Care-givers who put their elderly dementing relatives into institutional care suffer more trauma than those who carry on looking after them at home, says a report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (Aug 25). The four-year study of 1,222 pairs of care-givers and relatives by Pittsburgh University says that depression and anxiety were not reduced in care-givers who put relatives into care. They felt more distressed instead.
People with obesity-related type 2 diabetes often develop infections such as jaw disease and serious abscesses. Now a study in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology (Aug) says it has found out why: diabetes prolongs inflammation because it affects the body’s ability to control a protein called cytokine, which is produced when there is infection. Boston University researchers say this discovery could lead to new therapies.
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Draining toxic elements from Alzheimer’s disease patients stops their faculties declining, say Pennsylvania University doctors. They report in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease (Aug) that dementing people’s brains steadily lose their capacity to clear toxins, which in turn kill cells. The doctors removed the toxins in 12 patients by draining off cerebrospinal fluid continuously, and their conditions stabilised.
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People who are depressed are three times more likely to report that they are in pain, say Indiana University researchers. They suggest in the Journal of General Internal Medicine (Aug) that the frequency of common depression-related pains, such as muscle pain, headaches and leg pain, should be used to gauge how well antidepressant drugs are working.
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People with dyslexia have significantly lower levels of “grey-matter volume” in parts of the brain that are important for language functions, report Italian doctors in Neurology (Aug 24). The Milan University study of ten people with dyslexia says it found that word-decoding areas are less developed in dyslexic people who have a family history of the disorder.