Newborns of Smokers Have Abnormal Blood Pressure

MONDAY, Jan. 25 (HealthDay News) — Babies of women who smoked during pregnancy have blood pressure problems at birth that persisted through the first year of life, a new study finds.

“What is of concern is that the problems are present at birth and get worse over time,” said Gary Cohen, a senior research scientist in the department of women and child health at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, and lead author of a report in the Jan. 25 online edition of Hypertension. “They’re not going away, they’re getting worse.”

The study led by Cohen compared 19 infants of nonsmoking couples with 17 infants born to women who smoked an average of 15 cigarettes a day during pregnancy. At one week of age, the infants of nonsmoking mothers experienced a 2 percent increase in blood pressure when tilted upright, with a 10 percent increase at one year. The pattern for the children of smoking mothers was reversed: a 10 percent blood pressure increase at one week, a 4 percent increase at one year.

And the heart rate response to tilting of the children of mothers who smoked was abnormal and exaggerated, the report said.

It’s not possible to say whether the abnormalities seen in the babies will lead to trouble later in life, Cohen said. But, he noted, “the extent of the condition at one year suggests that it is not going to disappear quickly.”

The reason why exposure to tobacco in the womb affects blood pressure is not clear, Cohen said. A leading possibility is that “smoking might damage the structure and function of blood vessels,” he said, mainly by damaging the endothelium, the delicate layer of cells that line the interior of blood vessels.

Whether that damage will persist is not known. “We’re only up to 12 months at the moment,” he said. “We plan to follow them.”

The damage seen in the Karolinska study is similar to that observed in babies born to mothers whose pregnancies were marked by such abuses as drug use, said Barry M. Lester, a professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at Brown Medical School, and director of the Brown Center for the Study of Children at Risk.

“Early kinds of natal insults can cause reprogramming of brain circuitry,” Lester explained. He has led studies of the long-term effects of cocaine and amphetamine use during pregnancy. Many women who take such drugs also smoke, Lester added.

“When we isolated tobacco effects, we showed that there are inborn neural effects of tobacco exposure similar to what we see in cocaine and methamphetamine abuse,” he said.

Some research has connected such problems to overproduction of cortisol, a “stress hormone” that plays an important role in regulation of blood pressure and the immune system, Lester said. “Cortisol overexposure is one hypothesis,” he said. “There is a lot of evidence showing that too much cortisol is damaging.”

It is a reasonable hypothesis, Cohen said. Babies born preterm have problems with blood pressure that have been linked to overproduction of cortisol by the adrenal glands, he noted, “and there are some parallels between tobacco smoke exposure and preterm babies of the same age.”

Whatever the mechanism of damage, treatment to eliminate the problems after birth does not seem possible, Cohen added.

“What we know from studies in older kids is that even if you remove them from an environment of exposure to tobacco smoke, it is unlikely you will get full restoration of normal function,” he said. “The best intervention to solve these problems is prevention. Women who are pregnant need to avoid exposure to tobacco smoke in the air. Passive smoke exposure can be as bad as being an active smoker.”

source: www.healthday.com

Alternative Therapy for Hand Pain

Living, working, and socializing in the computer age can be very efficient and rewarding, however, sitting dormant at a computer screen all day can wear on your body. While searching the Internet or typing an email, your eyes are scanning the screen but the main body parts that are moving are your hands. Using your wrists and fingers to manipulate the keyboard and mouse can be particularly stressful on your tendons and muscles while the rest of your body is relaxed sitting at a computer all day. Here are some helpful tips for helping your hands get the relief they need after a hard day...whether you have an office job pecking on a keyboard, working outside with your hands, crafting, tending to a garden, or simply suffering from sore and overworked hands.

Posture

The way you sit or stand carries importance to more than just your mother. Posture professionals recommend sitting up while typing and leaning back a little at the keyboard to allow your spine to stretch. Finding the right office chair can be a hassle and they are also very costly, but you can find inexpensive lower back supports to keep you from slouching at your desk and helping to cradle your lumbar for the best possible seated position. Wrist guards, an ergonomically enhanced mouse, and supportive mouse pads can also be found and will help your posture and hopefully, your productivity.

Movement

Whether working with tools and machinery or living on the other side of a screen doing too much of one activity gets tedious and everyone needs a break. Experts say that if you are sitting for long periods of time, get up for two minutes every half hour and stand, walk around a bit, or just stretch from your toes up to your head.

Exercise

A little well known fact is that most of the crafty hobbies and everyday situations in which you use your hands actually need your finger strength instead of your palm strength. Sage advice from Dr. Alejandro Badia of the Badia Hand to Shoulder Center based in South Florida. Dr. Badia recommends finger exercises and wrist strengthening ideas to increase the blood flow to your hands and tighten the muscles in order to lessen pain. Common painful conditions that can arise from hurt upper limbs include: osteoarthritis, tendinitis, carpal tunnel syndrome, and general overall discomfort. Dr. Badia says that using a resistance band (or a device like the Xtensor, a popular resistance glove-like apparatus that works all your extensor muscles) hones in on certain finger extensor muscles that provide the basis of the finger strength necessary for healthy hands. Improve your range of motion by doing a couple exercises a couple of times per week.

More often than not we take our fingers for granted from driving, holding, gripping, touching, typing, eating, cooking, putting on makeup, shaving, and any other thousand things we do all the time that require the use of our hands we barely remember to take the time to pamper them and give them the support they need to help us throughout the day. Knuckle-cracking and joint pulling have often been used for relief however they have proven over the years not to be the healthiest idea because it can impair your dexterity and possibly decrease your flexibility over time. Ultimately by improving posture, remembering to move around while staying inactive, and building up our tendons, we can prevent injuries, stress, and strains that our joints would normally accrue over time.