Kids are home for the holidays, but the wonders of the season can pose problems for children with asthma. Sources of joy like Christmas trees, a Yule log burning or Grandma’s pet dog can all be unexpected asthma triggers, warns the American Lung Association. Parents should talk with their kid’s doctor about creating an asthma… read on > read on >
What’s even more nerve-wracking than paying taxes? The holidays, according to a majority of Americans, who say it takes them weeks to recover from seasonal stress. “The holidays are an easy time to justify putting off healthy habits, but it’s important to manage chronic stress and other risk factors to stay healthy during the holiday… read on > read on >
The new COVID variant known as JN.1 was named a “variant of interest” by the World Health Organization on Tuesday, which means health officials are now closely tracking its rapid spread across the globe. So far, the highly mutated variant has not been shown to trigger more severe illness than previous incarnations of the coronavirus.… read on > read on >
Anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress are common among people caring for the victim of a recent stroke, a new study has found. Nearly 30% of caregivers of severe stroke patients experience stress and emotional problems during the first year after the patient leaves the hospital, according to a report in the journal Neurology. “This research… read on > read on >
Beyond a myriad of other consequences, childhood trauma appears to raise the specter of chronic pain in adulthood, new research shows. Researchers pored over 75 years’ worth of data involving more than 826,000 people. That included information on levels of neglect or physical, emotional or sexual abuse, plus other serious trauma of childhood. Their review… read on > read on >
Long left to the fringes of the recreational drug culture, psilocybin — the hallucinatory ingredient in “magic mushrooms” — has recently been making inroads as a legitimate (and fast-acting) antidepressant. Research published Dec. 18 in Cancer shows its benefits may extend to people battling cancer, who often experience the added burden of depression. “As an… read on > read on >
Exposure to a common chemical group found in many household products may delay or even prevent a woman from becoming pregnant, a new study says. Phthalates can lower a woman’s odds of becoming pregnant by up to 18% in any given month, researchers report in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. Phthalates are chemicals found in… read on > read on >
Early research in mice could be getting closer to the roots of what causes Parkinson’s disease. A “pathological” form of a common brain protein, alpha-synuclein, could play a role in the death of dopamine-rich brain cells, according to a team at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore. It’s this steady loss of dopamine cells… read on > read on >
Women struggling with fertility and using in vitro fertilization (IVF) to conceive sometimes turn to supplements for help. Unfortunately, a new study finds only weak evidence to support that strategy. In contrast, the same research found that the heart-healthy Mediterranean diet does boost the odds that a woman will become a mother. Compared to the… read on > read on >
Cinnamon samples gathered at a facility in Ecuador linked to tainted applesauce pouches were found to contain levels of toxic lead that were 2,000 times higher than proposed standards, according to U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspectors. Tests conducted at an Ecuadorean facility run by Austrofoods (maker of the recalled applesauce) found that cinnamon supplied… read on > read on >
