Our weekly round up of the latest news in the world of health. This week we look at heart attack symptoms may signal cocaine use in some patients, at a possible genetic factor in post-traumatic stress disorder, at why taking human growth hormone may not help athletes, and at the shelf life of donated blood.
Stay well.
This Issue:
Cocaine and Heart Symptoms
PTSD Gene
Growth Hormone Not a Performance Enhancer
Shelf Life for Blood
In the News:
Cocaine and Heart Symptoms Some young emergency room patients with heart attack symptoms may be experiencing effects of cocaine use. New guidelines published in the American Heart Association journal Circulation warn ER doctors that chest pain, shortness of breath, anxiety, palpitations, dizziness, nausea and heavy sweating in younger people with no history of heart disease could signal cocaine use. It's important to know whether the drug is causing the symptoms, because the treatment may be different, the Associated Press reports. Cocaine can cause symptoms in about 1 to 6% of users, but most of them do not have a completely blocked artery that requires clot-busting drugs or emergency cardiac catheterization and coronary angiography.
PTSD Gene
Your genes may help determine whether you get over a traumatic event or suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found specific variations in a stress-related gene that seem to be influenced by trauma at a young age, increasing the chances of PTSD in adulthood. The study looked at 900 adults adult, age 40 average. About 30% of them reported having been sexually or physically abused as children, and most had also experienced violent trauma as adults. The researchers screened them for symptoms of PTSD, and also did genetic tests on a saliva sample from each. About 25% of the study participants had PTSD symptoms. Those with the specific gene variations scored more than twice as high on a scale of post-traumatic stress compared to those without the variations, the researchers found. And the worse the abuse, the greater the risk of PTSD in those with the gene variations. The researchers say there probably are other gene variants even more strongly linked to PTSD. They were not able to determine whether the participants' reactions were to childhood trauma or more recent events, the Associated Press reports.
Growth Hormone Not a Performance Enhancer
Human growth hormone may not improve athletes' performance. An analysis published in the Annals of Internal Medicine finds that growth hormone may add muscle, but it does not appear to improve strength or exercise capacity, at least in the short term. In the study, researchers analyzed 27 studies involving 440 participants. They found that people who took human growth hormone put on about 5 pounds of muscle and lost about 2 pounds of fat compared to people not taking the hormone. But they saw no differences in strength or stamina between the two groups, and those taking growth hormone had more side effects such as swelling and fatigue. However, the researchers acknowledge that the doses of hormone used in the studies may be lower than that used by athletes. They also were unable to assess the long-term effects of hormone use, since the longest study analyzed was just three months, the Associated Press reports.
Shelf Life for Blood
The "age" of transfusion blood may affect a patient's chances of surviving after surgery. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that heart surgery patients who got transfusions of blood that were more than two weeks old were more likely to die or experience problems than those who got "fresher" blood. Currently, the Food and Drug Administration allows blood centers to store blood for up to six weeks. But previous studies have also suggested that blood deteriorates with age and that, at least for certain patients, older blood poses a safety risk, the Associated Press reports. In the new study, researchers looked at data on 6,000 patients who were given transfusions during heart-bypass or heart-valve surgery. The patients' median age was 70 years old. About half of them got blood that had been stored for two weeks or less -- 11 days on average -- and the others got blood that had been stored for longer -- an average of 20 days. After a year, the survival rate for those who got older blood was 89%, while for those who got fresher blood it was about 93%. Complication rates were also higher in the patients who got older blood. However, the AP quotes other experts who say the findings won't settle the debate over the shelf life of blood because the patients studied were not representative of all transfusion recipients.
Used with the permission of the copyright owner. All rights reserved. The above summaries are not intended to provide advice on personal medical matters, nor are they intended to be a substitute for consultation with a physician.
