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Associate Professor Derek Laver from the University of Newcastle and international colleagues have found that Flecainide - a drug used to treat heart arrhythmias - could also be used to treat Catecholaminergic Polymorphic Ventricular Tachycardia (CPVT).

CVPT is a heart arrhythmia induced by emotional stress or exercise. It is estimated to cause 15 per cent of all unexplained sudden cardiac deaths in people under the age of 30.

Associate Professor Laver said CPVT was caused by too much calcium being released from calcium stores within the heart cells.

"Correct calcium flow within the heart cells is essential for the heart to function properly," he explained. "Calcium is released from the stores into the heart cells through specific channels and we have found that Flecainide reduces the ability of these channels to release calcium, thereby directly counteracting the cause of CPVT."

Currently, beta-blockers are used to treat CPVT but 37 per cent of patients are unresponsive and 24 per cent suffer sudden cardiac death within 10 years of beginning treatment.

Implantable defibrillators are used to prevent sudden death but these cause painful electric shocks that can trigger further stress-induced arrhythmias.

"Current treatments are largely ineffective and we need new and more effective anti-arrhythmic drugs," Associate Professor Laver said.

"We have now discovered something close to an ideal drug for this rare arrhythmia disorder."

Labels: heart disease

New genetic variants that increase the likelihood of developing coronary artery disease and heart attacks are published in three studies in Nature Genetics today.

Dr. Sekar Kathiresan, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and director of preventive cardiology at Massachusetts General Hospital. He is the leader of a group that has identified three new genetic variants associated with an increased risk of heart attack.

The study led by Kathiresan, done by a group of six organizations called the Myocardial Infarction Genetics Consortium, is the largest of the five. It compared the genomes of about 3,000 people who had suffered heart attacks relatively early in life -- under 50 in men, under 60 in women -- with those of 3,000 people who hadn't had a heart attack.

It's known that heart disease tends to cluster in families, Kathiresan said, in part because family members tend to share bad habits, such as smoking. The aim of the study was to single out the role of genes in increased familial risk.

In response to the studies involving British Heart Foundation (BHF) Professors Nilesh Samani and Stephen Ball and part-funded by the charity, Professor Peter Weissberg, Medical Director at the BHF, said:

"These studies demonstrate the power of big international collaborations to unearth new clues on the causes of heart attacks. Our scientists are making excellent progress in this field but genetic testing to predict heart attack risk is still a long way off.

"Vital research is now trying to get to grips with how and why these genetic traits increase heart attack risk and whether new treatments can be devised to counteract them.

"Our thanks go to the thousands of heart patients who provided samples of their DNA for the BHF's Family Heart Study, which contributed to these studies."

The British Heart Foundation (BHF) is the nation's heart charity, dedicated to saving lives through pioneering research, patient care, campaigning for change and by providing vital information. But we urgently need help. We rely on donations of time and money to continue our life-saving work. Because together we can beat heart disease.

Also, to urge Americans to join the battle against these diseases, since 1963 Congress has required the president to proclaim February "American Heart Month."

SOURCE

Labels: genetics, heart disease

As we know loss of sleep can really hurt your immune system. But what else do we need to know about having a healthy, or unhealthy, sleeping pattern?

According to a recent posting on Science Daily, there has been a recent study which shows losing sleep for even part of one night can trigger the key cellular pathway that produces tissue-damaging inflammation. The findings suggest a good night's sleep can ease the risk of both heart disease and autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis.

SOURCE

In further reading, I found that sleeping pill use among young adults rose 85 percent between 2000 and 2004, according to Medco Health Solutions, and the older the person, the more likely they are to use sleeping pills.

One has to wonder if all these sleep issues could potentially be a big factor in the problem of obesity. I don't know about you but I am more likely to search out foods which will give me more energy when I'm tired and they tend to have a lot of sugar in them.

I suppose we shall see.

Labels: Autoimmunity, Biological Psychiatry, heart disease, Immune System, Inflammation, Rheumatoid arthritis, Science Daily, United States

We all know I like my wine, I'm a complete wine addict and until this very morning I was okay with it. Until, of course, I read an article in which research shows even having one to two alcoholic drinks in a day can raise your risks of certain types of breast cancer.

"While the studies do not prove cause and effect, they lend plausibility to growing evidence implicating drinking as a risk factor for breast cancer, says Elizabeth Platz, ScD, a specialist in cancer prevention at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health."

Given the high rate of cancer in Delaware, where I live, and in my family history reading reports like this is alarming. When you put all these factors in the same bowl of likelihood then your risks appear ready to overflow, right?

The researchers reviewed data on 184,418 postmenopausal women, who answered questions about how much alcohol and what type of alcohol they drank each day. They were followed for an average of seven years.

Overall, moderate drinking raised the risk of developing breast cancer, regardless of whether a woman's preference was for beer, wine, or hard liquor. And the more she drank, the greater the risk.

Aw hell.

In other reports, we hear how a glass of wine a day is good for your heart. So how do you weigh the risks? Which studies should take precedence? This I do not know and even my assumptions should be taken lightly because I lack any type of medical background.

I suppose the biggest argument would be regarding your other behavior. When it comes to heart disease there are a plethora of preventive measures you can take to lower your risks. Whereas with breast cancer...well..not so much, unless maybe this means not drinking alcohol is your only preventive measure.

Decisions, decisions.

SOURCE

Labels: alcoholism, breast cancer, heart disease, research