'Fasting may kill cancer cells of common childhood leukaemia'

December 13, 2016

Houston, Dec 13: Intermittent fasting may inhibit the development and progression of the most common type of childhood leukaemia, a new study has claimed. kill-cancer-cells

The strategy is not effective, however, in another type of blood cancer that commonly strikes adults, researchers said.

"This study using mouse models indicates that the effects of fasting on blood cancers are type-dependent and provides a platform for identifying new targets for leukaemia treatments," said Chengcheng Zhang, associate professor at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Centre in the US.

"We also identified a mechanism responsible for the differing response to the fasting treatment," he added.

Researchers found that fasting inhibits the initiation and reverses the progression of two subtypes of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia, or ALL - B-cell ALL and T-cell ALL.

The same method did not work with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), the type that is more common in adults.

ALL, the most common type of leukaemia found in children, can occur at any age. Current ALL treatments are effective about 90 per cent of the time in children, but far less often in adults, said Zhang.

The two types of leukaemia arise from different bone marrow-derived blood cells, he said.

ALL affects B cells and T cells, two types of the immune system's disease-fighting white blood cells. AML targets other types of white blood cells such as macrophages and granulocytes, among other cells.

In both ALL and AML, the cancerous cells remain immature yet proliferate uncontrollably.

Those cells fail to work well and displace healthy blood cells, leading to anemia and infection. They may also infiltrate into tissues and thus cause problems.

Researchers created several mouse models of acute leukaemia and tried various dietary restriction plans.

They used green or yellow florescent proteins to mark the cancer cells so they could trace them and determine if their levels rose or fell in response to the fasting treatment.

"We found that in models of ALL, a regimen consisting of six cycles of one day of fasting followed by one day of feeding completely inhibited cancer development," he said.

At the end of seven weeks, the fasted mice had virtually no detectible cancerous cells compared to an average of nearly 68 per cent of cells found to be cancerous in the test areas of the non-fasted mice.

Compared to mice that ate normally, the rodents on alternate-day fasting had dramatic reductions in the percentage of cancerous cells in the bone marrow and spleen as well as reduced numbers of white blood cells, he said.

"In addition, following the fasting treatment, the spleens and lymph nodes in the fasted ALL model mice were similar in size to those in normal mice," he said.

"Mice in the ALL model group that ate normally died within 59 days, while 75 per cent of the fasted mice survived more than 120 days without signs of leukaemia," he said.

The study was published in the journal Nature Medicine.

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Excess smartphone use linked to mental distress, suicidality

Agencies

February 11,2020

Using smartphone for long hours every day may do you more harm than you can probably think of. Researchers have found that spending a lot of time with the device and on social media may lead to mental distress and suicidality among adolescents.

The findings, published in the journal CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) contains guidance for physicians, parents and teachers on how to help teenagers manage smartphone and social media use for a healthy balance between sleep, academic work, social activity, interpersonal relationships and online activity.

"Physicians, teachers and families need to work together with youth to decrease possible harmful effects of smartphones and social media on their relationships, sense of self, sleep, academic performance, and emotional well-being," said lead author of the study Elia Abi-Jaoude from Toronto Western Hospital in Canada.

This review of evidence, led by the Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), focuses on smartphone use and does not consider online gaming.

"For adolescents today, who have not known a world without social media, digital interactions are the norm, and the potential benefits of online access to productive mental health information -- including media literacy, creativity, self-expression, sense of belonging and civic engagement -- as well as low barriers to resources such as crisis lines and Internet-based talking therapies cannot be discounted," the authors wrote.

The researchers recommend that doctors should ask teenagers to reduce social media use rather than eradicate it completely and encourage parents to be part of the conversations.

Parents should discuss appropriate smartphone use with teenagers to determine together how to reduce risks and set boundaries.

A recent poll from the US indicates that 54 per cent of teenagers think they spend too much time on their smartphones and about half said they were cutting back on usage.

"Encouragingly, youth are increasingly recognising the negative impact of social media on their lives and starting to take steps to mitigate it," the authors wrote.

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Alzheimer can spread it roots if you lose even one night's sleep!

Agencies

January 12,2020

Washington D.C., Jan 12: Disruption in one night's sleep can lead to getting Alzheimer's disease, a recent study has stated.

The interruption in the sound sleep for a single night aggravates the level of tau protein in any young male's body, thus gives rise to the chances of developing the disease.

According to CNN, the report was published on Wednesday in neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

"Our study focuses on the fact that even in young, healthy individuals, missing one night of sleep increases the level of tau in blood suggesting that over time, such sleep deprivation could possibly have detrimental effects," says study author Dr Jonathan Cedernaes, a neurologist at Uppsala University in Sweden.

As defined by the Alzheimer's Association, tau is the name of a protein that helps in stabilizing the internal structure of the brain's nerve cells. An abnormal build-up of tau protein in the body can end up in causing interior cells to fall apart and eventually developing Alzheimer's.

"When you get more of that deep sleep and you get the REM sleep in the normal amounts, that improves clearance of abnormal proteins which we think is good," said Mayo Clinic neurologist Dr Donn Dexter, not the study author but a fellow of the American Academy of Neurology.

Earlier studies have also shown that getting deprived of sleep can allow higher tau development and accumulation. Thus that poor sleep can hasten the development of cognitive issues.

Researchers caution that the study is small and inconclusive, and acknowledged they were not able to determine what the increased levels might mean.

"This study raises more questions than answers," agreed Dexter on a concluding note, sharing, "What this is telling us is that we have to dig more deeply. Despite something we do for a third of our lives, we know so little about sleep and we're learning every day, particularly when it comes to sleep and dementia."

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