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 >

The Mediterranean diet has already been shown to be great for a person’s physical health, but new research finds that following the Mediterranean diet also can lift your mood. People on the diet tended to have lower levels of anxiety and stress, researchers reported recently in the journal Nutrients. “It’s a big tick for the Mediterranean diet,” said researcher Evangeline Mantzioris, with the University of South Australia. “Through a relatively easy lifestyle change, people can markedly improve their stress and anxiety levels. Who wouldn’t want to give it a go?” The Mediterranean diet involves plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables, whole grains, seeds, nuts, legumes and olive oil, researchers said. Fish and seafood should be eaten at least twice a week, and dairy and lean proteins eaten daily in smaller portions. The diet encourages minimal consumption of red meats and processed foods and cutting out sugary beverages. For this study, researchers surveyed nearly 300 Australians aged 60 and older regarding their diet and their symptoms of depression, anxiety and stress. People who ate in ways that closely tracked a Mediterranean diet had lower levels of stress and anxiety, even after researchers accounted for other factors. The researchers also found that specific elements of a Mediterranean diet — fruit, nuts, legumes and low consumption of sugary beverages — were associated with less stress and anxiety. No…  read on >  read on >

People with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) face more than triple the odds of bruxism, otherwise known as teeth grinding, a new study finds. The small study of 76 Brazilian adults (38 diagnosed with PTSD and 38 without the condition) found much higher incidence of daytime teeth grinding. “Our study showed that PTSD can be manifested orally, in bruxism and a higher level of pain after a clinical dental examination. This requires joint action by psychiatrists, psychologists and dentists in screening and treatment of both health conditions,” said study lead author Dr. Ana Cristina de Oliveira Solis of the University of Sao Paulo. The findings were published recently in the journal Clinical Oral Investigations. According to background information supplied by the researchers, it’s thought that between 8% and 30% of people habitually grind their teeth during waking hours. While it’s well known that PTSD can manifest in psychological ways, such as flashbacks, nightmares, sleeplessness and self-destructive behaviors, there’s been little study of its effect on oral health, the researchers said. Everyone in the study underwent an examination to determine the health of their teeth and gums. “Oral hygiene was not found to be associated with the problem,” Solis said in a journal news release. “Periodontal examination, which included measurement of bacterial plaque and gingival bleeding [or bleeding on probing], showed that patients with PTSD and controls…  read on >  read on >