College Athletes in Low-Contact Sports Have More Overuse Injuries

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Anxiety Linked to Smarts in Brain Study

HealthDay – 30 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- Worrying may have co-evolved with intelligence as an important survival trait in humans, new research suggests.

For the study, researchers looked at 26 people with generalized anxiety disorder and compared them to a group of 18 healthy volunteers without the disorder. The investigators found that both worry and high intelligence were associated with brain activity measured by the depletion of the nutrient choline in the brain's white matter.

This suggests that worry may have co-evolved with intelligence, said Dr. Jeremy Coplan, a professor of psychiatry at the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center in New York City.

"While excessive worry is generally seen as a negative trait and high intelligence as a positive one, worry may cause our species to avoid dangerous situations, regardless of how remote a possibility they may be," Coplan said in a center news release.

"In essence, worry may make people 'take no chances,' and such people may have higher survival rates. Thus, like intelligence, worry may confer a benefit upon the species," he added.

The study was published in a recent issue of the journal Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience.

More information

The U.S. National Mental Health Institute has more about generalized anxiety disorder.

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Health Highlights: April 18, 2012

HealthDay – 30 mins ago Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by the editors of HealthDay:

Entertainment Legend Dick Clark Dies at 82

Dick Clark, best known as the longtime host of "American Bandstand" and "Dick Clark's NewYear's Rockin' Eve" passed away Wednesday, his agent Paul Shefrin said in a statement.

Shefrin said that Clark, 82, died Wednesday morning of a "massive heart attack," ABC News reported.

Clark, whose full name was Richard Wagstaff Clark, was born in 1929 in Mount Vernon, N.Y., and got his start as a teenager working in the mailroom in an upstate New York radio station. He quickly made his way onto the air, and later hosted his own radio show at a station in Philadelphia before taking over as host of "Bandstand."

"Bandstand" and Clark became synonymous with the promotion of rock'n'roll music and his Dick Clark Productions produced such TV hits as "Pyramid" and the "American Music Awards," ABC News said.

Clark's ever-youthful demeanor gained him the nickname "America's Oldest Teenager," but in 2004 a stroke left him partially paralyzed. He recovered and within a year was back hosting "Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve."

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Breast Cancer 10 Different Diseases: Study

A "landmark" international study says breast cancer should be regarded as 10 completely separate diseases and that this type of categorization could improve treatment by tailoring drugs for a patient's exact type of breast cancer.

The researchers analyzed breast cancers from 2,000 women and their findings appear in the journal Nature. It will take at least three years for their findings to be used in hospitals, BBC News reported.

The study authors compared breast cancer to a map of the world and said current tests for the disease are quite broad and split breast cancer up into the equivalent of continents instead of countries. These new findings allow doctors to identify individual "countries."

"Breast cancer is not one disease, but 10 different diseases," said lead researcher Prof Carlos Caldas, BBC News reported. "Our results will pave the way for doctors in the future to diagnose the type of breast cancer a woman has, the types of drugs that will work and those that won't, in a much more precise way than is currently possible."

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J&J Says Some Popular OTC Drugs May Not be Sold Again Until 2013

Some popular over-the-counter products made by Johnson & Johnson may not return to U.S. store shelves until next year because efforts to fix manufacturing problems at three plants are taking longer than expected, according to company officials.

In an agreement reached last year with the Food and Drug Administration, Johnson & Johnson pledged to overhaul operations at the three plants after quality problems forced several OTC products off store shelves, The New York Times reported.

Some of the products are available again while others, including eight-hour Tylenol and Simply Sleep, have not yet returned to the market.

While some products may return to store shelves this year, others likely will not return until 2013, Johnson & Johnson's chief financial officer Dominic J. Caruso said in a conference call, The Times reported.

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Scientists Grow Hair on Bald Mice

Hairless mice grew hair after they received implants of follicles created from adult stem cells, an achievement that points to a possible cure for baldness.

The Japanese scientists said the hair sprouted by the mice continued regenerating in normal growth cycles after old hairs fell out, Agence France-Presse reported.

The results suggest that it may be possible to use bald people's own cells for implants that will restore their hair, according to the study published online in the journal Nature Communications.

"We would like to start clinical research within three to five years, so that an actual treatment to general patients can start within a decade," said researcher Koh-ei Toyoshima of the Tokyo University of Science, AFP reported.

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141 Now Sickened in Tuna-Linked Salmonella Outbreak

A salmonella outbreak linked to a frozen yellowfin tuna product has now sickened 141 people in 20 states and the District of Columbia, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said late Tuesday.

In a statement, the agency said 21 people have been hospitalized but there have been no deaths reported.

On Monday, nearly 59,000 pounds of the product, labeled Nakaochi Scrape AA or AAA, was recalled by Moon Marine USA Corp. of Cupertino, Calif. The product, which is scraped off fish bones, was sold to grocery stores and restaurants to make dishes such as sushi, sashimi and ceviche.

As reported by the Associated Press, many people who became ill reported eating raw tuna in sushi as "spicy tuna."

As of Tuesday, the CDC said illnesses linked to the recalled product had been reported in: Alabama (2), Arkansas (1), Connecticut (6), District of Columbia (2), Florida (1), Georgia (6), Illinois (13), Louisiana (3), Maryland (14), Massachusetts (9), Mississippi (2), Missouri (4), New Jersey (8), New York (28), North Carolina (2), Pennsylvania (6), Rhode Island (5), South Carolina (3), Texas (4), Virginia (8) and Wisconsin (14).

The CDC noted that salmonella illness is often serious for infants, older adults, pregnant women and persons with impaired immune systems, and these individuals should not eat raw or partially cooked fish or shellfish.

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Researchers Repair Damage Caused by Heart Attacks in Mice

HealthDay – 29 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- Scientists report they were able to repair mouse hearts that were damaged by heart attacks.

Researchers from the Gladstone Institutes successfully converted scar tissue in the mice into beating heart muscle. Their findings, they said, might eventually lead to a similar treatment for people who've had heart attacks.

"The damage from a heart attack is typically permanent because heart-muscle cells -- deprived of oxygen during the attack -- die and scar tissue forms," Dr. Deepak Srivastava, who directs cardiovascular and stem cell research at Gladstone, a nonprofit biomedical research institution, said in a Gladstone news release. "But our experiments in mice are a proof of concept that we can reprogram non-beating cells directly into fully functional, beating heart cells -- offering an innovative and less invasive way to restore heart function after a heart attack."

In conducting the study, the researchers delivered three genes, known as GMT, involved in embryonic heart development directly into the damaged areas of the mouse hearts. They found the non-beating scar tissue was transformed into beating heart muscle within one month. The heart function of the mice improved even more after three months, the study added.

"These findings could have a significant impact on heart-failure patients -- whose damaged hearts make it difficult for them to engage in normal activities like walking up a flight of stairs," Li Qian, a postdoctoral scholar, who is also a California Institute for Regenerative Medicine postdoctoral scholar and a Roddenberry Fellow, said in the news release. "This research may result in a much-needed alternative to heart transplants -- for which donors are extremely limited. And because we are reprogramming cells directly in the heart, we eliminate the need to surgically implant cells that were created in a petri dish."

The next step, the study authors noted, is to duplicate their research and test its safety in larger mammals, such as pigs. This will bring the scientists one step closer to testing this type of treatment in people.

"We hope that our research will lay the foundation for initiating cardiac repair soon after a heart attack -- perhaps even when the patient arrives in the emergency room," said Srivastava, who is also a professor at the University of California, San Francisco, with which Gladstone is affiliated.

The findings were published online April 18 in the journal Nature.

In the future, the scientists say they hope this type of direct reprogramming will be used to also treat spinal cord injury and illnesses such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease.

While the findings of the new study are promising, scientists note that research involving animals often fails to produce similar results in humans.

More information

The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute provides more information on heart attacks.

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Use of Ecstasy, Speed by Teens Tied to Later Depression

HealthDay – 29 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- Teens who use the party drugs ecstasy (MDMA) and speed (methamphetamine and/or amphetamine) appear to face a notably higher risk of depression afterward, new Canadian research suggests.

Interviews and mental health assessments conducted among nearly 3,900 10th-grade residents of Quebec revealed that, compared to non-users, adolescents who acknowledged taking either speed or ecstasy had a 60 percent to 70 percent greater risk of experiencing telltale signs of depression a year after their last recorded use.

What's more, those who said they had tried both speed and ecstasy showed double the risk for depressive symptoms, when compared to non-users.

Nevertheless, study co-author Jean-Sebastien Fallu, an associate professor in the school of educational psychology at the University of Montreal, cautioned that his team cannot draw a specific cause-and-effect line between such recreational drug use and depression.

"But researchers have advanced two possible mechanisms," he said. "That these drugs have a neurotoxic affect on serotonin

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EPA to Cut Air Pollution from Natural Gas 'Fracking'

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Half of Young Cigarette Smokers Also Smoke Pot: Survey

HealthDay – 29 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- More young cigarette smokers may also be lighting up joints than was previously thought, a new study finds.

In a survey of young adults aged 18 to 25, more than half said they also use marijuana. Researchers from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), say that's a big increase from the 35 percent of young adults that, in prior research, had admitted to using both marijuana and tobacco within the past month.

One expert said the new findings ring true.

"The data presented are far more consistent with what I hear simply by speaking with thousands of students of middle and high school age," noted Stephen Dewey, an addiction researcher and director of the Laboratory for Behavioral and Molecular Neuroimaging at the Feinstein Institute for Medical Research in Manhasset, N.Y. "The importance of getting accurate data like these cannot be stressed enough, as treatment programs and the financial support required for them are often guided by studies that demonstrate both prevalence and risk."

According to the researchers, the fact that their study was conducted online, primarily through Facebook, and participants could remain anonymous, may have resulted in a more accurate picture of tobacco and marijuana use.

"We were curious whether rates would be different in our study where we reached out through social media and the Web," study author Danielle Ramo, a postdoctoral scholar in the UCSF Department of Psychiatry, said in a university news release. "And rates were much higher, which shows the problem might be larger than we realize."

The study, published April 18 in Addiction Science and Clinical Practice, was conducted in two phases. First, researchers questioned participants on their smoking habit. In the second stage, 3,500 participants were asked to anonymously reveal if they had used marijuana in the past 30 days.

The study found that of the 68 percent of respondents who smoked cigarettes every day, 53 percent said they had also used marijuana within the past month. Both tobacco and marijuana use was highest among whites, those from the Northeast, those living in rural areas and young adults who were not students, the researchers noted.

"Residence in a medical marijuana state was unrelated to the prevalence of marijuana use as well as the co-use of marijuana and tobacco in this young adult sample," study senior author Judith Prochaska, an associate professor of psychiatry at UCSF, said in the news release. "The prevalence of marijuana use also did not differ by respondents' age, income or gender."

Another expert said he wasn't surprised by the findings.

"Those who suffer from mental health and substance abuse problems have an extremely high rate of nicotine dependence," said Bruce Goldman, director of Substance Abuse Services at The Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, NY. "It stands to reason that those seeking help to quit smoking also would have high rates of substance abuse including cannabis."

He added that, "given the high rates of concurrence, it is a good idea to briefly screen all those seeking smoking cessation services for alcohol and drug abuse problems as well."

The study's authors argued that programs to help young adults quit smoking should also take into account the effects of marijuana use. They said the next step in their research is to bring counseling and other therapies to help people quit to Facebook.

"Adapting the social media aspect into intervention and incorporating the social environment are new ways to approach finding the most effective means for treatment," Prochaska concluded.

"This format allows them to remain anonymous as much as they want, but have ease to access interventions when they are at the age when they are less likely to enter a treatment center, research lab or clinic," added Ramo.

Goldman agreed. "Individuals might be more comfortable seeking assistance via the web than presenting in person to a local treatment center," he reasoned.

More information

The U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse provides more information on marijuana.

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Chemo + Radiation Best for Bladder Cancer, Study Finds

HealthDay – 29 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- The addition of two well-tolerated chemotherapy drugs to radiation therapy led to significantly longer survival rates among patients with muscle-invasive bladder cancer.

In a new study splitting 360 patients into groups receiving radiation alone or radiation plus chemotherapy, British researchers found that those undergoing combined therapies had a 67 percent rate of local disease-free survival after two years, compared with 54 percent in the radiation group. Five-year overall survival rates were 48 percent in the chemo-radiation group, compared with 35 percent in the radiation-only group.

"Overall, the results establish that the addition of chemotherapy to radiotherapy should become standard practice for organ-preserving treatments of bladder cancer," said Dr. Manish Vira, director of the fellowship program in urologic oncology at the Arthur Smith Institute for Urology in Lake Success, N.Y. "The tried-and-true treatment method is still

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When Does Boxing-Related Head Trauma Become Too Much?

HealthDay – 29 mins ago WEDNESDAY, April 18 (HealthDay News) -- Professional fighters may hit a threshold -- a specific number of fights and years in the ring -- where they can no longer take blows to the head without brain damage, a new study suggests.

But, once they cross that threshold, years might pass before symptoms show.

"The brain can tolerate or absorb a certain amount of trauma and repair itself," explained study author Dr. Charles Bernick. The findings raise the question of whether -- and when -- fighters should be medically screened, so changes could be caught earlier and available treatment offered, he said.

It's already well documented that "the more exposure you have to head trauma, the higher your risk of developing long-term complications. Primarily, this condition is chronic traumatic encephalopathy," said Bernick, associate director of the Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.

Also known as Boxer's Syndrome, chronic traumatic encephalopathy is a degenerative brain disease that causes the same kinds of thinking difficulties and personality changes seen with Alzheimer's disease.

As part of an ongoing study on brain health, the researchers divided 109 licensed boxers and mixed martial artists into three groups: those who had fought for less than six years, six to 12 years or more than 12 years. Their average age was about 29.

Participants underwent MRI scans to measure their brain volume and tests of their thinking and memory.

"In those that fought less than six years, we didn't find any changes," Bernick said. For that group, he said, "the more you fought didn't seem to make any differences in the size of brain structure or their performance on some of the tests like reaction time."

But for the other two groups of boxers and combat athletes, "the greater number of fights, the sizes of certain volumes of the brain were decreasing," he said. "But, it was only in those that fought more than 12 years that we could detect the changes in performance in reaction time and processing speed."

Women made up about 10 percent of the fighters in the study, too small a number to make any comparisons for now, Bernick said.

The study, released April 18, will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's annual meeting in New Orleans, held from April 21 to 28.

"This is a cross-sectional study -- just one point in time in all these fighters' lives," Bernick said. "It needs to be substantiated and confirmed, but it's biologically plausible and it makes sense, and we're going to be following up on that."

With repetitive head trauma, Dr. Howard Derman, medical director at the Methodist Concussion Center in Houston, said "boxing is clearly more dangerous than football, because the number of the hits to the head is greater," and no headgear is used at the professional level.

"The initial presentations may begin with things like deterioration in attention, concentration, memory, disorientation, confusion and then they get much bigger issues with dementia, and then it even progresses to parkinsonian features," Derman said. Parkinsonian features include rigidity and tremor.

Derman isn't convinced that a time lag always exists between early head injuries from sports and measurable brain changes.

"Most of us believe that there is the period of quiescence, which is why you're seeing a lot of these

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Think carrots, not candy as school snack, group suggests

Reuters – 16 mins ago WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Junk food may soon be hard to buy at American public schools as the U.S. government readies new rules requiring healthier foods to be sold beyond the cafeteria - a move most parents support, according to a poll released on Thursday.

With childhood obesity rising, the survey found most people agreed the chips, soda and candy bars students buy from vending machines or school stores in addition to breakfast and lunch are not nutritious, and they support a national standard for foods sold at schools.

The findings from the advocacy group Kids' Safe and Healthful Foods Project came as the federal government prepares to roll out a nationwide standard that may set up another battle among health experts, schools and the food industry.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is expected to issue its guidelines by June, according to some experts. These could limit the amount of sugar, salt and fat foods sold at schools could contain.

Agriculture Department Under Secretary Kevin Concannon said an important step in addressing childhood obesity is to help make the "right choice an easy choice" while at school.

"We look forward to working with parents, teachers, school food service professionals and the food industry to craft workable guidelines so that healthier options are available for our students," he said.

Many states have already enacted their own laws mandating healthier non-cafeteria food options.

Jessica Donze Black, a dietician who leads the Kids' Safe and Healthful Foods Project, said the results show growing support for updating standards that surfaced in 1979.

"What has changed in the last 30 years is that the childhood obesity epidemic has more than tripled," she said. "The school environment has also changed. ... Today, there are a lot of other places throughout the day that compete with kids eating a healthy school meal."

SUPPORT FOR HIGHER STANDARDS

Eighty percent of the 1,010 adults polled said they would support nutritional standards limiting the calories, fat and sodium in such foods. Seventeen percent would oppose it.

Most also agreed there are now few healthy options. Just 5 percent of adults said vending machines offered totally or mostly healthy choices compared with 10 percent for school stores and 21 percent for a la carte lunch lines.

Changes to school foods may be controversial. New standards for more fruits, vegetables and whole grains in traditional school meals announced in January drew scrutiny when lawmakers blocked limits to french fries and counted pizza as a vegetable because it contains tomato sauce.

Efforts to give students more healthy options to help fight childhood obesity have historically faced pressure from food and beverage companies and even from schools themselves, who rely on such food sales for extra cash.

But health experts, pediatricians and other advocates say that is changing as more companies and school districts come on board at a time when more than one-third of U.S. children are overweight or obese.

"Most people accept that soda, candy bars and other unhealthy foods just don't deserve a place in school on a regular basis," said Margo Wootan, head of nutrition policy at the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

She said there are still concerns that members of Congress and industry lobbyists could water down the proposal.

The American Academy of Pediatrics' Laura Jana said new rules are imperative now that kids consume more than half of their daily calories in school. More students are getting most of their calories from snacks and drinks, not meals, she said.

"To me, it's a no-brainer. ... They can't make that healthy choice when we stick all those temptations under their noses," said Jana, a pediatrician based in Omaha, Nebraska and co-author of "Food Fights: Winning the Nutritional Challenges of Parenthood Armed with Insight, Humor and a Bottle of Ketchup."

JUICE, GRANOLA BARS

Food and beverage makers have expanded their portfolios to include juice, granola bars and other healthier products. Vending machine companies focused on nutritious offerings have also sprung up.

U.S. drink companies have already taken voluntary steps to keep sodas out of some schools and their trade group says this has cut calories consumed from beverages in schools by 88 percent.

Christopher Gindlesperger, spokesman for the American Beverage Association, said its voluntary guidelines are a good model for the government to follow.

"It's a standard that's already in place that is working. It strikes a balance," he said.

ABA's guidelines eliminate soda in elementary and middle schools but allow diet sodas and low-calorie sports drinks in high school.

Companies such as The Coca-Cola Co, PepsiCo Inc, and Nestle SA either had no immediate comment or referred questions to industry trade groups.

Mars Inc, maker of the iconic M&M's chocolate candies, said it has already agreed to withdraw branded vending machines from schools and does not offer traditional candy in those settings. Mars said it has instead developed other, lower-calorie products.

As for schools, most now realize vending machines can help teach students about healthy habits and boost learning even though money does loom large, said Whitney Meagher, project director for the National Association of State Boards of Education.

"If you have a choice between a cookie and an apple and the cookie is going to sell better, it's hard not to make that decision as a business decision," she said.

The Kids' Safe and Healthful Foods Project is a joint venture by the nonprofit policy group The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, a private organization that aims to improve Americans' health.

Its poll surveyed 1,010 registered voters by telephone in mid-January and has a margin-of-error of plus-or-minus 3.1 percentage points.

(Editing by Marilyn W. Thompson and Cynthia Osterman)

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Happy? Positive outlook may be good for your heart

it seems to be good for your heart.

Scientists have long known that Type A personalities and people who are chronically angry, anxious or depressed have a higher risk of heart attacks.

Now a Harvard review of the flip side of that psychology concludes that being upbeat and optimistic just may help protect against heart disease.

Rather than focusing only on how to lessen heart risks, "it might also be useful to focus on how we might bolster the positive side of things," said lead researcher Julia Boehm of the Harvard School of Public Health.

Boehm reviewed dozens of studies examining a positive outlook

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Cell transplants boost vision of night-blind mice: study

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