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The media gets it right: The health effects of coffee

June 26, 2012 By 2 Comments

Here at EBL, we love it when a major media outlet takes a fair and balanced look at the evidence.  As we’ve written about before, mainstream publications don’t always present all of the evidence.  But this week, the New York Times published an excellent update on the health effects of coffee.

Health writer Jane Brody first wrote up a thorough review of the health effects of coffee in 2008.

Among the findings she reported:

  • Drinks with fewer than 550 milligrams of caffeine, which includes a Grande brew from Starbucks, are equally as hydrating as drinking pure water. (Many previous reports have touted coffee’s diuretic effects.)
  • There is very little evidence that coffee increases your risk of heart attack or abnormal heart rhythms.
  • Coffee causes a small, temporary rise in blood pressure, but there’s no evidence that it leads to chronic hypertension.
  • And on a positive note, coffee is found to increase alertness, happiness and endurance in aerobic activities. It also helps blunt the feeling of pain. (No wonder so many Americans love it so!)

Brody’s update, published this week, was based on a study published in May in the New England Journal of Medicine. Here’s how she summed it up:

“When smoking and many other factors known to influence health and longevity were taken into account, coffee drinkers in the study were found to be living somewhat longer than abstainers. Further, the more coffee consumed each day — up to a point, at least — the greater the benefit to longevity.”

That’s good news on two fronts: Coffee drinkers the world over can enjoy brews without worry, and the New York Times gets accolades for balanced, comprehensive reporting.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, Health and Wellness, In The Media Tagged With: , , ,

Studies on same-sex parenting: The details matter

June 20, 2012 By 1 Comment

Here on EBL, we’ve talked frequently about what makes for quality research. There’s new research out this month on gay parents that illustrates the importance of seeking out high quality research.

A new study by a University of Texas sociologist  surveyed nearly 3,000 Americans ages 18 to 39 to ask about their family structure growing up. Of the participants, 248 grew up in households where one parent  had a same-sex relationship at some point.  The study found that children of these parents were more likely than kids in other family structures to be on public assistance, unemployed or in therapy as adults, among other negative outcomes.

To collect information about same-sex parenting, the study asked: “Did either of your parents ever have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex?” and then asked whether participants had lived with their parents at the time.

But the question does not collect enough information about these families. Are they parents involved in heterosexual marriages who had an affair, or divorced and then entered into a same-sex relationship?  We just know. The study didn’t ask any questions about whether participants were raised in stable homes with committed parents who were of the same sex.

The study has sparked a flurry of media attention, including the New York Times and Time magazine, among other

s, with plenty of criticism. And the criticism is merited, said Ritch Savin-Williams, Director of the Sex and Gender Lab at the Cornell’s College of Human Ecology.

“The research design of this study is sufficiently flawed (inappropriate comparison group) as to merit disbelief in the findings,” he said. “It is unclear if this major shortcoming was lack of scientific rigor or in some part influenced by the funding sources that have both religious and political agendas.”

There is a systematic review on same-sex parenting that provides more answers. The review looked at 33 studies that lesbian, gay and heterosexual parents. Their analysis found no difference in parenting ability or the children’s psychological and social success between same-sex and heterosexual parent partners.

Clearly, the issue of same-sex parenting is politically-charged for a lot of reasons. The point we’d like to make here on EBL is that it’s important to understand the details of research study, and draw your conclusions with all of the evidence.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media, Youth Development Tagged With: , , , ,

Exaggerating neuroscience in the news

May 22, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The 1990s were proclaimed the “Decade of the Brain” by President George W. Bush – an action that bolstered neuroscience research and continues to spur discoveries about one of the most important human organs.

Neuroscience researchers have made strides in a myriad of realms – personality, economics, human develop and medicine, to name a few.  Of course, these discoveries have been reported and discussed across news channels and the Internet, including here on EBL.  (We’ve written about the impact on video games on the brain and the benefits of meditation, to name a few.)

Now a new study in the journal Neuron calls into question how well the media have explained neuroscience research. The study reviewed articles publishes in six major British newspapers from 2000 to 2010. The study found three ways that the brain is commonly portrayed in the media.

The first is the idea of brain as a resource that needs to be protected an optimized through, for example, doing crossword puzzles or avoiding television.  This concept makes it seems like “exercising” the brain is as simple a strengthening a muscle, which is an inaccurate simplification.

The second is the idea of the brain as a way to quantify the difference between people – the idea that gender, sexual orientation and conditions like substance abuse and obesity show up in our brains. While differences in our personalities and behaviors certainly do show up in our brains, it doesn’t mean that women, or gay people or alcoholics are the same.

The third idea is that the brain provides biological proof of our experiences. While it’s true that our experiences do show up in our brains, the review found that media stories often overextend brain research. For example, a study showing that informational overload can crowd out empathy was presented as evidence that social networking websites like Twitter rob people of compassion, even though there’s no proof that the evidence extends that far.

“You can do without a lot of your body parts – but without your brain, you just aren’t you,” said Barbara Ganzel, a researcher at Cornell’s College of Human Ecology who studies the impact of trauma on the brain. “The mystery of the connection between your brain and ‘you’ is exciting and scary and complicated. While we’re beginning to better understand the connection, there is a long road ahead before we will fully comprehend the answers to many of these questions.”

The take-home message: While we’re making great strides in neuroscience research, the media often extends the actual evidence in ways that may not be completely accurate. The brain is the most complex organ in the human body, and one we’re not likely to understand fully for a very long time.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, Health and Wellness, In The Media Tagged With: , , ,

Real evidence linking taxes and death

April 17, 2012 By Leave a Comment

With U.S. income taxes due today, there will surely be banter around water coolers across the country on the subject of taxes, including a myriad of jokes about paying Uncle Sam.

“If my business gets much worse, I won’t have to lie on my next tax return.”

“When it comes to taxes, there are two types of people. There are those that get it done early, also known as psychopaths, and then the rest of us.”

“Drive carefully. Uncle Sam needs every taxpayer he can get.”

It turns out, there’s actually something to that last one.

A study in the most recent issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, reviewed data on fatal road crashes from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration from the past 30 years. The study found there are consistently more fatal car crashes on Tax Day each year, compared with other days. On average there are 13 more deaths – approximately a 6 percent increase – compared with other days.

What is going on?  The study authors speculate that added stress of a deadline could lead to more distracted driving, or that people could be consuming more alcohol on tax day.  Whatever the reason, they suggest a public health campaign to remind people to drive carefully on Tax Day.

Drive safely today!

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media Tagged With: , , ,

New evidence on running shoes

April 10, 2012 By 6 Comments

If you frequent a trail or neighborhood that is popular with runners, you’ve most likely noticed a new trend: people running barefoot or with very odd-looking shoes that place for each toe. And if you’re a runner yourself, you’ve certainly come across – maybe even experimented with – the trend of barefoot running.

Books like ChiRunning and Born to Run make the case for lower-profile, less-cushioned shoes or none at all. Here at EBL, we’ve written about the phenomenon before – specifically the work of Harvard biologist Daniel Lieberman, who studies the biomechanics of barefoot running and how early humans survived by evolving the ability to travel long distances to hunt.

Now a new study – detailed by a New York Times blog – has found that wearing light-weight shoes, instead of going completely barefoot, is metabolically more efficient.

The researchers’ argument goes something like this:  Running with traditional running shoes, which weight 300 to 400 grams, increase the amount of energy required to run because with every step, the running is lifting those weights.  Over the miles, that extra energy adds up.

For this study, researchers compared runners in lightweight shoes – weighing 150 grams – to barefoot runners who ran with leaded strips weighing 150 grams taped to the top of their feet. Carrying the same weight, the study found that barefoot running was actually less efficient compared to wearing light-weight shoes.

“What we found was that there seem to be adaptations that occur during the running stride that can make wearing shoes metabolically less costly,” Jason R. Franz, a doctoral candidate at the University of Colorado who led the study, told the New York Times. Shoes, he says, “provide some degree of cushioning.” If you eschew shoes, “something else has to provide the cushioning.”

Without any shoes, a runner’s leg muscles require additional energy to provide this cushioning.

In fact, the study even found that unweighted barefoot running was slightly less efficient than running with light-weight shoes, even though the shoes added weight.

The study didn’t address other benefits that barefoot runners tout – namely a reduction in injuries from running without shoes. But the study does make the case for investing in a different kind of running shoe – not the cushioned, bulky trainer that was once popular, but a more protective, lighter shoe that protects feet without adding weight.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, Health and Wellness, In The Media Tagged With: , , ,

BPA: The answer is in the details

April 2, 2012 By 1 Comment

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration decided not to ban the chemical bisphenol A, also known as BPA, in food packaging last week. The decision may seem like a surprising one since so many water bottles and serving utensils are sold as “BPA-free.” So let’s look at the evidence behind their decision.

National Public Radio offered a good overview of the evidence available on the health effect of BPA. The story noted that evidence from government agencies typically weighs heavier in FDA decisions.

One worry with other studies in contamination – BPA accidentally getting into the blood after samples are drawn. Some studies have found high levels of BPA in the blood. But these studies used samples collected in hospitals or doctors’ offices, not research settings and did not include a common test to detect contamination.

One study performed by government scientists involved feeding 20 adults a diet high in BPA from packaged foods for a day, and then measuring how much of it ended up in their blood.  At the end of the day, there wasn’t enough BPA in participants’ blood to measure.

That’s because the human body can he human body can actually inactivate dangerous chemicals like BPA in the intestine and liver, Justin Teeguarden, a toxicologist at the Pacific Northwest National Lab who conducted the study, told NPR.  Contamination was also an issue in this study, but the researchers tested for it and overcame it, he said.

Other government studies found that very little BPA is transferred to a nursing mother’s breast milk, and that  newborn monkeys are able to inactivate BPA just like human adults. (Researchers aren’t able to conduct studies on newborn babies.)

While the evidence does not show that BPA is completely safe, the FDA found that the low levels of BPA that humans are safe.

As for me, I’m still going to avoid BPA when I can. With the pressure on companies to remove from their products, there are plenty of BPA-free alternatives available, especially for kids. Any other BPA from canned food or juice containers, I’m not going to worry about for the moment.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, Health and Wellness, In The Media Tagged With: , , ,

What we know about mindfulness and meditation

March 29, 2012 By 1 Comment

The phrase “living in the moment” is a buzz word in our modern society that denotes a life well-lived. With its roots lie in Buddhism, the idea of “mindfulness” and “living in the moment” has taken root in modern American culture.

From best-selling books like Eat, Pray, Love to yoga classes offered at nearly every gym in the country, the idea of living in the moment is en vogue. But does it really lead to a happier life?

A systematic review of the evidence found  that mindfulness-based therapy – which encourages patients to focus on their breathing and their body, to notice but not judge their thoughts and to generally live in the moment – does yield positive benefits.

The review, published last year in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, is focused on mindfulness as a treatment for psychological disorders. It looked at 39 studies involving 1,140 participants who received mindfulness-based therapy for a range of conditions including cancer, generalized anxiety disorder and depression.

The review concluded that mindfulness-based therapy somewhat helped ease the mental stress of people recovering from cancer and other serious illnesses. The treatment had the strongest benefits for people diagnosed with mood disorders, including generalized anxiety disorder and recurring depression.

That’s not to say that a daily meditation session can help cure severe depression or anxiety disorders, but it is a useful tool along with other treatment and for patient with more mild cases.

On a personal note, I don’t suffer from depression or mood disorders, but I do find that a few minutes spent focused on my breath and calming my mind helps me to focus and stay positive for the rest of the day. I find it’s a habit worth cultivating.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, Health and Wellness, In The Media Tagged With: , , , ,

The buzz on red meat

March 20, 2012 By 3 Comments

Last week, the headlines on meat consumption were inflammatory to say the least.

The Los Angeles Times: All red meat is bad for you, study finds Fox News: Red meat linked to premature death, research finds
The BBC: More Red Meat, More Mortality
The New York Times: Red Meat Increases Death, Cancer and Heart Risk

The researchers, from the Harvard School of Public Health, followed the diets and health outcomes of 37,000 men and 83,000 women over more than two decades. The found those who ate protein sources other than red meat were more likely to live longer. But what’s really at work here?

I found several systematic reviews on red meat consumption that give a broader look at this issue.

One published in the journal Circulation found 20 case-controlled studies and randomized controlled trials that assessed the effect of red meat consumption on health and concluded that eating processed meats, but not red meat, is associated with higher incidence of heart disease and diabetes.

Another review looked at the link between red meat consumption and colorectal cancer, and found eating red meat on a daily basis is associated with an increased risk of colorectal cancer and eating processed meats regularly is associated with an even higher risk of colorectal cancer.

And a third review found little evidence available on the links between red meat consumption and stroke risk.

As much as I love a good burger or juicy steak, the available evidence shows that eating red meat regularly is bad for your health. It is worth noting ,though, that in each study, the conclusions were drawn based on participants consuming red meat every day.

Personally, I’m going to stick with my motto of everything in moderation, and still enjoy a nice cut of beef once in a while.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media Tagged With: , , , , ,

Who works more: men or women?

February 7, 2012 By Leave a Comment

It’s a dilemma as old as the feminist movement, and one that graces the house of nearly every family in American today: How should two partners divide the workload that comes along with earning money and making a home?

To be sure, there are as many answers to the question as there are families in America. The solutions depend on a myriad of variables – expectations of cleanliness, culinary preferences, earning potential, family values and more. The topic has filled the pages of magazines and newspapers across the country.

It turns out, researchers know more than most of us can imagine about how men and women share responsibilities. And, while every family is different, there are some norms across our society.

The best resource I’ve come across is called America’s Time Use Survey, an on-going collection of data that measures how much time people spend doing various activities. The survey is sponsored by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.

In 2010, the survey found:

  • On the days that they did household activities, women spent an  average of 2.6 hours on such activities, while men spent 2.1 hours.
  • On an average day, 20 percent of men did housework such as cleaning or doing laundry, compared with 49 percent of women.
  • Forty-one percent of men did food preparation or cleanup, compared with 68 percent of women.
  • On an average day, among adults living in households with children  under 6, women spent 1.1 hours providing physical care such as bathing or feeding a child, and men spent 26 minutes providing physical care.

So, it’s clear that, on average, women are doing more of the housework than men, but the survey also shows that men work more outside of the home.  On the days that they worked, employed men worked 41 minutes more than employed women.

Of course, the survey reports averages, and individual households can differ greatly from those.  Still, it sparked some interesting discussions in our house.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media

New evidence on global warming

January 19, 2012 By 1 Comment

An international team of researchers have developed a new plan to slow climate change – one that involves reducing levels of two of the lesser-known contributors to global warming.

Their paper, published this week in the journal Science, recommends 14 actions to reduce emissions of methane gas – a greenhouse gas more powerful than carbon dioxide – and black carbon – the technical term for soot, which absorbs heat from the sun’s rays.

Among the measures they suggest are:

  • encouraging people to use switch cleaner diesel engines and cookstoves
  • building more efficient kilns and coke ovens
  • capturing methane at landfills and oil wells
  • reducing methane emissions from rice paddies by draining them more often.

Adopting the study’s recommendations would reduce projected temperatures by approximately 0.5°C by 2050, as well as avoiding millions of premature deaths due to air pollution and increasing crop yields thanks to reductions in ozone.

The proposal is a projection, to be sure.  But there is a large body of evidence available that shows there are many benefits to reducing these contaminants.

Systematic reviews show that reducing soot levels improves lung function and pregnancy outcomes. And it’s been clearly documented that methane gas warms the atmosphere, and that reducing its levels will boost agricultural yields.

So, in fact, the new study delivers another benefit, as noted in this New York Times column: it offers practical solutions with the immediate benefits of improving health and helping farmers produce more.

To us, it seems like a proposal worth putting into practice.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media, policy Tagged With: , , , , ,

Missing data: The Achilles heel of systematic reviews

January 6, 2012 By Leave a Comment

If you’re a regular reader of EBL, you know we’re huge fans of systematic reviews – studies in which researchers use sophisticated methods to bring together and evaluate the dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of articles on a topic.

We value these analyses because they collect all of the information available and then look at why and how each study differs. By looking at so many studies, researchers can make general conclusions, even though participants and study settings might be different.

So we took a great interest this week in a series of studies in the British Medical Journal making the case that many medical studies aren’t published, and therefore missing from systematic reviews and the decision-making processes of doctors and patients.

One of the studies found that fewer than half of the clinical trials funded by the National Institutes of Health from 2005 to 2008 were published in peer-reviewed journals within 30 months of study completion, and only 68 percent were published at all.

Another examined trials registered at the federal web site ClinicalTrials.gov during 2009. Of the 738 studies registered and subject to mandatory reporting guidelines (per the rules of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration), only 22 percent reported results within one year.  (It’s interesting to note that trials of medicines in the later stages of development and those funded by the drug industry were more likely to have results reported.)

A third study re-analyzed 41 systematic reviews of nine different medicines, this time including unpublished clinical trial data from the FDA in each analysis.  For 19 of the systematic reviews, the addition of unpublished data led to the conclusion that the drug was not as effective as originally shown. For 19 other reviews, the additional data led to the conclusion that the drug was more effective than originally shown.

Dr. Harlan Krumholz, a cardiologist at Yale and a internationally-respected expert in outcomes research, summarized the issue in his Forbes magazine blog, including some of the reasons that data goes unreported. (Among them, researchers may not be happy with the results or may shift focus to a new study. And medical journals may not be receptive to negative results.)

Whatever the reasons, the take-home message seems to be that researchers and publishers need to do a better job getting all of the information out in the public domain so that doctors and patients can truly make informed decisions.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media, The Learning Center Tagged With: , , , ,

Can you boost your IQ? The evidence says yes

December 7, 2011 By 1 Comment

It’s an age-old question studied by researchers for more than a century:  Is there anyone to make your-self smarter?

In the early days of this inquiry, researchers were certain the answer was no.  But studies over the past two decade have proven otherwise.  Yes, you can raise your intelligence quotient, or IQ.   In fact, the very question was covered in a recent Wall Street Journal article.

While I didn’t manage to track down a systematic review of the topic, I did find a body of literature pointing to methods for improving your IQ.  One study that followed 250 adults over the course of six years found that people in jobs involving complex relationships, elaborate systems or difficult problems tend to perform better over time on cognitive tests.

Likewise, the work of Cornell Professor Steve Ceci has found that schooling raises IQ by several points a year, mainly because students are exposed to information and problem-solving often included in cognitive tests.

In another recent study, British students were given IQ tests and brain scans at ages 12 to 16 and again four years later. The students with significant improvements in IQ – 15 points or more – showed changes in gray matter in areas corresponding with their improvements.

Alas, the issue is complicated.  Another recent study tested adults using at Wii video game, reading and reference ability. While the participants showed improvements in what they practiced, their new-found skills didn’t transfer well to other areas, suggesting that learning for adults may be more narrow than for young adults and children.

Clearly, more research is needed. But it seems that we can say definitely that if you practice something – whether physical or mental – you will see improvements in that specific area.

Filed Under: Evidence-Based Living, In The Media Tagged With: , ,
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