healthy living websites: August 2014

Outdoor Enthusiasts Need a Lightning Plan

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

SUNDAY, Aug. 31, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Those partaking in outdoor sports and activities need to be aware of the threat posed by lightning and take appropriate safety measures, experts say.

Over the last decade, lightning killed an average of 42 people a year in the United States and caused about 10 times as many injuries. So far this year, there have been 19 reported lightning deaths, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

In light of the incidents, many of which involved outdoor enthusiasts, the National Athletic Trainers' Association (NATA) has reissued lightning safety guidelines.

"It is critical for those who are in charge of sports and recreational activities, as well as outdoor enthusiasts, to be aware of lightning danger and prepare accordingly," guidelines committee chair Katie Walsh Flanagan, of East Carolina University, said in a NATA news release.

The guidelines suggest that administrators, coaches, athletic trainers, parents and others involved in outdoor sports and recreational activities create a lightning emergency plan for each venue.

This includes closely monitoring weather forecasts and reports and pinpointing lightning-safe locations, like a building or another fully enclosed space, in advance of events, NATA said, noting unsafe locations include picnic shelters or tables, bus shelters and trees.

Among their other guidelines:

Time how long it takes to get to safe locations and plan accordingly.

Establish guidelines for suspending and resuming sports or activities. Do not go back outdoors until at least 30 minutes after the last lightning strike or sound of thunder.

In large sports venues, have a safety plan for spectators, including a plan for safe and orderly evacuation to previously identified safe locations, and know how long it will take to move them out of the facility.

If someone is struck by lightning, move them to a safe location when possible. If an automated external defibrillator is available, use it on victims who don't have a pulse or are unconscious.

The guidelines are published in NATA's Journal of Athletic Training.

More information

The U.S. National Weather Service has more about lightning safety.

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Drug Gives 'New Hope' Against Heart Failure, Expert Says

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

SATURDAY, Aug. 30, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- In a head-to-head comparison, an experimental drug was more effective than standard treatment at preventing deaths and hospitalizations in heart failure patients.

According to the study authors, the trial was stopped early because of the marked benefit of the new drug, dubbed LCZ696.

In the trial, 26.5 percent of those getting the standard medication, enalapril (Vasotec), either died or were hospitalized due to heart failure, compared with 21.8 percent of those on the new drug. Enalapril belongs to a class of blood pressure-lowering medications known as ACE inhibitors.

"LCZ696 could become the new gold standard, replacing ACE inhibitors," said lead researcher Dr. John McMurray, a professor of cardiology at the British Heart Foundation Cardiovascular Research Center at the University of Glasgow, in Scotland.

LCZ696 combines two blood pressure drugs -- an angiotensin II receptor blocker (ARB) and the neprilysin inhibitor known as sacubitril.

"We found that LCZ696 was superior to the gold-standard ACE inhibitor for heart failure -- an ACE inhibitor being the absolute cornerstone of treatment for this problem," he said.

Not only did LCZ696 beat enalapril, but it did that even when added to other treatments, McMurray noted.

"The new treatment was very well tolerated, with no significant safety concerns," he added.

The report was published online Aug. 30 in the New England Journal of Medicine, to coincide with a presentation at the European Society of Cardiology annual meeting in Barcelona. The trial was funded by Novartis, the maker of LCZ696.

Dr. Mariell Jessup, a professor of medicine at the University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine, said, "There is new hope for heart failure."

She added, "We have not had a new drug for heart failure for many years. LCZ696 is a unique compound that may represent a new approach."

Doctors have relied on ACE inhibitors for over two decades, she said. According to Jessup, who wrote an accompanying editorial, "Newer drugs that work via alternate pathways may [show] benefit beyond the medical therapy that is used today."

For the study, over 8,400 patients with heart failure were randomly chosen to receive LCZ696 or enalapril.

Over an average of 27 months of follow-up, LCZ696 reduced the risk of hospitalization for heart failure by 21 percent, compared to enalapril, the findings showed.

Moreover, among the 1,251 people who died from heart disease during the trial, 558 were taking LCZ696 (13.3 percent) and 693 were taking enalapril (16.5 percent), the researchers noted.

Dr. Gregg Fonarow, a professor of cardiology at the University of California, Los Angeles, commented, "The results of this study are terrific news for patients with heart failure, and represent landmark findings."

If approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, this new medication should help doctors improve outcomes for the millions of men and women with chronic heart failure worldwide, he said.

More information

Visit the American Heart Association for more on heart failure.

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Spaceflight Might Weaken Astronauts' Immune Systems

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Astronauts may be at heightened risk of illness because space travel appears to disrupt human immune systems, a new study suggests.

That could be a real problem on any long missions to asteroids, the moon and Mars undertaken in the future, because getting a cold or flu while in space can be dangerous, NASA researchers say.

They found that the distribution of immune cells in the blood of International Space Station crew members remains relatively unchanged during their time in space. However, some immune cell activity is much lower than normal, while other activity is heightened.

The NASA team described the space station crew members' immune systems as being "confused." Reduced immune cell activity may prevent an appropriate response to threats from germs or viruses, while increased activity may lead to excessive responses that result in problems such as increased allergy symptoms and persistent rashes.

Astronauts' immune systems are likely being altered by many factors associated with the overall spaceflight environment, added Brian Crucian, a biological studies and immunology expert at NASA.

"Things like radiation, microbes, stress, microgravity, altered sleep cycles and isolation could all have an effect on crew member immune systems," he said in a NASA news release. "If this situation persisted for longer deep space missions, it could possibly increase risk of infection, hypersensitivity, or autoimmune issues for exploration astronauts."

Crucian and his colleagues analyzed the blood plasma of 28 space station crew members before, during and after their missions. The study was published recently in the Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research.

It's not known if the immune system changes that occur during spaceflight increase astronauts' risk for health problems during long missions, and further research is needed to determine if that is the case, Crucian said.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has more about the immune system.

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Take Steps to Control Bunions

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- If you have bunions, taking care of them now can help you avoid more serious treatment later, an expert says.

A bunion is a bump that forms on the joint of the big toe when bone or tissue moves out of place and extends beyond the normal anatomy of the toe. Left untreated, bunions can cause debilitating pain and may require surgery to correct, said Brent Rosenthal, a podiatrist and podiatric surgeon at CentraState Medical Center in Freehold, N.J.

To prevent bunions, avoid wearing shoes with pointed triangular tips and don't wear high heels for long periods of time each day, Rosenthal said. You should know your correct shoe size, which can increase with age, weight gain and pregnancy, he added.

If you do develop a bunion, start wearing shoes with a wide and deep toe box. Shoe inserts may reduce symptoms and prevent the bunion from getting worse, according to Rosenthal.

He also suggested using over-the-counter, non-medicated bunion pads whenever you wear shoes. If the bunion is inflamed and sore, apply ice packs several times a day, he said.

If these initial treatments don't help, see a podiatrist, a doctor who specializes in conditions of the feet and ankle. The doctor might prescribe an anti-inflammatory drug and/or cortisone injection to ease pain and inflammation. Ultrasound therapy is widely used to treat bunion-related soft tissue damage.

If these therapies fail, surgery may be required to relieve pressure and repair the toe joint, said Rosenthal, who noted that recovery from the surgery takes time and discomfort can last weeks.

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine has more about bunions.

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Faced With Prostate Cancer, It Helps to Know the Enemy

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Prostate cancer patients lacking knowledge about the disease have difficulty making good treatment decisions. This can lead to worse quality of care and long-term results, new research suggests.

The study included 70 men, with a median age of 63. All were newly diagnosed with localized prostate cancer.

Poor understanding of the disease was associated with greater difficulty deciding which treatment to choose and less confidence that the treatment would be effective, the study found.

"For prostate cancer, there is no one right answer when it comes to treatment. It comes down to the right answer for each specific patient, and that is heavily dependent on their own personal preferences," study first author Dr. Alan Kaplan, a resident physician in the urology department at the University of California, Los Angeles, said in a university news release.

"Men in general, and specifically economically disadvantaged men, have a hard time deciding what their preferences are, how they feel about any possible complications and what the future after treatment might be like. If you don't know anything about your disease, you'll have a really tough time making a decision," Kaplan explained.

The findings, published in the Sept. 1 print issue of the journal Cancer, suggest that doctors need to identify and educate men with little knowledge about prostate cancer in order to help them feel more comfortable making treatment decisions.

"If you get shot in the gut, there aren't many options. You go into the operating room to get fixed up," Kaplan said. "With prostate cancer, there are lots of options and not all are right for everybody."

Treatment options for prostate cancer include surgery, radiation, and burning or freezing tumors. Or, patients might choose active surveillance. That means they don't receive treatment but are closely monitored for changes in their cancer.

Prostate cancer is the second most commonly diagnosed cancer in men. This year, about 233,000 American men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer, and nearly 30,000 will die from the disease, according to the university news release.

More information

The U.S. National Cancer Institute has more about prostate cancer treatment.

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Monkey Trial Supports Ebola Drug That May Have Helped 2 Stricken Americans

By Dennis Thompson

HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- An experimental Ebola drug previously given to two American aid workers successfully cured a group of monkeys infected with the deadly virus in laboratory tests, researchers report.

The drug, ZMapp, prompted recovery in all 18 monkeys who received it, even if they didn't get the medication until five days after infection.

ZMapp even cured monkeys with advanced cases of Ebola who were days or even hours away from death, said study senior author Gary Kobinger, chief of special pathogens for the Public Health Agency of Canada.

"The level of improvement was beyond my own expectations," Kobinger said, noting that the drug cleared the liver damage, excessive bleeding and horrible rashes that are the hallmarks of Ebola infection.

This study provides some scientific evidence for the effectiveness of ZMapp, which aid workers Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol both received under "compassionate use" guidelines after contracting Ebola while in Liberia fighting the current outbreak in West Africa.

Brantly and Writebol successfully fended off the virus. They were flown home for treatment in the United States, and last week were released from hospital care in Atlanta.

The results of the monkey trial were published Aug. 29 in the journal Nature.

Because Brantly and Writebol were given ZMapp outside of a clinical trial, physicians and public health officials have been reluctant to fully credit the drug with their recovery. Further clouding the picture, a Liberian doctor and a Spanish priest subsequently died from Ebola despite receiving the drug.

"We hope that initial safety testing in humans will be undertaken soon, preferably within the next few months, to enable the compassionate use of ZMapp as soon as possible," the researchers concluded in their paper.

The West Africa outbreak is the largest ever for Ebola, with 3,069 infected and 1,552 dead. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that more than 20,000 people could become infected before the end of the outbreak.

In the face of this health-care crisis, a WHO expert panel ruled earlier this month that it would be ethical to treat Ebola patients with experimental medications like ZMapp.

"Given the severity of this condition and the fact that there's nothing else available, this is as good as it gets," Dr. Ambreen Khalil, an infectious disease specialist with Staten Island University Hospital in New York City, said of the results from the ZMapp monkey trial. "Our focus should be now on the people who are rapidly dying in Africa. In those patients, ZMapp should be used, based on this study."

ZMapp is a cocktail of three laboratory-produced antibodies, which have been derived from two previous antibody cocktails for Ebola, Kobinger said.

In the study, researchers infected 21 rhesus monkeys with an Ebola strain similar to the one raging through West Africa. Then they administered ZMapp to 18 of the monkeys starting on days three, four or five after infection. The monkeys received three doses of the drug at three-day intervals.

All 18 animals treated with ZMapp survived, regardless of how sick they had become. The three monkeys not treated with ZMapp all died by day eight.

Because the Ebola virus strain used to infect monkeys in this experiment is different to the strain in the current West African outbreak, the researchers also performed lab tests that showed that ZMapp does bind to the new virus strain and would likely be as effective against it, Kobinger said.

ZMapp is the only experimental treatment that has been deployed against Ebola during this outbreak, but others could be on the way.

The U.S. National Institutes of Health and drug manufacturer GlaxoSmithKline are expected to announce that they are starting the first human trials of a potential Ebola vaccine, NBC News reported Wednesday.

More information

For more on the Ebola virus, visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Biggest Ever Weekly Rise in Ebola Cases, U.N. Agency Says

By HealthDay staff, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The West African Ebola outbreak took a more deadly turn Friday with the World Health Organization announcing an estimated 500 new cases this week -- the biggest jump in infections so far.

Most of the new cases arose in Liberia, the U.N. health agency said, but cases in Guinea and Sierra Leone also rose sharply, the Associated Press reported.

"There are serious problems with case management and infection prevention and control," according to the WHO report. "The situation is worsening in Liberia and Sierra Leone."

Senegal -- a prime tourist destination in the region -- has also now recorded its first case, an infected university student from Guinea who sought treatment at a hospital in Senegal's capital city, Dakar, the AP reported.

According to Senegal's Health Minister, Awa Marie Coll Seck, the young man had had contact with Ebola patients in Guinea and has now been placed under quarantine. Tests have confirmed he is infected with Ebola virus, the AP said.

The news follows a WHO update released on Thursday that warned that the deadly Ebola outbreak hitting five West African nations could eventually infect more than 20,000 people.

Already the largest Ebola outbreak ever, the viral infection has produced 3,069 cases so far and killed 1,552 people in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone, with Senegal now added to that list.

Nearly 40 percent of the total number of reported cases have occurred in the past three weeks, the health agency said.

"This far outstrips any historic Ebola outbreak in numbers. The largest outbreak in the past was about 400 cases," Dr. Bruce Aylward, WHO's assistant director-general for emergency operations, said at a news conference, the AP reported.

In the meantime, many American universities say they plan to run extra health checks on college students arriving from the affected region.

According to the AP, about 30 students from Nigeria are expected to arrive this semester at the University of Illinois. According to Dr. Robert Palinkas, director of the university's health center, the Nigerian students will be asked to undergo a temperature check for signs of fever and to have a private discussion about Ebola when they arrive at the university health center for required immunization paperwork and tuberculosis testing.

Health experts stress that the threat to U.S. college students remains very small, but Palinkas told the AP that the added precautions should reassure parents.

"Parents are comforted to know that there is a screening process, that we are alert for it, that we are prepared for it," he said, "and that we're doing everything we can without infringing on the rights of anybody to make sure their son or daughter is going to have the lowest risk possible."

Similar precautions are being conducted at the University at Buffalo in New York, Mercer University in Georgia, Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., and the University of Akron in Ohio, the AP said.

In response to the crisis, WHO unveiled a battle plan Thursday that calls for stopping Ebola transmissions within six to nine months, while "rapidly managing the consequences of any further international spread," the WHO said in a news release.

The plan calls for spending $489 million over the next nine months and enlisting 750 international workers and 12,000 national workers, the AP reported.

Also Thursday, the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) said it would begin testing an experimental Ebola vaccine in humans next week. It will be tested in 20 healthy adults in Maryland to see if it's safe and able to produce an appropriate immune system response.

The vaccine was developed by the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and drug maker GlaxoSmithKline. It will also be tested on healthy volunteers in Great Britain and the West African nations of Gambia and Mali, the NIH said.

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'Doctor-Shopping' for Painkillers Common After Broken-Bone Surgery, Study Finds

By Randy Dotinga

HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- About one in five patients operated on for broken bones or other orthopedic trauma shops around for additional painkillers after surgery, a new study finds.

Less-educated patients and patients who had used narcotic painkillers previously were several times more likely to be "doctor shoppers," said study lead author Dr. Brent Morris, a shoulder and neck surgeon in Lexington, Ky. Overall, he said, the study suggests that doctors aren't talking to one another about the painkiller needs of their patients.

"There needs to be coordination if additional pain medications are needed," he said. "Patients should not be receiving multiple narcotic pain medication prescriptions from multiple providers without coordinating with their treating surgeon."

Use of narcotic painkillers for nonmedical purposes is a serious concern in the United States. Unintentional overdose deaths increased 124 percent from 1999 to 2007 largely because of prescription narcotics, according to background information in the study.

Doctor shoppers go to multiple physicians in search of prescription medications, often narcotic painkillers, anti-anxiety drugs such as Xanax, or medications to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), said Julie Worley, an assistant professor of nursing at Rush University in Chicago, who has studied the trend.

Patients who doctor-shop are often addicted to painkillers or looking to get drugs they can sell, Worley said. Most states track prescriptions of narcotic painkillers to prevent abuse, but the systems "have many issues and aren't foolproof," she said. In addition, she said, physicians are often wary of confronting their patients.

In the new study, published in the August issue of the Journal of Bone & Joint Surgery, researchers examined the medical and pharmacy records of 130 patients ages 18 to 64 who sought treatment at Nashville's Vanderbilt University Medical Center in 2011.

They looked at painkiller prescriptions for three months before admission and six months after discharge. All of the patients suffered from single orthopedic injuries such as broken legs, ankles and arms.

"The surgeon that performed the operation is typically responsible for pain control immediately after surgery," Morris said. "Pain control after this type of surgery often requires narcotic pain medications for the first several weeks."

Overall, 21 percent of the patients tried to get narcotic painkillers from more than just the surgeon who treated them. Patients who weren't college-educated were 3.2 times more likely to try to get the drugs from more than one doctor, and those who had used narcotic painkillers before were 4.5 times more likely.

The doctor shoppers -- who were mostly white males -- used narcotics for about 3.5 months after surgery whereas single-provider painkiller users took them for four weeks on average, the study found. Many obtained seven or more narcotic prescriptions compared to two prescriptions for single-provider patients.

Whether the doctor shoppers had legitimate pain needs isn't clear from the study. "The ER is definitely an area where people doctor-shop. But I don't know that they're going to be having an orthopedic trauma to get drugs," said Worley.

It's possible, she said, that some of the patients went to other doctors, perhaps their own physicians, in search of painkillers.

Whatever the reasons, Morris and Worley called for more reliable systems to prevent patients from abusing narcotic painkillers.

Worley said physicians should be wary of patients who pay with cash since doctor-shoppers with insurance are more easily detected. It's also helpful to check patients for needle marks and to use more extensive drug test procedures to make sure patients aren't sneaking in someone else's urine, she said.

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European MRSA Originated in Sub-Saharan Africa, Study Finds

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The main strain of a common antibiotic-resistant infection in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa originated in sub-Saharan Africa, a new study says.

Researchers studied so-called community-acquired methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (CA-MRSA) infections, which occur in healthy people who have not recently been hospitalized. These infections typically affect the skin and can be transmitted through person-to-person contact or through touching contaminated objects such as clothing or towels.

The predominant strain of CA-MRSA in Europe is called CC80. It was identified in the late 1990s, and has since been detected throughout the Middle East and North Africa. There also have been sporadic reports of the strain in Asia, Australia and South America, the study authors noted.

The researchers analyzed samples of CC80 from 22 countries in Asia, North and sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and the Middle East, and found that it originated from a single sub-Saharan ancestor.

The CC80 strain likely started to spread from sub-Saharan Africa to other regions starting in the mid-1980s because of increased migration of people from sub-Saharan Africa to other countries and growth in the number of European tourists traveling to this part of Africa, according to the researchers.

The study was published Aug. 26 in the online journal mBio.

"With increasing levels of CA-MRSA reported from most parts of the Western world, there is a great interest in understanding the origin and factors associated with the emergence of these epidemic lineages," lead author Marc Stegger, of the microbiology and infection control department at Statens Serum Institute in Denmark, said in a news release from the American Society for Microbiology.

"Our study determined that a single descendant of a methicillin-sensitive ancestor circulating in sub-Saharan Africa rose to become the dominant CA-MRSA clone in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa," Stegger said.

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine has more about MRSA.

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Study Counters Critics of Plainer Cigarette Packaging

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Aug. 29, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Selling cigarettes in plain packages doesn't increase the use of low-cost or illegal tobacco and doesn't harm sales in small stores, according to new research from Australia.

Those problems were predicted by the tobacco industry when it tried to prevent Australia from becoming the first country in the world to introduce plain packaging for tobacco products in 2012. Similar legislation is being considered in Ireland, New Zealand and the U.K.

Researchers surveyed nearly 2,000 adult smokers in Australia before and after the plain-packaging rule was implemented. The results showed that the smokers continued to buy their tobacco from the same places, according to the study released online on Aug. 28 in the BMJ.

Nearly two-thirds of smokers bought their tobacco from supermarkets in 2011 and 2013. The proportion of those who bought tobacco at small, independent stores rose from just over 9 percent in 2011 to just over 11 percent in 2013.

The use of low-cost Asian brands hovered around 1 percent in both 2011 and 2013. The use of illegal unbranded tobacco was dropped slightly to less than 2 percent between 2011 and 2013.

In 2013, about 3 percent of smokers said they had bought at least one possibly contraband pack within the previous three months, and nearly 2 percent said they had bought from informal sources -- such as a market stall or the back of a van -- once or twice over the past 12 months.

"This study provides no evidence of the unintended consequences of standardized packaging predicted by opponents [having] happened one year after implementation," the study authors concluded.

More information

The American Cancer Society offers a guide to quitting smoking.

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Health Tip: Teach Your Child to Read Food Labels

Health Tip: Exercise While Watching Television

By Diana Kohnle, HealthDay Reporter

(HealthDay News) -- If your favorite TV shows are pulling you away from your workout, why not combine the two?

The American Council on Exercise offers these suggestions:

Ditch the remote and walk to the TV to change the channel.

During commercial breaks, walk up and down the stairs or around the room.

Perform resistance exercises while you watch.

Invest in a treadmill or stationary bike.

Perform activities that require you to stand, such as ironing your clothes.

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Could Too Much Salt Harm MS Patients?

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Too much salt in the diet may worsen symptoms of multiple sclerosis (MS), a new study from Argentina suggests.

"Many environmental factors affect MS, such as vitamin D, smoking and Epstein Barr virus infection. Our study shows that high salt intake may be another environmental factor affecting MS patients," said lead researcher Dr. Mauricio Farez, of the Raul Carrea Institute for Neurological Research in Buenos Aires.

Multiple sclerosis is a disease of the nervous system that causes weakness, visual disturbances, trouble with balance, numbness and thinking and memory problems. The most common form is called relapsing-remitting MS, meaning symptoms subside and then become worsen.

Earlier research found that salt may alter autoimmune response, which is involved in the development of MS.

Farez cautioned that this study does not show that salt causes MS to worsen, but there does seem to be an association.

"This is a small observational study showing a relationship between salt intake and MS disease activity, and these data need to be further validated in larger studies, including different populations," he said.

For the study, Farez's team measured the levels of sodium (the main component of salt), creatinine and vitamin D in the blood and urine of 70 patients with the relapsing-remitting form of MS. Creatinine is a marker of inflammation, and low levels of vitamin D have been associated with MS.

Sodium intake was divided into three levels: less than 2 grams daily, between 2 and 4.8 grams a day, and more than 4.8 grams daily. Current guidelines for heart disease prevention recommend a maximum sodium intake of 1.5 grams to 2.4 grams per day. At the upper end, that's just under half a teaspoon of table salt a day.

Farez's group found that people with daily sodium intake of between 2 and 4.8 grams and those who consume more than 4.8 grams -- a little less than a teaspoon of salt -- were up to four times more likely to have more episodes of worsening MS symptoms as those who consumed the least salt.

To check the progression of the disease in patients' brains, the researchers analyzed X-rays and scans. They found that patients who had the highest salt intake were about 3.4 times more likely to have their disease worsen, compared with those with the lowest salt intake.

Similar results were found in a second group of 52 MS patients, the researchers added.

"It is too soon to say that MS patients should cut their salt intake," Farez said. "Our findings could serve as a basis for clinical trials with salt restriction in MS patients," he said.

The report was published Aug. 28 in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry.

Salt's influence on MS is a subject of increasing interest, said Nicholas LaRocca, vice president of health care delivery and policy research at the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

"At this stage you really can't assign cause and effect, but it's beginning to look like there is a significant role of salt in MS disease activity and progression," he said.

The mechanism for this association isn't known, LaRocca said. Salt may make the immune system more prone to the disease, he suggested.

He agreed that there isn't enough evidence to recommend that MS patients reduce salt in their diet.

"However, in a more general sense, we should all be watching our salt intake. We should all be careful about consuming excessive amounts of salt," he said.

For the study, salt intake was estimated from sodium excreted in urine samples the participants provided three times over nine months. In addition, the researchers tracked the course of the patients' MS from 2010 to 2012.

After accounting for factors such as smoking, age, gender, length of time after diagnosis, weight, treatment and vitamin D, the link between more salt and worsening MS remained, the researchers said.

More information

For more on MS, visit the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

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Parents' Fights May Strain Bonds With Their Kids

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Arguments between parents may damage their relationships with their children, a new study indicates.

Parents in more than 200 families were asked to make daily diary entries for 15 days. At the end of each day, mothers and fathers rated the quality of their marriage and their relationship with their children.

On days when parents reported conflict and tension in their marriage, their dealings with their children were also strained, according to the study recently published in the Journal of Family Psychology.

However, there were notable differences between mothers and fathers. Marital conflict affected mothers' relationships with their children for just one day.

"In fact, in that situation, moms appeared to compensate for their marital tension. Poor marital quality actually predicted an improvement in the relationship between the mom and the child. So, the first day's adverse spillover is short-lived for moms," study author Chrystyna Kouros, an assistant professor in the psychology department at Southern Methodist University, Dallas, said in a university news release.

It was a different story with fathers.

"In families where the mom was showing signs of depression, dads on the other hand let the marital tension spill over, with the result being poorer interactions with their child, even on the next day," Kouros said.

The study shows that the quality of their marriage affects each parent's ties with their children.

"We see from the findings that the marriage is a hub relationship for the family," Kouros said. "The quality of that relationship spills over into each parent's interactions with the child. So if mom and dad are fighting, it will show up initially -- and in some cases on the second day -- in a poorer quality relationship with their kids."

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine has more about parenting.

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Most U.S. Babies Get Their Vaccines: CDC

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The vast majority of American babies are getting the vaccines they need to protect them from serious illnesses, federal health officials said Thursday.

More than 90 percent of children are getting the vaccines that prevent measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR); polio; hepatitis B and chickenpox (varicella), according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Nationally, vaccination among children 19 to 35 months of age remains stable or has increased for all of the recommended vaccines, and that's really good news," said Dr. Melinda Wharton, acting director of CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases.

"There is still room for improvement," she added. "Coverage is not as high as we would like it to be for doses of vaccines and boosters given in the second year of life."

Wharton suggested one way to improve vaccine coverage could be with electronic medical records to help doctors keep track of when vaccinations are needed.

While some parents are reluctant to have their children vaccinated, or don't believe in vaccines at all, Wharton doesn't see this as a major problem. "The number of children who do not get any vaccine remains low and stable at less than 1 percent," she said.

Vaccines are essential in preventing sickness and death, the CDC said. "Among children born during 1994-2013, vaccination will prevent an estimated 322 million illnesses, 21 million hospitalizations and 732,000 deaths during their lifetimes," the CDC report stated.

The new findings were published in the Aug. 29 issue of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

The report also found that:

While initial vaccination rates are high, getting second doses and booster shots that are needed when children are 2 years old remains a challenge, Wharton said.

These vaccines include the DTaP vaccine, which prevents diphtheria, tetanus and pertussis (whooping cough); Hib, which protects against haemophilus influenzae type b, which can cause severe diseases like meningitis -- an infection of the fluid and lining around the brain and spinal cord; and the PCV vaccine, which prevents pneumococcal disease, which can trigger ear infections and meningitis.

Poor children are less likely to get booster shots, and the full series of polio, rotavirus and hepatitis B vaccines, according to the report.

Wharton said most insurance plans cover vaccines. People who can't afford them can turn to the federal Vaccines for Children Program, which provides vaccines for free.

Vaccine coverage also varies by state and vaccine, the CDC report found.

When the researchers looked at immunizations against 11 different diseases -- including chickenpox, measles and polio -- coverage ranged from a high of 82 percent in Rhode Island to 57 percent in Arkansas. Also, 17 states had less than 90 percent coverage with the measles/mumps/rubella vaccine.

For one disease, measles, which has made a recurrence in the United States, national coverage with at least one dose of the measles/mumps/rubella vaccine was 92 percent. While this seems high, one in 12 children did not receive the first dose of the MMR vaccine on time, putting lots of kids at risk for measles, the CDC noted.

As of Aug. 22, there had been 592 measles cases reported in the United States this year, the most since 1994, according to the CDC.

Measles is most often introduced into the United States by unvaccinated Americans who travel overseas to areas where measles is endemic. Measles can spread quickly in communities with unvaccinated and under-vaccinated people, the CDC pointed out.

Dr. Adriana Cadilla, a pediatrician at Miami Children's Hospital, said, "We still have a ways to go, but it's good to know that we're headed in the right direction" with childhood vaccinations.

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Less Sleep in Teen Years Tied to More Pounds at 21

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Lack of sleep not only puts teens at risk for poor grades, it also puts them at increased risk for obesity, researchers warn.

The study authors analyzed data collected from more than 10,000 Americans when they were aged 16 and 21. Nearly one-fifth of them got less than six hours of sleep a night when they were age 16, and this group was 20 percent more likely to be obese at age 21 than those who got more than eight hours of sleep per night at age 16, the investigators found.

Although lack of exercise and too much time spent watching television were also risk factors for obesity, these behaviors did not account for the link between lack of sleep and obesity, according to the study published online recently in the Journal of Pediatrics.

"Lack of sleep in your teenage years can stack the deck against you for obesity later in life. Once you're an obese adult, it is much harder to lose weight and keep it off. And the longer you are obese, the greater your risk for health problems like heart disease, diabetes, and cancer," study author Shakira Suglia, an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University in New York City, said in a university news release.

"The message for parents is to make sure their teenagers get more than eight hours a night. A good night's sleep does more than help them stay alert in school. It helps them grow into healthy adults," Suglia added.

Teens should get nine to 10 hours of sleep a night, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

It's known that daytime sleepiness and fatigue affect what and how people eat by triggering cravings and altering appetite. For example, sleep-deprived people find it easier to buy calorie-laden fast food rather than preparing a healthy meal.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about sleep.

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Donated Livers Not Harmed by Travel Distances, Study Finds

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Transporting donated livers long distances does not affect the quality of the organs, according to new research.

This finding may impact the number of organs transported by air rather than road.

The study was triggered by concerns about the increasing distances from donor to recipient that are being caused by the ongoing shortage of liver donations in the United States. The concern involves organ quality because increased travel time significantly increases the time the liver is in a cooled state outside the body (called "cold ischemia time").

In this study, researchers looked at more than 1,200 livers removed from donors in 2010, and found that the average time the liver was kept in a cooled state outside the body was six hours for livers shared locally and seven hours for those shared regionally.

Average transport times were one hour for livers shared locally and two hours for those shared regionally. Ninety percent of livers shared regionally were transported by air, compared with 22 percent of livers shared locally, according to the study published online recently in the journal Liver Transplantation.

"Our findings indicate that non-transport factors impact [cold ischemia time] much more than transport time," Dr. Sommer Gentry, of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md., said in a journal news release.

"Broader sharing of livers will not have much effect on [cold ischemia time] or negatively impact the liver transplant recipient, but will significantly increase the number of organs transported by flying," Gentry concluded.

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine has more about liver transplantation.

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Your Family's Germs May Move With You

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Your family carries its own unique population of bacteria that accompany you when you move to a new home, a new study finds.

Over the course of six weeks, seven families -- with a total of 18 people, three dogs and one cat -- swabbed their hands, feet and noses every day to collect samples of bacteria living in and on them. The participants also collected samples from household surfaces such as doorknobs, light switches, countertops and floors.

The samples underwent DNA testing to identify the different species of bacteria they contained.

"We wanted to know how much people affected the microbial community on a house's surfaces and on each other," study leader Jack Gilbert, a microbiologist at the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, said in a government news release.

The results showed that people have a major impact on the bacterial populations in their homes. For example, when three of the families moved, it took less than a day for their new homes to have the same bacteria populations as their old homes.

The researchers also found that regular physical contact between people had a strong effect. For example, in a home where there was a couple and another person, the couple shared many more bacteria. Married couples and their young children also shared many of the same bacteria.

Within homes, people's hands were most likely to have similar bacteria, while there was more variation in the types of bacteria in their noses. Homes with indoor-outdoor dogs or cats had more plant and soil bacteria, according to the study published Aug. 28 in the journal Science.

The findings suggest that by analyzing bacteria in a home, it would be possible to "predict whether a person has lived in this location, and how recently, with very good accuracy," Gilbert said.

In one case, the researchers tracked a potentially harmful strain of bacteria called Enterobacter. It first appeared on one person's hands, then the kitchen counter, and then another person's hands.

"This doesn't mean that the countertop was definitely the mode of transmission between the two humans, but it's certainly a smoking gun," Gilbert said. "It's also quite possible that we are routinely exposed to harmful bacteria -- living on us and in our environment -- but it only causes disease when our immune systems are otherwise disrupted."

The study provides new insight into the interaction between people and the bacteria that live in and on them, and play a role in their health.

"We know that certain bacteria can make it easier for mice to put on weight, for example, and that others influence brain development in young mice," Gilbert said.

"We want to know where these bacteria come from, and as people spend more and more time indoors, we wanted to map out the microbes that live in our homes and the likelihood that they will settle on us," he explained.

Learning more about bacteria is "essential for us to understand our health in the 21st century," Gilbert concluded.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has more about microbes.

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Gene Research Yields Insights Into Ebola Virus

By Dennis Thompson

HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Genetic research performed during the early days of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa has given scientists unprecedented insight into how the virus mutates and spreads.

Researchers report in the Aug. 28 online issue of Science that they have now determined the following:

The researchers' efforts have quadrupled the amount of genetic data available on Ebola, creating mounds of new and publicly available information about the DNA structure of the deadly virus, said senior study author Dr. Pardis Sabeti.

Sabeti is a senior associate member at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard and an associate professor at Harvard University.

The ongoing Ebola outbreak has infected 3,069 people and claimed the lives of 1,552, according to the World Health Organization.

The genetic researchers rapidly sequenced and analyzed more than 99 Ebola viruses from 78 patients in Sierra Leone during the first 24 days of the outbreak there.

Government health officials traced the entrance of Ebola into Sierra Leone to the burial of a traditional healer who had treated patients in neighboring Guinea. Thirteen women who attended the burial contracted Ebola, and researchers drew viral samples from these women to begin genetic sequencing.

Such genetic data is comparable to "fingerprints at the scene of the crime," said Dr. Lee Norman, chief medical officer of the University of Kansas Hospital.

"It tells you so much about how and where the virus came from, and what we can do about it," Norman said.

The team has found more than 300 genetic changes that make the 2014 Ebola virus distinct from the strains tied to previous Ebola outbreaks.

They also have found evidence that the Ebola outbreak started from a single introduction into humans, and has subsequently spread from person to person over many months. Animals are not helping spread Ebola.

"This is very important, because if you're trying to contain an outbreak that's coming in through an animal population, you have to do something about human contact with those animals," said Dr. Robert Amler, dean of the School of Health Sciences and Practice and dean of the Institute of Public Health at New York Medical College.

Knowing that the virus is only spreading from human-to-human will help public health workers use time-tested isolation and quarantine procedures to protect people against further spread, Amler said.

"The basic principles of disease control in a population still hold," he said. "That's reassuring, because we have a lot of experience in controlling disease outbreaks in densely populated areas, and those principles hold."

The researchers involved in this effort have publicly released all of the Ebola genetic information they've gathered, making it available through a U.S. National Institutes of Health database starting in June, Sabeti said.

This huge amount of genetic information regarding the virus hopefully will help spur and direct new research into therapies, vaccines and treatments for Ebola, Sabeti said.

"A lot of important findings that will come out of data will not come from us, but from others," Sabeti said, noting that some of the world's leading epidemic specialists are now working with the data they gathered.

Norman hailed the "integrity" behind making the genetic data available to the global health community.

"Releasing the DNA sequence into the public domain is just the right thing to do," he said. "That shows an altruistic intent, which is perfect for something as heart-rending as this outbreak has been."

The researchers involved in this effort have been tracking lethal viruses in West Africa since the middle of the last decade, initially focusing on the Lassa virus, Sabeti said.

When the ongoing Ebola outbreak began in Guinea, they were perfectly positioned to set up shop in Sierra Leone and start watching for the first cases there.

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Young Driver's Gender May Play Role in Timing, Type of Crash

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The types of vehicle crashes involving young drivers often vary by gender, a new study has found.

Researchers analyzed data from 2007 to 2011 for all crashes involving drivers between the ages of 16 and 24 in Kansas and found a number of differences between male and female drivers.

Young women were 66 percent more likely to wear a seat belt, 28 percent more likely to drive on a restricted license and they had more crashes at intersections and with pedestrians. They were also more likely to have crashes on weekdays.

Young men, on the other hand, had more crashes at night, more off-road crashes and were more likely to have crashes on weekends, according to the study published recently in the Journal of Safety Research.

"There are often different risk factors for young male and young female drivers because their behavior and attitudes are generally different," lead researcher Sunanda Dissanayake, a civil engineering professor at Kansas State University, said in a university news release.

"This may help explain why one gender is more likely to be involved in a certain type of crash. For example, young males may have more off-road crashes because this crash type is more frequently involved with speeding on rural roads -- a driving habit exhibited more by young males than young females," she added.

The findings could be used to develop educational materials specifically targeted at either young male or young female drivers, the researchers added.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about motor vehicle safety.

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Ebola Outbreak Could Infect 20,000 People, U.N. Says

By HealthDay staff, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The deadly Ebola outbreak hitting four West African nations could eventually infect more than 20,000 people, the World Health Organization announced Thursday.

Already the largest Ebola outbreak ever, the viral infection has produced 3,069 cases so far and killed 1,552 people in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.

Nearly 40 percent of the total number of reported cases have occurred in the past three weeks, the health agency said.

Part of the problem, he said, is that the outbreak is occurring in large cities and broad sections of the affected countries.

"What we are seeing today, in contrast to previous Ebola outbreaks: multiple hotspots within these countries -- not a single, remote forested area, the kind of environments that have been tackled in the past. And then not multiple hotspots within one country, but international disease," Aylward said.

In response to the crisis, the U.N. health agency unveiled a battle plan Thursday that calls for stopping Ebola transmissions within six to nine months, while "rapidly managing the consequences of any further international spread," the WHO said in a news release.

The plan calls for spending $489 million over the next nine months and enlisting 750 international workers and 12,000 national workers, the AP reported.

Earlier this week, Dr. Thomas Frieden, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, visited Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, where he acknowledged that the virus currently has the "upper hand" in the outbreak.

"Lots of hard work is happening, lots of good things are happening," Frieden said during a meeting in Liberia, the AP reported. "But the virus still has the upper hand."

"Ebola doesn't spread by mysterious means, we know how it spreads," he said. "So we have the means to stop it from spreading, but it requires tremendous attention to every detail."

Unlike diseases such as tuberculosis or flu, Ebola isn't spread by breathing air from an infected person. Transmission requires direct contact with blood, secretions, organs or other body fluids of infected living or dead persons or animals, according to the WHO.

Ebola, one of the world's most virulent diseases, kills up to 90 percent of people it infects. Symptoms include a sudden fever, intense weakness, muscle pain, headache and sore throat. This is followed by vomiting, diarrhea, rash, poor kidney and liver function and, in some cases, both internal and external bleeding.

Many of those killed during the current Ebola outbreak have been health care workers.

According to the CDC, health care workers must be able to recognize a case of Ebola and be ready to use "isolation precautions or barrier nursing techniques." Barrier nursing techniques include:

The aim of these techniques is to avoid contact with the blood or secretions of an infected patient, the CDC said.

More information

For more on Ebola virus, visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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California Trees Harbor Fungus Deadly to People With HIV

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- A potentially deadly fungus that has been sickening HIV/AIDS patients in Southern California for decades grows on trees, a new study finds.

The team of scientists who published the research note that they were tipped off to the finding by a teen girl's science fair project.

The Cryptococcus gattii fungus triggers infections of the lungs and brains and is responsible for a full third of all AIDS-related deaths, the researchers noted. They found that three tree species -- Canary Island pine, Pohutukawa and American sweetgum -- harbor the fungus and are sources of human infection.

"Just as people who travel to South America are told to be careful about drinking the water, people who visit other areas like California, the Pacific Northwest and Oregon need to be aware that they are at risk for developing a fungal infection, especially if their immune system is compromised," study author Deborah Springer, a postdoctoral fellow in the Center for Microbial Pathogenesis at Duke University School of Medicine, said in a Duke news release.

However, she and her colleagues owe their discovery to a science fair project conducted by 13-year-old Elan Filler, who gathered tree and soil samples from areas around Los Angeles.

Elan is the daughter of Dr. Scott Filler, an infectious disease specialist the University of California, Los Angeles.

Elan sent samples of C. gattii to the researchers, who compared them with samples from HIV/AIDS patients with C. gatti infections. The samples from three of the tree species were nearly genetically identical to the samples from the patients.

The C gattii samples from the trees were fertile, and able to reproduce sexually or asexually, according to the study published recently in the journal PLoS Pathogens.

"That finding is important for long-term prevalence in the environment, because this fungal pathogen will be able to grow, reproduce, disperse spores and serve as a source of ongoing infections," Springer explained.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about Cryptococcus gattii .

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Eye Pigment May Help Vision in Hazy Conditions

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Having greater amounts of yellow pigment in your eyes could boost your ability to see distant objects in hazy conditions, a new study reports.

In a laboratory experiment, University of Georgia researchers simulated hazy conditions in order to test the distance vision of people with different levels of yellow pigment (also called macular pigment) in their eyes.

The volunteers had widely varying amounts of yellow pigment, which represents accumulations of the nutrients lutein and zeaxanthin, according to the researchers, led by Laura Fletcher of the University of Georgia, Athens. The study was published in the September issue of the journal Optometry and Vision Science.

Those who had more yellow pigment were better able to see distant objects through haze. Those with the highest levels of yellow pigment could see through twice the amount of haze as those with the lowest levels, the investigators found.

"All human eyes, and many animal eyes, contain an inert yellow pigment that is reported to be both protective and also slightly enhance vision, particularly in short wavelength (blue light) settings," Anthony Adams, editor-in-chief of Optometry and Vision Science, said in a journal news release.

"The results suggest that people with high levels of yellow macular pigment may have some slight advantage in hazy and glare conditions," he added.

The next step in this research would be to assess how different levels of yellow pigment affect vision in actual outdoor settings, the researchers said.

More information

The U.S. National Eye Institute explains how to keep your eyes healthy.

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Concussion Recovery Can Reverse After Return to Activity, Study Shows

By Amy Norton

HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, Aug. 28, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Athletes who seem to have recovered from a concussion may actually show a subtle worsening in a particular mental ability after they return to exercise, a small study suggests.

The findings come from a study of 19 high school athletes who suffered a concussion and then got medical clearance to return to physical activity -- most often football, although a few were on soccer, wrestling or volleyball teams.

Researchers found that for 12 of those athletes, a particular mental ability that had been improving post-concussion reversed course once they were up and moving again.

Specifically, the athletes' ability to simultaneously walk and do simple mental tasks "regressed," the researchers report in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.

In real-life terms, that means walking down the street while talking to a friend would be a bit harder, explained Li-Shan Chou, one of the researchers on the study.

The shift would be too subtle for a person to actually notice, said Chou, a professor of human physiology at the University of Oregon in Eugene.

But he and his colleagues were able to detect the regression in lab tests where the athletes walked while performing basic mental tasks -- like listening to a spoken word, then saying whether it was a high or low pitch.

What does it all mean? That's not clear, said Kenneth Podell, a concussion expert who was not involved in the study.

For one, since the study group was so small, the findings need to be replicated in larger studies to know whether they are "real," according to Podell, co-director of the Houston Methodist Concussion Center in Texas.

He also questioned how the athletes could show an improvement in their test performance early on, when they were "most concussed," but then worsen after all their other signs and symptoms had improved.

Chou agreed that the implications of his findings are unclear. For now, he said the study highlights the importance of giving concussions time to heal.

"Have patience, and give the brain time to recover," Chou added.

According to the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), more than 1 million athletes in the United States suffer a concussion each year.

Concussion symptoms include headache, dizziness, nausea, ringing in the ears, fatigue and confusion -- though these problems may not become noticeable until hours after the jolt to the head. And contrary to popular belief, concussions usually do not cause unconsciousness.

When athletes are recovering from a concussion, the "standard of care" is to gradually return them to physical activity before they can get back on the field, Podell said.

In fact, all 50 states and the District of Columbia now have some kind of law on youth concussions, protecting athletes from returning to the playing fields too soon.

But there is no "set timeline" for safe return to play, according to the AAN. And judging recovery is subjective, Chou said, because it involves asking patients how they feel.

The current findings are based on 19 high school athletes who were periodically assessed for two months after sustaining a concussion. All returned to physical activity, with medical clearance, during that time.

Chou's team found that once they were active again, 12 of the athletes showed some reversal in their ability to walk and perform mental tasks simultaneously. The problem showed up as a subtle change in their walking speed or balance.

Still, Podell said, it's not clear what to make of that. Even if the athletes' gait did regress when they first started physical activity, it might have been "fine" by the time they got back into their sport, he noted.

"The take-away for parents is, the return from concussion is complex, and the best clinical practice calls for a slow and gradual return to activity under the guidance of professionals," Podell said.

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Health Tip: Eating When You're Not Hungry

By Diana Kohnle, HealthDay Reporter

(HealthDay News) -- Eating when you're not hungry can pack on unnecessary pounds and calories.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says common triggers for eating when not hungry include:

Seeing your favorite snacks when you enter the pantry.

Watching TV.

Passing by the vending machines at work.

Dealing with a stressful situation.

Being bored.

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Health Tip: Recognizing Hay Fever

By Diana Kohnle, HealthDay Reporter

(HealthDay News) -- Millions of people are bothered by hay fever, an allergy to grass, trees, weeds or other types of pollen. Symptoms of the most common type of allergy frequently make sufferers feel miserable.

The American Academy of Family Physicians mentions these common symptoms of hay fever:

Sneezing, a stuffy or runny nose and difficulty recognizing smells.

Coughing and a sore throat.

Itchiness of the skin, mouth, throat, nose and eyes.

Pressure in the cheeks and nose.

A popping sensation and fullness of the ears.

Headache.

Eyes that are swollen, watery or red, or surrounded by dark circles.

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MERS Virus Doesn't Seem to Spread Easily, Study Finds

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- People infected with the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) virus are unlikely to pass it to others in their household, a new study suggests.

Mostly confined to countries in the Middle East so far, the virus has infected 837 people and killed at least 291, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

"A lot of speculations have been made that MERS spreads significantly among family members and household contacts of active cases," said study lead researcher Dr. Ziad Memish, Saudi Arabia's assistant deputy minister of health for preventive medicine.

Memish's team studied 26 patients with MERS and their 280 household contacts. The researchers found that 12 people among the 280 household contacts came down with MERS.

According to Memish, that puts the odds of getting MERS from another person at about 5 percent.

"It's reassuring that very low transmission takes place at home among family contacts, and the majority of transmission occurs at health-care facilities," Memish said.

In fact, 25 percent of all MERS cases have been among health-care workers, according to WHO.

The new study's findings were published in the Aug. 28 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Dr. Marc Siegel, an associate professor of medicine at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City, agreed with the findings, saying, "MERS is not very contagious."

By comparison, the odds of catching the flu from a close contact are 25 percent, Siegel said. "If someone in your household has flu, there's a one in four chance you're going to get it," he said.

With measles, the chances of getting the disease from an infected person in your household are even higher, hitting 90 percent, Siegel said.

"This study shows that the chances of MERS becoming widespread is small," he said.

Siegel added that this low transmission rate has kept the virus largely confined to the Middle East, and the cases seen outside the region have been among people who traveled or worked in that area.

MERS can start with a fever, cough and shortness of breath. Pneumonia is a common complication. Diarrhea has also been reported by some patients, the WHO said.

Severe cases of MERS can cause respiratory failure requiring breathing support in an intensive care unit. Some patients suffer kidney failure or septic shock.

The virus causes more severe disease in people with weakened immune systems, older people and those with such chronic diseases as diabetes, cancer and lung disease, the agency said.

More information

Visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for more on the MERS virus.

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Polyp Removal Doesn't Always Signal Raised Colon Cancer Risk, Study Says

By Dennis Thompson

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Doctors may be performing too many repeat colonoscopies on people who've had pre-cancerous polyps removed during an earlier colon cancer screening, a new Norwegian study suggests.

Many of these patients have no greater risk of dying from colon cancer than the general public, the researchers determined.

People who have a single low-risk polyp removed have a much lower risk of colon cancer, compared to both the general public and patients who have multiple polyps or aggressive polyps removed, said lead author Dr. Magnus Loberg, a lecturer in health management and health economics at the University of Oslo.

These low-risk patients likely don't need the aggressive follow-up called for under current guidelines, Loberg said.

"These findings support more intense surveillance of the high-risk group, but should maybe lead to reconsideration of the guidelines regarding the low-risk group," he said. The study is published in the Aug. 28 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Current guidelines recommended by the American Cancer Society call for repeat colonoscopy at 5 to 10 years for patients who have one or two small, non-aggressive polyps removed, based on risk factors such as family history and prior health problems. People with large or aggressive polyps are encouraged to receive repeat colonoscopy every 3 years.

About one-quarter of all colonoscopies performed in the United States are done as increased cancer surveillance for patients who had polyps removed during earlier colonoscopies, said Dr. David Lieberman, chief of gastroenterology at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, Ore.

"That's a lot of colonoscopy, and if we don't need to do as many, that potentially would free up more resources and enable more screening exams to be done on new patients," Lieberman said.

"These data would suggest a 10-year follow-up would be fine for most patients with low-risk polyps," he added.

The study involved nearly 41,000 patients in Norway who had colorectal polyps removed during a colonoscopy between 1993 and 2007.

Researchers sorted the patients as low-risk or high-risk based on the size of the removed polyp, and whether they had more than one polyp removed. They then tracked how many died from colon cancer through 2011.

Patients in Norway who had a single polyp smaller than 1 centimeter removed during an earlier colonoscopy had a 25 percent reduced chance of death from colon cancer, compared to the general population, researchers found.

At the same time, patients who had multiple polyps or larger polyps removed ran a 16 percent increased risk of colon cancer death.

"As expected, the high-risk group had increased risk of colorectal cancer death compared with the general population, while the low-risk group had a stronger risk reduction," Loberg said. "This really questions the recommendations that are given now" for low-risk patients.

Lieberman noted that since the study took place in Norway, it might not correspond perfectly to America.

For example, Norway had no colon screening program set up during the study period, so the people who underwent colonoscopy likely had symptoms that led doctors to suspect some sort of health problem.

Also, Norway is less ethnically diverse than the United States, which could make a difference, he said.

"It would be important to try to get this kind of information in the United States, to better inform our screening policies," said Lieberman, who wrote an editorial accompanying the study.

More information

For more on colonoscopy guidelines, visit the American Cancer Society.

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'Half a Glass' Rule May Curb Overdrinking

By Robert Preidt, HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Pouring half a glass of wine at a time may keep you from drinking too much, according to a new study.

Researchers asked 74 college students and staff to pour red and white wines in different settings and from bottles that had varying amounts of wine in them. The participants were told to pour an amount they considered normal.

Those who had a "rule of thumb" about how much to pour -- such as limiting it to half a glass or two fingers from the top -- poured less wine than those without set guidelines.

"About 70 percent of the people in the sample used the half-glass rule, and they poured significantly less, by about 20 percent," study author Laura Smarandescu, an assistant professor of marketing at Iowa State University, said in a university news release.

"It's a big difference. We would suggest using a rule of thumb with pouring because it makes a big difference in how much people pour and prevents them from overdrinking," she added.

The researchers also found that body-mass index (BMI) -- an estimate of body fat based on height and weight -- affected how much wine men poured. Among men without a rule of thumb, overweight or obese men poured 31 percent more, while those at the midpoint of the normal BMI ranges poured 26 percent more.

BMI did not affect how much women poured, but those at the midpoint of the normal BMI range poured 27 percent less when using the half glass rule than those who did not, according to the study published recently in the International Journal of Drug Policy.

Overall, men poured more wine than women, unless they had a half-glass rule.

"In this study, we had every expectation that men would always pour more than women, no matter what. But what we found is that the rule-of-thumb effect is so strong that men using a rule of thumb at all levels of BMI actually poured less than women who were not using a rule of thumb," Doug Walker, an assistant professor of marketing at Iowa State, said in the news release.

More information

The U.S. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism offers tips for reducing your drinking.

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Light Therapy a Good Option for Pre-Cancerous Skin Lesions, Study Says

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- Treating pre-cancerous skin spots with a type of light therapy may be more effective than the usual therapy -- freezing the lesions with liquid nitrogen, a new study suggests.

Rough, scaly spots, called actinic keratoses, are often found on the scalp and face of people with fair complexions who've had a lot of sun exposure.

This review of prior research found that people who underwent the light treatment -- called photodynamic therapy -- were 14 percent more likely to have the lesion completely cleared three months later than those who had the freezing treatment known as cryotherapy.

Photodynamic therapy "is associated with better outcomes," said Dr. Daniel Eisen, the study's lead author. "It's a relatively new treatment. Freezing has been done for decades."

Eisen, director of aesthetic dermatology at the University of California, Davis Health System, said photodynamic therapy involves placing a light-sensitive liquid medication on a patient's skin. The doctor shines a special light on the area, which activates the drug, killing the cells of the lesion.

He doesn't think that photodynamic therapy will replace other treatments, however. "It's going to be an additional option," he said.

The treatment might be a good alternative for people who have 20 or 30 lesions, he said, since photodynamic therapy can treat them all at once, while cryotherapy deals with each lesion individually.

The report was published online Aug. 27 in JAMA Dermatology.

Dr. Harvey Lui, a Canadian dermatologist, is less of a fan of photodynamic therapy, which is also known as PDT.

"There are economic barriers, barriers related to the tolerability of the treatment, and barriers because the treatment is time consuming," said Lui, head of dermatology and skin science at the University of British Columbia and co-author of an accompanying journal editorial.

Insurance coverage for photodynamic therapy is spotty, with some insurers covering it and others not, he explained. Photodynamic therapy is, however, covered by Medicare, the publicly funded insurance program for the elderly in the United States.

Photodynamic therapy also takes hours longer than cryotherapy, Lui said. "You have to apply the medication, have the patient wait and then shine the light on the skin. You stack that up against cryotherapy where I dispense liquid nitrogen on the lesion and I'm finished," he said.

Also, photodynamic therapy "hurts when we activate the medication," he said. "It seems for many patients, the pain is much more than what they experience with cryotherapy."

Lui thinks a better, less expensive and less painful way of using the treatment is to apply the medication and let patients expose themselves to sunlight, which will activate the drug.

"We can use sunlight to treat a disease that was caused by sun exposure," Lui said.

Dr. Jeffrey Salomon, an assistant clinical professor of plastic surgery at Yale University School of Medicine, said photodynamic therapy might also be an improvement on topical chemotherapy. This treatment -- placing an anti-cancer medication on the skin lesions -- "remains a workhorse for the treatment of skin with areas of actinic keratoses," he said.

But the crusty wounds it causes can be unsightly for more than a month, he said. Photodynamic therapy "would be a welcomed treatment from that standpoint, as the downtime would be less," he said.

For isolated actinic keratoses, Salomon said, almost anything works: laser, liquid nitrogen or a surgical shave.

"That being said, the recurrence of lesions is expected in the majority of patients with any of the treatments, due to sun damage to their entire exposed skin. These patients all require regular surveillance for new or recurrent lesions," he said.

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