?Alert status? area in brain discoved by Hebrew University scientists

A new understanding of how anesthesia and anesthesia-like states are controlled in the brain opens the door to possible new future treatments of various states of loss of consciousness, such as reversible coma, according to Hebrew University of Jerusalem scientists. In an article published in the Journal of Neuroscience, the scientists, Marshall Devor, the Cecile and Seymour Alpert Professor of Pain Research, graduate student Ruth Abulafia and research associate Dr. Vladimir Zalkind describe their discovery of an area of the brain that participates in the control of ?alert status.? Loss of response to painful stimuli and loss of consciousness are the most striking characteristics of surgical anesthesia and anesthesia-like states, such as concussion, reversible coma, and syncope (fainting). These states also exhibit behavioral suppression, loss of muscle tone, a shift to the sleep-like ?delta-wave? EEG pattern, and depressed brain metabolism.  More »


Children with emotional difficulties at higher risk for adult obesity

Previous research has shown that low self-esteem and emotional problems are found in people who are overweight or obese? but not which influences which. Research published today in the open access journal BMC Medicine, sheds light on this issue showing that children with emotional difficulties are at higher risk for obesity in adult life. Andrew Ternouth, David Collier and Barbara Maughan from the MRC Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Centre at the Institute of Psychiatry, King?s College London, studied data from around 6,500 members of the 1970 British Birth Cohort Study who, as 10 year-olds, had been assessed for emotional problems, self-perceptions and BMI, and who reported on their BMI again at age 30. The researchers found that children with a lower self-esteem, those who felt less in control of their lives and those who worried often were more likely to gain weight over the next 20 years. They also found that girls were slightly more affected by these factors than boys. Ternouth said: ?While we cannot say that childhood emotional problems cause obesity in later life, we can certainly say they play a role, along with factors such as parental BMI, diet and exercise? More »


Multiple factors impact adolescent smoking risk

There is no one-size-fits-all explanation for why teenagers take up smoking, hint findings of a Canadian study. Therefore, focusing on one single risk factor is not likely to help adolescents resist peer pressure to smoke, or help advance the understanding of why young people smoke, Dr. Jennifer O?Loughlin and colleagues report in the American Journal of Epidemiology. O?Loughlin, at the University of Montreal in Quebec, therefore suggests that efforts to prevent smoking should take into account ?individual-level factors such as age, self-esteem, alcohol use, and academic success.? Those involved should also bear in mind ?contextual factors such as smoking in parents and friends, and school smoking policies,? she told Reuters Health in email correspondence. More »


Mayo Clinic identifies 2 genes as potential therapeutic targets for multiple sclerosis

A Mayo Clinic study has found that two genes in mice were associated with good central nervous system repair in multiple sclerosis (MS). These findings give researchers new hope for developing more effective therapies for patients with MS and for predicting MS patients? outcomes. This study will be presented at the Congress of the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis in Dusseldorf, Germany, on Sept. 11, 2009. ?Most MS genetic studies have looked at disease susceptibility?or why some people get MS and others do not,? says Allan Bieber, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic neuroscientist and author of this study. ?This study asked, among those who have MS, why do some do well with the disease while others do poorly, and what might be the genetic determinants of this difference in outcome.? Mayo Clinic provides care for nearly 2,500 patients with MS each year. MS is a disease of the central nervous system that includes the brain, spinal cord and nerves. MS is called a demyelinating disease because it results from damage to myelin, the insulating covering of nerves. It occurs most commonly in those between the ages of 20 and 40, and is the most frequent neurological disorder in young adults in North America and Europe. Approximately 330,000 people in the United States have MS. Symptoms include loss of muscle coordination, strength, vision, balance and cognition.  More »


















Check obesity using waist, hips, not BMI

Do you like to blame your weight on being ?big-boned?? If you?ve ever thought that the body mass index (BMI) - a ratio of weight to height often used as a yardstick of obesity - doesn?t tell the true story of your relative weight and health, you may be onto something if you?re elderly, UCLA researchers say. A fundamental question is ?whether or not BMI is the appropriate measure of obesity in older adults,? Dr. Preethi Srikanthan and colleagues at David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Los Angeles, California write in the Annals of Epidemiology. In these individuals, the authors write, ?changes in body size and composition that commonly occur with aging may limit the usefulness of BMI? for determining how much fat a person is carrying around - and also their risk of death in a given period. More »