Harvard Health Content API

A drug used to treat impotence may also help people with a scarring lung disease, new research suggests. The study focused on sildenafil, the drug used in Viagra. But people in the study received a lower dose, sold under the brand name Revatio. The 180 men and women in the study had advanced pulmonary fibrosis. This disease causes scarring of the lungs that hinders breathing. It keeps getting worse, and there’s no good treatment. People were randomly divided into two groups. One group took sildenafil for 12 weeks. The other group received placebo (fake) pills. After 12 weeks, people in both groups were able to walk about the same distance in six minutes. But people in the sildenafil group did better in some measures of breathing ability. The New England Journal of Medicine published the study online. HealthDay News wrote about it May 18.

Newborn babies can learn simple things even while asleep, new research suggests. The study included 26 babies who were 1 or 2 days old. The experiment took place while they were sleeping. They were videotaped and hooked to a machine to record their brain activity. Researchers played a tone. Then a machine blew a faint puff of air at each baby’s eyelids. This made the babies squeeze their lids together tighter. The tone and puff were repeated. But on the 10th time the tone was played without the puff. This sequence was repeated over and over. After 20 minutes of this, most of the babies squeezed their eyes at the tone, even when there was no puff. The machine also showed changes in brain wave activity after the tone was played. The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published the study online. United Press International wrote about it May 17.

Postpartum depression can affect fathers, too, a new study has found. Researchers combined the data from 43 studies to reach this conclusion. They estimated that about 10% of fathers become depressed just before or after the birth of a child. This is about twice the rate for the overall male population. Depression occurred most often about 3 to 6 months after the birth. Fathers were more likely to be depressed if the mothers were depressed, too. Depressed dads were more common in the United States (14%) than in other countries studied (8%). The Journal of the American Medical Association published the study. Reuters Health news service wrote about it May 18.

Obese women who lose weight faster may lose more and keep the weight off just as well as those who lose more slowly, a new study finds. Researchers looked at data on 262 obese women who were in a study on weight loss. They were divided into three groups based on how quickly they lost weight. The fastest group lost 1.5 or more pounds a week. The slow group lost less than half a pound a week. The middle group lost in between these two amounts. After 6 months, average weight loss was 29.7 pounds for the fast group. It was 19.6 pounds for the moderate group and 11.2 pounds for the slow group. Follow-up on the study totaled 18 months. At this point, the fast group was 5 times as likely as the slow group to have lost 10% of body weight. Regaining weight was equally likely among the three groups. The International Journal of Behavioral Medicine published the study online.

Babies who are breastfed may be less likely to overeat later, a study suggests. The study included 1,250 infants. In the first 6 months of life, some were breastfed only and some were bottle-fed only. Others received both breast and bottle. By age 6 months, about 2 out of 3 babies were getting only formula. In each of the next 6 months, mothers were asked how often their babies emptied a whole bottle or cup of milk. About 27% of babies who had been breastfed exclusively in their first 6 months of life were draining their bottles as older babies. This compares with 68% of those who were bottle-fed from birth and 54% of those who received both breast and bottle. The pattern was the same even if those early bottle feedings contained expressed breast milk. Researchers said breastfeeding may help babies “self-regulate” food intake.

Addressing some common risk factors for heart disease saves lives, a study has found. The study focused on Ontario, Canada. This province had about 7,600 fewer deaths due to heart disease in 2005 than there were in 1994. About 48% of the reduction was linked with prevention of heart disease. This includes addressing risk factors, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol. Medicines for these conditions were a major part of the change. Another 43% of the difference was due to improved treatments for people who already had heart disease. The reduction in death rate was most dramatic for people ages 75 to 84. The study was published in the May 12 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation wrote about it May 11.

A group of popular heartburn drugs can cause more side effects than most people realize. That’s the overall finding of five new research articles. They appear in the May issue of the journal Archives of Internal Medicine. The studies focus on proton pump inhibitors. These drugs include omeprazole (Prilosec), esomeprazole (Nexium), lansoprazole (Prevacid) and others. They are mostly used to treat gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) and ulcers. But some prescriptions are not needed, an editorial in the issue says. New research in this issue outlines some risks. One study found that women who take these drugs after menopause are more likely to break bones. Taking them for at least five years raises the risk of infections caused by Clostridium difficile bacteria, another study found.