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Acupuncture, exercise may help women with polycystic ovary syndrome

August 21, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Aug 21 (ANI): Acupuncture and exercise can bring relief to women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), according to a new study.

Nearly 10pct of women of reproductive age suffer from PCOS. The syndrome expresses itself as a large number of small immature cysts on the ovaries that cause a disturbance in the production of hormones and an increase in the secretion of the male sex hormone.

Many women with the condition do not ovulate normally, and the syndrome may lead to infertility.

“We do not know for certain what causes the condition, despite it being so common. We have seen that women with the syndrome often have high activity in that part of the nervous system that we cannot consciously control, known as the ‘sympathetic nervous system,’” said lead researcher Elisabet Stener-Victorin, Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

“We believe that this may be an important underlying factor in the syndrome,” she added.

During the study, one group of women with polycystic ovary syndrome received a specific type of acupuncture called “electro-acupuncture” for four months.

In this type of acupuncture, the needles are stimulated with a weak low-frequency electric current, similar to that developed during muscular work.

A second group of women were provided with heart rate monitors and instructed to exercise at least three times a week.

The study showed that activity in the sympathetic nervous system was lower in the women who received acupuncture and in those who took regular exercise than it was in the control group.

The acupuncture treatment brought further benefits.

“Those who received acupuncture found that their menstruation became more normal,” she said.

“We could also see that their levels of testosterone became significantly lower, and this is an important observation, since elevated testosterone levels are closely connected with the increased activity in the sympathetic nervous system of women”, she added.

The study appears in American Journal of Physiology – Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology. (ANI)

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New discovery to pave way for novel treatments of alcohol dependence

July 1, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, July 1 (ANI): Scientists have identified a brain mechanism linked with alcohol addiction that involves the stomach hormone ghrelin, a discovery that may lead to new therapies for addictions like alcohol dependence.

The researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy, Gothenburg, have observed that blocking ghrelin’s actions in the brain can reduce alcohol’s effects on the reward system.

Ghrelin is a hormone produced by the stomach and, by signalling in the brain, it increases hunger.

Its involvement in alcohol addiction highlights the reward system of the brain as a key target for ghrelin’s effects.

“Ghrelin’s actions in the brain may be of importance for all kinds of addictions, including chemical drugs such as alcohol and even food,” said Suzanne Dickson, Professor of Physiology, a leading expert in appetite regulation.

The researchers showed that mice treated with ghrelin increase their alcohol consumption.

When ghrelin’s actions are blocked, for example, by administering ghrelin receptor antagonists, mice no longer show preference for an alcohol-associated environment.

This means that alcohol is no longer able to produce its addictive effects that include reward-searching behaviour (similar to craving in alcoholic patients).

“If we can develop drugs that block the receptors for ghrelin, we could have a new effective treatment for alcohol dependence. It may however take several years until such a pharmacological treatment will reach the patient”, said a co-author of the study.

Alcohol dependence is a complex and chronic disease that leads to adverse consequences affecting not only the patient but also their immediate family, and it also has a profound economic burden on society.

The results of the study will be published in the renowned American scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). (ANI)

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How to prevent transmission of stomach ulcer bacteria

June 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, June 25 (ANI): A new research from the Sahlgrenska Academy has revealed that the stomach ulcer bacterium Helicobacter pylori is not transmitted through drinking water as previously thought, but rather through vomit and possibly faeces.

The researchers say that it is therefore possible to prevent the spread of the bacterium in developing countries through some fairly simple measures.

“Taking some cheap but powerful measures may prevent the spread of the bacterium. It could be enough to isolate vomiting patients especially from small children for a short period of time, since Helicobacter pylori is not able to survive for long outside the stomach,” says doctoral student Anders Janzon.

“If isolation is not possible, it may suffice to pay extra attention to good hygiene’, Janzon added.

The researchers analysed the drinking water, lake water and wastewater in an area in Dhaka in Bangladesh, where the bacterium Helicobacter pylori is very common.

They found that while the diarrhoea bacterium ETEC is often present in the drinking water, Helicobacter pylori is not.

Other studies have shown that new cases of Helicobacter pylori tend to pop up in connection with various diarrhoea illnesses, and this pointed the research team in the right direction.

“We analysed vomit and diarrhoea from cholera patients, and found large amounts of active Helicobacter pylori. We therefore conclude that vomit is a very likely source of new infections,” said Janzon. (ANI)

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How to text message without any pain in neck, arms and hands

June 26, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, June 24 (ANI): Suffering sore thumbs, pain in the neck, arms and hands owing to that constant text messaging to your girlfriend? Well, then you are certainly typing those messages differently than others.

According to a study at the Sahlgrenska Academy, young adults with symptoms in these parts of the body use a different technique when texting.

Ergonomist Ewa Gustafsson studied mobile phone habits among 56 young adults who text message on a daily basis.

Half of the subjects reported problems with the neck, arms or hands, while the other half had no such symptoms.

“Considering how much we use the small mobile phone keypads, it is important that we learn how they affect our bodies. We need to identify factors related to mobile phone usage that may affect our health and ability to work,” said Gustafsson.

Her thesis has shown that mobile phone users with neck, arm or hand symptoms tend to use their mobile phones differently than seen in a healthy control group.

‘Those with symptoms more often text messaged hunched over. Just like when using a computer, such posture should be avoided’, said Gustafsson.

She observed that those with neck, arm or hand problems have the tendency to use one thumb to text instead of two, thus using that one thumb with a higher speed and giving it fewer breaks.

‘It was fascinating to see how fast some individuals could use their thumbs and still find the right letters. Those with symptoms should use both thumbs to reduce the stress on their hands, but these individuals instead use the single-thumb technique to a larger extent than those without problems’, said Gustafsson.

There were also differences in terms of work technique, thumb movements and muscular activity.

She assessed thumb movements with a so-called electrogoniometer, and the muscular activity through electromyography (using electrodes to measure electrical activity in muscles).

Gustafsson also interviewed 25 young adults who use mobile phones and computers extensively to communicate.

‘These people use the technology as a tool to be and act in the present, to be social, effective and independent with almost unlimited possibilities. But there are also risks. Those interviewed related health risks to long-term usage, bad work posture and reduced physical activity’, she said. (ANI)

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Special exercise programme could benefit migraine sufferers

April 17, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 17 (ANI): Researchers from the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden have developed a special exercise programme for people suffering from migraine.

Migraine sufferers are often advised to take exercise, however, they avoid it amid fears that the physical activity may bring on a serious migraine attack.

“We know that everyone benefits from a little exercise, but if you’re convinced that a session at the gym will end up with you being confined to bed with a thumping headache and nausea then it’s hardly surprising that people give it a miss,” said Jane Carlsson, Professor in Physiotherapy at the Sahlgrenska Academy.

During the study, the researchers recruited twenty migraine sufferers who were asked to follow a special exercise programme three times a week for three months.

The programme involved using an exercise bike under the guidance of a physiotherapist.

“We could see that those who participated in the study were much fitter after the training period, since their ability to absorb oxygen increased considerably,” said physiotherapist Emma Varkey, one of the researchers behind the study.

Moreover, the researchers revealed that only one of the patients suffered a migraine attack that was directly linked to the training session.

“Now that we’ve been able to show that the risk of increased frequency of attacks in connection with this type of exercise is extremely small, we can study whether exercise can be used to prevent or alleviate migraine attacks,” said Mattias Linde, neurologist at Cephalea Headache Centre and researcher at the Sahlgrenska Academy.

“We have already initiated a new study in which we plan to compare the results against a control group,” Linde added.

The study is published in journal Headache. (ANI)

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Energy-burning brown fat’s presence in adults offers new obesity treatment strategy

April 17, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, April 17 (ANI): Swedish researchers have found that adults use brown fat to convert energy into heat, a finding that may lead to novel treatments for overweight and obesity.

Sven Enerback, Professor at the Institute of Biomedicine at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, points out that the brown fat found in infants is traditionally believed to disappear as a person grows up.

However, the researcher insists, the new study has shown the presence of brown fat cells in the lower part of the neck in adults, just above their collarbones.

During the study, the researchers tested the region of brown fat cells in the neck by placing five volunteers, in thin clothing, in a chilly room for a couple of hours.

Using PET scanning, the researchers studied this region, and found that metabolism there was on average 15 times higher than in the neighbouring white fat tissue.

Prof. Enerback says that the result suggests that the brown fat may play a significant role in metabolism.

The expert believes that this finding may pave the way for new and better ways of treating obesity.

Prof. Enerback reckons that any such novel treatments would be based on an exciting strategy that focuses on increasing the amount of fat burnt by the body, instead of focusing solely on reducing the intake of energy.

A report on this study has been published in The New England Journal of Medicine. (ANI)

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Why touching the skin relieves pain

April 15, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

London, April 15 (ANI): Scientists at the Sahlgrenska Academy have found out why touching the skin relieves pain.

The researchers have revealed that the skin has specialised nerve fibres called called CT nerves (C-tactile), which travel directly to the areas in the brain that are important in the emergence of feelings.

“Basically, the signals that tell the brain that we are being stroked on the skin have their own direct route to the brain, and are not blocked even if the brain is receiving pain impulses from the same area. In fact it’s more the opposite, that the stroking impulses are able to deaden the pain impulses,” Nature magazine quoted Line Loken, postgraduate student in neurophysiology at the Sahlgrenska Academy, as saying.

The researchers used a technique called microneurography to examine a group of healthy subjects.

“By inserting a thin electrode into a nerve in the forearm we can listen in on the nerve and pick up signals from one of the thousands of nerve fibres that make up a nerve,” explains Associate Professor Hakan Olausson, who is leading the research group behind the discovery, together with Johan Wessberg.

According to the research team, each individual nerve fibre was responsible for touch signals from roughly a square centimetre of skin.

During the study, the researchers used a specially-designed robot that brushed over the exact area of skin for which a particular nerve fibre is responsible.

They also asked the participants to rate how pleasant or unpleasant they found the brushing.

“As the nerve signals that were sent in the CT nerves became more frequent, the subjects reported the experience as being increasingly pleasant. Of the skin nerves that we studied, it was only the CT nerves that had this strong link between the frequency of the signals and how pleasant it felt,” says researcher Johan Wessberg.

The study has been published in the journal Nature Neuroscience. (ANI)

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Big men ‘at increased abnormal heart rhythm risk’

April 5, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 4 (ANI): Older men who were big during their 20s are at an increased risk of suffering from atrial fibrillation, or abnormal heart rhythm, says a new study.

According to the new research from the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, being big includes height and weight.

The study, which has been published in the latest issue of the European Heart Journal, was initiated in 1970.

Over 7,000 men living in Gothenburg aged between 45 and 55 were examined and asked questions about their lifestyle. The subjects were asked to state their weight at the age of 20. The research material has now been compared with the National Patient Register.

“Atrial fibrillation proved to be significantly more common both among those men who were big during their youth, as well as among those who gained a considerable amount of weight later on in life,” says Annika Rosengren, Professor of Medicine at the Sahlgrenska Academy.

The study reveals that the risk of atrial fibrillation increases linearly with both body size and weight gain. The larger the men were in their 20s and the more weight they gained during their life, the greater the risk.

The fact that the men were big in their youth does not mean that they were obese. Obesity in young men was extremely unusual during the 1930s and 40s, and these big men were quite simply tall and well-built.

“Since both weight and height are increasing among young people, it’s quite likely that atrial fibrillation will become more common when today’s young men reach their 60s and 70s, particularly if the tendency to put on several kilos later on in life continues,” says Rosengren. (ANI)

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Shampoos, conditioners, soaps can cause eczema

March 28, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Mar 28 (ANI): Many shampoos, skin conditioners and soaps contain an ingredient that can cause eczema, warn Swedish scientists.

A thesis presented at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, Sweden found that over 5 percent of those who underwent patch testing were allergic to the air oxidized form of the fragrance ingredient linalool.

Eczema can cause a lot of different skin conditions, including rashes, swelling, itching and cracking.

“I would suspect that about 2 percent of the complete population of Sweden are allergic to air oxidized linalool. That may not sound very much, but it is serious since linalool is so widely used as a fragrance ingredient. Linalool is found in 60-80 percent of the perfumed hygiene products, washing up liquids and household cleaning agents that can be bought in the nearest supermarket, and it can be difficult for people who are allergic to avoid these products”, says dermatologist Johanna Brared Christensson, author of the thesis.

Nickel is by far the most common substance that causes eczema, but the thesis shows that oxidized linalool occupies third place in the list, after nickel and cobalt.

In the study, oxidized linalool was added at patch testing for more than 3,000 patients who wanted to find out what was causing their eczema. Between 5 percent and 7 percent proved to be allergic to the oxidized form of the fragrance ingredient.

“Linalool is present in many products around us, and this is probably the reason that contact allergy to this material is so common. Some people can shower with shower cream that contains linalool but never develop contact allergy, but we know that the risk increases as the exposure to t! he substance increases”, says Johanna.

Linalool is a fragrance ingredient found naturally in lavender, mint, and other plants. Linalool breaks down when it comes into contact with oxygen, it becomes oxidized and can cause allergy. Manufacturers do include other substances in the products to delay this oxidation process, but allergenic substances can stiill be formed from linalool when it is stored.

“One way of trying to minimize exposure to oxidized linalool is to avoid buying large packs of soap and shower cream, and always to replace the top after using a bottle”, says Johanna. (ANI)

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Psychiatric disorders common in adults who have had anorexia

March 28, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, March 27 (ANI): After studying 51 teenagers with anorexia nervosa and an equal number of healthy persons for a number of years, a team of Swedish scientists have come to the conclusion that psychiatric disorders are common in adults who have had anorexia.

“This study is unique in an international perspective. It is the only study in the world that reflects the natural course of anorexia nervosa in the population,” says Elisabet Wentz, Associate Professor in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the Sahlgrenska Academy.

In a report based on the findings of the study, initiated in 1985, the researchers point out that the groups have been investigated and compared several times as the years have passed.

They say that three women have still not recovered from anorexia, 18 years after the start of the study.

According to them, 13 people, or around 25 per cent, are on disability benefit or have been signed off sick for more than six months due to an eating disorder or other psychiatric disorder.

The research team further say that 39 per cent of the subjects have at least one other psychiatric disorder, in addition to the eating disorder. The most common of these is obsessive compulsive disorder.

However, the study’s findings also contain some positive surprises.

“Previous studies have shown that anorexia is a diagnosis with a very poor prognosis, with as many as one in five patients dying as a result of the disease. In contrast, we have not had a single death among the subjects of our study,” says Elisabet Wentz.

Studies conducted in the past have shown that infertility is a common complication for adult women who have had anorexia, as are increased risks of giving birth prematurely and of post-natal depression.

The researchers say that the women in the two groups in the current study have had essentially the same number of children, but the women who have had anorexia were younger when they had their first child.

According to them, such kids had a lower birth weight than children of women in the control group.

“None of the women who had had children still suffered from an eating disorder, but it is still more common that they worry about whether their babies are putting on weight,” says Elisabet Wentz.

The findings of the new study have been published in the British Journal of Psychiatry and in the International Journal of Eating Disorders. (ANI)

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Study sheds light on egg cells’ unique ability to ensure that sperm don’t get too old

March 26, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, March 26 (ANI): While it is thought that men remain fertile throughout life as compared to women, Swedish researchers have now shown that a fertilising sperm can get help from the egg to rejuvenate.

Researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg, say that their finding is an important step towards future stem cell therapy.

The researchers highlight the fact that the risk of chromosomal abnormalities in the foetus is highly correlated to the age of the mother, but is nearly independent of the age of the father.

According to them, one possible explanation is that egg cells have a unique ability to reset the age of a sperm.

“We are the first to show that egg cells have the ability to rejuvenate other cells, and this is an important result for future stem cell research,” says Associate Professor Tomas Simonsson, who leads the research group at the Sahlgrenska Academy that has made this discovery.

The ends of the chromosomes called “telomeres”-which are important for the genetic stability of the cell and they act as a DNA clock that measures the age of the cell-become shorter each time a cell divides, due to which the cell stops dividing and dies.

The researchers say that their finding that the egg cell can extend the telomeres of a fertilising sperm cell attains significance for the development of stem cell therapy, which involves replacing the cell nucleus in unfertilised egg with a nucleus from a somatic cell that has come from a patient who needs a stem cell transplantation.

As soon as the cell has divided a few times, it is possible to harvest stem cells, which are then allowed to mature to the cell type that the recipient needs.

“The genetic stability of the transplanted cells has been a serious concern up until now, and it was feared that the lifetime of these cells would depend on the age of the cell nucleus that was transferred. Our results suggest that this is not the case,” says Tomas Simonsson. (ANI)

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Sweden causing serious environmental harm in India

February 7, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Feb 6 (ANI): In a new research, it has been found that Sweden is indirectly causing serious environmental harm in India, as the European country is a major consumer of pharmaceutical substances from Indian factories that fail to adequately treat their wastewater.

The research was carried out by scientists from the Sahlgrenska Academy at University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

“We used to think that pharmaceuticals that ended up in the environment mostly came from the use of the medicines and that the substances were dispersed through wastewater. We now know that certain factories that manufacture substances release very large quantities of active substances,” said associate professor Joakim Larsson of the Sahlgrenska Academy in Gothenburg,Sweden, one of the research scientists behind the studies.

The water from the pharmaceutical industries is highly toxic.

Larsson has visited the industrial zone near Hyderabad, India, an important centre for the manufacturing of pharmaceutical substances.

Here, his research team has taken samples of the water discharged from a treatment plant that treats wastewater from around 90 pharmaceutical factories before it is released.

“We have previously shown that the “treated” water contained exceptionally high levels of various pharmaceutical substances, including several broad-spectrum antibiotics,” said Larsson. “We estimated that the treatment plant released 45 kilograms of the antibiotic ciprofloxacin in one day, which is equivalent to five times the daily consumption of Sweden,” he added.

Such high levels of antibiotics in the water are a cause for alarm as there is an increased risk of spawning resistant bacteria, an issue of global concern. This can lead to hose antibiotics that are invaluable today becoming ineffective sooner and not killing the bacteria of tomorrow.

In addition, the environment is affected locally by the pollution.

The research proved that the substances manufactured in Hyderabad are sold in Sweden.

Where the active substance in a pharmaceutical product is manufactured is not public information, but the Swedish Medical Products Agency can grant exemptions for research purposes.

The researchers analyzed data from the Medical Products Agency for all 242 products on the Swedish market that contained any of nine specific substances.

They found that 123 products contained substances from India and for 74 of the products, 31 per cent, the active substance was manufactured by one of the factories that send their wastewater to the treatment plant outside Hyderabad that was studied.

“The analysis shows quite clearly that a large number of medicinal products on the Swedish market is made by manufacturers that send their effluent to a treatment plant that does not treat their water satisfactorily,” said Larsson. (ANI)

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