Culture

Fruit and vegetable consumption could be as good for your mental as your physical health, new research suggests.

The research, conducted by the University of Warwick's Medical School using data from the Health Survey for England, and published by BMJ Open focused on mental wellbeing and found that high and low mental wellbeing were consistently associated with an individual's fruit and vegetable consumption.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have shown that after a long stay in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) only a handful of pathogenic microbe species remain behind in patients' intestines. The team tested these remaining pathogens and discovered that some can become deadly when provoked by conditions that mimic the body's stress response to illness.

September 23, 2014 – The "area under the curve of oxygen desaturation" (AUCDesat) may provide a more sophisticated approach to monitoring blood oxygen levels during procedures using sedation, according to a study published in Anesthesia & Analgesia.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommends intensive behavioral counseling to reduce risky sexual behaviors among all sexually active adolescents and for those adults who are at risk for sexually transmitted infections (STIs), according to a recommendation being published in Annals of Internal Medicine. Approximately 20 million new cases of STIs occur each year in the United States and half of these cases occur in persons ages 15 to 24 years.

The findings back up other epidemiological studies pointing to a link between the development of asthma and stress, particularly work related stress, say the researchers.

They base their findings on just over 7000 working adults, who responded to the German Socio-Economic Panel Study—an annual representative survey of the German population—in 2009 and 2011, when questions about asthma were asked.

OAKLAND, Calif., September 22, 2014 –Patients who were treated with a statin in the hospital after suffering from a hemorrhagic stroke were significantly more likely to survive than those who were not, according to a study published today in JAMA Neurology. This study was conducted by the same researchers who recently discovered that the use of cholesterol-lowering statins can improve survival in victims of ischemic stroke.

Bottom Line: Hospitalized patients who took statins after a stroke caused by an intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH, bleeding in the brain) appeared to have better 30-day survival and were more likely to be discharged to their home or an acute rehabilitation facility than patients who did not use statins or whose statin use was discontinued in the hospital.

Author: Alexander C. Flint, M.D., Ph.D., of Kaiser Permanente Northern California, Redwood City, Calif., and colleagues.

Bottom Line: A health care system reduced its use of telemetry (monitoring to detect irregular heartbeats) by 70 percent by integrating the American Heart Association's (AHA's) guidelines into its electronic ordering system.

Author: Robert Dressler, M.D., M.B.A., of the Christiana Care Health System, Newark, Del., and colleagues.

Generic discount drug programs (GDDPs, which charge nominal fees to fill prescriptions) have grown over time and their initial lower use by racial/ethnic minorities has evaporated., writes author Song Hee Hong, Ph.D., of the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, Memphis, and Sunghee H. Tak, Ph.D., M.P.H., R.N., of the University of Memphis, Tennessee.

GDDPS can reduce medication costs and help patients get their drug therapy. However, the initial use of GDDPs was low in 2007 at 3.6 percent of patients receiving any prescription drugs, especially among minorities.

Researchers at the University of Chicago have shown that after a long stay in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) only a handful of pathogenic microbe species remain behind in patients' intestines. The team tested these remaining pathogens and discovered that some can become deadly when provoked by conditions that mimic the body's stress response to illness.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – Almost three-quarters (74%) of parents are aware of online rating sites for physicians, and more than one-quarter (28%) have used those online ratings to choose a healthcare provider for their children, according to U-M research published today in Pediatrics.

Using the University of Michigan's C.S. Mott Children's Hospital National Poll on Children's Health, researchers surveyed 1,619 parents about how online ratings of physicians influenced their choices in seeking healthcare providers for their children.

According to the American College of Surgeons' Committee on Trauma, patients with severe injuries should be treated at level I or level II trauma centers. Those centers have the resources to provide the best care for those patients.

Children and adolescents see thousands of food commercials each year and most of them advertise junk foods high in sugar, fat and salt. Yet, we know almost nothing about how all of this food marketing impacts the brain, especially for teens. New research suggests that food commercials "get under the skin" of teens by activating reward regions when they are viewing ads for milk shakes, or burgers, or colas. The bad news for us is that this can result in weight gain and obesity.

Campaigns against disposable plastic shopping bags recently scored a major win. In August, California lawmakers passed the first statewide ban on the bags, and Governor Jerry Brown is expected to sign it. But the plastic bag industry is not yielding without a fight, according to an article in Chemical & Engineering News.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Couples and other adult family members living without minors in the house are just as likely as adults living with young children or adolescents to eat family meals at home on most days of the week, new research suggests.

The study is the first large-scale look at family-meal eating patterns in American adults. While a substantial amount of research has focused on health benefits for children who regularly eat family meals, such eating patterns have not been widely studied in adult-only households.