SIMEDICMX

Archive for March, 2009

People who don’t take regular physical exercise till the age of 50 may still benefit from physical workout but the results take further ten years to appear, Swedish researchers said.

A study conducted upon the 2,205 men for the span of 20 year started from the age of 50, presented that exercise have no effect on the premature death before ten years for those who started exercises, late in life.

“Everybody knows, physical exercise provide many health benefits to the young people but first time any study showed that old people can also get health benefits from physical workout. Its not too late to start.” Liisa Byberg said.

Researchers divided the participants into three groups (low medium and high) on the basis of intensity of exercises. Half of the volunteers reported high level of exertion almost equivalent to three sports or gardening each week.

About one third engaged themselves in the moderate activities like cycling or walking remaining participant did little or absolutely no exercise.

With respect to researchers’ predication, most of the inactive and least active people died within the five years of the study, but after ten years the death rate was similar in the people who started exercises after 50 and high active group.

“Quit smoking also have the similar effects but more research is required to find out the exact amount of exercise that provide health benefits in real mean,” researcher stated

Good health in old age depends on the diet that we consume. Nowadays with the advancement in the field of medicines, more people are being healthy. The factors that contribute to the healthy life in old age are good nutrition, hygiene, antibiotics and medicines to prevent any disease. There will be some metabolic changes in the old age.

Most old age people tend to lose considerable weight. Their diet usually becomes unbalanced if they are living alone as they become very reluctant to cook by themselves. They also avoid going to restaurant and often skip the meals. They start to rely on the snacks and tea.

Their diet may be still restricted considering the fact that they have high blood pressure, cardiac failure, diabetes and other disease. Their digestive system would also have become less effective. Hence the diet for the people in old age should be helpful for them to maintain good health.

In old age, they cannot adjust to the constant variations in the intake of water. The old people have 7-8 lts less body water of the same weight with a person of about 35 years of age. The old people have also impaired response to the dehydration. This is due to the presence of high sodium levels in the blood. Their urine is not concentrated and their thirst sensation will not be so acute.

Their bones may become weak due to the deficiencies of calcium, vitamins, minerals, proteins and hormones. So diet should be designed in order to fulfill these requirements. Osteomalacia is very common in old people and especially in women. This happens due to the deficiency of vitamin D, phosphorous and low serum calcium. Osteomalacia can take form as back pain, bone pain, muscle weakness and neck fractures. Diet is provided in such a way that it fulfills these requirements.

Some of the elderly people use medicine for the normal passage of the urine but this causes the level of the serum sodium to be decreased. The low level causes confusion, weakness, giddiness and fits. This also causes heartbeat irregularities.

The protein deficiencies are common in old people. Protein rich foods like meat and eggs are given. For vegetarians, food substances like pulses are rich in proteins and can be added to the regular diet daily. The basic requirement for a person is about 70 g of proteins. If this amount cannot be given by diet, it is given by protein supplementation.

Fats are reduced because they are difficult to be digested. About 40 g of fats can be added to the diet daily. Carbohydrates are a very good source of energy. Foods like bread, cakes, biscuits and pastries are very good source of carbohydrates.

Shots of antibody could be beneficial for the patients of sever asthma, a new study suggested.

Two teams of Canada and UK, founded mepolizumab helpful for the treatment of eosinophilia, a condition usually develop with asthma exacerbation.

The antibodies provide reduction in the episodes of asthma attacks as well as minimize the use of steroids which have certain side effects.

According to the estimation, more than 500,000 people of UK are suffering from sever asthma. Eosnophilia is a persistent inflammation of air passage associated with high level of white blood cells, an essential component of immunity system, also called eosinophils. The disease, sometime, requires hospitalization, depends on the severity of the condition.

Canadian researchers focused on 20 patients of sever asthma those were using steroids for nine years to control asthma, which has common side effects, like bone loss and weight gain.

After the use of mepolizumab, these patients were enabled to reduce their steroid use without any adverse effects regarding their disease. On the other hand symptoms start to get worse with placebo as they curtailed steroids.

The study conducted in UK, including 61 asthmatic patients provided the similar kind of results. In this study, mepolizumab was used in conjunction with steroids.

“Results showed that mepolizumab can reduce the frequency of asthma attack up to 50 percent and also cut the need of steroids,” Professor Pavord said.

“In the last decade there were very few alternative treatments for sever asthma. Now new approaches are available, so the possible reimbursement that mepolizumab can bring to five hundred thousand people with severe asthma complications in the UK are amazingly stirring.”

A verdict by Supreme Court has declared that federal approval of a drug could not protect it from proceedings in state courts. The analysts of drug industry said the verdict, keeping a $6.7 million jury award against Wyeth, will tend drugmakers towards the inspection of safety issues of all untried or tentative drugs in progress along with the existing ones.

The case in which a Vermont musician Diana Levine, who had to lost her arm in the consequences of a poor injection of Wyeth’s ex-medication, Phenergan, for nausea, has drawn the attention of drugmakers to weigh the pervasiveness of the side effects of a drug, its seriousness as compared to its benefits to the people and also the money being produced by it.

Drugmakers argued that product liability claims became banned or anticipated, if the product had any warning label in the inserted package and was approved from FDA (Food and Drug Administration). But it was rejected by a 6-3 decision of the court.

On the other hand Wyeth, although, disappointed by the ruling, it is ready to pay the jury award quickly. Moreover, the spokesman of Wyeth has stated that there was a clear disclosure of the damages and risks caused by Phenergan injection. The severe damage to Diana Levine was done due to the negligence of the doctor. This statement exposed the doctors to be cautious to select the most effective but more risky method to administrate a drug.

Furthermore the verdict said, FDA lacks funds and is overload by various tasks so it’s the responsibility of drug companies to mention the effectiveness and safety of drugs.

A new research is alarming for the parents whose children spend much time before TV. The researchers observed that the children who are habitual to watching television for more than two hours daily had a greater tendency to fall a prey to asthma.

To evaluate the health of this concept, the researchers studied the respiratory health of more than 3, 000 children who were monitored from their birth to the age of 11.5 years.

The researchers critically examined the wheezing symptoms in the TV addicted children and the diagnosis by doctor. To measure the effect of sedentary behavior, the time spent before television is also noted.

It was also found that both the genders had the same tendency of developing asthma. The children, who spend more time before TV and remain inactive, are at a doubled risk to develop asthma as compared to those who spend less time.

The fact was surprising for the researchers to note that the children who spend a lot of time had clear and obvious symptoms of developing the chronic illness of wheezing or asthma while the children who though had been growing asthma yet did not showed up the symptoms of the disease.

Peptic ulcer and its causes

Peptic ulcer is referred to the injury of the gastrointestinal tract where the digestive juice called the gastric juice comes into direct contact with the mucous lining. So far, the exact cause for the ulcer is not known.

The aggressive factors for the cause of ulcer are hydrochloric acid, pepsin, bile acids, smoking, alcohol and stomach emptying at all times. Peptic ulcer is caused by gastric ulcer, gastric erosion, curling’s burns and hiatal hernia. Other causes for the ulcer may include portal hypertension with ruptured varices.

Diet for peptic ulcer

The diet for the peptic ulcer should be very simple to the patient. Almost all the food substances that we normally consume are permitted for the person with only the exception of chillies and sour food substances. The reason for the exclusion of these kinds of food is that, it causes intense peptic pain. The sour foods stuffs and citrus fruits like the orange and sweet lime cause peptic discomfort and hence these are also excluded from the normal diet.

The foods can be cooked by the oil and ghee but the Chinese food dishes like fried rice and fried noodles are not allowed in the diet because it is be very difficult to digest. Milk has always been a very good medicine for the peptic ulcer and is known to relieve the peptic pain. Regular intake of the milk is necessary and the pain usually subsides within 24 hours.

Milk also has the ability to improve the secretion of gastric acids. This is because of the fact that milk contains the amino acids and calcium content. The milk neutralizes the gastric content in the stomach for about twenty minutes but after that the pH level raises to normal. So, the milk diet is given by three times a day with equal time. For the patients who have intestinal lactase deficiencies are given with the milk that is treated with added lactose.

For a person, when he is given an exclusive milk diet, it is given as follows. A milk diet consisting of 500 ml of milk is given at the morning, 750 ml of milk food stuff is given at the lunch time and also 750 ml of milk is given at the dinner time. Following this type milk diet almost shows no symptoms of the peptic ulcer.

A snack or meal every three hours should be provided to the patient. This is very essential to reduce the ulcer. Only by providing something or the other from time to time is the only way to increase the gastric secretion. Following these diet steps, most of the patients report that their ulcer is reduced by 65%.

It has been founded that, breastfeeding reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), German researchers stated.

Researcher advised that public health messages which are providing awareness about the SIDS risk reduction should highlight the mother to breastfeed their babies at least for the first six months.

Some countries are already emphasizing on the breastfeeding in their Anti-SIDS campaigns, while most are not. The objective of this study was to reconfirm that the breastfeeding, in real means, protect infants from SIDS.

The specific study included 333 children who died because of SIDS and 998 age-matched “control” kids.

After the fifteen days of birth control infants were being breastfed in comparison with 50 percent of SIDS infants. At the age of one month, resultant rate was 72 verses 40 percent respectively.

Exclusive breastfeeding of one month reduce the risk of SIDS in half while partial also tied to a reduced risk although the reduction was not up to the mark.

These results authenticate the breastfeeding as the greatest risk reducer of the SIDS and kid remain protected as long as breastfeeding continues. The researchers concluded

What is malabsorption syndrome?

Malabsorption syndrome is the deficiency of the body to absorb variable degrees of number of nutrients like vitamins, fats, proteins and carbohydrates. The malabsorption syndrome causes ill health, anemia and steatorrhea.

The malabsorption syndrome can occur due to some of the following factors. Due to gluten sensitivity, diffuse of small bowel mucosal injury, tuberculosis and other diseases involving the wall of the small bowel, parasitic infections, short circuiting of the bowel, decrease in the amount of the bile salts and use of the laxative drugs.

Diet for malabsorption syndrome

For the persons having malabsorption syndrome, a small peptide based diet may be beneficial. Wheat is one of the enemies for malabsorption syndrome and hence it should be avoided. Oats can be added to the diet as it may help a lot with the syndrome. Always a high protein diet is given to correct the mal nutrition of the proteins.

Along with the high nutrition diet, supplements like tetracycline and other antibiotics can also be used to make a quick recovery. The food items for a gluten free diet are given as follows. The permitted food substances are cereals like oats, rice, maize, ragi and bajra, all types of pulses available, all fresh vegetables, meat stuffs like chicken meat, fish and other meats, egg, potatoes, all fresh fruits, all types of fresh vegetable and curry soups.

The substances that include a gluten free diet may also include milk and milk products, dairy and dairy products, sweets, beverages like aerated water, pepsi, coke, tea and coffee and extra additives like garlic, vinegar and giner.

The food substances that should be excluded from the diet are the substances that are made from wheat like chappaties, bread, biscuits and biscuits. All the food substances that we buy from outside whether readymade or raw should be checked for wheat content. If there are no specifications about the products, then it must be strictly avoided.

Here is a sample diet for a person from the morning to night. For the breakfast, fruit juices, cornflakes, butter and jam can be consumed for the western type of diet and for the vegetarian, it can be fruit juice, flaked rice or bajra chappaties.

For lunch, roast lamb, salad, minted peas and an apple can be consumed for the western culture. For the vegetarian, it can be baked potato, rice and dal, lady’s finger and fruits. For the dinner, for the western diet, it can be homemade soup, smoked fish, cabbage rice and jelly and for the vegetarian diet, it can be homemade soup, vegetable curry and boiled potato and rice pudding. Following a strict diet of the above can lead to a quick recovery from the malabsorption syndrome.