Kidney Disease Often Unreported in Blacks Kidney disease, which is four times higher among Black Americans than White Americans, often goes undetected until the latest stages, according to new research. In a study that included more than 3,400 Black Americans who were interviewed and given physical examinations, about one in five were found to have chronic kidney disease, but fewer than one in six knew they had the condition. “Much of the problem of patient awareness is due to a lack of awareness of the medical practitioners,” study lead author Dr. Michael F. Flessner said in a National Kidney Foundation news release. “Most physicians were trained in an era in which serum creatinine (a measure of kidney function) was used as an absolute indicator of kidney disease.” Currently, early stages of kidney disease are diagnosed when protein is detected in the urine, and later stages of the disease are diagnosed by reductions in the glomerular filtration rate, a measure of how well the kidneys are filtering out waste products. “It is imperative that new approaches be implemented to increase awareness, diagnosis and treatment — for both the health-care provider and the patient,” the researchers said. Their findings are published in the February issue of the American Journal of Kidney Diseases.

Seven salmonella cases in Maryland have been tied to a nationwide outbreak of the disease that has infected 400 people and killed one, according to the state health department. The cases have the same DNA “fingerprint” as other cases in the outbreak that has struck 42 states, said Health Department spokeswoman Karen Black.  No deaths in Maryland have been attributed to the outbreak. However, federal health officials say the strain involved in the outbreak has hospitalized about one in five.

Government doctors fight staph infection.

Just as NBA Star Grant Hill rallies others who have experience with the flesh-eating staph infection known as MRSA, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention launched a campaign to make parents more aware of the dangerous and potentially deadly effects of methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The government campaign hopes to get parents to identify, prevent and combat the infection. Often mistaken for a spider bite as the symptoms, MRSA also causes painful, red, swollen areas on skin that sometimes ooz puss, experts say. MRSA infection begins as a bump or infected area on the skin, is warm to touch and maybe accompanied by fever. It is contracted when someone touches an infected area or shares a personal item with someone who is already infected. Athletes are more prone to this infection, but it is also common at hospitals. To prevent the disease, the CDC advises frequent hand-washing, no sharing of personal items such as towels and to keep any wound or cut clean and bandaged. Early detection is always advisable as the infection at a later stage becomes difficult to treat. As part of the awareness campaign, the CDC hopes to develop Web sites, brochures, fact sheets, posters, radio and print public services, Web banners and mom-blogging sites. To find out more about Hill’s personal experience with the deadly staff infection and the Stop MRSA Now campaign go to BET.com/Body & Soul.  

Study: Fast-Food Ads Target Blacks.   A higher exposure to fast-food ads and marketing of other fatty foods is in part to blame for why overweight and obesity rates are such a bigger problem for African Americans (68.9 percent) than for Whites (59.5 percent), says the numbers crunched by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Read more at BET.com’s Body & Soul.
 

Blacks with lung disease have twice the cancer risk. Blacks with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease – including chronic bronchitis and some types of serious chronic asthma – have twice the risk of developing lung cancer than Whites with the condition, according to a study published in the journal Cancer Prevention Research, Reuters reports. For the study, lead researcher Carol Etzel of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center and colleagues developed a risk assessment model to help predict Blacks’ risk for lung cancer. Researchers analyzed data on 491 Blacks with lung cancer and 497 Blacks without the disease and compared those numbers against models that measured the disease in Whites. Researchers said the model will help doctors better predict lung cancer risk. The new model found that Black men with a history of chronic lung disease, often called COPD, had a more than a six-fold increased risk of developing lung cancer, which is about the same risk for those who smoke. According to Reuters, both Black and White smokers have a risk of lung cancer six times higher than that of non-smokers. Smoking is the leading cause of COPD, but pollution, and other environmental factors also play a role, Reuters reports. “What we hope is that a doctor can use these models to encourage their patients to take steps to prevent lung cancer,” Dr. Ezel says. “Even if they are never smokers, they can be at risk.”

Smoking causes more cancers than once thought  It is known that tobacco-smoking leads to serious health complications. Smoking is a major risk factor for cancer. But a new report by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) links smoking to more cancers than most people realize. Get the details at BET.com/Body & Soul.

Infamous Klansman will rally troops in civil rights capital

Renowned ex-Klansman David Duke is uniting his troops in Memphis, the home of the National Civil Rights Museum. Duke, the Louisiana White supremacist politician who came a stone’s throw from landing in the U.S. Senate, has announced his Euro-International Conference to be held in the historic city on Nov. 8. But it is unclear exactly where the event will be held, according to Kevin Kane, an official with the convention and visitors bureau. At the convention, Duke will address the presidential election. “We will assemble to say clearly that neither Black radical, Barrack Obama, nor Mr. Amnesty, John McCain, truly represent the will of the American people,” says Duke, who left the Democratic Party several years ago to join the Republican ranks. Before his run for the Senate in 1990, Duke left the KKK – officially – and he formed the National Association for the Advancement of White People, NAAWP. He says he didn’t pick Memphis because it is the infamous site of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. or the home of the National Civil Rights Museum, but because it is the most centrally located cities in the United States.

Police seek noose planter at Texas University. Police want to know who put a noose on the chair of the student body president at Abilene Christian University last week. When Daniel Paul Watkins, and African-American senior political science major, returned to his office on Wednesday, somebody had put the racially insensitive symbol there. University President Royce Money said the action is nothing short of a hate crime and campus cops are working to solve the case. Only about 13 percent of the student body at Abilene Christian, a campus of 4,700 students, is Black.

Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

Many youths tried as adults suffer from mental disorders.
Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Most of the students needed more information about testing.
Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

Many youths tried as adults suffer from mental disorders.
Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago, reports HealthDay. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Most of the students needed more information about testing.
Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

National Urban League and Walgreens provides free health screenings. In an effort to promote early detection and raise awareness of preventable diseases in urban communities, the National Urban League and Walgreens have partnered to launch a nationwide, educational health screening bus tour. The tour will encourage consumers to act as their own health advocates by visiting the wellness bus when it visits New Orleans August 28-30. The National Urban League and Walgreens Wellness Tour will continue will raise awareness of various health issues and encourage individuals to seek the appropriate resources by providing free health screenings in 27 urban communities across the U.S. as part of a 12-month mobile health campaign. the 38-foot customized bus features five free screenings, including blood pressure, bone density, glucose levels, cholesterol levels and body mass index which total more than $100 in value. “Walgreen is delighted to partner with the National Urban League to provide resources that will empower Americans in urban communities to live healthier lives,” said Mark Wagner, executive vice president of store operations for Walgreen Co. “Many diseases can be detected through screenings long before any symptoms are noticed, which is why we are bringing this valuable service to residents of New Orleans.” People in urban communities, particularly minorities, experience disproportionately higher rates of preventable disease. “The National Urban League is pleased to offer these screenings and health information to people who otherwise may not have had access to these basic health resources,” said Marc H. Morial, NUL president and CEO. “We are excited to be taking this tour to major cities across the country , such as Chicago, New York and Miami.” The National Urban League’s State of Black America 2006 reports that Blacks are impacted by higher rates of obesity, substance abuse and diabetes.

Married folks are the healthiest. People who’ve exchanged wedding vows tend to be healthier than their single, divorced or widowed peers, but new research shows that health gap may be narrowing, reports HealthDay News. Interviews with today’s never-married men suggest they are healthier than never-married guys were three decades ago, researchers say. And that’s helping single males gain some ground, in terms of their health, compared to married people. “One of the most-often documented facts is that married people are healthier than non-married people, but the difference between married and unmarried people has changed over the past few decades,” said the study’s lead author, Hui Liu, an assistant professor and sociologist at Michigan State University in East Lansing. Liu said there are two theories as to why married people report better health. One is that being married gives you more access to social support and economic resources. The other is that being divorced or widowed hurts health. “In general, marriage tends to make people healthier, happier and richer, and that’s especially true for men,” Scott Wetzler, vice chairman of psychiatry and behavioral science, and head of the “Supporting Healthy Marriage” program at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City told HealthDay.

Some overweight people can be healthy.

Some obese individuals do not appear to have an increased risk of heart disease, while some normal-weight individuals experience a variety of heart risks, according to two reports in the August 11 Issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, a JAMA/Archives journal. “The prevalence of obesity is increasing worldwide, and this epidemic is accompanied by a high incidence of type 2 diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular disease,” the authors write as background information in one of the articles. But research shows that in addition to overall obesity, the way body fat is distributed may decide whether a person is at risk of heart disease and diabetes. For instance, individuals with fat around the tummy — estimated by measuring waist size —appear to be at higher risk for insulin resistance (a pre-diabetic condition that occurs when the body fails to respond to the hormone insulin) and for having an unhealthy cardiovascular risk profile. In one study, individuals in the obese–insulin sensitive group did not differ from the normal-weight group in insulin sensitivity or artery wall thickness, the authors note. “In conclusion, we provide evidence that a metabolically benign obesity can be identified and that it may protect from insulin resistance and atherosclerosis,” Norbert Stefan, M.D., and colleagues at the University of Tübingen, Germany, wrote about their study of 314 individuals age 18 to 69 (average age 45). The second study found that among U.S. adults 20 years and older, 23.5 percent (about 12 million adults) of normal weight had abnormal metabolisms, while 51 percent (about 36 million adults) who were overweight and 31.7 percent who were considered obese had healthy metabolisms. The average weight of individuals with slow metabolisms tended to be older, less physically active and had large weights. Bottom line, waist size had more to do with whether a person had an increased risk for heart disease or diabetes than their actual weight, the studies show.

Sickle cell is on the rise in some communities. Once thought of as a disease that affects only Black Americans, sickle-cell anemia and related blood diseases can also be traced to countries as diverse as Burma, Greece, Saudi Arabia, Spain and the Philippines. Globalization and mixed marriages mean more people are at risk than ever before. Last year, Neighborhood Health Clinics tested 400 Burmese refugees for inherited blood disorders, and another 800 are expected to be tested this year, said Belinda Dean, director of the clinics’ sickle-cell program. About 5 percent have tested positive this year for an inherited disease called hemoglobin E, less serious than sickle cell. “I’ve had people come in here who have a child that tests positive … and they say, ‘There is no way I could be a carrier,’ ” Dean said. “They may not know everything about their ancestry. They may not realize that someone in the family was from Africa or the Mediterranean or Southeast Asia.” About 2 million Americans, including one in 12 Blacks, carry the sickle cell trait, according to the federal National Institutes of Health. For a carrier, there are no or few symptoms, but a child born to two parents with the trait has a one in four chance of developing sickle cell disease. If one parent has the trait and the other doesn’t, all the children will have the trait. If one parent has sickle-cell anemia and the other has the trait, each child born to the couple has a 50 percent chance of having the trait or the disease. Perhaps the silver lining in the increase of people at risk for the trait or the disease is that more funding for sickle-cell research and related diseases could become available. Research using skin stem cells to cure mice with sickle-cell anemia has shown promise, as have bone marrow transplants. Earlier this year, the National Institutes of Health committed to improving and restructuring its sickle-cell research program.

Blacks are most likely to be victimized because of their race

While most crimes went down dramatically over the past half-decade, those committed against people because they happen to be Black, White, Latino, Jewish, Asian or gay skyrocketed over that period, according to a recent report. reports. The Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission annual report shows that hate crimes rose by 28 percent, to 763 offenses, with hate-related vandalism leading the way, The Los Angeles Times. The spike in hate crimes is what Robin Toma, executive director of the Human Relations Commission, describes as an alarming trend. The most victimized have been Blacks, at the hands of Latino suspects, the report shows. Next, Latinos have been victimized at the hands of Black suspects. “Latinos also made up the largest number of suspects in hate crimes based on sexual orientation. Whites were the leading suspects in religion-based incidents,” the Times reports. “Overall, Blacks made up nearly half the hate crime victims, totaling 310.”

Judge resigns after calling crack a “Black man’s disease”

A White South Carolina judge who said that being addicted to crack cocaine is a “Black man’s disease” was forced to resign following a reprimand by the state Supreme Court. George Peter Lamb, former Beaufort County magistrate, had engaged in a series of actions deemed inappropriate by the Supreme Court, including his behavior toward women workers and his incorrect admonishment to a defendant about the penalty he could face if convicted. When the justices publicly reprimanded Lamb, they said it was the most severe penalty they could mete out, because Lamb already had stepped down. He also agreed not to seek any other judicial position within the state without permission from the high court.

Award-winning singing preacher is about to get a promotion

After 14 years of pastoring one of the fastest growing churches in New York City and in Bensalem, Pa., the Rev. Hezekiah Walker is about to add bishop to his resume. The 45-year-old singer and pastor will be named bishop in the Pentecostal church on Aug. 3, in Atlanta , in recognition of his work among young people and for starting new churches – five in the U.S. , and one in Cape Town , South Africa . “This is a very great honor,” said Walker, 45, founder of the Love Fellowship Tabernacle in East New York , and host of “Afternoon Praise” on WLIB-AM.

Blacks are underrepresented in cancer studies
Across Maryland, minorities and residents of rural areas are under-represented in cancer trials, according to a new study from University of Maryland researchers. And the study found that rates of participation among African Americans are dropping, reflecting a nationwide trend. “Everyone should have an equal chance of participating in a trial. That does not happen,” said Shiraz I. Mishra, an associate professor at the School of Medicine and one of the study’s authors. It’s no secret that some drugs respond better in certain racial groups. Such is the case with some new types of heart disease drugs, researchers have found. However, without minority participation in medical trials, there is no guarantee that new medicines and therapies being developed to treat cancer will work with Blacks or other ethnic groups, researchers say. The Maryland study, which appears in the current Journal of Clinical Oncology, made its findings after looking at 2,240 Maryland cancer patients enrolled in National Cancer Institute-sponsored clinical trials from 1999 to 2002 What they found is that cancer patient participation from rural counties was underrepresented. Participation from counties heavily populated by African Americans, such as Baltimore City and Prince George’s County, was also lower than the researchers anticipated. African-American patients have less access to care overall and so are less likely to end up in a study. Over the course of the study, participation among African Americans decreased from 24 percent to 18 percent of the cancer trial patients in Maryland. One reason may be that many cancer trials exclude patients with diseases other than cancer. Baquet said African Americans are more likely than Whites to have multiple ailments, such as diabetes and high blood pressure.

Is stress and the couch-potato effect killing Black Americans?
Vital Signs: Stress, unequal treatment in the U.S. healthcare system and stagnant lifestyles are killing Black Americans, various health professionals told an audience at the NAACP on Saturday. What are the solutions? Vital Signs has the answers.

South African court rules that AIDS patients deserve betterA South African court has barred a team of scientists and doctors, including a former adviser to President Thabo Mbeki, from doing their own clinical trials to treat AIDS with vitamins. German doctor Matthias Rath and American biochemist David Rasnick, who used to sit on Mbeki’s AIDS advisory council, were among 12 people accused in the Cape high court of supervising illegal medical trials in Black townships and selling unregistered vitamin supplements to poor AIDS sufferers. The suit was brought by the South African Medical Association and the Treatment Action Campaign lobby group, which said some of Rath’s patients died after relying on his unproven remedies rather than seeking conventional treatment at state-run clinics. Judge Dumisani Zondi ruled Friday that the trials that Rath and Rasnick, who is a member of the Dr. Rath Health Foundation, conducted in South Africa were “unlawful.” The judge barred Rath from publishing any advertisements for his natural AIDS remedies – high-dose vitamin pills containing minerals such as iron and iodine – a which he claims are more effective that antiretroviral drugs. His theories have proved hugely controversial in South Africa, which has one of the highest incidences of HIV in the world, with up to 1,000 people dying of AIDS-related illnesses every day.Vital Signs: The death of NBC Washington Bureau Chief Tim Russert, host of the Sunday morning political talk show Meet The Press, is a wake-up call: You can’t take your health for granted. Read more about what felled one of the greatest newsmen ever at Vital Signs.