Women with HIV too often unseen: US advocate

"A worker passes out flyers for free HIV testing outside a Walgreens pharmacy in New York on June 27. In the US, black heterosexual women made up the next largest group of new infections after gay men of all races in 2009, with about 5,400 cases according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (AFP Photo/Mario Tama)" title

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Young Cancer Patients Often Lack Support: Study

HealthDay – 1 hr 40 mins ago MONDAY, July 23 (HealthDay News) -- Many teens and young adults diagnosed with cancer aren't receiving the social, psychological and informational support they require, new research suggests.

Cancer patients aged 14 to 39 have different needs and issues than younger and older patients, the researchers explained.

"When patients in this age group are diagnosed with cancer, they face issues -- premature confrontation with mortality, changes in physical appearance, disruptions in school or work, financial challenges and loss of reproductive capacity -- that can all be particularly distressing," study lead author Bradley Zebrack, associate professor of social work at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, said in a university news release.

"Whether it's mental health care, information for topics like infertility or other aspects of care like camps or retreat programs, this study shows that many of these patients aren't getting the care they need to address these unique challenges," he added.

Zebrack and colleagues surveyed 215 newly diagnosed teen and young adult cancer patients. Those in their 20s were much less likely than teens or patients in their 30s to use mental-health services and were more likely to report an unmet need for information about cancer, infertility and diet.

Young adults who were treated in adult, rather than pediatric, cancer facilities were more likely than teens who were treated in pediatric facilities to report an unmet need for age-appropriate websites, mental-health services, camp and retreat programs, transportation assistance and complementary and alternative health services.

The study was published online recently in the journal Cancer.

The lack of research involving teen and young adult cancer patients makes it difficult for health care providers to create age-appropriate services for them, Zebrack said. This study might help change that.

"Our research shows increasing patient referral to community-based social service agencies and reputable Internet resources can enhance the care and improve the quality of life for this group of patients," Zebrack said. "The more we know about their needs, the better support health care professionals will be able to provide."

More information

The U.S. National Cancer Institute has more about support for people with cancer.

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Cancer Survivors Call in Sick to Work More Often, Study Finds

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CDC: Older teens often text behind the wheel

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Autism Often Not Diagnosed Until Age 5 or Older: U.S. Report

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Cancer Docs Often Deal With Own Grief, Doubts When Patients Die

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Back Pain Therapy Often Yields Early Benefits: Study

HealthDay – 1 hr 38 mins ago MONDAY, May 14 (HealthDay News) -- People who receive treatment for chronic and acute low-back pain show significant improvement in the first six weeks, but may still have some pain and disability after one year, according to a new study.

Researchers analyzed data from 33 studies that included more than 11,000 patients to learn more about how treatment affects low-back pain. Their findings appear in the May 14 online edition of CMAJ, the journal of the Canadian Medical Association.

"Our review confirms the broad finding of previous reviews that the typical course of acute low-back pain is initially favorable: there is a marked reduction in mean pain and disability in the first six weeks," Dr. Christopher Maher, director of the musculoskeletal division at the George Institute for Global Health of the University of Sydney in Australia, said in a journal news release.

"Beyond six weeks, improvement slows and thereafter only small reductions in mean pain and disability are apparent up to one year," he added.

One year after beginning treatment, the typical improvement in pain intensity was about 90 percent for patients who had acute low-back pain and about 50 percent for those who had chronic low-back pain, the investigators found.

"There is both good and bad news in our review. It is great that people improve with care, but arguably there is room to do better, particularly for people with persistent low-back pain," Maher said.

"Generally, when people see results like this they want to blame the clinician, but I think that is short-sighted," he added. "One of the principal reasons we have not made more progress in the back pain field is that research agencies do not take back pain research seriously. Around the world, back pain research is hugely underfunded relative to the burden of the disease. It's time for that to change."

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke has more about back pain.

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Lifesaving Defibrillators Often Not Nearby When Needed

HealthDay – Fri, May 11, 2012 FRIDAY, May 11 (HealthDay News) -- Potentially lifesaving automated external defibrillators (AEDs) are not close at hand in most cases of cardiac arrest that occur in public places, according to a new study.

Cardiac arrest occurs when an abnormal heart rhythm causes the heart to stop beating. Automated external defibrillators are devices that use electrical shocks to restore the heart to a normal rhythm.

The findings may help explain why cardiac arrest survival rates remain below 10 percent in most areas of the United States, despite AED and cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) awareness programs, according to the researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

For the study, the research team examined the locations of nearly 3,500 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests and the locations of more than 2,300 automated external defibrillators throughout Philadelphia County. The devices were most commonly located in schools and on university campuses (30 percent), in office buildings (22 percent) and in residential buildings (4 percent).

The investigators found that just 7 percent of cardiac arrests occurred within a 200-foot radius of an automated external defibrillator, which is about a two-minute round-trip walk from the scene of the emergency. Ten percent of cardiac arrests occurred within 400 feet and 21 percent occurred within 600 feet -- a six-minute walk -- of an automated external defibrillator location.

The study was slated for presentation Friday at the annual meeting of the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine in Chicago.

It's been found that cardiac arrest victims' chances of survival fall by about 10 percent with each minute that passes without CPR and defibrillation. Patients who receive an automated external defibrillator shock six minutes or more after suffering a cardiac arrest have very low survival rates.

"AEDs are an essential part of the 'chain of survival' that's necessary to save cardiac arrest victims," senior author Dr. Raina Merchant, an assistant professor of emergency medicine, said in a Penn Medicine news release. "Despite thousands of them in the community, our results show they are usually not readily available during cardiac arrests. Without an AED, the minutes bystanders spend waiting for paramedics to arrive could mean the difference between life and death."

The researchers said their findings highlight the need to place automated external defibrillators more strategically in communities and to develop new ways to help the public easily find them and use them in emergencies.

Because this study was presented at a medical meeting, the data and conclusions should be viewed as preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.

More information

The American Heart Association has more about automated external defibrillators.

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Maternal perceptions of toddler body size often wrong

ScienceDaily (May 7, 2012) — A study of mothers and their toddlers suggests that mothers of overweight toddlers often had inaccurate perceptions of their child's body size, according to a report published in the May issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, a JAMA Network publication. The study is part of the Nutrition and the Health of Children and Adolescents theme issue.

See Also:Health & MedicineDiet and Weight LossChildren's HealthObesityFitnessTeen HealthPregnancy and ChildbirthLiving WellReferenceToddlerNutrition and pregnancyBody mass indexInfant

Feeding behaviors are influenced by perceptions of a child's body size and misperception of a child's size could lead to inappropriate feeding behaviors, such as encouraging a healthy-weight child to eat more, the authors write in their study background.

"Mothers of overweight toddlers were more than 88 percent less likely to accurately perceive their child's body size. … This may be because high-weight status is often regarded as a sign of successful parenting, especially during the early years when parents are responsible for their child's health, nutrition and activity opportunities," the authors comment.

Erin R. Hager, Ph.D., of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and colleagues conducted a study that included 281 mother-toddler pairs recruited from a suburban Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) clinic and an urban pediatric clinic serving predominantly low-income families.

The mean (average) age of the toddlers was 20.2 months and 54.1 percent of them were male. The mothers ranged in age from 18 to 46 years and most (71.9 percent) of them were overweight/obese.

According to the results, nearly 70 percent of mothers were inaccurate in assessing their toddler's body size when selecting a silhouette that correctly reflected their child's true body size. Overall, 71.5 percent of mothers were satisfied with their toddler's body size, with a greater proportion of mothers of healthy-weight or overweight toddlers likely to be satisfied than mothers of underweight toddlers.

"In conclusion, the majority of mothers were satisfied with their toddler's body size, yet were inaccurate in their perception of their child's actual body size. … Future studies should examine how parental satisfaction and/or accuracy are related to parenting behaviors including feeding behaviors and encouragement of physical activity," the authors conclude.

Invited Commentary: Toddler Weight Perception

In an invited commentary, Eliana M. Perrin, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, writes: "This research is instructive because an emerging body of literature suggests that parents with accurate perceptions of weight have greater readiness to make weight-related behavioral changes and are more effective making them."

"We likely need a public health campaign that allows us to visualize the range of healthy toddlers' and older children's weight. I am imagining posters showing photographs of children of all ages between the 5 th and 85 th percentiles saying, 'I'm at a healthy weight!' This type of campaign may help reset our nationally normed pictures of health, helping parents appreciate healthy undulations of weight," Perrin continues.

"In short, we should be able to explore parental perception and satisfaction with children's weight and preserve cultural ideals and pride in children's growth but also help parents achieve healthy weight trajectories. We can do this by counseling with sensitive and culturally competent dialogue and providing guidelines for eating and activity tailored for age, culture and socioeconomic status compatible with lifelong health," Perrin concludes.

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Men's Breast Cancer Often More Deadly, Study Suggests

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Women With Older Partners More Often Admitted to Nursing Homes

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Gastro Woes Often Strike Rheumatoid Arthritis Patients

HealthDay – 1 hr 34 mins ago MONDAY, April 9 (HealthDay News) -- People with rheumatoid arthritis are at increased risk for gastrointestinal problems, such as ulcers and bleeding, and also for death related to gastrointestinal issues, a new study says.

The findings highlight the need to develop new ways to prevent and treat gastrointestinal complications in rheumatoid arthritis patients, according to the Mayo Clinic researchers.

They examined data collected from 813 rheumatoid arthritis patients and an equal number of patients without the disease between 1980 and 2008.

During that time, the incidence of upper gastrointestinal problems in rheumatoid arthritis patients declined but was still higher than in people without rheumatoid arthritis: 2.9 vs. 1.7 per 100-person years. Rheumatoid arthritis patients also had a higher rate of lower gastrointestinal problems than people without RA: 2.1 vs. 1.4 per 100-person years.

The researchers also found that 229 of the rheumatoid arthritis patients died and that gastrointestinal problems such as bleeds, perforations and obstructions were significantly associated with their deaths.

"Our findings emphasize that physicians and patients must be vigilant for these complications, which can occur without causing abdominal pain," study co-author Dr. Eric Matteson, chair of the rheumatology department at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., said in a Mayo news release.

Quitting smoking and reducing use of corticosteroids may be important ways to cut the risk of gastrointestinal complications in rheumatoid arthritis patients, he added.

The study was published online last week in The Journal of Rheumatology.

More information

The American Academy of Family Physicians has more about rheumatoid arthritis.

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Narcissists Often Ace Job Interviews, Study Finds

HealthDay – 2 hrs 26 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 4 (HealthDay News) -- Really, really liking yourself may give you the edge in your next job interview, a new study suggests.

That's because narcissists, known to be obnoxiously high on self-esteem, are better able to talk about and promote themselves, which projects confidence and expertise to interviewers, University of Nebraska-Lincoln researchers explained.

In their two-part study, narcissists scored much higher in a simulated job interview than equally qualified non-narcissists.

"This is one setting where it's OK to say nice things about yourself and there are no ramifications. In fact, it's expected," study co-author Peter Harms, an assistant professor of management, said in a university news release. "Simply put, those who are comfortable doing this tend to do much better than those who aren't."

The study, which appears in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology, first involved 72 people being videotaped as job applicants. While non-narcissistic people eased up on their self-promotion when challenged by expert interviewers, the narcissists actually increased their attempts to promote themselves, the researchers found.

In the second part of the study, 222 expert interviewers rated videos of applicants with similar job skills and varying degrees of narcissism. The self-promoters -- those who spoke quickly and at length and used such "ingratiation tactics" as smiling, gesturing and complimenting others -- received far more positive evaluations than equally qualified applicants who used tactical modesty, the researchers reported.

"This shows that what is getting (narcissists) the win is the delivery," Harms said. "These results show just how hard it is to effectively interview, and how fallible we can be when making interview judgments. We don't necessarily want to hire narcissists, but might end up doing so because they come off as being self-confident and capable."

The findings also suggest that interviewers need to be aware of the tactics used by narcissists, Harms said.

"On the whole, we find very little evidence that narcissists are more or less effective workers. But what we do know is that they can be very disruptive and destructive when dealing with other people on a regular basis," he said.

And, he added, "If everything else is equal, it probably is best to avoid hiring them."

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine explains narcissistic personality disorder.

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