According to a study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, interval training—workouts that involve a series of intense exercises with brief recovery periods—may help you lose more weight than continuous moderate intensity workouts on a treadmill or elliptical.
The researchers compared interval training with continuous moderate intensity workout for weight loss by analysing data from 41 studies involving 1,115 people.
The two most common types of interval training are high intensity interval training (HIIT) and sprint interval training. HIIT includes various exercises, whereas sprint interval training includes running, jogging, speed walking and cycling.
While both exercise regimen reduced overall weight and percentage of body fat, regardless of starting weight or gender, interval training provided greater total weight loss. Overall, interval training provided a 28.5 per cent greater reduction in weight.
Sprint interval training was the most effective and provided an even larger difference in weight loss.
Ultra-processed menace
Ready-to-eat meals and snacks may be convenient and tasty, but they can increase your risk of early death. According to a French study published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, eating ultra-processed food increases the risk of all-cause mortality.
Ultra-processed food has already been linked to a number of health conditions, including obesity, hypertension and cancer. To analyse the mortality risk link, researchers analysed data from 44,551 adults aged 45 or older.
During an average of 7.1 years of follow-up, the volunteers periodically answered questions about their food intake. Ultra-processed food accounted for 14.1 per cent of the total food consumed by the participants, and about 30 per cent of their daily calorie intake.
Among them, 602 participants died during the study period. Each 10 per cent increase in the amount of ultra-processed food was associated with a 14 per cent increase in mortality risk.
Did you know
Four hundred and sixty-six million people worldwide have disabling hearing loss, up from 360 million in 2010. The figure is expected to rise to 900 million by 2050. The culprit—prolonged exposure to loud sounds, including listening to music using headphones.
World Health Organization
Stroke stimulators
Post menopausal women who drink more than one diet soda or other artificially-sweetened juices a day have a higher risk of stroke, heart disease and death, according to a US study published in the journal Stroke.
The researchers followed 81,714 postmenopausal women (aged 50 to 79) for an average of 11.9 years.
After accounting for other risk factors for stroke, such as age, smoking and high blood pressure, the study found that consuming two or more artificially sweetened beverages per day was associated with a 23 per cent higher risk of stroke; 31 per cent increased risk of clot-caused (ischemic) stroke; 29 per cent greater risk of heart disease (fatal or non-fatal heart attack); and 16 per cent higher risk of death from any cause, compared with women who consumed diet drinks less than once a week or not at all.
High consumption of diet drinks was associated with a 2.03 times increased risk of ischemic stroke in obese women.
Did you know
Oral contraceptives can hinder a woman’s ability to read emotional expressions of others, which could adversely affect their interpersonal relationships.
Frontiers in Neuroscience
Safe up to an hour
Infants can be safely given up to an hour of general anaesthesia without the risk of neuro-developmental or behavioural problems.
About one in ten children in developed countries would have to have general anaesthesia for surgical, medical and diagnostic procedures during the first three years of life, mostly for hernia repair, tonsillectomy, imaging scans and endoscopies.
But, parents and clinicians often delay these essential procedures.
For the Australian study published in The Lancet, 722 babies, aged less than 60 weeks, who were having hernia operations were randomly assigned to receive either general anesthesia or local anesthesia. The average duration of general anesthesia was 54 minutes.
At age five, the children had tests to assess their IQ, memory, attention, executive function and behaviour. There was no significant difference between the two groups in IQ scores as well as neuro-cognitive function. But, the safety of longer and repeated exposure remains unknown, the study authors cautioned.
For a healthy baby
For women in impoverished and rural settings, taking a certain daily nutritional supplement before conception or in early pregnancy may improve foetal growth and outcomes, according to a National Institutes of Health- funded study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
The supplement that was used in this study consisted of dried skimmed milk, soybean and peanut extract, blended into a peanut butter-like consistency and fortified with essential vitamins and minerals. The supplement provided women with protein and fatty acids that were often lacking in their diets.
For the study, 7,387 women in rural areas of India, Pakistan, Congo and Guatemala were randomised to either receive the supplement three months before conception or during the first trimester of pregnancy, or receive no supplement other than what they may have received from local health services.
Women who took the supplements were 31 per cent less likely to have an infant that was stunted at birth and 22 per cent less likely to have an infant that was small for gestational age.
Education helps
Hearing impairment can speed up cognitive decline, but the impact may be lessened by higher education, according to a US study published in the Journal of Gerontology, Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences.
Majority of adults aged 70 and older suffer from some degree of hearing loss.
Researchers followed 1,164 adults, average age 73.5 years, for up to 24 years. The participants had their hearing checked at the start of the study. None of them were using a hearing aid. Their cognitive function was also assessed at the start and every four years thereafter.
Nearly half of the participants had mild hearing impairment and 16.8 per cent had moderate-to-severe hearing loss.
Those with serious hearing impairment performed worse on the initial cognitive assessment tests. People with mild hearing loss as well as those with more severe hearing impairment showed greater decline in subsequent cognitive tests. Mild hearing loss was associated with a steeper cognitive decline among participants without a college education, but not among those with higher education.
Inexpensive, but effective
The number of push-ups a man can do may determine his heart health.
According to a Harvard University study published in JAMA Network Open, middle-aged men who could do more than 40 push-ups in a row had a significantly lower risk of cardiovascular diseases during ten years of follow-up, compared with men who could do only fewer than ten.
The researchers tracked the heart health of 1,104 active male firefighters for ten years. Their average age was 39.6 and mean body mass index was 28.7.
The participants' push-up capacity as well as aerobic capacity measured by a treadmill test were analysed at the start of the study. Among them, 37 men suffered cardiovascular events during the study period.
Men who were able to do more than 40 push-ups at baseline were 96 per cent less likely to suffer a cardiovascular event, including coronary artery disease, heart failure or sudden cardiac death, compared with those who were able to do fewer than ten push-ups. “Our findings provide evidence that push-up capacity could be an easy, no-cost method to help assess cardiovascular disease risk in almost any setting,” said the lead researcher.
Did you know
People with type 2 diabetes who ate five servings of nuts per week had a 17 per cent lower risk of total cardiovascular disease incidence; 20 per cent lower risk of coronary heart disease; 34 per cent lower risk of cardiovascular disease death; and 31 per cent reduced risk of all-cause mortality, compared with those who ate less than one serving a month.
Circulation Research
Yoga heals
Just eight weeks of yoga can ease the physical and psychological symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, according to a study from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences.
Patients with rheumatoid arthritis often suffer from psychological factors like depression, which make treatment much harder. Medical therapies often fail to address the psychological component of the disease.
For the study published in the journal Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience, 72 patients with rheumatoid arthritis were randomly assigned to either 120-minute sessions of yoga five times a week—for eight weeks—along with medication for the disease or just medication (control group).
Blood samples were collected for measurements of systemic biomarkers at the beginning and end of the study. Disease activity, functional status and depression severity were also assessed.
Patients in the yoga group saw significant decrease in the severity of rheumatoid arthritis, which corresponded with significant improvement in markers of neuro-plasticity, inflammation, cellular health integrity and ageing as well as reduction in depression, disease activity and disability.
Stay active in midlife
Staying both physically and mentally active when you are younger may help prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s disease when you are older.
The Swedish study published in the journal Neurology followed 800 women, aged 38 to 54 years, for 44 years.
The women provided information about their regular mental and physical activities at the start of the study.
Among them, 194 women developed dementia, including 102 with Alzheimer's disease during the study period.
Women who were mentally active in midlife were 34 per cent less likely to develop any form of dementia and 46 per cent less likely to develop Alzheimer's disease compared to women who indulged in fewer cognitive activities.
Women who were physically active were 52 per cent less likely to develop vascular dementia and 56 per cent less likely to develop mixed dementia, compared with inactive women.
These associations held even after accounting for other risk factors for dementia, including high blood pressure, smoking and diabetes.
Adversities on shoulder
Shoulder replacement surgeries are rapidly increasing. Especially among adults older than 50, surgery increased more than 5.6-fold.
To find out the lifetime risk of re-operation and other adverse events after elective shoulder replacement surgery for arthritis, researchers at Oxford University looked at the hospital and mortality records of 51,895 adults, aged 50 and older.
Rates of serious adverse events such as major blood clots, heart attack, infections, stroke and death were calculated at 30 and 90 days after surgery. Risk for revision surgery was estimated at three, five, ten and 15 years after surgery, and over a patient’s lifetime.
The lifetime risk of re-operation was considerably higher in young participants, especially men, compared with older participants. The risk of revision surgery was highest during the first five years after surgery. The lifetime risk ranged from one in 37 in women (aged 85 years and older) to one in four in men (aged 55 to 59 years).
The overall rate of serious adverse events at 30 days was 3.5 per cent and at 90 days was 4.6 per cent. Increasing age and existing illness increased the risk of serious adverse events—one in nine women and one in five men, aged 85 years and older, experienced at least one serious adverse event within 90 days.
“Our findings caution against unchecked expansion of shoulder replacement surgery in both younger and older patients,” the study concluded.
Did you know
Women's brains appear to be about three years younger than men's of the same chronologicalage, which could explain women tend to stay mentally sharp longer than men.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
For your child's oral health
According to a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention survey, children start to brush their teeth late. And, when they do, they often use too much toothpaste.
So what are the oral health guidelines for kids?
Parents should start brushing their children’s teeth as soon as the first tooth appears, which can be as early as six months, and they should have their first dental visit when they are one.
Children should brush their teeth twice daily with a fluoride toothpaste only starting at age two. Even though fluoride use helps prevent dental caries and cavities, ingesting too much fluoride while teeth are developing can cause visibly detectable changes in enamel structure such as discoloration and pitting (dental fluorosis). So, fluoride toothpaste is recommended only when the children turn two.
Children younger than three should use only a smear of toothpaste—the size of a rice grain—and children older than three should use a pea-sized amount until age six.
The guidelines also recommend parents to supervise young children during brushing and to monitor fluoride ingestion.
CONTRIBUTOR: SHYLA JOVITHA ABRAHAM