stem Cells That Help Nails Regenerate
Using mouse nail cells, University of Southern California scientists identified stem cells that can perform two roles. In normal conditions, the stem cells assist in the growth of both the nails and nearby skin. However, if a nail is damaged or destroyed, the stem cells focus exclusively on nail repair, according to the study.
"That was a very surprising discovery, since the dual characteristic of these nail stem cells to regenerate both the nail and skin under certain physiological conditions is quite unique and different from other skin stem cells, such as those of the hair follicle or sweat gland," principal investigator Krzysztof Kobielak said in a university news release.
The researchers wonder if it might be possible to get these nail stem cells to produce other types of tissue. If so, it could lead to new ways to help people with everything from nail and finger defects to severe skin injuries and amputations.
Findings from the study were published online recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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Restroom Hand Dryers Spread More Germs Than Paper Towels, Study Finds
British researchers placed a harmless type of bacteria on the hands of volunteers in order to simulate poorly washed hands. They then had them use warm-air dryers, high-powered "jet-air" dryers or paper towels to dry their hands.
The investigators measured airborne bacteria levels and found higher amounts of germs around both types of dryers than around towel dispensers.
Jet-air dryers were the worst, the study found. Bacteria levels in the air around jet-air dryers were 4.5 times higher than around warm air dryers and 27 times higher than around paper towel dispensers, said a team led by Mark Wilcox of the University of Leeds.
His team also found that the bacteria persisted in the air around hand dryers long after they were used. Forty-eight percent of the bacteria around hand dryers was collected more than five minutes after use, and the bacteria could still be detected 15 minutes after use.
"Next time you dry your hands in a public toilet using an electric hand dryer, you may be spreading bacteria without knowing it. You may also be splattered with bugs from other people's hands," Wilcox said in a university news release.
"These findings are important for understanding the ways in which bacteria spread, with the potential to transmit illness and disease," he added.
The study was published Nov. 20 in the Journal of Hospital Infection and was also presented at the Healthcare Infection Society International Conference in Lyon, France.
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Senior-to-Senior Aggression Common in U.S. Nursing Homes
The study of 10 centers in New York state found that, in the space of just one month, nearly 20 percent of residents were involved in some type of incident with a fellow resident.
Most often, it was a verbal clash, with someone yelling or cursing at another resident. In other cases, the incidents involved hitting or kicking -- or, in a small percentage, inappropriate touching.
"We discovered that this is a much more prevalent problem than any of us realized," said researcher Karl Pillemer, a gerontology professor at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City.
Results of the study were presented at a recent meeting of the Gerontological Society of America. Findings from studies presented at meetings are generally considered preliminary until they've been published in a peer-reviewed journal.
Pillemer's research also zeroed in on the residents who were most likely to be involved in incidents. "Typically," Pillemer said, "they were people who were in the moderate stages of dementia, but were still physically able to get around."
That makes sense, according to Dr. Laura Mosqueda, a geriatrics specialist who was not involved in the study. Mosqueda directs the National Center on Elder Abuse at the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles.
Nursing home residents with dementia commonly become confused, and may act out aggressively -- but only if they have the physical capacity to do so, explained Mosqueda.
"I think the point this study raises is, who's responsible or accountable for this behavior?" Mosqueda said. "It's not the residents. In my view, it's the owners and people running the facilities. Do they have enough staff with the appropriate training?"
Still, Mosqueda also cautioned against an alarmist interpretation of the findings.
She noted that one of the more common forms of "aggression" in this study was "unwelcome entry" into another resident's room or going through another person's possessions.
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