IF YOU HAD TROUBLE SLEEPING BEFORE SURGERY … you may be at risk for postoperative brain issues. Twenty percent of adults have enough trouble sleeping that they end up feeling sleepy during the day. For adults aged 60 and above, that sleep trouble may be related to increased risk of perioperative neurocognitive disorders, or PNDs, according to a new study. And since PNDs can be associated with longer hospital stays and poorer postoperative quality of life, patients heading toward surgery should take sleepiness into account in their preop planning. After surgery, up to 40 percent of older patients can have PND, which may mean confusion, disorientation or even delirium and can sometimes last for months or longer. “Asking patients, their family or caregivers if they doze frequently during the day or have trouble staying alert might provide an important clue to brain health after surgery,” said Dr. Jeffry Takla, postdoctoral associate in anesthesiology. So watch that sleep, bub, especially if you have a procedure coming up.
Speaking of Sleep, we have bad news … and OK news. The bad news is new: If you’re looking for a scientific reason to rid the world of the scourge of daylight saving time, don’t lean on the oft-repeated trope that the spring loss of an hour disrupts sleep enough to cause a spike in heart attacks. A new analysis of 170,000 patients over a decade draws the scientific conclusion that the time change is innocent. The analysis showed no meaningful changes except in the spring of 2020, which you may recall included a new scourge called COVID-19. “This is the most comprehensive look we’ve had at the relationship between DST and heart health,” said Dr. Jennifer Rymer, interventional cardiologist and associate professor of medicine at Duke’s School of Medicine. “And the data simply don’t support the idea that changing the clocks causes a surge in heart attacks.” The OK news is older: Studies still show that an extra hour of sleep can reduce heart attack risk by up to 20 percent, so you can still tell the boss you need that extra shut-eye, and DukeMag says they have to give it to you – that’s the rule.
Pushing 70 And Want To Stay Alive?
Here’s hoping you live in the right place. We’re not talking about walking up hills or the feng shui of your living room. This is another story about the lottery of birth: If you want a long life, your best decision would be to have been born in Japan, western Europe or Canada. According to a new study, the risk of dying before age 70 – the probability of premature death (PPD) – still varies widely around the world. Duke University School of Medicine researchers examined databases and compared PPD with the best
case possible. You know the drill: “We expected disparities,” said Omar Karlsson of the Center for Policy Impact in Global Health at the Duke Global Health Institute. “What was surprising was just how extremely uneven mortality decline has been across the world.” China, Africa and India keep improving; the U.S. keeps lagging. “The tools to prevent early death are out there,” said Osondu Ogbuoji, deputy director and research lead at the center. “But how quickly and fairly they’re shared is the real challenge.”
Don’t Touch Me There, AI … but go ahead and tell me stuff. Nobody wants prostate cancer, but it’s worse for some guys than others. If it’s likely to spread, you might need years of not-so-pleasant hormone therapy. But if it’s not likely to, you can skip all that and have just as good an outcome. So digitizing a thousand biopsied samples from men with prostate cancer and connecting them to long-term outcomes enabled AI to learn to draw conclusions from the samples. “About two-thirds of the men had a positive biomarker, meaning that they benefited from the two years of hormonal therapy,” said Dr. Andrew Armstrong, director of research for the Duke Cancer Institute Center for Prostate and Urologic Cancers. “But one third of the men did not – they had no added risk of cancer spreading or coming back. That would save a third of all high-risk men that extra 18 months of hormonal therapy.” This is good news for men with prostate cancer – and maybe lots of people with other cancers, Armstrong says: “AI can uncover patterns that even expert pathologists might miss.”
Give it to the tree. He eats anything.
Um, does he though? You may be thinking that all this extra carbon in the air causing the weather to change and the planet to warm and all that other stuff just needs some time and some trees. Right? Photosynthesis takes carbon dioxide out of the air and makes plant matter out of it, removing carbon. So just let the trees have at it and we’ll – eventually – be fine, right? Wrong. “There used to be a common assumption that higher levels of carbon dioxide will cause trees to grow more and store more carbon,” said Gaby Katul, George Pearsall Distinguished Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering. “But benchmark experiments showed that while this may be true in isolation, other environmental factors also play a large role. We have now uncovered some of the underlying mechanisms at work.” Like, the stomata on leaves – they’re basically pores – which close up to hold in water when it’s hotter and drier. That means the tree saves precious water, but absorbs less carbon through the diminished pore. “Stomata are like valves that control how much water is drawn up into the leaves and released into the air,” said Katul.
IT'S NOT JUST THE FIRE... that could cause you trouble if you’re a firefighter. All that amazing protective clothing – called turnout gear – has several layers to protect from flame, germs and overheating. The stuff all has to pass rigorous tests, but some materials still use a group of “forever chemicals” known as PFAs, which are linked to cancer, and other hazardous chemicals such as decabromodiphenyl ethane, or DBDPE. “I was really surprised that the manufacturers used DBDPE in turnout gear,” said Heather Stapleton, Ronie-Richele Garcia-Johnson Distinguished Professor of Environmental Natural Science at the Nicholas School of the Environment. “It has similar properties as a toxic chemical called decaBDE that has been largely phased out globally, raising questions about its safety. We know firefighters receive higher exposure to multiple chemicals from all the hazards they face during their duty, and they shouldn’t have to worry about receiving additional chemical exposures from their gear.”
Two shots are better than … an iv?
Evidently so, if you’ve been unfortunate enough to get a systemic staph infection. For a long time, if you contracted a staph infection in your bloodstream, you have received your antibiotics for more than a month, through a peripherally inserted central catheter (or PICC line), which meant lots of nursing visits or hospital care and possible side effects. “Even with antibiotics that technically kill the bacteria, one in four patients can still die,” said Dr. Nicholas Turner, assistant professor in the Department of Medicine. “That’s why we need better, easier treatments.” Just such a new treatment delivers a strong antibiotic through two injections a week apart – and seems to be not only equally good in curing the infection but also slightly better at avoiding side effects. The new protocol “offers a way to complete therapy without the hassle and hazards of long-term IV access,” said Dr. Thomas Holland, professor in the Department of Medicine. “That’s a meaningful shift in how we care for people with serious infections.”