Health Highlights: May 21, 2009
May 22 -- Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by editors of HealthDay:
No Decline in Pregnant Women's Alcohol Use: CDC
The number of American women who drink alcohol while pregnant didn't decrease between 1991 and 2005, despite warnings from the Surgeon General about the dangers of drinking while pregnant, says a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study released Thursday.
During that 15-year period, about 1 in 8 women drank any amount of alcohol while pregnant and about 1 in 50 pregnant women engaged in binge drinking. Rates of alcohol use and binge drinking among women of childbearing age remained steady.
The study was published Thursday in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
Alcohol use during pregnancy continues to be an important public health concern, said the study authors. They added that health care professionals play an important role in education women about this issue and should routinely ask all women who are pregnant or of childbearing age about their alcohol use, inform them of the risks of alcohol use while pregnant, and advise them not to consume alcohol while pregnant.
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Japanese Women Have Longest Life Expectancy: WHO
Women in Japan and men in San Marino have the longest life expectancies in the world, according to the World Health Organization.
Life expectancies are 86 years for Japanese women and 81 years for men in San Marino. On the other end of the scale, men in Sierra Leone are expected to live only 39 years, while women in Afghanistan live to an average age of 42 years, the Associated Press reported.
The figures are based on statistics from 2007. While some countries, such as Angola, Eritrea and Liberia have made great progress in increasing life expectancy, countries such as Botswana, Kenya and Lesotho have experienced a decrease in life expectancy since 1990, the WHO said.
The life expectancy statistics were among more than 100 health trends released Thursday by the Geneva-based body, the AP reported.
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Chronic Ills Common Among Adults With Public Insurance: Study
Nearly two-thirds of adult Americans under age 65 covered by public insurance in 2005-06 had at least one chronic illness, such as heart disease, diabetes and kidney disease, says a U.S. government study.
About 57 percent of people with private insurance and 36 percent of those without insurance had at least one chronic condition, said the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
Among the other findings:
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Many U.S. College Students Feel Stressed: Survey
A new survey of American college students found that 85 percent said they've felt stressed in their daily lives in recent months, 42 percent said they felt down, depressed or hopeless several days during the previous two weeks, and 13 percent appeared to be at risk for at least mild depression.
Major causes of stress included concerns about school work, grades, relationships and money, according to the Associated Press-mtvU poll of 2,240 undergraduate students, ages 18 to 24, at 40 colleges.
Among the other findings:
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Costly Hospital Care Doesn't Guarantee Better-Quality Care: Study
Patients treated at hospitals that provide more intensive and costly care don't necessarily receive better-quality care, according to a U.S. study that looked at care given to Medicare beneficiaries with heart attack, pneumonia and congestive heart failure.
The researchers looked at end-of-life (EOL) spending at 2,172 hospitals and found that average EOL spending per patient was $16,059 for the lowest-spending quintile (or fifth) of hospitals, compared to $34,742 at hospitals in the highest-spending quintile.
"We found no evidence that hospitals with higher spending provided better care, whether we looked at all hospitals across the country or limited our study to academic medical centers, or hospitals within a single region. In fact, in some cases, hospitals that spent more provided worse care," Laura Yasaitis, a joint M.D./Ph.D. student at Dartmouth Medical School and a researcher at the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice, said in a news release.
"The fact that some hospitals in the same region are able to provide exemplary care at lower costs points to the need for better reporting of both costs and quality, and for a greater understanding of what processes lead to this improvement in performance," Amitabh Chandra, professor of public policy at Harvard Kennedy School, said in the release.
The study appears online in the journal Health Affairs.
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Young Children's Deaths Decline 27%: WHO
Nearly one-third fewer young children died in 2007 than in 1990, the World Health Organization said Thursday.
The Geneva-based body said that about 9 million children under 5 years old died in 2007, compared with 12.5 million in 1990, the Associated Press reported.
The WHO said the 27 percent decline shows progress is being made toward the goal of a two-thirds reduction in deaths by 2015, which is one of the United Nations' Millennium Development Goals.
The data on young children's deaths were included in more than 100 health trends published this week by the WHO, the AP reported.