Latest news with #DavidGeffenSchoolofMedicine
13-06-2025
- Health
COVID-19 patients with reduced kidney function who are vaccinated are more likely to survive: Study
Patients vaccinated against COVID-19 who caught the virus -- and were hospitalized with reduced kidney function -- had better outcomes than unvaccinated patients with the same conditions, a new study has found. Vaccinated patients were less likely to need dialysis after being discharged from the hospital and were more likely to survive, according to the study. Lead author Dr. Niloofar Nobakht, a health sciences clinical associate professor of medicine in the division of nephrology at UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine, said the findings suggest COVID-19 vaccination can reduce the risk of long-term kidney function decline and of death. "The COVID-19 vaccine is an important intervention that can decrease the chances of developing complications from the COVID-19 infection in patients hospitalized with acute kidney injuries," Nobakht said in a news release. "It is important for individuals to discuss the benefits of getting vaccinated for COVID-19 with their doctors as it can decrease the chances of needing dialysis, which can severely affect the quality of life of patients and lead to further complications, including death," she continued. For the study, published early Friday in the journal Kidney Medicine, researchers looked at about 3,500 patients who were hospitalized with COVID-19 between March 1, 2020, and March 30, 2022. Of those patients, 972 developed acute kidney injury, which is a sudden reduction in kidney function, with 411 who were unvaccinated against COVID-19 and 467 who were vaccinated. Vaccinated patients received either at least two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccines or one dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. Nearly 16% of unvaccinated patients needed a form of dialysis known as continuous renal replacement therapy (CRRT) -- a continuous, slow-motion dialysis that runs 24 hours a day -- compared with about 11% of vaccinated patients. Results also showed unvaccinated patients were 2.56 times more likely to need CRRT after being discharged from the hospital and 5.54 times more likely to die in the hospital compared to vaccinated patients. Additionally, those who were unvaccinated were 4.78 times more likely to die during long-term follow-up. "This study also emphasizes the importance of the need for continued research in understanding how COVID-19 infections affect the kidney and how we should manage and monitor kidney complications from COVID-19 infections to improve patient outcomes," Nobakht said. The authors said one of the limitations of the study was not enough data on the severity of COVID-19 illness, but the team did note all the patients were ill enough to have required hospitalization. The new study comes as COVID-19 vaccines have received renewed attention due to recent moves from Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Last month, Kennedy announced COVID-19 vaccines were being removed from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's immunization schedule for "healthy children and pregnant women." Additionally, earlier this week, Kennedy removed all 17 sitting members of the CDC's independent vaccine advisory committee and appointed eight replacement members, some of whom have shared vaccine-skeptic views.
Yahoo
11-06-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Still Not Feeling the Same After COVID-19? You're Not Alone
Credit - Getty Images Most people have put the COVID-19 pandemic behind them. Infections, vaccinations, or a combination of both have bolstered people's immunity, and while new variants continue to pop up, getting sick does not induce the same panic it once did. But a new study shows that recovery from COVID-19 might not be as quick or straightforward as most of us now expect. The study, published in Open Forum Infectious Diseases, found that on average, it takes many people up to three months to return to good physical health after a COVID-19 infection, and nine months to recover good mental well-being. For up to 20% of infected people who were analyzed in the study, this mental-health recovery took even longer: up to a year or more. Lauren Wisk, assistant professor in the division of general internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California, Los Angeles, and her team looked at data from people who had COVID-19 at eight health facilities across the U.S. from Dec. 2020 to Aug. 2022. People were asked to fill out surveys every three months for one year about their recovery, recording physical and mental symptoms like anxiety, depression, fatigue, social participation, sleep disturbances, and pain. It took people far longer to regain their mental well-being than it did their physical health. 'To be totally honest, we didn't necessarily expect to see different recovery trajectories as big as the ones we are seeing,' says Wisk. 'While it makes sense that some people recover faster physically, and other people recover faster mentally, on average the difference that we saw was surprising.' Read More: You Could Have Long COVID and Not Even Know It Wisk and her team also asked people to self-report if they experienced Long COVID, meaning symptoms stemming from their infection that lingered for at least three months. Nearly half of people who reported both poor physical and mental qualify of life following their infections also believed they had Long COVID. While the assessment was subjective, it tracked with the data Wisk's team collected; among people who reported just poor physical health, poor mental health, or neither, there were fewer reports of Long COVID. The findings point to the need for a deeper understanding of how COVID-19 infections affect the body, physically and mentally, in the short and long term, says Wisk. 'We need to be thinking about a longer road to recovery for people, because even if someone recovers physically from their symptoms, it might not end there for them.' Appreciating these longer lasting effects could help people seek treatment for their symptoms, which may condense their recovery period. Wisk says that short courses of anxiety medications and sleep therapies, for example, could address some of the lingering effects of COVID-19. 'We know how to treat the initial infection and how to keep people alive, but we don't have a great treatment protocol for the after effects and the lingering symptoms,' says Wisk. 'These data should help to guide development of protocols in which we think of recovery over a potentially long time horizon before people get back to normal.' Contact us at letters@
Time Magazine
11-06-2025
- Health
- Time Magazine
Still Not Feeling the Same After COVID-19? You're Not Alone
Most people have put the COVID-19 pandemic behind them. Infections, vaccinations, or a combination of both have bolstered people's immunity, and while new variants continue to pop up, getting sick does not induce the same panic it once did. But a new study shows that recovery from COVID-19 might not be as quick or straightforward as most of us now expect. The study, published in Open Forum Infectious Diseases, found that on average, it takes many people up to three months to return to good physical health after a COVID-19 infection, and nine months to recover good mental well-being. For up to 20% of infected people who were analyzed in the study, this mental-health recovery took even longer: up to a year or more. Lauren Wisk, assistant professor in the division of general internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen School of Medicine at University of California, Los Angeles, and her team looked at data from people who had COVID-19 at eight health facilities across the U.S. from Dec. 2020 to Aug. 2022. People were asked to fill out surveys every three months for one year about their recovery, recording physical and mental symptoms like anxiety, depression, fatigue, social participation, sleep disturbances, and pain. It took people far longer to regain their mental well-being than it did their physical health. 'To be totally honest, we didn't necessarily expect to see different recovery trajectories as big as the ones we are seeing,' says Wisk. 'While it makes sense that some people recover faster physically, and other people recover faster mentally, on average the difference that we saw was surprising.' Wisk and her team also asked people to self-report if they experienced Long COVID, meaning symptoms stemming from their infection that lingered for at least three months. Nearly half of people who reported both poor physical and mental qualify of life following their infections also believed they had Long COVID. While the assessment was subjective, it tracked with the data Wisk's team collected; among people who reported just poor physical health, poor mental health, or neither, there were fewer reports of Long COVID. The findings point to the need for a deeper understanding of how COVID-19 infections affect the body, physically and mentally, in the short and long term, says Wisk. 'We need to be thinking about a longer road to recovery for people, because even if someone recovers physically from their symptoms, it might not end there for them.' Appreciating these longer lasting effects could help people seek treatment for their symptoms, which may condense their recovery period. Wisk says that short courses of anxiety medications and sleep therapies, for example, could address some of the lingering effects of COVID-19. 'We know how to treat the initial infection and how to keep people alive, but we don't have a great treatment protocol for the after effects and the lingering symptoms,' says Wisk. 'These data should help to guide development of protocols in which we think of recovery over a potentially long time horizon before people get back to normal.'
Medscape
11-06-2025
- Health
- Medscape
Race, Ethnicity Linked to Divergent Outcomes in AF
In a cohort of 157,332 in the Veterans Health Administration with atrial fibrillation (AF), Black patients had a 14% higher risk for stroke than White patients, but Black, Asian, and Hispanic patients were less likely than White patients to die from stroke. METHODOLOGY: Researchers identified 157,332 patients in the Veterans Health Administration with incident AF (mean age, 72.9 ± 10.5 years, 97.8% men) from January 1, 2014, to December 31, 2021, with follow-up through May 31, 2022. The study's independent variables were race and ethnicity. The primary outcomes were the incidence of stroke and mortality from any cause. Cox proportional hazard models were used to assess associations between race and ethnicity and patient outcomes. TAKEAWAY: Overall, 22,628 patients (14.7%) experienced a stroke (46.3 per 1,000 person-years) during the study period, with Black patients showing a higher risk for the event (adjusted hazard ratio [AHR], 1.14; 95% CI, 1.09-1.20) than White patients. No significant differences were observed between White patients and American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian, or Hispanic patients. Overall, 52,288 patients (33.2%) died (96.1 per 1,000 person-years), with Asian (AHR, 0.85; 95% CI, 0.78-0.93), Black (AHR, 0.92; 95% CI, 0.89-0.95), and Hispanic (AHR, 0.82; 95% CI, 0.77-0.87) patients showing a lower risk for death than White patients. Among patients with stroke, mortality rates were higher for racial and ethnic minoritized groups, while those without stroke showed lower mortality rates for Asian, Black, and Hispanic patients compared to White patients. IN PRACTICE: 'Our findings of higher rates of stroke in Black patients, even when controlling for anticoagulant use, suggest that there are other mechanisms by which stroke prevention must be addressed in ongoing VA quality improvement efforts for AF. These include improving equitable access to all AF treatment strategies beyond anticoagulation, including rhythm control agents and therapeutic procedures such as cardiac ablation, for which notable disparities have been observed,' the researchers reported. 'Furthermore, our observation that the magnitude of the association between race and stroke decreased with the addition of socioeconomic markers in our stepwise modeling suggests that addressing social factors and structural determinants beyond the health system may improve downstream AF outcomes.' SOURCE: The study was led by Utibe R. Essien, MD, MPH, of the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Leslie R.M. Hausmann, PhD, MS, of the Center for Health Equity Research and Promotion at the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System, Pittsburgh. It was published online in JACC: Advances . LIMITATIONS: The study primarily included men receiving care within the Veterans Health Administration, limiting crossover to non-VA settings or practices with larger proportions of female patients. Stroke outcomes were identified solely through VA data. The analysis lacked data on specific cause of death, preventing an analysis of cardiovascular mortality. DISCLOSURES: The study received funding from the Veterans Affairs Health Services Research and Development Division and the American Heart Association Amos Medical Faculty Development Program Award. The funders had no role in the study design, data collection, and analysis. The authors reported having no relationships relevant to the paper's contents.
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
This Type Of Work May Lower Heart Attack Risk For Women, Says New Study
A new study suggests that being self-employed can have an impact on your heart health. Specifically, it can help improve cardiovascular risk factors like obesity, sleep, and activity. Experts have a few theories why this might be, including lower stress and greater freedom to follow a healthy lifestyle. We all know there are a lot of factors that can influence your heart health, from what you eat to your family history, but new research suggests that your work environment might actually have a big influence how likely women are to develop cardiovascular disease. The findings, which are published in the journal BMC Public Health, suggest that being self-employed can have a noticeable influence on factors that lead to your risk of heart attack, stroke, and more. Right now, the study only establishes an association—so don't quit your day job and strike out on your own based purely on these findings. But they do raise a lot of questions about how your workplace can impact your heart and overall health. Here's what the research suggests, plus what doctors want you to keep in mind about the fascinating findings. Meet the experts: Jennifer Wong, MD, cardiologist and medical director of Non-Invasive Cardiology at MemorialCare Heart and Vascular Institute at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, CA; Kimberly Narain, MD, MPH, PhD, lead study author assistant professor-in-residence of medicine in the division of general internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. Yanting Wang, MD, an associate professor at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and director or the Women's Heart Program and Cardio-Obstetrics Program at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. For the study, researchers analyzed data from 19,400 working adults who participated in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). The researchers crunched the data to look at the link between being self-employed and having cardiovascular risk factors like high cholesterol, high blood pressure, glucose intolerance, obesity, poor diet, physical inactivity, smoking, binge drinking, sub-optimal sleep duration, and poor mental health. Researchers discovered lower rates of certain cardiovascular risk factors between people who were self-employed and those who were salaried. White women who were self-employed had a 7.4 percent lower risk of obesity, 7 percent lower risk of being physically inactive, and 9.4 percent drop in having poor sleep. The change in risk was slightly different for self-employed women of color. These women had a 6.7 percent lower risk of having a poor diet, 7.3 percent lower risk of being physically inactive, and 8.1 percent lower risk of getting poor sleep. Self-employed white men also saw a drop in certain factors, although it wasn't as noticeable. (Minority men didn't see the same benefits.) The study didn't explore this exact question beyond just finding a link, but there are a few theories, according to Kimberly Narain, MD, MPH, PhD, lead study author assistant professor-in-residence of medicine in the division of general internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. One is that women who are self-employed may be able to dictate their work schedule more and have less stress as a result, she says. Self-employed women with more free time may possibly have 'less perceived stress compared to women with less autonomy,' says Jennifer Wong, MD, cardiologist and medical director of Non-Invasive Cardiology at MemorialCare Heart and Vascular Institute at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, CA. (Chronic stress is a risk factor for cardiovascular disease on its own, but it can also raise the risk of developing other factors that contribute to the condition, like obesity or trouble sleeping.) Women also tend to be caregivers and as such, have more responsibilities at home, Dr. Narain points out. 'When you're trying to combine that high level of demand and employment that doesn't have autonomy and flexibility, it can be stressful,' she says. 'It can potentially manifest in higher levels of blood pressure and less sleep.' Unfortunately, both of those raise your risk for cardiovascular disease. Women who are self-employed may have greater freedom to take on healthy lifestyle habits, like being more physically active and making medical appointments to stay on top of their health, says Yanting Wang, MD, an associate professor at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and director or the Women's Heart Program and Cardio-Obstetrics Program at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. Finally, Dr. Narain says that self-employed women may not have to deal with micro-aggressions that can happen in the workplace—and that can also lower stress. Dr. Narain says the findings suggest that your work environment can have an impact on your cardiovascular health. 'We really need to be thinking about the meaning people get from their work and what that may mean for their health outcomes,' she says. But Dr. Wong says the study also stresses the importance of taking care of your health, no matter what your job is. 'In any job, women should try to take the time to optimize their cardiovascular health focusing on a heart healthy diet, exercise, and adequate sleep,' she says. You Might Also Like Jennifer Garner Swears By This Retinol Eye Cream These New Kicks Will Help You Smash Your Cross-Training Goals
