Mar 31st, 2023 - Anti-amyloid therapies for Alzheimer's disease accelerated brain atrophy, a systematic review and meta-analysis of MRI data showed. Across 31 clinical trials, brain volume changes were seen for different classes of anti-amyloid agents, reported Scott Ayton, PhD, of the University of Melbourne in Australia, and co-authors in Neurology. The analysis focused mainly on two types of anti-amyloid dru...

Mar 23rd, 2023 - The FDA reminded healthcare providers and patients on Thursday that several Exactech joint replacement devices packaged in defective bags should be closely monitored for device wear or failure. Many of the devices for knees, ankles, and hips -- which were manufactured by Exactech from 2004 to August 2021, and recalled in 2021 and 2022 -- were packaged in bags that were missing one of the oxygen...

Mar 21st, 2023 - Greater social support for older adults with depression helped boost verbal functioning, researchers reported. In a cross-sectional study, seniors with major depressive disorder tended to score higher on phonemic fluency -- measured by Controlled Oral Word Association Test (FAS) -- when they had higher levels of perceived social support, according to Nili Solomonov, PhD, of Weill Cornell Medici...

Mar 20th, 2023 - Physicians accepting payments from drug and device companies administered significantly more hyaluronic acid (HA) injections to Medicare beneficiaries for knee osteoarthritis, researchers found. Those receiving more than $100 in cash or other forms of remuneration were more than three times as likely to give HA injections under Medicare Part B than those receiving no payments (OR 3.28, 95% CI 2...

Mar 20th, 2023 - Postoperative delirium in older adults was associated with 40% faster cognitive decline, data from a prospective cohort study showed. Among older adults who developed delirium after major elective surgery, cognitive decline over 72 months occurred at a rate of 0.14 population standard deviation (SD) units per year, reported Zachary Kunicki, PhD, MS, MPH, of Brown University in Providence, Rhode...

Mar 16th, 2023 - The association between short sleep duration and subsequent incident peripheral artery disease (PAD) was clarified and supported by complementary analyses of various large cohorts. Based on a group of 50,000 Swedish adults, excess PAD risk was more likely in people sleeping less than 5 hours a day or 8 hours or more, a U-shaped relationship that was replicated in Million Veteran Program and U.K...

Mar 14th, 2023 - A majority of older adults undergoing surveillance colonoscopy were invited to return for a subsequent colonoscopy, even when no significant polyps were detected and they had a limited life expectancy, a study using Medicare claims data found. Of nearly 10,000 adults 65 and up undergoing surveillance colonoscopy due to a prior polyp, colonoscopy turned up colorectal cancer (CRC) in 0.2%, advanc...

Mar 13th, 2023 - Adults ages 40 to 69 with physical frailty or prefrailty were more likely to have subsequent Parkinson's disease, prospective data from the U.K. Biobank cohort showed. Over 12 years, frailty was tied to an 87% increased risk of Parkinson's compared with nonfrailty (HR 1.87, 95% CI 1.53-2.28), reported Liangkai Chen, PhD, of Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, China, and coll...

Mar 8th, 2023 - Healthy, plant-based dietary patterns were linked with less postmortem Alzheimer's disease pathology, primarily beta-amyloid load, in older adults. Both MIND diet scores (β -0.022, P=0.035; standardized beta -2.0) and Mediterranean diet scores (β -0.007, P=0.039; standardized beta -2.3) were significantly associated with lower global Alzheimer's pathology, reported Puja Agarwal, PhD, of Rush Un...

Mar 7th, 2023 - Perceived stress was linked with both prevalent and incident cognitive impairment in older adults, data from a national longitudinal cohort study showed. Elevated levels of perceived stress -- dichotomized as low versus high stress scores -- were associated with higher odds of poor cognition after adjusting for sociodemographic variables, cardiovascular risk factors, and depression (adjusted OR...

Mar 6th, 2023 - Hospital patients discharged after severe SARS-CoV-2 infection followed one of three cognitive trajectories, longitudinal data showed. Of 946 severe COVID patients age 50 and older with no previous dementia or memory complaints, 69.0% had no cognitive impairment 1 month after discharge, 20.3% had short-term impairment that resolved in a few months, and 10.7% had long-term impairment that persis...

Mar 3rd, 2023 - Adding another antidepressant to the mix was more helpful than switching agents in older adults with treatment-resistant depression, a two-step, open-label trial suggested. In the first step of the study which included 619 adults ages 60 and older, those who were randomly assigned to augment their existing antidepressant with aripiprazole (Abilify) saw a 4.83-point improvement in psychological ...

Mar 1st, 2023 - A panel of FDA’s outside advisors recommended the agency approve GSK’s respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine for older adults, a day after backing Pfizer’s RSV vaccine candidate for that same population. By votes of 12-0 on efficacy and 10-2 on safety, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) said the available data support GSK’s RSV prefusion F protein vacci...

Mar 1st, 2023 - Vitamin D supplements were linked with lower dementia incidence and longer dementia-free survival, prospective data showed. In a sample of 12,000 older adults, exposure to vitamin D supplementation was associated with a 40% lower dementia incidence rate compared with no exposure (adjusted HR 0.60, 95% CI 0.55-0.65), reported Zahinoor Ismail, MD, of the University of Calgary in Canada and the Un...

Feb 23rd, 2023 - High-intensity walking exercise helped chronic stroke patients regain walking capacity compared with more moderate training, a pilot randomized trial showed. While there was no significant difference between high-intensity interval training (HIIT) and moderate-intensity aerobic training in 6-minute walk test distance changes after 4 weeks (27 vs 12 m, P=0.28), the more vigorous training had gre...

Feb 22nd, 2023 - Implementing a frailty screening initiative before elective surgery was associated with more referrals of frail patients for additional evaluation and improved survival at 1 year, a quality improvement study showed. After controlling for confounding factors, there was a 22% reduction in the odds of mortality at 180 days post-surgery after an Epic Best Practice Alert (BPA) was implemented (OR 0....

Feb 21st, 2023 - Being and remaining physically active throughout adulthood was linked with higher cognition at age 69, a longitudinal cohort study showed. Effect sizes were similar across all adult ages, suggesting that being physically active at any time in adulthood -- even as little as once a month -- was tied to higher cognition, reported Sarah-Naomi James, PhD, of University College London, in the Journal...

Feb 20th, 2023 - Neurodegenerative pathologies have shown few differences over time despite falling dementia incidence rates, brain autopsy data suggested. In over 1,500 deceased people from birth epochs spanning 25 years (1905-1930), no significant differences in global Alzheimer's disease pathology or other neurodegenerative pathologies emerged over time, according to Francine Grodstein, ScD, of Rush Universi...

Feb 17th, 2023 - Older patients prescribed an atypical antipsychotic for hospitalization-related delirium more often stayed on it past the recommended duration than if prescribed a typical antipsychotic, researchers reported. Among nearly 6,000 patients 65 and older without prior psychiatric disorders, 13.5% were newly prescribed haloperidol and 86.5% initiated an atypical antipsychotic to treat delirium around...

Feb 16th, 2023 - Cognitive functioning improved 12 months after cochlear implantation for older adults with severe hearing loss and poor cognition, data from a single-center study showed. Among 21 cochlear implant candidates whose preoperative scores indicated mild cognitive impairment, overall cognitive scores improved 12 months after cochlear implant activation from a median percentile of 5 to 12 (difference ...