Medical Bulletin 23/December/2023

Here are the top medical news of the day:

Brain lesions in former football players linked to vascular, brain changes

Signs of injury to the brain’s white matter called white matter hyperintensities, as seen on brain scans, may be tied more strongly to vascular risk factors, brain shrinkage, and other markers of dementia in former tackle football players than in those who did not play football, according to a study published in the December 20, 2023, online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.

“Studies have shown that athletes exposed to repetitive head impacts can have increased white matter hyperintensity burden in their brains,” said study author Michael L. Alosco, PhD, of Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine. “White matter hyperintensities are easily seen on MRI as markers of injury of various causes. We know these markers are more common as people age and with medical conditions such as high blood pressure, but these results provide initial insight that they may be related to multiple aspects of brain damage from repetitive head impacts.”

Reference: Brain lesions in former football players linked to vascular, brain changes; Neurology

Study: Spinal cord injury causes acute and systemic muscle wasting

Acute spinal cord injury (SCI) patients lose body weight and muscle mass, despite being on a high-calorie diet while in the intensive care unit. Their muscle wasting is substantial and extends beyond what can explained by inactivity or denervation (loss of nerve supply) alone.

Research led by The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and College of Medicine published in the journal Science Translational Medicine sheds new light and decodes early muscle loss after SCI to provide an unprecedent first understanding that muscle wasting.

Reference: Study: Spinal cord injury causes acute and systemic muscle wasting; Science Translational Medicine, DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.adh2156

Women's risk of infertility increases by 3% for every Kg of weight gained

Obesity has significant implications for fertility and reproductive health. However, evidences linking abdominal obesity to female infertility were limited and inconclusive. Our objective was to figure out the potential relationship between waist circumference (WC) and infertility among women of childbearing age in the United States using data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).

Researchers conducted cross-sectional study included 3239 female participants aged 18–45 years. To explore the independent relationship between WC and female infertility, the weighted multivariable logistic regression and smoothed curve fitting were performed. Interaction and subgroup analyzes were then conducted for secondary analysis.

Reference: Ke J, Feng Y, Chen Z (2023) Association between waist circumference and female infertility in the United States. PLoS ONE 18(12): e0295360. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0295360