Latest Health News

• There is yet another reason to stay away from soft drinks, sweetened fruit juices, and sugar-loaded sports drinks: a new study has shown that there is a direct association between fructose and glucose intake and increases in blood pressure and that these sugar-sweetened beverages are associated with significant increases in systolic and diastolic blood pressures. - Medscape March 4, 2011

• Treatment of fevers in children should focus on improving the child's comfort rather than bringing the temperature down to normal levels or preventing the onset of fever, according to a new clinical report issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).
"Many parents administer antipyretics even when there is minimal or no fever, because they are concerned that the child must maintain a 'normal' temperature," the study authors note. "Fever, however, is not the primary illness but is a physiologic mechanism that has beneficial effects in fighting infection," they write. "There is no evidence that fever itself worsens the course of an illness or that it causes long-term neurologic complications." - Medscape March 3, 2011

• Breast-feeding may protect babies who were prenatally exposed to diabetes against childhood obesity, according to the results of a retrospective cohort study reported in the March issue of Diabetes Care. "Our data suggest that breastfeeding promotion may be an effective strategy for reducing the increased risk of childhood obesity in offspring of mothers with diabetes during pregnancy," said senior author Dana Dabelea, MD, PhD, an associate professor of epidemiology at Colorado School of Public Health, Aurora, in a news release. - Medscape March 3, 2011