All posts tagged "Trends"

Women who have an epidural during labour face a lower risk of severe complications during childbirth, according to a study. Making epidurals more widely available and providing more information to those who would benefit from one is important, researchers said. The study by the University of Glasgow and the University of Bristol involved 567,216 women who were in labour in Scottish hospitals run by the UK's National Health Service (NHS) from 2007 and 2019, and went on to give birth vaginally or by an unplanned caesarean section. Of the total, some 125,024 women had an epidural, which is admini......

The number of people in poor health worldwide has climbed by almost 50% since the turn of the millennium, with many at risk of dying prematurely due to being overweight with high blood pressure and blood sugar. People face "increasing exposure to risk factors," including "low physical activity, and diet high in sugar-sweetened beverages," said Greg Roth of the Seattle-based Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). Roth and fellow researchers found a 49.4% increase in "lost years of healthy life due to poor health and early death," which they said were "attributable to metabolism-rel......

Youngsters who spend a lot of time on social media are more likely to vape and smoke cigarettes, research suggests. The more time children and young people spend on social media, the more likely they are to be regular users, experts found. This was particularly apparent at higher levels of use, with those on social media more than seven hours a day almost eight times more likely to smoke than non-users, and four times more likely to vape. The study, published in the journal Thorax, included data for 10,808 people aged 10 to 25 from the UK Household Longitudinal Study 2015–2021. In total, just ......

Google boss Sundar Pichai has said he believes the tech giant, and wider industry, is well placed to combat AI-generated misinformation around elections. Concerns have been raised about the potential for AI-generated audio and visual content to be used by bad actors to interfere with elections around the world – in a year where billions of people in many of the world’s major democracies are due to go to the polls. Speaking during the technology giant’s annual developer conference, Google I/O, Pichai said he was “cautiously optimistic” about his own company’s ability to handle this threat, as w......

It can happen while you're cycling, driving a car, speaking on the phone or working at a computer. It can also wake you up at night: Your fingers tingle or go numb, and they, your hand or wrist may ache. While it's normal for your hand to "fall asleep" on occasion, frequent such occurrences can be a sign of carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). Here are three questions and their answers regarding this common nerve disorder: What's carpal tunnel syndrome? The carpal tunnel is a narrow passageway on the palm side of the wrist, bound by the carpal bones and traversed by nine flexor tendons and the median......

Young users of live-streaming gaming platforms appear to be eating more unhealthy snacks after being "bombarded" with promotional content while logged on. "Food and drink advertisements on videogame livestreaming platforms (VGLSPs) like Twitch are associated with more positive attitudes towards, and purchases and intake of, unhealthy foods that are high in fat, salt and/or sugar," according to survey-based research presented in Venice at the European Congress on Obesity. Calling the results "concerning," the researchers said there needs to be "stronger regulations on digital marketing of unhea......