Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7VhzLMO4N/

Being overweight but also underweight boosts a woman’s risk of suffering recurrent pregnancy losses by 20%.  British obstetricians performed a focused meta-analysis of 16 published studies covering nearly 66,000 women.

Repeated miscarriages are 21% more likely in women with BMI’s >25 than those with normal body weight.  In those with repeated losses, having a BMI greater than 30 bumps up the risk of additional miscarriages to 77%.  Those with BMIs under 18, were 20% more likely to have repeat losses, particularly if they were underweight between the ages of 18 and 20.

Smoking, drinking, coffee, stress, and night shifts had no significant effects on recurrent miscarriages.

Pregnant women should weigh daily and adjust intake accordingly.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-86445-2

#miscarriage #overweight #underweight

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7UgbcLSY4/

The debate about egg safety continues.  Some say that ingesting cholesterol-rich eggs plugs your blood vessels while others insist that the dangerous cholesterol is manufactured in your own body due to saturated fat intake.

A huge Chinese study using the American NIH-AARP database looked at more than 521,000 persons reporting their dietary choices over 16 years.  Those wolfing down the most egg had 16% higher risk of a cardiovascular death and a 23% higher risk of cancer death.

The study does have shortcomings as the egg eaters also smoked more, exercised less, and didn’t take daily aspirin.  

The winning formula is healthy eating, avoiding smoke, and regular aerobic exercise.

https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1003508

#egg #heart #cancer #exercise

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7SmdLtfBz/

Exploding cigars are an old prank, but e-cigarette explosions aren’t funny and can be devastating to an increasing number of teens.  University of Utah surgeons combed the case records for 9 children’s hospitals looking for e-cigarette-related injuries during the years 2016 through 2019.

A total of 15 children 13 to 18 years were injured.  Ten required hospital admission and 3 landed in the ICU.  The catalog of injuries included facial burns, loss of teeth, thigh and groin burns, hand burns, eye injuries, and even a jaw fracture. Forty percent required surgery.

Nationally, FEMA reported 195 e-cigarette fires and explosions between 2009 and 2016, and 29% of the victims suffered severe injuries.

Why do e-cigarettes explode? They often contain often cheap lithium-ion batteries to power their heaters.  When these batteries get banged around, they can explode and the e-cigarette becomes a flaming rocket.

So add this explosion danger to lung damage and cancer generation making 3 good reasons for your teens and for you not to use these e-cigarettes.

https://www.journalofsurgicalresearch.com/article/S0022-4804(22)00095-6/fulltext

https://www.usfa.fema.gov/downloads/pdf/publications/electronic_cigarettes.pdf

#ecigarette #explosions #batteries #lithiumion #cancer #emphysema

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7RMIxpwIB/

Taking a daily cocoa supplement may reduce your chance of dying from cardiovascular disease by 27%.  Preventive medicine investigators at Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital conducted a randomized, double-blind placebo controlled study in which 420 persons took a commercially available cocoa extract supplement each day for 3.6 years.  Each of the Mars Edge CocoaVia capsules contained 500 mg of flavanols.  A control group of 456 consumed a multivitamin on a daily basis.

Besides having a reduced risk of death, those taking the Mars CocoaVia supplement had a 13% lower risk of heart attacks, a 9% lower risk of stroke, and overall a 10% lower risk of all cardiovascular events.  Only the reduced risk of death was statistically significant.

The researchers stop short of making a blanket recommendation to use the supplement citing the need for more work.  If you are at risk for cardiovascular disease, there is nothing wrong with using this supplement.  It’s not cheap, though, as a one month supply is about $40.

https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/advance-article/doi/10.1093/ajcn/nqac055/6548186

https://amzn.to/35aNcmc

#cocoa #cardiovasculardisease #stroke #mars #cocoavia

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7Pwwss9CX/

Women who smoke consistently from 14 weeks before conception to 10 weeks after it carry fetuses that are consistently underweight and are born with a notable weight deficit.  Dutch researchers studied 689 pregnant women between 2010 and 2018 and compared the babies carried by the smokers with the non-smokers.

Those who smoked a half-pack a day or more were already carrying smaller fetuses by week 10 of their pregnancies.  Their 20 week ultrasounds revealed significantly smaller babies and no growth catchup during the second trimester. Over their gestational periods, the weight deficits persisted and theses babies of smoking mothers were more likely to be born small for gestational age.  Furthermore, the fetal growth deficits were directly proportional to the number of cigarettes smoked per day.

 If you are a woman who smokes and you want to have the healthiest baby possible, stop smoking or cut it way down by 4 months before you try to conceive and don’t resume until after your baby is born if ever.

https://academic.oup.com/humrep/advance-article/doi/10.1093/humrep/deac018/6533372

#pregnancy #smoking #underweight #fetalgrowthretardation

pregnancy, smoking, underweight, fetalgrowthretardation

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq7N1J7gD4e/

A child’s level of dislike for a given food rather than how much the child likes that food is a better predictor of consumption at any given meal.  Penn State nutritionists studied 61 children 4 to 6 years of age who were asked to rate the 7 foods presented to them on a meal tray: chicken nuggets, grapes, potato chips, cherry tomatoes, broccoli, ketchup, and cookies.

After the children consumed the available foods they wished, the researchers weighed the remaining foods and mathematically compared the food consumed with the child’s expressed preferences.  The results showed that the correlation between liking a food and the amount consumed was poor while the relationship between disliking a given food and the amount that remained uneaten was statistically significant.

Interesting enough, other studies have shown the same trend for adults.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S019566632200037X?via%3Dihub

#children #foodpreferences #foodconsumption

children, foodpreferences, foodconsumption

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq31GOIvydl/

Two-thirds of Americans don’t know that drinking alcohol increases their cancer risk. This from a National Cancer Institute survey of 3,865 adults statistically representative of nearly 254 million Americans.

Looking at the details, nearly 80% are unaware that wine poses a risk, 75% don’t know that beer poses a cancer danger, and 69% are unaware of that hard liquor is associated with greater risk of cancer.  The good news is that 2 of every 3 in the US support health warnings on alcoholic beverage containers.

Alcohol ingestion increases the risk of 7 cancers: breast, colon, oral cavity, throat, voice box, esophagus, and liver.  The key to avoiding these is moderation.

https://www.ajpmonline.org/article/S0749-3797(21)00430-X/fulltext

https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/alcohol/alcohol-fact-sheet

#alcohol #cancer #packagewarnings #moderation

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/CqlxV2QMvcJ/

Dr. Smith gives his WBZ Radio listeners a tip regarding the do-it-yourself Heimlich-type maneuver that actually preceded Heimlich’s report.  The Flake Maneuver was developed by Boston Children's Hospital ENT specialist Carlyle Flake MD.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1987-10-04-8703150357-story.html

#choking #flakemaneuver #heimlichmaneuver #foreignbody #asphyxiation #wbznewsradio

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/Cqlv6CwJEMx/

Lead-in by WBZ’s Gary LaPierre

Dr. Smith reports on his WBZ Medical Minute the sad New England Journal posting about a young man who swallowed a toothpick with ultimately fatal consequences.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17457300.2021.1930059?journalCode=nics20

#toothpick #bowels #eyes #perforation 

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/CqluJoPL-zs/

Dr. Smith takes a WBZ Radio on-air call from the mother of a 6 year old with recurrent ear infections and persistent middle ear fluid.  They discuss a medical approach than can prevent the need for tube surgery.

https://www.drhowardsmith.com/book

#earinfections #earfluid #otitis #serousotitis #eartubes #wbznewsradio