Health

There`s an urgent need to boost preventive health to prevent a large burden of diseases, even as a recent study showed an increase in lifespan by 2050, said experts on Saturday.    According to the latest findings from the Global Burden of Disease Study (GBD) 2021, published recently in The Lancet journal, global life expectancy is expected to increase by 4.9 years in men and 4.2 years in women by 2050. This is despite the geopolitical, metabolic, and environmental threats. However, people are expected to spend more years in poor health with cardiovascular diseases, cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and diabetes. "Unless we take preventive health more seriously, our health systems will not be able to cope with the huge burden of the disease," said Lancelot Pinto, consultant...

As many as 13 school kids fell sick at a village in West Bengal`s Bankura district after consuming mushrooms which they cooked at an Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) centre.  They were first taken to the Raipur Rural Hospital with symptoms of food poisoning like vomiting and severe stomach ache. However, after the condition of some of them deteriorated, they were shifted to the Bankura Sammilani Medical Colleg; Hospital where their condition has improved, sources said. It is learned that the mushrooms they ate were collected from a local field and taking advantage of the staff at the ICDS kitchen, the kids themselves cooked and consumed them. Doctors suspect that the kids picked up infected mushrooms, which resulted in food poisoning. The parents of the kids, however, have co...

High stress among women in pregnancy may get passed on to the foetus and raise the risk of depression and obesity among children later, finds a study.  Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and Dartmouth College conducted a small study of 46 mothers and 40 toddlers and discovered a link between toddler hair cortisol levels -- a long-term stress biomarker -- and maternal prenatal depression. Published in the American Journal of Human Biology, the study suggests that a child`s long-term stress physiology may be influenced by conditions experienced in utero. Co-author Theresa Gildner highlighted that hair cortisol, which is less invasive than blood tests and more useful than saliva tests, can assess cumulative cortisol exposure over extended periods. "By understanding the long...

Low Vitamin D levels, also known as the sunshine vitamin, are vital for bone health and remain a pressing concern among women, who are more prone to osteoporosis, arthritis, or other bone-related issues, said experts on Saturday. Vitamin D is essential to help prevent thinning of the bones. It is also known to have anti-inflammatory effects and can protect against arthritis in women. Osteoporosis, characterised by weakened and brittle bones, often finds its roots in insufficient levels of Vitamin D. It is not uncommon for individuals to solely rely on calcium supplements to support bone health, overlooking the crucial role of vitamin D in calcium absorption. "We are frequently seeing women who have problems with their bones that are related to low vitamin D levels. This essential nutrie...

Maternal Zika virus infections can re-programme foetal immune development, leading to long-term consequences for children`s immunity, according to a study on Friday, amid cases of the mosquito-borne viral disease in India.   The study led by Cleveland Clinic researchers in the US showed that the immune system occurs in children born even without the physical characteristics associated with congenital Zika syndrome. While visible symptoms of congenital Zika syndrome include impaired skull or brain development, the team found "much more to this condition than meets the eye". The findings, published in the journal eBioMedicine, revealed that only 5 per cent of children whose mothers experienced Zika infections during pregnancy are born with physical or neurological disabilities and diagnos...

Doctors at the Osmania General Hospital, the oldest government-run hospital in Hyderabad, have successfully performed a liver transplant on a three-year-old boy.  Modugu Chohan Aditya of Khammam district was suffering from congenital biliary atresia and liver failure. An advanced liver donor transplant procedure was performed successfully on July 3 by Dr Madhusudan and his team of surgical gastroenterology and liver transplantation at the Osmania General Hospital. According to a statement issued by the Chief Minister’s Office, the child`s mother Amla donated a part of her liver to her son. Both the mother and child were discharged on July 16. So far, 30 cases of liver transplant, including 8 paediatric liver transplant cases, have been successfully performed at the Osmania General Hospi...

A 31-year-old woman with primary infertility has successfully delivered  a baby after undergoing a novel Transvaginal Sonography in Mumbai recently. She visited Wockhardt Hospitals, Mumbai Central presenting with primary infertility of seven years due to polycystic ovaries and her husband`s oligoasthenozoospermia (OATS).  Under Dr Rana Choudhary, consultant obstetrician, gynecologist & fertility specialist, the patient conceived via in-vitro fertilization (IVF), and all embryos were frozen. In a subsequent cycle, she underwent frozen embryo transfer (FET) and conceived a singleton. Her antenatal course was uneventful, but at 26 weeks, she reported heaviness and discomfort in the lower abdomen and vulva. Examination revealed a 26-week-sized uterus with no uterine contractions and a foe...

Air pollution, exposure to secondhand smoke, occupational hazards, and indoor pollutants like cooking fumes are responsible for the rising cases of lung cancer, even among people who do not smoke, said experts on Thursday. A recent research, published in the Lancet`s eClinical Medicine Journal, showed that the ratio of lung cancer research output in India to global research output is 0.51. The study revealed that lung cancer develops 10 years earlier in India than in Western countries, where the age of diagnosis ranges from 54 to 70.  It could also be the result of India`s younger population where the median age is 28.2 years, compared to the US’ 38 years and China’s 39 years. Speaking to IANS, Dr. Shrinidhi Nathany from the Department of Molecular Hematology and Oncology at Fortis Mem...

Prediabetes is the most ‘overlooked’ health condition, which if not reversed in time can raise the risk of diabetes by 70 per cent, said experts on Wednesday. Prediabetes is a serious condition that occurs when blood sugar levels are higher than normal, but not high enough to be considered Type 2 diabetes. The condition affects more than 130 million individuals in India and over 700 million people worldwide. Like diabetes, it can lead to life-threatening complications like a heart attack or brain stroke. “Prediabetes puts you at a greater risk of developing diabetes. If both fasting and post-glucose levels are high, the risk is the highest. The level of HbA1c determines the risk for diabetes, with the five-year risk being 50 per cent if the HbA1c is more than 6 per cent, and 25 per cent...

People who gain excess weight from their 20s are likely to have weaker hearts by the time they reach their 60s, according to a study. Scientists from the University College London (UCL) verified this by examining the links between weight gain in young and middle-aged adults and enlarged hearts that pump blood less well. This is over and above the effect of being overweight in later years, they said in the paper, published in the European Heart Journal. Alun Hughes, Professor of Cardiovascular Physiology and Pharmacology at UCL noted that early weight gain causes heart damage beyond the effects of being overweight later in life. He said that while it is known that "being overweight is associated with poorer heart health, we know little about the long-term relationship between being overw...