Yoga and exercise may help reduce the pain associated with cancer treatment. Researchers at the University of Rochester found that patients who practiced yoga slept less but had less fatigue, mostly because they cut down on daytime napping. The result was a 37% reduction in “daytime dysfunction.” A second study from the Tata Memorial Centre in Mumbai, India, found that cancer patients who participated in both yoga and exercise were nearly twice as likely to report improved mood and had less trouble with general activities. The results of both studies were presented at this week’s American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting. Posted June 7, 2017. Via The Guardian.
Cancer doctors who receive freebies from pharmaceutical companies are more likely to prescribe drugs manufactured by those companies. University of North Carolina researchers found that doctors were 78% more likely to prescribe a specific drug to treat kidney cancer if they’d received a gift or small payment from that drug’s manufacturer, compared to physicians who didn’t receive any payments. For docs that received payments from a manufacturer of a cancer drug, the average amount of the gift or payments was $566. The researchers also noted that even small payments were enough to sway many physicians. Posted June 6, 2017. Via UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Health problems seen in newborns are not connected to antidepressant use by the mother but are likely due to preterm birth. Researchers looked at babies 2 to 4 weeks after birth and determined that preterm birth was the main cause of neonatal signs of agitation, excessive crying, rigidity, tremors and restlessness, typically called Neonatal Discontinuation Syndrome (NDS). They found that the babies of women who had a mood disorder and were taking a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant had rates of NDS that were similar to babies of mothers who had no mood disorders at all or who had mood disorders but weren’t taking any medication. Posted June 1, 2017. Via Northwestern University.
