Contraception and birth control Archive

As a group, men have nudged down their stroke numbers over the past decade. Why haven't women seen the same improvement?

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Men are less likely to have strokes than they were 10 years ago, but the risk for women has stayed about the same, according to a study of stroke data from Ohio and Kentucky, published online on August 21 by Neurology.

The question is, why?

"This study raises important concerns about the lack of decline in stroke rates in women," says Dr. Kathryn M. Rexrode, associate professor of medicine and chief of the Division of Women's Health at Harvard Medical School. Study authors suggested it's likely that better treatments for high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes, and a reduction in the number of people smoking helped to reduce the risk for men for having the most common type of stroke — ischemic stroke, which is typically caused by a clot that blocks blood flow to the brain. But women, who in theory should benefit from the same interventions, didn't see any improvement in their stroke rates over the study period.

All women, regardless of risk, should focus on preventing diabetes.

Can a blood test act as a crystal ball, alerting you to a health hazard that may await you down the road? Researchers say they've found one that may do just that for diabetes. It could help predict whether women — even ones with no other signs of the disease — may develop the condition in the future.

In a study published online June 21 by the Journal of Clinical Lipidology, researchers showed that in many cases, a test called lipoprotein insulin resistance (LPIR) did a better job, at predicting which women would go on to develop diabetes, says Dr. Samia Mora, one of the study authors and associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School. In many cases, it was more accurate than traditional measures — such as

Experts says it's too early for alarm, but the findings provide another good reason to pay attention to oral health.

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Is gum disease linked to cancer? A study published in the August issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention suggests a tie between the two, finding that older women with gum disease had a higher risk for cancers of the breast, lung, and esophagus as well as melanoma, the most dangerous form of skin cancer.

But it's not time to sound the alarm just yet, because while the study was published in a well-regarded journal, it had limitations that may have affected the results, says Alessandro Villa, instructor in oral medicine, infection, and immunity at the Harvard School of Dental Medicine and associate surgeon at Brigham and Women's Hospital. Even so, he says, your oral health should still be a top priority because while it may be premature to say gum disease and cancer are linked, research has shown that gum disease, also known as periodontal disease, may increase the risk of heart disease and other health problems.

Challenging a long-held belief, a new study found that women who received epidural anesthesia during labor did not have prolonged labor or higher rates of cesarean births.

Surveys of over 900 men who were diagnosed with prostate cancer in the 1990s found that approximately 15% had some regret over their treatment choices. Study authors encourage doctors and patients to have frank and thorough discussions about about the risks and benefits of various forms of treatment for prostate cancer.

Charles Schmidt As they get older, do men with prostate cancer come to regret the treatment decisions they made? A new study of men diagnosed during the mid-1990s indicates that some of them will. Richard Hoffman, a professor of internal medicine and epidemiology at the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine in Iowa City, […]

Charles Schmidt Does screening for prostate cancer with the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test save lives? A new study suggests that it does, but at the risk of exposing men with slow-growing tumors that may not be life-threatening to treatments they may not really need. Published in Annals of Internal Medicine, the study reconciles conflicting results […]

Muscle loss is inevitable as you age, but adopting a regular weight training program can help slow the process.

You naturally lose muscle as you age, a condition called sarcopenia. After age 30, men begin to lose as much as 3% to 5% of their muscle mass per decade, and most will lose about 30% over their lifetimes. But you have the power to change this — with weight training.

"Weight training is the best way to increase muscle mass lost due to aging and keep the muscle you have, and it's never too late to begin," say Vijay Daryanani, a personal trainer with Harvard-affiliated Spaulding Outpatient Center.