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Total 273 results found since Jan 2013.

High salt levels in soluble drugs may raise heart risk
Conclusion This large case control study suggested that people who had experienced disease of the heart and blood vessels were more likely to have taken sodium-containing medicines than people without cardiovascular disease. Put in other words this can be interpreted that people who took sodium-containing medicines were at a higher risk of experiencing cardiovascular disease than people who took the same medications in formulations free of sodium. The increased risk appeared to be driven mostly by an increased risk of hypertension and to a lesser extent, non-fatal stroke. The study has some strengths including its large s...
Source: NHS News Feed - November 27, 2013 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Medication Medical practice Source Type: news

Could testing grip strength predict heart disease risk?
Conclusion These are interesting results from a range of very different countries, showing that people with low muscle strength may be at higher risk of dying prematurely than other people. Earlier studies in high-income countries had already suggested that this was the case, but this is the first study to show it holds true across countries from high to low incomes. The study also shows that Europeans, and men from high-income countries, on average, have higher grip strength than people from lower-income countries. Interestingly, women from middle-income regions, such as China and Latin America, had slightly higher muscl...
Source: NHS News Feed - May 14, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Medical practice Source Type: news

Med diet best for heart disease (but some junk food won’t hurt)
Conclusion This study showed 3% fewer people with CHD, at high risk of major cardiovascular events, who reported eating the healthiest Mediterranean-style diets, had either died, or had a non-fatal heart attack or stroke over a three-year period than those with less healthy diets. Western diet scores were not related to major cardiovascular events. The study was large, worldwide and its methods quite robust, all boosting the believability of the findings. It is possible that unmeasured factors explain all or part of the findings, but the study made a concerted attempt to minimise the chance of this through adjusting for i...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 25, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Food/diet Source Type: news

'Not enough over-50s' taking aspirin to prevent heart disease
Conclusion This study doesn't really tell us anything we didn't already know. Aspirin has been used for many years to prevent heart attacks and strokes in people with cardiovascular disease. Aspirin's wider use is controversial, because of the potential side effects. What this study does add is an estimate of what might happen if all people in the US who were advised to take aspirin under US guidelines, actually did so. (The researchers say that 40% of men and 10% of women advised to take aspirin don't take it). The study assumes that people would get the same benefits as those seen in clinical trials of aspirin. This is u...
Source: NHS News Feed - December 1, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Medication Older people Source Type: news

Five-a-day of fruit and veg is good, but '10 is better'
Conclusion This research supports the idea that the more fruit and veg you eat the better – at least, up to 10 portions (800g) a day. It also suggests the number of people who die early might be reduced if they were to eat more than the current recommended guideline daily amount. However, before we take this at face value, there are some important considerations: There are likely to be many confounding factors that may have affected the results. It might be that people who eat a lot of fruit and veg are also more likely to be physically active, consume less alcohol, not smoke and be a healthy weight, or other facto...
Source: NHS News Feed - February 23, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Food/diet Heart/lungs Cancer Medical practice Source Type: news

Moderate drinking may reduce heart disease risk
Conclusion This study paints a more complicated picture than the "Pint a day keeps the doctor away" story proffered by The Sun. It seems to confirm the findings of other studies, which have shown that non-drinkers tend to have a higher risk of cardiovascular diseases than people who drink moderately. It suggests that some cardiovascular diseases (mainly those directly affecting the heart) seem to have a stronger link to a possible protective effect from alcohol than other vascular diseases, such as mini-strokes and bleeding in the brain. However, this can't be concluded with certainty due to the study design. We ...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 23, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Food/diet Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news

Statin use linked to small increase in cataracts risk
Conclusion This research using a large cohort of people from a military healthcare system finds that overall, use of statins for over 90 days was associated with a slight increase in a person’s risk of developing cataracts. Further analyses suggested that the risk was higher among people who did not have any additional diseases. From this the researchers suggest that risk may be higher when statins are given for what is called primary prevention, i.e. given to people with risk factors for cardiovascular disease but who have not yet suffered any cardiovascular disease events such as a heart attack or stroke. The study h...
Source: NHS News Feed - September 20, 2013 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Medication Older people Heart/lungs Source Type: news

Angry outbursts may up heart attack risk
ConclusionThis systematic review found there is an increased risk of cardiovascular events, including heart attack and disturbances in heart rhythm, shortly after outbursts of anger.This is based on results from nine case-crossover studies. In these, information on feelings of anger in the period before the cardiovascular event, as well as an earlier period, were collected retrospectively. The risk of having a cardiovascular event after an episode of anger was then calculated. The researchers point out several limitations to their review, including the fact that: participants were asked to remember angry outbursts hours o...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 4, 2014 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Neurology Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news

Does a wife's illness lead to divorce?
Conclusion This US cohort study of older married couples (over the age of 50) finds links between the onset of serious illness in the wife and subsequent divorce, but the same link wasn't found with illness in the husband. Meanwhile, serious illness in either spouse was, rather unsurprisingly, associated with a higher risk of widowhood in a subsequent assessment. This study has the strength of using a large, nationally representative dataset. However, it cannot prove direct causative links, and does not prove that wives are more likely to stick with their spouse during serious physical illness than husbands. Though the st...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 6, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Mental health Source Type: news

Claims that 'butter is safe' and 'margarine deadly' are simplistic
ConclusionThis careful systematic review and meta-analysis of research into the effects of saturated and trans fat on health found no evidence that eating more saturated fat raises the risk of death from any cause, death from cardiovascular disease, or risk of getting heart disease, stroke, or type 2 diabetes. However, the authors say they can only have "very low" confidence in their findings, because of the methodological limitations of the individual studies that contributed data.The study did find a link between eating more trans fats and death from any cause, from heart disease or risk of getting heart diseas...
Source: NHS News Feed - August 12, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Food/diet Source Type: news

Statins are 'safe, effective and should be used more widely'
Conclusion This study reviews evidence from randomised controlled trials (RCTs) and observational studies to better evaluate the effects and safety of statin therapy. It provides valuable data on the size of the benefits compared with the risks, informing a topic that has had much media coverage in recent times. The researchers highlight that the benefits of statin therapy for people at risk of cardiovascular disease events far outweigh any possible side effects. But it is still for a doctor and their patient to come to a conclusion about what the best treatment for them may be. If you have been prescribed a statin, it...
Source: NHS News Feed - September 9, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: QA articles Medication Heart/lungs Source Type: news

Long working week 'may increase risk of irregular heartbeat'
Conclusion This study draws together data from a large group of people to investigate whether working hours could be linked to AF. It found people who work 55 or more hours a week had an increased risk of developing an irregular heartbeat. But before we jump to any conclusions, there are several important things to consider: The number of people who developed AF during this study was small: only 1.24%. That's the absolute risk of AF. Even if working more than 55 hours a week does increase your risk of AF by around 40%, it would only be increasing it to something like 1.74% – which is still very small. Only a small ...
Source: NHS News Feed - July 14, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news

One in 10 men aged 50 'have the heart of a 60-year-old'
"One-tenth of 50-year-old men have a heart age 10 years older than they are," BBC News reports. This is the finding of an analysis of 1.2 million people who used the NHS Heart Age Test. The principle behind the test is that you can "age" your heart through unhealthy behaviour such as smoking and being obese. Underlying conditions like high blood pressure and high cholesterol, which often have no noticeable symptoms, can also age the heart. An obese smoker in their 50s who has high blood pressure and high cholesterol could have the heart of a 60- or 70-year-old. The quick and simple test tells you the...
Source: NHS News Feed - September 4, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Source Type: news

Any type of physical exercise is good for the heart
Conclusion This study shows that all physical activity, in any form, is good for us. This includes both recreational and non-recreational activities. Don't be misled by some of the media: non-recreational activities like housework are not "better" than recreational activities like playing sports or going to the gym. The fact that reduced risk was seen with non-recreational activity across all countries, but only seen with recreational activity in high-income countries was probably just because fewer people in lower-income countries play sports or go to the gym. The researchers estimate that 8% of all deaths and...
Source: NHS News Feed - September 22, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news