Recent Longevity News for the seven days ending 5/24/06.  You should consult your doctor if you are taking any medications.

Low Vitamin D May Harm Teens’ Lungs - WebMD, 5/23/06 - "35% of the teens consumed less than 200 IU (international units) of vitamin D per day ... The teens who had low levels of vitamin D in their diets (157 IU or less) also had significantly lower lung function"

Selenium-protein Deficiency Raises Prostate Cancer Risk - Science Daily, 5/23/06 - "Selenium, an essential dietary mineral that can act as an antioxidant when incorporated into proteins, has been shown in many studies to reduce the incidence of cancers -- notably lung, colorectal and prostate"

Blood Pressure Drugs Counter Cancer? - WebMD, 5/23/06 - "After crunching the numbers, the risk reduction in veterans taking ACE inhibitors was 53% for colon cancer, 52% for pancreatic cancer, and 46% for esophageal cancer"

Women With Type 2 Diabetes at Increased Risk of Colorectal Adenomas - Doctor's Guide, 5/23/06 - "type 2 diabetics had up to a 2- to 3-fold increased risk of having any adenoma or advanced adenomas, which are precancerous polyps" - Related study:

• High Blood Sugar Raises Cancer Risk - WebMD, 1/11/05 - "the men in the study with the highest fasting blood sugar levels (those greater than 140 mg/dl) were 29% more likely to die of cancer than men with the lowest levels (those less than 90 mg/dl). The difference among women with the highest and lowest blood sugar levels was 23%"

Sexual Functioning in Long-term Treatment of MDD: Duloxetine, Escitalopram, and Placebo - Doctor's Guide, 5/23/06 - "the study found a statistically significant worsening of sexual functioning as measured by the Changes in Sexual Functioning Questionnaire (CSFQ) for escitalopram versus placebo at 4 weeks (P </=.01) while duloxetine was not statistically different from placebo"

Metabolic Syndrome Hurts Heart - WebMD, 5/22/06 - "men who had metabolic syndrome at the start of the study were 66% more likely to have heart failure by the end of the study"

CLA Weight Loss Debate Continues - WebMD, 5/22/06 - "for six months ... Three months into the study, the CLA group had lost an extra 1.5 pounds of body fat, compared to the placebo group ... At the study’s end, the CLA group lost 5.6% more body fat mass than those taking the placebo. The CLA group also lost about 3.3 pounds more than the placebo group" - See iHerb or Vitacost CLA products.

Some blood pressure meds may raise diabetes risk - Reuters, 5/19/06 - "The risk of developing diabetes in subjects taking thiazide-type diuretics compared with those not taking a thiazide was increased by 20 percent in older women, 45 percent in younger women, and 36 percent in men ... Compared to patients not taking a beta-blocker, older women taking beta-blockers had a 32 percent higher risk of diabetes, while for men the risk was 20 percent higher"

Saturated fats are worse than you think - MSNBC, 5/19/06 - "too much saturated fat may be problematic, even if your cholesterol isn’t high, because of its possible effects on insulin functions, potentially raising the risk of diabetes, cancer, ovarian disorders and other health problems"

Antioxidant-rich coffee may have health benefits - Reuters, 5/19/06 - "There was a "substantial" 24 percent reduction in risk of "inflammatory deaths" among women who drank 1 to 3 cups of coffee a day compared to non-drinkers of coffee"

Valsartan Lowers C-reactive Protein Levels; Combination Doesn't - Doctor's Guide, 5/19/06 - "Paradoxically, adding a diuretic to valsartan (Diovan) allows even more patients to reach blood pressure goals -- but appears to raise levels of C-reactive protein ... the monotherapy patients achieved an 8.9% reduction while the combination patients experienced a 4.4% increase"

Blood Pressure and Women's Sex Drive - WebMD, 5/19/06 - "women with high blood pressure were twice as likely to experience sexual dysfunction compared with their counterparts who had normal blood pressure"

Medication Slowed Progression to Hypertension - Intelihealth, 5/19/06 - "people with pre-hypertension who received candesartan -- an anti-hypertensive drug -- had a significantly reduced risk of developing high blood pressure compared with those who received a placebo"

Isoflavones may help women after menopause - Reuters, 5/18/06 - "Postmenopausal women who were given phytoestrogen tablets containing 60 milligrams of isoflavones for 6 months did better on measures of cognitive performance and mood"

Broccoli, Cauliflower And Genetic Cancer - Science Daily, 5/18/06 - "cruciferous vegetables ... are abundant in sulforaphane (SFN) ... those mice fed with an SFN-supplemented diet developed significantly fewer and smaller tumors"

Reduced Diabetes Likelihood in Hypertensives Starting Valsartan Treatment - Doctor's Guide, 5/18/06 - "Over a mean follow-up of 4.2 years, the risk of diabetes was 11.5% for valsartan versus 14.5% for amlodipine; the odds ratio was 0.77 in favor of valsartan" - Related study:

• Angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors or Angiotensin receptor blockers for prevention of type 2 diabetes a meta-analysis of randomized clinical trials - J Am Coll Cardiol. 2005 Sep 6;46(5):821-6 - "ACE inhibitors and ARBs were associated with reductions in the incidence of newly diagnosed diabetes by 27% and 23%, respectively, and by 25% in the pooled analysis ... The use of an ACE inhibitor or ARB should be considered in patients with pre-diabetic conditions such as metabolic syndrome, hypertension, impaired fasting glucose, family history of diabetes, obesity, congestive heart failure, or coronary heart disease"

Atorvastatin Effective for Stroke Prevention - Doctor's Guide, 5/18/06 - "the atorvastatin arm (265 events) showed a significant 16% risk reduction over placebo (311 events)"

Statin Therapy Benefits Hypertensive and Non-Hypertensive Patients - Doctor's Guide, 5/18/06 - "Overall, pooled results showed that statin therapy reduced cardiac deaths by 24%"

Researchers Reveal Apples' Protective Ways: Molecular Mechanism Of Flavonoid-rich Fruit Discovered - Science Daily, 5/18/06 - "the flavonoids in apples and apple juice can inhibit signals in this pathway that would otherwise damage or kill cells in the body"

New Stroke Guidelines Underscore Importance of Aspirin for Women - Doctor's Guide, 5/17/06 - "aspirin was associated with a 17% reduction in the overall risk of stroke (P = 0.04) and a 24% reduction in the risk of ischemic stroke ... The guidelines do not recommend the use of aspirin for prevention of a first stroke in men"

Hair Loss? It May Be Iron Deficiency - WebMD, 5/17/06 - "whatever the cause of hair loss -- for both women and men -- having too little iron in the blood makes it worse"

Study Indicates Widely-Used Nutritional Supplement Does Not Improve Cholesterol Levels - Doctor's Guide, 5/17/06 - "Most of the published scientific literature, more than 80 trials, supporting the beneficial effects of policosanol on lipids has been authored by a single research group from Cuba. One clinical trial from the Netherlands showed wheat germ-derived policosanol ineffective in lowering total cholesterol and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C)" - My total cholesterol is 123, LDL is 56, HDL is 58 and I find it hard to believe that policosanol didn't have something to do with that or that Cuba gundecked the other 80 studies.  Maybe it was the brand used.  I take 20 mg of Lipitor (OffshoreRx1.com), 10 mg of policosanol, 300 mg of Sytrinol™ and 3 grams of niacin. - Ben

Arthritis Drugs May Up Cancer Risk - WebMD, 5/17/06 - "Rheumatoid arthritis patients who take the newer biologic medications have a threefold increase in cancer risk over patients who don't take them"

Senior Moment? Check Blood Pressure - WebMD, 5/17/06 - "the greater the numeric differences in blood pressure readings during the day, the greater the risk of cognitive dysfunction"

Abstracts from this week's Doctor's Guide Nutrition/Dietetics:

The effect of the ingestion of Ginkgo biloba extract (EGb 761) on the pharmacokinetics of metformin in non-diabetic and type 2 diabetic subjects-A double blind placebo-controlled, crossover study - Clin Nutr. 2006 May 12 - "Ingestion of EGb 761 produced no significant changes in diagnostic laboratory tests in either group, except reducing glycosylated hemoglobin A(1c) levels (from 7.7+/-1.2 to 7.2+/-0.9%, P<0.05) in T2DM the subjects"

Association of abdominal obesity with decreased serum levels of carotenoids in a healthy Japanese population - Clin Nutr. 2006 May 12 - "abdominal fat accumulation is associated with oxidative stress as determined by low levels of serum carotenoids in females"

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