Politics, especially the 2024 elections, can quickly turn the family Thanksgiving table into a battleground. Steering clear of hot-button topics will not only help a big meal go down easier, it has health benefits as well. Keeping the peace prevents a surge of fight-or-flight hormones that can disrupt sleep and cause headaches, inflammation and even shortness of breath, according to UT Southwestern colleagues Cameron Davis, an assistant professor of psychiatry, and Sarah Woods, vice chair of research in the Department of Family and Community Medicine. They assure folks that it is possible to stay calm and enjoy yourself this Thanksgiving, even in a house divided. Here are their do’s and dont’s for reducing stress this Thanksgiving: Do communicate respectfully: Avoid personal attacks and keep the conversation focused on facts and objectives. Be assertive, not aggressive.  Don’t feel pressured to engage in emotionally charged talk: Politely state your desire to not take part in political discussions — or change the topic. Don’t push family members’ buttons. Do be prepared: Practice how you will handle it if conversation gets stressful and how you’ll behave toward individuals.  Don’t pressure others into a debate or insist they agree with your views: Focus on fostering respectful dialogue. Asking for permission or gauging others’ willingness to discuss a topic can help head off tense encounters. In charged conversations, remember: The goal…  read on >  read on >

When people whose parents died by suicide reach that same age, their own risk often spikes, Danish researchers warn. Reporting in the journal Suicide and Life-Threatening Behaviors, the researchers looked at data on more than 470,000 Danes whose parents died between 1980 and 2016. Of those, 17,806 individuals had parents who died by suicide. The study looked at the risk of self-harm and suicide during the year before and after individuals reached the age of their deceased parent — typically about 24 years later. Compared to the 15 years before or after, they were at roughly twice the risk of self-harm or suicide when they reached the corresponding age. Individuals whose parent died of other causes had no increased risk during the corresponding time. “Our findings support the practice of asking suicide-bereaved individuals about age at parental suicide, identifying this as an anticipated period of increased risk,” wrote a team led by Yanakan Logeswaran, of the University College of London.  “This is also an opportunity to reinforce that suicide is not inevitable after the suicide of a parent, with an absolute risk … estimated at less than 1%,” they added in a American Psychiatric Association news release. More information If you have suicidal thoughts, free, confidential help is available 24/7. Call or text to 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Or chat with…  read on >  read on >

For many, the holidays are a time when you connect with others and share time with loved ones. But for some, the holidays are a painful exercise in loneliness. While a Northwestern Medicine study published last spring found loneliness is more prevalent in both younger and older adults, those feelings intensify around the holidays, said Eileen Graham, who co-authored that study. And those feelings are most pronounced for the oldest. “What was striking was how consistent the uptick in loneliness is in older adulthood,” Graham noted when the study was published. “There’s a wealth of evidence that loneliness is related to poorer health, so we wanted to better understand who is lonely and why people are becoming lonelier as they age out of midlife so we can hopefully start finding ways to mitigate it.”   One way to ease loneliness for these folks is to invite them into your home. “Young adults who are living in unfamiliar cities and setting up new social networks will often find ways to celebrate with Friendsgivings because they might not be coming home for the holidays,” said Graham, an associate professor of medical social sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “Others include older adults who have lost friends or spouses and, finally, people who have fewer resources.” How else can folks deal with those heightened feelings of isolation during the…  read on >  read on >

How long Americans can expect to live varies dramatically — and the gap continues to widen. A new report says health inequalities have, in essence, created 10 Americas. These mutually exclusive populations are divided along familiar fault lines, including race, ethnicity, income and address.  While life expectancy rose in nine of 10 Americas between 2000 and 2010, only six saw gains between 2010 and 2019, according to the report.  And it plummeted in all 10 in 2021, the first year of the pandemic. In 2021, Asian Americans had the longest life expectancy at birth — 84 years.  That’s two decades more than the group with the lowest life expectancy: American Indians and Alaska Natives living in the West, who were expected to live 63.6 years.  “The extent and magnitude of health disparities in American society are truly alarming in a country with the wealth and resources of the USA,” said Christopher Murray, director of the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. “These disparities reflect the unequal and unjust distribution of resources and opportunities that have profound consequences on well-being and longevity, especially in marginalized populations.” Murray is senior author of the report, which was published Nov. 21 in The Lancet, a British health journal. It builds on an earlier study that identified “Eight Americas” based on race, geography, ethnicity, per capital income…  read on >  read on >

Three out of four times, your Facebook friends don’t read past the headline when they share a link to political content.  Experts say that’s somewhat surprising — and downright scary.  People who share without clicking may be unwittingly aiding hostile adversaries aiming to sow seeds of division and distrust, warned S. Shyam Sundar, a professor of media effects at Penn State University. “Superficial processing of headlines and blurbs can be dangerous if false data are being shared and not investigated,” said Sundar, corresponding author of the new study published Nov. 19 in the journal Nature Human Behavior.  “Disinformation or misinformation campaigns aim to sow the seeds of doubt or dissent in a democracy — the scope of these efforts came to light in the 2016 and 2020 elections,” he added in a Penn State news release. To learn more about content shared on social media, his team analyzed more than 35 million public posts containing links shared on Facebook between 2017 and 2020. The links included political content from both ends of the spectrum — and it was shared without clicking more often than politically neutral content. While the study was limited to Facebook, researchers said their findings likely apply to other social media platforms as well.  Data for the analysis were provided in collaboration with Facebook’s parent company, Meta.  It included user demographics and…  read on >  read on >