Lesbians, gays and bisexuals are experiencing more mental health and substance use issues than their heterosexual peers, researchers say. According to a new government report released Tuesday, this includes major depressive episodes, serious thoughts of suicide, and more misuse of alcohol and drugs. The National Survey on Drug Use and Health includes a question about sexual orientation and has since 2015. Although that question on this 2021-2022 report from the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA) focused solely on people who are lesbian, gay or bisexual, the survey will include transgender and nonbinary people in 2023, CNN reported. “It is really important data, especially coming from an organization like SAMHSA that has such an influence over both national policy as well as resource allocation in terms of what kinds of prevention, treatment and recovery services get supported at the federal level,” Dr. Jeremy Kidd, a psychiatrist who has worked on studies to improve health outcomes for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer populations, told CNN. The report notes that “sexual minorities experience unique stressors that can contribute to adverse substance use and mental health outcomes.” Among the findings are that bisexual females were six times more likely to have attempted suicide in the previous year than their straight peers. Bisexual women were also three times more likely to have an opioid use…  read on >  read on >

While the challenges of farm work are well noted, the stressors affect not just the mental health of adults, but also their teenage children, according to new research. In results from the first year of a five-year study, researchers found that 60% of both adults and teens on U.S. farms met the criteria for at least mild depression. About 55% of the adults and 45% of the teenagers had symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder. “There’s a lot of young people growing up on a farm and participating in agricultural work. We’ve long acknowledged the inherent hazards of this work environment, and now we’re also recognizing its impact on mental health,” said researcher Josie Rudolphi, Illinois Extension specialist and assistant professor in the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. “Most of the work on farm stress and mental health is primarily focused on adult farmers. However, it is important to recognize that children are fully aware of what’s happening on the farm, and they are not immune to the stressors that exist,” Rudolphi said in a university news release. The researchers gathered data through online surveys of farmers and their children ages 13 to 18 throughout the United States. They used something called the Family Stress Model, developed in Iowa in the 1990s as a way to look at…  read on >  read on >

Many studies have suggested that light drinking can do the heart some good, and now researchers think they have found one reason why: It helps the brain relax. It’s no secret that many people pour a drink as a way to unwind and shed the stressors of the day. And research suggests that is not just a placebo effect. In the short term, alcohol has a quieting effect on the amygdala — a brain area that processes potential threats in our surroundings. Now the new study shows that amygdala activity is habitually dialed-down in moderate drinkers, relative to non-drinkers. And that appeared to partially account for their lower risks of cardiovascular ills, including heart attack and stroke. The findings, published in the June 2023 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, add to a large body of evidence connecting moderate drinking to a lower heart disease risk. “Moderate” is generally defined as no more than one alcoholic drink per day for women, and no more than two per day for men. No one, however, is suggesting that people drink for the sake of their heart health, experts stressed. For one, alcohol can clearly have harms. There’s the potential for abuse and dependency, and heavy drinking is known to be detrimental — including to the brain. Even moderate drinking can carry health risks,…  read on >  read on >

Humans are inhaling microplastics from the degradation of plastic products in the environment, and these tiny plastic particles are sticking in human airways, according to researchers. People inhale about 16.2 bits of these microplastics every hour — the equivalent of a whole credit card each week — according to a study published June 13 in Physics of Fluids. These microplastics usually contain toxic chemicals. “This study emphasizes the need for greater awareness of the presence and potential health impacts of microplastics in the air we breathe,” study co-author YuanTong Gu said in a journal news release. He’s a professor at Queensland University of Technology in Australia. Millions of tons of these microplastic particles have been found in water, air and soil, the researchers noted. Global microplastic production is surging, and in 2022 studies found microplastics deep in human airways, raising the concern of serious respiratory health hazards, they pointed out. The international team of researchers developed a computational fluid dynamics model to analyze microplastic transport and deposits in the upper airway. These microplastics tended to collect in hot spots in the nasal cavity and the back of the throat, the study showed. They were 1.6, 2.56 and 5.56 microns in size and spherical, tetrahedral and cylindrical in shape. The team also looked at movement during slow and fast breathing conditions. The complicated and highly asymmetric…  read on >  read on >

About one in every seven American kids aged 5 to 17 underwent some form of mental health treatment in 2021, the latest year for which statistics are available. So finds a new report from researchers at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which pegs the percentage of kids who got mental health care in 2021 at 14.9%. Rates of mental health care were higher among older kids (aged 12 to 17), nearly 19% of whom received treatment over the prior year, than they were for children aged 5 to 11 (just over 11%). The new statistics don’t necessarily mean that more American children are suffering from mental illness, but it could mean that more are receiving the care they need, one expert said. “I have a report from 2015 that suggests that 49% of U.S. children have a mental health disorder of some kind, may it be ADHD [attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder], anxiety, depression, autism spectrum,” said Mary Karapetian Alvord, a psychologist who practices in Chevy Chase, Md. “But at that time, the stat was that only 7.4% [of these children] actually received one treatment within the year. So there’s definitely, I think, more access now, more availability.” However, another expert said the new numbers could reflect an increase in mental health troubles among kids. “Following the pandemic, we have seen substantial increases in mental…  read on >  read on >

Men with erectile dysfunction will now have the option of using a topical gel to treat the condition. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved over-the-counter marketing for the product, called Eroxon, as a first-of-its-kind medical product. The British pharmaceutical firm Futura Medical makes the gel. “FDA set a very high standard in evaluating the effectiveness and safety of De Novo Medical Devices. I am delighted that we met this standard,” Futura CEO James Barder said in a news release on Monday. About 30 million American men are affected by erectile dysfunction, where they’re not able to get or keep an erection for sexual activity. This new gel will be sold in a single-dose tube, CNN reported. It should be applied to the head of the penis before sex. Users may be able to become erect within 10 minutes and maintain that for long enough to have sex in about 65% of those who use it, according to the company. The product is already sold in Belgium and the United Kingdom, where it costs the equivalent of $31.22 in U.S. dollars for a four-pack, CNN reported. “We don’t have specific pricing details yet, as the pricing will ultimately be determined by the partner who launches Eroxon in the U.S.,” a company spokesman told CNN. The timeline for when the product will be in the…  read on >  read on >

COVID caused more than 20 million Americans to lose their ability to smell and taste, and at least 25% haven’t regained those vital senses, a new study says. Survey responses from nearly 29,700 adults also show a correlation between more severe COVID infection and taste and smell loss, researchers reported recently in the journal The Laryngoscope. “The value of this study is that we are highlighting a group of people who have been a bit neglected,” said study co-author Dr. Neil Bhattacharyya, a professor of otolaryngology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear. “Losing your sense of smell or taste isn’t as benign as you may think. It can lead to decreased eating for pleasure and, in more extreme cases, it can lead to depression and weight loss,” he added in a journal news release. One motivation for the study was a patient who lost 50 pounds due to his loss of smell, Bhattacharyya said. “The patient wasn’t eating and became very sick and very depressed because of the loss of smell,” Bhattacharyya said. “When you hear about COVID-related smell loss, you think most people get it back and are fine. But there is a substantial number of people who don’t recover it.” Using data from the 2021 National Health Interview Survey, the researchers found that about 60% of participants infected with COVID had a loss of…  read on >  read on >

Sometimes women who survive breast cancer will die from a second cancer, and now new research suggests the risk of that happening is higher for Black and Hispanic survivors than white women. “We believe this to be one of the first studies to comprehensively examine the racial and ethnic disparities in survival outcomes after a second cancer,” said study author Dr. Kala Visvanathan, director of the Cancer Genetics and Prevention Service at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, in Baltimore. “The findings are extremely concerning, given the increasing prevalence of second cancer at a young age among women diagnosed with breast cancers,” she added in a Hopkins news release. For the study, the researchers looked at nearly 40,000 adult survivors, discovering the risk of death from a second cancer was 12% higher in Black women and 8% higher in Hispanic women than it was in white women. Women in these racial and ethnic minority groups were also diagnosed with second cancers up to six years younger than white survivors, and within a shorter time from their first cancer. Black survivors also had a 44% higher risk of cardiovascular disease-related death after a second cancer diagnosis than white survivors did, the investigators found. It’s important to determine risk factors associated with these second cancers, to either prevent them or to diagnose and manage them early, the…  read on >  read on >