Tag: skin

Actress Mamta Mohandas diagnosed with vitiligo | Here’s what you need to know about the skin condition

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Actress Mamta Mohandas on Sunday took to Instagram to share her recent diagnosis of vitiligo, a skin condition often linked to autoimmune diseases. The actor-producer and playback singer posted selfies with a geolocation tag of Niraamaya Retreats in Kerala and said she is “losing color.”

Mamta has appeared in over 55 films since her debut in the 2005 Malayalam film “Mayookham.” She even has her own film production company and has won several accolades including two Filmfare Awards South.

Currently residing in Los Angeles, the 38-year-old is a cancer survivor having previously battled Hodgkin lymphoma in 2010 and suffering a relapse in 2013. Michael Jackson, fashion model Winnie Harlow former Chief Justice of India P. Sathasivam, former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and Raymond Group’s Chairman Gautam Singhania are among some of the prominent figures with vitiligo.

What is vitiligo and what are its symptoms?

Vitiligo is a condition that causes loss of skin color in patches called depigmentation. It can affect the skin on any body part and the discolored patches usually grow bigger over time.

The skin of people with vitiligo usually turns into a milky-white color that often appears symmetrically on both sides of their body. The rarer type of vitiligo that affects only one side of the body such as one leg or half the face begins usually at a young age and stops after progressing for 6-12 months.

In certain cases, people’s hair and the inside of their mouths and nose can also show signs of vitiligo and get depigmented. They can also experience itchiness in areas with patchy skin.

What causes vitiligo?

The disease is caused due to the attack and destruction of melanocytes — melanin-making skin cells — by the body’s immune system.

The condition is also often linked to autoimmune diseases and commonly seen in those who suffer from the following diseases:

> Addison’s disease

> Pernicious anemia

> Psoriasis

> Rheumatoid arthritis

> Systemic lupus erythematosus

> Thyroid diseases such as Hashimoto’s thyroiditis

> Type 1 diabetes

> Alopecia areata

> Celiac disease

The National Institute of Health (NIH) also reports that sunburns can play a role in causing or exacerbating the condition, although the theory isn’t well researched yet.

How is vitiligo diagnosed?

A physical examination and close evaluation of the patient’s skin is a typical starting point for a vitiligo diagnosis, the NIH says.

They can identify missing melanocytes in a patient’s skin through a skin biopsy as well wherein they take a small sample of it and examine it under a microscope.

Other indirect modes of diagnosis include a blood test for other autoimmune diseases and an eye exam to check for uveitis, an eye inflammation that might occur with vitiligo.

Doctors can also use a black or ultraviolet light in early phases of the disease for detection and to determine the effectiveness of treatment.

What is the cure?

Currently, there is no cure for vitiligo but there are treatment options. These are aimed at either slowing/stopping the disease’s progression, encouraging the re-growth of melanocytes or restoring color in the white patches.

The treatment options include:

> Topical medicated creams or medicines with corticosteroids or calcineurin inhibitors to restore color

> Phototherapy or the use of light or laser treatments to treat specific areas affected by vitiligo. However, the UK’s National Health Service only recommends this if other treatments are ineffective due to cancer risks

> Depigmentation or the intentional removal of dark areas of the skin to match the white patches in cases where more than half the body has been affected by vitiligo

> Surgery

> Spots can be hidden or “camouflaged” through the use of makeup and be made less visible by avoiding tanning (especially in the case of pale-skinned individuals)

How does it affect people?

Living with vitiligo can be emotionally and psychologically hard for people. Its outward appearance can cause people to feel embarrassed, ashamed, ostracised and even be bullied. It can also lead to low self esteem and depression.

Aastha Shah, a 25-year-old digital content creator with over 300,000 followers on Instagram, shared her story about her childhood diagnosis of vitiligo with Humans of Bombay (2019). She recalled being teased in school and feeling limited and tired due to the “constant battle to get better.” Realising that there’s not much in her control, Shah said she finally learned to let go and enjoy her life despite her condition.

“Now, the white spots have completely taken over my body,” Shah told HoB in 2019. “But it doesn’t bother me. I’m enjoying life like never before.”

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Omicron survives much longer on plastic, skin than earlier coronavirus variants: Study

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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The Omicron variant of coronavirus can remain alive on skin for over 21 hours, and more than eights days on plastic surfaces, which may be contributing to its faster spread compared to other strains, according to a study. The researchers from Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine in Japan analysed the differences in viral environmental stability between the SARS-CoV-2 Wuhan strain and all variants of concern (VOCs).

The yet-to-be peer-reviewed study, posted recently on the preprint repository BioRxiv, found that the Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants exhibited more than two-fold longer survival on plastic and skin surfaces, than the Wuhan strain. “The high environmental stability of these VOCs could increase the risk of contact transmission and contribute to their spread,” the authors of study said.

“This study showed that Omicron has the highest environmental stability among VOCs, which might be one of the factors that have allowed the variant to replace the Delta variant and spread rapidly,” they said. The study shows on plastic surfaces, average survival times of the original strain and the Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Delta variants were 56 hours, 191.3 hours, 156.6 hours, 59.3 hours, and 114 hours, respectively.

That compared to 193.5 hours for the Omicron variant, according to the researchers. On skin samples, average virus survival times were 8.6 hours for the original version, 19.6 hours for Alpha, 19.1 hours for Beta, 11 hours Gamma, 16.8 hours for Delta and 21.1 hours for Omicron, they said.

There was no significant difference in survival times between Alpha and Beta variants, and they had similar environmental stability, which is consistent with the results of previous studies, according to the researchers. Although Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Omicron variants showed a slight increase in ethanol resistance in response to increased environmental stability, all VOCs on the skin surface were completely inactivated by 15 second exposure to 35 per cent ethanol.

“Therefore, it is highly recommended that current infection control (hand hygiene) practices use disinfectants… as proposed by the World Health Organisation,” the researchers added. The Omicron variant is currently a major concern owing to the rapidly increasing number of infected patients worldwide.

Read Also | EXPLAINER: What’s known about ‘stealth’ version of Omicron?

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Breathing with face mask does not alter oxygen level; virus can last 9 hours on skin

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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The following is a roundup of some of the latest scientific studies on the novel coronavirus and efforts to find treatments and vaccines for COVID-19, the illness caused by the virus. Breathing with face masks does not affect the lungs

The average face mask may be uncomfortable but does not limit the flow of oxygen to the lungs, even in people with severe lung diseases, researchers say. They tested the effect of wearing surgical masks on gas exchange – the process by which the body adds oxygen to the blood while removing carbon dioxide – in 15 healthy physicians and 15 military veterans with severely impaired lungs via a quick-paced six-minute walk on a flat, hard surface.

Oxygen and carbon dioxide levels in the blood were measured before and after the walking test. Neither the healthy doctors nor the patients with diseased lungs showed any major changes in gas exchange measurements after the walking test or up to 30 minutes later.

Mask discomfort is likely not due to rebreathing of carbon dioxide and decreases in oxygen levels, the researchers reported on Friday in the journal Thorax. Instead, masks may be causing discomfort by irritating sensitive facial nerves, warming inhaled air, or inducing feelings of claustrophobia. Any such discomfort should not cause safety concerns, researchers said, as that could contribute to reduction of ”a practice proven to improve public health.”

New coronavirus survives nine hours on human skin

Left undisturbed, the new coronavirus can survive many hours on human skin, a new study has found. To avoid possibly infecting healthy volunteers, researchers conducted lab experiments using cadaver skin that would otherwise have been used for skin grafts. While influenza A virus survived less than two hours on human skin, the novel coronavirus survived for more than nine hours. Both were completely inactivated within 15 seconds by hand sanitizer containing 80 percent alcohol.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends using alcohol-based hand rubs with 60 percent to 95 percent alcohol or thoroughly washing hands with soap and water for at least 20 seconds. Studies have shown that COVID-19 transmission largely occurs via aerosols and droplets. Still, the authors of the new study conclude in a report published on Saturday in Clinical Infectious Diseases, ”Proper hand hygiene is important to prevent the spread of SARS-CoV-2 infections.”

Obstructive sleep apnea linked with worse COVID-19

A common sleep disorder appears to put COVID-19 patients at higher risk for critical illness, a new study finds. Using Finnish national databases, researchers found that while the rates of infection with the new coronavirus were the same for people with and without obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), among people who did become infected, those with OSA had a five-fold higher risk of hospitalization. When people with OSA are asleep, their breathing stops briefly and then restarts, often multiple times during the night. OSA is associated with health problems like obesity, high blood pressure, heart disease, and diabetes, but was linked with a higher risk for severe COVID-19 even after researchers took all these other factors into account. The study cannot prove that OSA caused more severe outcomes. But in a paper posted on medRxiv ahead of peer review, researchers advise doctors evaluating patients with suspected or confirmed coronavirus infection to recognize that the sleep disorder is a risk factor for severe COVID-19.

Also Read: Battery-powered face mask seeks to fight COVID and foggy glasses

Infrared thermometers may be inaccurate in adults

Non-contact infrared thermometers, long used in children and now being used to screen for fever in public places, may not accurately measure body temperature in adults, a small study suggests. The devices are held a short distance from the forehead. Because they never touch the skin, they help prevent transmission of germs and do not need to be sterilized after each use. In a study of 265 adults at two hospitals, Australian researchers compared infrared thermometers with ”temporal artery” thermometers, which are rubbed across the forehead. When body temperatures were below 99.5 degrees F (37.5 C), the devices yielded similar results. But for higher body temperatures, the non-contact thermometers ”demonstrated poor accuracy,” with greater discrepancies as temperatures rose, according to a report published on Friday in the American Journal of Infection Control. As only 37 study participants had fever, larger studies are needed to confirm these findings, researchers said.

Meanwhile, they added, when an infrared thermometer shows a temperature above 99.5 F in an adult, it might be wise to get a direct measurement with a thermometer than makes contact with the body.

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Bad food habits can lead to cancer

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Enrich your diet with green tea, curcumin, pomegranate, and broccoli — rich in polyphenol — to keep cancers at bay, a nutritionist said, cautioning that unhealthy eating habits leads to cancer.

“The key could be in the food we eat and in its antioxidant properties, especially regarding polyphenols,” head of clinical nutrition of Mexico’s General Hospital Vanessa Fuchs told EFE on Friday.

“It has been scientifically proven that foods rich with polyphenol content have antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects, which lead to less neurodegeneration, slower ageing, anti-carcinogenesis, among other benefits,” she said.

She said that is why a diet poor in polyphenol is related to a higher risk of cancer including breast cancer, pancreatic, ovarian, skin, prostate, intestine and esophagus cancer.

“Green tea, for example, inhibits the spread of breast and prostate cancer cells, while curcumin and pomegranate slow the growth of prostate cancer cells,” she said.

As for broccoli, the specialist said that it is rich in isothiocyanate and sulforaphane, which inhibit the growth and promote the apoptosis of cancer cells.

Fuchs said that people should be aware that factors such as exposure to light, the state of conservation and food preparation methods can affect the polyphenol content of foods.

“For example, people are used to peeling certain fruits and vegetables, yet it is often the skin that has the highest polyphenol content,” she said.

In addition, cooking certain foods can lower their polyphenol content up to 75 per cent, “since many polyphenols are hydrosoluble and remain in the water,” the physician added.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), cancer is the second cause of death in the world.

In 2015 alone, 8.8 million deaths in the world were caused by cancer.

Close to a third of cancer deaths were attributed to five main factors: high body mass index, low consumption of fruits and vegetables, lack of physical activity, tobacco use and alcohol consumption.

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KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow