Dr. Howard Smith Reports

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/LNri2WQPAnQ   Cannabis users who also use alcohol are more likely to drink heavily and more frequently.   This is the conclusion from Penn State researchers who surveyed more than 1,000 subjects between the ages of 18 and 25 years about their use of alcohol, marijuana, and the two together.   Those who used the two drugs simultaneously, so-called SAM users, consumed nea...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/7PXOk2UMWz0   Sixty percent of children having their tonsils removed are prescribed opioids for 6 to 10 days following the surgery.   This fact comes from study by University of Michigan of nearly 16,000 children ages 1 to 18 years who underwent surgery from 2016 until 2018.   This prescribing pattern flies in the face of American Academy of Otolaryngology guidelines th...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/M8KGl6VRPSk   A whopping 48% of persons who are victims of the big four, domestic violence, sexual assault, depression, or suicidal thoughts refuse to reveal this fact and ask for help.   A collaborative study of some 4500 subjects questioned in two online surveys was just published in JAMA Open Network.   Digging deeper into the data, the investigators showed that 70%...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/j0AMNiPTals   One in every 14 persons over the age of 65 who undergoes even seemingly risk-free elective surgery may suffer a silent or covert stroke that can permanently impair their cognitive powers or worse.   This warning comes from a Canadian study just published in The Lancet.   Covert strokes are those without obvious symptoms including paralysis, weakness, speec...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/MatgZ2Jd0-U   Teens who have been bullied are 3 times more likely to have attempted suicide than those who have not be victimized.   This fact is true for adolescents around the world according to a recently published data analysis culled from more than 130,000 adolescents 12 through 15 years by the World Health Organizations Student Health Survey.   The risk of suicide...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/sSbGUgcsl68   As medical and recreational cannabis are increasingly legalized, poison control centers are fielding more calls from emergency rooms and desperate parents.   A report from UMass-Amherst just published in JAMA looks at the rise in calls following legalization of medical marijuana in Massachusetts.     Legalization of medicinal weed was followed by a 140% in...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/ByXQXvIfwRg   The obesity epidemic is triggering cancer in ever-younger Americans.   Epidemiologists from Case Western Reserve University studied cancers, both obesity-related and non-related, that were documented in the worldwide SEER18 database over the first 16 years of the 21 st century.   They focused on the age of the cancers at diagnosis.   The data included some...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/WaX8zsaB2Xg   Recovery from breast cancer surgery is challenging, and much work is needed to regain arm strength, shoulder mobility, and freedom from arm swelling.   A Spanish meta-analysis, just published in the European Journal of Cancer Care, shows that Nordic walking has a significant, positive impact on arm edema, physical fitness, disability, and patient optimism....

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/WRdLs2fhXtY Nearly 90% of American stroke victims with large blood vessel blockages receive less than optimal care.   That statistic is even worse for minority populations suggesting healthcare racism.   Mayo Clinic neurology researchers reviewed more than 200,000 admissions to some 173 medical centers over the most recent 2 year period.   Despite widespread professiona...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/4VSFYpvclCQ   A VR trip to far-off lands or a challenging VR adventure game may curb pain without the risks of medicine.   UCLA researchers proved that point by quantitating the pain of 120 hospital patients half of whom were randomized to use virtual reality headsets three times a day for a two day study period.   Those treated to the VR sessions recorded nearly 4 time...

Vidcast: https://youtu.be/V3eQcWkwLWY   Information technologists from Utah’s Brigham Young University have a simple answer: NOT YET!   They studied 274 adult subjects to determine how they interact with digital assistants versus humans.   The researchers conclude that adults consistently code switch adding please and thank you to their requests of other human beings despite their tendencies to ba...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/oPpEHSrCrLs   Ok...be honest.   How often during the day do you take a break from report writing or tedious calculations by picking up your cellphone?   Management scientists at New Jersey’s Rutgers Business School are just out with new data that shows such cellphone breaks do not refresh your brain but just the opposite.   The investigators presented each of   more tha...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/yZ2lRytD7kw   Going on alcoholic benders is bad news for your liver, but a new study from the University of Missouri-Columbia suggests that women’s livers may be particularly vulnerable to alcohol injury.   The researchers employed a rodent model and gave both female and male rats three large rounds of drinks at 12 hour intervals.   The females’ do   blood alcohol level...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/A5oZaWBaabk   Insomniacs have a genetic association with coronary artery disease, heart failure, and stroke.   This conclusion stems from a Swedish Karolinska Institute study of more than 1.3 million individuals whose genetic characteristics were found in publicly available databases.   The investigators employed an epidemiological method called Mendelian randomization...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/wMLmrsA4nfc   If your child is a mild asthmatic, you need only use inhalers when symptoms arise.   If you do, your child child will likely receive 74% less steroid medication and you’ll save a bundle of money.   This strategy comes from Washington University-St. Louis study just published in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology .   The researchers studied more...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/kj8WxgQ-ZS4   Thousands of young women are having unnecessary radiation exposure via mammograms prior to surgery to right-size their breasts.   A just published University of Michigan study of more than 52,000 women candidates for this surgery shows that one-third of them had mammography prior to the procedure.   The American Society of Plastic Surgeons stated 5 years a...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/eHlGf-j9ZaA   We know all about the dangers of second-hand smoke, those clouds of toxic fumes emanating from cigarettes, cigars, and pipe bowls.   Now a study from the University of Cincinatti and the Cincinatti Children’s Hospital hone in on the vapors that waft up from those yellow stains on walls, ceilings, carpets, upholstery and, yes, the fingers of smokers themsel...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/kj8WxgQ-ZS4   If you smoked or ate some weed over the weekend, will you flunk that pop drug test your boss springs on you Monday morning?   The answer depends on how much you consumed and the type of test you must take.   Either way, be forewarned that marijuana’s psychoactive agent, THC, is fat-soluble and definitely hangs around in your body longer than alcohol.   Smo...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/fTadT-9r9_k   Another goal for the #metoo movement is suggested by the latest study from Yale psychologists.   As research subjects observed a video of the very same child being subjected to the classic, old fashioned medical torture, the fingerstick, but identified as either Samuel or Samantha, the majority of observers, both men and women, believe that the girl Samant...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/ud9tvdV6Kus   School violence is on the rise but, surprise, it’s the bullies themselves who are most likely to be   seriously injured.   This the conclusion of a study by researchers at the University of Texas-Houston who studied of some 4300 5th, 7th, and 10th graders in Houston, LA, and Birmingham, Alabama.   In 5th grade, 17% of children sustained at least one violen...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/bZrgrEGpo-A   Women suffering preeclampsia during their pregnancies have a 30% higher risk of later stroke.   Columbia University neurologists studied 84,000 California teachers and found that low dose aspirin at least 3 times weekly virtually erases the greater risk of stroke for women before they reach the age of 60.   Once past 60, aspirin’s protective effect vanishe...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/WmKXvNLFi1Y   One or two hits of cannabis in any form does permanently affect the brain structure of young people.   New studies by University of Vermont psychiatrists looked at brain imaging for 46 teens experiencing cannabis for the first time and compared their brains with those of with non-users.   The data reveals greater gray matter volumes in cannabis-binding zon...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/x0ty9N1p3D4   Newborns and infants have very sensitive developing respiratory and gastrointestinal channels.   When parents have brought them to my pediatric ENT office, I found that their breathing issues were usually due to   airway irritation from refluxed feedings and dryness.   These observation became so common, that I began to offer 3 tips to every parent of a ne...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/50fbFNDy8bE   Repeated miscarriages, that is 3 pregnancy losses in a row each before 20 weeks of gestation, are usually thought to be due to maternal factors including uterine defects, infection, hormonal imbalances, and autoimmune disease.   A study from Imperial College, London, now suggests that flawed sperm may also play a key role in some miscarriages.   After anal...

Vidcast:   https://youtu.be/ANDsWahh5Ow   Metabolic syndrome is a nasty group of problems that might kill you but certainly will make your life miserable.   If you have any 3 of these 5 issues, namely central obesity or a body like a pear, high blood pressure, elevated blood sugar, high blood triglycerides, or low high density lipoproteins, then you’ve got metabolic syndrome.   Metabolic syndrome...