Darjeeling Hills ART Center for HIV/AIDS patients

7:02 PM

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Live News

Darjeeling gets  Antiretroviral therapy or ART Center for HIV/AIDS patients.The people living with HIV/AIDS in Darjeeling Hills had long pending demands for a  ART  center  which  provides Antiretroviral therapy (ART) which prolongs and improve HIV/AIDS patients' lives, and potentially  reduce the risk that they will infect others.

Darjeeling Hills ART Center for HIV/AIDS patients

Bimal Gurung on his Facebook Fan Page wrote "I am happy to inform that the GTA today inaugurated a Nodal ART Center for the people living with HIV/AIDS at the Darjeeling District Hospital by Smt. Asha Gurung, Sabhasad, Health, GTA". 

The ART Centre will not only offer ART but also give counselling to HIV positive people. 

I also inaugurated a another cable ropeway car from Tukvar to Goke.

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Bimal Gurung perks to woo doctors to hills - Rs 65,000 per month

9:56 AM

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Live News

Bimal Gurung announced that the GTA would provide a salary of Rs 65,000 a month to contractual doctors across the hills along with accommodation and schooling for their children in an attempt to woo them.

Gurung perks to woo docs to hills

Gurung said an earlier attempt by the GTA to woo contractual doctors to the hills had failed to evoke any response.

The GTA chief executive, while inaugurating a 10-bed Critical Care Unit and a 10-bed High Dependency Unit at the Darjeeling district hospital today, said: “There is shortage of doctors in the hospital and other hospitals across the hills. The GTA had earlier issued an advertisement (at the end of last year) inviting doctors to work in the hills for a salary of Rs 45,000 a month but no one turned up. We will now give the doctors a salary of Rs 65,000 per month, take care of their housing, including electricity bills, water connection and schooling for their children. I am hopeful that this offer will evoke some response.”

A contractual doctor gets Rs 45,000 a month from the state. After the GTA was formed, the health department was transferred to the hill body and now the GTA can recruit doctors on yearly contracts. Any doctor recruited by the hill body would have a fresh contract and be entitled to the perks announced by Gurung today. Permanent doctors can only be appointed by the state government.

Subir Bhowmick, the chief medical officer of health, Darjeeling, said: “There are 45 (regular) doctors posted in the Darjeeling district hospital but there is still a shortage of 33 doctors. Across the GTA area, the shortage of doctors is around 50-60.”

Gurung said the GTA would continue to correspond with the state government to fill up the vacancies by appointing permanent doctors. Till that happens, the GTA would try to recruit doctors on contract. Officials in the hills, however, could not say how many contractual doctors are in the hills or what was likely to happen if the state was able to fill up the posts.

“We will not compromise with health and education. We will try and solve the smallest problem in these sectors as early as possible. The public must support us,” Gurung said.

The GTA chief also announced that the NHPC Ltd had promised to provide Rs 2 crore to set up an MRI machine at a hospital in Darjeeling. “I appeal to the hospital authorities to identify land and we will immediately provide the funds to set up an MRI unit.”

Bhowmick said the health department was planning to set up the MRI unit at Victoria Hospital, which is currently defunct. “We are also planning to set up a sick new born baby care unit at Victoria Hospital and shift the maternity section there from the district hospital. To run the MRI machine each time, we would need 600KV of electricity,” he said.

Bhowmick added that the CCU was similar to the ICU and the ITU.

“The CCUs and the ICUs or the Intensive Therapy Unit for Critical patients are synonymous. The units have life support and monitoring systems, ventilators and other facilities. The new units (10-bed Critical Care Unit and a 10-bed High Dependency Unit at the Darjeeling district hospital) have been set up for around Rs 1 crore,” he said.

Source:Telegraph

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CCU and HDU in Darjeeling District Hospital - Bimal Gurung

7:42 PM

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Live News

Today Bimal Gurung  inaugurated a 10- bedded Critical Care Unit (CCU) along with another 10 bedded High Dependency Unit (HDU) at the Darjeeling District hospital.

These units will have life support systems, monitoring systems, ventilators and other modern medical facilities. 

 Bimal Gurung  inaugurated a 10- bedded Critical Care Unit
CCU in Darjeeling

The Gorkhaland Territorial Administration has also raised the salary of contractual doctors from 45,000 to Rs 65,000 and will also take care of their accommodation and schooling for their children so that we get the best doctors in the hills for the general public. 

Gurung said The NHPC Ltd has promised to provide a sum of Rs 2 crore to set up an MRI machine at Darjeeling . He would appeal to the hospital authorities to identify the land and the GTA will immediate provide the funds to set up an MRI at Darjeeling District Hospital.

The GTA will give top priority to the Public Healthcare system in the Hills. 

With this CCU and HDU in the Darjeeling District Hospital, I hope the people in the Hills do not have to go to the plains for special medical care.

Source: Bimal Gurung FB page

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Mirik : free medical camps for pensioners

11:32 AM

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mirik live news

The Mirik Block Health Centre will host free medical camps at a number of places with the view to offer basic healthcare services to pensioners.

Sources said the centre will organise panchayat-level free health camps for the benefit of sexagenarian pensioners.

BMOH P Lepcha said the estimated number of pensioners in the block is around 1,200 and the camps will be set up at Panighatta on February 8, at No. 10 on February 12 and another one at Phuguri.

Blood and diabetes tests will be conducted in the camps besides other primary tests. He said the patients will also be issued identity cards and provided with additional services free of cost at the health centre. 

Source:EOI

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NSS Leadership development and Health awareness workshop begins

8:51 AM

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Kalimpong

Kalimpong : A three day workshop on “Leadership development and Health awareness” began today here at SUMI school under the initiative of the National Service Scheme (NSS) cell in association with West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education. NSS students from as many as 177 schools from across the state are participating in the workshop.

Students perform folk dance at the first day of
NSS workshop in Kalimpong on Thursday.

The first day of workshop was presided over by Deputy Magistrate Pritam Limboo while the program was inaugurated by WBCHSE secretary Shubroto Ghosh. Addressing the program Ghosh said the government is holding the function with an aim of developing leadership qualities among the students.

The students were lectured on various social issues by the source persons today. The students also performed different cultural items in the program including folk dances and folk music.

Source:EOI

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Kalimpong - Free eye camp at Bhagesong Busty

10:51 AM

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news

Kalimpong - Preservation of Humanities Buddhism in association with the Emmi Bhutia Association today organized a free eye camp at Bhagesong Busty, about 12 kms away from Kalimpong town. Around one hundred residents of the village benefited from the free eye camp which also included few other general medical check-ups.

Free eye cam in Kalimpong

Eye specialists from Jamgon Kongtrul Eye Centre conducted the eye check-ups in the camp today along with providing medicines to the patients with minor problems. Meanwhile those with major problems have been asked to visit Jamgon Kongtrul Eye Centre on January 15 for necessary tests and medicines. They will also be provided spectacles.

Emmi Bhutia Association’s regional president Jigme Bhutia lamented the people of the region are deprived of the medical facilities and the camp was organized to help the locals benefit from the free medical servic

Source : EOI

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First death from Dengue in the hills reported in Kalimpong

12:43 AM

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Live News

Dengue has been terrorising Siliguri in the plains and other areas including Sikkim for a while, and now a death from the dreaded fever has been reported from Kalimpong. Padma Golay (47) who was working as a nurse in Kalimpong sub-divisional hospital died today from dengue. Sixteen more cases of the illness have been reported from the hospital.

Death from Dengue reported in Kalimpong

Hospital sources said Golay was suffering from high fever and was admitted on October 4. Three tests were conducted on her following which she was found positive for NS 1 and IGA. After her condition deteriorated sharply on Sunday evening, Golay was referred to Siliguri, but she died on the way. Kalimpong residents have become apprehensive about dengue spreading even as patients at the hospital have complained diagnostic tests are not being conducted in time.

SDMO Dr. D Sonam verified Golay’s death was due to dengue, but dismissed allegations about the hospital showing negligence. He said chances of dengue spreading in town have increased after Golay’s and tests are being conducted on every fever patient. The hospital administration is ascertaining if the deceased contracted dengue in Kalimpong or when she had visited the plains, added Sonam.

Ten male and six female confirmed dengue patients are currently undergoing treatment at the hospital. However, the sub-divisional hospital here lacks proper facilities to diagnose the fever and patients have to queue up before private clinics and hospitals.

It may be mentioned here that Municipal Health Officer Dr. SD Zimba recently asserted dengue cannot spread in the hills as the Aegypti mosquito has not been found.

echoofindia.com

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Dengue in Siliguri 900 people tested positive

9:57 AM

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Siliguri

Around 900 people from Siliguri and adjoining blocks of Jalpaiguri district have tested positive for dengue since the last week of August, according to data provided by the district health department of Darjeeling today.

Dengue in Siliguri

North Bengal development minister Gautam Deb held a meeting with the district magistrate Punit Yadav, officials from the Siliguri Municipal Corporation and the health department to discuss steps to control the outbreak.

Deb, who held the meeting at the PWD inspection bungalow, said: “In total, 894 people have tested positive with dengue in the past one month, and seven of them have died. Another 278 people are suspected to be suffering from the disease and are yet to get the results of MacElisa, the confirmatory test for dengue.”

At present, the dengue confirmatory tests are conducted at North Bengal Medical College and Hospital. The reports for these tests come in 4-5 days.

“We are making efforts to install machines at the Siliguri district hospital through which the MacElisa test is done. I have talked with state urban development and municipal affairs minister Firhad Hakim for his intervention and assistance,” he said.

“The district magistrate has been asked to monitor the entire process of precautionary measures and treatment,” Deb said.

Since the outbreak of the disease in Siliguri a month back, there have been differences among the state government and the Congress-run board of SMC. Deb has blamed the civic body for its failure to check the outbreak.

“It is high time the outbreak is controlled through a concerted effort. A joint committee has been formed but unfortunately, there is hardly any proactive and consistent drive from the SMC. We are disappointed to note that the mayor and members of the civic board are sitting idle with no visible initiative from their side,” Deb added.

Two senior doctors, a virologist and an expert in public health and communicable diseases, will arrive here tomorrow from Calcutta to assist doctors at the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital and the Siliguri District Hospital. SMC mayor Gangotri Datta held a meeting with the officials of the civic body today.

“We are forming teams which will work across the city to prevent spreading of the disease,” she said.

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Too much social media may affect short-term memory - study

9:32 AM

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technology news

Always online? Take a break!People who spend too much time browsing social media could be squandering their memories or losing important information, a new study has warned.
Contrary to common wisdom, an idle brain is in fact doing important work - and in the age of constant information overload, it's a good idea to go offline on a regular basis, according to a researcher from Stockholm's KTH Royal Institute of Technology.

Erik Fransen, whose research focuses on short-term memory and ways to treat diseased neurons, said that a brain exposed to a typical session of social media browsing can easily become hobbled by information overload.

The result is that less information gets filed away in your memory.

The problem begins in a system of the brain commonly known as the working memory, or what most people know as short-term memory. That's the system of the brain that we need when we communicate, Fransen said.

"Working memory enables us to filter out information and find what we need in the communication. It enables us to work online and store what we find online, but it's also a limited resource," he said.

"At any given time, the working memory can carry up to three or four items. When we attempt to stuff more information in the working memory, our capacity for processing information begins to fail.

"When you are on Facebook, you are making it harder to keep the things that are 'online' in your brain that you need. "In fact, when you try to process sensory information like speech or video, you are going to need partly the same system of working memory, so you are reducing your own working memory capacity.

"And when you try to store many things in your working memory, you get less good at processing information," he said.

You're also robbing the brain of time it needs to do some necessary housekeeping. The brain is designed for both activity and relaxation, Fransen said.

"The brain is made to go into a less active state, which we might think is wasteful; but probably memory consolidation, and transferring information into memory takes place in this state. Theories of how memory works explain why these two different states are needed.

"When we max out our active states with technology equipment, just because we can, we remove from the brain part of the processing, and it can't work," Fransen said.

Source : indianexpress.com

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Dengue in siliguri more than 100 cases confirmed

10:59 AM

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Siliguri

(IANS) More than 100 confirmed dengue patients have been admitted in hospitals in Siliguri town of West Bengal's Darjeeling district, the local legislator said Thursday. As many as 12 patients were hospitalised for suspected dengue.

"There are over a 100 confirmed dengue cases admitted now," said Rudranath Bhattacharya, the Trinamool Congress Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) from Siliguri.

According to District Chief Medical Officer (Health) Subir Bhowmick, 12 patients were admitted Thursday at the Siliguri District Hospital, whereas 25 blood samples for dengue testing were sent to the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital since Wednesday.

"Five of the samples tested positive for dengue," he said.

Around 700 suspected dengue cases have been reported in Darjeeling and adjoining Jalpaiguri district, while two have died.

"Confirmatory tests are being done. Three hundred of them are from Darjeeling and four hundred from Jalpaiguri," said a health official.

The patients were admitted in various hospitals and nursing homes in the region.

The local authorities have opened blood testing and awareness camps, while stressing on mosquito control and garbage clearance.

Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) leader and Siliguri municipal councillor Joy Chakraborty was one of those admitted as a suspected dengue patient.

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Siliguri - 74 dengue patients admitted in govt. hospital

1:54 PM

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Siliguri

Siliguri - A total of 74 confirmed dengue patients are admitted in a government hospital in Siliguri town of West Bengal, an official said Wednesday.

“There are 74 confirmed dengue cases admitted now. Half of them are serious,” North Bengal Medical College and Hospital Superintendent Sabyasachi Das said.

One person has died of the disease in Darjeeling in the last few days, said District Chief Medical Officer (Health) Subir Bhowmick.

A 31-year-old woman, Sarada Sha, died in the hospital Wednesday due to encephalitis, an ailment of the brain, Das said.

Around 700 suspected dengue cases have been reported in Darjeeling and adjoining Jalpaiguri district.

“Confirmatory tests are being done. Three hundred of them are from Darjeeling and four hundred from Jalpaiguri,” said a health official.

The patients were admitted in various hospitals and nursing homes in the region.

The local authorities have opened blood testing and awareness camps, while stressing on mosquito control and garbage clearance.

Signs and symptoms


Typically, people infected with dengue virus are asymptomatic (80%) or only have mild symptoms such as an uncomplicated fever.Others have more severe illness (5%), and in a small proportion it is life-threatening.The incubation period (time between exposure and onset of symptoms) ranges from 3–14 days, but most often it is 4–7 days. Therefore, travelers returning from endemic areas are unlikely to have dengue if fever or other symptoms start more than 14 days after arriving home. Children often experience symptoms similar to those of the common cold and gastroenteritis (vomiting and diarrhea) and have a greater risk of severe complications,though initial symptoms are generally mild but include high fever.

Source: newsyaps.com and wikipedia.org

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New AIDS vaccine may completely eradicate HIV from body

9:31 PM

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study

A promising new AIDS vaccine may be able to completely eradicate the deadly HIV from the body, a new study has claimed.

The HIV/AIDS vaccine candidate developed at Oregon Health & Science University has demonstrated the capacity to effectively remove all traces of an AIDS-causing virus from non-human primates, researchers said.
The promising vaccine is being tested through the use of a non-human primate form of HIV, called simian immunodeficiency virus, or SIV, which causes AIDS in monkeys.
Following further development, it is hoped an HIV-form of the vaccine candidate can soon be tested in humans.
"To date, HIV infection has only been cured in a very small number of highly publicised but unusual clinical cases in which HIV-infected individuals were treated with anti-viral medicines very early after the onset of infection or received a stem cell transplant to combat cancer," said Louis Picker, associate director of the OHSU Vaccine and Gene Therapy Institute.
"This latest research suggests that certain immune responses elicited by a new vaccine may also have the ability to completely remove HIV from the body," said Picker.
The Picker lab\'s approach involves the use of cytomegalovirus, or CMV, a common virus already carried by a large percentage of the population.
Researchers discovered that pairing CMV with SIV had a unique effect. They found that a modified version of CMV engineered to express SIV proteins generates and indefinitely maintains so-called "effector memory" T-cells that are capable of searching out and destroying SIV-infected cells.
T-cells are a key component of the body\'s immune system, which fights off disease, but T-cells elicited by conventional vaccines of SIV itself are not able to eliminate the virus.
The SIV-specific T-cells elicited by the modified CMV were different. About 50 per cent of monkeys given highly pathogenic SIV after being vaccinated with this vaccine became infected with SIV but over time eliminated all trace of SIV from the body.
In effect, the hunters of the body were provided with a much better targeting system and better weapons to help them find and destroy an elusive enemy.
"Through this method we were able to teach the monkey\'s body to better \'prepare its defences\' to combat the disease," said Picker.
"Our vaccine mobilised a T-cell response that was able to overtake the SIV invaders in 50 per cent of the cases treated. Moreover, in those cases with a positive response, our testing suggests SIV was banished from the host. We are hopeful that pairing our modified CMV vector with HIV will lead to a similar result in humans," said Picker.
The study was published in the journal Nature.

Source : financialexpress.com

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Fruit juices and smoothies risk to our health - Study

1:25 PM

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study

Researchers from the US have pointed out that fruit juices and smoothies are now a new risk to our health because of the amount of sugar the healthy drinks are believed to contain.

Image courtesy Shutterstock

Barry Popkin and George Bray pointed the finger at high fructose corn syrup in soft drinks in 2004, causing a huge headache for the big manufacturers, including Coca-Cola and Pepsi.

Popkin, a distinguished professor at the department of nutrition at the University of North Carolina, told the Guardian that smoothies and fruit juice are the new danger.

He added that it’s kind of the next step in the evolution of the battle, and it’s a really big part of it because in every country they’ve been replacing soft drinks with fruit juice and smoothies as the new healthy beverage.

Researchers from the UK, USA and Singapore found that, in large-scale studies involving nurses, people who ate whole fruit, especially blueberries, grapes and apples, were less likely to get type 2 diabetes, which is obesity-related, but those who drank fruit juice were at increased risk.

People who swapped their fruit juice for whole fruits three times a week cut their risk by 7 percent.

The British Soft Drinks Association says that consumption of soft drinks containing added sugar has fallen by 9 percent over the last 10 years, while the incidence of obesity has risen by 15 percent.

The study is published in the journal Pediatric Obesity.

Source : dnaindia.com

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Punjab wins CMR e-Readiness-2013 Gold Award for improving healthcare

12:57 PM

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India Live news

Punjab has been awarded the Dataquest-CMR e-Readiness-2013 Gold Award for e-governance impact on improving healthcare service delivery and highest reduction in maternal and infant mortality rate.

Stating this on Friday, an official spokesman said the special secretary and director, governance reforms, VN Zade received the award at a function in New Delhi recently.

Former union secretary, department of information technology and telecommunications, and designated president of the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) R Chandrasekhar conferred the award.

The spokesman said the award had been given to Punjab for registering remarkable performance in improvement of healthcare service delivery and its impact on reduction in female and infant mortality rates. He added that the national planning commission on IMR (infant mortality rate) and MMR (maternal mortality rate) had released the data for 29 states, comparing the figures for 2006-07 and 2011-12.

On the basis of this data, the states with the highest drop in IMR and MMR won the awards for best healthcare service delivery. He said Punjab had reduced IMR and MMR by 34% from 50 per 1,000 live births in 2006-07 to 33 per 1,000 live births during 2011-12.

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Indian men have the least sex

12:08 PM

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study

A survey conducted by Men's Health found that males in India have sex an average of once a week, while Croatian men were the mostly likely to get dirty in parks, pools and cars.

When it comes to the sexcapades of men around the world, Croatians have the most partners in their lifetimes, Indians think their women are faking it, and British men and women are most likely to take a page from "50 Shades of Grey," according to a new survey.
Men's Health found that Indian men have sex less than once a week on average. This was the lowest rate among the 30 participating countries. Almost half of the Indian males surveyed (48%) said they believe their partners often fake orgasm, and the average man has had just three bedroom companions.

RELATED: PEOPLE WHO HAVE MORE SEX MAKE MORE MONEY

Meanwhile, men in Croatia reported having an average of 11 partners each, making them the most promiscuous guys on the planet. They were also more likely than males from other countries to get it on in parks, fields, pools and cars, according to The Telegraph.
British men and women were deemed the kinkiest based on the survey. British ladies had an average of nine partners each.
RELATED: ONE IN FIVE WOMEN SAY THEY NEVER FEEL SEXY: SURVEY
And men around the world might want to learn a thing or two from their Dutch brothers. The Netherlands was the only country where women said they were happy with the amount of foreplay that was offered.
Nearly 50,800 people around the world participated in the survey.

RELATED: PAKISTAN A HOMOPHOBIC COUNTRY THAT GOOGLES GAY PORN: REPORT

Men's Health India's managing editor Bobby Varkey told The Telegraph that Indians may live in noisy "joint homes," which prevents them from having sex as often as they'd like because of the lack of privacy. He said that having an extramarital affair is incredibly taboo in India. Varkey also drew a link between apparent sexual frustration among men and the nation's epidemic of rape and violence against women.
Ranjana Kumari of the Center for Social Research, however, challenged this notion. She pointed out that 95% of people in India are in arranged marriages, and half wed by the time they turn 18.
"Sexual access is very much there for men," she told The Telegraph. "I wouldn't want to generalise that India is a frustrated [sexual] culture. Rape isn't about sex but about men who think they can control women and instill fear in them."


Source : www.nydailynews.com

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Breastfeeding and health benefits in infancy

11:11 AM

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health news

Scientists have linked breastfeeding with better receptive language at 3 years of age and verbal and nonverbal intelligence at age 7 years.

Evidence supports the relationship between breastfeeding and health benefits in infancy, but the extent to which breastfeeding leads to better cognitive development is less certain, according to the study background.

Mandy B. Belfort, M.D., M.P.H., of Boston Children’s Hospital, and colleagues examined the relationships of breastfeeding duration and exclusivity with child cognition at ages 3 and 7 years.

They also studied the extent to which maternal fish intake during lactation affected associations of infant feeding and later cognition. Researchers used assessment tests to measure cognition.

The study said that longer breastfeeding duration was associated with higher Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test score at age 3 years (0.21; 95 percent CI, 0.03-0.38 points per month breastfed) and with higher intelligence on the Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test at age 7 years (0.35; 0.16-0.53 verbal points per month breastfed; and 0.29; 0.05-0.54 nonverbal points per month breastfed). However, the study also noted that breastfeeding duration was not associated with Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning scores.

The authors said that in summary, our results support a causal relationship of breastfeeding in infancy with receptive language at age 3 and with verbal and nonverbal IQ at school age.

These findings support national and international recommendations to promote exclusive breastfeeding through age 6 months and continuation of breastfeeding through at least age 1 year.

The study has been published in JAMA Pediatrics.

Source: dnaindia.com

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World Hepatitis Day

10:20 AM

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health news

For 45-year-old Prajakta Juwekar*, World Hepatitis Day today is very special as after two years of battling with the disease, she is now free from it. 

A resident of Ghatkopar, Juwekar was detected with breast cancer six years ago. 
As she successfully overcame it, she was diagnosed with hepatitis C two years ago. Her condition got so bad that she was referred for a liver transplant.”

“Initially, when we put her on treatment, her platelet counts went low. The platelet count fell to dangerous levels below 4,000 and she started bleeding,” said Dr Aabha Nagral,consultant gastroenterologist and hepatologist at Jaslok Hospital. 

The team of doctors then decided to go for life-saving drugs meant for increasing the platelet count. “Luckily it worked in her case. After a turbulent year and a half, she is now virus-free and resuming her normal life. Our biggest achievement was that she didn’t need a liver transplant,” said Dr Nagral. 

There are five main hepatitis viruses, referred to as types A, B, C, D and E. (see right)

“Hepatitis B (HBV) and Hepatitis C (HCV) infections are silent diseases that remain asymptomatic for decades. Due to lower awareness, more than 80 percent HCV patients and over 60 percent patients with HBV are diagnosed at a stage when the disease is irreversible,” said Dr Rakesh Rai, liver transplant expert at Fortis Hospital.

*name changed

DNA

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5,000 doctors to witness Obstructive Sleep Apnea surgery in India

11:03 PM

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Live News

More than 5,000 doctors from all over the world will witness a live surgery to treat Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA), a sleep disorder, to be performed at the Asian Heart Institute (AHI) here Tuesday, an official said here Saturday.

This is the first time that such a live robotic surgery will be performed before a global audience of medicos along with expert lectures on the occasion.

Leading ENT surgeon Vikas Agrawal will operate on three patients to show the different issues pertaining to OSA among Indians.

Two Italian medicos and pioneers in OSA - Claudio Vicini and Filippo Montevecchi - shall discuss different aspects of Transoral Robotic Surgery for OSA.

OSA is a disorder in which a person stops breathing during night, maybe several times - with the gaps called 'apneas' (literally "without breath").

The disorder occurs when tissues in the upper throat collapse at different times during sleep, thereby blocking passage of air.

According to Agrawal, OSA increases with age and the latest Indian studies have revealed that its prevalence is three times higher in men as compared to women.

Agrawal is the first Indian medico to cure this complex ENT procedure robotically and endoscopically.

AHI Vice-Chairman and Managing Director Ramakanta Panda (who operated on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh four years ago), has lauded the initiative which would help AHI set new benchmarks globally.

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Low sleep can lead to ageing of skin

7:50 PM

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health news

Scientists have shown that lack of quality sleep can lead to ageing of skin, says a study.

In a first-of-its-kind clinical trial, physician-scientists at University Hospitals (UH) Case Medical Centre, US, found that sleep quality impacts skin function and ageing.

The recently completed study demonstrated that poor sleepers had increased signs of skin ageing and slower recovery from a variety of environmental stressors, such as disruption of the skin barrier or ultraviolet (UV) radiation.

Poor sleepers also had worse assessment of their own skin and facial appearance, reports Science Daily.

The research team, led by lead investigator Elma Baron, director of the Skin Study Centre at UH Case Medical Centre, presented their data recently at the International Investigative Dermatology Meeting in Edinburgh, Scotland, in an abstract titled 'Effects of Sleep Quality on Skin Ageing and Function'.

"Our study is the first to conclusively demonstrate that inadequate sleep is correlated with reduced skin health and accelerates skin ageing. Sleep deprived women show signs of premature skin ageing and a decrease in their skin's ability to recover after sun exposure," said Baron, who is also associate professor of dermatology at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.

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Skipping Breakfast Increases Risk Of Heart Attack

10:33 AM

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study

Yet another reason to eat breakfast in the morning–doing so may prevent you from having a heart attack.

Skipping Breakfast Increases  Risk Of Heart Attack

A recent study of men aged 45-82 who regularly skipped breakfast demonstrated a 27% increase in risk of having a heart attack or developing coronary artery disease compared with those who ate breakfast daily. Although the research was done in older men, researchers believe the results may likely apply to the broader population as a whole.

It is important to note that this was an observational study, and cannot prove a cause and effect relationship between consumption of breakfast and risk of heart attack.

The research was published in the Journal, Circulation, July 22.

The researchers evaluated 27,000 men regarding their daily eating habits in 1992. Based on their results, 13% of the respondents stated that they routinely skipped breakfast. These men were all at least 45 years of age and had professional careers. Over the next 16 years, 1,527 suffered a heart attack-fatal or nonfatal.

After accounting for other variables such as smoking, alcohol use, diet, high blood pressure and diabetes, this equated to a 27% percent added risk for skipping breakfast.



More details of the study revealed that younger men were more likely to skip breakfast than older men. Other factors associated with skipping breakfast included smoking, drinking alcohol regularly, working full time, being unmarried, and being less physically active overall.

Of note, previous research has shown a relationship between skipping breakfast and developing high blood pressure, obesity, and diabetes—all a precursor to the development of the dangerous metabolic syndrome- an important risk for heart disease.

What distinguishes the current study is the role of skipping breakfast and its future relationship to having a heart attack.

So why does skipping breakfast lead to an increased risk for having a heart attack?

Researchers believe that people who skip breakfast tend to eat larger, more calorically dense meals later in the day, often late into the night, to compensate for the lack of an early morning meal. They also tend to eat more meals later into the night.

Eating later into the night–the case for a small number of men in the study who awoke after initally going to sleep– was associated with a 55 % increase in the incidence of developing coronary artery disease. The overall risk, however, was perceived to be small, since only a minority of men in this study exhibited this behavior.

Ultimately, however, this means fewer hours in the day to process additional, more calorically dense foods, which lead to higher levels of blood sugars and more intense and frequent insulin spikes. This process is thought to be a precursor to premature development of coronary artery disease, more commonly termed atherogenesis.

One drawback of the study was that researchers did not ask what participants actually ate for breakfast. So whether they ate sausage, biscuits with gravy, or a big stack of buttery pancakes was never investigated. The question is whether eating fat laden, highly caloric breakfast foods is better than skipping breakfast altogether.

The issue of when you eat, as well as the content of what you eat is currently a topic of debate. It is unclear what is more important, but it is likely a combination of both factors that is pivotal.

The bottom line is that people who eat breakfast generally eat fewer calories throughout the day, and are usually healthier than those who do not eat breakfast.

According to data from the NPD group, as many as 10% of US adults–30 million people–routinely skip breakfast.

The take home message is that eating breakfast is an important component of a healthy lifestyle.

If results of the research examined here can be demonstrated in women, as well as among other races and ethnic groups, then eating breakfast may become an important preventive health measure for the public.


Of note, a January, 2013 New England Journal of Medicine article published this year called into question the concept that eating breakfast actually reduces obesity, examining various myths associated with gaining weight. The article evaluated data from two specific studies that demonstrated that breakfast eaters did not have a reduction in rates of obesity.

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