Ciggie smoking, fructose consumption worsens liver disease

April 28, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 28 (ANI): Modifiable risk factors such as cigarette smoking and fructose consumption can worsen nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), scientists have claimed.

With NAFLD, fat accumulates in the liver of overweight individuals despite drinking little alcohol, causing in some cases liver scarring that can lead to liver failure. Identifying modifiable factors that contribute to disease severity and progression is essential in improving patient outcomes, according to recent studies.

Details of these studies are published in the May issue of Hepatology, a journal of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases (AASLD).

NAFLD is the most common cause of liver disease worldwide and research suggests the number of cases will climb given an increasing trend toward higher fat diets, obesity, decreased physical activity, and a rise in diabetes.

In the first study, Ramón Bataller, M.D., and colleagues from the Hospital Clínic in Barcelona, Spain investigated the effects of cigarette smoking (CS) in obese rats. Rats were divided into 4 groups: obese smokers, obese non-smokers, control smokers and control non-smokers. Smoker rats were exposed to 2 cigarettes/day, 5 days/week for 4 weeks. Researchers found that obese rats exposed to CS showed a significant increase in ALT serum levels (indicating liver disease), while this effect was not observed in control rats.

“Our results show that CS causes oxidative stress and worsens the severity of NAFLD in obese rats,” said Dr. Bataller. “Further studies should investigate longer exposures to CS, and assess whether this finding also occurs in patients with obesity and NAFLD.”

Additionally, prior studies suggest an over consumption of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), primarily in the form of soft-drinks, have contributed to weight gain and the rise in obesity, particularly in children and adolescents. Table sugar (sucrose) and HFCS are the two major dietary sources of fructose. Over the past 40 years, consumption of dietary fructose has increased 1,000 percent according to Bray et al, and doctors believe it to be a major cause of NAFLD.

Researchers from Duke University studied 341 adults enrolled in the NASH Clinical Research Network who responded to a Block food questionnaire within 3 months of a liver biopsy. Fructose consumption was estimated conservatively by including that found in beverages, which accounts for 50 percent of dietary fructose intake. Results showed that 27.9 percent of participants consumed at least 1 fructose-containing beverage per day, 52.5 percent had 1 to 6 beverages with fructose per week, and 19.7 percent drank no beverages with fructose.

“In patients with NAFLD, daily fructose ingestion was associated with reduced fatty liver (steatosis), but we found increased fibrosis,” noted Manal Abdelmalek, M.D., M.P.H, and lead author of the study. “Further dietary intervention studies are needed to evaluate whether a low-fructose diet improves metabolic disturbances associated with NAFLD and improves patient outcomes for those at risk of disease progression,” concluded Dr. Abdelmalek.

A second fructose study led by Ling-Dong Kong, M.D., from Nanjing University in China investigated the effects of curcumin on fructose-induced hypertriglyceridemia and fatty liver in rats. Curcumin, a compound derived from turmeric (curcuma root), is sold as an herbal supplement and is believed to have anti-inflammatory, anti-tumor, and anti-viral properties. Researchers observed a hyperactivity of hepatic protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B (PTP1B), which is associated with defective insulin and leptin signaling, in fructose-fed rats. (ANI)

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Boffins find link between common sexual infection, prostate cancer risk

September 10, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Sept 10 (ANI): A strong association between the common sexually transmitted infection, Trichomonas vaginalis, and risk of advanced and lethal prostate cancer in men has been found by researchers from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

The study appears online on September 9, 2009, on the Journal of the National Cancer Institute website and will appear in a later print edition.

“Prostate cancer is the most common cancer among men in western countries, and the second leading cause of cancer-specific mortality. Identifying modifiable risk factors for the lethal form of prostate cancer offers the greatest opportunity to reduce suffering from this disease,” said Jennifer Stark, an HSPH researcher and lead author of the study.

One potential risk factor is inflammation, which appears to play an important role in the development and progression of prostate cancer, but the source of inflammation of the prostate is not clear.

Trichomonas vaginalis is the most common non-viral sexually transmitted infection, and can infect the prostate and could be a source of inflammation.

In the study, researchers analyzed blood samples from 673 men with prostate cancer who were participants in the Physicians’ Health Study and compared infection status based on antibody levels to 673 control subjects who were not diagnosed with prostate cancer. The blood samples were collected in 1982, on average a decade before cancer diagnosis.

The results showed that Trichomonas vaginalis infection was associated with a more than two-fold increase in the risk of prostate cancer that was advanced stage at diagnosis, and a nearly three-fold increase in prostate cancer that would result in death.

“The fact that we found a strong association between serologic evidence of infection with Trichomonas vaginalis, a potentially modifiable risk factor, and risk of advanced and lethal disease represents a step forward in prostate cancer, especially given that so few risk factors for aggressive prostate cancer have been identified,” said Lorelei Mucci, assistant professor in the department of epidemiology at HSPH and senior author of the study. (ANI)

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Obese men at increased risk for erectile dysfunction

August 25, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, August 25 (ANI): Obesity may increase men’s proneness to erectile dysfunction (ED), likely caused by atherosclerosis-related hypertension and cardiovascular disease, according to a research article.

Hormonal changes associated with obesity may also increase the risk, adds the article published in the journal Obesity and Weight Management.

The write-up published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. points out that as many as 30-40 per cent of men over the age of 50 may experience ED, and both obesity and physical inactivity may increase their risk.

It states that the build-up of atherosclerotic plaque in the arteries of obese men can damage the arterial lining, and contribute to elevated blood pressure.

Besides atherosclerosis, according to the write-up, the hormonal changes that accompany obesity, including lower testosterone, increase the risk of ED.

The modifiable risk factors for heart disease, such as excess weight, diabetes, and hypertension, are generally the same as those for ED. Studies have shown that weight loss and increased physical activity can improve ED.
Dr. Adam Gilden Tsai, from the University of Colorado Denver, and Dr. David Sarwer, from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, even talk about a 48-year-old man with mild obesity and hypertension, who suffers from ED in the article “Obesity and Erectile Dysfunction”, in the article.

They say that even ED medication-tadalafil, Cialis, Eli Lilly-did not help him much in achieving an erection adequate for intercourse.

They stress that it is only after dietary counselling, a 4.6 per cent weight reduction, and medication to lower his blood pressure to within the normal range that the patient has been able to achieve adequate erections with the use of ED medication as needed.

The authors emphasize: “The complicated interplay of weight and other health conditions relate to common medical symptoms, such as ED. We are reminded that atherosclerosis can cause not only macrovascular disease such as heart attack and stroke, but also microvascular disease, of which ED is one example.”

“If you are looking for another reason to lose weight, research now suggests that erectile dysfunction can improve with weight loss,” says Dr. James O. Hill, Editor-in-Chief of Obesity and Weight Management, Professor of Pediatrics and Medicine and Director of the Center for Human Nutrition and of the Colorado Clinical Nutrition Research Unit at the University of Colorado Denver. (ANI)

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Smoking, high BP, obesity: Leading causes of death in US

May 2, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 28 (ANI): Smoking, high blood pressure and being overweight-these are the top three preventable risk factors for premature mortality in the United States, according to a new study.

Led by researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH), the collaborative study found that smoking is responsible for 467,000 premature deaths each year, high blood pressure for 395,000, and being overweight for 216,000.

The effects of smoking work out to be about one in five deaths in American adults, while high blood pressure is responsible for one in six deaths.

The study is the most comprehensive analysis till date, which looked at how diet, lifestyle and metabolic risk factors for chronic disease contribute to mortality in the U.S.

“The large magnitude of the numbers for many of these risks made us pause. To have hundreds of thousands of premature deaths caused by these modifiable risk factors is shocking and should motivate a serious look at whether our public health system has sufficient capacity to implement interventions and whether it is currently focusing on the right set of interventions,” said Goodarz Danaei, a doctoral student at HSPH and the lead author of the study.
Also, the researchers found large effects from a series of other preventable dietary and lifestyle risk factors.

All of the deaths calculated in the study were considered premature or preventable in that the victims would not have died when they did if they had not been subject to the behaviours or activities linked to their deaths.

All the risk factors are modifiable through a range of public health and health system interventions.

This is also the first to use methods that allowed a true comparison of a diverse set of risks in terms of how many deaths each of the risk factors is responsible for.

The researchers analysed data from a number of public sources, including from the National Center for Health Statistics and numerous published epidemiological studies and clinical trials.

“The findings should be a reminder that although we have been effective in partially reducing smoking and high blood pressure, we have not yet completed the task and have a great deal more to do on these major preventable factors,” said senior author Majid Ezzati.

The study appears in the latest edition of the open-access journal PLoS Medicine. (ANI)

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Cumulative lead exposure may impair women’s cognition in later years

March 29, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Washington, March 29 (ANI): Cumulative exposure to lead at levels likely to be experienced in community settings may have adverse consequences for women’s cognition in their later years, according to a study.

The study, supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, was conducted with a view to examine biomarkers of lead exposure in relation to performance on cognitive tests given to older women.

Lead exposure is measured in two ways-blood lead level, which is a reading of recent lead dosage; and bone lead level, which is a cumulative measure of lead exposure over many years.

The current study involved the assessment of bone lead levels in the tibia and the patella.

The researchers said that the analysis of all cognitive tests combined showed that levels of all three lead biomarkers were associated with worse cognitive performance, with the association between bone lead and letter fluency scoring dramatically different from the other bone lead/cognitive score associations.

They said that even though the levels of patella and blood lead were linked with worse cognitive function, their findings were statistically significant only for tibia lead, which typically reflects longer-ago exposures than patella lead.

Based on their observations, the researchers came to the conclusion that lead exposures in the distant past might be more important than relatively recent exposures in influencing cognitive function in older women.

“The identification of modifiable risk factors for cognitive decline may provide important clues for delaying or even preventing dementia,” wrote first author Jennifer Weuve and colleagues.

The study has been published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives (EHP).

The journal’s editor-in-chief, Dr. Hugh A. Tilson, said: “Findings in this study are important because of their long-range consequences on the public health of an aging generation. Impaired cognition and cognitive decline in older women are associated with heightened risks of dementia, physical disability, hospitalisation and reduced quality of life in later years.” (ANI)

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