Kids who snore may have poorer grades in school
Snoring and other breathing problems during sleep can put kids at risk for poorer performance in school, a new study confirms. Parents, teachers, and health care professionals need to be aware of the potential effects of sleep-disordered breathing and be able to recognize the symptoms, Barbara Galland, who led the study, said in an email. Read more here.
Sleep longer to stay healthier
People who sleep six hours or less a night are four times more likely to develop a cold than those who snooze seven hours or more, according to a study in the journal Sleep. In the study of 164 recruits, people who slept less than five hours a night were 4.5 times more likely to fall ill than the seven-hour sleepers. The data revealed a threshold effect: Those getting six hours or less of sleep were more susceptible, while those sleeping between six and seven hours were not more at risk. Among the short sleepers (six hours or less), 39% fell ill, compared to only 18% of longer sleepers (more than six hours). Read more here.
Anti-smoking drug doesn’t trigger heart disease, depression
A drug that helps smokers kick the butt does not increase their risk of heart attack and depression as was previously thought, a new study suggests. Researchers who carried out the study said doctors can prescribe varenicline - also known as Champix or Chantix - more widely to help people stop smoking. Varenicline is the most effective medication to help smokers quit but previous reports have suggested that users may be more likely to suffer a heart attack. The drug has also been linked to depression, self-harm and suicide. The new research - which has for the first time simultaneously studied these potential side effects - supports recent studies that failed to find any evidence that varenicline has a negative effect on mental health. It also shows that taking the drug does not raise a person’s risk of heart disease, researchers said. The study was published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. PTI Read more here.
Gene signature to predict onset of Alzheimer’s
Scientists have developed a ‘gene signature’ that could allow a blood test to predict the onset of diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, years in advance. The study aimed to define a set of genes associated with ‘healthy ageing’ in 65 year olds. Such a molecular profile could be useful for distinguishing people at earlier risk of age-related diseases. “We use birth year, or chronological age, to judge everything from insurance premiums to whether you get a medical procedure or not,” said lead author James Timmons, from King’s College London in UK. “Most people accept that all 60 year olds are not the same, but there has been no reliable test for underlying ‘biological age’,” Timmons said. “Our discovery provides the first robust molecular ‘signature’ of biological age in humans and should be able to transform the way that ‘age’ is used to make medical decisions. “This includes identifying those more likely to be at risk of Alzheimer’s, as catching those at ‘early’ risk is key to evaluating potential treatments,” he said. The study was published in the journal Genome Biology. Read more here.
Understanding why girls with autism behave differently than boys
Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine found that girls with autism display less repetitive and restricted behavior than boys do. They also found that brain differences between boys and girls with autism help explain this discrepancy. The research team discovered the boys and girls shared similar low scores for social and communication behaviors; however, the girls had scores much closer to the normal range when they were measured for repetitive and restricted behaviors. Read more here.
Compiled by Pooja Chaturvedi
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