U.S. Measles Cases Now Exceed 100: CDC

By Dennis Thompson

HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — The number of measles cases in the United States has climbed to 102, federal health officials reported Monday, with most of the cases part of the ongoing outbreak traced to Disney amusement parks in southern California.

The vast majority of cases have occurred in California and they involve people who weren’t vaccinated against the highly contagious disease, officials said.

But cases have also been reported in 13 other states: Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Michigan, Nebraska, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Washington, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“The majority of the adults and children that are reported to us for which we have information did not get vaccinated, or don’t know whether they have been vaccinated,” Dr. Anne Schuchat, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, said at a Thursday news conference. “This is not a problem of the measles vaccine not working. This is a problem of the measles vaccine not being used.”

Schuchat added that “we’ve already had a very large number of measles cases [in 2015] — as many cases as we have all year in typical years. This worries me, and I want to do everything possible to prevent measles from getting a foothold in the United States and becoming endemic again.”

The United States declared measles eliminated in 2000, meaning that the virus was no longer native to this country.

Public health officials said they’re particularly concerned because the current outbreak comes on the heels of the worst year for measles in the United States in two decades.

In 2014, there were more than 600 cases of measles, the most in 20 years. Many of the infected were people who contracted measles from travelers to the Philippines, where a massive outbreak of 50,000 cases had occurred, Schuchat explained.

Health officials aren’t sure how the current outbreak began. But Schuchat said that “we assume that someone got infected with measles overseas, visited the Disneyland parks and spread the disease to others.”

Parents whose children are not vaccinated against measles should get them immunized, Schuchat said, and adults who aren’t sure about their vaccination history should get a booster dose as well.

Many parents aren’t getting their children vaccinated against measles, due largely to what experts call mistaken fears about childhood vaccines.

A big contributing factor to the parents’ continuing concerns about vaccine safety was a 1998 fraudulent paper published and later retracted in the medical journal The Lancet. The study falsely suggested a link between the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine and autism. The lead author of that paper, Andrew Wakefield, has since lost his medical license for having falsified his data.

Several dozen studies and a report from the Institute of Medicine have since found no link between autism and any vaccines, including the MMR vaccine.

Dr. Michael Tosi, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at the Kravis Children’s Hospital at Mount Sinai in New York City, said, “Any concerns or claims about a connection between measles vaccine and autism in young children have absolutely no scientific basis and have been entirely discredited.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians and the CDC all recommend that children receive the MMR vaccine at age 12 to 15 months, and again at 4 to 6 years.

The most common side effects of the MMR vaccine are a fever and occasionally a mild rash. Some children may experience seizures from the fever, but experts say these seizures have no long-term negative effects.

According to the CDC, serious complications from measles can include pneumonia and encephalitis, which can lead to long-term deafness or brain damage. About two or three in every 1,000 cases of measles in children results in death, the agency said.

Dr. Ambreen Khalil, an infectious disease specialist at Staten Island University Hospital in New York City, said, “Given the fact that there is a vaccine available, it makes sense to avail this opportunity to get immunized against this highly contagious disease. As you know, there is no drug available to cure it.”

More information

Visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for more on measles.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1LF0V0B

Timing of Kidney Transplants Doesn’t Affect Pregnancy Chances

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Pregnancy outcomes are similar for women who received a kidney transplant whether they were a child or an adult when they got their transplant, a new study says.

“This work has shown that outcomes for childhood transplant mothers are similar to outcomes for adulthood transplant mothers and should provide comfort to such mothers and their physicians that their early onset of kidney failure and longer period of posttransplant exposure to immunosuppression do not adversely affect their pregnancy outcomes,” the researchers wrote.

Researchers reviewed data on women in Australia and New Zealand who received a new kidney and got pregnant at least once between 1963 and 2012.

There were 101 pregnancies among 66 women who had a childhood kidney transplant, defined as getting a transplant before they were 18. There were more than 600 pregnancies among 401 women who had an adulthood kidney transplant.

At the time of pregnancy, those in the childhood transplant group were an average age of 25 with a functioning transplant for 10 years. Those in the adulthood transplant group were an average age of 31 with a functioning transplant for six years, according to the study.

Live births occurred in 76 percent of pregnancies in the childhood transplant group and 77 percent of pregnancies in the adulthood transplant group. The study found that rates of preterm birth (less than 37 weeks pregnancy) were 45 percent in the childhood transplant group and 53 percent in the adulthood transplant group.

The percentage of preterm babies who were small for their gestational age was 22 percent in the childhood transplant group and 10 percent in the adulthood transplant group, the researchers found.

Rates of full-term babies who were small for gestational age were 57 percent in the childhood transplant group and 38 percent in the adulthood transplant group. Those rates were much higher than in the general population, the researchers noted.

The study was published online Feb. 2 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

More information

The National Kidney Foundation has more about kidney disease and transplants and pregnancy.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2wn5

Timing of Kidney Transplants Doesn’t Affect Pregnancy Chances

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Pregnancy outcomes are similar for women who received a kidney transplant whether they were a child or an adult when they got their transplant, a new study says.

“This work has shown that outcomes for childhood transplant mothers are similar to outcomes for adulthood transplant mothers and should provide comfort to such mothers and their physicians that their early onset of kidney failure and longer period of posttransplant exposure to immunosuppression do not adversely affect their pregnancy outcomes,” the researchers wrote.

Researchers reviewed data on women in Australia and New Zealand who received a new kidney and got pregnant at least once between 1963 and 2012.

There were 101 pregnancies among 66 women who had a childhood kidney transplant, defined as getting a transplant before they were 18. There were more than 600 pregnancies among 401 women who had an adulthood kidney transplant.

At the time of pregnancy, those in the childhood transplant group were an average age of 25 with a functioning transplant for 10 years. Those in the adulthood transplant group were an average age of 31 with a functioning transplant for six years, according to the study.

Live births occurred in 76 percent of pregnancies in the childhood transplant group and 77 percent of pregnancies in the adulthood transplant group. The study found that rates of preterm birth (less than 37 weeks pregnancy) were 45 percent in the childhood transplant group and 53 percent in the adulthood transplant group.

The percentage of preterm babies who were small for their gestational age was 22 percent in the childhood transplant group and 10 percent in the adulthood transplant group, the researchers found.

Rates of full-term babies who were small for gestational age were 57 percent in the childhood transplant group and 38 percent in the adulthood transplant group. Those rates were much higher than in the general population, the researchers noted.

The study was published online Feb. 2 in the journal JAMA Pediatrics.

More information

The National Kidney Foundation has more about kidney disease and transplants and pregnancy.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2wn5

Certain Genes in Babies May Up Preterm Birth Risk

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Some babies’ genes may increase their risk of preterm birth, a new study suggests.

Researchers analyzed the number of copies of certain genes in hundreds of babies and their mothers. There was no link between the number of copies of these genes in mothers and the risk of preterm birth. A preterm birth is one that occurs before 37 weeks of pregnancy.

However, if any of four specific genes were duplicated, or if any of seven specific genes were deleted, the risk of birth before 34 weeks of pregnancy was two to 11 times higher, according to the researchers. Birth before 34 weeks of pregnancy is called early preterm birth.

Differences in the number of copies of the genes may not be what triggers a preterm birth. Instead, the differences may put a baby at higher risk of infection or other factors that may trigger preterm birth, study author Dr. Joseph Biggio, of the University of Alabama, said in a March of Dimes news release.

The findings may also help explain why treatment with the hormone progesterone — which has been shown to prevent some preterm births — works for only about one-third of pregnant women, he added.

“We always thought we were treating the mother with progesterone, but perhaps we were actually treating the baby,” Biggio said.

Biggio’s research was to be honored by the March of Dimes at the Society for Maternal Fetal Medicine’s annual meeting, which starts Feb. 2 in San Diego. Findings presented at meetings are generally considered preliminary until they’ve been published in a peer-reviewed journal.

“These findings may help explain what triggers early labor in some women even when they’ve done everything right during pregnancy and there’s no obvious cause for an early birth,” March of Dimes Chief Medical Officer Dr. Edward McCabe said in the news release.

“The hope is that this finding may one day lead to a screening test to help identify which babies are at a higher risk of an early birth,” he added.

There are more than 450,000 preterm births in the United States each year. Preterm birth is a leading cause of newborn death and many preterm babies who survive face long-term health problems.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development has more about preterm labor and birth.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2vQh

Non-Drug Options Can Help Curb Delirium in Hospital Patients, Study Finds

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Delirium is a common and troubling symptom for critically ill hospital patients, and medications are often used to ease the condition. But a new study suggests that non-drug alternatives are available.

According to the study authors, delirium — a sudden onset of confusion — is common among older hospital patients and raises their risk of falls, physical decline and longer hospital stays.

The researchers, from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, reviewed 14 studies that assessed the use of drug-free strategies to reduce delirium in older patients at 12 hospitals around the world.

Those methods included proper nutrition and hydration, adequate sleep, daily exercise, activities to improve thinking and memory and telling patients where they are, and the date and time, every day.

These techniques appeared to reduce patients’ odds of delirium and falls. They also led to shorter hospital stays, according to the study published online Feb. 2 in JAMA Internal Medicine.

“Delirium is a major problem at many hospitals and preventing its downstream consequences, including falls, is a priority,” Dr. Tammy Hshieh, of the hospital’s Division of Aging and the Aging Brain Center, said in a hospital news release.

“Delirium can be the source of anxiety for many patients and their families and often they wish that there was a pill that would make the patient’s symptoms go away,” Hshieh added. “Our study demonstrates that there are effective strategies for preventing delirium and treating patients that don’t rely on medications.”

It’s estimated that 29 percent to 64 percent of elderly hospital patients suffer delirium, but the condition is likely underdiagnosed, the researchers added.

They estimate that drug-free prevention methods could prevent 1 million cases of delirium a year in the United States, and save Medicare $10 billion annually.

Two experts agreed that alternative approaches are needed.

“The use of medications to control delirious behavior is common, but poses other problems for the patient, including actually increasing risk for further illness,” said Dr. Gayatri Devi, a neurologist specializing in memory disorders at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.

She said that the “simple interventions” outlined in the study “are not only cost-effective, but also humane and a welcome addition in treating our ailing elders.”

Dr. Gisele Wolf-Klein is director of geriatric education at North Shore-LIJ Health System in New Hyde Park, N.Y. She said that interventions mentioned in the study are “already known to health care workers, but need to be further emphasized and recognized.”

Wolf-Klein added a few other measures that she believes can help keep delirium at bay. They include “making sure elderly patients have access to their glasses or hearing aids to alleviate visual or hearing difficulties while in the unfamiliar confines of the hospital.

She said hospital visitors can play a vital role, too. “Family members, friends or even paid assistants should attempt to spend as much time with these hospitalized older patients as possible to chat, answer questions and hold them onto reality,” Wolf-Klein said.

More information

The U.S. National Library of Medicine has more about delirium.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2sUv

Sexual Assault Under-Reported on U.S. College Campuses: Study

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Some U.S. universities and colleges appear to be under-reporting sexual assaults on their campuses, a new study concludes.

Researchers looked at data about on-campus sexual assaults reported by 31 large private and public universities and colleges during audits by the federal government. During the audits, the number of reported sexual assaults rose an average of 44 percent compared to previously reported figures.

After the audits ended, the reported number of sexual assaults fell to pre-audit levels. This finding suggests that some schools provide accurate statistics about sexual crimes only when they’re under government scrutiny, according to the study.

“When it comes to sexual assault and rape, the norm for universities and colleges is to downplay the situation and the numbers,” study author Corey Rayburn Yung, a law professor at the University of Kansas, said in an American Psychological Association news release.

“The result is students at many universities continue to be attacked and victimized, and punishment isn’t meted out to the rapists and sexual assaulters,” he added.

Results were published online Feb. 2 in the journal Psychology, Public Policy, and Law.

The study included large universities and colleges with on-campus housing and more than 10,000 students that were audited by the U.S. Department of Education from 2001 to 2012. Off-campus crimes involving students were not included in the study.

Most of the audits were triggered by complaints about how schools handled sexual assaults or other violent crimes on campus. Some of the audits were conducted in conjunction with FBI investigations of local police, and some universities were audited at random.

Individual data for each school wasn’t published in the study. But, the authors noted that not all of the schools saw a surge in reported sexual assaults during the audits.

The study also found that reporting of other serious crimes — such as assault, robbery and burglary — during audits didn’t show the same dramatic increase as seen in the reporting of sexual assaults.

“Colleges and universities still aren’t taking the safety of their students from sexual assault seriously,” Yung said.

“The study shows that many universities continue to view rape and sexual assault as a public relations issue rather than a safety issue. They don’t want to be seen as a school with really high sexual assault numbers, and they don’t want to go out of their way to report that information to students or the media,” he concluded.

More information

The American Association of University Women has more about ending campus sexual assault.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1LF0UcV

Some Kids Use Tobacco, E-Cigarettes Together, Study Finds

By Steven Reinberg

HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — American children and teens who smoke may also use a variety of other nicotine delivery systems, including e-cigarettes, cigars, smokeless tobacco, hookahs and pipes, a new study finds.

“We are concerned about this because of the potential for increased harms associated with the use of multiple products, such as exposing young people to nicotine during a time when their brains are still developing or risk for nicotine addiction,” said lead researcher Youn Ok Lee, a research public health analyst at RTI International in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

Public health experts are also concerned that these products could attract kids who might not otherwise use cigarettes or tobacco products, she said.

For the study, Lee’s team collected data on almost 25,000 students between 9 and 18 years old who took part in the 2012 National Youth Tobacco Survey. In addition to cigarettes, the researchers looked at the use of e-cigarettes, cigars, smokeless tobacco, hookahs, pipes, bidis (small imported cigarettes), kreteks (cigarettes blended with cloves or other flavors), snus (a type of smokeless tobacco) and dissolvable tobacco.

The researchers found that nearly 15 percent of children and teens used one or more tobacco products. Of these, about 3 percent smoked cigarettes exclusively and 4 percent used one non-cigarette product exclusively. However, 3 percent used cigarettes along with another product and 4 percent used three or more nicotine delivery products, according to the study.

In addition, twice as many kids used e-cigarettes alone than kids who used them along with cigarettes, the researchers found.

Children who used several nicotine delivery devices were more likely to be boys, the study found. Kids using multiple devices also were more likely to use flavored products, to be addicted to nicotine, and to be influenced by advertising and susceptible to peer pressure, the researchers said.

“Our results also suggest that policymakers should look more closely at the potential influence of flavors and company marketing on kids’ use of multiple products. Researchers have looked at these issues when it comes to cigarettes, but less is known about them when it comes to non-cigarette products,” Lee said.

The report was published online Feb. 2 in Pediatrics.

Dr. Norman Edelman, a senior consultant for scientific affairs for the American Lung Association, said, “This is an important article as it makes a good case for regulations which make nicotine delivery devices such as e-cigarettes unavailable to children.”

The study points out that very often these devices are being used in addition to cigarettes and not as substitutes, Edelman said. “Thus, no so-called harm reduction is going on, but enhanced addiction to nicotine among our youth is taking place,” he said.

Flavoring these products is especially egregious as this practice has already been banned in cigarettes, because it’s “a direct and blatant attempt to sell to minors,” he said.

“The American Lung Association has been urging the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to develop regulations for nicotine delivery devices like e-cigarettes. Among other things, this would protect our children from being harmed by them. The agency announced an intent to do so a while ago,” Edelman said.

In 2014, the FDA proposed a new rule that would allow the agency to regulate e-cigarettes.

More information

For more information on youth and tobacco, visit the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2sny

Certain Heart Drug, Antibiotic Combo Might Be Fatal for Seniors

By Dennis Thompson

HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — The combination of a widely used heart medication and a commonly prescribed antibiotic seems to more than double the risk of sudden death in seniors, a new study says.

Spironolactone (brand name Aldactone) is a diuretic widely used in treating heart failure. It protects the heart by blocking a hormone that causes salt and fluid buildup.

But taking spironolactone alongside the antibiotic trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole (brand names Septra, Bactrim) can cause blood potassium to rise to potentially life-threatening levels, said study lead author Tony Antoniou, a scientist with the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto.

“One of the consequences of a high potassium level is getting these irregular heart rhythms that can be quite dangerous and cause sudden deaths,” Antoniou said.

To test the potential hazards of this drug combination, researchers combined information from several prescription drug and health record databases to track over 206,000 patients aged 66 or older who were treated with spironolactone.

Over a 17-year period, almost 12,000 people died suddenly — 349 of them within 14 days after taking either trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole or another antibiotic. Most of the patients who died were over age 85.

Trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole is frequently prescribed for urinary tract infections, with more than 20 million prescriptions written every year in the United States for a variety of infections, the researchers said in background information.

Both spironolactone and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole are individually known to increase blood potassium levels, according to the U.S. National Institutes of Health.

Heart patients prescribed spironolactone must be closely watched to make sure their potassium levels don’t build up and cause irregular heart rhythms, said Dr. Mathew Maurer, a geriatric cardiologist and medical director of The HCM Center at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center.

“Spironolactone is an old drug that’s been around for decades, and has shown to greatly impact older adults with advanced heart failure,” said Maurer, also a spokesman for the American College of Cardiology. “It’s been well-known within the heart failure community that while spironolactone is a great drug, management and use of the drug has to be carefully monitored.”

Previous research had shown that the combination of spironolactone and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole caused a 12-fold increased risk of being hospitalized due to high potassium levels compared to use of the heart medicine with another antibiotic, amoxicillin, Antoniou said.

“We wanted to see if this translated into a higher risk for sudden death in these patients,” he said.

The researchers found that the combination increased the risk of sudden death nearly 2.5 times higher than the combination of spironolactone and amoxicillin.

The study authors also found evidence of an interaction between spironolactone and the antibiotic ciprofloxacin (brand names Cetraxal, Cipro), which increased by half a person’s risk of sudden death, Antoniou said.

Although the study found an association between combined use of spironolactone and trimethoprim-sulfamethoxazole and sudden death in seniors, it did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship.

The solution is simple, Antoniou said: If a heart patient is taking spironolactone, they should be prescribed a different antibiotic if one is needed. Doctors also can limit the length of antibiotic treatment.

“For these patients, try if possible to avoid this particular combination,” he said. “We want to make sure pharmacists and physicians are aware of this interaction, but I don’t think it’s on the radar that this is something that can happen.”

Maurer agreed that doctors should avoid this particular drug combination, especially since it mainly affects vulnerable seniors.

“If there’s a problem with a drug interaction, it’s only going to be exacerbated in a population of older adults with heart problems,” he said.

The findings are published Feb. 2 in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

More information

For more on spironolactone, visit the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2uf0

Medication Problems May Spur Many Child ER Trips, Study Finds

By Amy Norton

HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Medication-related problems — from side effects to improper use — may be the cause of many kids’ trips to the emergency room, a new study suggests.

Researchers found that at one Canadian children’s hospital, medication-related problems accounted for one in 12 ER visits over a year. And about two-thirds of those incidents were preventable, the researchers concluded.

The findings, published online Feb. 2 in Pediatrics, do not mean that parents should be afraid to give their children needed medications, the researchers noted.

Instead, parents — and older kids — should have a “clear understanding” of why a medication is being prescribed and how to use it properly, said lead researcher Peter Zed, a pharmacist and associate professor at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.

His team found that allergic reactions and drug side effects were commonly behind pediatric ER visits. But so was prescription misuse — such as when kids did not use their asthma medication properly or, in the case of type 1 diabetes, did not take their insulin.

When children have chronic medical conditions or multiple conditions treated by more than one doctor, it’s especially important for parents to ask questions about medication use, Zed said.

A pharmacist who was not involved in the study agreed.

“It’s good for parents to ask questions,” said Laura Pizzi, a professor at Jefferson School of Pharmacy in Philadelphia.

Busy doctors may not delve into all the details of a medication’s proper use or potential risks, Pizzi said. So parents should feel free to question either their child’s doctor or the pharmacist who fills the prescription, she said.

The study findings are based on more than 2,000 children and teenagers — average age 6 — who arrived at a pediatric ER in Halifax,

Nova Scotia over the course of a year. Overall, about 8 percent were considered to have “medication-related” symptoms.

Adverse drug reactions were the culprit 26 percent of the time, while “non-adherence” to a prescription was to blame in 17 percent of cases. Another 19 percent of kids were not taking a high enough medication dose, and in 12 percent of cases, an “improper” drug was prescribed, the study found.

The researchers only had information on general drug classes. The most commonly implicated ones were those that treat infections or asthma, or that act on the central nervous system — which includes medications for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, migraines and depression.

Zed’s team also found that among all kids who landed in the ER, certain ones were at increased risk of a medication-related problem. That included kids with multiple health conditions or more than one prescribing doctor.

Pizzi noted that this study took place at a specialized pediatric hospital, and the children treated there would tend to have more underlying health conditions, putting them at greater risk of medication problems.

“If you did this study at a general hospital, the proportion of medication-related visits could be lower,” she said.

Zed said doctors and other providers need to do their part to prevent these kinds of ER trips, too.

He suggested that they need to be vigilant that they are prescribing the best medication for a child’s symptoms, at the optimal dose. They also need to follow up with parents, to make sure that not only is a drug not causing problems, but is working adequately, Zed added.

Parents’ choice of pharmacy also matters. Pizzi said it’s best to fill all prescriptions at one pharmacy, and, ideally, at one where you feel comfortable talking to the pharmacist.

“There’s a trained medication expert available right there, and the advice is free,” Pizzi said.

At some busy pharmacies, she acknowledged, it can be hard to get much face time with the pharmacist. “Look for a less-busy pharmacy where you feel comfortable approaching the pharmacist,” she suggested. “Don’t be afraid to shop around.”

Zed pointed out that prescription drugs are not the only medications that require careful use.

“Parents can always ask the pharmacist questions about over-the-counter drugs, too,” he said.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more on children and medication safety.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2s6O

Toddler Snacks, Meals Have Lots of Salt and Sugar: Study

By Tara Haelle

HealthDay Reporter

MONDAY, Feb. 2, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Many prepackaged dinners for toddlers contain high amounts of salt, and many toddler and infant snacks, desserts and juices contain added sugar, a new study found.

“It was surprising that more than seven of 10 packaged toddler meals contained too much sodium (salt),” said study leader Mary Cogswell, a researcher at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “In addition, a substantial proportion of toddler food, and infant and toddler snacks — even those we don’t think of as sweet, like toddler meals and salty snacks — contained at least one added sugar.”

The good news, she said, was that most commercial infant foods were low in salt and did not contain added sugar.

Cogswell and other researchers tallied up the total sugar and salt in more than 1,000 U.S. infant and toddler foods found in major grocery stores in 2012. The infant foods were for children aged 4 to 12 months; the toddler foods were for children 1 to 3 years old.

The 657 infant foods included dinners, vegetables, fruits, dry cereals and ready-to-serve mixed grains. All but two of these were low in sodium, defined as less than 140 milligrams (mg) per typical serving.

Most infant food was also free of added sugars — except the infant mixed grains and fruits, about half of which had added sugar and more than a third of total calories from sugar. A typical serving of these, on average, contained 10 grams (g) of sugar.

But the 72 toddler dinners the researchers looked at were a different story: A third of them had added sugar, and more than seven in 10 of them were high in salt, defined as more than 210 mg per typical serving.

Further, most of the snacks, desserts and juices for both infants and toddlers tended to contain added sugar. Sugar made up more than a third of total calories for nearly 90 percent of dry fruit-based snacks.

“Some parents might be surprised that a majority of infant and toddler snacks and sides, such as flavored crackers and rice cakes, contained added sugar,” Cogswell said. “About half the analyzed ready-to-serve mixed grains and fruits products, such as oatmeal and fruit in a jar, contained added sugar.”

The findings were published online Feb. 2 in the journal Pediatrics.

The trade group the Grocery Manufacturers of America said in a statement that the study “does not accurately reflect the wide range of healthy choices available in today’s marketplace… because it is based on 2012 data that does not reflect new products with reduced sodium levels.”

The Institute of Medicine recommends that children ages 1 to 3 years consume no more than 1,500 mg of salt a day. But 79 percent of children in this age group exceed that limit, putting them at greater risk for high blood pressure in later childhood and adulthood, the study authors noted.

Further, an estimated quarter of U.S. children aged 2 to 5 years are overweight or obese, which increases the risk of type 2 diabetes and other health conditions. Federal guidelines recommend that no more than 5 percent to 15 percent of total daily calories come from added sugar, and U.S. children aged 2 to 5 years average about 13 percent, according to background information in the study.

“A significant amount of evidence shows that one of the strongest predictors of what children eat later in life can be what they eat at a young age,” Cogswell said. “A poor diet in childhood can lay a foundation for future health problems such as obesity and cardiovascular disease, so it’s important to try to instill healthy eating habits early.”

Parents can do a lot to instill those habits, Cogswell said. She suggested repeatedly offering infants and toddlers foods that are naturally low in salt and added sugars, as well as fruits and vegetables without added sugar, salt or sauces, as often as possible.

When shopping, parents can look for foods labeled “low sodium,” which can only legally be used on products with less than 140 mg per serving, or labeled “no salt” or “no added sugar.” New federal nutrition labeling guidelines set to take effect within the next year will also require products with added sugar to say as much on the label, she said.

However, parents must still be wary about the “no added sugar” claim or mention of “equivalent number of fruit servings” when it comes to some fruit-containing products, cautioned Dr. Yoni Freedhoff, an assistant professor of family medicine at the University of Ottawa in Canada, and an obesity specialist.

“There are no equivalents to fruits other than actual fruits, and if a label needs to brag about sugar not being added, it often means that manufacturers have used fruit concentrates to spike their products with huge amounts of sugar,” Freedhoff said. “I’ve seen fruit bars and snacks with more sugar than chocolate bars, where, by weight on a scale, 80 percent of them are pure sugar.”

He suggested that labels sounding too good to be true are also a red flag.

“The easiest and saddest rule of thumb is that the harder a product’s packaging tries to convince you its contents are healthful, the more important it is to turn the product around and take a moment to consider the nutrition facts panel and ingredients to determine if the claims are justified,” Freedhoff said.

One quick way to assess a nutrition label is to look to see if sugar or salt are listed in the top five ingredients, said Kristi King, senior dietitian at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. In addition to sugar and corn syrup, parents can look for honey, fructose, malt, maltose, molasses, dextrose, glucose, lactose, sucrose, turbinado and trehalose among the ingredients.

“Food labels can get very tricky and overwhelming,” King said. “A general rule of thumb is that 4 grams of sugar equals one teaspoon. Knowing this information can quickly help parents calculate how many teaspoons of sugar their child would be consuming.”

King also recommended not adding salt to foods at the table or while cooking, not adding sugar to cereals or fruits, and offering children a variety of food types and colors to ensure they get a variety of nutrients. “You can use some of the prepackaged convenience foods, but these should not be the base of the diet,” King said.

Even though preparing food at home takes time, it need not be gourmet and will generally be healthier, Freedhoff said.

“I’d recommend a sandwich over a prepackaged kid lunch product any day of the week,” he said. “This study suggests that from the age of toddlerhood onward, we’re building kids out of sugar and salt, not exactly the highest quality building materials around.”

More information

Visit the U.S. National Library of Medicine for more on childhood nutrition.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wZ2rzZ

Stay Warm This Winter to Protect Your Health

SUNDAY, Feb. 1, 2015 (HealthDay News) — During cold weather, people are at an increased risk for a dangerous drop in body temperature, called hypothermia. And that can lead to heart attack, kidney problems, liver damage and even death, the U.S. National Institute on Aging (NIA) cautions.

Older people and those with chronic medical conditions are at highest risk for hypothermia, defined as having a core body temperature of 95 degrees Fahrenheit or lower, according to the NIA.

In seniors, the body’s response to cold can be hampered by health problems such as diabetes, or by certain medications, including over-the-counter cold remedies. Older adults can develop hypothermia after relatively short exposure to cold weather or a slight drop in temperature.

Signs of hypothermia include:

• slowed or slurred speech,


• sleepiness,


• confusion,


• shivering,


• stiffness in the arms and legs,


• slow reactions,


• poor control over body movements,


• a weak pulse.

If you think someone has hypothermia, get them out of the cold if possible, call 911 immediately, remove any wet clothes and cover the person with a coat or blanket, said the NIA.

The NIA also recommends asking the doctor or pharmacist if any prescription or over-the-counter drugs patients are taking increase the risk for hypothermia.

When going outside in cold weather, wear warm layers of loose clothing, along with a hat, scarf and gloves or mittens to prevent the loss of body heat.

Keep your home warm enough by setting the thermostat to at least 68 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit. Older people can develop hypothermia even in mildly cool homes with temperatures between 60 and 65 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the NIA.

Other ways to keep warm at home include wearing long underwear under your clothes, along with socks and slippers. Keep your legs and shoulders warm with a blanket or afghan. Wear a hat or cap indoors to keep your head warm.

Due to high energy costs, some older adults may not keep their homes warm enough during the winter. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services can help low-income people meet their home heating needs through a program called Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program. Local and state agencies can help you learn if you might qualify.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about hypothermia.

---

from Health News / Tips & Trends / Celebrity Health http://ift.tt/1wYjPF4