Girls Who Use Laxatives to Influence Weight Are More Prone to Eating Disorders
What’s new Healthy young women who use over-the-counter laxatives in an attempt to lose weight or avoid getting fat are significantly more likely to be diagnosed with an eating disorder compared with those who don’t take laxatives, according to a study published November 2019 in the American Journal of Public Health. The study, which was based on data from 10,058 U.S. females ages 14 to 36 who participated in the Growing Up Today Study (GUTS) from 2001 to 2016, found that nearly 5 percent of those who used laxatives for weight control were diagnosed with an eating disorder in the next one to three years, compared with fewer than 1 percent among those who didn’t use laxatives. Why it matters The authors of the study concluded that a healthy young person using laxatives could be at risk for an eating disorder. As with many health conditions, the sooner an eating disorder is diagnosed and treated, the better patients tend to fare. RELATED: What’s Normal Eating Behavior and What Isn’t?
Side Effects of IV Ketamine Treatment for Depression Are Mild
What’s new A single, low-dose of ketamine in IV form can provide rapid relief from depression without significant side effects in adult patients who haven’t responded to standard treatments, according to a study published in November 2019 in the Journal of Affective Disorders. The findings, which were based on five National Institutes of Health (NIH) clinical trials that included 163 patients with major depressive disorder, found that the ketamine treatment produced no serious adverse events. “The most common short-term side effect was feeling strange or loopy,” says Elia Acevedo-Diaz, MD, one of the authors of the study. “Most side effects peaked within an hour of ketamine administration and were gone within two hours.” Why it matters Previous studies have shown that ketamine infusions can reverse feelings of sadness, hopelessness, lack of energy, and other symptoms of major depressive disorder in as little as 40 minutes, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. That’s far speedier than oral antidepressants, which typically take weeks or even months to work, and don’t work at all for about 30 percent of patients. Although widespread, IV ketamine treatments are considered experimental. They are only available from healthcare professionals willing to administer them off-label, which means prescribing treatments for something other than the condition the treatment was originally intended for. This research may help allay fears about side effects. RELATED: FDA Approves Nasal Spray for Treatment-Resistant Depression
A Positive Outlook Helps Protect Your Retirement Nest Egg
What’s new How well you hold on to your savings in retirement is influenced by a positive attitude, according to a study published November 2019 in the journal Psychology and Aging. Researchers at Texas Tech University in Lubbock analyzed personality and psychological data as well as tax returns from 3,678 participants in the ongoing University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study. Key findings were that people who scored high on certain personality traits, including conscientiousness, extroversion, and having a positive outlook, withdrew money from their savings at a slower rate than those who scored high on openness to new experiences, agreeableness, and neuroticism (a personality trait that makes you more likely than average to be moody and experience frequent anxiety and worry). Researchers speculate that agreeableness may cause you to make decisions that jeopardize your savings for the benefit of others; for example, lending money to friends and family members, or contributing in excess to charity. Neuroticism, on the other hand, may decrease the likelihood of developing a retirement income plan and sticking to it, and cause people to spend impulsively as a way to regulate negative emotions. Why it matters The findings suggest that you may be able to help yourself avoid pitfalls of planning for retirement by taking into account how your personality affects your spending. RELATED: Why Stress Happens and How to Manage It
