Could your tattoos put you at risk of heat stroke?
Conclusion
The study showed that artificially stimulating sweat glands in a tattooed area of skin in 10 men produced a lower sweat rate than stimulating sweat glands in a non-tattooed area of skin in the same person.
The authors suggest a number of possible explanations for this, including that it may be because tattooing skin starts an inflammatory response that may cause damage to normal tissue including sweat glands. However, these are only theories and need to be investigated further.
While this is interesting preliminary research, there are some important things to remember:
There were only 10 male participants inv...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 13, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news
Daily diet of fresh fruit linked to lower diabetes risk
Conclusion
The study findings – that eating fresh fruit every day does not raise the risk of diabetes, and may reduce it – are reassuring and in line with dietary advice in the UK. It's also helpful to see evidence that people who already have diabetes are likely to benefit from fresh fruit as well, because there has not been much research into fruit-eating for people with diabetes.
However, it's a step too far to say that fresh fruit prevents diabetes or diabetes complications. Fresh fruit is just one part of a healthy diet, and diet is just one of the things that may affect someone's risk of getting diabetes. This ty...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 12, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Diabetes Food/diet Source Type: news
Brain cell reprogramming therapy shows promise for Parkinson's
Conclusion
This laboratory and animal study aimed to see whether it is possible to modify a type of cell commonly found in the brain, called glial cells, to become dopamine-producing nerve cells. These dopamine-producing nerve cells are the ones lost in people with Parkinson's disease. If a method could be found to replace these cells, it could potentially be used to treat the condition.
Previous research has shown that mouse and human skin cells can be converted to dopamine-producing cells in the laboratory. However, this is the first study to develop a way to convert a different type of cell already in the brain into dop...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 11, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Medical practice Source Type: news
Growing up with a pet may boost a baby's bacterial health
Conclusion
This subgroup analysis of babies from a large Canadian birth cohort assessed whether exposure to furry pets before and after birth has any impact on infant gut bacteria. Overall it found that exposure to pets while in the womb and after birth was linked with richer and more diverse gut bacteria.
The researchers say that several studies in the past, including their own, have found a link between richness of gut bacteria and both the development of allergies and the development of obesity. Therefore these findings may be taken to imply that pet exposure could protect against allergy and obesity in infants – as i...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 10, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Pregnancy/child Source Type: news
Tea not proven to 'shield you against dementia'
Conclusion
This analysis of data from a prospective cohort study of Chinese older adults looked at a potential link between tea consumption and development of dementia. It found that tea drinkers who took part in the study were less likely to develop dementia compared to non-drinkers. The links were observed specifically in women tea drinkers, and in drinkers who carry the APOE ε4 gene that has been linked with Alzheimer's development.
This was a well-designed cohort study which controlled for numerous potential confounders in its analysis. However, there are a number of things to bear in mind, many of which have been po...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 7, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Food/diet Source Type: news
Antibiotic use linked to 'pre-cancerous' bowel changes
Conclusion
Antibiotics, like all drugs, have side effects. We know that they affect the composition of bacteria that live in a healthy gut. This study suggests that might possibly be linked to future development of bowel cancer.
However, there are some major limitations to keep in mind. Bowel polyps are very common, and they're not cancerous. Most people who have them won't know they're there, unless they have a colonoscopy. Some polyps do develop into bowel cancer, but we don't know if any of these women got bowel cancer, or how many of their polyps would have become cancerous if not treated.
It's highly possible that wom...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 6, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Cancer Medication Source Type: news
Reports that Marmite prevents dementia are laying it on a bit thick
Conclusion
This is an early investigative research study, and while some of the findings are interesting, it's a long way from showing that yeast extract spreads can help with conditions like epilepsy or other neurological disorders.
The study's strength is that it was carried out as a randomised controlled trial. However, its small size means we need to see the results replicated in larger studies to be sure they are not down to chance. We also need to see longer-term studies into the actual clinical effects of the changes measured. At this point, we don't know what effect – if any – the changes in brain response have...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 5, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Food/diet Neurology Source Type: news
Firefighters warned about heart attack risk
Conclusion
This randomised crossover trial aimed to assess whether putting out a fire has an effect on the biological signs of cardiovascular health of firefighters.
By simulating a fire fighting scenario the researchers found that exposure to these conditions increased tendency of the blood to clot, reduced the stretchiness of the blood vessel walls, and caused a slight increase in a marker of heart muscle damage.
This trial is thought to be the first assessing this link. Whilst a randomised controlled trial is the best way of investigating this link, there are some limitations to consider.
The trial included a co...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 5, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Source Type: news
British babies 'among the world's biggest criers' claim unproven
Conclusion
This study suggests the prevalence of colic is highest in the first six weeks of a child's life and then decreases over the next six weeks. Colic seems to be less common in babies in Denmark, Germany and Japan and more common in babies from Canada, the UK and Italy.
This study is valuable in demonstrating the pattern of fussing and crying over the first 12 weeks of a baby's life and how this varies across countries, but there are limitations to the research:
There was a varied number of studies from the different countries. For example, there were seven studies from the UK, but only one study from Canada, Ger...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 4, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Pregnancy/child Source Type: news
Morning after pill 'less reliable' for women over 11 stone
Conclusion
Overall the FSRH guideline gives additional clarity around the different types of emergency contraception that should be selected in different circumstances.
These recommendations are based on the best level of evidence and expert understanding to date. However, they may change in the future as more evidence comes to light.
In particular, related to the issue of weight on the effectiveness of oral emergency contraception, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) concluded in 2014 that the available evidence "was limited and not robust enough to support with certainty a conclusion that oral emergency contracepti...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 3, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Pregnancy/child QA articles Medication Source Type: news
Loneliness may make cold symptoms feel worse
Conclusion
This study shows that when people are infected with a common cold virus, there seems to be an association between how lonely people say they are and the self-reported severity of their cold symptoms.
However, loneliness did not make people more likely to get a cold in the first place.
From the findings in this study, it seems that the quality of social relationships and the feeling of loneliness are more important than the quantity of relationships and the social roles people play.
A possible ironic consequence of the social networking age is that some people may have lots of "friends", via Facebook, ...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 31, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Mental health Lifestyle/exercise Heart/lungs Source Type: news
Electromagnetic fields link to motor neurone disease 'weak'
Conclusion
The study found an increased risk of ALS for men with high exposure to ELF magnetic fields, but that doesn't mean magnetic fields are a direct cause of ALS. While figures such as a doubling of risk suggest a big increase, the overall risk of ALS remains low, at 0.009 per hundred people per year in this study.
We should also be cautious because the rarity of the disease means – even with a big group of people – there's room for error. The margin of error on the possible increased risk from ELF magnetic fields comes close to the point where the result could be down to chance. This point is reinforced by the fa...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 30, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news
Exposure to electromagnetic fields linked to motor neurone disease
Conclusion
The study found an increased risk of ALS for men with high exposure to ELF magnetic fields, but that doesn't mean magnetic fields are a direct cause of ALS. While figures such as a doubling of risk suggest a big increase, the overall risk of ALS remains low, at 0.009 per hundred people per year in this study.
We should also be cautious because the rarity of the disease means – even with a big group of people – there's room for error. The margin of error on the possible increased risk from ELF magnetic fields comes close to the point where the result could be down to chance. This point is reinforced by the fa...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 30, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news
Brain implants allow paralysed man to feed himself
Conclusion
This was a case report which described how a man who was paralysed from the shoulders down regained the ability to perform reaching and grasping movements using his own paralysed arm and hand controlled by his brain.
It was a "proof of concept" study to show that the approach – using a brain implant linked via a computer to "functional electrical stimulation" (FES) devices to deliver electrical stimulation to the muscles – could work. The next step will be to continue developing and studying the technique in more people.
These are exciting findings and pave the way for further developm...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 30, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Neurology Medical practice Source Type: news
Can playing Tetris help prevent PTSD?
Conclusion
Involvement in a traumatic event such as a traffic accident can have long-lasting effects on mental health. Some people have months or years of distressing, intrusive flash-backs, feelings of guilt or helplessness, anxiety and depression. At present, there are no treatments that can be given straight away to prevent such long-term effects.
The lack of long-term effects in the study results mean we need to be cautious about claims that playing Tetris could "prevent" PTSD. Limitations of the study – such as an untested control intervention, and the relatively small number of participants – mean this ...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 29, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Mental health Source Type: news
