Women | World Tech Today

Regular consumption of Alcohol increases risk of Cancer in Women, finds new study

Aug 19, 2015 by William Harper Leave a Comment

A new study suggests that consumption of alcohol on regular basis can increase the risk of certain types of cancer both in men and women. This is in contrast to the previously held view that a glass of red wine daily is good for cardiac health. The new study highlights the dangers associated with daily drinking even in light to moderate quantities without suggesting that alcohol causes cancer.

The study carried on by researchers from Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston underlines that consuming as little as one glass of wine everyday can put women at greater risk of developing breast cancer. Daily women drinkers, according to these researchers, are 13% more likely to be diagnosed with cancers of mouth, larynx, esophagus, throat, bowel and liver, no matter how little the quantity consumed.

The findings are based on data collected from 88,084 women and 47,881 men participating in the Nurses’ Health Study from 1980 and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study from 1986 who were followed until 2010.

“The elevated risks for certain cancers associated with light and moderate drinking are important, and have partly been confirmed by the present study,” researchers wrote in the editorial. “Even when we consider all cause mortality attributable to alcohol, drinking more than 10 grams of pure alcohol per day for women or 20 grams for men over a lifetime can lead to a magnitude of risk not considered acceptable for voluntary behavior in modern societies.”

In another study conducted by researchers at the Oxford University too, researchers had found a link between moderate drinking and breast cancer.

While emphatically stating that further research is required to explore the relationship between smoking and drinking on the risk of developing cancer, they strongly recommend women to restrict their alcohol consumption to not more than one drink daily while men were allowed two standard drinks. Those with a family history of cancer were however asked to refrain from alcohol altogether.

Pregnant women prescribed with Opioids give birth to NAS babies

Apr 16, 2015 by Karla Fetrow Leave a Comment

According to a research study, pregnant women prescribed on opioids (during their pregnancy) develop greater risks of giving birth to babies with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome. The research was conducted by researchers from Vanderbilt University, Nashville and was published in Paediatrics Journal.

Around 259 million pregnant women in the US alone were prescribed opioids as a pain reliever in 2012. Researchers had examined the records of nearly 112,000 pregnant women and also examined the data obtained from Tennessee’s Medical program. Around 28% of women who were the subjects of this study had received at least one pain reliever with opioid content in their prescription.

However, researchers are puzzled by the fact that the babies, who were exposed to these opioids during the birth, do not have the drug withdrawal symptom post birth. The researchers have also showed that several things have enhanced the risks associated to the infant. Other factors associated to enhance the risks were the number of cigarettes a woman smoked, type of opioid prescribed, antidepressants prescribed and other similar elements.

However, it was also stated by the researchers that studying the impact, which opioid had during the pregnancy should be considered “more pertinent” than other elements associated with the risks. Also, researchers have concluded one important point from the study.

Infants need different post birth care, if their mothers had been prescribed with opioids. Moreover, such infants should be watched closely on instances of NAS. Also, the care required by such infants should be more efficient than normal healthy infants.

The research also concludes that there is a need to develop innovative strategies to enhance monitoring of the prescribed drugs. It also states that relevant database and predicting adverse outcomes, associated with risks such as Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome and death from overdoses needs to be evaluated and piloted.

Opioids are chemical substances, which resembles opiates in its pharmacological effects. They act as pain relievers by binding on opioid receptors, which are majorly found in the Peripheral and the Central Nervous system.

Women divorced multiple times twice more prone to heart attack

Apr 16, 2015 by Karla Fetrow Leave a Comment

Women divorced multiple times are twice more likely to get a heart attack than women who are happy in their married life. A new study conducted by the Duke University Medical Center reveals that divorce brings the risk of heart attack closer in both men and women and the risk tends to increase in women who are divorced more than once.

The study was carried out on 15827 men and women who were married once in their lifetime. The participants were asked questions regarding their marital status and health after every two years during the span of 1992 to 2010. Surprisingly, the studies indicated that around one-third people divorced once during these eight years.

Stress of Divorce Makes the Impact

The study reveals that women suffer from a lot of stress due to divorce and it makes a lasting impact on their health. This is one of the main reasons behind the increase in the incidences of heart attack among women, who went through divorce multiple times. The women who divorced once were 24 percent more at risk of getting a heart attack as compared to women who remained married.

While in women who are divorced twice or even more times the risk of heart attack is doubled also causing high blood pressure or diabetes in some cases.

Effect of Divorce on the Health of Women

In any fallout, one of the partners is more affected and harmed both psychologically and biologically. It is very hard to adjust when the marriage is dissolved. Apart from ending one of the most significant relationships of life, other adjustments such as property disputes, custody of the children, financial stability and insurances also cause great distress to women especially if they are dependent financially on their husband.

All this stress can affect the stress hormone cortisol, which spikes the cholesterol, blood sugar and blood pressure to unhealthy heights. This can lead to permanent health problems in many women.

Study finds HPV vaccines do not encourage risky sexual behaviors in girls

Feb 10, 2015 by Charles Omedo Leave a Comment

A new study published in JAMA Internal Medicine has revealed that getting the Human papillomavirus vaccine (HPV) does not necessarily encourage young girls to be sexually careless. The study addresses a number of myths and fears that people have about HPV vaccination.

HPV vaccine was first produced in 2006, and according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, young kids aged 11-12 as well as older teens and young adults should get a series of three HPV vaccine shots.

The vaccination will safeguard them against contracting the common HPV strain that causes genital warts, cervical cancer, and other related diseases. However, these shots work best and are most effective when the teens getting them are not yet sexually active.

About 38% of girls and 14% of boys aged 13-17 had been fully vaccinated as at 2013 (this was the latest available figures); although boys just started to be vaccinated much later than girls.

According to a medical researcher at Harvard Medical School, Boston, Anupam Jena, almost 20% of parents surveyed in given polls believe that HPV shots would encourage young teens to start having sex or to engage in riskier sex behavior. The parents have reasons to believe that their children would develop “a false sense of security” as a result of their vaccine shots, believing it protects them against pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.

Jena together with other researchers analyzed the insurance records of 21,610 girls aged 12-18 before and after their vaccinations; and they also studied the records of 186,501 unvaccinated girls, and tallied it with the first group according to ages and zip codes.

The researchers found that vaccinated girls had increased rates of herpes, gonorrhea, and Chlamydia among others in the first year before their shots; and according to Jena, this was likely because sexually active girls with experience of infections might be more motivated to get the shots. But for the years afterward, infections different from HPV increased in both groups, and Jena said this was likely because infections would rise with age as more teens get more sexually active.

“This is probably the most definitive evidence yet that vaccinating your child against HPV is unlikely to lead them to be more sexually active, at least in an unsafe way,” Jena said.

The study also finds that some doctors or physicians hesitate to recommend HPV vaccination to young girls because they fear giving “tacit approval for sexual activity,” wrote Robert Bednarczyk, an epidemiologist at Emory University in Atlanta.

“However, just as we do not wait until we have been in the sun for two hours to apply sunscreen, we should not wait until after an individual is sexually active to attempt to prevent HPV infection,” he wrote.

The Guttmacher Institute, a non-profit organization that investigates sexual health, discovered that about 2% of 12-year-olds, 20% of 15-year-olds, and 61% of 18-year-olds have had sex at least once.

However, Valerie Huber, the president and CEO of the National Abstinence Education Association stated that all sexual infection risks can be avoided be avoiding pre-marital sex. Huber said physicians should encourage teens about abstinence and not “merely encouraging a vaccine that, at best, only reduces the risk of a single STD.”

Source: HPV

Research finds more women at risk for death from type-I diabetes than men

Feb 8, 2015 by Karla Fetrow Leave a Comment

A new research study by The University of Queensland’s School of Public Health suggests that women with type-I diabetes are twice more likely to die from heart disease than men. Moreover, women with this condition also had a 37% higher excess risk of death from any cause, 37% increased risk of stroke and 44% increased risk of death from kidney disease compared to men with type-I diabetes.

The researchers analyzed 26 studies between 1966 and 2014 that involved 214,114 type-I diabetes participants. The primary objective of the present study was to assess sex-specific estimates of type-I diabetes mortality.

The researchers hypothesize the poorer glycemic control and issues with insulin management to be the primary reasons for higher vascular-related death in women with type-I diabetes compared to men with the disease.

Lead author and public health professor, Rachel Huxley explains that the marked difference between the sexes for vascular-related disease could have significant clinical implications for how women with type-I diabetes are treated throughout their lives. A recent joint statement by the American Diabetes Association and the American Heart Association also highlighted the need of further research to examine ethnic and racial differences and improved cardiovascular risk-prediction methods in type-I diabetes population. In light of our findings, we would like the sex differences to be included in this statement.

Simon O’Neill, Director of Health Intelligence at Diabetes UK, also mentioned that treatment choices critically impact the way type-I diabetes affects people’s lives. He also stressed the urgent need for health organization to improve treatment options for tailored diabetes care in an effort to reduce the risk of life-threatening complications and mortality.

David Simmons, of the University of Western Sydney, said that the current study points at further investigating how the risk of excess mortality in women with type-I diabetes can be reduced further.

Four cups of coffee daily lowers risk of Endometrial Cancer in Women up to 18%

Feb 8, 2015 by Karla Fetrow Leave a Comment

A new study has shown that a cup coffee may be more than enough in reducing women’s risk to endometrial cancer; researchers having evaluated dietary habits in more than 2,800 women diagnosed with the disease. The study found out that women who drank up to four cups of coffee on a daily basis had an 18% lowered risk of contracting endometrial cancer compared to women who drank less.

One trial test concluded that 37 ounces of coffee on a daily basis reduced endometrial cancer risk by 18% with another one attributing a reduction on 26 ounces a day. Endometrial Cancer is the most common type of cancer on female reproductive organs in the U.S., affecting nearly 1 of 37 women in their lifetime.

Researchers found a link between Coffee and lowered risk of endometrial cancer but not the cause and effect; the study also did not differentiate between regular and decaf. On the other hand, the study did not show how coffee lowered the risk although it has been found to be efficient in reducing estrogen levels.

It is estimated that approximately 54,870 women may contract the disease this year, which could lead to 10, 170 deaths. The finding of the study validates earlier research works that showed coffee may be beneficial in decreasing endometrial cancer with additional research still needed to affirm the link between endometrial cancer and Coffee.

No specific causes have been attributed to endometrial cancer although, researchers maintain hormonal imbalances as well as diabetes and obesity as some of the probable factors that may accelerate the risk of getting the disease.

Researchers in the study assessed the link between 84 foods and nutrients with a view of ascertaining the risk to endometrial cancer. Some of the foods that the study found could be associated with disease include total fat, phosphorus, carbohydrates as well as yogurt, butter and potatoes.

Study reveals eating fish good for both pregnant mother and the baby

Jan 25, 2015 by Charles Omedo Leave a Comment

A new study by nutritionists suggest that eating fish is good for both pregnant mother and baby, considering the rich amounts of Omega-3 fatty acids they get from fish. Omega-3 fatty acids was found to boost the development of soft tissues in unborn babies, and linked to protecting the brain from toxicity which comes about from mercury poisoning.

“This research provided the opportunity to study the role of polyunsaturated fatty acids on development and their potential to augment or counteract the toxic properties of mercury,” comments Sean Strain, Ph.D, professor of Human Nutrition at the Ulster University in Northern Ireland. The lead study author continues “The findings indicate that the type of fatty acids a mother consumes during pregnancy may make a difference in terms of their child’s future neurological development.”

It is understandable that excessive consumption of ocean fish could predispose you to mercury, but yet the derivable Omega-3 fatty acids far outweigh the chances of mercury poisoning.

“It appears that the relationship between fish nutrients and mercury may be far more complex than previously appreciated. These findings indicate that there may be an optimal balance between the different inflammatory properties of fatty acids that promote fetal development and that these mechanisms warrant further study,” said Seychelles Child Development lead study author, Phillip Davidson.

“It’s not clear that the current recommendations of limiting your fish intake is actually warranted based on the current data,” explains Dr. Laura Riley. The Massachusetts General Hospital medical director of labor and delivery continues, “This study is again raising that same question. Is this really that bad? Do you need to take into consideration the beneficial effects of eating fish?”

Researchers recommend that more study needs to be conducted to fully investigate the benefits of ocean fish as they relate to Omega-3 fatty acids and its ability to neutralize mercury in the body.