Mentally stressed young women with heart disease have reduced blood flow to heart
November 16, 2014
Science Daily/American Heart Association
Young women with stable coronary heart disease are more likely than men of the same age to develop reduced blood flow to the heart if they're under emotional stress. Women 55 years and younger under mental stress had three times greater reduction in blood flow to the heart than men.
Compared to men of the same age, when subjected to a mental stress test, women:
· age 55 and younger had three times greater reduction in blood flow to the heart;
· age 56-64 had double the reduction in blood flow to the heart; and
· age 65 and older had no difference in blood flow to the heart.
"Women who develop heart disease at a younger age make up a special high-risk group because they are disproportionally vulnerable to emotional stress," said Viola Vaccarino, M.D., Ph.D., study author and chairwoman of Cardiovascular Research and Epidemiology at Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health in Atlanta, Georgia.
Women generally develop heart disease later in life than men. However, younger women who have premature heart attacks are more likely to die than men of similar age. Risk factors, such as diabetes or high blood pressure, don't explain these mortality differences.
Young and middle-age women may be more vulnerable to emotional stress because they face considerable burden of stressors in everyday life such as managing kids, marriage, jobs and caring for parents, Vaccarino said. Biology may also play a role -- for example, a greater propensity towards abnormal blood vessel function during emotional stress, such as exaggerated constriction of coronary or peripheral blood vessels.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141116094330.htm
Older women with breathing problems during sleep experience decline in ability to perform daily tasks
November 12, 2014
Science Daily/Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Older women with disordered breathing during sleep were found to be at greater risk of decline in the ability to perform daily activities, such as grocery shopping and meal preparation, according to a new study.
The findings are notable given the aging of the population -- an estimated 3.7 million Americans will turn 65 in 2015, and by 2030, 19 percent of the U.S. population will be 65 or older -- and the fact that sleep-disordered breathing is treatable. Older adults are as much as four times as likely as middle-aged individuals to have problems with breathing during sleep.
Sleep-disordered breathing involves repeated interruptions or decreases in breathing during sleep, which often leads to fragmented sleep and hypoxemia, or low blood oxygen levels.
Doctors rate the severity of sleep-disordered breathing with the apnea-hypopnea index (AHI), which reflects the number of breathing interruptions (apneas) and the number of significant decreases in breathing (hypopneas) per hour of sleep.
The researchers say they believe it is the low blood-oxygen levels caused by sleep-disordered breathing that cause the trouble with daily tasks, and not sleep fragmentation, which is also increased by sleep-disordered breathing.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141112134748.htm
Pregnant women with PTSD more likely to give birth prematurely
- November 6, 2014
Science Daily/Stanford University Medical Center
Pregnant women with post-traumatic stress disorder are at increased risk of giving birth prematurely, a new study has found. The study, which examined more than 16,000 births to female veterans, is the largest ever to evaluate connections between PTSD and preterm birth.
Having PTSD in the year before delivery increased a woman's risk of spontaneous premature delivery by 35 percent, the research showed. The results will be published online Nov. 6 in Obstetrics & Gynecology.
"This study gives us a convincing epidemiological basis to say that, yes, PTSD is a risk factor for preterm delivery," said the study's senior author, Ciaran Phibbs, PhD, associate professor of pediatrics and an investigator at the March of Dimes Prematurity Research Center at Stanford University. "Mothers with PTSD should be treated as having high-risk pregnancies."
Spontaneous preterm births, in which the mother goes into labor and delivers more than three weeks early, account for about six deliveries per 100 in the general population. This means that the risk imposed by PTSD translates into a total of about two additional premature babies for every 100 births. In total, about 12 babies per 100 arrive prematurely; some are born early because of medical problems for the mother or baby, rather than because of spontaneous labor.
The effect of stress
In other words, although pregnant women with PTSD may have other health problems or behave in risky ways, it's the PTSD that counts for triggering labor early.
"The mechanism is biologic," Phibbs said. "Stress is setting off biologic pathways that are inducing preterm labor. It's not the other psychiatric conditions or risky behaviors that are driving it."
However, if a woman had been diagnosed with PTSD in the past but had not experienced the disorder in the year before giving birth, her risk of delivering early was no higher than it was for women without PTSD. "This makes us hopeful that if you treat a mom who has active PTSD early in her pregnancy, her stress level could be reduced, and the risk of giving birth prematurely might go down," said Phibbs, adding that the idea needs to be tested.
Although PTSD is more common in military veterans than the general population, a fairly substantial number of civilian women also experience PTSD, Phibbs noted. "It's not unique to the VA or to combat," he said, noting that half of the women in the study who had PTSD had never been deployed to a combat zone. "This is relevant to all of obstetrics."
The VA has already incorporated the study's findings into care for pregnant women by instructing each VA medical center to treat pregnancies among women with recent PTSD as high-risk. And Phibbs' team is now investigating whether PTSD may also contribute to the risk of the mother or baby being diagnosed with a condition that causes doctors to recommend early delivery for health reasons.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/11/141106173639.htm
Study Supports Notion of Leaving Infants to Cry Themselves Back to Sleep
January 2, 2013
Science Daily/Temple University
Today, mothers of newborns find themselves confronting a common dilemma: Should they let their babies "cry it out" when they wake up at night? Or should they rush to comfort their crying little one?
"By six months of age, most babies sleep through the night, awakening their mothers only about once per week. However, not all children follow this pattern of development," said Weinraub, an expert on child development and parent-child relationships.
Of the babies that awoke, the majority were boys. These transitional sleepers also tended to score higher on an assessment of difficult temperament which identified traits such as irritability and distractibility. And, these babies were more likely to be breastfed. Mothers of these babies were more likely to be depressed and have greater maternal sensitivity.
The findings suggest a couple of things, said Weinraub. One is that genetic or constitutional factors such as those that might be reflected in difficult temperaments appear implicated in early sleep problems. "Families who are seeing sleep problems persist past 18 months should seek advice," Weinraub said.
Another takeaway is that it is important for babies to learn how to fall asleep on their own. "When mothers tune in to these night time awakenings and/or if a baby is in the habit of falling asleep during breastfeeding, then he or she may not be learning to how to self-soothe, something that is critical for regular sleep," she said.
According to Weinraub, the mechanism by which maternal depression is connected to infant awakenings is an area that would benefit from further research. On the one hand, Weinraub said, it's possible that mothers who are depressed at six and 36 months may have been depressed during pregnancy and that this prenatal depression could have affected neural development and sleep awakenings. At the same time, it's important to recognize that sleep deprivation can, of course, exacerbate maternal depression, she said.
"Because the mothers in our study described infants with many awakenings per week as creating problems for themselves and other family members, parents might be encouraged to establish more nuanced and carefully targeted routines to help babies with self-soothing and to seek occasional respite," said Weinraub.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/01/130102161811.htm
Study Evaluates Treating Mothers with ADHD to Improve Outcomes in Kids
October 17, 2012
Science Daily/University of Illinois at Chicago
University of Illinois at Chicago researchers are conducting a study to determine if treating mothers with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder -- either with medication or parent training -- will help children at risk for ADHD.
"About 25 percent of the time, when a child has ADHD, there's a parent that has ADHD," said Mark Stein, UIC professor of pediatrics and psychiatry and principal investigator of the study. "We realize this is a weakness in our service delivery models, because often clinicians focus on just treating the child and ignore the fact that another family member has ADHD."
ADHD is often misdiagnosed as depression or anxiety in women, and it often contributes to marital, parenting, sleep and medical problems, Stein said. Many health care providers have not been trained in diagnosing and treating adult ADHD.
"When a mom complains about how bad her life is, she's given a prescription for Prozac versus understanding that she's always had issues with inattention, distractibility, or impulsivity, and that's why she's having problems," Stein says.
"When you think of ADHD, you think of a 7-year-old boy, not a mom who says 'I am overwhelmed, easily distracted, and just can't get things done,'" he said.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121017131544.htm
Half of pregnant women who have hypertension and snore unknowingly have a sleep disorder
June 2, 2014
Science Daily/University of Michigan Health System
A substantial proportion of hypertensive pregnant women have obstructive sleep apnea, and many may not be aware. We know that habitual snoring is linked with poor pregnancy outcomes for both mother and child, including increased risk of C-sections and smaller babies," says the lead author. “Our findings show that a substantial proportion of hypertensive pregnant women have obstructive sleep apnea and that habitual snoring may be one of the most telling signs to identify this risk early in order to improve health outcomes.”
"We know that habitual snoring is linked with poor pregnancy outcomes for both mother and child, including increased risk of C-sections and smaller babies," says lead author Louise O'Brien, Ph.D., M.S., associate professor at U-M's Sleep Disorders Center in the Department of Neurology and adjunct associate professor in the Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology at the U-M Medical School.
"Our findings show that a substantial proportion of hypertensive pregnant women have obstructive sleep apnea and that habitual snoring may be one of the most telling signs to identify this risk early in order to improve health outcomes."
Habitual snoring – snoring three or more nights a week – is the hallmark symptom of obstructive sleep apnea, which has been shown to increase in frequency during pregnancy. and affects up to one-third of women by the third trimester.
O'Brien's previous studies have found that snoring during pregnancy may influence delivery and baby's health, with a higher risk for C-sections and delivering smaller babies. Women who begin snoring during pregnancy are also at a strong risk for high blood pressure and preeclampsia, O'Brien's research has shown.
"Hypertensive pregnant women who report snoring should be evaluated for obstructive sleep apnea since sleep apnea can be treated during pregnancy," says O'Brien, who is also a member of the Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation.
"Prompt recognition, evaluation, and management will not only improve health benefits for both moms and babies but may also help cut the high healthcare expenses of operative deliveries, taking care of babies who are admitted to the NICU and other associated health risks."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/06/140602102009.htm
Zinc deficiency before conception disrupts fetal development
May 29, 2014
Science Daily/Penn State
Female mice deprived of dietary zinc for a relatively short time before conception experienced fertility and pregnancy problems more than mice that ingested zinc during the same times, according to researchers.
Zinc deficiency caused a high incidence of pregnancy loss, and embryos from the zinc-deficient diet group were an average of 38 percent smaller than those from the control group. Preconception zinc deficiency also caused approximately half of embryos to exhibit delayed or aberrant development.
Going without zinc prior to ovulation had marked effects on the mice's reproductive functions. Zinc deficiency caused a high incidence of pregnancy loss, and embryos from the zinc-deficient diet group were an average of 38 percent smaller than those from the control group. Preconception zinc deficiency also caused approximately half of embryos to exhibit delayed or aberrant development.
Defects in placenta development are a major cause of delayed embryo/fetal development because the developing embryos do not get enough nutrients to support normal growth. In the zinc-deficient group, the fetal side of the placenta was much less developed. Consistent with delayed development of the placenta, expression of key placental genes was sharply curtailed in mice with zinc-deficient diets.
Collectively, the findings provide evidence for the importance of preconception zinc in promoting optimal fertility and embryo, fetal and placenta development, explained Francisco Diaz, assistant professor of reproductive biology.
"The mineral zinc acts as a catalytic, structural and signaling factor in the regulation of a diverse array of cellular pathways involving hundreds of enzymes and proteins," he said. "Given these wide-ranging roles, it is not surprising that insufficient zinc during pregnancy causes developmental defects in many species. We have known that for a long time.
"However, the role of zinc during the preconception period in promoting later development during pregnancy is not clearly understood."
Diaz noted that this research and follow-up studies may result in a recommendation for women intending to get pregnant to make a special effort to eat foods containing zinc in the weeks prior to ovulation, or even to take zinc supplements. Foods containing higher levels of zinc include meats, seafood and milk. Fruits and vegetables contain lower amounts of the mineral.
"It looks like zinc is similar to folic acid, which is one of the few nutrients that are prescribed before a woman becomes pregnant, because it is needed preconception to ensure the quality of the egg," Diaz said. Zinc is very similar in that it is needed before conception -- so giving multivitamins or supplements to a woman after she has found out that she's pregnant doesn't really address the issue."
"It is certainly important during pregnancy, but if the egg development is already compromised, it may not help that aspect of development. I think our work suggests that you need zinc preconception, just like you need folic acid."
A woman's requirement for zinc is not large -- unlike for calcium or iron -- but there is a fairly rapid turnover of zinc in the body, so humans need a steady supply, Diaz pointed out.
"Actually, our mice become zinc deficient rather quickly," he said. "Animal studies have shown that some tissues can become zinc deficient within a few days."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140529092816.htm
Flame retardants during pregnancy as bad as lead? Exposure linked to lower IQs in kids
May 28, 2014
Science Daily/Simon Fraser University
A new study involving Simon Fraser University researchers has found that prenatal exposure to flame retardants can be significantly linked to lower IQs and greater hyperactivity in five-year old children
Prenatal exposure to flame retardants can be significantly linked to lower IQs and greater hyperactivity in five-year old children. The researchers found that a 10-fold increase in PBDE concentrations in early pregnancy, when the fetal brain is developing, was associated with a 4.5 IQ decrement, which is comparable with the impact of environmental lead exposure. PBDEs have been widely used as flame retardants in furniture, carpet padding, car seats and other consumer products over the past three decades.
PBDEs have been widely used as flame retardants in furniture, carpet padding, car seats and other consumer products over the past three decades. While most items containing PBDEs were removed voluntarily from the market a decade ago, some are still in commerce and others persist in the environment and human bodies. Nearly all homes and offices still contain some PBDEs.
"The results from this and other observational human studies support efforts to reduce Penta-BDE exposures, especially for pregnant women and young children," says Lanphear. "Unfortunately, brominated flame retardants are persistent and North Americans are likely exposed to higher PBDE levels than people from other parts of the world. Because of this it is likely to take decades for the PBDE levels in our population to be reduced to current European or Asian levels."
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140528105258.htm
Poor diet before pregnancy linked with preterm birth
May 23, 2014
Science Daily/University of Adelaide
For the first time, researchers have confirmed that women who eat a poor diet before they become pregnant are around 50% more likely to have a preterm birth than those on a healthy diet. The study shows that women who consistently ate a diet high in protein and fruit prior to becoming pregnant were less likely to have a preterm birth, while those who consistently ate high fat and sugar foods, and take-out food were about 50% more likely to have a preterm birth.
It's the first study of its kind to assess women's diet prior to conception and its association with outcomes at birth.
The results, published in The Journal of Nutrition, show that women who consistently ate a diet high in protein and fruit prior to becoming pregnant were less likely to have a preterm birth, while those who consistently ate high fat and sugar foods and takeaway were about 50% more likely to have a preterm birth.
"Preterm birth is a leading cause of infant disease and death and occurs in approximately one in 10 pregnancies globally. Anything we can do to better understand the conditions that lead to preterm birth will be important in helping to improve survival and long-term health outcomes for children," says the lead author of the paper, Dr Jessica Grieger, Posdoctoral Research Fellow with the Robinson Research Institute, based at the Lyell McEwin Hospital.
"In our study, women who ate protein-rich foods including lean meats, fish and chicken, as well as fruit, whole grains and vegetables, had significantly lower risk of preterm birth.
"On the other hand, women who consumed mainly discretionary foods, such as takeaway, potato chips, cakes, biscuits, and other foods high in saturated fat and sugar were more likely to have babies born preterm," Dr Grieger says.
"It is important to consume a healthy diet before as well as during pregnancy to support the best outcomes for the mum and baby," Dr Grieger says.
"Diet is an important risk factor that can be modified. It is never too late to make a positive change. We hope our work will help promote a healthy diet before and during pregnancy. This will help to reduce the number of neonatal deaths and improve the overall health of children," she says.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140523145127.htm
High cholesterol levels linked to lower fertility
May 20, 2014
Science Daily/NIH/National Institute of Child Health and Human Development
High cholesterol levels may impair fertility in couples trying to achieve a pregnancy, according to a study. Couples in which each partner had a high cholesterol level took the longest time to reach pregnancy.
Moreover, couples in which the woman had a high cholesterol level and the man did not also took longer to achieve pregnancy when compared to couples in which both partners had cholesterol levels in the acceptable range.
"We've long known that high cholesterol levels increase the risk for heart disease," said the study's first author, Enrique Schisterman, Ph.D., chief of the Epidemiology Branch at the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), the institute that led the study.
"In addition to safeguarding their health, our results suggest that couples wishing to achieve pregnancy could improve their chances by first ensuring that their cholesterol levels are in an acceptable range."
The researchers found that on average, those couples in which the female did not become pregnant during the study duration had the highest free cholesterol levels. In general, high free cholesterol levels were correlated with longer times to pregnancy and lower fecundability odds ratios.
Couples in which the female had a high cholesterol level and the male did not also took longer to achieve pregnancy when compared to couples in which both partners had cholesterol levels in the acceptable range. In their analysis, the study authors accounted for potential racial differences, as well as differences by age, body mass index, and education.
"From our data, it would appear that high cholesterol levels not only increase the risk for cardiovascular disease, but also reduce couples' chances of pregnancy," Dr. Schisterman said.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140520133212.htm
Pregnant women respond to music with stronger physiological changes in blood pressure
May 20, 2014
Science Daily/Max-Planck-Gesellschaft
Pregnant women, compared to their non-pregnant counterparts, rate music as more intensely pleasant and unpleasant, associated with greater changes in blood pressure, a study has demonstrated. Music appears to have an especially strong influence on pregnant women, a fact that may relate to a prenatal conditioning of the fetus to music.
Music can be soothing or stirring, it can make us dance or make us sad. Blood pressure, heartbeat, respiration and even body temperature -- music affects the body in a variety of ways. It triggers especially powerful physical reactions in pregnant women.
Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig have discovered that pregnant women compared to their non-pregnant counterparts rate music as more intensely pleasant and unpleasant, associated with greater changes in blood pressure. Music appears to have an especially strong influence on pregnant women, a fact that may relate to a prenatal conditioning of the fetus to music.
According to the results, music is a very special stimulus for pregnant women, to which they react strongly. "Every acoustic manipulation of music affects blood pressure in pregnant women far more intensely than in non-pregnant women," says Fritz. Why music has such a strong physiological influence on pregnant woman is still unknown.
Originally, the scientists suspected the hormone estrogen to play a mayor part in this process, because it has an influence on the brain's reward system, which is responsible for the pleasant sensations experienced while listening to music. However, non-pregnant women showed constant physiological responses throughout the contraceptive cycle, which made them subject to fluctuations in estrogen levels.
"Either estrogen levels are generally too low in non-pregnant women, or other physiological changes during pregnancy are responsible for this effect," explains Fritz.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/05/140520123513.htm