Health Capsules

Breastfeeding may cut heart attack risk in mothers

Breastfeeding is not only healthy for the baby, but also reduces the mother's risk of suffering a heart attack or stroke later in life, a study claims. Researchers found that compared to women who had never breastfed, mothers who breastfed their babies had a nine per cent lower risk of heart disease and an eight per cent lower risk of stroke. Among mothers who breastfed each of their babies for two years or more, heart disease risk was 18 per cent lower and stroke risk was 17 per cent lower than among mothers who never breastfed, researchers said. They also found that every six months of breastfeeding per baby was associated with a four per cent lower risk of heart disease and a three per cent lower risk of stroke. The health benefits may be explained by a faster "reset" of the mother's metabolism after pregnancy," said an expert. Pregnancy changes a woman's metabolism dramatically as she stores fat to provide the energy necessary for her baby's growth and for breastfeeding once the baby is born. Breastfeeding could eliminate the stored fat faster and more completely. The study was published in the Journal of the American Heart Association.

Men gain weight after marriage

Men get fatter after getting hitched and the early days of fatherhood add to the problem. A study shows that married men have a higher Body Mass Index (BMI) than their non-married counterparts, adding approximately three pounds or 1.4kg to the scales. There's no effect on male BMI if their wife becomes pregnant, but in the early years after childbirth men gain weight. It takes the period just before and after divorce to register a dip in male BMI. The findings clear up the confusion of competing theories put forward by social scientists linking BMI to marital status. It confirms the idea that people who are single but seeking marriage have more incentive to stay fit and make more effort than those who are married. It also supports the theory that marriage leads to more social occasions involving richer foods, or more regular meals for men; while putting paid to the idea that married couples have better physical health because of increased social support. The study of heterosexual couple in the United States, between 1999 and 2013, used data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and is published in the journal Social Science and Medicine.

Parkinson's may partly be an autoimmune disease

Scientists have found the first direct evidence that Parkinson's disease is partly an autoimmune disorder in which the body's immune system attacks its own tissues. The findings raise the possibility that the death of neurons in Parkinson's could be prevented by therapies that dampen the immune response. "Our findings show that two fragments of alpha-synuclein, a protein that accumulates in the brain cells of people with Parkinson's, can activate the T cells involved in autoimmune attacks," said an expert. "It remains to be seen whether the immune response to alpha-synuclein is an initial cause of Parkinson's, or if it contributes to neuronal death and worsening symptoms after the onset of the disease," another expert added. These findings, however, could provide a much-needed diagnostic test for Parkinson's disease, and could help to identify individuals at risk or in the early stages of the disease. The new study found that T cells can be tricked into thinking dopamine neurons (those affected by Parkinson's disease) are foreign by the build-up of damaged alpha-synuclein proteins, a key feature of Parkinson's disease.

Your job could be making you vitamin D deficient

Stuck behind your office desk for most part of the day? Your nine-to-five job could be a major factor that puts you at high risk of vitamin D deficiency. Shift workers, healthcare workers and indoor workers in particular are at high risk of vitamin D deficiency, researchers suggest. They said the results suggest that occupation is a major factor that may contribute to suboptimal vitamin D levels. Regular screening of vitamin D levels in at-risk groups should be considered for future clinical practice guidelines and public health initiatives. This could help prevent adverse health outcomes linked to vitamin D deficiency, such as metabolic disorders, psychiatric and cardiovascular disorders, and cancer. The researchers found that prevalence of vitamin D deficiency was highest among shift workers (80 per cent of individuals), followed by indoor workers (77per cent) and healthcare students (72per cent). Among healthcare workers, rates of vitamin D deficiency varied depending on whether they were students, medical residents (65 per cent), practicing physicians (46 per cent), nurses (43 per cent) or other healthcare professionals (43 per cent). Vitamin D production by the body is reliant on sunshine and UV exposure so any activity that reduces exposure tends to reduce vitamin D levels.  The study has been published in the open access journal BMC Public Health.

— Agencies