Food insecurity ”ups risk of greater weight gain, pregnancy complications”

May 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Washington, May 4 (ANI): A new study by researchers in the U.S. has shown that living in a food-insecure household during pregnancy may increase the odds of greater weight gain and pregnancy complications, particularly gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM).

Household food insecurity, the inability to obtain nutritious and safe foods in socially acceptable ways, is increasingly recognized as an independent risk factor for many poor health outcomes among women.

Previous studies have shown that paradoxically, women living in food insecure households report higher rates of overweight and related health complications.

“The present study was conducted to estimate the association between household food insecurity status and maternal health during pregnancy, when changes in both body weight and overall health can be dramatic,” according to Barbara A. Laraia, and co-authors.

“The results suggest that the experience of living in a food insecure household was associated with metabolic health indicators during pregnancy.

“Not only was living in a food insecure household associated with severe pregravid obesity-a condition that broadly predisposes women to adverse pregnancy outcomes-but also with greater gestational weight gain and gestational diabetes mellitus,” she added.

Researchers from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and the US Department of Agriculture”s Economic Research Service, Washington, DC, used data from the Pregnancy, Infection and Nutrition prospective cohort study-810 pregnant women with incomes less than 400 percent of the income/poverty ratio were followed through their pregnancies.

This household income restriction allowed better comparison among households that might have food insecurity due to financial and material constraints. In this group, 76 percent were from fully food secure, 14 percent were from marginally food secure, and 10 percent were from food insecure households.

A significant finding that emerged is the association between household food insecurity and development of GDM.

The authors observed that the combined group of women from marginally secure and insecure food households had more than twice the odds of developing GDM than women in food secure households, suggesting that women living in a household with any level of food insecurity may be at risk.

The study has been published in the May issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. (ANI)

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Obesity linked to increased fibromyalgia risk

April 29, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 29 (ANI): Norwegian University of Science and Technology scientists have established a link between the level of leisure time physical exercise and a future risk of developing fibromyalgia.

The research team also identified BMI as an independent risk factor for fibromyalgia.

The study’s findings appear in the May issue of Arthritis Care & Research, a journal published by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the American College of Rheumatology.

Fibromyalgia (FM) is a chronic pain syndrome characterized by widespread pain lasting more than 3 months, and tender point sites in the neck, shoulders, back, hips, arms, and legs. Associated features often include unexplained fatigue, sleep disturbances, headache, cognitive difficulty, and mood disturbances. The prevalence of FM increases with age and is considerably higher among women than men. Although the etiology of FM is poorly understood, many authors have suggested that a dysfunctional autonomic nervous system involving deficiencies in the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis and sympathetic nervous system contributes to the development of FM by altering pain perception and endogenous pain inhibition.

According to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases, FM has been linked to stressful or traumatic events, such as car accidents, repetitive injuries, illness, certain diseases, or FM can occur spontaneously. Some scientists speculate that a gene or genes might be involved in fibromyalgia that could make a person react strongly to things that other people would not find painful.

Longitudinal studies have shown that physical exercise is associated with less musculoskeletal pain and stiff or painful joints among aging women. The Norwegian researchers, led by Paul Mork, D.Phil., proposed that first, there is an association between levels of leisure time physical exercise and future risk of FM and, second, being overweight/obese may represent an independent risk factor for future development of FM. Data for the study was collected from the Nord-Trøndelag Health (HUNT) Study, the first part conducted in 1984 (HUNT 1) and the second in 1995 (HUNT 2). During the 11 years between HUNT 1 and HUNT 2, 380 cases of incident FM were reported among 15,990 women who provided information on relevant variables at both surveys and who reported no FM or physical impairment at HUNT 1.

“Women who reported exercising 4 times per week had a 29 percent lower risk of FM compared with inactive women,” says Dr. Mork. “Similar results were found in the analysis of the summary score combining information on frequency, duration, and intensity of exercise; women with the highest exercise level had a somewhat lower risk than inactive women. The study further shows that a high BMI (i.e., being overweight or obese) is a strong and independent risk factor for future development of FM. Moreover, the higher relative risks for the combined effect of being overweight/obese and inactive, relative to being overweight/obese alone, point to a further disadvantage for overweight women who do not exercise.” (ANI)

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Need to prevent periodontitis to cut head and neck cancer risk

September 8, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Sep 8 (ANI): Researchers at the University of Buffalo have stressed on the need for increased efforts to prevent and treat chronic periodontitis, a form of gum disease, to reduce the risk for head and neck cancer.

Led by Dr. Mine Tezal at Buffalo, periodontitis is an independent risk factor for head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.

“Prevent periodontitis; if you have it already, get treatment and maintain good oral hygiene,” said Tezal.

Chronic periodontitis is characterized by progressive loss of the bone and soft tissue attachment that surround the teeth.

The researchers assessed the role of chronic periodontitis on head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, as well as the individual roles on three subsites: oral cavity, oropharyngeal and laryngeal.

They used radiographic measurement of bone loss to measure periodontitis among 463 patients, 207 of whom were controls.

The results of the study revealed that chronic periodontitis might represent a clinical high-risk profile for head and neck squamous cell carcinoma.

The strength of the association was greatest in the oral cavity, followed by the oropharynx and larynx, according to Tezal.

When they stratified the relationship by tobacco use, they found that the association persisted in those patients who never used tobacco.

The researchers did not expect the periodontitis-head and neck squamous cell carcinoma association to be weaker in current smokers compared to former and never smokers, according to Tezal.

However, this interaction, although statistically significant, was not very strong.

“Confirmatory studies with more comprehensive assessment of smoking, such as duration, quantity and patterns of use, as well as smokeless tobacco history are needed,” said Tezal.

“Our study also suggests that chronic periodontitis may be associated with poorly differentiated tumor status in the oral cavity. Continuous stimulation of cellular proliferation by chronic inflammation may be responsible for this histological type. However, grading is subjective and we only observed this association in the oral cavity. Therefore, this association may be due to chance and needs further exploration,” she added.

Andrew Olshan, Ph.D., said these results lend further support to the potential importance of poor oral health in this form of cancer.

Olshan said, “Although the study is comparatively small, the researchers were able to also see an association between bone loss and the risk of head and neck cancer.”

The results of the study have been published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. (ANI)

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Smokers ‘at increased pancreatitis risk’

March 24, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Mar 24 (ANI): People who smoke are at an increased risk of suffering from acute and chronic pancreatitis, according to a new report.

What’s more, the risk of developing the disease may be higher in those who smoke more, the report in the March 23 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals stated.

Acute and chronic pancreatitis (an inflammation of the pancreas usually characterized by abdominal pain) are believed to be commonly caused by gallstone disease and excessive alcohol use, respectively. Studies have suggested that smoking may be associated with damage to the pancreas, but since smoking may be associated with alcohol use and risk of gallstone disease, it is difficult to note whether smoking is an independent risk factor for the disease.

To reach the conclusion, Janne Schurmann Tolstrup, M.Sc., Ph.D., of the National Institute of Public Health, University of Southern Denmark, Copenhagen, and colleagues analyzed results from physical examinations and lifestyle habit self-administered questionnaires of 17,905 participants (9,573 women and 8,332 men) to determine if smoking was associated with an increased risk of acute or chronic pancreatitis independent of alcohol consumption and gallstone disease.

Participants were followed up for an average of 20.2 years.

“Overall, 58 percent of the women and 68 percent of the men were current smokers, 15 percent of the women and 19 percent of the men were ex-smokers and 28 percent of the women and 13 percent of the men had never smoked,” the authors write.
“Participants who at baseline reported smoking or being previous smokers had higher risks of developing acute and chronic pancreatitis compared with non-smokers,” they added.

By the end of the study, 235 participants (113 women and 122 men) had developed acute (160 cases) or chronic (97 cases) pancreatitis, with some participants having developed both. About 46 percent of pancreatitis cases were attributable to smoking in this group.

Although alcohol intake was associated with increased risk of pancreatitis, the risk of pancreatitis associated with smoking was independent of alcohol and gallstone disease.

“Apart from the epidemiologic evidence of an association between smoking and development of acute and chronic pancreatitis, a biological effect of smoking seems plausible because both animal studies and human studies have demonstrated changes of the pancreas and in pancreatic functioning after exposure to tobacco smoke,” they conclude. (ANI)

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Pre-diabetic condition increases heart disease risk for the elderly

March 4, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, March 4 (ANI): Researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University have warned that older adults who have impaired glucose tolerance, but are not considered diabetic, may be at an increased risk of heart disease.

The researchers, however, add that such pre-diabetics may benefit from preventive therapies.

Lead researcher Dr. Jill P. Crandall, associate professor of clinical medicine and director of the Diabetes Clinical Trials Unit at Einstein, points out that diabetes becomes increasingly common with age.

“In most cases, this mild form of high blood glucose causes no symptoms and is often overlooked by both doctors and patients, but studies have shown that it may be associated with increased risk of heart disease,” says Dr. Crandall.

“The purpose of this study was to explore the cardiovascular risk profile of older adults with pre-diabetes,” adds the researcher.

Describing the study in the online edition of the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism, Dr. Crandall revealed that the research team looked at 58 older adults with an average age of 71, half with normal glucose tolerance and half with post-challenge hyperglycemia (PCH)-which is characterized by a temporary spike in blood glucose levels that occurs immediately after a meal.

The researchers took various measures before and after the study participants consumed a standard high carbohydrate meal.

They observed that the adults with PCH not only had higher glucose and insulin levels after the meal, but also higher levels of triglycerides-a type of blood fat considered an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease.

The group said that such people also had higher levels of a protein that promotes blood clotting, and more inflammation of blood vessels, compared to controls.

After carrying out a test of blood vessel function after the meal, the researchers found impairment only in the PCH group.
They highlight the fact that previous studies have shown that increases in each of such measures raise one’s risk for heart disease.

According to them, routine glucose screening like the standard oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT)-which measures the body’s ability to use glucose, the body’s main source of energy-may be used to identify these high-risk individuals among the elderly.

Despite the results of the current study, the researchers concede that they have not established it as yet whether treatment aimed at reducing mild hyperglycemia will lower their risk for heart disease.

“Consequently, other interventions designed to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, including the use of statins and aspirin, should be strongly considered for older adults with PCH,” says Dr. Crandall. (ANI)

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