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THURSDAY, April 15, 2021 (American Heart Association News) -- Body mass index may be more helpful in predicting the risk of a common type of irregular heartbeat in women, while waist size may better predict that risk in men, new research suggests.The link between obesity and atrial fibrillation, or AFib – when the heart beats irregularly and often too fast – is well established. But researchers wanted to understand the extent to which body fat distribution might predict AFib risk among men and women.The researchers analyzed BMI, waist circumference and electrocardiogram data gathered between 2008 and 2013 from more than 2 million older adults in the U.S. and United Kingdom who didn't have cardiovascular conditions, including heart failure and stroke. The study's lead author, Dr....

THURSDAY, April 15, 2021 (HealthDay News) -- The magic ingredient in "magic mushrooms" may be at least as effective as standard medication for depression, an early clinical trial suggests.The study of 59 patients with major depression tested the antidepressant escitalopram (Lexapro) against psilocybin, which is the psychedelic substance in hallucinogenic mushrooms. Over six weeks, it appeared that just two doses of psilocybin were at least as effective as daily escitalopram pills, both of which were given along with psychological counseling.Patients on either treatment improved to a similar degree in their scores on a depression rating scale.But psilocybin patients actually fared better by other measures: By week six, twice as many were in remission compared to the antidepressant...

THURSDAY, April 15, 2021 (HealthDay News) -- The fate of Johnson & Johnson's coronavirus vaccine hung in the balance on Thursday after a government advisory committee said it needed more time and evidence to determine whether unusual, but severe, blood clots seen in a handful of people were caused by the vaccine.So far, only six clotting cases have been officially reported out of more than 7 million shots given of the one-dose vaccine. But on Tuesday, U.S. health officials recommended a pause in J&J vaccinations.On Wednesday, advisers to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention held an emergency meeting to look at the evidence and decided they did not have enough information or time to recommend how to proceed and they would meet again within 10 days, the Associated Press...

THURSDAY, April 15, 2021 (HealthDay News) -- States that required people to mask up last year had lower rates of COVID-19 than those with no mask requirements, a new study finds.Researchers examined data from all 50 states and Washington, D.C., to assess mask policies, people's self-reported use of masks in public, and COVID rates from May through October 2020.They factored in a one-month delay between mask wearing and its subsequent potential effect on COVID infection rates."States with the lowest levels of mask adherence were most likely to have high COVID-19 rates in the subsequent month, independent of mask policy or demographic factors," the Boston University team recently wrote on the preprint server medRxiv, before their findings had been peer-reviewed. Charlie Fischer of Boston...