Debbie Mandel's Wellness Newsletter

According to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center epidural analgesia is the most effective method of labor pain relief. In widespread use since the 1970s epidurals have long been thought to slow the second stage of labor defined as beginning when the cervix is completely dilated and ending when the baby is delivered. Because a longer duration of this stage of labor is associated with adverse outcomes, obstetricians routinely reduce or discontinue epidural pain management in an effort to expedite this main stage of labor. However, new research claims that epidurals do not slow labor.

The world's better countries with greater access to healthcare experience much higher rates of cancer incidence than the world’s worse off countries according to new research from the University of Adelaide. “Because of the quality of our healthcare in western society, we have almost removed natural selection as the janitor of the gene pool. Unfortunately the accumulation of genetic mutations over time and across multiple generations is like a delayed death sentence, Professor Henneberg says.

Daily exposure to bright white light at midday significantly decreased symptoms of depression and increased functioning in people with bipolar disorder a recent Northwestern Medicine study found.

Farsighted preschoolers and kindergartners have a harder time paying attention and that could put them at risk of slipping behind in school a new study from Ohio State University suggests.

For the first time researchers have evidence of exactly what dads are doing while moms are taking care of housework or tending to their child. The results will be disappointing for those who expected more gender equity in modern society. The study from Ohio State University found that three months after the birth of their first child, on days when couples were not working, men were most often relaxing while women did housework or child care. In contrast when men were taking care of the kids or working around the house, their partners were most often doing the same thing. One telling statistic: Women spent 46 to 49 minutes relaxing while men did child care or housework on their day off. But men spent about twice that amount of time in leisure about 101 minutes while their partners did some kind of work.

Researchers from the University of Alabama have shown for the first time that reduced dietary potassium promotes elevated aortic stiffness in a mouse model. Such arterial stiffness in humans is predictive of heart disease and death from heart disease and it represents an important nutritional need for dietary potassium as for example found in bananas.

Women who develop high blood pressure in their 40s may be more likely to develop dementia years later according to a study published in Neurology.