Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Moon Phases Tied to Sleep Cycles
Swiss researchers have found evidence that the lunar cycle may affect sleep patterns, with total sleep time lowest at full moon.
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Moon Phases Tied to Sleep Cycles
How Exercise Changes Fat and Muscle Cells
Several striking new studies provide some clarity by showing that exercise seems able to drastically alter how genes operate, perhaps altering the risk for problems like obesity and diabetes.
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How Exercise Changes Fat and Muscle Cells
Tuesday, July 30, 2013
Understanding Eczema to Treat It
New discoveries shed light on a skin condition that afflicts 15 million Americans.
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Understanding Eczema to Treat It
Monday, July 29, 2013
Concerns About Dementia Screening
A push for early detection and treatment, even in the absence of cognitive symptoms, of the amyloid plaques that indicate a risk for Alzheimer’s and other dementias has some researchers worried.
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Concerns About Dementia Screening
Definition of Cancer Should Be Tightened, Scientists Say
Some of the top scientists in cancer research are recommending sweeping changes in the approach to detection and treatment, including eliminating the word cancer entirely from some common diagnoses.
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Definition of Cancer Should Be Tightened, Scientists Say
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Living With Cancer: A Quilt of Poetry
Taking inspiration from a number of cancer poets, Susan Gubar pieced together a quilt of poetry to convey the feeling of chaos so common among people with cancer.
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Living With Cancer: A Quilt of Poetry
Saturday, July 27, 2013
In Terms of Injury, Cities Safer Than Country
If you want to avoid death by injury, live in a large city — a new study has found they are safer than rural areas.
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In Terms of Injury, Cities Safer Than Country
Medical Procedures May Be Useless, or Worse
Many new techniques and medicines are either no more effective than the old ones, or worse, and many doctors persist in using practices that have been shown to be useless or harmful, a new analysis shows.
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Medical Procedures May Be Useless, or Worse
Friday, July 26, 2013
Tomatoes Plain and Simple
Martha Rose Shulman turns to tomatoes for her annual Recipes for Health tomato week.
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Tomatoes Plain and Simple
Cancer Risk Increases With Height
Height is associated with a greater risk of cancer for both men and women, new research shows.
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Cancer Risk Increases With Height
Thursday, July 25, 2013
When the Patient Is Racist
Since Hippocrates, physicians have embraced the ideal of caring for all patients, regardless of who they might be. But what does the doctor do when the patient discriminates?
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When the Patient Is Racist
Wednesday, July 24, 2013
Australians Are Getting Fatter
Australia may be known for its rugged outdoor lifestyles but recent statistics suggest a different reality. Australia and its equally outdoorsy neighbor, New Zealand, are now two of the fattest countries in the developed world.
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Australians Are Getting Fatter
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Can You Get Too Much Exercise?
Study of endurance athletes who participated in the Vasaloppset, a grueiling 56-mile cross-country ski marathon in Sweden, as well studies in rats raise new questions about the heart dangers of intense and prolonged exercise, while other research points to the benefits of moderation.
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Can You Get Too Much Exercise?
Nightmares After the I.C.U.
Patients who have prolonged stays, getting intubated and sedated, may experience severe hallucinations, putting them at risk of PTSD for years to come, studies show.
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Nightmares After the I.C.U.
Monday, July 22, 2013
Diaries Aid Mental Recovery
Critical care units in several European countries have long been using diaries to help patients, and their families, recover after their ordeal.
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Diaries Aid Mental Recovery
Sunday, July 21, 2013
After a Sprain, Don’t Just Walk It Off
Ankle injuries should never be taken lightly and are too often mistreated or not treated at all.
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After a Sprain, Don’t Just Walk It Off
Exercise in a Pill? The Search Continues
Two recent studies investigate the enticing possibility that we might one day be able to gain the benefits of exercise by downing a pill, rather than by actually sweating. But the question of whether it’s wise remains.
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Exercise in a Pill? The Search Continues
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Is sexual addiction the real deal?
Is sexual addiction the real deal?
Controversy exists over what some mental health experts call “hypersexuality,” or sexual “addiction.” Namely, is it a mental disorder at all, or something else? It failed to make the cut in the recently updated Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM-5, considered the bible for diagnosing mental disorders. Yet sex addiction has been blamed for ruining relationships, lives and careers.
Now, for the first time, UCLA researchers have measured how the brain behaves in so-called hypersexual people who have problems regulating their viewing of sexual images. The study found that the brain response of these individuals to sexual images was not related in any way to the severity of their hypersexuality but was instead tied only to their level of sexual desire.
In other words, hypersexuality did not appear to explain brain differences in sexual response any more than simply having a high libido, said senior author Nicole Prause, a researcher in the department of psychiatry at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA.
“Potentially, this is an important finding,” Prause said. “It is the first time scientists have studied the brain responses specifically of people who identify as having hypersexual problems.”
The study appears in the current online edition of the journal Socioaffective Neuroscience and Psychology.
A diagnosis of hypersexuality or sexual addiction is typically associated with people who have sexual urges that feel out of control, who engage frequently in sexual behavior, who have suffered consequences such as divorce or economic ruin as a result of their behaviors, and who have a poor ability to reduce those behaviors.
But, said Prause and her colleagues, such symptoms are not necessarily representative of an addiction — in fact, non-pathological, high sexual desire could also explain this cluster of problems.
One way to tease out the difference is to measure the brain’s response to sexual-image stimuli in individuals who acknowledge having sexual problems. If they indeed suffer from hypersexuality, or sexual addiction, their brain response to visual sexual stimuli could be expected be higher, in much the same way that the brains of cocaine addicts have been shown to react to images of the drug in other studies.
The study involved 52 volunteers: 39 men and 13 women, ranging in age from 18 to 39, who reported having problems controlling their viewing of sexual images. They first filled out four questionnaires covering various topics, including sexual behaviors, sexual desire, sexual compulsions, and the possible negative cognitive and behavioral outcomes of sexual behavior. Participants had scores comparable to individuals seeking help for hypersexual problems.
While viewing the images, the volunteers were monitored using electroencephalography (EEG), a non-invasive technique that measures brain waves, the electrical activity generated by neurons when they communicate with each other. Specifically, the researchers measured event-related potentials, brain responses that are the direct result of a specific cognitive event.
“The volunteers were shown a set of photographs that were carefully chosen to evoke pleasant or unpleasant feelings,” Prause said. “The pictures included images of dismembered bodies, people preparing food, people skiing — and, of course, sex. Some of the sexual images were romantic images, while others showed explicit intercourse between one man and one woman.”
The researchers were most interested in the response of the brain about 300 milliseconds after each picture appeared, commonly called the “P300″ response. This basic measure has been used in hundreds of neuroscience studies internationally, including studies of addiction and impulsivity, Prause said. The P300 response is higher when a person notices something new or especially interesting to them.
The researchers expected that P300 responses to the sexual images would correspond to a person’s sexual desire level, as shown in previous studies. But they further predicted that P300 responses would relate to measures of hypersexuality. That is, in those whose problem regulating their viewing of sexual images could be characterized as an “addiction,” the P300 reaction to sexual images could be expected to spike.
Instead, the researchers found that the P300 response was not related to hypersexual measurements at all; there were no spikes or decreases tied to the severity of participants’ hypersexuality. So while there has been much speculation about the effect of sexual addiction or hypersexuality in the brain, the study provided no evidence to support any difference, Prause said.
“The brain’s response to sexual pictures was not predicted by any of the three questionnaire measures of hypersexuality,” she said. “Brain response was only related to the measure of sexual desire. In other words, hypersexuality does not appear to explain brain responses to sexual images any more than just having a high libido.”
But debate continues over whether sex addiction is indeed an addiction. A study published in 2012 by Prause’s colleague Rory Reid, a UCLA assistant professor of psychiatry, supported the reliability of the proposed DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for hypersexual disorder. However, Prause notes, that study was not focused on the validity of sex addiction or impulsivity, and did not use any biophysiological data in the analysis.
“If our study can be replicated,” she said, “these findings would represent a major challenge to existing theories of a sex ‘addiction.’ ”
(Source: newsroom.ucla.edu)
Is sexual addiction the real deal?
Saturday, July 20, 2013
New Radiation Therapy Prolongs Prostate Cancer Survival
A new radiation therapy can extend the lives of men with the most advanced form of prostate cancer, a large new study found.
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New Radiation Therapy Prolongs Prostate Cancer Survival
Dr. Adina Nack on HPV, herpes & incurable STDs
TV interview with Adina Nack, Ph.D. about her own cervical HPV experiences, STD research, her new book (Damaged Goods? Women Living with Incurable Sexually T...
Video Rating: 4 / 5
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