Exposure to diesel pollution may damage your heart

People exposed to particulate matter (PM) emitted mainly from diesel used in vehicles may be at greater risk of developing heart attack, heart failure and death, researchers warned.

The findings showed that exposure to PM 2.5 from diesel can lead to systemic inflammation, vasoconstriction — narrowing of blood vessels, and raised blood pressure, all of which can cause harmful changes to the structure and function of heart.

The combination of these factors can also increase the pressure in the heart, which enlarges to cope with the overload.

Every 5 per cubic metre air or µg/m3 increase in exposure was associated with a 4-8 per cent increase in left ventricular volume (structure) and a 2 per cent decrease in left ventricular ejection fraction (function), the researchers said.

“The study found that as PM2.5 exposure rises, the larger the heart gets and the worse it performs. Both of these measures are associated with increased morbidity and mortality from heart disease,” said lead author Nay Aung from Queen Mary University of London.

This may be due to an inflammatory response. The inhalation of PM2.5 causes localised inflammation of the lungs followed by a more systemic inflammation affecting the whole body, Aung added.

For the study, presented at the annual conference EuroCMR 2017 in Prague, the team included 4,255 participants, 62 years old on average.

“Reducing PM 2.5 emission should be an urgent public health priority and the worst offenders such as diesel vehicles should be addressed with policy measures,” Aung noted.

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ANTI-INFLAMMATORY DRUGS THAT TREAT ARTHRITIS COULD ALSO HELP WITH DEPRESSION

Anti-inflammatory drugs similar to those used to treat conditions like rheumatoid arthritis and psoriasis could in future be used to treat some cases of depression, according to a research by the Uni. of Cambridge.

Researchers analysed data from 20 clinical trials involving the use of anti-cytokine drugs to treat a range of autoimmune inflammatory diseases.

By looking at additional beneficial side-effects of the treatments, the researchers were able to show that there was a significant antidepressant effect from the drugs compared to a placebo based on a meta-analysis of 7 randomised controlled trials.

Meta-analyses of the other types of clinical trials showed similar results.

When we're exposed to an infection, for e.g., influenza or a stomach bug, our immune system fights back to control & remove the infection. During this process, immune cells flood the blood stream with proteins known as cytokines. This process is known as systemic inflammation.

Even when we're healthy, our bodies carry trace levels of these proteins- known as inflammatory-markers- which rise exponentially in response to infection.

Previous work from the team found that children with high everyday levels of one of these markers are at greater risk of developing depression & psychosis in adulthood, suggesting a role for the immune system, particularly chronic low-grade systemic inflammation, in mental illness.

Inflammation can also occur as a result of the immune system mistaking healthy cells for infected cells & attacking the body, leading to autoimmune inflammatory diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis & Crohn's disease.

New types of anti-inflammatory drugs called anti-cytokine monoclonal antibodies & cytokine inhibitors have been developed recently, some of which are now routinely used for patients who respond poorly to conventional treatments.

Many more are undergoing clinical trials to test their efficacy and safety.

The team of researchers carried out a meta-analysis of these clinical trials & found that the drugs led to an improvement in the severity of the depressive symptoms, independently of improvements in physical illness.

In other words, regardless of whether a drug successfully treated rheumatoid arthritis, for e.g., it would still help improve a patient's depressive symptoms. Their results are published today in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.

A lead researcher said , " It's becoming increasingly clear to us that inflammation plays a role in depression, at least for some individuals, and now our review suggests that it may be possible to treat these individuals using some anti-inflammatory drugs. These are not your everyday anti-inflammatory drugs such as Ibuprofen, however, but a particular new class of drugs."

"It's too early to say whether these anti0cytokine drugs can be used in clinical practice for depression, however," added the co-author of the study.

"We will need clinical trials to test how effective they're in patients who do not have the chronic conditions for which the drugs have been developed, such as rheumatoid arthritis or Crohn's disease. On top of this, some existing drugs can have potentially serious side-effects, which would need to be addressed," he said.

The team believed that anti0inflammatory drugs may offer hope for patients for whom current anti-depressant are ineffective.

Although the trials reviewed by the team involve physical illnesses that trigger inflammation- & hence potentially contribute to depression-their previous work found a connection between depression & baseline levels of inflammation in healthy people (when someone doesn't have an acute infection), which can be caused by a number of factors such as genes & psychological stress.

" About a 3rd of patients whio are resistant to anti-depressants show evidence of inflammation. So, anti-inflammatory treatments could be relevant for a large number of people who suffer from depression," added the researcher.

The research was published in Molecular Psychiatry Journal.

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Turmeric could help treat diabetes

Curcumin, a substance in turmeric, combined with an omega-3 fat may potentially delay or prevent the onset of type-2 diabetes, according to researchers.

Health scientists from the University of Newcastle's Nutraceuticals Research Group, led by Professor Manohar Garg, are seeking 80 recruits for a new clinical study to find out whether the Indian spice combined with an omega-3 fat can delay the onset of type 2 diabetes or prevent it altogether.

"The root cause of type 2 diabetes is systemic inflammation, which impacts insulin secretion and function," said Garg. "We want to nip the inflammation in the bud," he said. "This study will use two bioactive compounds that we find in food – curcumin and omega-3 fat. Both are very important anti-inflammatory agents," Garg said.


Curcumin, derived from turmeric, is part of the ginger family and commonly used for food colouration. Its healing properties are well known in India.

"Turmeric has been used for centuries to promote healing of bruises, sprains, wounds and inflammation," he said. "Nowadays in India the level of curcumin (turmeric) intake has dropped considerably as people switch to Westernised fast foods, and it parallels with a significant rise in type 2 diabetes cases. In fact the disease is now an epidemic in India and may soon be the number one health burden," said Garg.

The randomised control trial will test both compounds, with the recruitment group being segregated into four. One will get curcumin only, the second will get omega-3 fat only, the third will receive both, and the fourth will serve as a control group.

The capsules contain 200 milligrammes of curcumin and one gramme of omega-3 fat respectively. People who are prone to develop diabetes because of impaired glucose tolerance or impaired fasting glucose, and who are aged between 30 and 70, may be eligible.

"The anti-inflammatory mechanisms surrounding curcumin and omega-3 fats are different, so we want to test if they complement each other and have treatment synergies beyond their individual effects," Garg said."Our thinking is that the combination is safe, free of any side-effects and may prove to be as effective as drugs used for management of diabetes," he added.

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5 types of pain you should not treat at home

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Most often than not, we deal with pain by popping pain killers without giving it much thought. The strong willed ones usually wait for it to subside or go for the tried and tested methods at home.

Beware, not all pains should be treated at home. A physiotherapist told us about the 5 types of pain that you should not attempt to treat at home:

1.Pain accompanied with fever, fatigue, red-hot-swollen joints which worsens with exercise is indicative of rheumatoid arthritis which is a chronic, systemic inflammatory disorder that may result in deformed and painful joints and lead to loss of function.

2.Pain in the left arm accompanied with feeling of tightness and discomfort in chest and upper back could be Angina Pectoris, a symptom of reduced blood flow to the heart as in coronary artery disease.

3.Pain and cramping in muscles of the extremities (commonly calf muscles) at rest along with pallor/ discoloration and temperature reduction of skin overlying the painful area and lack of pulses is suggestive of arterial insufficiency or blockage in blood supply to an organ.

4.Acute or chronic back pain with numbness, tingling or weakness in the limbs or loss of bladder/ bowel control points towards nerve compression which may need emergency intervention.

5.Deep, severe, boring pain anywhere in the body which worsens at night and is accompanied with anemia, unexplained fractures, trivial falls, frequent infections and fatigue could be due to a type of bone cancer.