If it would stave off heart disease, diabetes and colon cancer, would you swear off bacon and burgers? A new international simulation projects cutting Americans’ intake of processed meat alone by 30% could head off more than 350,000 cases of diabetes in the United States over 10 years, along with 92,500 cases of heart disease and 53,300 cases of colon cancer. That’s about 10 slices of bacon a week — a little more than one strip a day at breakfast. If Americans slashed consumption of red meat by 30% at the same time, the combined health benefit would be even bigger, according to the new study from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill — nearly 1.1 million fewer cases of diabetes, 382,400 fewer cases of heart disease and 84,400 fewer cases of colon cancer. “Cutting consumption of meat has been recommended by national and international organizations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including the Climate Change Committee here in the UK and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change or IPCC,” said co-author Lindsay Jaacks, head of global health and nutrition at the University of Edinburgh. “Our research finds that these changes in diets could also have significant health benefits in the U.S., and so this is a clear win-win for people and planet,” she added…  read on >  read on >

Women who survive cardiac arrest are more likely to suffer anxiety or depression than male survivors, a new study warns. Data regarding the five-year health consequences of a cardiac arrest revealed “most significantly a 50% rise in antidepressant prescription in the first year among women that was not mirrored in men,” said researcher Robin Smits, a doctoral student at Amsterdam University Medical Center. After five years, this rise tapered off to a roughly 20% increase in prescriptions. “While we need to carry out more research to understand exactly why this happens, we can already say that it shows that particularly women are not adequately supported after a cardiac arrest,” Smits said in a medical center news release.   For the study, researchers analyzed data on 1,250 people (average age: 53) who survived an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in the Netherlands.  They also found that people who survive a cardiac arrest are more likely to face financial problems afterward. “We saw significant decreases in employment rates and, consequently, earnings,” Smits said. “Further, we also saw a change in ‘primary earner status’ — meaning that the member of a household who had the highest earnings frequently changed after a cardiac arrest, suggesting that it was difficult for individuals to return to the labor market.” The new research was published July 8 in the journal Circulation Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes.…  read on >  read on >

Cannabis use during pregnancy might affect the way a child’s brain develops after birth, a new study says. Brain imaging of children exposed to cannabis in the womb has revealed patterns consistent with reductions in brain inflammation, researchers reported July 4 in the journal Nature Mental Health. Too much reduction in inflammation in a child’s brain could interfere with “pruning,” the natural process in which weak or unnecessary neural connections are shed as kids transition from early childhood to puberty, researchers said. “We see evidence that cannabis exposure may influence the developing brain, consistent with associations with mental health,” said researcher David Baranger, a postdoctoral fellow at Washington University in St. Louis. The research team earlier found that prenatal cannabis exposure appears to increase a child’s later risk for problems involving mental health, behavior and brain function, according to a 2020 report in JAMA Psychiatry. However, that earlier study couldn’t pinpoint whether this increased brain risk was due solely to weed exposure, or if it was also influenced by genetics or environment, researchers said. To draw a finer picture, researchers continued to analyze data from the clinical trial that formed the basis of the earlier findings. The trial involved nearly 12,000 children across the United States, and included brain imaging at ages 9-10 and 11-12. About 370 kids were exposed to cannabis before their mom…  read on >  read on >

Researchers have identified a gene that can trigger obesity, behavior problems and postpartum depression when missing or damaged. The finding could lead to new treatments for postpartum depression and overeating: The study in mice suggests the so-called “love hormone” — oxytocin — may ease symptoms.  Obesity and postpartum depression are major health problems worldwide. The new study, published July 2 in the journal Cell, is an outgrowth of research by scientists at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston and the University of Cambridge in the U.K.  They were studying two boys from different families who were severely obese. The boys had autism, anxiety and behavior problems triggered by smells or sounds. Both were missing a gene called TRP5.  They inherited the gene deletion from their mothers, who also were missing the gene. Both women were obese and had experienced postpartum depression. To find out if the missing TRPC5 gene was causing problems in the boys and their moms, researchers put genetic engineering to work. They produced mice with a defective version of the gene — called Trpc5 in mice. “What we saw in those mice was quite remarkable,” said study co-author Dr. Yong Xu, associate director for basic sciences at the USDA/ARS Children’s Research Center at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. “They displayed very similar behaviors to those seen in people missing the TRPC5…  read on >  read on >

If you and your partner fall silent when vexing money issues arise, new research suggests you are not alone. A team from Cornell University found that the more stressed people were about their finances, the less likely they were to discuss those concerns with their romantic partners. The findings were published recently in the Journal of Consumer Psychology. “This is the first thing that fascinated us about this topic — that financially stressed individuals who need to have these conversations the most are the least likely to have them,” said study co-author Emily Garbinsky, an associate professor of professor of marketing and management communication at Cornell. Financial stress affects a staggering 70% of Americans, the researchers noted, and includes feelings of being overwhelmed with spending, struggling to meet financial obligations and worrying about money management. Even those who are well-off can struggle with financial anxiety, and this stress makes it tough to have constructive conversations about money with their partners. Not surprisingly, a common strategy is to avoid the sensitive subject completely, the researchers noted. Why? What they discovered was that this avoidance stems from the belief that financial conflicts with a partner are perpetual rather than solvable. In the study, scientists sifted through survey data from thousands of folks who either completed the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s National Financial Well-Being Survey or a survey…  read on >  read on >

Millions of Americans struggle to fall or stay asleep, a new survey finds. Some struggle more mightily than others: Roughly 12% of Americans polled said they have been diagnosed with chronic insomnia, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) survey revealed. Who was the most likely to miss out on good sleep? Men (13%) were slightly more likely than women (11%) to have been diagnosed with chronic insomnia. Meanwhile, millennials reported the highest rate of chronic insomnia diagnosis (15%). How debilitating can insomnia be? Symptoms associated with insomnia include daytime fatigue or sleepiness; feeling dissatisfied with sleep; having trouble concentrating; feeling depressed, anxious or irritable; and having low motivation or low energy. “Chronic insomnia impacts not just how a person sleeps at night, but also how they feel and function during the daytime,” said AASM President Dr. Eric Olson. “Fortunately, there are effective treatment options for those who are living with chronic insomnia, and these treatments can significantly improve both health and quality of life.” Chronic insomnia can impair physical, mental and emotional health, and it can lead to increased risks for depression, anxiety, substance abuse, motor vehicle accidents, Alzheimer’s disease and type 2 diabetes, experts say. The most effective treatment for chronic insomnia is cognitive behavioral therapy, which combines behavioral strategies such as setting a consistent sleep schedule and getting out of bed when…  read on >  read on >

It may sound far-fetched, but new research suggests that living in dangerous neighborhoods could trigger an unintended health harm: higher smoking rates among residents. “High levels of neighborhood threat shape perceptions of powerlessness among residents, amplifying a general sense of mistrust, that can promote maladaptive coping behavior like smoking,” said researcher Michael Zvolensky, a professor of psychology at the University of Houston. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the neighborhoods people live in can determine their health and well-being. While such factors are now understood as important factors in the onset, maintenance and relapse of substance use behavior, little research has evaluated what the researchers called “neighborhood vigilance” in terms of smoking rates, the researchers noted. Zvolensky’s team examined the role of neighborhood vigilance in terms of smoking and the severity of problems smokers thought they might face if they try to quit. Living in less secure neighborhoods was tied to smokers thinking it would be tough to quit, expecting “negative mood and harmful consequences,” Zvolensky said in a university news release. These types of neighborhoods were “also associated with more severe problems when trying to quit smoking,” he added. The findings support the notion that dangerous neighborhoods exacerbate “certain negative beliefs about abstinence and challenges in quitting,” Zvolensky said. Participants in the study included 93 adult smokers who were seeking…  read on >  read on >

People who are grateful for what they have tend to live longer, a new study reports. Older women who scored highest on a questionnaire measuring gratitude had a 9% lower risk of premature death from any cause, compared to those with the least gratitude, according to findings published July 3 in the journal JAMA Psychiatry. The results suggest that feelings of gratitude “may increase longevity among older adults,” lead author Ying Chen, a research scientist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said in a news release. For the study, researchers analyzed data gathered from the long-term Nurse’s Health Study. In 2016, more than 49,000 women in the study with an average age of 79 completed a six-question gratitude test. They had to agree or disagree with statements like “I have so much in life to be thankful for” and “If I had to list everything that I felt grateful for, it would be a very long list.” Three years later, researchers followed up to identify deaths among those women. They found that more than 4,600 participants had died, most commonly of heart disease. Those with the highest levels of gratitude had a lower risk of death from any cause, compared to those with the lowest, results show. Gratitude appeared to protect against every specific cause of death included in the study, and…  read on >  read on >