Oh $#*%! Cursing can reduce pain perception

Screaming a profanity when you suddenly experience acute pain—such as striking your head on an open cabinet door—is commonplace. But did you know that such an abrupt vocal outburst of four-letter words was actually beneficial to the unsuspecting victim? Such were the conclusions that researchers from the Keele University School of Psychology in Staffordshire, UK came to, after subjecting volunteers to painful stimuli under controlled laboratory conditions.

In a study published in NeuroReport, the researchers hypothesized that cursing would increase pain perception and decrease tolerance, since swearing had been assumed to be a maladaptive response. But instead, the researchers found that, "people withstood a moderately to strongly painful stimulus for significantly longer if they repeated a swear word rather than a non-swear word."

Participants were asked to name "five words you might use after hitting yourself on the thumb with a hammer," and were then told to use the first swear word on the list while submerging one hand in ice-cold water. As a control, participants were asked for "five words to describe a table," and then used the word that corresponded in order with the swear word. Males and females had a similar reduction in pain perception, with women experiencing somewhat greater pain reduction and increased heart rate while cursing.

Here’s an excerpt from the study for some background on the science of cursing:

Health Weekender: Mosquito madness—and how to fight bites

In my feverish rush to a friend’s barbecue last weekend, I forgot to pack the insect repellent. After 3 hours of chomping down on burgers and avocado dip, I found that something else was chomping down on me—pesky mosquitoes. Twelve mosquito bites later, I decided I’d had enough and headed home. Typically, I’d expect 5 or 6 mosquito bites, but twelve seemed a bit much—even for a warm July day. Why so many, I wondered? So, I did a bit of research.

Some are predicting one of the worse mosquito season we’ve seen in years. Here in the Northeast, we’ve had the second wettest June ever, and since mosquitoes need water to reproduce, rising temperatures and increased rainfall equal a spike in mosquito populations and a nuisance for humans.

Growth of the mosquito population also leads to the spread of mosquito-borne illness such as West Nile virus, dengue, and malaria. According to the American Mosquito Control Association (AMCA), over one million people worldwide die from mosquito-borne illnesses each year. A single mosquito bite can give you West Nile virus and since 1999, 29,000 people have contracted the virus and 1,100 have died. So far this year, the CDC has reported six human West Nile cases.

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Have you ever said "mosquitoes love me?" It’s more likely they love your odor. While many theories exist on why mosquitoes are more attracted to some and spare others, one way to start repelling mosquitoes is to wear light-colored, flowy clothing. According to Colorado Mosquito Control, mosquitoes are more attracted to darker colors because it captures heat and have a hard time biting you through looser-fitting clothing. And while odors from a human skin, fabric softeners, hair products, and perfumes can attract mosquitoes. Drinking beer and eating limburger cheese can attract mosquitoes—the latter may be why scientists think mosquitoes have an appetite for human feet.

Parents: Don’t rush to Adderall XR, Concerta, Strattera

Not all children diagnosed with ADHD need to take a drug. But if one is warranted, the choice may be difficult in light of very effective drug advertising and free drug samples provided by doctors. Most parents of course will do everything they can to get the best treatment for their child. But when it comes to drugs for ADHD, shelling out thousands of dollars a year on the brand-name drugs may not provide it.

According to our new Best Buy Drugs report, no one drug to treat ADHD symptoms has been proven to work better than any another. So, for most children and adults, the generics dextroamphetamine or methylphenidate are as safe and effective as the heavily-advertised, brand-name drugs like Adderall XR (an extended-release mix of amphetamine salts), Concerta (extended-release methylphenidate) or Strattera (atomoxetine) to treat ADHD symptoms. Plus, you could save roughly $3,000 a year or more with one of the generic Best Buy drugs, depending on the dosage.

So why would you give the well-known, branded drugs to your child? And why do doctors prescribe them?

One answer is clear: free drug samples.

Drug companies gave away nearly $16 billion in free drug samples in 2004, and doctors often hand these out to patients—and, in pediatric practices, to parents. In fact, according to a 2004 study, about one out of every 10 kids already taking a medication received a free drug sample. Contrary to popular belief, children from well-off families with drug plans receive the bulk of those samples, not the most-needy children.

Considering LASIK? Watch for our upcoming report

Given the buzz about LASIK eye surgery, it’s important to know what you can realistically expect—particularly the side effects—before you decide to go under the laser. Millions of Americans have had LASIK or other laser eye surgery to correct routine vision problems, most with good results. But some patients suffer side effects that impair the quality of their eyesight, even if visual acuity is improved. A Consumer Reports Health survey of 793 adult Americans who’ve had laser eye surgery since 2001 shows 80 percent reported being "highly satisfied" with the results. But 53 percent of respondents experienced at least one side effect, such as halos, light sensitivity, or blurry vision. And 22 percent still had problems six months after the surgery.

Still, laser eye surgery can be an effective measure for improving people’s vision. And it turns out the most common regret from those surveyed was not doing it sooner.

Are you or someone you know considering laser eye surgery? Check back next month for our essential guide to help you understand if you’re a good candidate or if you should steer clear, plus tips for choosing a surgeon and ways to get the best price.

—Ginger Skinner

Take a walk to prevent deep vein thrombosis

If you’re flying to your next vacation spot this summer—taking a walk during your flight could save your life. A new study released in today’s Annals of Internal Medicine suggests a heightened risk of deep vein thrombosis (DVT) during long-distance travel. DVT happens when a vein your leg gets partly or completely blocked by a blood clot, which can lead to swelling, pain, a pulmonary embolism, or death.

Sitting or lying for long periods, like as on a long flight, can cause DVT. However, you’re at a higher risk if you’re older, overweight, or have cancer, problems with clotting, or varicose veins. Pregnant women and women taking birth control pills are also vulnerable to DVT.

Seek medical attention immediately if you experience DVT symptoms—the main symptom is a swollen, painful leg. If you’re traveling on an airplane, notify the airline staff. To prevent DVT while traveling, experts recommend you:

Could heartburn drugs cause "rebound" symptoms?

My husband may not always remember to take his multivitamin, but he never forgets his omeprazole. This is a type of medication called a proton pump inhibitor (PPI), and he takes it daily to keep his heartburn from flaring up. But could his dedication to this medicine actually be rooted in a drug dependency? A new study suggests this may be the case for some PPI users, showing that these drugs may cause heartburn and other "rebound" symptoms when people stop taking them.

The study, which involved 120 healthy volunteers, found that those who took a PPI called esomeprazole for eight weeks were more likely to develop heartburn, indigestion, and similar symptoms in the weeks after they stopped taking the drug. Overall, 44 percent of people who took the PPI reported at least one acid-related symptom within four weeks of stopping, compared with 15 percent of volunteers who took an inactive treatment (a placebo). The symptoms caused mild-to-moderate discomfort, and most people got them within two weeks.

If PPIs cause rebound symptoms once stopped, this could lead to people becoming dependent on them, say the researchers. To put it another way, if people get heartburn or related symptoms when they stop taking a PPI, they may think they still need the drug and continue the treatment unnecessarily.

Antibiotics for an ear infection lead to... more ear infections

In a survey done nearly 10 years ago, half of all pediatricians said they were regularly pressured by children's parents to prescribe unnecessary antibiotics. What's more, a third said they sometimes caved, writing scripts simply because of parental demands.

It would be interesting to know if things have changed. Doubtless parents still want the best for their children, but there's been plenty of publicity about dangerous, hard-to-treat infections caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and how these dangerous strains are created partly by overuse of antibiotics.

There have also been many attempts to explain to the public that antibiotics are often of limited use for everyday illnesses, have side effects, and contribute to the wider problem of treatment-resistant infections.

New research published in the BMJ gives even more reasons to be cautious about giving antibiotics to children. In the study, 168 children had been randomly given antibiotics or a placebo for an ear infection. Three years later, the researchers asked the children's parents how many more ear infections the children had suffered.

French fries—minus a little guilt

French fries are an American fast-food favorite, but they catch a lot of flack—too much fat, too much salt, not to mention too many calories. But now that Burger King, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s have cut the trans fats from their fries, you can enjoy them with a little less guilt. Our taste testers recently tried the new trans-fat free fries from the three fast-food restaurants, and found some good news: they all taste about the same as they used to. Take a look at the french-fry face-off results.

Of course, you’ll want to keep your health in mind—these fries are still considerably high in fat and calories. A medium-sized order of McDonald’s fries comes in at 380 calories and 19 grams of fat, Wendy’s has 430 calories and 20 grams of fat, and Burger King topped out at a whopping 480 calories and 23 grams of fat. A high intake of saturated fat can lead to obesity and high cholesterol—precursors for heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and stroke.

So what’s the skinny? Keep french-fry runs to a minimum, particularly if you’re already at risk.

—Ginger Skinner

FDA warns of dangerous side effects of smoking cessation drugs

The Food and Drug Administration today said smoking cessation drugs varenicline (Chantix) and bupropion (Zyban and generics) must now carry a "black box" warning that they can increase the risk of psychological side effects. These include unusual changes in behavior, hostility, agitation, depressed mood, suicidal thoughts, and attempted suicide.

People who are taking Chantix or Zyban and "experience any serious and unusual changes in mood or behavior or who feel like hurting themselves or someone else should stop taking the medicine and call their health-care professional right away," the FDA says. Additionally, if friends and family members notice these behavioral changes, they should counsel the person to stop taking the drug and call his or her doctor.

The FDA said it detected the increased risk for the side effects from reviewing reports of adverse events associated with the drugs.

The news about Chantix is not surprising. We first reported on potential serious side effects from Chantix, including aggressive behavior and suicide, more than a year ago. Bupropion was originally approved as an antidepressant (Wellbutrin and generic), and there have been some concerns about potential risks from that drug. But FDA officials said they included bupropion in the review, along with nicotine replacement therapies, to determine if reports of adverse events for Chantix were unusually high.

FDA panel calls for crackdown on acetaminophen

The dangers of the painkiller acetaminophen, which include liver damage and death from overdosing, have long been a concern, and Tuesday, a Food and Drug Administration advisory committee recommended the agency take strong action to protect the public, including banning widely used prescription pain drugs, such as Percocet and Vicodin, that combine acetaminophen with a narcotic opioid.

Acetaminophen is hard to avoid because it’s in so many products, from Percocet and Vicodin to hundreds of over-the-counter medicines, such as cough syrups and the pain relievers Excedrin and Tylenol. And that makes it dangerous, because people who are taking a few of these drugs at the same time can unwittingly take too much acetaminophen, which can lead to liver damage and even death.

Among the advisory panel’s other recommendations were that the highest allowed dose of acetaminophen in over-the-counter pills be reduced from its current level of 500 mg to 325 mg and that the maximum daily dosage be dropped to less than 4,000 mg. The panel also recommended that acetaminophen products contain a black box warning about the risk of liver damage, the most serious warning the FDA bestows.

Cigarette use down—but nicotine dependence holds steady

One image in particular sticks in my mind from my husband's days as a heavy smoker—him, huddled under the eaves at our back door, smoking an Old Gold cigarette as sheets of rain poured down. I remember thinking "He can't be enjoying that," and indeed he wasn't. But his need for a cigarette fix at that moment was stronger than any consideration for bodily comfort, so powerful is the sway of nicotine addiction.

Like President Obama and many other smokers, my husband struggled to give up his nicotine habit. He finally succeeded (10 years ago and counting), but quitting remains an elusive goal for many, despite public-awareness campaigns on the health risks of smoking, heavy taxation of cigarettes, and restrictions on smoking in public places. True, the number of smokers has dropped in recent decades with the help of such public health initiatives. But a new study finds that the ranks of heavy smokers has actually remained steady, suggesting that other approaches are necessary to help these smokers kick the habit.

Unlike previous research on smoking, the new study sought to separate occasional smokers from those with a true nicotine dependence. The researchers gathered information from a survey* of more than 40,000 adults on alcoholism and related conditions and addictions. As part of the survey, participants were asked questions about smoking, including more than 40 to gauge nicotine dependence.

Shattering the myths about health reform

In a USA Today editorial today, Steven Findlay, senior health policy analyst at Consumers Union, sheds some light on the myths about health-care reform, many of which have frightened Americans. In it he debunks the notion that our system is headed toward socialized, government-run medicine with a side of rationed care:

"Cookbook and rationed care? This fear stems from concerns that the government aims to dictate what doctors do and cut costs by limiting access to care. These notions are wrong. Rather, what [President] Obama and both Democratic and Republican leaders want to do is aggressively measure the quality of care that doctors and hospitals deliver and change the way those providers get paid so quality of care—rather than quantity—is rewarded. That's hardly a socialistic notion."

So what must be done to fix the system? Findlay urges creative thinking and proposes that the medical industry be challenged to cut costs and change its "General Motors gas-guzzler mindset" by reducing waste and inventing more efficient systems.

U.S. seniors have better memories than English counterparts

Everyone worries about memory problems as they get older. But U.S. seniors may have less reason to worry than their peers in England—they do a whole lot better on a standard memory test.

Several thousand people over the age of 65 were given the test, in both countries. The test consisted of listening to a list of 10 common words, then repeating them back immediately and again after 5 minutes.

The Americans did far better on the delayed memory test than the English. Researchers said the difference was what you'd normally expect to see over the course of a decade—so Americans age 75 had the memory of English people age 65.

The point of the study wasn't just to crow, however. The researchers are looking hard at the rest of the data from the surveys to try to spot the causes for the difference.

So far, they've found that American seniors were on average wealthier, and had more years of education, than English seniors. That accounted for some of the difference, because wealth and education usually coincide with less of a decline in memory with age. English seniors were more likely to report symptoms of depression, which can affect memory. Another study suggested that depressed older people in the United Kingdom were less likely to be treated with antidepressants than they would be in the U.S.

Commuting can pose a hazard to your hearing

If you’ve ever ridden a subway, particularly New York’s aged system, you’ve probably experienced the ear-splitting shrieks as the train takes a fast turn or screeches to a halt. Those sounds are more than just annoying; they can actually contribute to hearing loss, according to a new study published in the August edition of the American Journal of Public Health.

Researchers took sound level readings while waiting for and riding buses, trains, subways and ferries in the New York metro area, and found that subways were the loudest. But they also found that all commuter systems were loud enough to cause noise-induced hearing loss in some riders, given sufficient length of exposure.

How long? The actual risk varies from person to person. But according to the researchers the highest maximum sound level of 102 decibels, recorded at a subway platform, could cause hearing loss over time for some people within just two minutes a day—based on guidelines from the Environmental Protection Agency. The average sound level for the entire New York subway system of 80.4 decibels could cause hearing loss if regular exposure exceeds about an hour and 40 minutes a day, or just 18 minutes per day on some of the noisiest platforms averaging 90.2 decibels.

And with iPods and cell phones now ubiquitous, subways themselves may not be the only in-transit exposure. "Imagine someone on a subway who is getting 80 decibels of exposure in the car," explains Rick Neitzel, a research scientist at the University of Washington in Seattle and one of the study’s lead investigators. "Most people would turn their MP3 player up at least a few decibels above the background noise, if not five or six. So now their exposure isn’t 80, it’s 86. And when we start getting up to sustained levels in the mid-80s that’s a concern because your recommended daily exposure duration is pretty short at those levels—less than an hour based on recommendations from the EPA."

Q&A: Are refined carbohydrates linked to cancer?

Is it true that eating white flour and sugar fuels cancer growth? —B.T., El Macero, Calif.

It’s unclear. Many population studies have examined the possible link between the intake of refined (white) carbohydrates such as flour and sugar and various types of cancer, with mixed results. The largest review we could find, involving 39 studies, found an association between refined-carb intake and colorectal and endometrial cancer, but not breast or pancreatic cancer. But a smaller review of 23 studies found no increased risk of colorectal cancer.

Regardless of any possible cancer risk, there are other good reasons to limit your intake of refined carbs: They provide plenty of calories and have little nutritional value. Instead choose healthful, complex carbohydrates such as whole grains, brown rice, and vegetables.

Find out why successful dieters recommend restricting refined carbs.