Could COVID-19 infection be responsible for your depressed mood or anxiety?
Doctors told you that your COVID-19 virus infection cleared months ago. However, even though you no longer struggle to breathe, and your oxygen levels have returned to normal, something doesn’t feel right. In addition to constant headaches, you find yourself struggling with seemingly easy tasks. The fatigue you experience makes moving from the bed to the kitchen feel like an accomplishment. But most troubling for you is a feeling of dread, a nervousness so severe you can feel your heart pounding. Constant worries now keep you from sleeping at night.
What are the mental health effects of COVID-19?
We are still learning ab...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 19, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Stephanie Collier, MD, MPH Tags: Behavioral Health Coronavirus and COVID-19 Mental Health Prevention Stress Source Type: blogs
Are antidepressants also pain relievers?
Did you know that antidepressant medications are often prescribed for people without depression?
It’s true. Antidepressants are frequently prescribed for chronic pain, especially pain related to nerve disease (called neuropathic pain), chronic low back or neck pain, and certain types of arthritis.
In fact, some guidelines for the treatment of chronic low back pain and osteoarthritis (the most common type of arthritis) include antidepressants. One antidepressant in particular, duloxetine (Cymbalta), is FDA-approved for these conditions.
Just how antidepressants reduce pain is not well understood. One possibility is they a...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 16, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Back Pain Bones and joints Health Osteoarthritis Pain Management Source Type: blogs
Anti-Asian racism: Breaking through stereotypes and silence
Like the rest of the country, I awoke on Wednesday, March 17 to the horrific news of a mass shooting in Atlanta that killed eight people. Six were Asian women, ranging in age from 44 to 74. I immediately went numb. Lulu Wang, the Chinese American filmmaker and director of The Farewell, gave voice to my pain on social media: “I know these women. The ones working themselves to the bone to send their kids to school, to send money back home.”
The fact is, I’ve been in a state of numbness for much of the past year. On top of the unprecedented strains that COVID-19 has placed on all of us, Asian Americans like me have had ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 15, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Justin Chen, MD, MPH Tags: Adolescent health Children's Health Coronavirus and COVID-19 Mental Health Parenting Relationships Safety Source Type: blogs
Can some postmenopausal women with breast cancer skip chemotherapy?
Breast cancer remains the most common cancer among women. In the last two decades, the treatment of breast cancers has become personalized. This has been possible due to the subtyping of breast cancers. Breast cancers have been subtyped based on the receptors on the breast cancer cell. The most clinically significant receptors — those that have targeted therapies — are the estrogen and progesterone receptors and the human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). Cancers that have the estrogen and progesterone receptors are termed hormone receptor (HR)-positive cancers.
The development of hormone therapy for HR-positi...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 15, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Salewa T. Salewa Oseni, MD Tags: Cancer Medical Research Women's Health Source Type: blogs
Stress may be getting to your skin, but it ’s not a one-way street
Are you stressed out? Your skin can show it. Studies show that both acute and chronic stress can exert negative effects on overall skin wellness, as well as exacerbate a number of skin conditions, including psoriasis, eczema, acne, and hair loss.
But it’s not just a one-way street. Research has also shown that skin and hair follicles contain complex mechanisms to produce their own stress-inducing signals, which can travel to the brain and perpetuate the stress response.
Stress and the two-way street between your brain and skin
You may already have experienced the connection between the brain and skin. Have you ever gotte...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 14, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Neera Nathan, MD, MSHS Tags: Skin and Hair Care Stress Source Type: blogs
The art of a heartfelt apology
If you’ve been stuck mostly at home with one or more family members over the past year, chances are you’ve gotten on one another’s nerves occasionally. When you’re under a lot of stress, it’s not uncommon say something unkind, or even to lash out in anger to someone you care about. And we all make thoughtless mistakes from time to time, like forgetting a promise or breaking something.
Not sure if you should apologize?
Even if you don’t think what you said or did was so bad, or believe that the other person is actually in the wrong, it’s still important to apologize when you’ve hurt or angered someone. “To...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 13, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Julie Corliss Tags: Behavioral Health Mental Health Relationships Source Type: blogs
How is treatment for myasthenia gravis evolving?
Myasthenia gravis (MG) — a medical term that translates as “serious muscle weakness” — is a rare neuromuscular disease. An estimated 30,000 to 60,000 people in the United States have this disorder, which affects people of all ages, sexes, and ethnicities. Recently updated consensus guidelines have added to our knowledge of different forms of myasthenia gravis and improved approaches to treatment.
What are the symptoms of myasthenia gravis?
Myasthenia gravis impairs the transmission of signals from nerves to muscles at a site called the neuromuscular junction (NMJ), where nerves make contact with muscle. This causes...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 12, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Pushpa Narayanaswami, MD, FAAN Tags: Autoimmune diseases Neurological conditions Source Type: blogs
Sleep, stress, or hormones? Brain fog during perimenopause
Often when people think of perimenopause, irregular periods and hot flashes come to mind. But some women may notice another symptom: brain fog.
You’re reading a letter and suddenly realize your thoughts have drifted off and you need to start again. Or you draw a blank when you’re trying to remember someone’s name, or find yourself standing in a room, wondering what you came there to get.
The good news is that these small cognitive blips are probably not anything you need to worry about long-term.
Sleep disturbances and stress may be part of brain fog
Those times when you are less focused and a bit forgetful are likel...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 9, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Kelly Bilodeau Tags: Brain and cognitive health Memory Stress Women's Health Source Type: blogs
Black peer support: A role in mental health recovery
It’s been a troubling year for millions of Americans, marked by public reckonings over inequities in justice, health care, and most certainly mental health care. None of these inequities are new. Estimates suggest that only 22% of Black Americans — fewer than one in four — who need mental health care actually receive treatment. In addition to financial and insurance barriers to mental health treatment, a long history of discrimination in medicine makes it difficult for some people of color to form trusting relationships with medical providers. And that’s one reason why peer support has been gaining traction to help...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 8, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Valeria Chambers, EdM, CAS, CPS Tags: Anxiety and Depression Health Health care disparities Mental Health Relationships Source Type: blogs
What ’s new in the updated asthma guidelines?
In 2007, The Sopranos was a hit TV show, patterned jeggings were a fashion trend, and the National Institutes of Health–sponsored National Asthma Education and Prevention Program (NAEPP) published the second edition of the Asthma Management Guidelines.
A lot has changed since 2007, including in the area of asthma. The NAEPP recently published the third edition of the Asthma Management Guidelines to address these changes. This update reflects recent advances in our understanding of the disease mechanisms causing asthma, and the current best practices to manage asthma symptoms. As such, the updated guidelines are an import...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 7, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Kathleen Haley, MD Tags: Asthma Drugs and Supplements Source Type: blogs
Women, alcohol, and COVID-19
Excessive alcohol use is a common response to coping with stress. Alcohol use increased following the September 11th terrorist attacks and Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The COVID-19 pandemic is following this same path. However, this pandemic is different in its scope and duration. COVID-19 is associated with both negative health and economic impacts, as well as grief, loss, and prolonged stress and uncertainty.
The emotional impact of COVID-19 on women
According to the U.S. National Pandemic Emotional Impact Report, compared to men, women reported higher rates of pandemic-related changes in productivity, sleep, mood, healt...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 6, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Dawn Sugarman, PhD Tags: Addiction Alcohol Coronavirus and COVID-19 Women's Health Source Type: blogs
Do vitamin D, zinc, and other supplements help prevent COVID-19 or hasten healing?
In this study, people whose symptoms did not require hospital admission were randomly assigned to receive
only vitamin C, 8,000 mg/day (the recommended daily amount is 75 mg/day for women and 90 mg/day for men)
only zinc, 50 mg/day (the recommended daily amount is 8 mg/day for women, 11 mg/day for men)
both supplements at the doses above
neither supplement.
The researchers found that people receiving the supplements, whether individually or combined, had no improvement in symptoms or a faster recovery when compared with otherwise similar patients receiving neither supplement.
Proponents of melatonin for COVID-19 have enc...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 5, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Health Vitamins and supplements Source Type: blogs
An emerging treatment option for men with recurring prostate cancer after radiation therapy
Prostate cancer is often a multifocal disease, meaning that several tumors can be present in different parts of gland at the same time. Not all of these tumors are equally problematic, however. And it’s increasingly thought that the tumor with the most aggressive features — called the index lesion — dictates how a man’s cancer is likely to behave overall. That concept has given rise to a new treatment option. Called partial gland ablation (PGA), and also focal therapy, it entails treating only the index lesion and its surrounding tissues, instead of removing the prostate surgically or treating the whole gla...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 2, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Charlie Schmidt Tags: Health Living With Prostate Cancer Prostate Knowledge Treatments HPK Source Type: blogs
Want to improve your memory? Get a good night ’s sleep!
There are few things that are as beneficial for your memory as having a good night’s sleep. Let’s understand why.
If you’re tired, it’s hard to pay attention, and memory requires attention
To remember information, you need to pay attention to it. If you’re tired, you simply cannot pay attention as effectively as you would if you were well rested. That statement seems straightforward, but it brings up another question: why do you get tired?
You may feel tired and have trouble paying attention either because you’ve been awake too many hours and sleep pressure is building up, or — even if you’ve had a nap — ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 2, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Andrew E. Budson, MD Tags: Health Healthy Aging Sleep Source Type: blogs
Can fitness counter fatness?
In a recent study, researchers attempted to answer the very question posed in the title of this post. Before delving into the findings of this study and how it fits with what we already know about this topic, let’s define some key terms.
What do we mean by fitness and fatness?
Fitness, also referred to as cardiovascular fitness or cardiorespiratory fitness (CRF), is a measure of the performance of the heart, lungs, and muscles of the body. Muscle performance includes measures of both strength and endurance. Because of the connections between the mind and body, fitness also has an effect on mental alertness and emotional ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 1, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Chika Anekwe, MD, MPH Tags: Diet and Weight Loss Exercise and Fitness Source Type: blogs
