Folks regularly taking fish oil supplements might not be helping their health as much as they might think, a new study suggests. Regular use of fish oil supplements could increase the risk of first-time heart disease and stroke among those with good heart health, new research suggests. However, the long-term study also found that fish oil can help those whose hearts are already in trouble, potentially slowing the progression of heart problems and lowering the risk of death. Healthy people taking fish oil supplements had a 13% increased risk of developing atrial fibrillation, a heart rhythm problem that increases the risk of heart attack and stroke, researchers found. They also had a 5% increased risk of stroke, results show. “Our findings suggest caution in the use of fish oil supplements for primary prevention because of the uncertain cardiovascular benefits and adverse effects,” wrote the research team led by Dr. Hualiang Lin, an epidemiologist with Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou, China. But in those with existing heart disease, regular use of fish oil lowered risk of a heart attack due to atrial fibrillation by 15%, and the risk of heart failure leading to death by 9%. “Regular use of fish oil supplements might have different roles in the progression of cardiovascular disease,” based on whether someone already has heart problems, the researchers suggested. “Overall, I would…  read on >  read on >

Doctors have long known that excessive marijuana use can trigger psychosis, especially in the young. But new research suggests the link is stronger that ever imagined before. Teens who use cannabis face 11 times the odds for a psychotic episode compared to teens who abstain from the drug, new Canadian research contends. The teen years may be an especially vulnerable time in this regard, the researchers noted. “We found a very strong association between cannabis use and risk of psychotic disorder in adolescence. Surprisingly, we didn’t find evidence of association in young adulthood,” said lead author André McDonald, who led the study as part of his PhD work at the University of Toronto. The findings were published May 22 in the journal Psychological Medicine. McDonald finished the research while at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES). Psychotic episodes involve a dangerous psychiatric state in which people lose their connection with reality. These episodes can get so out of control that people may need hospitalization. It’s long been known that marijuana use can help trigger psychosis, and the potency of cannabis is much stronger now than in decades past, the Toronto investigators noted. They estimate that the average THC potency of cannabis in Canada rose from roughly 1% in 1980 to 20% in 2018.  So how is all that super-strong weed affecting the developing brains…  read on >  read on >

Improved inhalers are now available to help control asthma and treat sudden attacks, but a new study shows that hardly anyone’s using them. The new inhalers combine inflammation-fighting corticosteroids with a long-acting drug called formoterol that opens up the airways, researchers report. These combo inhalers are used twice a day to treat moderate to severe asthma, and they can also be used as a rescue inhaler during an asthma attack. Guidelines from both the National Asthma Education and Prevention Program and the Global Initiative for Asthma now recommend the use of what are called “SMART” inhalers. But fewer than 1 in 6 adults with moderate or severe asthma have been prescribed a SMART inhaler, and more than 2 of 5 lung and allergy specialists haven’t adopted the combo therapy, researchers found. “Our findings suggest current asthma management guidelines are not being routinely implemented or adopted by clinicians,” said senior study author Dr. Sandra Zaeh, a pulmonary and critical care medicine physician at Yale University School of Medicine. Previous guidelines have recommended the use of maintenance inhalers twice a day, in addition to a short-acting rescue inhaler containing a drug like albuterol that opens airways, researchers said. By 2021, U.S. guidelines had been updated to recommend Single combination corticosteroid and formoterol inhaler for both Maintenance And Relief Therapy (SMART). SMART inhalers available in the United States…  read on >  read on >

If you’ve quit smoking and have switched to vaping instead, your odds for lung cancer won’t fall as steeply as if you quit nicotine altogether, new research suggests. “This is the first large population-based study to demonstrate the increased risk of lung cancer in e-cigarette users after smoking cessation,” said study lead author Dr. YeonWook Kim. He’s an assistant professor of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, in Seongnam, South Korea. Kim’s team presented its findings Monday at the annual meeting of the American Thoracic Society in San Diego. Many smokers are turning to nicotine-laden vapes in what they may believe is a “safe” switch from traditional cigarettes. But does their risk for lung cancer drop to levels that equal those of quitting nicotine completely? To find out, Kim’s team tracked outcomes for over 4.3 million South Koreans who enrolled in the country’s National Health Screening Program in either 2012-2014 or 2018. Follow-up was conducted in 2021. Participants were divided into categories by smoking/vaping habits. Over the follow-up period, over 53,000 developed lung cancer and 6,351 died from the disease. Folks who’d quit smoking for five years or more but were vaping still faced higher odds for fatal lung cancer than those who’d quit smoking for the same length of time but hadn’t taken up e-cigarettes, Kim’s team found. And…  read on >  read on >

Heat waves and heat domes are particularly dangerous to kids with asthma, a new study finds. Daytime heat waves are associated with 19% increased odds that a child with asthma will wind up in the hospital, researchers discovered. What’s more, heat waves that stretch for days double a kid’s risk of being hospitalized due to asthma. “We found that both daily high heat events and extreme temperatures that lasted several days increased the risk of asthma hospital visits,” said researcher Morgan Ye, a research data analyst with the University of California, San Francisco School of Medicine (UCSF). For the study, the team analyzed data from the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland between 2017 and 2020, using climate data to determine the timing of heat waves for each zip code in the hospital’s service area. “We continue to see global temperatures rise due to human-generated climate change, and we can expect a rise in health-related issues as we observe longer, more frequent and severe heat waves,” Ye said in a UCSF news release. Hot and humid weather is a common asthma trigger, the American Lung Association says. Such weather also increases smog levels. Past studies have linked extreme heat with asthma, but it’s been unclear whether heat waves can lead to asthma attacks so bad that children will need hospitalization, researchers said. This study also is…  read on >  read on >

People with asthma who vape tend to develop the respiratory disease earlier in life than folks who never vaped, new research shows. Overall, asthmatic adults who said they’d vaped over the past month were over three times as likely to have developed asthma relatively early in life (before the age of 27) compared to folks who never vaped, said a team reporting the findings May 17 in the journal JAMA Network Open. According to the researchers, “harmful chemical ingredients found in electronic nicotine delivery systems have been found to affect pulmonary function and may have the potential to affect respiratory health,” perhaps including the triggering of asthma. The study was led by Adriana Pérez, of the department of biostatistics and data science at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston. Her team noted that smoking has long been linked to an upped risk for asthma, but studies regarding links between vaping and asthma are lacking. By 2021, more than 11 million U.S. adults said they were vaping regularly, Perez’s team said, and by 2022 over 2.5 million U.S. high school students were doing so. Could all that vaping be speeding the emergence of asthma among Americans? To find out, Pérez’ team used data from a large study focused on tobacco and health outcomes (including asthma) involving almost 25,000 adults and high school-age teens,…  read on >  read on >

Following a vegetarian or vegan diet might just buy you a longer, healthier life, a new review finds. Staying away from meat was tied to a reduced risk of heart disease, cancer and early death, researchers reported in a study published Wednesday in the journal PLOS One. After combing through nearly 50 studies on such diets that were published between 2000 and 2023, a clear pattern emerged: Both were linked to a lower risk of both cancer and heart disease linked to narrowed arteries. Notably, the diets seemed to reduce the risk of prostate cancer and gastrointestinal cancers like colon cancer. Vegetarian diets were also linked to a lower risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. In addition, plant-based diets lowered the chances of obesity, inflammation and “bad” LDL cholesterol.  “This research shows, in general, that a plant-based diet can be beneficial, and taking small steps in that direction can make a difference,” said review co-author Matthew Landry, an assistant professor of population health and disease prevention at the University of California, Irvine. “You don’t have to go completely vegan to see some of these benefits,” he told NBC News. “Even reducing a day or two per week of animal-based consumption can have benefits over time.” Still, Dr. Walter Willett, a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, noted that…  read on >  read on >