The study was conducted over 53,936 Veteran Affairs (VA) patients for 39 weeks (21 weeks before and 18 weeks after the interventions) during outpatient visits. Of which 63 per cent reached their blood pressure goal.

The pre intervention analysis showed that 61.8 per cent reached their goal whereas post intervention was 64.3
per cent.

‘Over a four-month period we were able to highlight the importance of blood pressure control with Veteran Affairs Hospital providers and patients and make some small but significant changes," said Dr Christianne Roumie, lead author of the study and staff physician for the Veterans Affairs Tennessee Valley Healthcare System.

Roumie said hypertension is the most commonly treated chronic condition in VA hospitals, the chief of staff
created a performance improvement committee to optimise local hypertension care.

High blood pressure increases the risk of heart attack, angina, stroke, kidney failure, peripheral artery disease (PAD) and the development of fatty deposits in arteries (atherosclerosis).

Antibodies against flu

A new study report suggests that it is possible to rapidly produce infection-fighting proteins called human monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) in laboratory to fight influenza.

The report says that using cells drawn from volunteers inoculated with seasonal influenza vaccine, scientists supported by the US National Institutes of Health were able to produce influenza-specific mAbs in just a few weeks rather than the typical two to three months.

The researchers believe that the new technique may potentially be used to rapidly create mAbs for a range of uses.

“With this new technique for making human monoclonal antibodies efficiently and quickly, Dr Wilson, Ahmed and their colleagues have made a significant advance,” NIAID director Anthony S Fauci said.

Diabetes and Alzheimer’s

Scientists at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies say that they have probably unearthed the reason as to why diabetic individuals have a significantly higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

The researchers say that experiments on mice have shown that the blood vessels in the brain of young diabetic
animals are damaged by the interaction of elevated blood glucose levels and low levels of beta amyloid, a peptide that clumps to form the senile plaques that riddle the brains of Alzheimer’s patients.

Lead researcher David R Schubert, professor in the Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory, said that though the damage took place long before the first plaques appeared, the mice suffered from significant memory loss and an increase in inflammation in the brain.

BMI, physical activity

Contrary to established assumptions, a new study showed that physically active older teens don’t necessarily eat a healthier diet than their less-active contemporaries.

And there seemed to be no association between body mass index (BMI) values and levels of physical activity.

Dr Catherine Sabiston, of McGill University, and P R E Crocker, of the University of British Columbia (UBC) conducted a study of 900 Vancouver-area teenagers in Grades 10 through 12.

Sabiston said that overall boys reported participating in more physical activities but ate a less-healthy diet than did girls.

Also, contrary to established assumptions, researchers found that people with healthier BMI values were no more likely to be physically active than those with higher, unhealthier values.

Surprisingly, it was the latter who were more likely to eat a healthier diet.

Healthier weight

Highly educated women have a healthier average weight than less educated women, but the meaning of what is ‘healthier” changes with nation’s relative wealth, according to a new comparison of multi-national data.
The data showed that in countries where malnutrition is prevalent, better-educated women weigh more.

However, in wealthier countries, with rapidly growing rates of obesity, better-educated women weigh less.

“As a population moves through the nutrition transition, it is the most educated, and highest income, who are the first to exit under-nutrition. They are also the first to adjust their diet and physical activity to avoid the deleterious effects of being overweight. It appears that it is women who tend to lead this transition,” said John Strauss, professor of economics at the University of Southern California.