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Men who have long index fingers are at lower risk of prostate cancer, a new study published today in the British Journal of Cancer has found.

The study led by The University of Warwick and The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) found men whose index finger is longer than their ring finger were one third less likely to develop the disease than men with the opposite finger length pattern.

“Our results show that relative finger length could be used as a simple test for prostate cancer risk, particularly in men aged under 60,” Joint senior author Professor Ros Eeles from the ICR and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust says. “This exciting finding means that finger pattern could potentially be used to select at-risk men for ongoing screening, perhaps in combination with other factors such as family history or genetic testing.”

Over a 15 year period from 1994 to 2009, the researchers quizzed more than 1,500 prostate cancer patients at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust in London and Surrey, Nottingham City Hospital and The Royal Hallamshire Hospitals in Sheffield, along with more than 3,000 healthy control cases. The men were shown a series of pictures of different finger length patterns and asked to identify the one most similar to their own right hand.

The most common finger length pattern, seen in more than half the men in the study, was a shorter index than ring finger. Men whose index and ring fingers were the same length (about 19 per cent) had a similar prostate cancer risk, but men whose index fingers were longer than their ring finger were 33 per cent less likely to have prostate cancer. Risk reduction was even greater in men aged under 60 years– these men were 87 per cent less likely to be in the prostate cancer group.

The relative length of index and ring fingers is set before birth, and is thought to relate to the levels of sex hormones the baby is exposed to in the womb. Less testosterone equates to a longer index finger; the researchers now believe that being exposed to less testosterone before birth helps protect against prostate cancer later in life. The phenomenon is thought to occur because the genes HOXA and HOXD control both finger length and development of sex organs.

Previous studies have found a link between exposure to hormones while in the womb and the development of other diseases, including breast cancer (linked to higher prenatal oestrogen exposure) and osteoarthritis (linked to having an index finger shorter than ring finger).

Joint senior author, Professor Ken Muir, says: “Our study indicates it is the hormone levels that babies are exposed to in the womb which can have an effect decades later. As our research continues, we will be able to look at a further range of factors that may be involved in the make-up of the disease.”

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Working out can help you shed pounds — but that's just the beginning. New research from Tel Aviv University has found that "endurance exercises," like a Central Park jog or a spinning class, can make us look younger. The key, exercise, unlocks the stem cells of our muscles.

Prof. Dafna Benayahu and her team at Tel Aviv University's Sackler School of Medicine say their findings explain for the first time why older people who have exercised throughout their lives age more gracefully. They have discovered how endurance exercise increases the number of muscle stem cells and enhances their ability to rejuvenate old muscles. The researchers hope their finding can lead to a new drug to help the elderly and immobilized heal their muscles faster.

The results of the study were recently published in the journal PLoS ONE.

The real rat race

The muscles and skeleton in our bodies work together, explains Prof. Benayahu. "When we age, we experience sarcopenia, a decline in mass and function of muscles, and osteopenia referrers to bone loss," she says. As a result, our musculoskeletal system is more susceptible to daily wear and tear, which also explains the increased risk of falling in the elderly.

Investigating a rat population, Dr. Gabi Shefer from the research team says that the finding shows that exercise increased the number of satellite cells (muscle stem cells) — a number which normally declines with aging. The researchers believe that a decline in the number of these cells and their functionality may prevent proper maintenance of muscle mass and its ability to repair itself, leading to muscle deterioration.

Comparing the performance of rats of different ages and sexes, they found that the number of satellite cells increased after rats ran on a treadmill for 20 minutes a day for a 13-week period. The younger rats showed a 20% to 35% increase in the average number of stem cells per muscle fiber retained — and older rats benefited even more significantly, exhibiting a 33% to 47% increase in stem cells.

A good reason to get up and dance

Endurance exercise also improved the levels of "spontaneous locomotion" — the feeling that tells our bodies to just get up and dance — of old rats. Aging is typically associated with a reduced level of spontaneous locomotion.

The combination of aging and a sedentary lifestyle significantly contributes to the development of diseases such as osteoporosis, obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, as well as a decline in cognitive abilities. If researchers can discover a method to "boost" satellite cells in our muscles, that could simulate the performance of young and healthy muscles — and hold our aging bones in place.

"We hope to understand the mechanisms for the activation codes of muscle stem cells at the molecular level," says Prof. Benayahu. "With this advance, we can let ourselves dream about creating a new drug for humans — one that could increase muscle mass and ameliorate the negative effects of aging."

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University of Georgia research has provided new clues on surviving to be 100 years old, finding that how we feel about ourselves and our ability to adapt to an accumulation of challenging life experiences may be as or more important than health factors.

The research, published in the current edition of the journal Current Gerontology and Geriatrics Research, used data collected as part of the Georgia Centenarian Study, one of only two centenarian studies in the country, to measure psychological and social factors in addition to genetics and health of so-called expert survivors. Two hundred forty-four people age 100 years or older were studied between 2001 and 2009. The research found that critical life events and personal history, along with how people adapt to stressful situations and cope with them are crucial to explaining successful aging.

“Understanding health in these terms has huge implications for quality of life,” said Leonard Poon, director of the Institute of Gerontology in the UGA College of Public Health and lead author of the study. “What is happening to you matters, but more importantly, it is your perception of what is happening to you that is really important for your individual health.”

A majority of past research on the oldest of the old focused on health factors, but the researchers found that centenarians’ feelings about their own health, well-being and support systems, rather than measures such as blood pressure and blood sugar are stronger predictors of survival, said Poon.

Personality also determined how well the centenarians reacted to life stress and change, and therefore whether they were as happy in their old age as they were when young. Healthy 100-year-olds had personalities described as open and conscientious. Neurotic personalities tended to be less healthy, the study found.

An individual confronted with a stressful situation can either find a quick emotional solution or ruminate on the problem, explained Poon. “One is very destructive in terms of general well-being,” he said, “and the other is very adaptive.”

Other research drawing from the Georgia Centenarian Study compared physical function of the elderly living in the community with those living in retirement facilities and found that physical activity decreased by approximately one-third when community residents moved to retirement facilities.

A decrease in physical activity accelerates a decline in health, explained Elaine Cress, professor in the Institute of Gerontology and lead author of a related study published in the current issue of the journal Gerontology.

“By understanding physical decline in functioning, caregivers can help maintain a high quality of life for the centenarian with appropriate support,” said Cress, who also is a faculty member in the department of kinesiology in the UGA College of Education. “We developed a scale to assess physical performance, which has not been done before with centenarians. This can be used in future research to predict when people are going to start needing more help. They need to know how to plan, and society needs to know how to plan, too.

Although still rare, centenarians are a growing segment of the population. Poon notes there were an estimated 50,454 in 2000, but the number is expected to rise to more than 800,000 by 2050, making accurate information about their well-being increasingly important.

Poon added that one phenomenon that occurs all over the world is that women live longer than men. In industrialized countries such as the U.S., France and Japan, five to six women reach 100 years for every man who does. Only Sardinia has a one-to-one ratio. At the opposite extreme, 13 South Korean women live to be 100 for every man.

“Our next phase is to go to four different countries where there are different gender survival ratios and see why they are the same, why they are different and what makes women live longer than men,” said Poon.

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The majority of Americans and Canadians are getting enough vitamin D and calcium to meet their needs, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. Most people up to age 70 need no more than 600 international units, or IUs, of vitamin D per day, and those 71 and older may need as much as 800 IUs, the report finds. The amount of calcium needed ranges, based on age, from 700 to 1,300 milligrams per day.

A large amount of evidence reviewed by the committee that wrote the report confirms the roles of calcium and vitamin D in promoting skeletal growth and maintenance and the amounts needed to avoid poor bone health. The committee also reviewed hundreds of studies and reports on other possible health effects of vitamin D, such as protection against cancer, heart disease, autoimmune diseases, and diabetes. While these studies point to possibilities that warrant further investigation, they have yielded conflicting and mixed results and do not offer the evidence needed to confirm that vitamin D has these effects.

Sunlight triggers the natural production of vitamin D in skin and contributes to people's vitamin D levels. Individuals' sun exposure varies greatly, however, so the committee assumed minimal exposure to establish the intake values. The new intake levels for vitamin D cover the needs of individuals who get little sun.

Getting too much calcium from dietary supplements has been associated with kidney stones, while excessive vitamin D can damage the kidneys and heart. Evidence about other possible risks associated with routine vitamin D supplementation is still tentative, but some signals suggest there are greater risks of death and chronic disease associated with long-term high vitamin D intake. The report also set upper intake levels, which represent the upper safe boundary rather than amounts people should strive to consume. The upper intake levels and the amounts people require based on age and gender are detailed at www.iom.edu/vitamind.

Confusion about the amount of vitamin D necessary to ward off deficiency has arisen in recent years as tests that measure blood levels have become common. The measurements of sufficiency and deficiency that laboratories use to report test results are not standardized and different labs use different cutpoints. There may be an overestimation of deficiency because many labs appear to be using cutpoints that are higher than the evidence indicates are appropriate.

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Walking may slow cognitive decline in adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and Alzheimer's disease, as well as in healthy adults, according to a study presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).

"We found that walking five miles per week protects the brain structure over 10 years in people with Alzheimer's and MCI, especially in areas of the brain's key memory and learning centers," said Cyrus Raji, Ph.D., from the Department of Radiology at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania. "We also found that these people had a slower decline in memory loss over five years."

Alzheimer's disease is an irreversible, progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and cognitive skills. According to the National Institute on Aging, between 2.4 million and 5.1 million Americans have Alzheimer's disease. Based on current population trends, that number is expected to increase significantly over the next decade.

In cases of MCI, a person has cognitive or memory problems exceeding typical age-related memory loss, but not yet as severe as those found in Alzheimer's disease. About half of the people with MCI progress to Alzheimer's disease.

"Because a cure for Alzheimer's is not yet a reality, we hope to find ways of alleviating disease progression or symptoms in people who are already cognitively impaired," Dr. Raji said.

For the ongoing 20-year study, Dr. Raji and colleagues analyzed the relationship between physical activity and brain structure in 426 people, including 299 healthy adults (mean age 78), and 127 cognitively impaired adults (mean age 81), including 83 adults with MCI and 44 adults with Alzheimer's dementia.

Patients were recruited from the Cardiovascular Health Study. The researchers monitored how far each of the patients walked in a week. After 10 years, all patients underwent 3-D MRI exams to identify changes in brain volume.

"Volume is a vital sign for the brain," Dr. Raji said. "When it decreases, that means brain cells are dying. But when it remains higher, brain health is being maintained."

In addition, patients were given the mini-mental state exam (MMSE) to track cognitive decline over five years. Physical activity levels were correlated with MRI and MMSE results. The analysis adjusted for age, gender, body fat composition, head size, education and other factors.

The findings showed across the board that greater amounts of physical activity were associated with greater brain volume. Cognitively impaired people needed to walk at least 58 city blocks, or approximately five miles, per week to maintain brain volume and slow cognitive decline. The healthy adults needed to walk at least 72 city blocks, or six miles, per week to maintain brain volume and significantly reduce their risk for cognitive decline.

Over five years, MMSE scores decreased by an average of five points in cognitively impaired patients who did not engage in a sufficient level of physical activity, compared with a decrease of only one point in patients who met the physical activity requirement.

"Alzheimer's is a devastating illness, and unfortunately, walking is not a cure," Dr. Raji said. "But walking can improve your brain's resistance to the disease and reduce memory loss over time."

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People at risk for osteoarthritis may be able to delay the onset of the disease or even prevent it with simple changes to their physical activity, according to a study presented today at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA).

"According to the results of our study, participating in a high-impact activity, such as running, more than one hour per day at least three times a week appears associated with more degenerated cartilage and potentially a higher risk for development of osteoarthritis," said the study's senior author Thomas M. Link, M.D., professor of radiology and chief of musculoskeletal imaging at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). "On the other hand, engaging in light exercise and refraining from frequent knee-bending activities may protect against the onset of the disease."

Osteoarthritis is a degenerative joint disease that causes pain, swelling and stiffness. According to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases, osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis and affects an estimated 27 million Americans over the age of 25.

For the study, the researchers recruited 132 asymptomatic participants at risk for knee osteoarthritis who were enrolled in the National Institutes of Health Osteoarthritis Initiative, as well as 33 age- and body mass index-matched controls. Study participants included 99 women and 66 men between the ages of 45 and 55. The participants were separated into three exercise and strength-training levels, based on their responses to the Physical Activity Scale for the Elderly (PASE) questionnaire. Exercise levels included sedentary, light exercisers and moderate to strenuous exercisers, strength-training groups included none, minimal and frequent. Knee-bending activities were also analyzed.

MRI exams revealed that light exercisers had the healthiest knee cartilage among all exercise levels, and patients with minimal strength training had healthier cartilage than patients with either no strength training or frequent strength training.

Moderate to strenuous exercise in women who did any amount of strength training was associated with higher water content and more degenerated collagen architecture in the knee.

"The results for this group indicate that moderate to strenuous exercise may accelerate cartilage degeneration, putting these women at even greater risk of developing osteoarthritis," said study coauthor Keegan K. Hovis, B.S., R.N., research associate in the Department of Radiology at UCSF.

In addition, the findings showed that frequent knee-bending activities, such as climbing up at least 10 flights of stairs a day, lifting objects weighing more than 25 pounds, or squatting, kneeling or deep knee bending for at least 30 minutes per day, were associated with higher water content and cartilage abnormalities.

According to Dr. Link, known risk factors for cartilage degeneration include excess weight, knee injuries, frequent knee bending and severe or strenuous physical activity.

"People can reduce their risk for osteoarthritis by maintaining a healthy weight and avoiding risky activities and strenuous exercise," he said. "Lower-impact sports, such as walking, swimming or using an elliptical trainer are likely more beneficial than high-impact sports, such as running or tennis."

"Our findings indicate that light exercise, particularly frequent walking, is a safer choice in maintaining healthy cartilage," Hovis added.

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With the emergence of an epidemic of obesity and type 2 diabetes (DM) throughout the world, the association of lifestyle habits that may affect the risk of metabolic diseases is especially important. Most prospective studies have shown that moderate drinkers tend to have about 30% lower risk of developing late onset diabetes than do non-drinkers, and moderate drinkers also tend to be at lower risk of developing metabolic syndrome (MS). A cross-sectional analysis of 6172 subjects age 35 -75 in Switzerland related varying levels of alcohol intake to the presence of DM, MS, and an index of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR).

Alcohol consumption was categorized as non-drinkers (0), low-risk (1󈝹 drinks a week), medium-to-high-risk (14󈞎) and very-high-risk (= 35) drinkers. 73% of participants consumed alcohol, 16% were medium-to-high-risk drinkers and 2% very-high risk drinkers

Study findings: In multivariate analysis, the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome, diabetes and mean HOMA-IR decreased with low-risk drinking and increased with high-risk drinking. Adjusted prevalence of the metabolic syndrome was 24% in non-drinkers, 19% in low-risk, 20% in medium-to-high-risk and 29% in very-high-risk drinkers. Adjusted prevalence of diabetes was 6.0% in non-drinkers, 3.6% in low-risk, 3.8% in medium-to-high-risk and 6.7% in very-high-risk drinkers. These relationships did not differ according to beverage types.

Moderate drinkers also had the lowest weight, tryglycerides, and blood pressure. All drinkers had higher HDL-cholesterol values (that is 'good cholesterol) than did non-drinkers.

Forum comments:

Metabolic syndrome is the name given to a so called 'lifestyle disease', where patients exhibit multiple medical problems including high blood pressure, late on set diabetes, and high cholesterol.

The strengths of this paper include being population-based and having a large number of subjects who reported that they consumed 14 or more drinks/week. Also, there was a good percentage (27%) of subjects reporting no alcohol intake during the one week of assessment used for classifying subjects. Another strength is the careful confirmation of drinking status with state-of-the-art laboratory tests. In multivariate analysis, the prevalence of the metabolic syndrome, diabetes and mean HOMA-IR decreased with low-risk drinking and increased with high-risk drinking. No differences were noted according to the type of beverage consumed.

This is a cross-sectional analysis, so a causative relation between alcohol intake and the metabolic outcomes cannot be assessed. Still, the data supports much that has been shown in prospective studies. Several Forum members commented on potential problems when considering a number of physiologic conditions as the "metabolic syndrome" and focusing therapy on the syndrome; they believed that each metabolic factor should be evaluated and treated singly.