Diet & Nutrition News and Research

Latest Diet & Nutrition News and Research

Researchers study effects of dark chocolates in reducing heart disease

Volunteers are to have chocolate delivered to their homes and be encouraged to eat 50g of it every day for eight weeks as part of a new research study.

7 May 2010

A checklist to stay healthy at every age

Shantanu Nundy, MD, a second-year resident in internal medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center may soon find out. Driven by his mother's health questions and the difficulty of providing simple, reliable answers, Nundy collected all of the "generally accepted truths" about preventing disease, organized them into checklists based on age, and persuaded the Johns Hopkins University Press to publish them as Stay Healthy at Every Age: What Your Doctor Wants you to Know.

7 May 2010

Imprinted genes may be the root cause of gender specific diseases, says study

Pregnancy places competing demands on a mother's physiology: Her body wants to produce a strong healthy baby but not at the expense of her own health. Some of the genes that she passes on to her child therefore try to protect her own body from excessive demands from her child.

7 May 2010

IRIN examines possible changes to U.S. food aid policy

IRIN examines the Obama administration's efforts to expand U.S. food aid beyond the distribution of domestically-produced food to countries in need.

7 May 2010

Vitamin A supplements shown not to reduce maternal mortality

A new trial undertaken in Ghana has shown that vitamin A supplements do not reduce maternal mortality-contradicting previous findings from a trial in Nepal which showed a 44% decrease.

6 May 2010

Chicken nuggets rate not too good in nutritional value: consumer report

A product evaluation organization Consumer Reports recently analyzed 12 brands of chicken nuggets including brands like Market Pantry (from Target), Bell & Evans Breaded, Kirland Signature Disney (Costco), and Health Is Wealth.

6 May 2010

Australia’s first ever health policy for men

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd yesterday announced Australia’s first ever men’s health policy called the “National Male Health Policy”. He said in the announcement during a visit to the Whittlesea Men's Shed in Victoria, “They either think that they're invincible that they can just tough it out…'They don't like talking about it usually, and frankly, the problem with all that is it makes it really hard to deal with men's health problems before they become too serious.” He felt this move was long due. He added, “'It's a pretty important time that we do that, we're probably about 110 years late.”

6 May 2010

FDA assigns BYDUREON new PDUFA action date of October 22, 2010

Amylin Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Eli Lilly and Company and Alkermes, Inc. today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has classified the BYDUREON™ (exenatide for extended-release injectable suspension) complete response as a Class 2 resubmission and assigned a new Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA) action date of October 22, 2010.

6 May 2010

Gentiva Health Services first-quarter total net revenues up 7.5% to $297.1 million

Gentiva Health Services, Inc., a leading provider of home health and hospice services, today reported first quarter 2010 results.

6 May 2010

Experts unveil roadmap to improve health and health delivery in the U.S.

A Commission of national health care experts convened by the Center for the Study of the Presidency and Congress has unveiled a roadmap and integrated approach that will put "health" back into our nation's health care system as well as address key opportunities following passage of health care reform legislation.

6 May 2010

Measurement of finger temperature to assess individual's risk for CVD

Two University of Houston professors are working to help keep your heart beating stronger and longer simply by monitoring the temperature of your fingertip.

6 May 2010

New tools developed to enrich cereal products with bioactive compounds

The bioactive compounds of cereals are concentrated in the peripheral layers of the grains (bran) but most of them have a low bio-accessibility. In the HEALTHGRAIN project of the European Union, new tools for process monitoring were developed that support commercial implementation of innovative milling techniques including partial grain debranning, fine grinding and classification of grain fractions, resulting in flours and ingredients with enhanced nutritional properties.

6 May 2010

Annual heart disease and stroke rates in China to rise up to 73% by 2030: Research

Annual heart disease and stroke rates in China will rise by up to 73 percent by 2030, given an aging population and other increased risk factors, without policies and prevention efforts aimed at controlling blood pressure and smoking, according to research from Columbia University Medical Center published in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, an American Heart Association journal.

6 May 2010

Obesity epidemic may be flattening out - still much to be done

The prevalence of childhood obesity might be stabilising in developed countries, but there is still much to be done to combat this major threat to health, according to a Seminar published on Online First and in an upcoming issue of The Lancet.

6 May 2010

Dark chocolate may protect brain after stroke by increasing cellular signals: Researchers

Researchers at Johns Hopkins have discovered that a compound in dark chocolate may protect the brain after a stroke by increasing cellular signals already known to shield nerve cells from damage.

6 May 2010

Proper nutrition during multi-day stage races may prevent harmful changes in bone turnover: Study

The recent start of the North American cycling season marks the beginning of a physically demanding time for elite and professional bicycle racers who participate in multi-day stage races. Previous research has found that competitive cyclists have significantly lower bone mineral density than other endurance athletes, making them more susceptible to fractures.

6 May 2010

Milk consumption does not cause renal cell cancer

While previous research had suggested that drinking milk was related to factors that may increase the risk of renal cell cancer, results of a recent study exploiting the genetic contribution to variation in milk consumption suggest that this may not be the case.

6 May 2010

Study to assess therapy for feeding difficulties in kids

It is a common complaint of many mothers that their children refuse food. Now Australian scientists are looking for answers to this problem in order to reduce the increase in the number of malnourished children who need medical help because of their picky eating.

6 May 2010

Alcohol consumption during pregnancy can increase risk of AML in children

Although acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is relatively rare in children, drinking alcohol during pregnancy could increase the risk, according to a recent paper published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

6 May 2010

Caffeine is effective in preventing cataract formation, says study

Caffeine may be effective in protecting the lens against damage that could lead to the formation of cataracts, according to a study presented on May 4 at the 2010 Annual Meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology.

6 May 2010