Future shock for teenagers?

Tweet

Oh dear! A few years ago there were headlines declaring that the current generation would not live as long as their parents because of premature heart disease. I have to admit that at that the time I thought that there was an element of truth in the statement, but kept my head down when there was a "backlash" suggesting that this was too "emotional" a statement and would be counter-productive.

But it seems that Donald Lloyd-Jones, M.D., chair and associate professor of preventive medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, has decided to stick his head above the parapet and declare that as far as the current generation of US teenagers is concerned, "The future is bleak"! When it came to the established risk factors for heart disease, none of the 5,547 children profiled in the study fitted the criteria for ideal cardiovascular health: now that seems scarey! But before we think that our teenagers are letting the side down, I vividly remember attending a conference 10 years ago where the lecturer went through the list of cardiovascular risks and asked attendees to keep their hands up if they fitted into each criteria. With each new criteria, more hands went down: and by the end, ther were only one or two hands left up! And these were all Doctors!

But back to the teenagers: their biggest downfall was diet, which appears to be terrible with high sodium and saturated fats. Then approximately a third of them had higher than normal cholesterol, blood sugars and were overweight or frankly obese! Amazingly, considering all the health information regarding tobacco, 25% of them reported that they had smoked in the past month.

The conclusion is not that these teenagers are a lost cause, but rather that we must look at new ways of getting health information through to them so that they can maximize their health and their lives.  This is a complex challenge and one that perhaps should start with the idea that the easy option is not always the smartest or best option.

image

reference

Cigarettes, unborn children and heart disease: the link.

Tweet For many years, scientists have known about the phenomenon known as biological imprinting: the classic example is in geese. When the young gosling hatches from its shell it thinks that the first thing it sees must be its mother. So the canny owner of a flock of geese makes sure that when the goslings hatch, he/she is the first thing they see, so that when it comes to getting them to follow you wherever they may go - even if it's to market - then they will follow the human "mother" and not the feathered version.

Now there is an update on biological imprinting as it pertains to health: and it concerns the impact it can have on the unborn infant later in life. "We have found distinct links between cigarette smoking or even using nicotine patches or gum and the long-term harm for the child," says Dr. DaLiao Xiao, a scientist who works at the Loma Linda University School of Medicine in California.

Naturally, being researchers, they have done their initial research on rats, and what they found is that exposure of the unborn rats to nicotine - in whatever form it may be, either through cigarettes or patches - resulted in raised blood pressure, or Hypertension. Nicotine appears to release a chemical that has a direct and permanent effect that alters the normal behaviour of the blood vessel. "This faulty programming is then carried throughout the individual's life and may lead to high blood pressure in adults".

If these findings are confirmed in humans, then this is something that will be beyond the ability of the sufferer to counteract by lifestyle changes. The only way to prevent this will be by both parents making sure that their unborn child is not exposed to nicotine in any shape or form.