• Filter By:
• Specialty
• Source
• Condition
• Cancer
• Infectious Disease
• Drug
• Training
• Management
• Procedure
• Therapy
• Vaccine
• Nutrition
• Country

Reported link between diet drinks and dementia and stroke is weak
Conclusion The researchers used data from a large ongoing cohort study to look for links between consumption of sugary and artificially sweetened drinks and risk of stroke or dementia. This cohort study benefits from the large overall sample size, long period of data collection, careful and valid diagnostic assessments, and adjustments for a number of confounders. However, care must be taken when interpreting these results – particularly if latching on to the maximal tripled risk figures reported in the media. There are several points to consider: Small numbers The new number of strokes and dementia in this study was sma...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 21, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Food/diet Heart/lungs Neurology Source Type: news

Do diet soft drinks actually make you gain weight?
Conclusion This prospective study found that people who drank diet soft drinks every day experienced greater waist circumference gain over up to nine years of follow-up compared with those who never drank diet drinks (3.04cm gain versus 0.77cm). They also experienced a minimal gain in BMI (+0.05kg/m2) over follow-up, compared with a minimal loss in non-users of diet drinks (-0.41kg/m2). However, this study certainly does not prove that diet drinks, and diet drinks alone, are responsible for these small increases in waist circumference and BMI. People who drank diet drinks tended to have higher BMIs and waist circumferen...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 8, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Food/diet Obesity Source Type: news

Ten-point plan to tackle liver disease published
"Doctors call for tougher laws on alcohol abuse to tackle liver disease crisis," The Guardian reports. But this is just one of 10 recommendations for tackling the burden of liver disease published in a special report in The Lancet.The report paints a grim picture of an emerging crisis in liver disease in the UK, saying it is one of the few countries in Europe where liver disease and deaths have actually increased rapidly over the last 30 years. It concludes with 10 recommendations to tackle the burden of liver disease.The media has approached the recommendations from many different angles, with many sources only ...
Source: NHS News Feed - November 27, 2014 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Food/diet Lifestyle/exercise QA articles Source Type: news

PET scans may improve brain injury diagnosis
ConclusionThis is a valuable diagnostic study that tested how accurate PET and fMRI imaging are at distinguishing between different levels of conscious state and helping to predict recovery. Diagnostic assessments are traditionally made using bedside clinical tests – but as the researchers say, judging the level of awareness in people with severe brain damage can be difficult.In particular, the researchers wanted to see whether the scans could accurately distinguish between people with “unresponsive wakefulness syndrome” and “minimally conscious state”, as distinguishing between these two states can have impor...
Source: NHS News Feed - April 16, 2014 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Medical practice Neurology Source Type: news

Statins side effects are minimal, study argues
ConclusionThis meta-analysis pooled results from 29 studies and has shown a very small increased risk of newly diagnosed diabetes mellitus. This is the same as the decreased risk of any cause of death in people taking statins, compared to placebo, to prevent a heart attack or stroke.The researchers point out some limitations to the meta-analysis: Each study did not report on all of the side effects, meaning that for each category of side effect, the number of participants differed. The side effect categories were only included if at least 500 people had reported suffering from it. This means there may be numerous other si...
Source: NHS News Feed - March 13, 2014 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Medication Source Type: news