People with diabetes who are taking GLP-1 meds such as Ozempic or Mounjaro may be getting an added bonus: Reductions in their odds for a dangerous blood clot, new research finds. The study found that folks with diabetes who were using the drugs lowered their odds for a form of clot called venous thromboembolism (VTE) by 20%, compared to people taking another type of diabetes drug. “From a public health perspective, given how prevalent these [GLP-1] drugs are, there is potential to see if the overall burden of VTE might be reduced at a national or population level,” said study lead author Dr. Rushad Patell. “VTE risk seems to continuously go up; maybe this will bring the curve down.”  His team presented its findings Sunday in San Diego at the annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). Because these findings were presented at a medical meeting, they should be considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal. As the researchers explained, VTEs are common and dangerous clots that form in veins. The two best known forms of VTEs are pulmonary embolisms, where clots travel to the lungs, and deep vein thromboses (DVTs), where clots often form in the legs. Any VTE can lead to hospitalization and death if left untreated. Could the blockbuster class of new GLP-1 diabetes medications help ward off VTEs?…  read on >  read on >

Inebriated e-scooter and e-bike users, many of them teens, are increasingly showing up in the nation’s emergency rooms, new research shows. Overall, rates of injuries from these “micromobility” devices have tripled in recent years — from close to 23,000 in 2019 to nearly 66,000 by 2022, the new study found. Alcohol use was a factor in many of the injuries, and rates of use were highest among teens and college-age males, reported a team from North Dakota State University, in Fargo. Driving while intoxicated is a crime even when the vehicle is an e-scooter, so “there is a need to enforce the law against the use of alcohol and substance use among these adolescents,” especially, said researchers led by Akshaya Bhagavathula. He’s an associate professor of public health at the university. Bhagavathula’s team published its findings Dec. 9 in the journal Injury Prevention. Especially during and after the pandemic, the popularity of e-scooters and e-bikes soared as a means of transport. However, accidents can happen on these small two-wheeled vehicles. The Fargo team looked at federal data for 2019 through 2022 for these types of injuries treated at ERs in over 100 hospitals nationwide. During that time, a total of 4,020 injuries linked to micromobility devices were recorded at the hospitals — 3,700 linked to e-scooters and 320 tied to e-bike use. Extrapolated to the U.S.…  read on >  read on >

The advent of GLP-1 weight-loss medications such as Wegovy and Zepbound has spurred debate as to whether the drugs’ cost should be covered by Medicare, Medicaid and private insurers. Late last month, the Biden administration proposed that the drugs be covered by Medicare and Medicaid, a move that would have to be approved by the incoming Trump administration. Now, data suggests that dramatic weight loss could save Americans big bucks in health care spending. The study found that a 25% drop in weight among obese people could save an average of up to $5,442 per person annually. That’s a level of weight loss often achieved by GLP-1 users, the study authors noted. In trials, “more than one-third of participating adults with overweight or obesity who used the [GLP-1] product lost 20% or more of their body weight,” noted a team led by Kenneth Thorpe, professor of health policy at Emory University in Atlanta. “Improving access to new weight-loss medications, along with existing evidence-based behavior change and weight-loss interventions, should help reduce health care spending associated with obesity in the United States,” they wrote. The findings were published Dec. 5 in the journal JAMA Network Open. As Thorpe’s team noted, by 2020 an estimated 42% of Americans were obese and another 31% were overweight — meaning that nearly three-quarters of all adults are not at a…  read on >  read on >

Hockey players’ chances of developing concussion-related brain injury increase with every year they spend on the ice, a new study finds. The odds of having chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) increase among hockey players 34% for each year played, researchers reported Dec. 4 in JAMA Network Open. Results show 18 out of 19 National Hockey League players had CTE, a degenerative brain disease caused by repeated concussions, researchers found. However, CTE wasn’t found in a single hockey player who spent fewer than six years competing, researchers report. “Ice hockey players with longer careers not only were more likely to have CTE, but they also had more severe disease,” said researcher Dr. Jesse Mez, co-director of clinical research at the Boston University CTE Center. “We hope this data will help inspire changes to make the game safer as well as help former ice hockey players impacted by CTE get the care they need,” Mez added in a university news release. These results make ice hockey the third major sport, after American football and rugby, to show a dose-response relationship between years of play and the risk of developing CTE, the researchers noted. For the study, they studied the donated brains of 77 deceased male ice hockey players. They also tracked each player’s career, to see how their amateur or professional play might have affected their brain health.…  read on >  read on >