Ibuprofen may harm fertility of female child

Pregnant women who take the pain killer ibuprofen in the first trimester of their pregnancy may be reducing the store of eggs in the ovaries of their daughters. Researchers have found the first evidence in human ovarian tissue that exposure to ibuprofen during the crucial first three months of fetal development results in a loss of the germ cells that go into making the follicles from which female eggs develop. The germ cells either died or failed to grow and multiply at the usual rate.

Female children are born with a finite number of follicles in their ovaries and this defines their future reproductive capacity as adults," explained Dr Séverine Mazaud-Guittot, a researcher at INSERM in Rennes, France, who led the study. "A poorly stocked initial reserve will result in a shortened reproductive life span, early menopause or infertility-events that occur later in life.

The development of the follicles in the fetus has not been completed by the end of the first trimester, so if the ibuprofen treatment is short then the ovarian reserve may recover to some extent. However,  two to seven days of exposure to ibuprofen dramatically reduced the germ cell stockpile in human fetal ovaries during the first trimester of pregnancy and the ovaries did not recover fully from this damage.

This suggests that prolonged exposure to ibuprofen during fetal life may lead to long-term effects on women's fertility and raises concern about ibuprofen consumption by women during the first trimester of pregnancy. Researcher obtained human fetuses between 7-12 weeks of development from legally induced terminations of pregnancy and with the mothers' consent.

Then they cultured the ovarian tissue in the laboratory; part of the tissue from each fetus was exposed to ibuprofen and a second part (the control) was not. Samples from 185 fetuses were analysed. They measured the quantity of ibuprofen in the blood in the umbilical cord in order to analyse how much the fetus would have been exposed to.

They found that ibuprofen crosses the placental barrier. The concentration in the umbilical cords of fetuses from mothers who ingested 800 mg (four pills of 200 mg) two to four hours before surgery is similar to the concentration that can be found in adult's blood for the same treatment. This shows that the fetus is exposed to the same concentration as the mother. In contrast to the fetal tissue that was not exposed to ibuprofen, the tissue that was exposed to concentrations of 10 μM (micromolar) of ibuprofen for a week had approximately half the number of ovarian germ cells 2.

There were fewer cells growing and dividing, more cells dying and a dramatic loss of germ cell numbers, regardless of the gestational age of the fetus. There were significant effects after seven days of exposure to 10 μM of ibuprofen, cell death occurred after two days of treatment. Five days after withdrawing ibuprofen, these harmful effects of ibuprofen were not fully reversed. Ibuprofen use should be restricted to the shortest duration and at the lowest dose necessary to achieve pain or fever relief, especially during pregnancy.
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Hormonal contraceptives increases the risk of breast cancer

All forms of hormonal contraception bring an increased risk of breast cancer, which lasts for about five years after women stop taking it. The raised chance has been known for some time, but it was thought newer forms – such as those which release progesterone only – would be safer.

But now a new study, the largest of its kind, has found the combined pill, the progestogen-only pill and non-oral products such as the hormone-intrauterine system (IUS) have a 20 per cent higher risk. Researchers found that among women taking the pill for five years, there would be an extra one breast cancer diagnosis for every 1,500 women.

 Researchers analysed many women in who were followed up for nearly 11 years on average. Around two out of three breast cancers are hormone receptor-positive, which means hormones help the cancer cells grow and spread. The risk of breast cancer was higher in women who used the pill or other forms of hormonal contraception, including IUDs, for longer.

It was also raised for those who were older – the majority of the cases were in women over 40. The small risks of the pill needed to be weighed up against the benefits. These include not only preventing an unwanted pregnancy but a reduced risk of ovarian, endometrial and colorectal cancers in later life.

An increased risk of breast and cervical cancer in current and recent pill users which disappeared within approximately five years of stopping oral contraception. The similar breast cancer results in both cohort studies suggest that today's pills have similar cancer risks and benefits as older preparations.

Researchers compared the breast cancer risk in users of different types of hormonal contraception to women who had never used hormonal contraception. During the study period, several new breast cancers were detected. In current and recent users of any type of hormonal contraception, the risk of breast cancer was 20 per cent increased.

There was little evidence of consistent differences in risk between users of combined oral contraceptives with different progestogens. Researchers did not detect an increased risk in former users who had used hormonal contraception for less than five years. The increased risk in long-term users gradually decreased by time and disappeared five to ten years after stopping.

An over-the-counter supplement reduces breast cancer aggressiveness by up to 80 per cent, new research reveals. N-Acetylcysteine (NAC), which is sold as a supplement is approved as a cold and flu remedy in the US, significantly lowers levels of the breast cancer aggressiveness marker MCT4, a study found.

Users of progestogen only contraceptives – mainly pills and the hormone-intrauterine system (IUS) – also experienced an increased relative risk of breast cancer. Breast cancer is rare in young women. It is rare in women before the menopause, with most women using the combined pill also being in their late teens, twenties and early thirties.
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Alcohol causes different cancers

The more alcohol you drink, the higher your risk of developing at least seven different types of cancers. Drinking small or moderate amounts of alcohol was associated with increased risks for esophogeal, mouth, voice box, liver, stomach, pancreas and breast cancers, and is responsible for more than five percent of cancers and cancer deaths worldwide.

The American Society of Clinical Oncology ASCO has never addressed the link between alcohol and cancer, but is now underscoring the importance of controlling the risk of alcohol consumption to reducing the risk of cancer. While the ASCO does suggest strategies for cutting back on drinking, it also advocates for temperate use of alcohol, rather than recommending give up drinking.

The Centres for Disease Control and Prevention CDC recommends that women should not have more than one drink a day or eight drinks a week. Men drink two drinks a day, or 14 a week. There has been some debate over whether alcohol or other compositions of various alcoholic beverages are cancer-causing. There is an associations between alcohol drinking and cancer risk. Alcohol does not affect each part of the body in the same carcinogenic way.

For head and neck and esophageal cancers, alcohol's breakdown product- acetaldehyde, which is an established carcinogen touches the tissues directly as drinker swallows an alcoholic drink and causes cancer. Liver cancer is caused by cirrhosis, which is caused by drinking. When cirrhosis develops, healthy liver cells are replaced by damaged scar tissue cells, which can become cancer cells. It interferes with the absorption of folate, which leads to development of colon cancer.

When a woman’s estrogen levels become abnormally high, the hormone puts her at higher risk for breast cancer. Alcohol has been shown to increase estrogen levels, thus putting women at greater risk of breast cancer. In fact, ASCO reports that women who drank even one drink of beer or wine which have significantly lower alcohol contents than liquors were five percent more likely to develop premenopausal breast cancer, and nine percent more likely to develop the cancer after menopause.
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Menopause linked to changes in brain energy use

Researchers have found that women's brains use less energy during the menopause. The reduction in energy use by the brain was found to be similar to what is seen in people with Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's is characterised by changes in the brain beyond those associated with normal ageing and current research shows that women are more likely to develop Alzheimer's than men.
Menopause can have widespread effects on women, including changes in behaviour, mood and sleep patterns.

Researchers studied changes in energy use in the brains of women before and during menopause. They examined healthy women between the ages of 40 to 60 and used an imaging technique known as PET scanning to assess levels of glucose, one of the major energy sources for the brain.

The team saw reductions in the use of energy in women during menopause. Menopausal women also scored lower on memory tests compared to those who had not gone through menopause, even after accounting for their slightly older age.

The researchers made the observation that those areas of the brain where energy use had dropped in menopause were similar to those seen in people with Alzheimer's disease. Menopause has impacts on a woman's life, it can lead to changes in the brain.

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Links between menopause and type 2 diabetes

The sex hormones- estrogen and progesterone control how cells respond to insulin. Hormonal changes during menopause can trigger fluctuations of insulin levels in the blood and leads to type 2 diabetes.

Estrogen hormone lowers blood glucose levels while progesterone is responsible for increasing blood glucose levels. This hormonal reactions produce spikes and drops of the blood glucose levels.

According to the latest research, women who undergo the menopause before age 40 are at greater risk of developing type 2 diabetes. Menopause occurs between age 50 - 55  when the body stops producing oestrogen and other sex hormones.

Researchers examined many postmenopausal women and discovered that those that experienced early menopause have type 2 diabetes. Late menopause protects women from heart disease and diabetes because of regular natural supply of estrogen.
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Ovarian freezing is better than eggs freezing

Freezing of ovaries preserve fertility better than eggs. Women who freezed their ovaries tissues can have babies easily in future.

Eggs freezing requires an IVF with hormone replacement therapy before conception can take place while ovarian freezing reverses menopause and increases the chance of natural pregnancy without any fertility treatment.

Ovarian tissue cryopreservation can be considered as a good option for fertility preservation for women who are not ready to have children now; busy with their career or undergoing cancer treatment and choose to have children at old age or after treatment.
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Plants protein can prevent early menopause

Menopause occurs when ovaries stop producing the hormone known as estrogen that controls the reproductive cycle.

Early menopause is the ending of ovarian function before age 45, it is associated with higher risk of cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis and early cognitive decline.

Scientists examined many women for two decades and discovered that those who eat more of plants protein had a 59 per cent lower risk of an early menopause than those that eat less.

They discovered that high consumption of plants protein is linked to a lower risk of early menopause. According to the new research, women can lower their risk of reaching menopause early by eating plants protein

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Facts about male menopause

Levels of our sex hormones decline with age. For some men, the symptoms
attributed to low testosterone. Male menopause are sign of unhealthy aging Low testosterone indicates that you are not living healthy.

The normal range of testosterone can be from 10.4 to 41.6 nmol/l (nanomoles per litre of blood). A man can be healthy and sexually active while having a
relatively low testosterone level.

Men can boost testosterone level by living healthy lifestyle, engaging in
regular exercise, maintaining healthy weight, eating healthy diet and cutting down on alcohol.

The more you sleep, the more testosterone your body produces. Research shows that severe sleep deprivation can cause testosterone levels to drop by 70 per cent.

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Symptoms of cancer of the womb

The risk of developing womb cancer increases with age and majority of cases occur in women aged 40 to 74 years.

The womb is a hollow muscular organ between the rectum and the bladder.
Womb cancers start in endometrium.

 Common symptom of womb cancer is vaginal bleeding - bleeding after the menopause, bleeding in between periods, heavier periods than usual, or a watery or blood vaginal discharge.

Factors that contribute to the risk of developing womb cancer are: age, high oestrogen hormone and  women who have not had children.

Women who are overweight are three times more likely to develop womb cancer compared with women who are considered to be a normal weight.

Diabetes can increase risk of having womb cancer and women who have polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) are also at greater risk.


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Heart failure linked to early menopause

Early menopause occurs when a woman reaches the end of her reproductive age early.

More than a decade after 28,519 women had experienced the menopause, an analysis revealed 5.2 per cent of them had been admitted to hospital with heart failure.

Women who never gave birth were also found to be more at risk of diastolic heart failure, a problem affecting the left side of the heart.

Shorter reproductive duration is associated with increased risk of heart failure might be due to the increased coronary heart disease associated with early menopause.





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Diet rich in vitamin D prevents early menopause

Women can reduce their risk of an early menopause by eating oily fish and eggs, regular intake of foods rich n vitamin D lowers early menopause by 17 percent.

Calcium-rich foods make women 13 percent less likely to suffer early menopause, some women experience menopause before age 45, this increases  their risk of osteoporosis and heart disease, and reducing their chances of conceiving.

There is really good laboratory evidence that vitamin D increases the production of hormones which slow down ovarian ageing and slow down the rate at which a woman loses her eggs.

 This is important because menopause comes when a woman has no eggs left.
Calcium could also influence ovarian ageing, because it is present with hormones in cows' milk like progesterone, which may also reduce risk of early menopause.

New treatment for ovarian cancer

The cancer of the ovaries is one of the most common types of cancer in women. It affects women after menopause.

Symptoms of ovarian cancer include feeling constantly bloated, discomfort in stomach, feeling full quickly when eating, and frequent urination.

The study authors used an experimental drug called birinapant, in addition to the usual carboplatin, in mice with ovarian cancer tumours, and discovered it could boost survival.

The researchers enlisted birinapant - it deregrades proteins called cIAPs, which prevent cell death after chemotherapy - to make the chemotherapy drug more effective against ovarian cancer tumours.

Hormone replacement therapy may increase risk of hearing loss

Hearing loss is inability to hear sounds of 25 decibels or under in speech. This often leads to difficulties understanding conversations and hearing certain sounds.

Women seem to be at a significantly lower risk of hearing loss than men. Between the ages of 20 and 69, men are twice as likely as women to develop speech-frequency hearing loss.

While it is not known why women tend to be protected from hearing loss, some studies have suggested that estrogen
suggested that the female hormone may protect the inner ear.

Women that are affected by hearing loss experience it after menopause when During levels of progesterone and
estrogen start to reduce.

Prolonged use of hormone therapy HT at menopause raise hearing loss risk
The study analyzed existing data on almost 81,000 women who participated in the Nurses' Health Study II, making this research the first large-scale study to examine the use of HT in relation to hearing loss among menopausal and postmenopausal women.

The women were between 27 and 44 years at the beginning of the study, and they were clinically followed for 22 years between 1991 and 2013. During this time, the women reported how they used HT and lost hearing.

Almost 23 percent of the participants reported some degree of hearing loss during the follow-up period. HT taken by the participants consisted of either estrogen therapy or estrogen plus progestogen.

This shows that HT in postmenopausal women, as well as prolonged use of oral HT, correlated with a higher risk of hearing loss. HT increases the risk of hearing loss.

Links between gout and western diet

Regular consumption of Western diet can increase the risk of developing gout, researchers have discovered that people are at risk of developing gout  if they continue to eat processed meats, soft drinks, French fries, sugar, sweets and desserts.

Diet rich in fruits, vegetables, nuts and whole grains may prevent gout. Latest research discovered that eating these types of foods in preference to red meat could prevent gout.

Gout is a form of arthritis which affects a lot of people, it occurs when crystals form inside the joints causing sudden attacks of severe pain and swelling. It is
common in men over 30 years and women after the menopause.

It is caused by a build-up of uric acid which forms tiny crystals near the joints. Fruits, vegetables, nuts and whole grains have ingredients that can prevent gout.

Causes of frequent urination in women

Urination is the release of urine from the bladder, frequent urination is the need to urinate more than normal.

Cleveland Clinic said the average person should urinate between six to eight times a day.

Some of the causes of frequent urination are: drinking too much water, diabetes, overactive bladder, urinary tract infection, pregnancy, menopause, obesity, weak pelvic floor organs and inflammatory bladder disorder.

Treatment for frequent urination depends on the cause, visit your doctor anytime you experience frequent urination.