Sleep trouble not an inevitable part of pregnancyPregnancy doesn't have to mean nine months of sleep deprivation, says a noted sleep expert. Myriad factors can disturb sleep throughout pregnancy, from getting up at night to to trying to accommodate a giant belly comfortably, said Dr Jodi A Mindell, associate director of the Sleep Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. However, “almost all of those things you can manage at some level”, she said and getting enough sleep is important for an expectant mother and her baby. She points to a study that found women who got less than 6 hours of sleep a night for their last month of pregnancy had longer labors (29 hours vs 18 hours) and a greater risk of a C-section compared to those who logged at least 7 hours of sleep nightly.ZERO TO 20Bacteria in newborn airways may raise asthma riskNewborns who harbor certain types of bacteria in their throats, including Streptococcus pneumoniae, a common cause of pneumonia, and Haemophilus influenzae, which causes upper respiratory infections, are at increased risk for developing recurrent wheeze or asthma early in life. The finding opens new perspectives for the understanding and prediction of recurrent wheeze and asthma in young children, reported researchers from Denmark's Copenhagen University Hospital in The New England Journal of Medicine. The prevalence of asthma at age 5 was significantly more in children who harbored these organisms as newborns compared with those who did not (33 per cent vs 10 per cent), the researchers reported.20 TO 40Menstrual irregularity linked with lung functionWomen who have irregular menstrual periods with unpredictable flow are more likely than others to have abnormal lung function and asthma, reported researchers from Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen. Women with menstrual irregularity (irregular cycles and/or cycles longer than 32 days) were significantly more likely to have asthma and asthma symptoms than were women with normal menstrual cycles. The effects of menstrual irregularity on asthma symptoms were additive to those of BMI, the researchers note in the September issue of the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology.40 TO 60Had a heart attack? Be careful going back to workMiddle-aged heart attack victims who go back to chronically stressful jobs are twice as likely to suffer a second heart attack or a related problem than those in less taxing jobs, researchers from Quebec’s Laval University reported. The risk is there even after accounting for other heart disease-related factors such as high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity and smoking. Chronic job strain, defined as high psychological stress and little control over decisions that have to be made, was linked to a two-fold increase in the risk of a second problem, said the study published in Journal of the American Medical Association.60 AND ABOVEConscientious people less likely to suffer from Alzheimer’s People who are purposeful, self-disciplined and conscientious appear less likely to suffer from Alzheimer’s disease, found researchers from Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. They performed neurological, cognitive and medical tests on about 1,000 healthy Catholic clergy. After 12 years, 176 people had developed Alzheimer’s disease. Those who had the highest ratings of conscientiousness had an 89 per cent lower risk of showing symptoms of the disease than those with the lowest scores, the researchers reported in Archives of General Psychiatry.
