Category: Featured Stories and Interviews

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Asthma and Toxic Consumer Products Linked Says Study

Hormone Disruption and Asthma Found In Consumer Products, says National Work Group for Safe Markets

Press reports reflect that toxic chemicals linked to rising rates of endocrine disruption related disease were found in consumer products and reported in a peer reviewed article in Environmental Health Perspectives today. Silent Spring Institute tested cleaning products, cosmetics, sunscreens, shower curtains, air fresheners, and other household goods made by Colgate, Unilever, S.C. Johnson, Johnson and Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Seventh Generation, and Ecover and others.”Test results show conventional and ‘green’ products contain hidden toxic chemicals not on product labels; consumers have no way of avoiding them,” says Alexandra Scranton from Women’s Voices for the Earth, who conducted their own tests for hidden toxic chemicals in products.

Martha Arguello, with Physicians for Social Responsibility – Los Angeles, says: “Silent Spring used Battelle Labs in Ohio: they found 55 chemicals associated with endocrine disruption or asthma, including parabens, BPA, triclosan, and more. It’s not good science to assume that cumulative exposure to chemicals is safe.””This study found PVC products, including a pillow protector and shower curtain, contained high levels of toxic phthalate DEHP,” explains Mike Schade from Center for Health, Environment & Justice. “Phthalates, banned in toys, are widespread in many PVC products in schools and at home. Linked to asthma, impacts on brain development, and reproductive health problems in baby boys, safer cost-effective alternatives exist for our schools and homes.””Many products are targeted to women of color who suffer from high health disparities that are linked to endocrine disruptors in products. We hope studies like this inspire better policies and regulations,” says Janette Robinson-Flint from Black Women for Wellness. “Mothers shouldn’t have to be biochemists to protect themselves and their families.”

“Many folks tested positive for BPA and Triclosan in our human biomonitoring studies,” says Sharyle Patton, Director of the Biomonitoring Resource Center at Commonweal. “One has to wonder if rising rates of health problems are linked to these exposures.”Caroline Cox, Research Director, Center for Environmental Health, says, “These unnecessary, untested and unlabeled chemicals in dozens of products threaten our children’s and families’ health. It’s past time for federal action.””This is another example of the failure of federal law to protect workers and consumers,” said Sarah Doll from SAFER States, “States have been acting to protect consumers from toxic chemicals.”

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Asthma Study: Asthma Sufferers Trapped with Disease

The course of asthma activity: A population study

A recent asthma activity population study suggests that once you’ve been diagnosed with asthma, you’re trapped with the disease for life.

According to published reports in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology research conducted from 1993 to 2008 by scientists at Ontario’s Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES) studied 613,394 people with asthma. Eighty-two per cent of participants continued to have active asthma through the study.

For nearly 75 per cent of that group, the condition seemed inactive for years.

“Over 15 years, most individuals with asthma in Ontario were found to have active disease which was interspersed by periods of inactivity when they did not seek medical attention and were likely in remission,” states Dr. Andrea Gershon in a news release. Gershon is a respirologist and scientist at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, and the study’s lead author.

“These analyses offer insight into the natural course of asthma activity that may help improve the ability to predict an individual’s course of disease.”

Children, seniors, and those diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) were more likely to have active asthma.

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Asthma Study: Amish Farm Kids Have Lower Asthma, Allergy Risk

A recent study conducted by Dr. Mark Holbreich, an allergist reflect that children growing up in the Amish culture in Switzerland have significantly less asthma and allergies than Swiss children who didn’t grow up on a farm according to publish reports.

According to National Jewish Health Dr. Mark Holbreich began to offer free allergy clinics in the 1980s to the Amish community in Northern Indiana. “The Amish accept no insurance and live a life separate from the ‘outside world,'” said Dr. Holbreich. “They are committed to a traditional agrarian lifestyle and their faith.”

Dr. Holbreich noticed that the majority of the 20 to 30 patients who visited each clinic had no evidence of food or inhalant allergy, eczema, allergic rhinitis or asthma. Skin tests were often negative. His observations were different from the experience in his Indianapolis practice where most patients seeking advice have allergies.

Endotoxin Exposure

In 2000, Dr. Holbreich read National Jewish Health physician Dr. Andy Liu’s first observations on endotoxin exposure and allergy prevention. Amish have large families; children are in the barn and around farm animals from a very early age and drink unpasteurized milk. Dr. Holbreich wondered if the Amish community could be exemplifying the hygiene hypothesis. He contacted Dr. Liu and, in 2004, the two doctors together visited an Amish community. Their informal survey found no one with knowledge of any allergic individuals.

“I am grateful and appreciative of Dr. Holbreich’s willingness to share his experience,” said Dr. Liu. “While I came out of scientific interest, I left with a profound admiration for the Amish way of life. There may be benefits of the Amish lifestyle that go beyond early endotoxin exposure to account for the low incidence of atopy.”

Cooperation among former fellows and current faculty is a great strength of the National Jewish experience. Drs. Liu and Holbreich continue to work together on ways to further define the incidence of allergic disease in the Amish population and to explore what can be learned about prevention and well-being from this unique community.

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Asthma and Allergies Discovery in Ireland and the UK

Discovery that could lead to new treatments for Asthma

Press reports reflect that a Prof Padraic Fallon from Trinity College Dublin and his collaborators in Britain have found a pathway leading to the development of white blood cells that cause allergic inflammation.

Professor Fallon describes his discovery of a novel cell implicated in allergies. The discovery has the potential for new strategies to treat asthma and other allergic diseases. The research findings have just been published in the leading international journal Nature Immunology.

Two years ago he and Dr Andrew McKenzie from Cambridge University announced the discovery of a new white cell, the nuocyte — a previously missing link in the immune pathway that is activated in asthma attacks.

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Respected Reporter Dies from Asthma

Grim Reminder of Seriousness of Disease

According to new reports, foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid died this week. According to Boston.com Shadid wasn’t felled by the bullet he took in the shoulder or the brutality he experienced at the hands of those holding him hostage; he died yesterday of a condition that affects some 25 million Americans: asthma.

News accounts reflect that, while traversing the Syria-Lebanon border on assignment for the New York Times, the former Globe reporter started wheezing after having an allergic reaction to horses in his caravan. Within moments, he collapsed and died after his heart stopped beating, according to Times photographer Tyler Hicks, who was accompanying Shadid.

“Asthma deaths are pretty uncommon, though not as uncommon as you might think,” said Brigham and Women’s Hospital asthma researcher Dr. Michael Wechsler. It causes about 4,000 deaths in the United States every year.

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Asthma and Fragrance Sensitivity Law Introduced

According to published reports, a New Hampshire legislature has introduced a House Bill 1444 that could mandate that state workers who interact with the public as a part of their job would be prohibited from wearing fragrances or scented products during business hours. If approved, the bill would take effect within 60 days.

Chemical Sensitivity in Asthmatics Established

In 2009, a study conducted by Caress and Anne Steinenmann at the University of Washington found that nearly a third of people with asthma also have chemical hypersensitivity, and more than a third reported irritation from scented products.

“The more you’re around, the more likely it is to cause an attack,” one of the authors said. “People with asthma, many of them should try to avoid artificially fragranced products.”

Watch Fox News Video

NH bill would ban use of fragrances by some state workers: MyFoxBOSTON.com

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Asthma and Asthma Medication – Take Your Meds!

Improved Medication Use Could Reduce Severe Asthma Attacks

Researchers at Henry Ford Hospital have found that one-quarter of severe asthma attacks could be prevented if only patients consistently took their medication as prescribed.

Moreover, an asthma attack was only significantly reduced when patients used at least 75 percent of their prescribed dose, according to the study.

Patients often poorly take their medication based on the onset and degree of symptoms.

Henry Ford researchers say this is the first time that asthma medication use has been tracked closely over time and related to the likelihood of severe asthma attacks. The findings are published online in the December issue of The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology http://www.jacionline.org/article/S0091-6749%2811%2901481-3/abstract

“Our findings demonstrated a relationship between medication adherence and asthma events in a manner that accounts for the changing patterns of inhaler use over time,” says lead author Keoki Williams, M.D., MPH, an Internal Medicine physician and associate director of Henry Ford’s Center for Health Policy and Health Service Research.

Inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) medication is the most effective treatment for controlling symptoms and preventing attacks, which can lead to a visit to the emergency department or hospitalization or death if left untreated.

Working from their theory that ICS use changes with the episodic nature of asthma, Dr. Williams and his team of researchers set out to measure changes in medication use over time and to estimate the effect of ICS use on asthma attacks among 298 patients. Patients were followed on average for two years and had 435 asthma attacks during that time.

“We found that every 25 percent increase in ICS adherence was associated with an 11 percent decrease in asthma attacks,” Dr. Williams says. “But most importantly, we found that causal use of these medications is not enough, especially among patients whose asthma is not controlled. Patients must use their asthma controller medication as prescribed if they want to have the best chance of preventing serious asthma attacks.”

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Asthma Study: Getting Patients to Take Their Asthma Meds

Asthma Patients More Likely To Take Meds Under Physician Supervision

Armed with the right information, physicians can play a stronger role in ensuring asthma patients don’t waver in taking drugs proven to prevent asthma attacks, according to researchers at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.

The study finds patients are more likely to routinely take inhaled corticosteroids (ICS) for asthma control when physicians kept close watch over their medication use and reviewed detailed electronic prescription information, including how often patients fill their prescriptions and the estimated number of days each prescription would last.

“Better inhaled corticosteroid adherence means better overall asthma control, and less hospitalization,” says lead study author L. Keoki Williams, M.D., MPH, Center for Health Services Research and Department of Internal Medicine at Henry Ford Hospital.

“Unfortunately, overall patient adherence to ICS medication is poor, accounting for an estimated 60 percent of asthma hospitalizations. So it’s important, as we move forward with health care reform, to look for more effective ways to make sure patients stay with their prescription regimens.”

The study – the first large-scale, controlled study to test the effectiveness of routinely providing patient medication adherence information to physicians – appears online in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology (www.jacionline.org).

ICS, taken using an inhaler, help prevent and reduce airway swelling, and are considered the cornerstone therapy for controlling persistent asthma in patients, says Dr. Williams.

The Henry Ford scientific team set out to design an intervention that would provide physicians information on the most recent national asthma guidelines and methods for discussing medication non-adherence with their patients.

The intervention also offered physicians electronic access to patients’ medication prescription fill/refill information via Henry Ford’s ePrescribing application, part of its electronic medical record system that allows physicians to prescribe and review patient medications electronically.

The study enrolled 193 Henry Ford primary care physicians (family medicine, internal medicine, pediatrics). Eighty-eight were randomly assigned to the intervention group, while 105 were assigned to the control group (no intervention).

Physicians in the intervention group used ePrescribing to track medication fills and refills. The application also offered physicians the option to take it one step further: To review detailed adherence data, including estimates of the proportion of time that the patients took their medication.

Medication adherence for both groups was measured by using both electronic prescriptions and pharmacy claims for medication fills and refills.

Researchers found ICS adherence to be very similar among patients in the intervention group and those in the control group (21.3 percent vs. 23.3 percent).

But adherence was significantly higher in the intervention group (35 percent) when the patient’s physician elected to view detailed adherence information via the ePrescribing application.

Few physicians, however, in the intervention group accessed the detailed adherence information. “Going forward, one of the obstacles will be finding time for physicians to review and discuss this information with patients in their typically busy practices,” says Dr. Williams.

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Asthma and Mold

Preventive Mold Strategies for Asthmatics

Several molds that grow both indoors and outdoors, produce allergenic substances. These allergens can be found in mold spores and other fungal structures (e.g. hyphae). There is no definite seasonal pattern to molds that grow indoors. However outdoor molds are seasonal, first appearing in early spring and thriving until the first frost.

Indoor molds are found in dark, warm, humid and musty environments such as damp basements, cellars, attics, bathrooms and laundry rooms. They are also found where fresh food is stored, in refrigerator drip trays, garbage pails, air conditioners and humidifiers.

Outdoor molds grow in moist shady areas. They are common in soil, decaying vegetation, compost piles, rotting wood and fallen leaves.

Preventive Strategies

* Use a dehumidifier or air conditioner to maintain relative humidity below 50% and keep temperatures cool.
* Vent bathrooms and clothes dryers to the outside, and run bathroom and kitchen vents while bathing and cooking.
* Regularly check faucets, pipes and ductwork for leaks.
* When first turning on home or car air conditioners, leave the room or drive with the windows open for several minutes to allow mold spores to disperse.
* Remove decaying debris from the yard, roof and gutters.
* Avoid raking leaves, mowing lawns or working with peat, mulch, hay or dead wood. If you must do yard work, wear a mask and avoid working on hot, humid days.

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Asthma and Toxic Standards

Former NFL Player and Hall of Famer Jerome Bettis knows the effects of asthma first hand

In this short video clip, Jerome Bettis talks about EPA’s Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, which will help limit pollution from power plants, making it easier for Americans to breathe cleaner air.