Eldercare, Aging and Long Term Care

For Some, Exercise May Increase Heart Risk - NYTimes.com

By analyzing data from six rigorous exercise studies involving 1,687 people, the group found that about 10 percent actually got worse on at least one of the measures related to heart disease:blood pressure and levels of insulin, HDL cholesterolortriglycerides. About 7 percent got worse on at least two measures. And the researchers say they do not know why.

via well.blogs.nytimes.com

Why Are Some People Straight And Others Gay?

Why Are Some People Straight And Others Gay?.

Neuroscientist Simon Levay researches the science of sexuality and talks to Ross Reynolds about his findings.

Simon Levay is a neuroscientist and the author of "Gay, Straight And The Reasons Why: The Science of Sexual Orientation."

Dr. Robert L. Spitzer, Noted Psychiatrist, Apologizes for Study on Gay ‘Cure’ - NYTimes.com

Dr. Robert L Spitzer, considered by some to be the father of modern psychiatry, who turns 80 next week, lay awake at 4 o’clock on a recent morning knowing he had to do the one thing that comes least naturally to him

He pushed himself up and staggered into the dark# His desk seemed impossibly far away; Dr Spitzer suffers from Parkinson’s disease and has trouble walking, sitting, even holding his head upright#

The word he sometimes uses to describe these limitations — pathetic — is the same one that for decades he wielded like an ax to strike down dumb ideas, empty theorizing, and junk studies#

Now here he was at his computer, ready to recant a study he had done himself, a poorly conceived 2003 investigation that supported the use of so-called reparative therapy to “cure” homosexuality for people strongly motivated to change.

via www.nytimes.com

HDL ‘Good Cholesterol’ Found Not to Cut Heart Risk - NYTimes.com

Now, a new study that makes use of powerful databases of genetic information has found that raising HDL levels may not make any difference to heart disease risk. People who inherit genes that give them naturally higher HDL levels throughout life have no less heart disease than those who inherit genes that give them slightly lower levels. If HDL were protective, those with genes causing higher levels should have had less heart disease.

via www.nytimes.com

Duck Dunn, Bassist in Booker T. and the MG’s, Dies at 70 - NYTimes.com

Duck Dunn, whose simple but inventive bass playing anchored numerous hit records and helped define the sound of Memphis soul music, died early Sunday in Tokyo, where he had been on tour. He was 70.

via www.nytimes.com

Break Up the Psychiatric Monopoly - NYTimes.com

All mental-health disciplines need representation — not just psychiatrists but also psychologists, counselors, social workers and nurses. The broader consequences of changes should be vetted by epidemiologists, health economists and public-policy and forensic experts. Primary care doctors prescribe the majority of psychotropic medication, often carelessly, and need to contribute to the diagnostic system if they are to use it correctly. Consumers should play an important role in the review process, and field testing should occur in real life settings, not just academic centers.

Psychiatric diagnosis is simply too important to be left exclusively in the hands of psychiatrists. They will always be an essential part of the mix but should no longer be permitted to call all the shots.

via www.nytimes.com

Talking Past Older People to Their Younger Companions - NYTimes.com

THE first time Corky Alkin remembers being a nonperson was 20 years ago, at a shoe store in the San Fernando Valley suburbs of Los Angeles. Although Mrs. Alkin was the one shopping, the salesman spoke only to her grown daughter, Jodie Reff.

via www.nytimes.com

Regimens: Aspirin Seen to Be as Effective as Warfarin - NYTimes.com

People with congestive heart failure are often treated with warfarin to prevent blood clots, but a large randomized double-blinded trial has found that aspirin works just as well.

Researchers recruited 2,305 patients with heart failure and normal heart rhythm. Half were given regimens of warfarin and dummy aspirin, the other half aspirin and dummy warfarin. The scientists followed them for up to six years, tracking incidents of stroke, hemorrhage and death. The study was published online last week in The New England Journal of Medicine.

via well.blogs.nytimes.com

Tying Genes and Proteins to Dementia - NYTimes.com

Scientists think that abnormal protein deposits inside brain cells cause frontotemporal degeneration# The proteins vary, but they do not include amyloid, the substance found in Alzheimer’s patients#

In about 40 percent of patients, the deposits are an abnormal form of a protein called tau, which normally gives structural support to brain cells# #Tau is also one of the proteins found in Alzheimer’s patients##

Two other types of deposits are abnormal versions of proteins involved in other cell functions# In about half of all patients with frontotemporal dementia, the protein is one known as TDP-43, and in about 10 percent it is a substance called FUS#

But why do these protein deposits form? Often, the underlying reason is not known#

At least half of all cases are sporadic, in people with no family history of the disease and no known genetic disorder. About 40 percent of patients do have a family history, and some may have an identifiable genetic mutation.

via www.nytimes.com

When Illness Makes a Spouse a Stranger

From: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/health/a-rare-form-of-dementia-tests-a-vow-of-for-better-for-worse.html?_r=1&hp

Mr. French, now 71, has frontotemporal dementia — a little-known, poorly understood and frequently misdiagnosed group of brain diseases that eat away at personality and language. Although it was first recognized more than 100 years ago, there is still no cure or treatment, and patients survive an average of only eight years after the diagnosis.

But recently, researchers have been making important discoveries about the biochemical and genetic defects that cause some forms of the disease. And for the first time, they have identified drugs that may be able to treat one of those defects, the buildup of abnormal proteins in the brain. Tests in people, the first ever such drug trials in this disease, could begin as soon as early next year at the University of California, San Francisco.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/health/a-rare-form-of-dementia-tests-a-vow-of-for-better-for-worse.html?_r=1&hp