Smoking can do more than make your teeth yellow. A study indicates smoking can make teeth go away. Researcher Xiaodan Mai of the University at Buffalo in New York found this in data on about 1,100 postmenopausal women. She compared periodontal disease or gum disease with caries or tooth decay as reasons for tooth loss.

Smoking is an important risk factor for tooth loss in older women.  “The more women smoked, the more likely they are to experience tooth loss due to periodontal disease. This pattern was not seen in tooth loss due to caries.”

Mai says tobacco has chemicals that are bad for periodontal health, and also fosters bacteria that are bad.

The study in the Journal of the American Dental Association was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

To learn more about the side effects of smoking, visit:  http://betobaccofree.hhs.gov/health-effects/smoking-health/index.html

Source:  HHS HealthBeat, May 20, 2013

 

The density of bones, measured as bone mineral density (BMD), is strongly related to osteoporosis.  Elderly women with osteoporosis, in particular, are at increased risk of fractures of the hip, arm, and spine; such fractures often relate to severe disability.  With data on alcohol collected as part of a clinical trial on the prevention of osteoporosis, investigators in Finland have related alcohol consumption to changes over three years in BMD.  After those excluded due to incomplete data, data on 300 women were available for analysis.  The majority of women were abstainers or consumed little alcohol.  Nevertheless, the results support much earlier research: regular, moderate drinking is associated with higher levels of BMD (i.e., lower risk of osteoporotic fractures) than is abstinence.

Data from European surveys have shown that women in Finland tend to have high levels of osteoporosis and to drink very little; hence the increase in BMD associated with alcohol intake, even though slight, could be important in this population.  Over the past three decades, there has been an increase in alcohol consumption in Finland, especially a marked increase in the consumption of wine.  Hence, some Forum reviewers thought that the improvement in BMD among drinkers in this study may have been primarily from wine (which may have additional components, other than alcohol, that relate to BMD).  However, the number of subjects was not large enough to test this hypothesis in the present study.  Overall, this study supports the premise that moderate alcohol intake, along with an adequate calcium intake and vitamin D and exercise, may have a favorable influence on the risk of developing osteoporosis

Forum reviewers, as did the authors, noted a number of limitations of the study: a rather small cohort with a very low intake of alcohol, a short duration of follow up, and rather small differences according to whether the women consumed alcohol or not.

Reference:  Sommer I, Erkkilä AT, Järvinen R, Mursu J, Sirola J, Jurvelin JS, Kröger H, Tuppurainen M.  Alcohol consumption and bone mineral density in elderly women.  Public Health Nutr 2013;16:704-712.  doi: 10.1017/S136898001200331X.

Your feet are pretty small, considering they have to support the entire height and weight of your body. But they can cause big problems. So pay some attention to your feet especially with summer coming and you want to wear those cute sandals!

“Feet don’t get any respect,” says Dr. Marian T. Hannan, who studies foot disorders at the Institute for Aging Research at Hebrew SeniorLife. “They’re sort of the Rodney Dangerfield of the human body.”

Each step you take involves a remarkably intricate network of bones, muscles, tendons and ligaments. That complexity—combined with all the weight they carry—accounts for why feet can be so prone to problems, including bone fractures, arthritis and plantar fasciitis, a swelling of the thick band of tissue that runs along the bottom of the foot.

If left untreated, foot problems may worsen. Eventually, the pain could interfere with your ability to do even the most basic things like walking up stairs or down the street. If pain alters the way you walk, it can lead to pain in your knees, hips and back as well. These problems can multiply, limiting your activity and affecting your quality of life.

Several things can contribute to foot pain or numbness.

• Sports and physical activity can cause your feet to hurt or become numb.
• Going too far, too fast or not warming up properly before exercise can set you up for painful or numbing injuries.
• Excess weight puts extra stress on your feet. Poorly fitting shoes and other footwear are common causes of foot problems as well.

Health problems can also affect the feet. Lack of feeling in your feet could be a sign of a serious illness, such as diabetes or a nerve disorder. See your health care provider if you have unusual numbness in your feet or foot pain that is severe, comes on suddenly, or doesn’t improve with simple measures such as rest or over-the-counter pain medications.

“The good news is that most foot disorders are either treatable or modifiable,” Hannan says. “The first thing that you can do is notice and keep track of it to see if there’s a pattern to it.” Once you figure out when you feel pain or numbness, she explains, talk to an expert who can help.

How you walk and move affects your feet. Part of that is inherited. “Not only do our feet look like our parents’ but we also walk like our parents,” Hannan says. But you can modify your gait—either with training or by changing shoes or using shoe inserts or pads.

You can help keep your feet healthy by wearing comfortable, well-fitting shoes. Wash your feet regularly (especially between your toes), wear clean socks and try to rotate your shoes to give them time to air out.

“The more you exercise your feet, the better the blood flow is to the feet, and that’s important for general foot health,” Hannan says.

Walking is a great way to exercise your feet. You can also try specific foot exercises. Sit down and rotate your ankles in one direction, then the other. In bare feet, sit in a chair and curl your toes, then spread them out. This helps stretch and strengthen your feet to help you balance.

Seeing what someone’s foot looks like is incredibly informative, Hannan says. “I think we’re going to be seeing a lot more health care providers paying attention to the feet,” she predicts.

Women who take valproate (Depacon) during pregnancy may increase the risk of childhood autism and its spectrum disorders in their children, a population-based study showed.

In utero exposure to the drug was associated with a five-fold elevated risk of autism and three-fold elevated risk for autism spectrum disorder, Jakob Christensen, PhD, of Denmark’s Aarhus University Hospital, and colleagues found.

The absolute risks were 2.5% and 4.4%, respectively, and remained significantly elevated after adjustment for parents’ epilepsy and psychiatric disease, the group reported in the April 24 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

“For women of childbearing potential who use anti-epileptic medications, these findings must be balanced against the treatment benefits for women who require valproate for epilepsy control,” they concluded.  But “because autism spectrum disorders are serious conditions with lifelong implications for affected children and their families, even a moderate increase in risk may have major health importance,” they added.

The American Academy of Neurology recommends avoiding valproate in pregnancy whenever possible due to cognitive and physical birth defect problems for children exposed in utero.

The additional risk of autism and spectrum disorders needs to be included in counseling for women now too, Kimford Meador, MD, and David Loring, PhD, both of Emory University in Atlanta, recommended in an accompanying editorial.

“Because approximately half of the pregnancies in the U.S. are unplanned, delaying discussions of treatment risks until a pregnancy is considered will leave a substantial number of children at unnecessary risk,” they warned. “Women of childbearing potential should be informed of the potential risks of fetal valproate exposure before valproate is prescribed.”

The drug has an indication for manic and mixed episodes in bipolar disorder and for migraine prevention in addition to seizure control.

Primary source: Journal of the American Medical Association

Source reference:
Christensen J, et al “Prenatal valproate exposure and risk of autism spectrum disorders and childhood autism” JAMA 2013; 309: 1696-1703.

Additional source: Journal of the American Medical Association
Source reference:
Meador KJ, Loring DW “Risks of in utero exposure to valproate” JAMA 2013; 309: 1730-1731.

 

The most recent Physician Compensation Report 2013 published by Medscape continues to show that female physicians earn less than their male counterparts. The following graph shows the gap:

To learn more about the report click HERE.

When the mind is at rest, the electrical signals by which brain cells communicate appear to travel in reverse, wiping out unimportant information in the process, but sensitizing the cells for future sensory learning, according to a study of rats conducted by researchers at the National Institutes of Health.

The finding has implications not only for studies seeking to help people learn more efficiently, but also for attempts to understand and treat post-traumatic stress disorder — in which the mind has difficulty moving beyond a disturbing experience.

During waking hours, brain cells, or neurons, communicate via high-speed electrical signals that travel the length of the cell. These communications are the foundation for learning. As learning progresses, these signals travel across groups of neurons with increasing rapidity, forming circuits that work together to recall a memory.

During waking hours, electrical signals travel from dendrites — antenna-like projections at one end of the cell — through the cell body releasing chemicals at the other end, stimulating adjacent cells.. When groups of cells repeatedly fire in this way, the electrical signals increase in intensity.  Dr. Olena Bukalo and her team examined electrical signals that traveled in reverse from the cell’s axon, to the cell body, and out its many dendrites. The reverse firing, happens during sleep and at rest, appearing to reset the cell and priming it to learn new information.

It was previously known that, during sleep, these impulses were reversed. In the current study, the researchers found that these reverse signals weakened circuits formed during waking hours, apparently so that unimportant information could be erased from the brain. But the reverse signals also appeared to prime the brain to relearn at least some of the forgotten information. If the animals encountered the same information upon awakening, the circuits re-formed much more rapidly than when they originally encountered the information.

“The brain doesn’t store all the information it encounters, so there must be a mechanism for discarding what isn’t important,” said senior author R. Douglas Fields, Ph.D., head of the Section on Nervous System Development and Plasticity at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), the NIH institute where the research was conducted. “These reverse brain signals appear to be the mechanism by which the brain clears itself of unimportant information.”

Their findings appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers studied the activity of rats’ brain cells from the hippocampus, a tube-like structure deep in the brain. The hippocampus relays information to and from many other regions of the brain. It plays an important role in memory, orientation, and navigation.

A graphic illustration of a reverse firing neuron is available at: http://www.nichd.nih.gov/news/releases/Pages/031413-neurons-image.aspx.

Source:  NIH

 

Women who smoke have weaker bones than women who don’t. And a study indicates that’s also the case for teenage girls, who may be setting themselves up for weaker bones as they get old according to research Larah Dorn of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital where she followed this data on 262 health girls..

The researchers say girls who entered adolescence had about the same bone density whether or not they smoked, but the girls who smoked more had gained less bone at the end of adolescence.  Dorn says that’s especially important because the teen years are crucial for building bone for adulthood:

“You’re really laying what we think is an important foundation for bone health across the lifespan of a woman.”

The study in the Journal of Adolescent Health was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Learn more at healthfinder.gov.

 

Nearly 1 in 5 teen births are repeat births, about 183 a day.  Many repeat births could be prevented through postpartum use of long-acting reversible contraception (LARC) such as IUDs and implants. Counseling women during prenatal visits about postpartum contraception, and offering women LARC in the hospital after delivery makes it easier for women to avoid unintended pregnancy.

South Carolina’s Medicaid*  [PDF - 27KB] program reimburses for LARC insertion in the hospital before women who have just given birth leave the hospital.

President Barack Obama talks with Evan Jackson, 10, Alec Jackson, 8, and Caleb Robinson, 8, from McDonough, Ga., while looking at exhibits at the White House Science Fair in the State Dining Room, April 22, 2013. The sports-loving grade-schoolers created a new product concept to keep athletes cool and helps players maintain safe body temperatures on the field. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2013/04/22/young-scientists-and-innovators-amaze-president-obama-white-house-science-fair

On Monday, April 22, the Obama administration demonstrated its continued commitment to fostering the next generation of leaders in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) by hosting the third annual White House Science Fair.  100 students from 40 states showcased their projects in the White House’s public rooms and East Garden to business leaders, celebrities, and, of course, Mr. Obama himself.  Projects on display included a bicycle-powered emergency water sanitation system, a cloud computer program that improves cancer detection, and a fully functional prosthetic arm that cost only $250 to build.

President Obama used the occasion to announce his ‘all hands on deck’ plan to create and expand federal and private-sector initiatives designed to encourage children to study STEM.  The plan places particular focus on the inclusion of women and minority students, and those who are from low-income and military families.  According to Obama, “This is the time to reach a level of research and development that we haven’t seen since the height of the space race.”

In his 2014 budget request, the president asks that $180 million be designated to STEM programs that increase the participation of students (kindergarten through graduate school) from groups that are traditionally underrepresented in these fields. He also requests another $265 million to create a corps of master teachers and support educational entities and businesses focusing on STEM education.  85 million of this money would be put toward the administration’s goal of adding 100,000 math and science teachers over the next 10 years.

Such a strong administrative emphasis on increasing the participation of unrepresented minorities and women in STEM fields is music to the ears of the Women’s Health Research Institute, as our own Women’s Health Science Program (WHSP) strives to do this very thing.  In 2007, Dr. Teresa Woodruff created WHSP to provide science education programs to females from underserved communities in Chicago. WHSP targets young women who are considering careers in science and medicine and prepares them with valuable knowledge and skills to successfully become the next generation of women science leaders. Since 2007, over 150 high school girls from across the Chicago area have participated in one of the WHSP academies.

This summer, WHSP will run two academies: the Infectious Disease Summer Academy (July 8-12) and the Oncofertility Saturday Academy (July 22-26).  Both are open to 10-12th grade female students attending Chicago Public Schools and are designed to encourage and inspire the girls’ interest in science and medicine by involving them in hands-on laboratory and clinical activities and pairing them with graduate and medical student mentors.  Tuition for both programs is free, but there are a limited number of spots and students must apply online and, if asked, attend an interview with program directors.  For more information about WHSP and how to apply to the upcoming academies, click here to visit our website.

 A disturbing trend in many cases of domestic abuse, sexual assault, and rape against women is the tendency to blame the victim of the crime, rather than the perpetrator. Over the past several months, there have been a number of high profile cases of violence against women that highlight the victim-blaming culture we live in.This was seen in the aftermath of the recent Steubenville, Ohio trial in which two male high school football players were found guilty of raping a sixteen-year-old girl who was unable to consent to sexual activity after drinking alcohol at a party. Many individuals, both male and female, reacted to the trial and the guilty verdicts by harshly blaming the young woman for being raped, and declared the men’s innocence, despite the evidence against them. There has also been strong backlash against CNN’s reporting of the verdict, and its emphasis on the impact on the lives of the two men found guilty, rather than the victim. Reporter Poppy Harlow stated “These two young men that had such promising futures … literally watched as they believed their life fell apart,” and Candy Crowley reported “What’s the lasting effect though on two young men being found guilty in juvenile court of rape essentially?” She failed to discuss what the lasting effect on the young woman who was raped might be (Shapiro).

Similar incidences can be seen throughout the world. In mid-March, a Swiss woman was gang raped by a group of men while camping overnight in India with her husband. The men robbed the couple, tied up and beat the man, and gang raped the woman. During the course of the investigation, local police claimed that the tourists were at least partially to blame, as they failed to tell the police where they were staying (Sieczkowski). While these are just a couple of cases that made headlines, women are victims of sexual and domestic violence every day, usually without any media attention.

Within this culture of victim blaming, women are told to change their own behavior in order to avoid being assaulted or raped. Women are told repeatedly to dress less provocatively, drink less alcohol, and not put themselves in risky situations. This proliferates the belief that women are at fault when they are attacked, and leads to a lack of accountability for men. Recently though, there has been a push to increase rape and assault prevention education for men. Zerlina Maxwell, a rape survivor who appeared on the Fox News show “Hannity” to discuss this issue, advocates rape prevention education for young boys and men, stating that “we need to teach them about consent and to hold themselves accountable.” This is significant because despite the common perception that rapists are usually violent strangers, women are often raped by men they trust and consider friends (Williams). This strategy was used in a 2011 Canadian ad campaign called “Don’t be that guy.”  One poster consisted of an image of a woman appeared to be passed out, surrounded by alcohol, along with a quote stating “Just because she isn’t saying no doesn’t mean she is saying yes.” After the launch of this campaign, rates of sexual assault in Vancouver dropped for the first time in years, by a rate of 10% (Matas).

While it’s important that women continue to be empowered and educated on how to prevent rape, this education needs to be extended to men as well. Men and women need to work together to change the culture of victim blaming, and help reduce violence against women.

For more information or help, visit the Violence Against Women page on womenshealth.gov.

 

Dove does it again. In a recently released short film, Real Beauty Sketches, Dove conducted a social experiment involving seven women, several strangers and Gil Zamora, an FBI-trained forensic artist. Each woman was asked to enter a room and answer questions about her appearance to Zamora (a curtain separated the two), while he produced a sketch based on her answers. Afterward, he produced a second sketch with the aid of a stranger who’d spent a few minutes with the woman.

The results were dramatic. Sketches based on the women’s own descriptions show them with wrinkles, shaggy eyebrows, puffy cheeks and dark eye circles. Sketches based on the stranger’s descriptions, however, were much more flattering – and much more accurate.

Renee Engeln, senior psychology lecturer and founder of the Body and Media lab at Northwestern University, commented: “Many women see their bodies as a compilation of unacceptable features – thighs that are too big, arms that jiggle, cheekbones that aren’t high enough, lips that are too thin… They’re sensitive to every minor deviation from the ideal and can’t see anything but those ‘flaws’ when they look in the mirror.  But this type of intense scrutiny doesn’t capture the way other people see us.”

Further evidence that perhaps most of us are our own worst critics.

Read the full story on Today Health.

View the full Real Beauty Sketches ad on the Dove website.

Dating in middle school may be not so much fun in the long run.  A study indicates kids who date in middle school have worse study skills, more substance abuse and more likelihood to drop out of high school than kids who don’t date. Researcher Pamela Orpinas of the University of Georgia saw that in seven years of data on 624 northeast Georgia students, starting in sixth grade.

Orpinas advises parents to keep their lines of communication open to kids:“Tell your children that dating is not a rite of passage. Many kids do not date in middle school. They can wait. Wait a little bit; wait until high school.”

The study in the Journal of Research on Adolescence was supported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Population-wide weight loss during an economic crisis in Cuba in the ’90s led to declines in death from diabetes and heart disease, which rebounded once the country got back on its feet, researchers found.   During the crisis, which occurred between 1991 and 1995, shortages in food and gas meant people ate less and walked or biked more, Manuel Franco, MD, of the University of Alcala in Madrid, and colleagues noted online in BMJ.

Cubans lost 9 to 11 pounds (4 to 5 kg) on average during that period, and diabetes mortality stabilized; it then fell 50% during a slow recovery period between 1996 and 2002, but rose again by 49% from 2002 onward, they reported.   Heart disease mortality dropped by 34% during the recovery period, but the rate of decline slowed after 2002, the researchers found.

Cuba maintained a  public health surveillance through its economic crisis, according to Walter Willett, MD, DrPH, of the Harvard School of Public Health, who wrote an accompanying editorial.

The economy has since recovered, largely after the year 2000, and now the prevalence of obesity in that nation has exceeded pre-crisis levels, the researchers said.

About 5 years into the crisis — around 1996 — the researchers found an “abrupt downward trend” in mortality from diabetes, coronary heart disease, stroke, and all causes.

“This period lasted an additional six years, during which energy intake status gradually recovered and physical activity levels were progressively reduced,” they wrote. “In 2002, mortality rates returned to the pre-crisis pattern.”

Primary source: BMJ
Source reference:
Franco M, et al “Population-wide weight loss and regain in relation to diabetes burden and cardiovascular mortality in Cuba 1980-2010″ BMJ 2013; DOI: 10.1136/bmj.f1515.

Additional source: BMJ
Source reference:
Willett WC “Weight changes and health in Cuba: learning from hardship” BMJ 2013; DOI: 10.1136/bmj.f1777.

 

A new European study finds that children and teens suffering from migraine headaches were far more likely to have been colicky babies.  Dr. Phyllis Zee, a member of the Women’s Health Science Institute’s leadership council, commented on this study: “the suggestion is that the colic may be an early form of migraine and that it could very well be head pain or stomach pain or it could be both.”  Zee also suggests that colicky babies often do better in dark, quiet rooms, as do migraine sufferers.  Though there aren’t any indicated treatments for colic or migraine in infants yet, this study has the potential to shed some light on colic in babies.  Read the full article on Today Health.

Women are much less likely than men to be diagnosed with mesothelioma cancer – an approximate four-to-one ratio – but there is little to suggest a gender-based defense or susceptibility. The discrepancy centers more on blue-collar occupations and workplaces that have been dominated traditionally by males.

Mesothelioma is a rare cancer caused by exposure to asbestos, a naturally occurring mineral that played a major role in the building of America throughout much the 20th century. Although the use of asbestos has dropped dramatically in recent decades – by comparison very little is actually used in America today – the risk of exposure lingers from all that remains in the buildings and the products left behind.

There also is the lengthy latency period (10 to 60 years) between exposure to asbestos and symptoms that can be diagnosed. An estimated 3,000 cases of mesothelioma are diagnosed annually in the United States. The average life expectancy for a patient is only one year, but of course this can fluctuate because of a patient’s age, race, gender and a number of other demographics.

“People still are getting sick from being exposed to asbestos,” said Ken Rosenmen, M.D. Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine chief at Michigan State University. “Asbestos was once a useful product – and that’s why it was used so much – but we’re still paying the price for that.”

Michigan State University has been tracking mesothelioma cases throughout the state since 1985, reporting that only 25 percent of the cases involved women, which is comparable to trends throughout the country. The United States Centers of Disease Control (CDC) tracked 18,083 mesothelioma deaths during a recent six-year period and found that 19 percent (3,485) of cases occurred in women.

One study from Turkey determined that 160 women and only 115 men – from a pool of 100,000 exposed people – were at risk for mesothelioma cancer.

More definitive, though, is the type of mesothelioma that varied from men to women.  Among the men, 90.2 percent of cases were pleural mesothelioma (forming in the lungs), 8.3 percent were peritoneal mesothelioma (abdomen), and 1.1 percent was from other regions. Among the women, 71.1 percent of cases were pleural, 24.3 percent were peritoneal, and 3.1 percent were from other regions.

Mesothelioma for both men and women is generally difficult and slow to diagnose because symptoms often mirror those of less serious illnesses. Although millions of people year after year are exposed to asbestos in either the home or the workplace, only a small percentage develops mesothelioma.

There are stories about mesothelioma survivors, both men and women, with either pleural or peritoneal mesothelioma on the Wall of Hope section at Asbestos.com. Regardless of sex, both men and women can survive much longer with mesothelioma cancer than in the past thanks to innovative treatments.

Guest Author Tim Povtak has been a writer for Asbestos.com since 2011. Prior to joining Asbestos.com, he was an award-winning newspaper journalist.

 

Last week Health Canada released an official warning on the association of increased risk of bone fracture with the frequent use of Proton-Pump Inhibitor (PPI) medications, used to treat symptoms of  acid reflux and gastroesophegeal reflux disease (GERD).   While an important step, this warning, like the U.S. FDA’s before it, does not go far enough in ensuring that the public is aware of the immense risks posed by continuous dosages of PPI pills, particularly to women.

According to the alert, “several scientific studies suggest that PPI therapy may be associated with a small increased risk for fractures of the hip, wrist, or spine related to osteoporosis, a disease resulting in the weakening of bones.”  They added that “the risk of fracture was higher in patients who received multiple daily doses of PPIs and therapy for a year or longer. Additional risk factors for osteoporosis, such as age, gender and the presence of other health conditions, may also contribute to the increased risk of fractures.”[1]  Though the alert mentions that gender could also contribute to the increased risk, what the alert fails to mention is that women face the greatest risks when taking these pills.

Last year, a team of researchers from Harvard Medical School and Boston General Hospital in a study  focusing on over 80,000 post-menopausal women, found that among those who had taken PPI pills 3-4 times per week over a two-year period had an increased risk of hip-fracture of 35%.  For current and former smokers, the increase was as high as 50%.[2] A common theory for the cause of this increase is the fact that the pills inhibit the body’s ability to intake calcium, an essential element for maintaining strong bones.

These aren’t the only problems associated with PPI pills, however.  Though the warning labels on nearly all PPI’s, including those sold by major brands like Prilosec®, Nexium®, and Prevacid®, state that the pills should be taken for a maximum of fourteen days annually, many patients continue with daily therapy for years.  These medications,, which treat short-term symptoms of acid reflux by blocking the stomach’s natural production of acid, have serious negative side-effects.  According to the FDA, prolonged dosages of PPI pills can lead to an increase in risk of pneumonia, heart arrhythmia, and Clostridium difficile–associated diarrhea.[3]  Worse, according to a study by Dr. Blair Jobe at the University of Pittsburg, those taking PPI pills regularly to treat mild symptoms were 60% more likely to suffer from Barrett’s Esophagus, which often leads to esophageal cancer.[4]

In response to Health Canada’s warning, Dr. William Dengler, Medical Director of RefluxMD, issued this response: “In light of a recent warning by the Canadian federal government,  PPI users and their physicians should carefully consider the long-term side effects when using these drugs.  These same side effects are responsible for the U.S. FDA placing this class of drugs on their “watch list.”  With multiple governments warning patients that the side effects for acid reflux medications are troublesome, the media should play a larger role in combatting the over-saturation of television marketing for the drugs.”[5]  More importantly, however, consumers, particularly women, should pay careful attention to the risks associated with PPI pills before starting treatment, as well as consider natural alternatives that could help to treat long-term causes of acid-reflux, rather than short-term symptoms.

Guest Blogger:  Alexander Michael Jakubowski, Northwestern Undergraduate Student

[1] http://www.marketwatch.com/story/information-updateproton-pump-inhibitors-risk-of-bone-fractures-2013-04-04

[2] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2094622/Heartburn-pills-taken-women-raise-risk-hip-fractures.html

[3] http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/InformationbyDrugClass/ucm213259.htm

[4] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21768433

[5] http://www.refluxmd.com/learn/latest-news/2013-04-05/1928/refluxmd-reaction-health-canada-warns-risk-hip-fractures-ppi-users

Even though they’re more effective at preventing pregnancy than most other forms of contraception, long-acting birth-control methods such as intrauterine devices and hormonal implants have been a tough sell for women, especially younger ones. But changes in health-care laws and the introduction of the first new IUD in 12 years may make these methods more attractive. Increased interest in the devices could benefit younger women because of their high rates of unintended pregnancy, according to experts in women’s reproductive health.

IUDs and the hormonal implant – a matchstick-sized rod that is inserted under the skin of the arm that releases pregnancy-preventing hormones for up to three years — generally cost between $400 and $1,000. The steep upfront cost has deterred many women from trying them, women’s health advocates say, even though they are cost-effective in the long run compared with other methods, because they last far longer.

Under the Affordable Care Act, new plans or those that lose their grandfathered status are required to provide a range of preventive benefits, including birth control, without patient cost-sharing. Yet even when insurance is covering the cost of the device and insertion, some plans may require women to pick up related expenses, such as lab charges.

 Long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARCs) require no effort once they’re put into place, so they can be an appealing birth-control option for teens and young women, whose rates of unintended pregnancy are highest, experts say.

Across all age groups, nearly half of pregnancies are unintended, but younger women’s rates are significantly higher, according to a 2011 study from the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive health research organization. Eighty-two percent of pregnancies among 15- to 19-year-olds were unintended in 2006, and 64 percent of those among young women age 20 to 24 were unintended, the study found.

Although the use of LARCs has more than doubled in recent years, it is a small part of the contraceptive market. Among women who use birth control, 8.5 percent of women used one of those methods in 2009, according to the Guttmacher Institute. The use of LARCs by teenagers was significantly lower at 4.5 percent, while 8.3 percent of 20- to 24-year-olds chose this type of contraception.

In October, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists reiterated its strong support for the use of LARCs in young women.

Yet many young women are unaware that long-acting methods could be good options for them, in part because their doctors may be reluctant to prescribe them, experts say. That is partly the legacy of the Dalkon Shield, an IUD that was introduced in the 1970s whose serious defects caused pain, bleeding, perforations in the uterus and sterility among some users. The problems led to litigation  that resulted in nearly $3 billion in payments to more than 200,000 women.

In addition, providers may hesitate because there’s a slightly higher risk that younger women will expel the device, experts say.

But expulsion is a problem more likely associated with the size of the uterus, which is not necessarily related to a patient’s age, says Tina Raine-Bennett, research director at the Women’s Health Research Institute at Kaiser Permanente Northern California and chairwoman of the ACOG committee that released the revised opinion on LARCs. “Expulsion is only a problem if it goes unrecognized.” (Kaiser Health News is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.)

The new IUD Skyla became available in mid-February. It is made by Bayer, the same company that makes Mirena, another IUD sold in the United States. Unlike Mirena, which is recommended for women who have had a child, Skyla has no such restrictions (nor does ParaGard, the third type of IUD sold here). Mirena is currently the subject of numerous lawsuits alleging some complications, such as device dislocation and expulsion.

Skyla is slightly smaller than the other two IUDs on the market and is designed to protect against pregnancy for up to three years, a shorter time frame than the others.

This shorter time frame may make Skyla more attractive to younger women who think they may want to get pregnant relatively soon, some experts say, although any IUD can be removed at any time.

“More providers are spreading the word that it’s okay, and more young women are demanding it,” says Eve Espey, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of New Mexico.

This article was produced by Kaiser Health News with support from The SCAN Foundation.

Written by

By Michelle Andrews

Feb 18, 2013

Please send comments or ideas for future topics for the Insuring Your Health column to questions@kaiserhealthnews.org.

Nearly 25% of those infected with HIV/AIDS in the United States are female.   In recognition of National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day on March 10, take a few minutes to learn basic facts about prevention, testing, and issues specific to women. These resources will help:

Prevention — Learn how HIV is transmitted and how you can protect yourself.
Testing — Enter your ZIP code to find a testing site near you. If you have concerns about privacy, read about confidential and anonymous testing.
Treatment — Learn about different treatment options, potential side effects, clinical trials, and related topics.
Issues Specific to Women with HIV — Men and women need similar types of care for HIV, but there are some differences.
Campaign to Encourage African-American Women to Get Tested – African-American women account for about 66% of women in the U.S. who have HIV/AIDS. The campaign shares facts and outlines reasons to get tested.

Source:   www.usa.gov

 

According to a recent investigation, doctors in rural areas of India may be performing unnecessary hysterectomies (the surgical removal of the uterus) on women in an attempt to make additional money. While it is difficult to obtain exact statistics regarding hysterectomies in rural Indian villages, local reports and anecdotal information suggest that private doctors are frightening a number of women into receiving the procedure.

One woman, whose experience is similar to others who have been interviewed, recalls going to a private doctor initially for heavy bleeding during menstruation. After performing a single ultrasound, the doctor told her that she might develop cancer in the future, and needed to undergo surgery immediately. Although she wanted to wait and discuss the possible surgery with her family, the doctor pressured her into receiving the procedure a few hours later. Independent doctors have come to the consensus that a single ultrasound cannot justify a hysterectomy, and that biopsies and other tests are better indicators of cancer or pre-cancer. However, a doctor at the clinic where the woman received the operation admitted that he doesn’t always schedule biopsies prior to performing hysterectomies, so if the uterus or biopsy material is discarded afterwards, there is no way to prove whether the procedures were necessary or not.

Unfortunately, the case highlighted above is not unique in India. There are reports of large numbers of women receiving hysterectomies in some Indian states, and in one village it’s reported that around 90% of women have received a hysterectomy. As these procedures can be costly, women often have to sell some of their own assets to pay for them. Hysterectomies also lead to additional health risks inherent to any surgical procedures.

There are organizations currently working to make changes that will improve the health of women in rural India. Since health clinics are necessary and helpful, campaigners are focusing on improving oversight and regulation of the doctors working in these clinics to ensure that women are not tricked or scared into unnecessary procedures. There has been legislation passed in India to regulate private health care, but it is still in the process of implementation, and is not yet effective. For now, it’s important to raise awareness about this issue, and continue to work to improve women’s health everywhere.

Source: McGivering, Jill. “The Indian Women Pushed Into Hysterectomies.” BBC News Magazine. 5 February 2013

To learn more about hysterectomy, check HERE.   If you are considering a hysterectomy you might want to read this article about decision making.

 

As today’s cancer treatments increase survivorship, many young cancer patients now look at their potential for parenting children. The decision to have children, if fertility is sustained, is complicated and filled with legal, ethical and financial considerations.  The Oncofertility Consortium based at Northwestern University hosts a monthly webcast that explores a variety of reproductive options for individuals who have been treated for cancer and everyone is welcome.   Tomorrow’s CME lecture will discuss: Contraceptive Options during and following Cancer Treatment.    It will begin on March 7, 2013 at  9:50 AM Central US Time and last for one-hour.

To view a detailed flyer on this event including  how to connect, click HERE