Vegan diet lowers odds of having twins
Women who eat a vegan diet—a strict vegetarian diet that excludes all animal products including milk—are one fifth as likely as other women to have twins, a U.S. researcher reported on Saturday.
Hormones given to cattle to boost their milk and meat production might be related to these findings, said Dr. Gary Steinman, an obstetrician specializing in multiple-birth pregnancies at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in New Hyde Park, New York.
Steinman compared twin births rates among women who ate a regular diet, vegetarians who included dairy products, and vegan women.
Slovak doctor says solar flares could raise strokes
Human beings may be at higher risk of strokes in years when the explosions on the sun peak, according to a neurologist who studied the records of 6,100 patients in Slovakia.
Dr. Michal Kovac said he found a spike in strokes and brain hemorrhages in the town of Nove Zamky in southern Slovakia in years when solar flares—bursts of energy stronger than a million nuclear bombs combined—are most abundant.
Kovac says his work, recently published in the Bratislava Medical Journal, builds on studies that show parts of the human body respond to fluctuations in the earth’s geomagnetic field caused by sun storms.
Merck cancer vaccine faces Christian-right scrutiny
Merck & Co. Inc.’s vaccine to prevent the world’s most prevalent sexually transmitted infection sailed through a panel of U.S. health experts, despite early fears of opposition from the Christian Right that it might lead to promiscuity and a false sense of security.
The drugmaker’s efforts to educate Christian groups while touting the vaccine’s top selling point—prevention of cervical cancer—helped win them over.
But Merck may ultimately find itself at loggerheads with those same groups as it seeks to make the vaccine mandatory for school admission, a step considered key for widespread acceptance and one that many of the groups oppose.
Internet searches: Librarians do it better
Cancer patients seeking timely, accurate, unbiased information on the Internet about a disease and its treatment might do well to enlist the help of a professional librarian.
According to a study reported today at the Medical Library Association’s annual meeting in Phoenix, cancer patients are more likely to find what they are looking for with a librarian-mediated search instead of “going it alone.”
Over the last five years, Ruti Volk, a professional librarian and manager of the Patient Education Resource Center (PERC) at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center, and colleagues have done about 2,100 searches for cancer patients. After each mediated-search, patients are asked to complete an evaluation on the information provided to them.
Cancer Survivors Face Emotional Challenges after Successful Treatment
Your bout with cancer—or maybe a battle royal—is over. You beat the disease, withstood the treatment. You’re a survivor.
But after treatment, many women find themselves dealing with emotional fallout—fear of recurrence, depression, body changes, loneliness, and changing relationships—to name a few.
The June issue of Mayo Clinic Women’s HealthSource offers steps to deal with life’s chapters after cancer:
Cochlear Implantation In Both Ears May Improve Speech Perception
A new study suggests that sequential bilateral cochlear implantation, or the placement of cochlear implants in both of a child’s ears through separate surgeries, has the potential to improve speech perception abilities in quiet and in noise. Cochlear implants are electronic devices that have the potential to restore partial hearing to the deaf.
Background: Binaural or two ear hearing enables optimal performance of the human auditory system. In normal hearing subjects binaural hearing is directly associated with improved speech understanding in quiet and in noise, as well as improved sound localization ability, when compared to listening with a single ear. Unilateral (hearing in one ear) and/or bilateral hearing loss may deprive individuals of these binaural mechanisms. Because of its widely recognized advantages, hearing professionals have for many years endeavored to provide effective binaural hearing to individuals with hearing impairment whenever technology has allowed.
