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Can 2 Nutrients Lower Your Risk for Parkinson’s?

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People who consume high levels of dietary vitamin C and E may lower their risk for Parkinson’s disease by almost a third, a new study suggests. Foods high in vitamin C include oranges, strawberries, broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Foods high in vitamin E include spinach, collard greens, pumpkin and nuts such as almonds and peanuts. How might the two nutrients ward off Parkinson’s? According to the European researchers involved in the new study, vitamins C and E are also antioxidants that could ward off the cell damage Parkinson’s causes. Specifically, antioxidants might help counteract “unstable” molecules and the oxidative stress that can lead to a loss of a brain chemical called dopamine, which is a hallmark of the condition. “The protective effect of vitamins on Parkinson’s disease risk might be limited to specific vitamins, such as vitamins E and C. Therefore, eating foods that are rich in vitamins E and C might help to prevent the development of Parkinson’s disease,” said researcher Essi Hantikainen, from the University of Milano-Bicocca in Italy. “Also, high concentrations of vitamin C are found in the central nervous system, where it has neuroprotective properties,” she explained. Hantikainen noted that this study can’t prove that vitamins E and C prevent Parkinson’s, only that high levels of these vitamins are associated with a lower risk of developing the disease. “Further research is…  read on >  read on >

Cold Weather Exercise Could Burn More Fat

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If you want to burn fat this winter, take your exercise outdoors, researchers say. A Canadian study suggests that vigorous exercise in cold weather may burn more fat than working out indoors. Regular physical activity speeds metabolism and helps regulate fat in the blood (“lipids”), and high-intensity training is better for burning fat than moderate-intensity exercise, the researchers said. Temperature also plays a role in metabolism during exercise. In the study, a group of moderately fit, overweight adults participated in two high-intensity exercise sessions. In both, they completed 10 one-minute cycling sprints at 90% effort. A 90-second recovery period of cycling at 30% effort followed each sprint. In one session, the temperature was about 70 degrees Fahrenheit (“thermoneutral”). In the other session, it was 32 degrees Fahrenheit. During both sessions, the researchers measured participants’ skin temperature, core body temperature, heart rate and the amount of oxygen delivered to the large thigh muscle. “The present study found that high-intensity exercise in the cold increased lipid oxidation by 358% during the exercise bout in comparison to high-intensity exercise in a thermoneutral environment,” according to the report published online recently in the Journal of Applied Physiology. Longer-term metabolic responses after eating a high-fat meal did not change substantially after the cold condition, the researchers noted in a news release from the American Physiological Society. The lead researcher was…  read on >  read on >

Hope Can Save People From Making Bad Choices: Study

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Hope may help prevent you from doing things that aren’t good for you, a new study claims. The investigators wanted to find out why some people are more likely to fall into risky behaviors, such as gambling, drinking too much, taking drugs and overeating. To do this, the team at the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom focused on something called relative deprivation, which is when a person feels that other people have things better in life. “I think most people have experienced relative deprivation at some point in their lives. It’s that feeling of being unhappy with your lot, the belief that your situation is worse than others, that other people are doing better than you, ” said researcher Shahriar Keshavarz, from East Anglia’s School of Psychology. “Relative deprivation can trigger negative emotions, like anger and resentment, and it has been associated with poor coping strategies, like risk taking, drinking, taking drugs or gambling,” he explained in a university news release. “But not everyone scoring high on measures of relative deprivation makes these poor life choices. We wanted to find out why some people seem to cope better, or even use the experience to their advantage to improve their own situation,” Keshavarz said. “There is a lot of evidence to show that remaining hopeful in the face of adversity can be advantageous,…  read on >  read on >

Can 2 Nutrients Lower Your Risk for Parkinson’s?

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People who consume high levels of dietary vitamin C and E may lower their risk for Parkinson’s disease by almost a third, a new study suggests. Foods high in vitamin C include oranges, strawberries, broccoli and Brussels sprouts. Foods high in vitamin E include spinach, collard greens, pumpkin and nuts such as almonds and peanuts. How might the two nutrients ward off Parkinson’s? According to the European researchers involved in the new study, vitamins C and E are also antioxidants that could ward off the cell damage Parkinson’s causes. Specifically, antioxidants might help counteract “unstable” molecules and the oxidative stress that can lead to a loss of a brain chemical called dopamine, which is a hallmark of the condition. “The protective effect of vitamins on Parkinson’s disease risk might be limited to specific vitamins, such as vitamins E and C. Therefore, eating foods that are rich in vitamins E and C might help to prevent the development of Parkinson’s disease,” said researcher Essi Hantikainen, from the University of Milano-Bicocca in Italy. “Also, high concentrations of vitamin C are found in the central nervous system, where it has neuroprotective properties,” she explained. Hantikainen noted that this study can’t prove that vitamins E and C prevent Parkinson’s, only that high levels of these vitamins are associated with a lower risk of developing the disease. “Further research is…  read on >  read on >

1 in 4 Doctors Harassed Online, Study Finds

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One in four doctors has been personally attacked or sexually harassed on social media, a new study finds. Women are more likely to be sexually harassed, while both men and women are attacked based on religion, race or medical recommendations, researchers say. Doctors received negative reviews, coordinated harassment, threats at work, public exposure of their personal information and threats of rape and death. Distressingly, this was reported before the 2020 pandemic. The survey of 464 U.S. physicians was conducted before the COVID-19 outbreak and highlight the intensity of online harassment of doctors. The situation has only gotten worse since the spring, the authors noted. “If anything, our data is likely an underestimate of the true extent of attacks and harassment post-pandemic since so many doctors started to advocate for public health measures during the pandemic and have been met with an increasingly polarized populace emboldened by leadership that devalues science and fact,” said senior author Dr. Vineet Arora, assistant dean for scholarship and discovery at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. The study also reported that 1 in 6 women doctors said they had been sexually harassed on social media. Study co-author Tricia Pendergrast, a second-year medical student at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, described the findings as worrisome. “We worry this emotionally distressing environment will drive women physicians off…  read on >  read on >

Allergic Reactions to COVID Vaccines Are Rare, Resolved on Site: CDC

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Cases of anaphylactic shock caused by COVID-19 vaccines are very rare, based on numbers from the first week and a half of vaccinations in the United States, federal public health officials said Wednesday. There have been 21 cases of anaphylaxis out of nearly 1.9 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine administered in the very first days of the national COVID-19 vaccination program, said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “We’re in the setting of 2,000 COVID deaths per day. If you make that comparison, I think it’s still a good value proposition for someone to get vaccinated,” Messonnier said. “Their risk from COVID and poor outcomes from COVID is still more than their risk of a severe outcome from the vaccine.” The average rate is 11.1 anaphylaxis cases per one million doses administered, which is higher than the rate of anaphylaxis for flu vaccine of 1.3 per one million doses administered, Messonnier noted. “I guess you could mathematically say that’s 10 times the amount, but I think that misses the point,” Messonnier said. “This is exceedingly rare, and I think that is still the message that the public should be getting from this.” Anaphylaxis occurs rapidly following COVID-19 vaccination, with symptom onset within 13 minutes of receiving the shot…  read on >  read on >

1 in 4 Doctors Harassed Online, Study Finds

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One in four doctors has been personally attacked or sexually harassed on social media, a new study finds. Women are more likely to be sexually harassed, while both men and women are attacked based on religion, race or medical recommendations, researchers say. Doctors received negative reviews, coordinated harassment, threats at work, public exposure of their personal information and threats of rape and death. Distressingly, this was reported before the 2020 pandemic. The survey of 464 U.S. physicians was conducted before the COVID-19 outbreak and highlight the intensity of online harassment of doctors. The situation has only gotten worse since the spring, the authors noted. “If anything, our data is likely an underestimate of the true extent of attacks and harassment post-pandemic since so many doctors started to advocate for public health measures during the pandemic and have been met with an increasingly polarized populace emboldened by leadership that devalues science and fact,” said senior author Dr. Vineet Arora, assistant dean for scholarship and discovery at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. The study also reported that 1 in 6 women doctors said they had been sexually harassed on social media. Study co-author Tricia Pendergrast, a second-year medical student at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, described the findings as worrisome. “We worry this emotionally distressing environment will drive women physicians off…  read on >  read on >

Moves, Evictions Often Trigger Harmful Breaks in Health Care: Study

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Research brings grim findings for these economically tough times: People who must move because they can’t make the rent often miss out on needed medical care. The study, of over 146,000 California residents, found a connection between unaffordable housing and health care use: Of people who’d moved in the past five years because they couldn’t afford the mortgage or rent, about 27% had skipped or delayed necessary medical care. That was higher than the rates among Californians who’d stayed put and those who’d moved for reasons other than housing costs. The findings do not necessarily mean that the moves, per se, led to difficulties in getting health care. But it makes sense that there’s a connection, the researchers said. “The findings are intuitive,” said Dr. Katherine Chen, a fellow at the University of California, Los Angeles, who worked on the study. People who struggle to afford housing, she said, are likely to face other financial hardships. Housing is such an essential need that people will put rent or mortgage payments ahead of all else, said Corianne Scally. Scally, who was not involved in the new research, studies housing issues at the Urban Institute, in Washington, D.C. She said that resource-strapped families can be forced to choose which basics they can afford. Medical care may be far down on the list, behind housing, food and bills.…  read on >  read on >

Allergic Reactions to COVID Vaccines Are Rare, Resolved on Site: CDC

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Cases of anaphylactic shock caused by COVID-19 vaccines are very rare, based on numbers from the first week and a half of vaccinations in the United States, federal public health officials said Wednesday. There have been 21 cases of anaphylaxis out of nearly 1.9 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine administered in the very first days of the national COVID-19 vaccination program, said Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “We’re in the setting of 2,000 COVID deaths per day. If you make that comparison, I think it’s still a good value proposition for someone to get vaccinated,” Messonnier said. “Their risk from COVID and poor outcomes from COVID is still more than their risk of a severe outcome from the vaccine.” The average rate is 11.1 anaphylaxis cases per one million doses administered, which is higher than the rate of anaphylaxis for flu vaccine of 1.3 per one million doses administered, Messonnier noted. “I guess you could mathematically say that’s 10 times the amount, but I think that misses the point,” Messonnier said. “This is exceedingly rare, and I think that is still the message that the public should be getting from this.” Anaphylaxis occurs rapidly following COVID-19 vaccination, with symptom onset within 13 minutes of receiving the shot…  read on >  read on >

1 in 4 Doctors Harassed Online, Study Finds

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One in four doctors has been personally attacked or sexually harassed on social media, a new study finds. Women are more likely to be sexually harassed, while both men and women are attacked based on religion, race or medical recommendations, researchers say. Doctors received negative reviews, coordinated harassment, threats at work, public exposure of their personal information and threats of rape and death. Distressingly, this was reported before the 2020 pandemic. The survey of 464 U.S. physicians was conducted before the COVID-19 outbreak and highlight the intensity of online harassment of doctors. The situation has only gotten worse since the spring, the authors noted. “If anything, our data is likely an underestimate of the true extent of attacks and harassment post-pandemic since so many doctors started to advocate for public health measures during the pandemic and have been met with an increasingly polarized populace emboldened by leadership that devalues science and fact,” said senior author Dr. Vineet Arora, assistant dean for scholarship and discovery at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. The study also reported that 1 in 6 women doctors said they had been sexually harassed on social media. Study co-author Tricia Pendergrast, a second-year medical student at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, described the findings as worrisome. “We worry this emotionally distressing environment will drive women physicians off…  read on >  read on >