Sickle cell treatment shows promise
Scientists from the National Institutes of Health in December presented early results from a human clinical trial testing a novel gene replacement therapy in people with severe sickle cell disease. The experimental treatment involves removing hematopoietic stem cells from the patients’ bone marrow or blood and adding a therapeutic beta globin gene, which is defective in people with sickle cell disease. The cells are then returned to the patient, leading to the production of anti-sickling hemoglobin (T87Q). People with sickle cell disease often suffer severe pain because the sickled red blood cells clump together and become stuck in blood vessels. The condition can cause stroke, organ failure and early death. More than 100,000 people in the United States and 20 million worldwide suffer from the disease. Based on preliminary findings, researchers believe the new gene replacement therapy will enable the patients’ bone marrow to produce normal red blood cells consistently.
Gestational diabetes and the Mediterranean diet
Women with gestational diabetes assigned to medical nutrition therapy based on the Mediterranean diet for three months experienced an improvement in glycemic profile at delivery that was comparable to pregnant women with normal glucose tolerance, study data show. “Mediterranean diet-based medical nutrition therapy should be considered as a universal, first-line therapy in gestational diabetes treatment to improve glycemic control and perinatal pregnancy outcomes,” Alfonso Luis Calle-Pascual, MD, PhD, of the endocrinology and nutrition department of Hospital Clinico San Carlos in Madrid, told Endocrine Today.
Organic food: It really is good for you!
People who buy organic food are usually convinced it’s better for their health, and they’re willing to pay more for it, reports The New York Times. But until now, evidence of the benefits of eating organic has been lacking. Now a French study that followed 70,000 adults, most of them women, for five years has reported that the most frequent consumers of organic food had 25 percent fewer cancers overall than those who never ate organic, according to a study in JAMA Internal Medicine. Those who ate the most organic fruits, vegetables, dairy products, meat and other foods had a particularly steep drop in the incidence of lymphomas, and a significant reduction in postmenopausal breast cancers.
OK to induce labor after full term
For healthy pregnancies, inducing labor after full term (39 weeks) rather than waiting for natural labor does not increase the risk of major complications for newborns, reports the National Institutes of Health. (Prior research has shown that inducing labor before 39 weeks of pregnancy puts the baby at risk of serious health problems.) A research team under the direction of William Grobman of Northwestern University enrolled 6,000 pregnant women in the study. Participants were randomly assigned to two groups. Half of the women waited to have a natural labor. The other half were induced at 39 weeks. The two groups of babies had similar survival rates and chances of serious health problems, such as needing help with breathing, having a seizure, or getting an infection. Inducing labor also reduced the mothers’ chances of a C-section and lowered their blood pressure.
ADHD may be overdiagnosed in younger kids
Could a child’s birthday put them at risk for an ADHD misdiagnosis? The answer appears to be yes, at least among children born in August who start school in states with a Sept. 1 cutoff enrollment date, according to a study led by Harvard Medical School researchers. The findings, published Nov. 28 in The New England Journal of Medicine, show that children born in August in those states are 30 percent more likely to receive an ADHD diagnosis, compared with their slightly older peers enrolled in the same grade. “Our findings suggest the possibility that large numbers of kids are being overdiagnosed and overtreated for ADHD because they happen to be relatively immature compared to their older classmates in the early years of elementary school,” said study lead author Timothy Layton, assistant professor of health care policy in the Blavatnik Institute at Harvard Medical School. In states with a Sept. 1 cutoff, a child born on August 31 will be nearly a full year younger on the first day of school than a classmate born on Sept. 1, he points out. At this age, the younger child might have a harder time sitting still and concentrating for long periods of time. That extra fidgeting may lead to a medical referral, followed by diagnosis and treatment for ADHD.
High body fat levels and breast cancer risk
In postmenopausal women with normal body mass index (BMI), relatively high body fat levels were associated with an elevated risk of invasive breast cancer and altered levels of circulating metabolic and inflammatory factors, in a study of 3,460 postmenopausal women published in Jama Oncology. Obesity has been associated with an increased risk of breast cancer, including the estrogen receptor (ER)–positive subtype in postmenopausal women. Whether excess adiposity is associated with increased risk in women with a normal body mass index is unknown. But this study suggests that normal BMI categorization may be an inadequate proxy for the risk of breast cancer in postmenopausal women.
Sleep apnea and hypertension among African-Americans
African-Americans with moderate or severe sleep apnea are twice as likely to have hard-to-control high blood pressure when their sleep apnea goes untreated, according to a new study funded mainly by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI), part of the National Institutes of Health. The findings, which researchers say may partially explain why African-Americans suffer hypertension at rates higher than any other group, point to screening and treatment of sleep apnea as another important strategy for keeping uncontrolled high blood pressure at bay. The results were published in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Association.