heart rhythm problem

Smoking ups risk of common heart rhythm problem

In a new study finds that both current and former smokers run an elevated risk of the heart rhythm disorder atrial fibrillation. The condition known as AF, is the most common heart arrhythmia, affecting 2 million people. The arrhythmia itself is not life threatening, but over time AF can contribute to stroke or heart failure in some people.

The new findings, reported in the American Heart Journal, suggest that it does even after a smoker quits. Researchers found, nearly 5,700 Dutch adults age 55 & older, current smokers & former smokers were about 50% more likely to develop AF over 7 years.

An independent effect of smoking on atrial fibrillation has never been found, until now, in the study. Even when the researchers took other factors into account such as age, and whether participants had high blood pressure or had ever suffered a heart attack smoking itself was still linked to higher AF risk. It is surprising that former smokers had an AF risk comparable to current smokers.

But the finding does not mean that quitting the habit is "meaningless," the researcher stressed. It's known that smokers who quit lower their risk of developing a number of smoking-related ills, including lung cancer and heart attacks.

Heart failure risk

Even a tiny bit of flab raises heart failure risk

According to a US study: even a little bit of extra weight can raise the risk of heart failure that calculated the heart hazards of being pudgy but not obese. It comes obesity makes a person much more apt to get heart failure, a deadly condition which the heart is unable to pump enough blood throughout the body.

But researchers tracked the health of 21,094 male doctors for two decades found that even those who were only modestly overweight had a higher risk & it grew along with the amount of extra weight.

In men who are 5 feet 10 inches tall, for every seven pounds (3.2 kg) of excess body weight, their risk of heart failure rose on average by 11% over the next 20 years.

The average age of the men at the outset of the so called Physicians' Health Study was 53. Overall, the risk of heart failure increased by 180% in men who met the definition of obesity according to their body mass index (BMI of 30 and higher), and by 49 percent in men who met the definition of overweight (a BMI of 25 to 30).

Heart failure known as congestive heart failure, contributes to 300,000 deaths each year. The lean and active group had the lowest risk and the obese and inactive group had the highest risk. As far as vigorous physical activity is concerned, even if somebody said they exercised one to three times per month which is a very low level of exercise they had an 18% reduction in the risk of heart failure after accounting for all other established risk factors.

The benefit of exercise in cutting heart failure risk was seen in lean, overweight and obese men, the researchers found. But regardless of the level of activity, higher body mass index also meant higher heart failure risk.

Signs of the Times

Signs of the Times

The global recession manifests itself in big & small ways, most gloomy, some quirky and often reflecting the inventive human spirit. Here is a look at some signs of the times.

• If your hedge fund has collapsed, the bank foreclosed on your mansion and the Bentley's been repossessed, don't worry, you can still toast the new year with caviar.Well, fake caviar. A supermarket chain in Britain is selling something it calls Arenkha MSC with a similar texture and taste to the much-prized sturgeon roe but at a fraction of the price. It says it combines "smoked herring with squid ink, lemon juice and spices."
  
• Cricketers and dogs are also feeling the pain in Britain. Mobile phone company Vodafone Group Plc announced it was ending its sponsorship of the English cricket team, part of moves to cut 1 billion pounds ($1.52 billion) in costs. Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, the country's best-known animal refuge, said it was filled to bursting point, partly because of the financial crisis.
  
• Even the Queen of England is feeling the pinch. "The Sun"newspaper said Queen Elizabeth had mounted a sale at the gift shop at her Balmoral estate in Scotland, offering up to 50 percent cuts. Bargain hunters could buy a Prince Charles glossy landscape painting book for 10 pounds ($15). A bottle of Balmoral Whisky was cut by 6 pounds ($9) to 24 pounds ($36).
  
• In Moscow, the Niyama Japanese restaurant is pegging the price of a fixed-menu lunch to the country's benchmark stock index, the RTS. The "RTS lunch" costs 27 percent of the RTS index's daily opening level. If it opens at 690 points, as it did on Tuesday, the meal would cost 186.50 roubles (about $7). Had the offer been available at the market's peak in May, it would have been about four times the price.
  
• High-end consignment stores, where the once-rich try to unload their Gucci bags and Rolexes, have been swamped.
  
• Tokio 7, ranked one of New York's best second-hand shops, is turning down all but the best new consignments. "Business if very, very slow. Customers are very scared. Everyone needs a little money," said owner Makoto Watanabe.
  
• In Singapore, second-hand luxury watch dealers say customers are lowering their sights. Where they used to go for a Patek Philippe that can cost over S$10,000 (about $6,800), shoppers opt for models under S$5,000 (about $3,400). "Business has gone down about 20 to 30 percent," said Alvin Lye of Monster-Time.
  
• In Tokyo, many people are choosing the tubby "daruma"dolls, often given as good luck charms to someone starting a new business, not in the traditional red but in black. They hope it might portend their accounts will stay out of the red.
  
• Some American couples are being driven by the financial crisis to sell their wedding and engagement rings. The website idonowidont.com, originally conceived as a way for survivors of failed relationships to move on and make some cash at the same time, has experienced a 145 percent spike in traffic this fall, said David Becker, the site's chief executive officer.
  
• With unemployment spreading like a virus, Slovenia's national Employment Service has formed mobile units that will visit companies announcing losses to sign up the newly jobless, making it easier for them to get unemployment benefits.
  
• Greenwich, Connecticut, an upscale bedroom community for Wall Street and unofficial capital of the hard-hit hedge fund world, is, like thousands of U.S. towns, facing a big budget shortfall in 2009. Greenwich's deficit is projected at $31 million in the next 18 months, prompting proposed wage and hiring freezes and property tax hikes.

Lung cancer

Experts identify gene variants linked to lung cancer

Researchers in China & US identified 2 genes which appear to make ethnic Chinese more susceptible to lung cancer. Their finding involves 2 genes,ABCB1 & ABCC1, which were previously thought to be linked to eliminating carcinogens from the lungs and protecting them against inhaled toxins. Their study, analyzed the genes of 500 patients with lung cancer & 517 cancer free participants in China. The analysis found certain (gene) variants were found much more often in individuals with lung cancer than in cancer free controls. Among those 31% were found with a certain mutation of the ABCB1 gene, while 27% were found with a variant of the ABCC1 gene. But those same mutations were found in only 15% and 12 percent of participants in the cancer free group. The variant (of ABCB1) was particularly associated with an increased risk of cancer in women and in individuals under age 60 years. It also was linked to a major type of lung cancer called adenocarcinoma.

Those figures would account for 19 and 5% respectively of all deaths in China during that period, said the researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH).

Respiratory diseases are among the 10 leading causes of deaths in China. About half of Chinese men smoke. In more than 70% of homes, Chinese cook and heat their homes with wood, coal and crop residues.

Fast food

Fast food

According to a research it's found that, youth who study just a short walk from a fast food outlet eat fewer fruit and vegetables, drink more soda, are more likely to be obese than students at other schools. The study involved more than 500,000 schools and high schools in California, lends new fuel to a growing backlash against the fast-food industry as studies suggest they contribute to the rising obesity epidemic in the US.

Basically it discovered that kids who are going to a school that is near a fast food restaurant have a higher chance of being overweight & obese than kids who are at a school that is not near a fast food restaurant. Their study adds to prior research showing that fast food restaurants tend to be clustered near schools.

Students who were exposed to nearby fast food have a higher level of body mass index they weigh more. They are more likely to be overweight and obese.

Consumer groups have pushed for laws such as July's moratorium on new fast food restaurants in certain Los Angeles neighborhoods, while the food industry often maintains that a lack of exercise is more to blame.

For the study, they examined the relationship between fast food restaurants located within one half mile of schools and obesity among middle and high school students in California. They took weight and dietary information from a statewide school survey between 2002 and 2005 and cross referenced the data with a database of top fast food chains located near each school.

They also found that students whose schools were located near-fast food restaurants eat fewer servings of vegetables and fruits, and drink far more soda than students at schools not located near fast-food restaurants.

The study could not determine why fast-food restaurants near schools have such an impact. A nearby fast-food restaurant is really a hangout place for people to socialize.

Second-hand smoke

Second-hand smoke tied to fertility problems

A new study suggests that women who have ever been around smokers regularly may have more difficulty getting pregnant than those who have not. In their studies its found that women who smoke raise their risk of a number of pregnancy complications & their infants' risk of health problems. Less is known about the dangers of second hand smoke, though some studies have linked exposure during pregnancy to an elevated risk of miscarriage. The new study, of 4,800 women, researchers found those who had grown up with a parent who smoked were more likely to report they'd had difficulty becoming pregnant defined as having to try for more than 1 year.

In addition, women who'd been exposed to second-hand smoke in both childhood and adulthood were 39% more likely to have suffered a miscarriage or stillbirth, and 68% more likely to have had problems getting pregnant.

Researcher Luke J. Peppone at the University of Rochester, New York said: "These statistics are breathtaking and certainly (point) to yet another danger of second-hand smoke exposure." He also mentioned, "We all know that cigarettes and second hand smoke are dangerous, breathing the smoke has lasting effects, especially for women when they're ready for children."

For the study of surveying from 4,804 women who'd visited the university's Roswell Park Cancer Institute between 1982 and 1998 for health screening or cancer treatment. All had been pregnant at least once in their lives. Overall, Peppone's team found 11 % of the women had difficulty becoming pregnant, while one third had a miscarriage or stillbirth.

The risk of these problems tended to climb in tandem with the number of hours per day that a woman was exposed to second hand smoke a pattern that suggests a cause effect relationship.

Second hand smoke contains a host of toxic compounds that could potentially harm a woman's reproductive health. Tobacco toxins may damage cells' genetic material, interfere with conception, raise the risk of miscarriage, or inhibit the hormones needed for conception and a successful pregnancy.