Health/Fitness « Weekly Gravy

Weight-loss drugs like Wegovy can improve symptoms in heart failure patients, a new clinical trial shows. Both men and women showed improved heart function after a year on semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, researchers report. Women tended to lose more weight than men, on average about 9.6% of their body weight compared with 7.2% in men. However, both genders experienced similar improvements regarding their heart health, researchers found. This could mean the drug might have heart benefits above and beyond helping people lose weight. The results shed light on “the consistent benefits of semaglutide for women and men,” said senior researcher Dr. Mikhail Kosiborod, a cardiologist at Saint Luke’s Mid-America Heart Institute in Kansas City, Mo. For the clinical trial, researchers randomly assigned 1,145 people with heart failure to take either semaglutide or a placebo for a year. Heart failure occurs when the heart starts to pump less efficiently, slowing the delivery of oxygen-rich blood throughout the body. This results in fatigue and shortness of breath, making everyday activities like walking or carrying groceries very difficult for some, according to the American Heart Association. But people on semaglutide experienced improvement in both their heart failure symptoms and the physical limitations the condition placed upon them, trial results show. They also had lower blood pressure and a smaller waist circumference after a year… read on > read on >

Losing weight can protect you against cancers related to obesity, a new study finds. Obesity has been linked to higher risk of at least 13 types of cancer, researchers said. This is largely due to excess levels of hormones like estrogen and insulin. But study results show that dropping pounds can improve a person’s odds against developing these cancers, including breast, kidney, ovary, liver and pancreatic cancers. “This study reinforces how crucial it is to treat obesity as a chronic disease,” said researcher Dr. Kenda Alkwatli, a clinical fellow at Cleveland Clinic. “We are hopeful that these results can help us better understand how we can use weight loss to address co-morbidities, including cancer in patients with obesity.” For the study, researchers evaluated the electronic health records of more than 100,000 obese patients at the Cleveland Clinic, of whom more than 5,300 developed cancer. Researchers tracked changes in BMI at three-, five- and 10-year intervals prior to a person’s cancer diagnosis and compared them against controls. They found that losing weight could reduce a person’s risk of developing most obesity-related cancers within a five-year span. For example, the risk of kidney cancer dropped within three years and endometrial cancer at three and five years. Multiple myeloma risk fell within 10 years. What’s more, losing weight also appeared to protect people against a range of 16… read on > read on >

A well-established cholesterol-lowering drug appears to significantly slow the progression of a diabetes-related eye disease, a new trial shows. Fenofibrate (Tricor) has been approved since 2004 as a means of lowering cholesterol. Now, this new study shows that fenofibrate also can reduce the progression of diabetic retinopathy by 27% compared to placebo. The findings were published June 21 in the journal NEJM Evidence and presented simultaneously at the American Diabetes Association’s annual meeting in Orlando, Fla. “Diabetic retinopathy remains a leading cause of visual loss and we need simple strategies that can be widely used to reduce the progression of diabetic eye disease,” said researcher David Preiss, an associate professor at Oxford Population Health in the UK. The results from the new trial “suggest that fenofibrate may provide a valuable addition to treat people with diabetic retinopathy,” Preiss added in a meeting news release. Diabetic retinopathy occurs when elevated blood sugar levels damage blood vessels in the back of the eye. The vessels start to swell and leak, eventually leading to blurry vision, blank spots and blindness. For this study, researchers recruited 1,151 adults in Scotland who had developed early diabetic retinopathy or macular degeneration. They were randomly assigned to take either fenofibrate tablets or a placebo. Over four years, nearly 23% of people taking fenofibrate had their eye disease worsen, compared with 29% on… read on > read on >

For the first time since the pandemic, it got a little safer to cross America’s streets in 2023, new statistics show. According to data released Monday from the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA), 7,318 American pedestrians were killed by motor vehicles last year — a dip of 5.4% from 2022 and the first such decline seen since the pandemic ended. But it’s no time for celebration: The 2023 number for pedestrian deaths is still 14.1% above pre-pandemic levels. Still, the news is somewhat heartening, said GHSA Chief Executive Officer Jonathan Adkins. “A decline in pedestrian deaths offers hope that, after years of rising fatalities, a new trend is starting,” he said in a GHSA news release. “Each death is tragic and preventable. We know how to improve safety for people walking — more infrastructure, vehicles designed to protect people walking, lower speeds and equitable traffic enforcement. It will take all this, and more, to keep the numbers going in the right direction.” The new data comes from the State Highway Safety Offices (SHSOs) in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, the GHSA said. The report also gave insights into how and where pedestrians are most often killed: There’s been no big change in the kinds of vehicles driven when a pedestrian dies, only that the percentage of deaths involving light trucks ( SUVs, pickups… read on > read on >

Specific steps can be taken to reduce the risk of potentially fatal reactions to anti-seizure medications, researchers report in a new review. Performing blood tests, asking patients about risk factors and modifying dosages all can reduce reaction risk for drugs that millions of Americans take for epilepsy and other conditions, researchers said. However, rashes and skin reactions in newly medicated patients still require prompt medical attention, results show. Rashes are common with anti-seizure meds, occurring in 2% to 16% of patients, depending on the drug, researchers said in background notes. Roughly 5% of these rashes indicate a life-threatening condition, researchers added. The FDA recently issued a warning about serious reactions to two anti-seizure drugs, levetiracetam and clobazam, the researchers noted. “Dangerous reactions are rare, but patients and caregivers should understand the risk and how to respond if side effects occur,” said lead researcher Dr. Ram Mani, chief of the adult epilepsy division at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School in New Jersey. For the new report, published recently in the journal Current Treatment Options in Neurology, researchers analyzed and combined published data on individual anti-seizure drugs, distinguishing the different rashes and their triggers. Genetics can increase a person’s risk of a severe rash, as can interactions between the anti-seizure meds and other drugs, researchers found. Users also are at higher risk if they use aromatic… read on > read on >

A medication used to manage type 2 diabetes has been found effective in treating sleep apnea. The worldwide clinical trial demonstrates that tirzepatide significantly lowers breathing interruptions during sleep, a key indicator of the severity of a patient’s obstructive sleep apnea (OSA). Tirzepatide is one of the class of blockbuster GLP-1 medicines, sold as Mounjaro to fight diabetes and as Zepbound to help with weight loss. “This study marks a significant milestone in the treatment of OSA, offering a promising new therapeutic option that addresses both respiratory and metabolic complications,” said study leader Dr. Atul Malhotra, director of sleep medicine at UC San Diego Health. OSA is characterized by repeated episodes of irregular breathing during sleep due to total or partial blockage of the upper airway. It can result in reduced oxygen levels in the blood and has been linked to an increased risk for high blood pressure, heart disease and other heart-related complications. More than 900 million people worldwide are believed to have OSA, and the 469 participants in this study were recruited from the United States and eight other countries. All were clinically obese and had moderate-to-severe sleep apnea. Some used continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) treatment, in which a machine maintains an open airway during sleep. All were given 10 or 15 milligrams (mg) of tirzepatide or a placebo. Over the course… read on > read on >

Both the World Health Organization and Eli Lilly Co. warned Thursday that consumers should avoid fake versions of weight-loss drugs that are circulating in numerous countries. The WHO warning said that the international health agency has fielded several reports of fake semaglutide — the active ingredient in Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy and Ozempic — in all geographic regions of the world since 2022. “WHO advises healthcare professionals, regulatory authorities and the public be aware of these falsified batches of medicines,” Dr. Yukiko Nakatani, WHO Assistant Director-General for Access to Medicines and Health Products, said in the warning. “We call on stakeholders to stop any usage of suspicious medicines and report to relevant authorities.” Meanwhile, Lilly said in an open letter that it was “deeply concerned” about phony or compounded versions of tirzepatide, the active ingredient in the Lilly weight-loss drugs Mounjaro and Zepbound. “These [fake] products are often advertised and sold online, through social media or at certain med-spas,” Lilly said in its letter. “They may contain no medicine, the wrong medicine, incorrect dosages or multiple medicines mixed together, which could result in serious harm. They are never safe to use.” Novo Nordisk has issued similar warnings in the past about its medications. The WHO said patients can protect themselves by using prescriptions from licensed physicians to buy the medications. Consumers should also avoid buying the drugs from unfamiliar sources, the… read on > read on >

Can you trust your gut? UCLA researchers have shown that people who rank high in resilience — meaning they accept change positively and follow their instincts — have the bacteria living in their bellies in part to thank for it. Their new study looked at the brains and gut microbiomes of people who cope effectively with different types of stress, including social isolation and discrimination. Finding ways to prevent stress can help prevent heart disease, stroke, obesity and diabetes, researchers explained. “If we can identify what a healthy resilient brain and microbiome look like, then we can develop targeted interventions to those areas to reduce stress,” said senior study author Arpana Gupta, co-director of the UCLA Goodman-Luskin Microbiome Center. For the study, Gupta’s team surveyed 116 people about their resiliency and divided them into two groups — one ranked high in resilience, the other ranked low. Participants gave stool samples and underwent MRI brain scans. The study found that folks who were highly resilient had brain activity in regions associated with emotional regulation and better thinking skills than the group with low resilience. “When a stressor happens, often we go to this aroused fight-or-flight response, and this impairs the breaks in your brain,” Gupta said in a UCLA news release. “The highly resilient individuals in the study were found to be better at regulating their… read on > read on >

They aren’t exactly ready to open a jungle clinic, but new research suggests wild chimpanzees are practicing a kind of medicine. Fifty-one chimps living in two communities in Uganda appear to select edible plants specifically for their medicinal qualities, reports a team led by Elodie Freymann of the University of Oxford in the UK. The chimpanzees appeared to add certain plants to their diet when battling a sickness that they didn’t normally consume when healthy. Freymann’s team suspected this might be a kind of self-medication, so they tested the pharmacologic properties of these plants in the lab. Reporting June 20 in the journal PLOS One, they found that 88% of the 13 trees and herbs the chimps sought out when ill contained anti-bacterial properties, while 33% were anti-inflammatory. For example, “dead wood from a tree in the Dogbane family (Alstonia boonei) showed the strongest antibacterial activity and also had anti-inflammatory properties, suggesting that it could be used to treat wounds,” according to an Oxford news release on the study. The bark and resin of the mahogany tree and leaves from a species of fern (Christella parasitica) also had strong anti-inflammatory properties, Freymann’s group found. In fact, one male chimpanzee with an injured hand gathered the fern leaves, perhaps to ease pain, the team noted. In another incident, a chimp who was battling a parasitic infection… read on > read on >

A Colombian family’s genetics are shining a spotlight on a gene that might help protect people from the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease. About 1,200 out of 6,000 family members carry a genetic variant called the “Paisa mutation,” which dooms them to early Alzheimer’s, researchers said. But 28 family members with the Paisa mutation dodged early Alzheimer’s, apparently because they carry another gene that protects against the degenerative brain disease, researchers reported June 20 in the New England Journal of Medicine. The study represents the first evidence that having this other gene — known as the “Christchurch variant” — might confer some protection against inherited Alzheimer’s, researchers said. Drugs and therapies focusing on this genetic pathway might be capable of preventing or treating dementia and Alzheimer’s in others, said co-lead author Yakeel Quiroz, director of the Familial Dementia Neuroimaging Lab at Massachusetts General Hospital. “As a clinician, I am highly encouraged by our findings, as they suggest the potential for delaying cognitive decline and dementia in older individuals,” Quiroz said in a hospital news release. “Now we must leverage this new knowledge to develop effective treatments for dementia prevention.” The study focused on variants of the apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene. The APOE4 variant is known to increase the risk of Alzheimer’s, and is linked to developing a more severe form of dementia, according to the Mayo… read on > read on >