Healthy Me - At Home and Away: November 2011

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Back pain? Try yoga

Posted: 01 November 2011

WASHINGTON: People who took yoga classes for chronic lower back pain experienced more lifestyle improvements and better overall health than those who sought a doctor's advice, said a study published Monday.

The research in the US journal the Annals of Internal Medicine was led by scientists at the University of York, included more than 300 people and was described as the largest of its kind to date in the United Kingdom.

Researchers derived their study samples from a group of people who were already seeing a doctor for chronic or recurrent back pain. They assigned 156 of them to yoga classes and left 157 to the care of their physicians.

After three months, the yoga group reported they "were able to undertake 30 per cent more activities compared with those in the usual care group," said the study.

The main advantage appeared to be having more confidence to perform daily tasks such as "walking more quickly, getting dressed without help or standing up for longer periods of time," and not necessarily pain relief, it said.

Those taking yoga reported slightly less pain compared to the usual care group, but the difference was of "marginal statistical significance," the researchers said.

The data adds to a series of studies on how yoga may improve health. A study published earlier this month in the US journal Archives of Internal Medicine found yoga and stretching alleviated back pain more than reading a self-help manual.

Other studies out this year have suggested yoga can lower stress and improve quality of life among breast cancer patients, as well as cut irregular heartbeat episodes in half among cardiac patients.

The study authors said the findings are important because 80 percent of people in the United Kingdom suffer from back pain at some point in their lives, with few effective treatments.

"Back pain is an extremely common and costly condition. Exercise treatment, although widely used and recommended, has only a small effect on back pain," said lead investigator David Torgerson.

"Our results showed that yoga can provide both short and long-term benefits to those suffering from chronic or recurrent back pain, without any serious side-effects."

- AFP/wk

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Back pain? Try yoga

Monday, November 28, 2011

Aspirin slashes cancer rate for those with hereditary risk

Sometimes I get tired following these studies, and i get confused... maybe I need an aspirin...
-----

Posted: 28 October 2011

PARIS: Long-term, daily doses of aspirin led to a fall of some 60 percent in cases of colorectal cancer among people with an inherited risk of this disease, the journal The Lancet reported on Friday.

The trial - considered to be broad in sample and long in duration - confirms evidence elsewhere that aspirin has a protective effect against cancer of the colon and rectum, it said.

The study enrolled patients with Lynch Syndrome, a fault in genes charged with cellular repair that leads to colorectal and other cancers.

Lynch Syndrome occurs in around one in 1,000 people and accounts for about one in 30 cases of bowel cancer, The Lancet said.

A total of 861 patients were randomly designated to take either two aspirins daily, for a dose of 600mg, or a harmless dummy pill, known as a placebo, for at least two years. They were then regularly given colon exams.

When the data from this study were first examined in 2007, there was no difference in colorectal cancer incidence between the groups.

But things changed when the researchers checked again a few years later.

By this time, there had been 34 cases of colorectal cancer in the placebo group but 19 in the aspirin group - a reduction in incidence of 44 percent.

The doctors then looked further at those patients (60 percent of the total) who had been taking the aspirin or the placebo beyond the two-year minimum.

In this sub-group, the figures were even more impressive.

There were 23 cancers in the placebo group, but only 10 in the aspirin group, amounting to a fall of 63 percent. The difference began to be seen after five years.

In the light of this discovery, further research has been launched to see what is the best dosage and duration of aspirin treatment.

"In the meantime, clinicians should consider aspirin prescription for all individuals judged to be at high risk of colorectal cancer, but taking appropriate measures to minimise adverse effects," says the paper, headed by John Burn, a professor of clinical genetics at Newcastle University, northeastern England.

Last year, a study also published in The Lancet, found that rates of cancer of the colon, prostate, lung, brain and throat were all reduced by daily aspirin use. For the colon, the risk over 20 years declined by 40 percent.

Many doctors recommend regular use of aspirin to lower the risk of heart attack, clot-related strokes and other blood flow problems. A downside of extended daily use is the risk of stomach problems.

- AFP/de

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Aspirin slashes cancer rate for those with hereditary risk

Yoga and stretching help lower back pain

The West is looking to the East now...
-----

Posted: 25 October 2011

WASHINGTON: People who suffer chronic lower back pain saw about the same improvement after taking yoga classes taught by highly-trained teachers as they did from stretching classes, said a US study on Monday.

The findings, described by authors as the largest US randomised trial on yoga to date, appear in the October 24 issue of the Archives on Internal Medicine, a journal of the American Medical Association.

"We found yoga classes more effective than a self-care book - but no more effective than stretching classes," said lead study author Karen Sherman, a senior investigator at Group Health Research Institute in Seattle.

"We expected back pain to ease more with yoga than with stretching, so our findings surprised us," she said.

The same group of researchers conducted a smaller trial in 2005 based on a randomised sample of 101 adults. That study suggested yoga was the best remedy for back pain because those who practiced it used fewer pain relievers and had better back function.

The latest data is derived from a sample of 228 people across six cities in the western state of Washington, and while it showed a slight lead by the yoga class, the difference was not enough to matter statistically.

The subjects were assigned to 12 weekly classes that lasted 75 minutes each.

The yoga was a type known as viniyoga, which features poses adapted for the individual condition of those in the class, breathing exercises and a deep relaxation period. Classes were taught by instructors with more than 500 hours of training.

The stretch classes were taught by licensed physical therapists with teaching experience and two hours of training in techniques that focused on the trunk, legs, hamstrings and hips. Some strengthening exercises were also included.

The third group was given a self-care book called "The Back Pain Helpbook" to read for tips on alleviating pain.

"Back-related dysfunction declined over time in all groups," the study said, noting that compared to the handbook group, the yoga group reported superior function at 12 and 26 weeks.

The stretching group reported superior function at six, 12 and 26 weeks. At no point in the follow-up analysis was there a statistically meaningful difference between the stretching and yoga groups.

"The most straightforward interpretation of our findings would be that yoga's benefits on back function and symptoms were largely physical, due to the stretching and strengthening of muscles," Sherman said.

She also acknowledged that the stretching classes were longer and more intense than those typically offered at neighbourhood gyms, so the trial may have been inadvertently comparing two very similar exercise methods.

"Our results suggest that both yoga and stretching can be good, safe options for people who are willing to try physical activity to relieve their moderate low back pain," she said.

"But it's important for the classes to be therapeutically oriented, geared for beginners, and taught by instructors who can modify postures for participants' individual physical limitations."

A separate study released earlier this year suggested yoga can lower stress and improve quality of life among breast cancer patients.

Another research team found that regular yoga practice by cardiac patients was able to cut irregular heartbeat episodes in half.

- AFP/de

-----
Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Yoga and stretching help lower back pain

Sunday, November 27, 2011

US researchers study bed bugs' resistance

Posted: 20 October 2011

WASHINGTON: US researchers have uncovered the genetic mechanism that bed bugs use to resist powerful insecticides, according to a study published Wednesday, leading to the hope of more effective ways to combat the pests.

Bed bugs, which have been largely absent from the United States since the 1950s, have returned in force in the last decade in the US, and notably other Western countries in Europe.

They have, in this time, developed unique resistance to the insecticides that are mainly used against them -- deltamethrin and beta-cyfluthrin, both leading pyrethroids.

The genetic research released Wednesday in the journal PLoS One, published by the Public Library, offers new hope to understand their resistance and find new ways to eradicate the blood-sucking bugs.

"Different bed bug populations within the US and throughout the world may differ in their levels of resistance and resistance strategies, so there is the need for continuous surveillance," said lead author Zach Adelman, associate professor of entomology at Virginia Tech.

Adelman and the other researchers in the study assessed two populations of bed bugs -- "a robust, resistant population" found in 2008, and a "non-resistant population" that has been raised in a lab since 1973.

The study determined how each strain succumbed to the pyrethroids, if at all, and determined that over a 24 hour period it required "5,200 times more deltamethrin or 111 times more beta-cyfulthrin" to kill the modern bed bugs compared to the older specimens.

The bed bug's bite is a little painful rather than dangerous, but many people are scared because the creature mainly attacks when people are asleep.

-AFP/pn

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
US researchers study bed bugs' resistance

'Promising' step for world's first malaria vaccine

A month later, and is the promising holding up?
-----

Posted: 19 October 2011

WASHINGTON: The search for the world's first malaria vaccine received a boost Tuesday with the release of early results from a major clinical trial showing it cut risk by about half in African children.

The vaccine known as RTS,S is made by the British pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline's lab in Belgium, and is the first of its kind to attempt to block a parasite, rather than bacteria or viruses.

Experts hailed the phase III trial under way at 11 sites in sub-Saharan Africa as a promising step toward eradicating the ancient mosquito-borne disease that kills almost 800,000 people yearly, most of them children.

The results are published online in the New England Journal of Medicine, and were simultaneously announced at the Malaria Forum hosted by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in Seattle, Washington.

In a statement, philanthropist and Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates described the findings as a "huge milestone" in the fight against malaria, that "has the potential to protect millions of children and save thousands of lives."

Children aged five to 17 months who received three doses of the vaccine saw a 56 per cent lower risk of developing clinical malaria, which causes high fever and chills, according to the study.

When it came to severe malaria -- the stage of the illness that can be fatal and reaches the blood, brain or kidneys -- those who received the vaccine showed a 47 per cent lower risk.

"This is remarkable when you consider that there has never been a successful vaccine against a human parasite," said Tsiri Agbenyega, who chairs the RTS,S Clinical Trials Partnership and heads malaria research at Komfo-Anokye Teaching Hospital in Kumasi, Ghana.

"While these results are encouraging, we still have a ways to go," he told reporters.

The analysis was done with data from 6,000 children in the trial over a 12-month follow up after vaccination.

More data is needed from the younger age group -- infants aged six to 12 weeks -- to better assess how well it works in this particularly vulnerable group, experts said. Additional results from the younger set are due next year.

The World Health Organization says malaria claimed 781,000 lives in 2009. About 90 per cent of malaria deaths each year occur in Africa and 92 per cent of those are children less than five years old.

Asked whether the Gates Foundation would get behind a vaccine with a success rate of only about half, Regina Rabinovich, director for infectious diseases at the foundation's global health program, was circumspect.

"This is a key question. The group will ultimately want to understand efficacy, duration and safety," she said, adding she was "enthusiastic" about the results so far and was awaiting further data.

More than 15,000 children in seven African countries are enrolled in the trial, which is set to continue for two more years, and covers areas with other interventions in place against malaria, such as bed nets and spraying.

RTS,S was created in 1987 in GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals' lab in Belgium. Testing began on healthy adults in Europe and the United States in 1992, before the first Africa study started in Gambia in 1998.

Trial sites are now located in Burkina Faso, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania, including 15,460 infants and young children in what GSK described as "the largest malaria vaccine trial to date."

The vaccine works by triggering the immune system to defend the body against Plasmodium falciparum, the deadliest type of malaria parasite.

Side effects included fever and swelling at injection site, "what you would typically see in other childhood vaccinations," said Agbenyega.

Several questions remain, including how the long the vaccine may last and how much it will cost, said Seth Berkley, CEO of the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI Alliance).

Malaria "is a huge problem for the poorest of the poor, and there has been a search for vaccines for as long as I can remember," he told AFP. "So to have success, even if not perfect, is a really big deal."

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention hailed the findings as "a promising advance in development of a malaria vaccine for African children."

GlaxoSmithKline CEO Andrew Witty said the company had already invested US$300 million to develop the vaccine and aims to produce it at a low cost with no profit, though he said it was too early to set a price.

"We are hopeful that we will be able to bring this vaccine to children in Africa by 2015," Witty said.

- AFP/ck

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
'Promising' step for world's first malaria vaccine

S.African hospital reports 'superbug' outbreak

Posted: 18 October 2011

JOHANNESBURG: A South African outbreak of a multi-drug resistant "superbug" has been contained after it infected nine patients of whom three were still in quarantine, a hospital group said Monday.

Two patients infected with the NDM-1 (New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase 1) died but are suffering from other chronic diseases, said Joy Cleghorn, infection prevention risk manager at Life Healthcare.

"Four have been discharged and three remain isolated," she told AFP about the patients at the hospital east of Johannesburg.

The NDM-1, first detected in 2009, is a gene that enables some types of bacteria to be highly resistant to almost all antibiotics.

Only two other cases have been recently reported in South Africa.

"Around the same period, one month ago, there has been an outbreak in a public hospital of Johannesburg," said Cleghorn.

The patients at the private Life Glynnwood Hospital, in Benoni east of Johannesburg, had not travelled to India and the illness was "a secondary contact", she said.

The first African infections were reported in Kenya and they have also been found around the world including in Australia, Britain, Japan and the United States.

-AFP/vl

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
S.African hospital reports 'superbug' outbreak

Thursday, November 24, 2011

False positives in mammograms a big concern

Posted: 18 October 2011

WASHINGTON: After getting annual mammograms for 10 years, most women in the United States have had at least one false positive and seven to nine percent have been asked to get a biopsy, a US study released Monday found.

"We conducted this study to help women know what to expect when they get regular screening mammograms over the course of many years," explained Rebecca Hubbard, a Group Health Research Institute researcher in Seattle and an author of the research appearing in the October 17 edition of "Annals of Internal Medicine."

"We hope that if women know what to expect with screening, they'll feel less anxiety if -- or when -- they are called back for more testing. In the vast majority of cases, this does not mean they have cancer," Hubbard added.

Having a mammogram every two years would likely reduce the incidence of false positives but also could delay a cancer diagnosis, the researchers found.

Still, for those diagnosed with a cancerous tumor, the authors of the study did not find that women getting an exam every two years had a greater risk of advanced cancer than those getting annual mammograms.

The study looked at some 170,000 women from 40-59 across the United States and some 4,500 who were treated for metastisized breast cancer.

- AFP/cc

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
False positives in mammograms a big concern

New studies highlight risks of vitamin supplements

Posted: 17 October 2011

WASHINGTON: New research is prompting a fresh look at the value of vitamin supplements, with some surprising results indicating that taking too many supplements of some could be harmful.

The research is forcing scientists to rethink the use of supplements with antioxidants, which had been seen as beneficial in preventing cancer, heart disease and other ailments.

"Everybody is confused," admitted Toren Finkel, head of the Centre for Molecular Medicine at the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

While logic would seem to dictate that taking vitamins and antioxidants should help fight illness and disease, Finkel said in an interview that the clinical data "are pretty consistently showing no benefit."

"So that means we have to go back and think about some of the assumptions we have made along the way in terms of what the mechanism for these diseases are and how things like oxidants play a role in those diseases," he told AFP.

Finkel explained that while it has long been believed that oxidants -- free radicals produced by the body or introduced through external sources such as pollution -- were unhealthy, the research paints a more complex picture.

"You have to go back to the lab and try to design experiments you can do a little simpler with cells or animals... to better understand the role of oxidants and vitamins," he said.

"For years, we were using these supplements without knowing the effects on the body."

A study published on October 11 in the United States indicates a 17 per cent increase in the risk of developing prostate cancer among men who take high doses of vitamin E.

Another recent US study conducted among women and published on October 10 revealed that multivitamins -- commonly taken in the United States -- were useless and actually gradually contributed to a higher risk of mortality.

As far back as 2007, researchers had established a link between taking selenium supplements and an increased risk of adult diabetes.

For David Schardt, a nutritionist at the non-profit Centre for Science in the Public Interest, the problem is that "people think more is better and that (supplements) are harmless."

"We are finding out that some of these vitamins taken alone in large amounts may have effects we did not predict, we did not understand and we did not anticipate," Schardt said.

He added that the country has "a lot of people who believe, almost like a religion, in their vitamins" -- a faith encouraged by an industry that generates $20 billion a year in the United States, where more than half of the population takes some kind of vitamin supplement.

Moreover, US manufacturers are "free to say almost anything they want" about the virtues of supplements, Schardt explained, adding: "The only thing the Food and Drug Administration does not let them make are claims about disease."

Patsy Brannon, a Cornell University professor who served on an NIH panel on multivitamins, mineral supplements and chronic diseases, said that those who take supplements are often those already getting nutrients from their food.

"So the people who are choosing supplements are maybe the people who don't need them," she said. "So they are not thinking about their total intake and that I think is a concern."

Experts agree that multivitamins and other supplements are useful for certain groups such as pregnant women and elderly people suffering from vitamin deficiencies.

But for the general population, a healthy balanced diet rich in fruits, vegetables and fibre as well as animal-based protein will provide the proper vitamins and nutrients needed, Brannon said.

A study published in late August in the Journal of Nutrition showed that a significant number of Americans did not eat well and did not take vitamin supplements.

25 per cent of respondents had a vitamin C deficiency, 34 per cent were not getting enough vitamin A and 60 per cent needed more vitamin E. All three are found in fruits and vegetables.

-AFP/ac

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
New studies highlight risks of vitamin supplements

Vitamin E "ups prostate cancer risk"

Posted: 12 October 2011

WASHINGTON: US researchers warned Tuesday of an alarming link between vitamin E supplements and a 17 per cent increased risk of prostate cancer, describing the findings as an "important public health concern".

Ten years after the start of a randomised trial of more than 35,000 men, researchers discovered the spike in prostate cancer among those assigned to take vitamin E rather than selenium or a placebo.

"Dietary supplementation with vitamin E significantly increased the risk of prostate cancer among healthy men," said the study in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Selenium, a trace mineral found in foods like Brazil nuts, tuna and beef, is often deficient in areas such as China and Russia where it is lacking in the soil.

The study was launched based on previous research that had suggested that selenium or vitamin E might reduce the risk of developing prostate cancer.

The latest data emerged three years after a preliminary study of the findings, published in 2008, showed a slightly higher but statistically insignificant risk of prostate cancer among those taking vitamin E.

However, since the risk was approaching statistical significance, a safety committee called for a halt to the randomised Selenium and Vitamin E Cancer Prevention Trial (SELECT) in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico in 2008.

A longer-term follow up, concluded in July of this year, has revealed the higher cancer incidence in men assigned to the vitamin E portion of the trial.

"Based on these results and the results of large cardiovascular studies using vitamin E, there is no reason for men in the general population to take the dose of vitamin E used in SELECT as the supplements have shown no benefit and some very real risks," said Eric Klein, a study co-chair for SELECT, and a physician at the Cleveland Clinic.

"For now, men who were part of SELECT should continue to see their primary care physician or urologist and bring these results to their attention for further consideration."

The study began in 2001 and broke participants into four groups: one would receive selenium, another would get 400 international units of daily vitamin E, another group would take both, and the fourth was prescribed a placebo.

A total of 620 men in the vitamin E group developed prostate cancer, as did 555 in the combined selenium and vitamin E group.

Those taking selenium only saw 575 develop prostate cancer, compared to 529 on the sugar pill.

"The observed 17 per cent increase in prostate cancer incidence demonstrates the potential for seemingly innocuous yet biologically active substances such as vitamins to cause harm," said the study.

Men entering the trial had no signs of prostate cancer and were considered to exhibit average risk of developing the disease, which is the second most common cancer among US men, after skin cancer.

According to the American Cancer Society, 240,890 new cases of prostate cancer will be diagnosed in 2011 and 33,720 men will die of prostate cancer in the United States.

The study found no biological explanation for why vitamin E was driving the risk higher, but warned that the effects of the pills may continue even after the patient stops taking them.

"The fact that the increased risk of prostate cancer in the vitamin E group of participants in SELECT was only apparent after extended follow-up... suggests that health effects from these agents may continue even after the intervention is stopped," it said.

The findings also "underscore the need for consumers to be sceptical of health claims for unregulated over-the-counter products in the absence of strong evidence of benefit demonstrated in clinical trials," it said.

The trial was funded by the National Cancer Institute, the National Centre for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, the National Institute of Aging and the National Eye Institute.

- AFP/wk

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Vitamin E "ups prostate cancer risk"

Monday, November 21, 2011

Women chocoholics run smaller risk of strokes

Is this good news or what?!
-----

Posted: 12 October 2011

STOCKHOLM: Have a sweet tooth? It could protect you from a stroke, according to a large Swedish study published on Tuesday on women chocolate-lovers.

"We followed 33,000 women over the course of 10 years, and we found that those who ate most chocolate had a much lower risk - 20 percent lower - of suffering a stroke," said Susanna Larsson, one of three researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm who carried out the study.

The study, published this week in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, began in 1997 when the researchers asked 33,372 women in Sweden between the ages of 49 and 83 to fill out a questionnaire on their eating habits.

The women were asked to indicate how often they on average had consumed chocolate and 95 other foods during the previous year.

Over the following decade, a total of about 1,600 strokes were registered in the group.

After taking into account all the known risk factors for stroke, the researchers discovered that the women who ate the least chocolate - between eight grammes (0.3 ounces) a week and none - "were the ones who suffered most strokes," Larsson told AFP.

The women who ate the most chocolate - on average 66 grammes (2.3 ounces) per week - were the least likely to suffer a stroke, she said.

While the women were not asked to distinguish between light and dark chocolate, she points out that in the 1990s, about 90 percent of all chocolate eaten in Sweden was milk chocolate.

"If we had been able to separate light and dark chocolate we think that the connection would have been clearer with dark, since it's cocoa that is the protective substance," Larsson said.

She said she and her colleagues had found what they had expected to find.

"We weren't really surprised, because our hypothesis was that chocolate would help protect against strokes," she said, pointing out that it had already been shown that "chocolate reduces blood pressure, and high blood pressure is a high risk factor."

Other studies have also shown that antioxidants in chocolate "can reduce oxidation of the bad (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol, and has been shown to improve insulin resistance," she pointed out.

A few smaller studies have previously hinted that eating chocolate could help protect against strokes, but the Karolinska Institute team's decade-long study of such a large number of test subjects is the first to reach a clear connection.

Larsson said she and her colleagues now planned to check if they could find the same connection in men.

"We expect we will see the same connection," she said.

- AFP/de

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Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Women chocoholics run smaller risk of strokes

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Little need for vitamins, new study claims

Posted: 11 October 2011

WASHINGTON: There is no need for most people to take vitamin supplements and some may even be linked to a higher risk of dying in older women, according to a study published Monday in the United States.

Iron stood out among supplements as a particular concern, while calcium appeared to be linked to lower death risk, said the study in the Archives of Internal Medicine, a journal of the American Medical Association.

With about half of Americans taking vitamin pills of some kind, the study aimed to examine whether the $20 billion supplement industry was having any effect on extending lifespan in an already well-nourished population.

The researchers confirmed their theory -- that supplements were not helping people ward off death. But the reasons for the link to higher risk of overall mortality, or the risk of dying for any reason, were less clear.

"Based on existing evidence, we see little justification for the general and widespread use of dietary supplements," wrote the study authors from the University of Eastern Finland and the University of Minnesota.

"We found that several commonly used dietary vitamin and mineral supplements, including multivitamins, vitamins B6, and folic acid, as well as minerals iron, magnesium, zinc, and copper, were associated with a higher risk of total mortality."

The US and Finnish researchers examined data from the Iowa Women's Health Study, including surveys filled out by 38,772 women with an average age of 62.

Women self-reported their supplement use in 1986, 1997 and 2004, and data showed their use rose from 66 percent of survey-takers at the start to 85 percent by 2004.

Those who took supplements showed a range of healthy lifestyle factors, and were more likely than non-supplement users to be non-smokers, eat low-fat diets and exercise.

But in many cases they showed a higher risk of dying than their supplement-free counterparts.

"Of particular concern, supplemental iron was strongly and dose dependently associated with increased total mortality risk," said the study.

On the other hand, "supplemental calcium was consistently inversely related to total mortality rate," meaning that calcium-takers showed a lower death risk, though the same dosage relationship was not visible.

The authors said they could not rule out the possibility that the reason for the higher death rate in iron users could have been due to underlying conditions for which they were taking supplements, and more research is needed.

In the meantime, doctors urged patients to consider the risks of taking supplements unless they are needed to stave off deficiencies.

"We think the paradigm 'the more the better' is wrong," wrote doctors Goran Bjelakovic of the University of Nis in Serbia and Christian Gluud of Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark in an accompanying commentary.

These findings "add to the growing evidence demonstrating that certain antioxidant supplements, such as vitamin E, vitamin A, and beta-carotene, can be harmful," they said.

"We cannot recommend the use of vitamin and mineral supplements as a preventive measure, at least not in a well-nourished population."

Bjelakovic and Gluud said the only supplement that may be beneficial to older women, and possibly older men, is vitamin D3, if they do not already get enough through their diet or from sun exposure.

"The issue of whether to use calcium supplements may require further study," they added.

-AFP/pn

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
Little need for vitamins, new study claims

New study sees little need for vitamins, cites risks

Posted: 11 October 2011

WASHINGTON: There is no need for most people to take vitamin supplements and some may even be linked to a higher risk of dying in older women, according to a study published on Monday in the United States.

Iron stood out among supplements as a particular concern, while calcium appeared to be linked to lower death risk, said the study in the Archives of Internal Medicine, a journal of the American Medical Association.

With about half of Americans taking vitamin pills of some kind, the study aimed to examine whether the $20 billion supplement industry was having any effect on extending lifespan in an already well-nourished population.

The researchers confirmed their theory - that supplements were not helping people ward off death. But the reasons for the link to higher risk of overall mortality, or the risk of dying for any reason, were less clear.

"Based on existing evidence, we see little justification for the general and widespread use of dietary supplements," wrote the study authors from the University of Eastern Finland and the University of Minnesota.

"We found that several commonly used dietary vitamin and mineral supplements, including multivitamins, vitamins B6, and folic acid, as well as minerals iron, magnesium, zinc, and copper, were associated with a higher risk of total mortality."

The US and Finnish researchers examined data from the Iowa Women's Health Study, including surveys filled out by 38,772 women with an average age of 62.

Women self-reported their supplement use in 1986, 1997 and 2004, and data showed their use rose from 66 percent of survey-takers at the start to 85 percent by 2004.

Those who took supplements showed a range of healthy lifestyle factors, and were more likely than non-supplement users to be non-smokers, eat low-fat diets and exercise.

But in many cases they showed a higher risk of dying than their supplement-free counterparts.

"Of particular concern, supplemental iron was strongly and dose dependently associated with increased total mortality risk," said the study.

On the other hand, "supplemental calcium was consistently inversely related to total mortality rate," meaning that calcium-takers showed a lower death risk, though the same dosage relationship was not visible.

The authors said they could not rule out the possibility that the reason for the higher death rate in iron users could have been due to underlying conditions for which they were taking supplements, and more research is needed.

In the meantime, doctors urged patients to consider the risks of taking supplements unless they are needed to stave off deficiencies.

"We think the paradigm 'the more the better' is wrong," wrote doctors Goran Bjelakovic of the University of Nis in Serbia and Christian Gluud of Copenhagen University Hospital in Denmark in an accompanying commentary.

These findings "add to the growing evidence demonstrating that certain antioxidant supplements, such as vitamin E, vitamin A, and beta-carotene, can be harmful," they said.

"We cannot recommend the use of vitamin and mineral supplements as a preventive measure, at least not in a well-nourished population."

Bjelakovic and Gluud said the only supplement that may be beneficial to older women, and possibly older men, is vitamin D3, if they do not already get enough through their diet or from sun exposure.

"The issue of whether to use calcium supplements may require further study," they added.

- AFP/de

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
New study sees little need for vitamins, cites risks

40m more TB deaths due to smoking

Posted: 05 October 2011

PARIS: Lung damage caused by smoking could cause an additional 18 million cases of tuberculosis and 40 million extra deaths from TB by 2050, according to a study published on Tuesday in the British Medical Journal (BMJ).

The estimates derive from a mathematic model of smoking trends and smoking's impact on TB risk.

Africa, the eastern Mediterranean and Southeast Asia will see the biggest rise in smoking-linked TB, the study says.

"Aggressively lowering the prevalence of tobacco smoking could reduce smoking-attributable deaths from tuberculosis by 27 million by 2050," according to the paper, headed by Sanjay Basu of the University of California at San Francisco.

-AFP/pn

Taken from ChannelNewsAsia.com; source article is below:
40m more TB deaths due to smoking

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