Expert Offers Advice on How to Choose Age Appropriate and Safe Toys for Children During the Holidays

04.12.2008 08:10

With the excitement of the holidays, parents and relatives eagerly purchase the hottest toys and latest items for their children. But it??™s during the hustle and bustle of the season that many fail to buy age appropriate gifts for their children and they tend to disregard warnings on these toys and gifts when it comes to ensuring safety. Cincinnati Children??™s Hospital Medical Center suggests parents consider their child??™s age, interests, and skill levels when purchasing toys. While shopping, parents are urged to read product warnings and labels, look for sturdy construction and avoid items with sharp edges and points. Once the gifts are opened, it??™s important to quickly discard plastic wrappings and keep older children??™s toys away from younger siblings. ???Children under five years ??“ and especially those under three years ??“ are particularly vulnerable to airway obstruction due to small upper airways, inexperience with chewing and a natural tendency to put everything in their mouths,??? says Michael Gittelman, MD, an emergency medicine physician at Cincinnati Children??™s. Read more…

Meat 'ups prostate cancer risk'

08.10.2008 at 08:01 - Category: Health News Today

Hormone may stimulate development of cancer cells

Eating meat and dairy products may increase the risk of prostate cancer, research suggests.

Such a diet raises levels of a hormone called Insulin-like Growth Factor-1 (IGF-1) which promotes cell growth.

A University of Oxford team examined the results of 12 studies, featuring a total of nearly 9,000 men.

They found men with high blood levels of IGF-1 were up to 40% more likely to develop prostate cancer than those with low levels.

The study appears in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine.

IGF-1 plays a key role in the growth and development of children and adolescents.

In adults it continues to regulate cell growth and death, but it can also inhibit the death of cells which have come to the end of their natural life cycle.

Extent unclear

Lead researcher Dr Andrew Roddam said the degree to which diet influenced IGF-1 levels was unclear.

But he said levels could be up to 15% higher in people who ate a lot of meat and dairy products.

Dr Roddam said: "There is a need to identify risk factors for prostate cancer, especially those which can be targeted by therapy and/or lifestyle changes.

"Now we know this factor is associated with the disease we can start to examine how diet and lifestyle factors can affect its levels and whether changes could reduce a man's risk."

Dr Roddam said raised levels of IGF-1 were likely not only to increase the risk of developing prostate cancer, but also to aid the spread of tumours.

Research shows that cells fed IGF-1 grow much more quickly.

However, Dr Roddam said there was no evidence to suggest that measuring IGF-1 levels could be used to develop a new test to screen for prostate cancer.

Each year in the UK more than 34,000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer and around 10,000 die of the disease.

Dr Lesley Walker, of the charity Cancer Research UK, which funded the study, said: "While there are established risk factors associated with prostate cancer of age, family history, and ethnicity, there are no clear data on modifiable risk factors."

Original text is here

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