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Drinking black tea provides a variety of health advantages that can last a lifetime. However, in an unexpected discovery, Edith Cowan University-led research shown that it may also consistently predict dementia. Flavonoids, which are naturally occurring compounds present in many common foods and drinks such as black and green tea, apples, almonds, citrus fruit, berries, and more, are the key, according to the study, which was published in the journal “Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology.” They’ve long been recognised to offer several health advantages, but recent Edith Cowan University (ECU) study suggests they could be much better than previously thought.

The Heart Foundation funded a research of 881 elderly women (median age 80) that discovered they were considerably less likely to develop severe abdominal aortic calcification (AAC) if they drank a high amount of flavonoids in their diet.

AAC is the calcification of the abdominal aorta, the main artery in the body that transports oxygenated blood from the heart to the abdominal organs and lower extremities, and it is a risk factor for cardiovascular events such as heart attack and stroke.

It’s also been shown to be a good predictor of late-life dementia. According to Ben Parmenter, an ECU Nutrition and Health Innovation Research Institute researcher and study lead, while there were numerous dietary sources of flavonoids, some had unusually high quantities.

“In most populations, a small group of foods and beverages — uniquely high in flavonoids — contribute the bulk of total dietary flavonoid intake,” he said.
“The main contributors are usually black or green tea, blueberries, strawberries, oranges, red wine, apples, raisins/grapes and dark chocolate.”

There are several other kinds of flavonoids, such as flavan-3-ols and flavonols, which appear to have a link with AAC, according to the study.

Participants in the study who consumed more total flavonoids, flavan-3-ols, and flavonols were 36-39 percent less likely to have widespread AAC. Black tea was the primary source of total flavonoids in the research sample, and it was also related with a considerably decreased risk of widespread AAC.

Participants who drank two to six cups of tea per day had a 16-42 percent lower likelihood of having extensive AAC when compared to those who did not consume tea. Other dietary sources of flavonoids, such as fruit juice, red wine, and chocolate, did not, however, reveal a significant favourable connection with AAC.

Though black tea was the study’s major source of flavonoids (owing to the participants’ age), Mr Parmenter stated people might still benefit from flavonoids without brewing a cup.

“Out of the women who don’t drink black tea, higher total non-tea flavonoid intake also appears to protect against extensive calcification of the arteries,” he said.

“This implies flavonoids from sources other than black tea may be protective against AAC when tea is not consumed.”

Mr. Parmenter believes this is significant because it allows non-tea drinkers to benefit from flavonoids in their diet.

“In other populations or groups of people, such as young men or people from other countries, black tea might not be the main source of flavonoids,” he said.

“AAC is a major predictor of vascular disease events, and this study shows intake of flavonoids, that could protect against AAC, are easily achievable in most people’s diets.”

The first comprehensive study to investigate studies on children’s and young people’s mental health utilising evidence from before and during COVID-19 identified an influence on mental health that might lead to an increase in demand for support services.

The study, coordinated by the Universities of Exeter and Cambridge, is the first to look into studies on young people’s mental health before and after the epidemic. The study sheds further light on the changes in mental health of children and adolescents of various ages throughout the world during the epidemic.

The work was financed by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) with some assistance from NIHR PenARC and published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. Researchers gathered 51 research that examined how the epidemic affects young people’s mental health in a variety of dimensions. Importantly, rather than relying on retroactive impressions of change, most investigations incorporated information on baseline mental health acquired prior to the pandemic.

Because of the necessity for fast-paced research in the midst of a growing pandemic, the quality of the studies was uneven, with just four of the papers included classified as high quality. While the data revealed that some areas of mental health were deteriorating, the conclusions were inconsistent, with no clear trend developing.

There were conflicting findings from research that examined the same sort of mental health issue in different methods, suggesting that the impacts are not universal and are dependent on the conditions and settings of children, young people, and families. According to the researchers, the total effect is big enough to raise demand for services.

Study author Dr Tamsin Newlove-Delgado, of the University of Exeter, said: “The pandemic affected the lives of children and young people worldwide, and we’ve heard a lot of talk around the impact on mental health. Our review of the research in the field provides further evidence that already-stretched services are likely to see an increase in demand, but that perhaps things are not as bad for everyone as some headlines make them appear.

However, even a small average change in mental health symptoms for each child can mean that, on a societal level, a large number of children tip over from managing OK to needing some professional support. Children and young people must be prioritised in pandemic recovery, and explicitly considered in planning for any future pandemic response.”

The researchers discovered some evidence of worsening in a variety of broader measures of mental health, such as an increase in general issues with behaviour, emotions, or anxiety, as well as a large number of studies that showed no change and others that claimed gains in mental health.

According to the report, studies in this area is particularly challenging to understand because, progressively, mental health disorders become more widespread in adolescent than in childhood. This makes it difficult to determine if the negative effects discovered are the consequence of the youngsters in the study growing older or are directly due to the epidemic.

Co-author Professor Tamsin Ford, of the University of Cambridge, said: “Studying the whole population of children and young people means that our research may not pick up on differences between groups that may have fared better or worse during the pandemic. For example, other research has found that some children and young people reported sleeping and eating better during lockdowns, or found it easier to access remote schooling as they could work at their own pace. Others struggled with lack of structure or lack of access to remote schooling or peers.”

Dr. Abigail Russell of the University of Exeter, the study’s author, stated: “Because of the race for answers during the pandemic, a lot of research was done quickly, using opportunistic samples, such as asking people in online surveys how they thought the pandemic had affected their child’s mental health. Unfortunately, this implies that the general quality of research is relatively low, and even the articles that we included in our analysis using data from before the pandemic were not of very high quality.

“This may be partly because of the pressure to quickly publish research about the pandemic and its impacts. As a research community, we urgently need to do better by our young people who struggle with their mental health, to understand the impact on them and their families, to target support where it’s needed. In the longer term, researchers, funders and policymakers should take a more cohesive approach to supporting and conducting high-quality research.”

The report was published in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and is titled ‘The influence of Covid-19 on psychopathology in children and young people worldwide: systematic analysis of studies including pre- and within-pandemic data.’

According to a recent large-scale study involving over 20,000 people, one in every eight older Canadians suffered their first bout of depression during the pandemic. For persons who had previously suffered with depression, the figures were much worse. By the fall of 2020, over half (45%) of this group had reported suffering depression.

The International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health released a study of answers from the Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging, which collected information from participants for an average of seven years.

“The high rate of first-onset depression in 2020 highlights the substantial mental health toll that the pandemic caused in a formerly mentally healthy group of older adults.” says first author, Andie MacNeil, a recent Master of Social Work graduate from the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work (FIFSW) and the Institute for Life Course and Aging, University of Toronto.

Although it is commonly known that depression among older adults rose during the pandemic, few studies have looked at the proportion of individuals who had the disease for the first time, as well as the proportion of people who had a history of the condition who relapsed.

“The devastation of the pandemic which upended so many aspects of daily life hit those with a history of depression particularly hard,” said co-author Sapriya Birk, a researcher formerly based in the Department of Neuroscience, Carleton University, Ottawa who is currently a medical student at McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada, adding, “Health professionals need to be vigilant in screening their patients who had mental health problems at an earlier time in their life.”

Low income and savings, loneliness, chronic pain, difficulties obtaining healthcare, a history of traumatic childhood experiences, and family conflict were all connected to depression among older persons during the pandemic, according to the study.

Prior to the pandemic, older persons who believed their income was insufficient to cover their fundamental requirements, as well as those with fewer savings, were more likely to suffer from depression.

“These findings highlight the disproportionate mental health burden borne by individuals with low socioeconomic status during the pandemic. Many of these socioeconomic risk factors may have been exacerbated by the economic precarity of the pandemic, particularly for individuals with fewer resources,” says co-author Margaret de Groh, scientific manager at the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Individuals who experienced multiple characteristics of loneliness, such as feeling excluded, alone, and lonely, had a 4 to 5 times increased risk of both incident and recurring depression.

“It is not surprising that the lock-down was particularly difficult for older adults who were isolated and lonely during the pandemic. Social connections and social support are essential for well-being and mental health. Better support and outreach are needed for those who are isolated,” says co-author Ying Jiang, senior epidemiologist at the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Older adults in chronic pain and those who had trouble accessing their usual healthcare, medication or treatments were more likely to be depressed during the autumn of 2020.

“This finding underlines the importance of streamlining service provision to ensure less disruption of medical services when future pandemics arise,” said co-author Professor Paul J. Villeneuve, Department of Neuroscience, Carleton University, Canada.

Individuals having a history of suffering as a youngster were more likely to be depressed in the autumn of 2020. When compared to their contemporaries, older persons who experienced family conflict during the pandemic had more than quadruple the risk of depression.

“Family conflict is a major stressor that can impact mental health even in the best of times. With the enforced close quarters of lockdown and the stress of the pandemic, there was a considerable strain on many family relationships. The ensuing conflict was a major risk for depression,” says senior author, Professor Esme Fuller-Thomson at the University of Toronto’s FIFSW and director of the Institute for Life Course & Aging.

CAR T cells, or engineered immune cells, have demonstrated what tailored immunotherapies can achieve in the battle against blood malignancies. Researchers have now announced extremely encouraging early findings for CAR T treatment in a limited group of patients suffering from the autoimmune illness lupus. Carl June, MD, a Penn Medicine CAR T pioneer, and Daniel Baker, a PhD student in Cell and Molecular Biology at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, explain this breakthrough in a commentary published today in Cell.

“We’ve always known that in principle, CAR T therapies could have broad applications, and it’s very encouraging to see early evidence that this promise is now being realized,” said June, who is the Richard W. Vague Professor in Immunotherapy in the department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Penn Medicine and director of the Center for Cellular Immunotherapies at Penn’s Abramson Cancer Center.

T cells are among the most potent weapons in the immune system’s arsenal. They have the ability to connect to and destroy other cells that they perceive as viable targets, including virus-infected cells. CAR T cells are T cells that have been genetically engineered to destroy certain cell types more efficiently.

CAR T treatments are made from each patient’s own cells, which are extracted from the patient’s blood, modified and multiplied in the lab, and then re-infused into the patient as a “living medication.” Kymriah, the first CAR T treatment, was created by June and his team at Penn Medicine and was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2017. In the United States, there are presently six FDA-approved CAR T cell treatments for six distinct malignancies.

The medicines have transformed the treatment of some B cell leukemias, lymphomas, and other blood malignancies, putting many patients in long-term remission who previously had little hope. Experts expected that T cells may be modified to attack illnesses other than B cell tumours from the beginning of CAR T research. Dozens of research teams worldwide, including Penn Medicine and biotech spinoffs, are looking at these possible new uses.

June and Baker’s comments follows the publication of the first substantial clinical report of success from these efforts: a piece in Nature Medicine by German researchers on the use of CAR T treatment against the autoimmune illness lupus (systemic lupus erythematosus).

Lupus is an ideal candidate for CAR T therapy, according to researchers, because it is also driven by B cells, and so experimental CAR T therapies against it may utilise current anti-B-cell designs. B cells are antibody-producing cells in the immune system, and in lupus, B cells target the patient’s own organs and tissues.

The patients in the German trial, five young people, did not benefit from typical lupus therapy. Despite this, all went into remission and were able to discontinue their lupus medications three months after receiving a single, very tiny dosage of CAR T treatment, which virtually eradicated their existing B cells. (To preserve some antibody immunity, cancer patients require infusions of pure human antibodies from healthy donors.) Even more remarkable, all of the patients stayed in remission for up to a year, and unlike cancer patients, the lupus patients experienced the restoration of their B cells, which are regenerated spontaneously from blood stem cells in bone marrow.

Baker and June write in their commentary that, while the German study’s findings need to be verified with bigger trials and longer-term follow-up, they are extremely encouraging, suggesting that lupus may be a simpler CAR T target than B-cell malignancies.

“Disease-driving B cells are much less numerous in lupus,” Baker said. “Thus, effective CAR T treatment of this autoimmune disease may require a much lower dose that greatly reduces the problem of immunological side-effects.”

A vaping habit may result in a stained smile and more trips to the dentist.

Tufts University School of Dental Medicine researchers discovered that patients who admitted to using vaping devices were more likely to develop cavities. There are a lot of teeth that are at risk because 9.1 million American adults and 2 million teenagers use tobacco-based vaping products, according to CDC studies.

According to Karina Irusa, assistant professor of comprehensive care and the paper’s primary author, the findings of this study on the correlation between vaping and the risk of caries—the dental term for cavities—serve as a warning that this once-seemingly innocent behaviour may be seriously harmful.

The American Dental Association Journal released the findings.

Since the use of vaping devices was associated with lung disease, the public’s awareness of the risks of vaping to overall health has grown. Some dental studies have linked e-cigarette use to higher levels of gum disease indicators and, separately, to erosion of the enamel, the outer layer of the tooth. Irusa claims that even dentists haven’t given much attention to the link between using e-cigarettes and oral health.

Irusa says that the recent Tufts finding maybe just a hint of the damage vaping causes to the mouth. “The extent of the effects on dental health, specifically on dental decay, are still relatively unknown,” she says. “At this point, I’m just trying to raise awareness,” among both dentists and patients.

Irusa claims that this study is the first to precisely look into the link between using e-cigarettes and vaping and a higher risk of developing cavities. More than 13,000 patients over the age of 16 who had treatment at Tufts dentistry clinics between 2019 and 2022 had their data examined by her and her colleagues.

Irusa discovered that there was a statistically significant difference in the risk levels of dental caries between the e-cigarette/vaping group and the control group, even though the vast majority of the patients claimed not to use vapes.

Approximately 79 per cent of the vaping patients and only roughly 60 per cent of the control group were classified as having a high caries risk. Although nicotine-containing devices are more prevalent, the patients who vaped were not questioned whether they utilised THC- or nicotine-containing devices.

“It’s important to understand this is preliminary data,” Irusa says. “This is not 100 per cent conclusive, but people do need to be aware of what we’re seeing.” Further studies need to be done, and Irusa wants to take a closer look at how vaping affects the microbiology of saliva.

The sweet substance and viscosity of vaping liquid, which when aerosolized and subsequently breathed through the mouth, clings to the teeth, is one factor why using e-cigarettes could increase the risk of cavities.

The characteristics of e-cigarettes with sweet flavours have been compared to those of gummy candies and acidic beverages in a 2018 study that was published in the journal PLOS One. It has been demonstrated that vaping aerosols alter the oral microbiota, making germs that cause decay more hospitable. Additionally, it’s been noticed that vaping seems to promote decay in places where it doesn’t typically happen, including the bottom margins of front teeth. It has an aesthetic cost, according to Irusa.

Dentists should frequently inquire about e-cigarette usage as part of a patient’s medical history, according to Tufts researchers. That includes paediatric dentists who treat teenagers; in 2021, 7.6 per cent of middle- and high-school students reported using e-cigarettes, according to the FDA/CDC.

A “more stringent caries care approach” that can include prescription-strength fluoride toothpaste and fluoride rinse, in-office fluoride applications, and more frequent exams than twice a year is also recommended for patients who use e-cigarettes.

“It takes a lot of investment of time and money to manage dental caries, depending on how bad it gets,” Irusa says. “Once you’ve started the habit, even if you get fillings, as long as you continue, you’re still at risk of secondary caries. It’s a vicious cycle that will not stop.”

Teens and young adults who are treated for sleep disorders with benzodiazepines such as Xanax – a medication commonly prescribed to treat anxiety and sleeplessness – may be at a higher risk of overdose, according to Rutgers researchers.

The study, published in JAMA Network Open, looked at how frequently young people with sleep disorders overdosed after starting a prescription sleep medication. Benzodiazepines were involved in 12,290 overdose deaths in 2020, up from 6,872 in 2011 and 1,135 in 1999, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

However, Rutgers researchers said the risks of drug overdose in youth populations prescribed a benzodiazepine treatment for insomnia was unclear.
Researchers found young people using benzodiazepines for common sleep conditions had an increased risk of overdose during the six months after starting treatment compared with other prescription sleep medications, including trazodone, hydroxyzine and z-hypnotics.

“The risk of drug overdose with benzodiazepine treatment is an important safety consideration when treating adolescents and young adults,” said Greta Bushnell, an author of the study and a faculty member at the Center for Pharmacoepidemiology and Treatment Sciences at the Rutgers Institute for Health, Health Care Policy and Aging Research (IFH).

“We hope these results can inform prescribing decisions and encourage close monitoring in this young patient population.”

Using a commercial claims database covering privately insured young people ages 10 to 29 years old, researchers identified nearly 90,000 people newly receiving benzodiazepine or an alternative prescription treatment for a sleep disorder. Researchers then examined drug overdoses in this group in the six months following the start of treatment.

Researchers also found the risk of overdose was highest among young people starting treatment with benzodiazepines who recently were prescribed an opioid.

“Given the frequent co-use of benzodiazepines with other substances, it is important to discuss with young people the potential associated harms,” said Bushnell, who is an assistant professor at the Rutgers School of Public Health. “Because other substance use may be unknown to the prescriber, adolescents and young adults should be screened for substance use and a history of overdoses before treatment.”

According to Bushnell, more research is needed to determine how specific benzodiazepine treatment details, such as dosage, affect the risks of overdose.

According to new research from the University of Georgia’s Youth Development Institute, stress may be beneficial to brain function. The findings were published in the journal Neuropsychologia. According to the study, low to moderate amounts of stress boost working memory, which is the short-term knowledge individuals need to execute everyday activities such as remembering someone’s phone number or memorising directions to a certain location.

There is, however, one limitation, according to the researchers. The findings apply only to mild to moderate stress. When your stress levels rise over moderate and become consistent, the stress becomes poisonous. “The bad outcomes of stress are pretty clear and not new,” said Assaf Oshri, lead author of the study and an associate professor in the College of Family and Consumer Sciences.

Consistently high amounts of stress can alter the anatomy of the brain. It causes white matter to grow at the cost of grey matter, which is involved in muscular control, decision-making, self-control, emotional regulation, and other functions. Chronic stress can also make people more prone to a wide range of ailments, from nausea and migraine headaches to high blood pressure and heart disease.

“But there’s less information about the effects of more limited stress,” Oshri said. “Our findings show that low to moderate levels of perceived stress were associated with elevated working memory neural activation, resulting in better mental performance.”

Oshri and his colleagues previously established that low to moderate stress levels might help people build resilience and minimise their chances of acquiring mental health issues including depression and antisocial behaviour. This study also found that brief episodes of stress can assist people learn how to survive with challenging situations in the future.

The current study expands on prior work by using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to illustrate how low to moderate stress can help the areas of the brain that govern working memory do their job more successfully.
People may manage with stress in healthy ways with the aid of support networks, friends, and family.

The researchers examined MRI images from the Human Connectome Project of over 1,000 persons of various races and ethnicities. The Human Connectome Project, funded by the National Institutes of Health, attempts to provide light on how the human brain works.

The findings revealed that people who reported low to moderate stress levels had greater activity in areas of the brain associated with working memory. Participants who reported chronically high levels of stress exhibited a decrease in those regions. Participants were asked how frequently they encountered various thoughts or sensations in order to determine perceived stress levels.

For example, “how frequently in the previous month have you been unhappy because of something unexpected that happened?” and “how frequently in the recent month have you realised that you couldn’t keep up with everything that you had to do?” This scale has been shown to be an effective measure in a number of different international research.

The researchers also examined the participants’ social networks using a variety of measures, such as how individuals felt about their own ability to deal with unexpected events, how satisfied they were that their lives mattered and were meaningful, and the availability of friend-based support in their social networks.

To assess working memory, participants were given four different types of photographs of items like tools and people’s faces and then asked to recall if they were the same photos they had seen before. The researchers then assessed neural activity in different areas of the brain by analysing MRIs of the subjects’ brains while they performed the tasks.

Unsurprisingly, those who reported having greater support from their relatives and friends tended to be better able to manage with low to moderate stress levels.

“You need the correct resources to be empowered by difficulty and stress,” stated Oshri. “Exposure to adversity can be beneficial for certain people. Others, however, may not. ” If you have a supportive community or family, you may be able to withstand greater stress.”

According to a study, women of South Asian heritage may be more prone to develop gestational diabetes due to the same complicated genetics that raises their risk of developing type 2 diabetes. The study’s findings were published in the journal eLife. The discovery might lead to new methods of identifying women who would benefit from diabetes prevention measures during pregnancy.

People of South Asian heritage are more likely to acquire type 2 diabetes. Women of African origin are also twice as likely as women of European descent to acquire gestational diabetes during pregnancy. However, it is unclear why South Asians are at a higher risk of these two illnesses.

“Only a handful of studies have looked at how genetic and environmental factors interact in gestational diabetes in South Asian women,” says lead author Amel Lamri, a research associate at McMaster University and Population Health Research Institute (PHRI) in Ontario, Canada. “None have looked at how the genes associated with type 2 diabetes may interact with environmental factors to contribute to gestational diabetes in South Asian women.”

Lamri and colleagues investigated the link between genes linked with type 2 diabetes, environmental variables, and gestational diabetes to bridge this gap. They investigated whether genetic patterns associated with type 2 diabetes risk were also associated with gestational diabetes in 837 and 4,372 South Asian women who took part in the SouTh Asian BiRth CohorT (START) and Born in Bradford (BiB) studies, respectively.

The researchers used a polygenic risk score to quantify an individual’s hereditary risk of acquiring type 2 diabetes based on the number of risk alleles they had. The researchers discovered that South Asian women with higher polygenic risk scores for type 2 diabetes had a greater chance of gestational diabetes; each incremental rise in the score was linked with a 45% increase in the likelihood of acquiring this illness.

When the researchers looked at the risk of gestational diabetes at the population level, they discovered that having a polygenic risk score in the top one-third explained 12.5% of the risk among South Asian women. A family history of type 2 diabetes plus a polygenic risk score in the top third explained 25% of the risk of developing gestational diabetes.

“These findings reveal that a higher polygenic risk score for type 2 diabetes and a family history of diabetes are substantially and independently related with gestational diabetes in women of South Asian heritage,” Lamri added.

The researchers also investigated if environmental variables influenced these genetic risk factors. In both trials, the majority of the environmental factors they investigated (with the probable exception of body mass index and food quality) did not significantly increase the risk of diabetes during pregnancy. However, the authors cautioned that the studies may not have been big enough to identify more minor environmental impacts, and that further research is needed to validate the modulatory effects they detected.

“Our results support the idea that type 2 diabetes and gestational diabetes share a common genetic background,” concluded senior author Sonia Anand, the Michael G. DeGroote Chair in Population Health, and a senior scientist at PHRI, McMaster University, and Hamilton Health Sciences. “If future studies confirm our results, this information may help identify which women would benefit most from interventions to help prevent diabetes during pregnancy.”