Latest Health News

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 27, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- Women over 50 are turning to weed in droves, and menopause symptoms may be one big reason why, new research suggestsThese women may not necessarily be getting the results they’re looking for, however. That's according to menopause experts who say it’s not clear from limited research whether the drug helps ease symptoms or exacerbates them.“People are desperate. They want to sleep. They want to feel better. And it's been pretty normalized at this point that cannabis is something that works for those issues. I want to be clear that we don't actually know if it works,” said study author Carolyn Gibson, a health services researcher at the University of California, San Francisco.“The evidence is really mixed whether it's helping or...

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 27, 2023 (HealthDay News) – It seemed to some that patients of color were being restrained in the emergency room more often than others, so researchers decided to investigate.While physical restraints can be used to keep staff and patients safe, they may also cause injury to the patient, including aspiration, physical trauma and psychological harm.A new study bears out what the team from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston suspected: Black patients are more often restrained than patients from all other racial groups. The finding stems from a review of 10 studies published through February 2022.“The absolute event rate for restraint use was relatively low, less than 1%, but our results suggest that Black patients have a higher risk of restraint than patients of...

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 27, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- Suffering from PTSD may take a toll on your sex life if you're a woman, new research reveals.About 10% of women have PTSD symptoms because of combat exposure, childhood abuse and sexual violence. Little research has been done looking at how these symptoms might affect sexual functioning among midlife women."As women age, there are many reasons why sexual functioning may become an issue for them," said Dr. Stephanie Faubion, medical director for the North American Menopause Society. "This study highlights the need for health care professionals to ask about any history of trauma and open up the dialogue with their patients on this sensitive issue," she said in a society news release.Researchers studied this in more than 100 postmenopausal...

TUESDAY, Sept. 26, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- People who develop long COVID have distinct abnormalities in their immune and hormonal function that can be picked up with blood tests, researchers have found.In a new study of 268 patients with and without long COVID, those with the condition showed a number of biological "markers" in their blood samples.People with long COVID often showed signs of compromised immune function, including abnormal T cell activity and a reactivation of "sleeping" viruses that their immune system had previously kept in check -- including Epstein-Barr and other herpesviruses.They also had markers of hormonal dysfunction, like reduced morning-time levels of cortisol. That hormone, which normally peaks in the morning, plays an essential role in many bodily...