Category: harvardhealth_news_UNDEFINED

The COVID-19 vaccine is recommended for people with a history of heart attack.

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are different, though they can have similar symptoms. IBS symptoms seem to arise from hypersensitive nerves and abnormal muscle contractions in the digestive tract, while IBD results from a problem with the immune system causing inflammation.

Some fermented foods contain probiotics, beneficial microorganisms that can live in your intestines. These microorganisms help you stay healthy, potentially improving your immune function and reducing damaging inflammation. Eating prebiotics—high-fiber foods that are a source of nutrition for these healthful microorganisms—is essential to help these beneficial microorganisms grow and thrive.

Your eyes undergo natural changes that affect your vision as you age, but you are also more likely to develop eye diseases that may threaten your vision. These include age-related macular degeneration and glaucoma. Women are more likely than men to develop age-related eye diseases, partially because they live longer. Getting regular vision care and following a healthy lifestyle can help ensure that your vision remains intact.

Medical errors are less common than they used to be, but they still happen. Medication errors are particularly problematic. Being knowledgeable about medications, asking questions, and speaking up when something doesn’t sound right can help prevent many of these mistakes.

Lifestyle changes, such as 30 minutes of daily exercise, a healthy diet, and maintaining a normal body weight, may help to prevent symptoms related to gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD).

A study published Jan. 14, 2021, in TheNew England Journal of Medicine found that a combination drug therapy may provide some hope in helping people with methamphetamine use disorder.

A new study found women who reported using marijuana had more difficulty getting pregnant than women who didn’t use it.

Falls cause many serious and sometimes fatal injuries. For example: fractures can cause people to become temporarily or permanently disabled; long periods recuperating in bed can lead to pneumonia; and head injuries can trigger bleeding in the space between the skull and the brain. People who fall and are unable to move for hours may develop a potentially life-threatening breakdown of muscle tissue that can cause kidney failure. With so much at stake, it’s crucial to do everything possible to avoid falls, such as addressing underlying conditions that cause imbalance.

An mRNA vaccine is a new approach to vaccination. It induces human immune cells to make the same protein that’s on the surface of a virus, which then educates the immune system to attack the virus. In the case of the COVID-19 vaccine, the mRNA gets cells to produce the spike protein that’s on the virus. An mRNA vaccine may also have the potential to treat other conditions, such as cancer. There has already been some success in treating melanoma with an mRNA vaccine.