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

Elderly living near noisy roads have 'increased stroke risk'
ConclusionThis modelling study has examined the associations of exposure to traffic noise, independent of air pollution, on all-cause and cardiovascular mortality, as well as on cardiovascular hospital admissions in adult and elderly populations.It has shown a link between increased noise from traffic pollution and risk of hospital admission for stroke and death. Possible reasons for deaths were most likely to be linked to heart or blood vessel disease, which could be due to increased blood pressure, sleep problems and stress from the noise.The limitations of this study are that the exposure model used is likely to overest...
Source: NHS News Feed - June 24, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Heart/lungs Neurology Older people Source Type: news

UK heart disease and stroke death rates now lower than cancer
Conclusion This valuable research informs on the burden of cardiovascular disease and associated mortality across European countries. It demonstrates that CVD is still the most common cause of death across Europe, but rates have been falling over the past 10 years. This fall means that in several European countries, including the UK, cancer rates now overtake CVD death rates in men. Generally, CVD disability and burden of disease seems to be greater in Eastern European countries. The WHO mortality data and population data are quite up-to-date and should be reliable, though as the researchers say, there was a lack of high ...
Source: NHS News Feed - August 15, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Cancer Neurology 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

Smoking bans linked to fewer heart attacks and strokes
ConclusionThere is no doubt that tobacco smoking harms health and causes a great deal of disease and death. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that tobacco is responsible for one in 10 adult deaths worldwide.The question is whether smoking bans can help reduce the harm caused by tobacco. This summary of research suggests they can, particularly for people who are non-smokers. While it's hard to get good-quality evidence about the effects of smoking bans, comparisons of data from hospitals and national registries before and after a ban is helpful. However, we can't be sure the effects being measured are solely dow...
Source: NHS News Feed - February 4, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news

Long-term daily drinking linked to stiffening of the arteries in men
Conclusion This prospective cohort study aimed to look at the relationship between long-term alcohol patterns and stiffness of the arteries as a potential indicator of cardiovascular health. The researchers found men who were stable heavy drinkers had stiffer arteries compared with stable moderate drinkers. Male former drinkers also had increasingly stiffer arteries over the following four to five years compared with consistent moderate drinkers. There were no significant findings seen for women at all. But this study does have limitations: This type of study is not able to prove drinking causes stiffness of the arter...
Source: NHS News Feed - February 21, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Food/diet Source Type: news

Are weekly workouts as good as daily exercise?
Conclusion This study used a large quantity of data from more than 2,000 participants of the Canadian Health Measures Survey to try to gauge how often adults should perform 150 minutes of exercise a week, as recommended by most guidelines. The main finding was that those who met this total physical activity requirement were less likely to have metabolic syndrome than those who were less active, which is not particularly surprising. Lack of exercise is associated with many of the risk factors for metabolic syndrome, such as obesity. Importantly, however, the frequency of time that MVPA was conducted over – whether this w...
Source: NHS News Feed - June 24, 2013 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news

UK women's life expectancy 'second worst' in Western Europe
"British women have second worst life expectancy in Europe," The Guardian reports. This is one of the findings of a Europe-wide health report carried out by the World Health Organization (WHO). The report also warned that European levels of alcohol consumption, smoking and obesity are alarmingly high, which could result in the following possibility: "Young Europeans may die at an earlier age than their grandparents". In the interests of accuracy, we should point out that the claim British women have the second worst life expectancy in Europe is incorrect. This figure is based on an analysis of countrie...
Source: NHS News Feed - September 23, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Cancer Heart/lungs Food/diet QA articles Source Type: news

Sugary drinks linked to increased heart failure risk in men
Conclusion This observational study found an association between the consumption of sweetened drinks and risk of heart failure. The study has some strengths, such as the large population size and long follow-up period. However, it has several limitations, which are acknowledged by the researchers. These include the following: The study included middle-aged and elderly men, so the results cannot be generalised to all age groups and genders. The men were all from Sweden, where there is a different typical diet to that of the UK. Researchers collected data on the daily and weekly intake of sweetened drinks in the pa...
Source: NHS News Feed - November 4, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Food/diet Source Type: news

Exercise benefits you - even in polluted city air
Conclusion This modelling study aimed to assess exposure to air pollution through physical activity and the associated health risks around the world. The study found the background pollution level required to reach the tipping point is only present in less than 1% of cities, according to the WHO. In an average city physical exercise will remain beneficial up to seven hours a day for cycling or 16 hours for walking. In highly polluted areas this became as low as 30 minutes a day for cycling and 90 minutes of walking. The main limitation of this study is that it is only a model and we do not know how true to life the findi...
Source: NHS News Feed - May 6, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Heart/lungs Lifestyle/exercise Source Type: news

HRT increases ovarian cancer risk by small amount
Conclusion This systematic review and meta-analysis showed that ovarian cancer risk was significantly increased in current HRT users, even in those with less than five years of HRT use (the average was three years). In ex-users, risks decreased the longer ago HRT use had stopped, but risks during the first few years after stopping remained significant. Furthermore, about a decade after stopping, long-duration hormone therapy use (average nine years of HRT use), there still seemed to be a small excess risk. The review has a few limitations, however. The main one is that the review was heavily influenced by just two of t...
Source: NHS News Feed - February 13, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Cancer Medication Older people Source Type: news

Are broken bones, loneliness and poor sleep really hidden killers?
Conclusion As the researchers say, the WHO definition of health encompasses physical, mental and social wellbeing – not just the presence or absence of disease. But how often are these extra dimensions taken into account when assessing a person's health status? In this sample of older adults, just looking at their disease status puts the majority of them into an apparently "robust" health group. Yet when you consider the additional dimensions of psychological health and wellbeing, you seem to get a much better indication of those who were at higher or lower risk of dying or being incapacitated in the coming...
Source: NHS News Feed - May 18, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Lifestyle/exercise Medical practice Source Type: news

Obesity 'now a leading cause of death; especially in men'
Conclusion The effect of being overweight or obese on length of life has been discussed a lot in recent years, mainly because of studies which seemed to show people might live longer if they have a BMI in the overweight range, and that even moderate obesity did not raise the risk of death. However, this study suggests the previous findings were due to confounding factors – such as smoking and pre-existing diseases – which masked the link between BMI and length of life. The overall conclusion is that weight does matter, especially for men and younger people, who seem most affected by the link between BMI and early deat...
Source: NHS News Feed - July 14, 2016 Category: Consumer Health News Tags: Obesity Lifestyle/exercise Food/diet Source Type: news