PRESS-NEWS.org - Press Release Distribution
PRESS RELEASES DISTRIBUTION

Housing improvements should be targeted at those in poorest health

2013-02-28
(Press-News.org) Improving housing can improve health, particularly when interventions are targeted at those in the poorest health, according to a systematic review published in The Cochrane Library. The authors say their review underscores the importance of targeting those most in need when devising programmes for housing improvement.

Despite a wealth of research linking housing to health, it remains difficult to separate the effects of poor housing from the effects of other socioeconomic factors that influence health, such as poverty. The link could be made more strongly by showing that improvements in housing lead to improvements in health, but these types of studies are rare for several reasons. For example, high quality studies require controls, or houses that are left unimproved for comparison's sake. This would mean withholding benefits that residents are entitled to and would therefore be considered unethical.

The authors included 39 studies from around the world in their review. In studies carried out in high income countries, housing improvements included refurbishment, rehousing, relocation, installation of central heating and insulation. In studies carried out in low income countries, improvements included providing toilet facilities and, in older studies, rehousing from slums. Overall, the results suggest that improvements to housing conditions can lead to improved health. Improvements in space and warmth were especially important to achieving better health, and in particular for people with respiratory disease.

"The best available evidence suggests that housing that promotes good health needs to be of an appropriate size to meet household needs, and be affordable for residents to maintain a comfortable indoor temperature," said lead researcher Hilary Thomson of the Medical Research Council/Chief Scientist Office Social and Public Health Sciences Unit in Glasgow, UK.

Housing improvements resulted in greater health benefits when they were targeted at those living in the poorest housing, with the poorest health. The benefits were less clear in housing improvement programmes delivered across whole neighbourhoods, rather than targeted to those individual households in greatest need. "This finding further underlines the need to target households in the greatest need if we are to fully realise the potential for health improvement following housing improvement," said Thomson.

###URL Upon publication: http://doi.wiley.com/10.1002/14651858.CD008657.pub2


ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Patients with diabetes at no greater risk for infection

2013-02-28
Rosemont, Ill. – Patients with diabetes were no more likely to suffer infection, deep vein thrombosis (a deep vein blood clot) or other complications following total knee replacement (TKR) than patients without diabetes, according to new research published online today, in advance of its publication in the March 2013 Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery (JBJS). The study authors sought to determine whether or not blood sugar level (glycemic control) influenced outcome in TKR. Fifty-two percent of people with diabetes have arthritis. Previous studies have found that poor ...

Scientists discover molecule that does double duty in stopping asthma attacks

2013-02-28
BOSTON, MA—Scientists from Brigham and Women's Hospital are on the brink of the next treatment advancement that may spell relief for the nearly nineteen million adults and seven million children in the United States suffering from asthma. The scientists discovered two new drug targets in the inflammatory response pathway responsible for asthma attacks. The study will be published on February 27, 2013 in Science Translational Medicine. Researchers studied the lungs and blood of 22 people with mild and severe asthma. They saw that immune cells called natural killer ...

New study shows viruses can have immune systems

2013-02-28
BOSTON (February 27, 2013, embargoed until 1 p.m. US ET) — A study published today in the journal Nature reports that a viral predator of the cholera bacteria has stolen the functional immune system of bacteria and is using it against its bacterial host. The study provides the first evidence that this type of virus, the bacteriophage ("phage" for short), can acquire a wholly functional and adaptive immune system. The phage used the stolen immune system to disable – and thus overcome – the cholera bacteria's defense system against phages. Therefore, the phage can kill ...

Songbirds' brains coordinate singing with intricate timing

2013-02-28
As a bird sings, some neurons in its brain prepare to make the next sounds while others are synchronized with the current notes—a coordination of physical actions and brain activity that is needed to produce complex movements, new research at the University of Chicago shows. In an article in the current issue of Nature, neuroscientist Daniel Margoliash and colleagues show, for the first time, how the brain is organized to govern skilled performance—a finding that may lead to new ways of understanding human speech production. The new study shows that birds' physical ...

The NHL drafts the wrong players due to birthday bias

2013-02-28
ALLENDALE, Mich. — A hockey player's birthday strongly biases how professional teams assess his talent, according to a new study by Grand Valley State University researchers. The findings were published in the online journal PLOS ONE at http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0057753. The research, led by Robert Deaner, associate professor of psychology at Grand Valley State, shows that, on average, National Hockey League (NHL) draftees born between July and December are much more likely than those born in the first three months of the year to have successful careers. ...

Lipid researcher, 98, reports on the dietary causes of heart disease

Lipid researcher, 98, reports on the dietary causes of heart disease
2013-02-28
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — A 98-year-old researcher argues that, contrary to decades of clinical assumptions and advice to patients, dietary cholesterol is good for your heart – unless that cholesterol is unnaturally oxidized (by frying foods in reused oil, eating lots of polyunsaturated fats, or smoking). The researcher, Fred Kummerow, an emeritus professor of comparative biosciences at the University of Illinois, has spent more than six decades studying the dietary factors that contribute to heart disease. In a new paper in the American Journal of Cardiovascular Disease, he ...

Sitting less and moving about more could be more important than vigorous exercise to reduce your risk of type 2 diabetes

2013-02-28
New research led at the University of Leicester reveals that individuals at high risk of developing type 2 diabetes would benefit from being told to sit less and move around more often- rather than simply exercising regularly. The experts suggest that reducing sitting time by 90 minutes in total per day could lead to important health benefits. Currently, at risk patients are advised to engage in moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) for at least 150 mins per week. But the new study published in Diabetologia (The journal of the European Association for the Study ...

Canadian adult obesity at historic high

2013-02-28
Obesity rates across Canada are reaching alarming levels and continue to climb, according to a new University of British Columbia study. Published today in the Canadian Journal of Public Health, the study provides the first comprehensive look at adult obesity rates across Canada since 1998, complete with "obesity maps." "Being obese or overweight significantly increases the risk of chronic illnesses, such as heart disease, diabetes, and some cancers," says study lead author, Prof. Carolyn Gotay in UBC's School of Population and Public Health. "Our analysis shows that ...

How much will I be charged?

2013-02-28
It's a basic, reasonable question: How much will this cost me? For patients in the emergency room, the answer all too often is a mystery. Emergency departments play a critical role in health care, yet consumers typically know little about how medical charges are determined and often underestimate their financial responsibility -- then are shocked when the hospital bill arrives. A new study led by UC San Francisco highlights the problem by identifying giant price swings in patient charges for the 10 most common outpatient conditions in emergency rooms across the country. Out-of-pocket ...

How much protection is enough?

2013-02-28
Protection of marine areas from fishing increases density and biomass of fish and invertebrates (such as lobster and scallops) finds a systematic review published in BioMed Central's open access journal Environmental Evidence. The success of a protected area was also dependent on its size and on how it was managed, however even partial protection provides significant ecological benefits. Marine ecosystems worldwide are suffering from a loss of biodiversity due to destruction of food chains and habitats. Increasingly areas are being set aside to protect sensitive environments ...

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:

Brain stimulation can boost math learning in people with weaker neural connections

Inhibiting enzyme could halt cell death in Parkinson’s disease, study finds

Neurotechnology reverses biological disadvantage in maths learning

UNDER EMBARGO: Neurotechnology reverses biological disadvantage in maths learning

Scientists target ‘molecular machine’ in the war against antimicrobial resistance

Extending classical CNOP method for deep-learning atmospheric and oceanic forecasting

Aston University research: Parents should encourage structure and independence around food to support children’s healthy eating

Thunderstorms are a major driver of tree death in tropical forests

Danforth Plant Science Center adds two new faculty members

Robotic eyes mimic human vision for superfast response to extreme lighting

Racial inequities and access to COVID-19 treatment

Residential segregation and lung cancer risk in African American adults

Scientists wipe out aggressive brain cancer tumors by targeting cellular ‘motors’

Capturability distinction analysis of continuous and pulsed guidance laws

CHEST expands Bridging Specialties Initiative to include NTM disease and bronchiectasis on World Bronchiectasis Day

Exposure to air pollution may cause heart damage

SwRI, UTSA selected by NASA to test electrolyzer technology aboard parabolic flight

Prebiotics might be a factor in preventing or treating issues caused by low brain GABA

Youngest in class at higher risk of mental health problems

American Heart Association announces new volunteer leaders for 2025-26

Gut microbiota analysis can help catch gestational diabetes

FAU’s Paulina DeVito awarded prestigious NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

Champions for change – Paid time off initiative just made clinical trials participation easier

Fentanyl detection through packaging

Prof. Eran Meshorer elected to EMBO for pioneering work in epigenetics

New 3D glacier visualizations provide insights into a hotter Earth

Creativity across disciplines

Consequences of low Antarctic sea ice

Hear here: How loudness and acoustic cues help us judge where a speaker is facing

A unique method of rare-earth recycling can strengthen the raw material independence of Europe and America

[Press-News.org] Housing improvements should be targeted at those in poorest health