People With Parkinson's Disease can Improve With Regular Exercise

Exercise may help people with Parkinson's disease to improve their balance, ability to move around and eventually the quality of their lives, observed a new study.

The study approached 231 people with Parkinson's disease either received their usual care or took part in an exercise program of 40 to 60 minutes of balance and leg strengthening exercises three times a week for six months. This minimally-supervised exercise program was prescribed and monitored by a physical therapist with participants performing most of the exercise at home. On average, 13 percent of the exercise sessions were supervised by a physical therapist. 

Study author Colleen G. Canning, PhD, of the University of Sydney in Australia, said that the resulting injuries, pain, limitations of activity and fear of falling again can really affect people's health and well-being. 

Canning said that these results suggest that minimally supervised exercise programs aimed at reducing falls in people with Parkinson's should be started early in the disease process. 

The study observed that compared to those in the control group, the number of falls by participants who exercised was reduced in those with less severe Parkinson's disease, but not in those with more severe disease and for those with less severe disease a 70 percent reduction in falls was reported in those who exercised compared to those who did not. 

Source:The study is published in the online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

 

Comparing analgesic effect of manual vs. laser acupuncture for lateral epicondylalgia

A team of researchers from China Medical University and Da-Chien General Hospital in Taiwan (R.O.C.) recently compared the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture for the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia. Manual acupuncture is effective in short-term pain relief for the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia.

The acupuncture increases endorphin secretion to relieve pain and affects the pathway of the Aδ nerve fiber to inhibit painful sensation and relieves pain in certain body regions. The acupuncture causes a De Qi sensation and a sour and warm feeling at the acupuncture point. It is critical in pain relief because it activates the descending pain inhibitory system in the central nervous system.

Low-level laser therapy for laser acupuncture has been recently used for treatment of orthopedic diseases. Compared with manual acupuncture, laser therapy applied to the acupuncture point has more advantages because it is painless, aseptic, safe, dosage adjustable, and user friendly. The pain relief achieved using laser acupuncture is related to the metabolism of adenosine triphosphate because it encourages the myofascial trigger point to absorb energy and thereby causes local hypoxia to increase blood circulation, which subsequently decreases the pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia.

The team conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture for treating lateral epicondylalgia. We investigated studies in the Medline, PubMed, and CINAHL databases, published from January 1980 to December 2013.

Based on these statistics, the research team calculated the experimental event rate (EER), control event rate (CER), absolute risk reduction (ARR), and relative risk reduction (RRR) of the studies and analyzed the number needed to treat (NNT). The total effect was calculated by a total random effect model to assume the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture. The results indicated that manual acupuncture exhibited a substantial difference in treatment effect.

According to the Philadelphia Panel Classification System, they assigned as evidence-based results:

• The short-term effect of manual acupuncture on the relief of pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia is Level B
• The long-term effect of manual acupuncture of the relief of pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia is Level C+
• The analgesic effect of laser acupuncture in treating lateral epicondylalgia is Level D
• The analgesic effect of manual acupuncture on the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia is Level B.

Manual acupuncture immediately relieves the pain of lateral epicondylalgia, but its long-term analgesic effect is unremarkable. Applying it at a suitable acupuncture point and to an optimal acupuncture depth can effectively treat lateral epicondylalgia. The study indicates that manual acupuncture applied to lateral epicondylalgia produces stronger evidence of pain relief than the laser acupuncture does.

Source:WORLD SCIENTIFIC

Researchers target the cell's 'biological clock' in promising new therapy to kill cancer cells

Cell biologists at UT Southwestern Medical Center have targeted telomeres with a small molecule called 6-thiodG that takes advantage of the cell's 'biological clock' to kill cancer cells and shrink tumor growth.

Dr. Jerry W. Shay, Professor and Vice Chairman of Cell Biology at UT Southwestern, and colleague, Dr. Woodring E. Wright, Professor of Cell Biology and Internal Medicine, found that 6-thio-2'-deoxyguanosine could stop the growth of cancer cells in culture and decrease the growth of tumors in mice.

"We observed broad efficacy against a range of cancer cell lines with very low concentrations of 6-thiodG, as well as tumor burden shrinkage in mice," said Dr. Shay, Associate Director of the Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center.

Dr. Shay and Dr. Wright, who hold The Southland Financial Corporation Distinguished Chair in Geriatrics, are co-senior authors of the paper appearing in the journal Cancer Discovery.

6-thiodG acts by targeting a unique mechanism that is thought to regulate how long cells can stay alive, a type of aging clock. This biological clock is defined by DNA structures known as telomeres, which cap the ends of the cell's chromosomes to protect them from damage, and which become shorter every time the cell divides. Once telomeres have shortened to a critical length, the cell can no longer divide and dies though a process known as apoptosis.

Cancer cells are protected from this death by an RNA protein complex called telomerase, which ensures that telomeres do not shorten with every division.  Telomerase has therefore been the subject of intense research as a target for cancer therapy. Drugs that successfully block its action have been developed, but these drugs have to be administered for long periods of time to successfully trigger cell death and shrink tumors, leading to considerable toxicities. This outcome is partially because cells in any one tumor have chromosomes with different telomere lengths and any one cell's telomeres must be critically shortened to induce death.

6-thiodG is preferentially used as a substrate by telomerase and disrupts the normal way cells maintain telomere length. Because 6-thiodG is not normally used in telomeres, the presence of the compound acts as an 'alarm' signal that is recognized by the cell as damage. As a result, the cell stops dividing and dies.

Telomerase is an almost universal oncology target, yet there are few telomerase-directed therapies in human clinical trials, researchers noted.

"Using telomerase to incorporate toxic products into telomeres is remarkably encouraging at this point," said Dr. Wright.

Importantly, unlike many other telomerase-inhibiting compounds, the researchers did not observe serious side effects in the blood, liver and kidneys of the mice that were treated with 6-thiodG.

"Since telomerase is expressed in almost all human cancers, this work represents a potentially innovative approach to targeting telomerase-expressing cancer cells with minimal side effects on normal cells," said Dr. Shay. "We believe this small molecule will address an unmet cancer need in an underexplored area that will be rapidly applicable to the clinic."

UT Southwestern researchers collaborated with researchers in the Department of Biochemistry at Hacettepe University in Ankara, Turkey, including Ilgen Mender, Visiting Junior Researcher at UT Southwestern, and Zeliha Dikmen; and Dr. Sergei Gryaznov, Chief Technology Officer with AuraSense Therapeutics.

The work is supported by a SPORE (Specialized Program of Research Excellence) grant from the National Cancer Institute, the Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center, and the Southland Financial Corporation Distinguished Chair in Geriatric Research.

UT Southwestern's Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center is the only National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center in North Texas and one of just 66 NCI-designated cancer centers in the nation. The Harold C. Simmons Cancer Center includes 13 major cancer care programs with a focus on treating the whole patient with innovative treatments, while fostering groundbreaking basic research that has the potential to improve patient care and prevention of cancer worldwide. In addition, the Center's education and training programs support and develop the next generation of cancer researchers and clinicians.

In addition, the Simmons Cancer Center is among only 30 U.S. cancer research centers to be named a National Clinical Trials Network Lead Academic Site, a prestigious new designation by the NCI, and the only Cancer Center in North Texas to be so designated. The designation and associated funding is designed to bolster the cancer center's clinical cancer research for adults and to provide patients access to cancer research trials sponsored by the NCI, where promising new drugs often are tested.

About UT Southwestern Medical Center

UT Southwestern, one of the premier academic medical centers in the nation, integrates pioneering biomedical research with exceptional clinical care and education. The institution's faculty includes many distinguished members, including six who have been awarded Nobel Prizes since 1985. Numbering approximately 2,800, the faculty is responsible for groundbreaking medical advances and is committed to translating science-driven research quickly to new clinical treatments. UT Southwestern physicians provide medical care in 40 specialties to about 92,000 hospitalized patients and oversee approximately 2.1 million outpatient visits a year.

Source:UT SOUTHWESTERN MEDICAL CENTER

Scientific team sounds the alarm on sugar as a source of disease

Is sugar making us sick? A team of scientists at the University of California in San Francisco believes so, and they're doing something about it. They launched an initiative to bring information on food and drink and added sugar to the public by reviewing more than 8,000 scientific papers that show a strong link between the consumption of added sugar and chronic diseases.The common belief until now was that sugar just makes us fat, but it's become clear through research that it's making us sick. For example, there's the rise in fatty-liver disease, the emergence of Type 2 diabetes as an epidemic in children and the dramatic increase in metabolic disorders.

Laura Schmidt, a UCSF professor at the School of Medicine and the lead investigator on the project, SugarScience, said the idea is to make the findings comprehensible and clear to everyone. The results will be available to all on a website (SugarScience.org) and social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

Added sugars, Schmidt said, are sugars that don't occur naturally in foods. They are found in 74 percent of all packaged foods, have 61 names and often are difficult to decipher on food labels. Although the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requires food companies to list ingredients on packaging, the suggested daily values of natural and added sugars can't be found.

The FDA is considering a proposal to require food manufacturers to list information on sugars in the same way they do for fats, cholesterol, sodium, carbohydrates and protein. But because so much added sugar is dumped into so many products, one average American breakfast of cereal would likely exceed a reasonable daily limit.

"SugarScience shows that a calorie is not a calorie but rather that the source of a calorie determines how it's metabolized," said pediatric endocrinologist Robert Lustig, a member of the SugarScience team and the author of "Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease." Lustig said that more than half of the U.S. population is sick with metabolic syndrome, a group of risk factors for chronic diseases such as heart disease, diabetes and liver disease that are directly related to the excessive consumption of added sugars in the Western diet.Figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show the category of heart attack/stroke as the leading cause of death in the United States. Every day, 2,200 Americans die of cardiovascular disease. That's about 800,000 a year, or one in three deaths.

The latest statistics from the American Diabetes Association show that 29.1 million Americans, or 9.3 percent, have diabetes. Of that number, 21 million have been diagnosed and 8.1 million have not, and the numbers continue to grow, according to the association.

It doesn't stop there. The American Liver Foundation says at least 30 million Americans, or 1 in 10, has one of 100 kinds of liver disease.

Clinicians widely believe that obesity is the cause of metabolic disease. Although it is a marker for these diseases, Lustig said, it's not the cause. "Too much sugar causes chronic metabolic disease in both fat and thin people," he said, "and instead of focusing on obesity as the problem, we should be focusing on our processed-food supply."

The average American consumes 19.5 teaspoons (78 grams) of sugar a day, substantially more than the amount recommended by the American Heart Association. The association sets these limits: 6 teaspoons (24 grams) for women, 9 teaspoons (36 grams) for men, and 3-6 teaspoons (12-24 grams) for children, depending on age. Just one 12-ounce soda contains 8 to 9 teaspoons (32-36 grams) of sugar.

Liquid sugar in sodas, energy drinks and sports drinks is the leading source of added sugar in the American diet. That represents 36 percent of all added sugars consumed, according to the Department of Health and Human Services. And because liquid does not include fiber, the body processes it quickly. That causes more sugar to be sent to the pancreas and liver than either can process properly, and the resulting buildup of sugar leads to heart disease, diabetes and liver disease.

Consuming too much sugar causes the level of glucose sugar in the bloodstream to increase. That, in turn, causes the pancreas to release high levels of insulin that cause the body to store extra calories as fat.

Too much insulin also affects the hormone leptin, a natural appetite suppressant that signals the brain to stop eating when full. But the imbalance of insulin levels caused by the intake of too much sugar causes lipid resistance, and the brain no longer gets that signal.

Another member of the SugarScience team, Dean Schillinger, is a professor of medicine at UCSF and a practicing primary care doctor at San Francisco General Hospital. He believes the overconsumption of added sugars is a social problem, not a problem of individual choice and freedom.

"People are becoming literate about the toxic effects of sugar," Schillinger said, "and have more understanding of the idea that high doses are bad for one's health." He sees evidence that those in a higher socioeconomic bracket are taking steps to limit intake of sugar when compared with poorer, less literate people.

Healthy food is expensive and less readily accessible in poorer neighborhoods, and because corn is so abundant and cheap, it is added to many food products. "Dumping high fructose corn syrup into cheap foods, sodas, sports drinks and energy drinks is toxic to the body, causing epidemic metabolic diseases and a serious health crisis," Schillinger said.

To underscore the scope of the problem, he pointed out that during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, 1,500 American soldiers lost a limb in combat. In that same period, 1.5 million people in the U.S. lost limbs to amputations from Type 2 diabetes, a preventable disease. "We have yet to mobilize for a public health war," he said, "but the time has come to do so."

Such a war would have to take on the root causes of the problem. As a nation, Schillinger added, we would need to look at our food policies, food pricing, availability of healthy foods, and the marketing being carried out by food and beverage industries to hook the public on unhealthy choices loaded with added sugar.

Frank Hu, a professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health, is not a SugarScience researcher, but he agreed that the amount of sugar consumed by the American public is too high. SugarScience, he said, is being helpful by bringing the information about added sugar to public attention.

"It's just about impossible," Hu said, "to know from food labels what kinds and amounts of sugars are in a product." That's why he thinks the FDA should require food companies to list those amounts on all food labels so people know what they're eating, in what amounts they're eating it, and what amounts are safe.

Food labels are important, Schillinger said, and they need to be revised, but the most important change needed is to make the healthier choice the easier choice.

Source:Chicago Tribune

Sleep, Anxiety and Addiction to be Treated by 'Clock Proteins'

Findings about "clock proteins" offer the potential to manage circadian rhythm and treat problems like sleep, anxiety disorders.

 Thomas Burris, PhD, chair of pharmacological and physiological science at Saint Louis University, and his colleagues examined compounds that target a protein called REV-ERB. It is a core component of our clock, which appears to play a key role in regulating mammals' internal clocks.

The team examined effects of the REV-ERB drug on patterns of sleep and wakefulness and found that the compound increases wakefulness, reduces REM and slow-wave sleep, and, notably, decreases anxiety. 

"Mice without it are arrhythmic. This study demonstrated that when we give mice a synthetic compound that turns REV-ERB on, it altered their circadian rhythm."

The REV-ERB drug appears to target the clock in a way that is distinct from the common pathways where drugs that increase arousal (wakefulness) also increase anxiety. For example, cocaine, amphetamines). And, vice versa: Drugs that decrease anxiety also decrease arousal (for example, benzodiazepines, ethanol).

Further, the REV-ERB drug appears to be associated with a suppression of reward-seeking behavior. Drug addiction has a circadian component and mice with mutations in "clock genes" (genes that affect our internal clocks) have altered responsiveness to the reward associated with cocaine, morphine and alcohol. 

Burris speculates that REV-ERB targeted drug effect on the clock would modulate reward-seeking behavior, and so may be useful in treating addiction. 

 Source:Saint Louis University,

Apps to Help Autistic Kids Learn Social Skills

New Google Glass apps can help autistic kids learn social and communication skills, while also providing caregivers with feedback. The apps and hardware add-ons are being developed by Brain Power, The Cambridge, Massachusetts-based startup.

 The startup was founded by neuroscientist Ned T Sahin, who did his graduate training at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

Since the autism disorder spectrum is so wide, the company is initially focusing on children with moderate to high-functioning autism, though it hopes to extend its apps' capabilities to other kids. 

More than 200 people have so far signed up for Brain Power's beta programme, which will be completed in three phases next year. 

Google Glass is ideal for helping kids with autism. It has an accelerometer chip that enables head gestures, which Brain Power uses to track when kids look or don't look at their parents, as well as stereotypy. 

"In this way, we can provide numerical, objective, repeatable assessment of a child's current behaviours, as well as progress over time," Sahin said. 

Google Glass apps: They encourage kids to interact with others and make eye contact by presenting game-like exercises. The apps have 'social engagement module monitors' that assess how a child engaged with parents. 

The software also helps children interpret people's expressions through a series of games. Other areas the suite will tackle include language. When a kid looks at something through Google Glass, the object is recognized and its name is displayed and spoken through the Glass's earbud. 

Source:Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

 

Comparing analgesic effect of manual vs laser acupuncture for lateral epicondylalgia

A team of researchers from China Medical University and Da-Chien General Hospital in Taiwan (R.O.C.) recently compared the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture for the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia. Manual acupuncture is effective in short-term pain relief for the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia.

The acupuncture increases endorphin secretion to relieve pain and affects the pathway of the Aδ nerve fiber to inhibit painful sensation and relieves pain in certain body regions. The acupuncture causes a De Qi sensation and a sour and warm feeling at the acupuncture point. It is critical in pain relief because it activates the descending pain inhibitory system in the central nervous system.

Low-level laser therapy for laser acupuncture has been recently used for treatment of orthopedic diseases. Compared with manual acupuncture, laser therapy applied to the acupuncture point has more advantages because it is painless, aseptic, safe, dosage adjustable, and user friendly. The pain relief achieved using laser acupuncture is related to the metabolism of adenosine triphosphate because it encourages the myofascial trigger point to absorb energy and thereby causes local hypoxia to increase blood circulation, which subsequently decreases the pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia.

The team conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to compare the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture for treating lateral epicondylalgia. We investigated studies in the Medline, PubMed, and CINAHL databases, published from January 1980 to December 2013.

Based on these statistics, the research team calculated the experimental event rate (EER), control event rate (CER), absolute risk reduction (ARR), and relative risk reduction (RRR) of the studies and analyzed the number needed to treat (NNT). The total effect was calculated by a total random effect model to assume the analgesic effect of laser acupuncture and manual acupuncture. The results indicated that manual acupuncture exhibited a substantial difference in treatment effect.

According to the Philadelphia Panel Classification System, they assigned as evidence-based results:

• The short-term effect of manual acupuncture on the relief of pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia is Level B
• The long-term effect of manual acupuncture of the relief of pain caused by lateral epicondylalgia is Level C+
• The analgesic effect of laser acupuncture in treating lateral epicondylalgia is Level D
• The analgesic effect of manual acupuncture on the treatment of lateral epicondylalgia is Level B.

Manual acupuncture immediately relieves the pain of lateral epicondylalgia, but its long-term analgesic effect is unremarkable. Applying it at a suitable acupuncture point and to an optimal acupuncture depth can effectively treat lateral epicondylalgia. The study indicates that manual acupuncture applied to lateral epicondylalgia produces stronger evidence of pain relief than the laser acupuncture does.

Source:WORLD SCIENTIFIC

Yoga as a potential therapy for cardiovascular disease and metabolic syndrome

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) and metabolic syndrome are major public health problems in the USA and worldwide. There is promising evidence of Yoga, a popular mind-body practice, on improving cardio-metabolic health. This review helps strengthen the evidence base for yoga as a potentially effective therapy for such conditions. The results support earlier reviews on the positive benefits of yoga for CVD prevention. The review demonstrates the potential of yoga to have an impact on concrete, physiological outcomes that represent some of the greatest health burdens today."The effectiveness of yoga in modifying risk factors for cardiovascular disease and metabolic syndrome: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials" FromEuropean Journal of Preventive Cardiology (a SAGE Journal)

Read the full article here: http://cpr.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/12/02/2047487314562741.full.pdf+html