Generic Amaryl (Glimepiride) Information

Most Americans don’t eat the recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables, says a U.S. government study released Tuesday. And no state has achieved national objectives for consumption of fruits and vegetables, it found.

The goal for the Healthy People 2010 program is to get at least 75 percent of Americans to eat the recommended two or more daily servings of fruit and for at least 50 percent of Americans to consume three or more daily servings of vegetables.

But surveys from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that only 33 percent of adults meet the fruit consumption target and only 27 percent eat the recommended amount of vegetables. The statistics are worse for high school students — only 32 percent eat the recommended amount of fruit and 13 percent meet the goal for vegetables.

“A diet high in fruits and vegetables is important for optimal child growth, maintaining a healthy weight, and prevention of chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease and some cancers, all of which currently contribute to health care costs in the United States,” Dr. William H. Dietz, director of the CDC’s Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity and Obesity, said in a CDC news release.

“This report will help states determine what is taking place in their communities and schools and come up with ways to encourage people to eat more fruits and vegetables,” Dietz said.

The report — the State Indicator Report on Fruits and Vegetables, 2009 — is the first to detail state-by-state data about fruit and vegetable consumption and policies that may help boost fruit and vegetable consumption.

It spotlights three important policy and environmental areas associated with fruit and vegetable consumption: healthier food retail, availability of healthier foods in schools, and food system support.

Food stores that stock a variety of high-quality fruits and vegetables can play a key role in residents’ health, the report notes. But only eight states have a policy for healthier food retail improvements that can increase the number of full-service grocery stores in areas where they’re lacking, increase the availability of healthier foods in small food stores, and promote healthier foods by providing information to consumers in food stores.

Schools can influence better eating by students, staff, parents and other members of the community. But the report found that only 21 percent of U.S. middle schools and high schools offer fruits and non-fried vegetables in vending machines, school stores or snack bars. Fewer than half the states (21) have policies to support farm-to-school programs that can increase access to fruits and vegetables and teach students about nutrition and agriculture.

The report also mentioned food policy councils, which are organizations that look at access to fresh produce at the community and state levels. Food policy councils make recommendations about policies and programs such as community gardens, farmers’ markets, availability of fresh produce in supermarkets and farm-to-school programs. Currently, 59 local food policy councils operate across the United States, and 20 states have a state-level food policy council.

“We have seen the tremendous benefit of state and local officials, health professionals, employers, food store owners, farmers, school staff, and community members working together on food and nutrition issues,” CDC epidemiologist Heidi Michels Blanck said in the news release. “Their efforts can help to increase the availability of affordable healthier food choices such as fruits and vegetables.”

Some studies have suggested that strep throat may cause or trigger obsessive-compulsive disorder and Tourette syndrome, but extensive new research has found no evidence of a link.

“Streptococcal infection has previously also been linked to other, much rarer neuropsychiatric disorders,” Dr. Anette Schrag of the University College London and an author of the study said in a news release from the American Academy of Neurology. “These results do not confirm other, smaller studies done in the U.S. which found an association between strep infection and these brain disorders.”

The study involved 255 residents of the United Kingdom, 2 to 25 years old, including 129 who had obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and 126 with Tourette syndrome or tics, a symptom of that condition. The researchers compared incidents of strep throat infection in the 255 participants with that of 4,519 people who had neither condition.

Of those with OCD, about 15 percent had possible exposure to strep throat in the two years before they were diagnosed with their disorder; that was the case for 10 percent of those with Tourette syndrome. The rates were similar to those in the group without the conditions, the study found. The researchers found similar rates of strep infection five years before diagnosis as well.

This suggests, according to the researchers, that strep throat does not have a connection to either disorder.

Despite 14 years of public education campaigns, only one-third of Americans know about national recommendations for a minimum of 30 minutes of exercise a day, and fewer than half meet that goal, a new study has found.

The lack of awareness is greatest among men, the unemployed and people born in the United States, the researchers said. Their finding came from an analysis of data from 2,381 people who took part in the 2005 Health Information National Trends Survey.

One reason why efforts to spread the message about physical activity are having limited success is the “highly generalized, saturating effect of media in the current environment,” the authors wrote. “Through varied sources, many are bombarded with multiple physical activity and general health promotion ‘recommendations’ that may be challenging to differentiate.”

A report on the study is in the October issue of Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise.

Since 1995, the U.S. government and national organizations have used radio, TV, print publications and the Internet to make Americans aware they should be doing at least 30 minutes of moderate physical activity each day.

If more people followed the recommendations, it could help reduce rates of chronic health problems, said the study’s lead author, Gary Bennett, an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University.

“Physical activity is important for protecting against a large number of chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease, some cancer, diabetes, even some cognitive disorders,” Bennett said in a Duke news release. “So the physical activity recommendations are extremely important to help increase awareness among the American population about the amount of physical activity that is necessary to reduce the risk of developing these diseases,” he added.

“We’ve seen a lot of discussion about prevention in health-care reform debates over the last few months, and it’s becoming clear that increasing physical activity among Americans may, in the long run, reduce some of the major costs that burden our health-care system,” Bennett said.

Glimepiride is used to treat high blood sugar levels caused by a type of diabetes mellitus (sugar diabetes) called type 2 diabetes. In type 2 diabetes, your body does not work properly to store excess sugar and the sugar remains in your bloodstream. Chronic high blood sugar can lead to serious health problems in the future.

Proper diet is the first step in managing type 2 diabetes, but often medicines are needed to help your body. Glimepiride belongs to a class of drugs called sulfonylureas. It causes your pancreas to release more insulin into the blood stream. Glimepiride may be used alone, or in combination with insulin or another oral medicine such as metformin.

Glimepiride is available in the following dosage forms:
Tablet

Caffeine, known to help alleviate headaches, may cause them if consumed in large quantities.

That’s the finding of a study of more than 50,483 people who were questioned about caffeine intake and headache frequency as part of the 1995-1997 Nord-Trondelag Health Survey (HUNT 2) in Norway.

The study was published recently in the Journal of Headache Pain.

People who drank large amounts of caffeinated beverages each day had 18 percent more non-migraine headaches than those who drank few caffeinated beverages, according to researchers at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

High caffeine consumption was defined as more than 500 mg of caffeine daily, about what’s in five cups of coffee. Low caffeine consumption was about 125 mg per day, the study authors noted.

But although there was “no obvious reason,” the study also found that low caffeine consumption was associated with greater odds of having chronic headaches (headaches for at least 14 days each month).

Caffeine, the world’s most commonly consumed stimulant, is a common ingredient in headache analgesics, according to information in a news release about the study from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

But the research on how much caffeine is optimal for headaches is conflicting. Some studies have shown that high caffeine consumption increases the prevalence of headaches and migraines, while other studies have shown no connection.

Scandinavians consume about 400 milligrams of caffeine per day on average, or about four cups of coffee. That’s about twice the average caffeine intake in the United States and elsewhere in Europe, the new release states.

It’s unclear if the caffeine is causing the headaches or if people who tend to get headaches use caffeine to treat their pain, explained lead study author Knut Hagen.

Hagen recommended that people who get frequent headaches consider cutting back on their coffee consumption.

“People who suffer from headaches should be focused on their caffeine use, because it can be a cause of their headaches,” Hagen said in the news release.

A study in Taiwan has found that smokers are twice as likely to develop active tuberculosis compared to people who have never smoked, prompting calls for policymakers to be tougher on smoking.

The study tracked nearly 18,000 people in Taiwan representing a general population for more than three years.

“We found a two-fold increase in the risk of active TB in current smokers compared with never-smokers (those who have never smoked),” wrote the lead author Hsien-Ho Lin, a postdoctoral research fellow from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

One in three people in the world is infected with TB but 90 percent of these will remain latent infections. The remaining 10 percent will develop active TB and fall sick at some point in their lives because of weak immune systems. For example, many people who are infected with HIV/AIDS fall sick and die from TB.

Among the 17,699 participants in the Taiwan study, 3,893 were current smokers, 552 were former smokers and 13,254 had never smoked. There were 57 new cases of active TB by the end of the three-year study.

After factoring in considerations like sex, age, living in a crowded home, household income, marital status, alcohol use and employment, the researchers still found a higher risk of active TB among current smokers.

“Based on our analysis, 17 percent of incident TB cases in this population were attributable to smoking,” they wrote.

Smokers may have reduced ability to fight intruding viruses and bacteria, such as TB, in their lungs, the experts wrote.

“When these normal defense mechanisms are compromised, the development of TB might ensue upon exposure to the TB pathogen,” they wrote in a paper published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Addressing smoking would be key in any fight against TB.

“Based on results from ours and other studies, policymakers and public health personnel should consider addressing tobacco cessation as part of tuberculosis control,” Lin wrote.

TB is still a leading cause of death in the world. There were 9.3 million new cases of TB in 2007 and 1.8 million deaths.

The World Health Organization aims to bring the incidence of TB down to one case per million each year by 2050.

Dennis Yip, clinical assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong’s department of community medicine, said the study was significant given its huge sample size and monitoring over a long period — the gold standard of scientific studies.

“Previous studies have been much smaller. This is a Taiwan study but we have the same problem in China where smokers are getting younger. By the time they are 40, they would have smoked 25 years,” said Yip, who was not involved in the study.

While nightmares mostly affect children, even adults have an occasional bad dream.

Why do nightmares happen? The U.S. National Library of Medicine offers this list of possible causes:
-Being stressed or anxious, often resulting from a significant life event.
-Withdrawing too quickly from alcohol use, or drinking too much alcohol.
-Having a sleep disorder, such as narcolepsy.
-Being sick with a fever.
-Having a side effect or reaction to a drug.
-Eating too close to bedtime, which raises your metabolism and increases brain activity.