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Study identifies brain mechanism behind pregnancy-related food cravings

Why do food cravings become so strong during pregnancy? Researchers at LSU's Pennington Biomedical Research Center, in collaboration with colleagues, have identified a brain mechanism that may help explain how pregnancy changes the motivation to seek certain highly palatable foods.

18 Sep 2026

AI spots at-risk pregnancies for earlier, more personalized prenatal care

Artificial intelligence (AI) may help identify women and babies at risk of serious health problems earlier in pregnancy, according to a new study analyzing data from more than half a million pregnancies across Sweden, Chile, and Singapore.

18 Sep 2026

Breast density clue for cancer risk

Women with a higher Body Mass Index in early adulthood may have a lower risk of developing breast cancer after the menopause because of lasting changes in the structure of their breast tissue, according to researchers at The University of Manchester and Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust.

18 Sep 2026

Sex-specific biological clocks reveal how aging differs across the body in women and men

Researchers developed 38 sex-specific biological aging clocks across 15 organ systems, finding differences between females and males in genetic architecture, molecular signatures, disease associations, and mortality patterns. Brain aging clocks were linked to progression from mild cognitive impairment to Alzheimer’s disease in both sexes and to sex-dependent cognitive trajectories among solanezumab-treated A4 participants, while the authors stressed that sex-pooled and sex-interaction models remain complementary approaches.

17 Sep 2026

Being active may not tell the whole story when it comes to weight gain

A five-year study of 2,606 young and early-midlife Finnish municipal employees examined how leisure-time physical activity and sedentary behavior were associated with gaining at least 10% of baseline body weight. About 24% of women and 12% of men experienced major weight gain, with the analysis pointing to the importance of considering activity and sedentary time together.

17 Sep 2026

Can maternal diet prevent infant food allergy? A large trial puts eggs and peanuts to the test

A large Australian randomized trial of 2,137 pregnant women tested whether substantially increasing egg and peanut consumption during pregnancy and breastfeeding could prevent food allergy in infants with a strong family history of allergic disease. Higher maternal intake did not significantly reduce IgE-mediated egg or peanut allergy at 1 year, although the lower-than-expected allergy rate limited statistical power and the results could not exclude a clinically important benefit.

17 Sep 2026

Maternal depressive symptoms linked to higher infant mortality risk

Infants born to mothers with depressive symptoms immediately after delivery had a substantially higher risk of dying before their first birthday, according to researchers involved in a Rutgers-led study of more than 414,000 births in New Jersey.

17 Sep 2026

ACC Latin America 2026 studies highlight sex and regional disparities in heart attack care

disparities in ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) management and outcomes across Latin America, focusing on women as a higher risk, yet underrepresented, patient group.

17 Sep 2026

Study identifies key factors in breast cancer survivors' sexual recovery

Sexual wellbeing can often be overlooked during a woman's recovery from breast cancer with many continuing to experience significant sexual and intimacy challenges long after treatment ends.

17 Sep 2026

Women with hyperemesis gravidarum report major gaps in care

Medical assistance can help women suffering from severe nausea and vomiting during pregnancy, but insufficient recognition of Hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) means that many are not getting the help they need to overcome this severe and debilitating form of morning sickness.

17 Sep 2026

High estrogen alters brain circuit causing temporary memory impairment during pregnancy

Many women usually say the same thing during pregnancy: they walk into a room and forget why, misplace their keys or struggle to follow a conversation.

17 Sep 2026

Experts call for eating-disorder screening before GLP-1 treatment

An international multidisciplinary panel developed consensus-based recommendations for GLP-1 receptor agonist use in people with eating disorders, calling for screening, individualized monitoring, patient education, and further research into safety and potential therapeutic effects. The experts cautioned that current evidence remains limited and inconsistent, particularly outside binge eating disorder, and identified major gaps in understanding the risk of new or recurrent eating disorders during treatment.

16 Sep 2026

Study finds gender differences in active medical treatment

New research from the University of St Andrews has found that women are less like than men with the same medical condition to be offered active management such as surgery, a stent or a strong painkiller.

16 Sep 2026

Your walking pattern may reveal more about anxiety and depression than you think

Researchers used smartphone and wearable accelerometers to examine how everyday movement patterns relate to anxiety and depression symptoms in middle-aged adults. Phone-derived gait states differed with daily symptom scores, while lower wrist movement was linked to greater anxiety in a small subsample, supporting further study of passive movement sensing for mental health monitoring.

16 Sep 2026

Shatavari may affect more than hormones, and the gut could help explain why

A review in Nutrients examined how bioactive compounds in Asparagus racemosus (Shatavari) may influence cognitive health through the microbiota-gut-brain axis, estrogen-related signaling, neuroinflammation, oxidative stress, and neurotransmitter regulation. Evidence from computational, cellular, animal, and limited human studies suggests several plausible biological pathways, but key questions remain about bioavailability, brain exposure, dosing, and clinical efficacy.

16 Sep 2026

Cold plunges may boost your mood, but the evidence is still on thin ice

A Molecular Psychiatry review examined evidence linking cold exposure with mood and mental health outcomes, alongside proposed roles for catecholamines, the HPA axis, and immune-inflammatory pathways. Early studies report short-term mood improvements and physiological changes, but clinical evidence remains limited, and the proposed mechanisms have not been established as drivers of lasting psychiatric benefits.

16 Sep 2026

Scientists tested how much whole grain makes a difference. The answer was not simply “more”

A meta-analysis of 87 randomized trials found that increasing whole-grain intake was associated with improvements in several cardiometabolic risk factors, although many individual changes were small or clinically unimportant. Dose-response analyses suggested that the magnitude of the effects varied by outcome and intake level, with limited evidence at very high intakes.

16 Sep 2026

The music in psychedelic therapy may be more than background sound

A narrative review examines how music interacts with psychedelics, psychological support, and treatment context in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy, arguing that its role cannot be understood as an isolated component. The authors highlight limited evidence on music-specific effects and propose studying PAP as a complex intervention, with music described according to its therapeutic function rather than fixed playlists or genres.

16 Sep 2026

Promising AI tool to speed up endometriosis diagnosis

Less than a second. That’s how long it takes for an emerging AI tool to detect signs of endometriosis through one simple scan. It’s a much faster process than the current seven-year wait for surgery and less invasive.

16 Sep 2026

Researchers build prognostic model to guide end-of-life care in metastatic breast cancer

Oncologists know that intensive treatment rarely helps patients in their final days but recognizing when someone is entering that stage is difficult, especially in metastatic breast cancer, where an increasing number of effective treatments has helped prolong life and given patients and oncologists more treatment options.

16 Sep 2026