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Drishya Nair
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Parental Guide to Help Put Their Baby to Sound Sleep
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 07:53 AM ESTPoor advice and parental anxiety are two of the most common reasons why parents and infants lose sleep and struggle with sleep deprivation for weeks, months, even years together sometimes, according to child health nurse and Sunshine Coast author Rowena Bennett. The Queenslander's new book "Your Sleepless Baby: The Rescue Guide" talks about various sleeping problems and also guides parents through a step-by-step process so that they can identify and find a solution to their baby's issues, reports Fraser Coast Chronicle.
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Moving Closer to Bar may Increase Chances of Risky Drinking: Study
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 06:26 AM ESTA new study suggests that easy accessibility to alcohol may be responsible for some people drinking too often. According to the study by researchers from Finland, having a bar close to one's house may encourage people to overindulge. The study that involved the follow-up of 55,000 Finnish adults for a span of 7 years, found that people who moved to localities with a bar close by, tended to start drinking more often. Apparently, for someone moving every one kilometer closer to the bar, the probability of them becoming heavy drinkers increased by 17 percent.
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New Device may Eliminate Need for Surgery to Replace Pacemaker Batteries
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 06:11 AM ESTCurrently, patients need to undergo repeated surgeries in order to replace batteries in pacemakers. However, a new device tested recently, can convert energy from a beating heart to provide enough electricity to power a pacemaker, the American Heart Association's Scientific Sessions 2012 heard. Indeed, tests suggest that the device can produce 10 times more energy than required. This device is a huge discovery since patients wearing pacemakers, with the help of this device, would be able to eliminate the need for replacements when batteries are spent.
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Anti-Smoking Campaign to Target Pregnant Women in Australia
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 06:00 AM ESTA new anti-smoking campaign, which starts just a month before all cigarettes have to be sold in plain packaging, is targeting pregnant women and indigenous Australians. The Australian government has made it compulsory for cigarette packs to be sold with plain packing from December 1. Meanwhile, according to the latest statistics, one in seven Australian women reportedly smoke during pregnancy, and as of 2009, 37 percent of pregnant teens reportedly smoked.
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One in Ten British Students Admit to Taking Salvia: the Legal Drug
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 05:51 AM ESTSalvia, a herbal drug which is legal and commonly available in many countries, causes powerful hallucinations and has been linked to psychotic episodes. According to a new survey, the drug has been tried by about one in ten UK university students. In British universities, apparently, one in four students admitted to trying drugs that are legally available, and of them, 39 percent said they had experimented with salvia, one of the most powerful hallucinogenic herbs.
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Vigorous Exercise may Repair Damaged Heart: Study
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 03:13 AM ESTA new study suggests that vigorous exercise, if practiced daily, can repair a damaged heart. According to a report in The Telegraph, researchers say strenuous exercising done regularly can bring back dormant stem cells in the heart to life, leading to the development of new heart muscle. While previous studies have already discovered that stem cells could produce new tissues through injections of chemicals known as growth factors, the current study is the first to suggest that exercising could have a similar effect.
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Children Born with Thin Placenta at High Risk of Cardiac Arrest Later in Life
By Drishya Nair | Nov 05, 2012 02:59 AM ESTFollowing the publication of a new research which reveals that infants born with a thin placenta are twice as likely to die of a sudden cardiac arrest later in life when compared to others, a leading professor suggests that doctors must take a series of measures into consideration at birth to identify babies with such risk. Experts at a meeting in Parliament hosted by Shadow Health secretary Andy Burnham, will discuss and decide on the further installation and easy availability of potentially life-saving defibrillators in public places, apart from the introduction of a national screening program to identify young people at risk of cardiac arrest.
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Nail Biting to be Classified as Mental Disorder: Report
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 04:47 AM ESTSeeing people bite their nails is not an uncommon sight. People bite their nails in excitement, fear, nervousness, or most of the times, for no reason at all. As benign as it may seem, an attempt to quit an addiction to nail biting can be even harder than quitting cigarettes. While biting nails is not painful to the person, if overdone, it can cause bleeding and pain that lasts for 2-3 days or even cause an infection. The news may upset a few habitual nail biters, but apparently, medical experts are now planning to change its classification from a mere habit to a full-fledged obsessive-compulsive disorder.
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Brain Imaging Alone not Enough for Autism Diagnosis
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 04:39 AM ESTMcLean Hospital biostatistician Nicholas Lange, ScD, warns against depending on brain imaging scans alone for the diagnosis of autism and suggests that large, long-term multicenter studies should be conducted in order to identify the biological basis of the disorder. "Several studies in the past two years have claimed that brain scans can diagnose autism, but this assertion is deeply flawed," said Lange, an associate professor of Psychiatry and Biostatistics at Harvard Medical School.
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Self-Harm Need Not Always be a Serious Mental Health Issue
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 04:34 AM ESTPsychologist Jonas Bjärehed concludes in his study, that in order not to over-interpret the behavior in teenagers, one needs knowledge. Bjärehed recently presented his thesis at Lund University in Sweden. For the study, Jonas Bjärehed and his supervisor Lars Gunnar Lund surveyed 1,000 young people and found that four out of 10 young people had at least once hurt themselves intentionally. When the researchers broke down the data further, they found that it is only a small minority of youngsters who self-harm on a regular basis. This can be compared to self-harm in adults with mental health issues.
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Eating Read Meat and Poultry May Up Breast Cancer Risk in White Women: Study
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 04:27 AM ESTA new study suggests that eating red meat and poultry may boost the risk of breast cancer in white women - but not black women. "Most breast cancer studies have been conducted in [white] women," said senior study author Dr. Elisa Bandera, an epidemiologist at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, in an institute news release. Since most of the previous researches have been around white women, the current research aimed at collecting more information on the impact of consumption of meat on breast cancer in women with African and European origin as well, Bandera noted.
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How You React to Stress Defines The Diseases You May Have 10 Years Later
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 04:21 AM ESTIt is a common notion that stress causes health problems. However, researchers from Penn State claim through a new study that it is not the stressors themselves that cause health consequences in people, but the way people react to the stressors that determine the health consequences they may face as a result. "Our research shows that how you react to what happens in your life today predicts your chronic health conditions and 10 years in the future, independent of your current health and your future stress," said David Almeida, professor of human development and family studies.
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People as Young as 30 Experience Memory Loss: Survey
By Drishya Nair | Nov 04, 2012 03:59 AM ESTA new study reveals that memory loss can begin as early as age 30, even though the average age at which people generally experience memory loss is about 57 years. An online survey of people below 50 years revealed that while 11 percent of respondents reported noticing memory loss in their 40s, six percent said they did so in their 30s itself. Also, it was found that most of the people below 50 years of age live in the fear of memory loss and many of them also experience memory loss pretty often.
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Patients with Dry Mouth may Benefit from Acupuncture: Study
By Drishya Nair | Nov 02, 2012 12:30 PM EDTXerostomia is a dry mouth symptom often suffered by patients diagnosed with head and neck cancer. This symptom is a result of radiation treatment given to such patients, which damages their salivary glands. A new study suggests that patients suffering from xerostomia can perhaps find relief in the usage of acupuncture, a treatment originating from ancient China. According to researchers, up to 41 percent of around 500,000 who are diagnosed with head and neck cancer suffer from dry mouth, even after five years of treatment.
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Acupuncture Can Help Breast Cancer Patients Fight Fatigue
By Drishya Nair | Nov 02, 2012 12:13 PM EDTA new study suggests that breast cancer patients who suffer from fatigue may find relief in acupuncture, an alternative medicine methodology originating in ancient China. The treatment includes manipulation of thin, solid needles that have been inserted into acupuncture points on the skin of the patient. According to a report in Mail Online, about 40 percent of breast cancer patients suffer from fatigue and this study is the first clinical trial using acupuncture to treat this particular symptom of the disease.
