Diet may matter for prognosis of colon cancerA diet rich in red and processed meats, fat, sweets, and refined grains (also called the Western dietary pattern) seems to increase the risk of recurrence of disease and death in people with colon cancer. A prospective observational study assessed dietary habits in more than 1000 people with…
Read moreFood fortification with folic acid is the vogue. As nutritionists we must wonder why long term watching of folic acid dietary intake is not enoughIn the Lancet 2007, Smith et al report a case of a woman who had well documented anaphylactic responses to 5 mg of synthetic folic acidThis is rare and may be…
Read moreOsteoporosis is a progressive disabling bone condition where the bones soften as a result of bone resorption exceeding bone formation. Tang et al in a careful review of the prescription of calcium and vitamin D concluded that calcium ( 1200 mg / day ) or calcium plus 800 iu of vitamin D in addition to…
Read moreProbiotics are all the rage. But not all act in an effective manner. In a clinical trial of young children aged 3-36 months a variety of five probiotics drinks were compared over five daysThe trial was to ask the children’s parents purchase a specific probiotic product: oral rehydration solution (control group); Lactobacillus rhamnosus strain GG;Saccharomyces…
Read moreHuntington’s disease or Huntington’s chorea is a terrible dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disease. The basis of this problem is an accumulation of fragments of polyglutamine expanded protein in affected neurons. There is also in Huntington’s disease and Alzheimers an abnormal enrichment of ubiquitin . . Ubiquitin metabolism may be in disarray. Ubiquitin is widely found in…
Read moreMany water wells in Bangladesh are contaminated with arsenic. More than 70 million people are affected. In the 1970s and 80s various International Agencies joined together to dig wells to allow the population access to clean water.10 million wells were dug , but the presence of arsenic was unsuspected and untested for.The arsenic is a…
Read moreThe common biology of cancer and ageingThe biological processes involved in the development of cancer and the process of ageing have much in common.Perhaps cancer is a process where the process is concentrated in one organ and ageing involves the whole or most of the body.The ageing process involves a wide range of molecular stressesloss…
Read moreMedieval Islamic Medicine published by Georgetown University and Edinburgh University Pressby Peter Pormann and Emilie Savage-SmithReviewed by Yasmin Khan in Nature 2007 Medical History without Frontiers vol 448, 870 Islamic medicine has a long history especially in the medieval period of over thousand years and derives its past form vast geographical regions from Spain and…
Read moreThe discovery of DNA and RNA was to describe the anatomy of the mechanism whereby heritable information was transferred from generation to generation.Now the physiology and biochemistry of the mechanism is being described.Ericka Check in Nature 2007, Hitting the on switch , 448, pp 855-868 discusses RNA interference. This is the process whereby small pieces…
Read moreIn the June/July 2007 American Gastroenterology Perspectives there are two very interesting articles. One on the future of treatment of Crohns diseaseThe second is Technologies in the pipeline for obesity., by Susan Yanovski. P 9 and 15.Obesity is a scourge of Western affluent society. The surgeons have inevitably something to offer.The laparoscopic banding of the…
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