Take a Selfie…Die!

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From October 2011 to November 2017, there have been 259 deaths while clicking selfies in 137 incidents. The mean age was 22.94 years. About 72.5% of the total deaths occurred in males and 27.5% in females. The highest number of incidents and selfie-deaths has been reported in India followed by Russia, United States, and Pakistan. Drowning, transport, and fall form the topmost reasons for deaths caused by selfies. We also classified reasons for deaths due to selfie as risky behavior or non-risky behavior. Risky behavior caused more deaths and incidents due to selfies than non-risky behavior. The number of deaths in females is less due to risky behavior than non-risky behavior while it is approximately three times in males.

Conclusion:

“No selfie zones” areas should be declared across tourist areas especially places such as water bodies, mountain peaks, and over tall buildings to decrease the incidence of selfie-related deaths.

Read the study here.

No selfie zones?  Seriously?

Chronic Pain and Suicide

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Of 123 181 suicide decedents included in the study, 10 789 (8.8%) had evidence of chronic pain, and the percentage increased from 7.4% in 2003 to 10.2% in 2014. More than half (53.6%) of suicide decedents with chronic pain died of firearm-related injuries and 16.2% by opioid overdose.

Source article here.

America’s Declining Well-Being, Health, and Life Expectancy

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Abstract

Although recent declines in life expectancy among non-Hispanic Whites, coined “deaths of despair,” grabbed the headlines of most major media outlets, this is neither a recent problem nor is it confined to Whites. The decline in America’s health has been described in the public health literature for decades and has long been hypothesized to be attributable to an array of worsening psychosocial problems that are not specific to Whites.  To test some of the dominant hypotheses, we show how various measures of despair have been increasing in the United States since 1980 and how these trends relate to changes in health and longevity. We show that mortality increases among Whites caused by the opioid epidemic come on the heels of the crack and HIV syndemic among Blacks. Both occurred on top of already higher mortality rates among all Americans relative to people in other nations, and both occurred among declines in measures of well-being.  We believe that the attention given to Whites is distracting researchers and policymakers from much more serious, longer-term structural problems that affect all Americans. (Am J Public Health. Published online ahead of print September 25, 2018: e1–e6. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2018.304585)

Interesting AJPH analysis which can be accessed at this link.

The article has a link to the complete analysis in PDF.

Is Marijuana Safe?

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A new study confirms that cannabis use is related to impaired and lasting effects on adolescent cognitive development.

To understand the relationship between alcohol, cannabis use and cognitive development among adolescents at all levels of consumption (abstinent, occasional consumer or high consumer), the research team followed a sample of 3,826 Canadian adolescents over a period of four years. Using a developmentally sensitive design, the authors investigated relationships between year-to-year changes in substance use and cognitive development across a number of cognitive domains, such as recall memory, perceptual reasoning, inhibition and working memory. Multi-level regression models were used to simultaneously test vulnerability and concurrent and lasting effects on each cognitive domain. The study found that vulnerability to cannabis and alcohol use in adolescence was associated with generally lower performance on all cognitive domains.

Yikes.  Read the full story here.

20 Things Patients Can Do to Stay Out of My ER

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When you’re arguing, do NOT tell your significant other that your life is no longer worth living just to make them feel bad. If they call 911, EMS will bring you to me. I’ll keep you until you’re legally sober, even if it takes a week. I’ll sedate you or tie you down if I have to. Afterwards, you’ll get a mental health evaluation, and we’ll let you go home. By that time, your significant other has thoroughly enjoyed life without you. Speak wisely.

Priceless!

Read the list at this link.

HT – nakedcapitalism.com

US Towns With the Shortest Life Expectancy

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Link to The Oklahoman article. 

(The article may be behind a paywall).

shortest LE_Screenshot_2018-09-23 The Oklahoman e-Edition

The Paradox

The National Center for Health Statistics narrowed its life expectancy data to census tracts of a few thousand people, which can be a small town, a large rural area or a neighborhood in a large city. Oklahoma’s least healthy areas are small towns and rural areas, but so are some of its healthiest, according to the life expectancy figures.

The highest life expectancy in Oklahoma — 89.4 years — is in a Caddo County census tract that surrounds, but doesn’t include, Anadarko. McCurtain County, in far southeast Oklahoma, is home to the second-highest life expectancy at 89 years. Sparsely populated parts of Pushmataha County, also in rural southeast Oklahoma, have an average life expectancy of 88 years.

Other long-living parts of Oklahoma include the area around Grand Lake State Park in Mayes County (86.7 years), southwest neighborhoods of Stillwater (86.6 years) and rural areas south of Kingfisher (86.1 years).

All of this bothers and intrigues me at the same time.

 

Whole grains one of the most important food groups for preventing type 2 diabetes

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The proportion who developed type 2 diabetes was lowest in the group which reported the highest wholegrain consumption, and increased for each group which had eaten less wholegrain. In the group with the highest wholegrain intake, the diabetes risk was 34 percent lower for men, and 22 percent lower for women, than in the group with the lowest wholegrain intake.

“It is unusual to be able to investigate such a large range when it comes to how much wholegrain people eat,” says Rikard Landberg. “If you divided American participants into 4 groups, the group that ate the most wholegrain would be the same level as the group that ate the least wholegrain in Denmark. In Europe, Scandinavia eats the most, Spain and Italy the least.”

Additionally, the study was uncommonly large, with 55,000 participants, over a long time span — 15 years.

My source article is here and the study abstract can be found here.

 

Low Carb Diets Are Bad

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This study prospectively examined the relationship between low carbohydrate diets, all-cause death, and deaths from coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular disease (including stroke), and cancer in a nationally representative sample of 24,825 participants of the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) during 1999 to 2010. Compared to participants with the highest carbohydrate consumption, those with the lowest intake had a 32% higher risk of all-cause death over an average 6.4-year follow-up. In addition, risks of death from coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular disease, and cancer were increased by 51%, 50%, and 35%, respectively.

The results were confirmed in a meta-analysis of seven prospective cohort studies with 447,506 participants and an average follow-up 15.6 years, which found 15%, 13%, and 8% increased risks in total, cardiovascular, and cancer mortality with low (compared to high) carbohydrate diets.

For the source article click this link.

 

 

Longer daily fasting times improve health and longevity (in mice)

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The scientists randomly divided 292 male mice into two diet groups. One group received a naturally sourced diet that was lower in purified sugars and fat, and higher in protein and fiber than the other diet. The mice in each diet group were then divided into three sub-groups based on how often they had access to food. The first group of mice had access to food around the clock. A second group of mice was fed 30 percent less calories per day than the first group. The third group was meal fed, getting a single meal that added up to the exact number of calories as the round-the-clock group. Both the meal-fed and calorie-restricted mice learned to eat quickly when food was available, resulting in longer daily fasting periods for both groups.

The scientists tracked the mice’s metabolic health through their lifespans until their natural deaths and examined them post-mortem. Meal-fed and calorie-restricted mice showed improvements in overall health, as evidenced by delays in common age-related damage to the liver and other organs, and extended longevity. The calorie-restricted mice also showed significant improvement in fasting glucose and insulin levels compared to the other groups. Interestingly, the researchers found that diet composition had no significant impact on lifespan in the meal fed and calorie restricted groups.

Source article here.

One of my neighbors is a mouse researcher.  I bet he’s really excited this weekend.

The NIH webpage on caloric restriction and fasting diets is here.