Latest news with #asthma
CTV News
16 hours ago
- Health
- CTV News
How To Choose A Dehumidifier
If your home's air is exceptionally moist during summer and you want an easy, efficient method of drying the air, a dehumidifier is the best way to go. Musty air feels gross on our skin, and high humidity levels can cause issues for people with asthma and other respiratory conditions, especially if it leads to mildew and mould growth in your home. No matter your square footage, desired humidity levels, and budget, there is a perfect dehumidifier out there for you. If you think about all of the features and considerations below, you'll be working with the best dehumidifier in no time. What Is a Dehumidifier? A dehumidifier is a portable appliance that removes excess moisture from the air. While some models work with your air conditioner, most are portable dehumidifiers that you can move around your home as you see fit. They work by using refrigerated coils to rapidly cool air that is sucked into the machine. The cold creates condensation that is collected in a basin at the base of the machine or hosed directly outside, depending on your model. Then, the drier, cooler air is released back into your home. Some humidifiers use speed settings to control the process, while others have something called a humidistat that allows users to set a specific humidity setting, such as 50%, and the machine will automatically maintain that setting. Questions to Ask Yourself Before Buying a Dehumidifier How Large is My Room? Humidifiers are not a one-size-fits-all appliance. Each one has a different square footage rating, meaning they can only cover a room up to a certain size. You'll need to measure your room to obtain the total square feet of the area before choosing a dehumidifier to make sure it can handle your room size. How Much Do I Want To Spend? A key consideration when making this type of purchase is how much you're willing to spend. While the cost of the actual dehumidifier is the biggest concern, you should also consider the cost of running the machine. Some energy-efficient models boast a higher energy efficiency rating than standard dehumidifiers, but they are most likely a little more expensive upfront. If cost isn't as much of a concern, you could also consider a whole-house dehumidifier that is installed with your HVAC system. How Many People Live in The Home? Choosing a dehumidifier is not only about the size of the home, but also the capacity of the home. A house with just one person will tend to be less humid than a home with a family of six since fewer people are sweating, breathing, and heating the space. Larger families may need a larger size dehumidifier than an individual or couple, since the average humidity will be higher. Features to Consider When Purchasing a Dehumidifier Before you make your purchase decision, there are a few things that you must consider. Dehumidifiers have many different features and characteristics that may make them the wrong choice for your unique circumstances. When shopping for dehumidifiers, make sure to consider all of the following features carefully to avoid bringing home a dehumidifier that isn't right for you. Type of Dehumidifier There are two types of dehumidifiers that you can consider for your home: desiccant and refrigerant. Compressor Dehumidifier/Refrigerant Dehumidifier This is the standard type of dehumidifier. This type of dehumidifier uses a compressor to draw in air from your space and pull it over the refrigerated coils to create condensation. These models are efficient and can handle high levels of humidity. One flaw of these dehumidifiers is their noise level. They average between 50 and 60 decibels when running. Compressor dehumidifiers are also best used in warmer climates. The coils could freeze if the room temperature is below about 65 degrees Fahrenheit. Desiccant Dehumidifier Desiccant dehumidifiers are the ideal choice if you're in a colder climate since they can be used at any temperature above freezing. They are also more energy efficient since they don't need to cool down the air. Instead, the air is pulled through the desiccant, which acts like a sponge to remove excess moisture from the air. These models are also much quieter to operate than a compressor-based model, so they can be used in work environments and bedrooms without disturbing anyone. However, desiccant dehumidifiers expel air that is roughly 10-15 degrees warmer than the ambient air temperature, so this may be an issue for some people who like to keep their home at a low temperature. These humidifiers can handle the same relative humidity levels as a compressor, but they can cost a bit more to run in warmer temperatures. These models are effectively used in areas like crawl spaces and basements that may be cooler, wetter spaces. Fan Settings Most dehumidifiers have a low speed and a high-speed setting that enable a bit of extra control over how the machine operates. A high setting can be used for quickly drying out the air in a space, while a low setting can keep the noise disturbance to a minimum while maintaining proper humidity levels. Some models will also have a middle setting, but not all do. Most dehumidifiers will also offer a fan-only setting, which can help encourage airflow without affecting moisture levels. Energy Efficiency Though dehumidifiers don't cost more than a few cents per hour to operate, choosing an Energy Star-rated model is the best for your budget and the environment because it works more efficiently and operates at a lower cost. An energy-efficient dehumidifier will more quickly achieve the desired level of dehumidification you need, stopping musty odours, water damage, and allergens in their tracks. Built-In Hygrometer/Humidistat A built-in humidistat is the most convenient feature available on a dehumidifier. Rather than set a speed setting and walk away, you can set a precise humidity level that the machine should maintain. Not only does this feature enable energy savings since the machine only runs when the humidity rises above your desired setting, but you also won't have to manually turn on or shut off the dehumidifier. Since dry air can also be bad for your health, this feature can be a lifesaver if you forget to turn off the dehumidifier. Basin Pint Capacity The pint capacity of your dehumidifier is a key factor to consider since your room size and characteristics will influence the moisture level of your air. If your room houses your washer and dryer, has multiple windows and doors, or your home is in a more humid climate, you'll need a dehumidifier that can handle more pints of water per hour since there is a larger amount of water in your air. If your machine doesn't have the right pint capacity, your air quality will suffer. Aside from the efficiency of the appliance, you should also consider the reservoir's capacity since this will control how often you'll need to empty the reservoir. Most models only need to be emptied once or twice a day, but a smaller tank will require more frequent emptying or a hose connection. Room Coverage People buying a dehumidifier do need to double-check that their room size is within the appliance's capacity. To purchase the right size dehumidifier for your space, you'll first need to calculate the room's square footage. The larger it is, the higher capacity your dehumidifier will need to have. The general rule is that a small dehumidifier collects less than 20 pints of moisture per day, medium dehumidifiers collect between 30 and 40 pints per day, and large dehumidifiers collect more than 40 pints per day. Drainage Type There are two choices you have when draining the water from your reservoir. The first is manually emptying the bin. This is usually a simple, quick process, but it can become tedious if you need to empty the tank two or more times per day, especially if you work full time or want to go away for a weekend and keep your home's humidity in check. Though some models only need to be emptied once a day if they aren't being used in rooms with excessively humid air, this is still a less convenient option. If you have a small dehumidifier capacity for dehumidifier water or have a large amount of moisture in your air, a drain hose is the way to go. A hose can drain directly into a floor drain and can handle any number of pints of moisture per hour or day that you need. If you don't have a floor drain, a dehumidifier with a pump can be used to send the water up to a higher-level drainage spot like a sink. Our Top Picks:
Reuters
a day ago
- Business
- Reuters
US Senator investigates GSK for pulling children's asthma inhaler
WASHINGTON, June 27 (Reuters) - Democratic U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan said on Friday she is launching an investigation into British pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline's (GSK.L), opens new tab decision to discontinue a widely used asthma inhaler for children. In letters sent on Friday to GSK and its authorized generic distributor, Prasco Laboratories, and seen by Reuters, Hassan said the decision to remove Flovent HFA from the market in January 2024 had contributed to a spike in hospitalizations and deaths linked to asthma complications. She demanded documents detailing the rationale behind the decision, and its financial and health impacts. Hassan, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee's Health Care Subcommittee, called on GSK to restore the inhaler to market. She also requested internal pricing documents, rebate data, and communications with regulators by July 18. She accused GSK of evading rebate obligations to Medicaid, which provides health coverage to 71 million low-income people and is one of the biggest U.S. safety-net programs. In addition, GSK's decision to replace the brand-name inhaler with a higher-cost authorized generic had lowered access for low-income patients, Hassan said. "Children across the country have faced life-threatening medical challenges and families have grappled with more expensive or less effective alternative medications — when these options are available at all," Hassan wrote in her letter. GSK told Hassan in response to an earlier letter she sent in May last year that Prasco controls pricing of the generic. Hassan said both companies failed to ensure affordability of the treatment, contributing to delays or denials of insurance coverage. Hassan cited a Johns Hopkins analysis which found that GSK's move saved the company $367 million in 2024 Medicaid rebates, while costing the program over $550 million. Parents reported paying up to $150 per inhaler for the generic, compared to $10 for Flovent. GSK said last year it would cap out-of-pocket costs for all its inhaled asthma and chronic lung disease medicines at $35 per month for eligible patients in the United States starting January 2025, following similar moves by its rivals. The announcement came after lawmakers criticized manufacturers over high prices, and launched an investigation, opens new tab to look into the prices at which these were sold in the U.S. versus other countries.
Medscape
5 days ago
- Health
- Medscape
Inflammation Link Allergy, Asthma, and Depression?
The prevalence of depression is consistently higher in persons with asthma than in persons without it, according to experts, and a review of 24 studies also found that allergic rhinitis was associated with higher odds of depression or anxiety. Over the past two decades, multiple investigators have looked beyond emotional or lifestyle triggers of depression in chronic airway or allergic conditions, focusing instead on eco-biological ones. This has led to inflammation being identified as the common denominator in all three — allergies, asthma, and depression. As the understanding of how inflammation, as measured by an increase in immune cells, cytokines, and other biomarkers, affects neural signaling continues to improve; potential implications for clinical practice are beginning to emerge, experts say. Evolutionary 'Mismatch' One line of inquiry that implicates inflammation in depression, chronic airway trouble, and allergies, involves the microbiome and how modern living has altered it. 'There's essentially an evolutionary mismatch in the modern world,' Charles Raison, MD, professor of psychiatry and human ecology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison, told Medscape Medical News in an interview. 'We've made the world so clean we deprive ourselves — especially in early life when allergies and asthma tend to develop — of contact with microorganisms that train the immune system not to fire off at things they don't need to fire off about.' In a review of literature published in 2013 on immune function titled, Inflammation, Sanitation, and Consternation , Raison and his coauthors concluded that measured exposure to certain microorganisms and their antigens could offer both prevention and intervention for depression. 'Our current challenge is to determine who among those with allergies is at highest risk of developing depression, and why,' Christopher Lowry, PhD, a coauthor on the paper with Raison, told Medscape Medical News . Lowry is a professor of integrative physiology and associate chair of faculty affairs at the University of Colorado Boulder. 'Old Friends' Raison and Lowry's collaboration follows on from the 'Old Friends' work of Graham Rook, a coauthor of their review study, and an emeritus professor of medical microbiology at the University College London in London, England. 'The association between allergies and depression is embedded in the 'Old Friends' or Biodiversity Hypothesis which posits that reduced exposures to diverse microbial environments, which is typical of modern urban lifestyles, increases risk of allergies, anxiety disorders, and depression,' Lowry told Medscape Medical News . Because the commensal microorganisms in the gut are one of the major types of microbial 'Old Friends' that can induce anti-inflammatory and immunoregulatory responses, Lowry said, 'Those who lack diverse microbial exposures, including diverse microbial exposures in the gut microbiome, are thought to be at higher risk of inflammatory disease and inflammation-associated conditions.' Similarly, 'we have shown that this response is greater in persons who grow up in an urban environment, without daily exposure to pets, relative to persons who grow up on a farm, with daily exposure to farm animals,' said Lowry, whose research on the immune effects of exposure to animals was published in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Science . Other categories of microbial 'Old Friends,' according to Lowry, are environmental saprophytes found in soil, mud, and unpurified water, and so-called 'Old Infections' such as the hepatitis A virus or Salmonella . Rook has gone so far as to say that these microbial inputs, 'are absolutely crucial in early life, but continue to be important in adulthood and old age.' Raison added, 'These microbes don't cause illnesses, they are the teachers of tolerance, is how we used to say it. When we began to institute a bunch of modern sanitation and medical practices, on the plus side people stopped dying in youth. Huge win. But we didn't see we were tossing out the good with the bad, and we've lost our exposure to these environmental immunoregulatory organisms that suppress inflammation.' In the past 40 years, incident rates for asthma in the US have doubled according to federal data. A third of persons in the US now have an allergy of some kind, these data also showed. Rates of depression are also at their highest, according to a probability-based Gallup survey of 100,000 adults in the US. In 2023, the survey found that 29% of US adults had been given a diagnosis of depression in their lifetime. Microbial Population Health Initiative The 'Old Friends' theory was tested in Finland for the decade between 2008 and 2018, when a population health initiative to increase exposures to diverse microbial environments led to a reduction in hospitalizations for asthma by half nationally and a 50% drop in the number of food allergies reported in Finnish schools and daycares. The results were published in 2021 in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology . Depression rates for this time period in Finland are not currently available. 'This was hot, sexy stuff back 20 years ago, but nobody figured out the magic bullet to end all allergies and asthma, so like a lot of things in mental health, it didn't come too much,' Raison said. 'It's gone through fads, like the probiotic fad. But another question would be, what if you were to re-expose kids to these kinds of microbes that train the immune system not to be so agitated, would you lower rates of depression and suicide in adults? Those studies were never done.' Lowry, however, now studies whether the microorganism, Mycobacterium vaccae ATCC 15483, which has been identified as having anti-inflammatory, immunoregulatory, and stress-resilience properties, can be leveraged to protect humans from the effects of inflammation. In a study that was published earlier this year in Brain, Behavior and Immunity , Lowry and his colleagues found M vaccae reduced biomarkers of neuroinflammation and anxiety-like behavior in animals. It also reduced several indicators of obesity such as plasma leptin concentrations and adipose tissue. 'We hope to conduct clinical trials in the next 2-5 years to determine if treatment with mycobacteria can reduce inflammation and promote stress resilience in humans,' Lowry said. 'Future studies should evaluate if mycobacteria or other 'Old Friends' can prevent or treat anxiety and depression.' Inflammation Is Bidirectional If depression in asthma and allergies is at least partially biological, then there are implications for clinical practice, according to one expert. 'The default for physicians is usually that it's hard to have a chronic disease, and that's why their patients are depressed,' Melissa Rosenkranz, PhD, told Medscape Medical News . 'But if they understand that there is a biology that underlies it, that the immune dysregulation that's giving rise to the disease is also contributing to the depression, and that they can do something about that — if we can target those signaling pathways, then we can be treating both simultaneously.' Rosenkranz is an associate professor of psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin - Madison and is the distinguished chair of contemplative neuroscience at the Center for Healthy Minds. Her field is psycho-neuroimmunology, which focuses on interactions between the mind, brain, and immune system. Whether inflammation is the mechanism of action or a symptom in both asthma and depression is something she and her colleagues have studied. 'It goes in both directions,' Rosenkranz said. 'We've done that research.' Alterations in Neural Signaling Their first and second studies involved scanning study patients' brains before and after their airways were challenged with an inflammatory antigen and comparing those results to the before and after scans of the brains of participants exposed to methacholine, which does not irritate, but does constrict, the bronchial passages, making it difficult to breathe. A third study introduced an inflammatory agent to a micro region of the bronchial passages. 'All three studies showed what was happening in the brain was different in the inflammatory context,' Rosenkranz said in the interview. Specifically, Rosenkranz and her colleagues discovered that the brain's salience network — the part that prioritizes which stimuli, both internal and external to the body, require the brain's attention most — responded differently to emotional information when the immune system had been activated. They found that the more the salience network was engaged during psychological stress, the more the inflammatory response in the airway was activated, even without exposure to allergy triggers. 'Our results identify a specific inflammatory pathway linking asthma-related airway inflammation and emotion-related neural function,' Rosenkranz and her coauthors wrote in their study, published in The Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology . An immune pathway common to both depression and the airway inflammatory response in asthma is the T helper cell 17 (TH17) response, according to Rosenkranz, whose work has shown that the TH17 response is amplified in the lung during stress. Activity in the TH17 pathway is also elevated in people with depression, according to Rosenkranz, and TH17 is also less responsive to common asthma medications and is associated with treatment-resistant depression. 'There are probably multiple pathways through which [inflammation] happens, so I don't want to claim that this is the only one, but I think it's one among a few that may provoke inflammation in the brain,' Rosenkranz said. 'And inflammation has been shown to be part of the pathophysiology of depression. It's also part of the cascade that gives rise to Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia.' Rosenkranz's latest study is on how an asthma exacerbation can lead to inflammation in the brain, and whether those changes might set the stage for dementia. 'It's possible that depression is along the same trajectory as dementia,' Rosenkranz said. 'As you get on later in life, you see the cognitive decline. With nearly 10% of the population having asthma, this is a really important public health question.' Rosenkranz said she doesn't want to be an alarmist. 'I'm not suggesting that everybody who has depression has inflammation in their brain,' she said. As the field searches for an immune-signaling pathway that, if targeted with drugs, could improve asthma, allergies, prevent asthma-related depression, and possibly protect the brain, Rosenkranz said that for now, 'Physicians should evaluate the emotional well-being of their patients and work closely with mental health professionals to address mental and physical symptoms in tandem, so that they can best serve their patients.' They need to understand that depression in patients with asthma or allergy could be a symptom of, not a reaction to their diagnosis, she said.
The Independent
19-06-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Dyson purifier hot + cool formaldehyde: The £700 air purifier that tackles heatwaves and hay fever
Over the last few years, we've seen a big rise in home improvement and DIY, a penchant for viral candles, and a surging number of flights booked as 2025 is predicted to be biggest ever summer for travel. It's a random mix of topics with one thing in common: air pollution. Leading doctors have warned that 99 per cent of the population are breathing in 'toxic air', and air pollution has been declared a public health crisis here in the UK, possibly leading to 30,000 preventable deaths this year alone. It's not just us adults impacted by bad air quality. Recent NHS England data shows that in some parts of the country, air pollution is linked to 33 per cent of childhood asthma cases. But it's not all doom and gloom, as there are several ways that we can ensure we're breathing clean air. If you want to purify your air at home, providing a better quality of living for you and your family, we may just have found the ticket. Enter the Dyson purifier hot + cool formaldehyde, the brand's bestselling air purifier (plus fan and heater). It's designed to clean the air not only of the usual particles picked up by purifiers with a high efficiency particulate absorbing (HEPA) filter, but also to grab all formaldehyde-based resins that come from plywood and fibreboard, insulating materials, paint, wallpaper, varnishes, and some household cleaning products. This is no small task: formaldehydes are 500 times smaller than particles of 0.1 microns (10 microns is the limit for the naked eye) and to be efficient specifically at catching this chemical, Dyson created an intelligent formaldehyde sensor that's gel-based and will accurately catch and destroy it at a molecular level without confusing it with other volatile organic compounds. Is hayfever a problem in your house? Dyson's clever purifier also captures and removes the microscopic particles which may cause allergies, acting as a powerful shield against pollen, dust, pet dander and mould. When paired with a great vacuum, you're ready to tackle pollen season head-on. But these are all huge claims, and so we tested this purifier to find out if it could really clean our air. Why you can trust IndyBest reviews You can trust our independent reviews. We may earn commission from some of the retailers, but we never allow this to influence selections, which are formed from real-world testing and expert advice. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent.
Medscape
19-06-2025
- Health
- Medscape
Diabetes Plus Asthma Equals Greater Metabolic Risk
People with both diabetes and asthma appear to face greater metabolic risks than those with either condition alone, according to new observational data. In a study of more than 18,000 participants from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey during 2001-2020, individuals with both asthma and diabetes (most presumed to have type 2 diabetes) had significantly greater impairments in glucose regulation, insulin sensitivity, and lipid metabolism compared with those who had only one condition alone or neither. Inflammatory markers C-reactive protein (CRP) and high-sensitivity CRP (hs-CRP) were also elevated in the comorbid group, 'supporting a hypothesis of a shared inflammatory mechanism,' Sixtus Aguree, PhD, assistant professor at the Indiana University School of Public Health-Bloomington, and colleagues wrote in a poster presented at NUTRITION 2025, the annual meeting of the American Society for Nutrition. The findings 'emphasize the need for integrated clinical strategies that simultaneously target both inflammation and metabolic dysfunction in patients with asthma-diabetes comorbidity,' the authors wrote. 'Routine screening for insulin resistance and inflammatory markers in [these] patients may aid in early intervention and risk reduction.' This points to the need for integrated clinical care, Aguree told Medscape Medical News . 'For managing these comorbid conditions, healthcare professionals need to work together. I think that's a better way to treat the person than working in silos.' Bidirectional Relationship Commenting on the findings, Tianshi David Wu, MD, assistant professor of pulmonary and critical care at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, told Medscape Medical News that these findings align with current evidence. 'Diabetes and asthma have a bidirectional relationship,' Wu explained. 'Population studies have shown that patients with diabetes are at higher risk of developing asthma later on, and vice versa. What's still unknown are the mechanisms that explain this finding.' Wu added that the researchers had put forth a reasonable hypothesis — that systemic inflammation may play a key role in this association. 'The best way to prove this would be with a trial that specifically targets the type of inflammation you think is driving both asthma and diabetes to see how it affects these conditions.' As a possible blueprint, he pointed to cardiology, where patients with heart failure and diabetes are preferentially treated with sodium-glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors, which are effective at treating both conditions. 'In the asthma world, I don't think the evidence is there yet to recommend any specific diabetes medication, but there is plenty of real-world data suggesting some benefit, and there are two clinical trials ongoing testing semaglutide and metformin to see if they can improve asthma,' Wu said. Surprising Impact on Insulin Resistance The study included 18,370 nationally representative US adults. Among them, 8.2% had diabetes without asthma, 7.4% had asthma without diabetes, 83.3% had neither (controls), and 1.2% had both. BMI was highest in the combined asthma-diabetes group (35.9 kg/m2 vs. 28.2 kg/m2 in controls, P < .001), as was waist circumference (117.6 cm vs. 97.3 cm, P < .001). Insulin resistance, defined as a homeostasis model assessment of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) > 2.5, was present in 41% of controls, 46.8% with asthma only, 77.3% with diabetes only, and 85.6% with both conditions. The HOMA-IR score in the asthma-diabetes group was significantly higher than in controls (9.85 vs. 2.96, P < .001). Logistic regression analysis confirmed that the odds of insulin resistance were nearly eight times higher in the asthma-diabetes group than in the control group (odds ratio [OR], 7.89, P < .001), even after adjusting for BMI, sex, and medication use. 'We didn't expect insulin resistance to be that much higher in the combination of asthma and diabetes. That shocked us,' Aguree said. Asthma alone was not significantly associated with insulin resistance (OR, 0.76, P = .220), 'underscoring the additive impact of coexisting diabetes,' the authors wrote in their poster. Additional Metabolic Outcomes Absolute values of LDL cholesterol were 115.9 mg/dL and 114.5 mg/dL, respectively, for controls and asthma only, vs 98.9 mg/dL and 104.8 mg/dL for diabetes only and asthma-diabetes groups, respectively. The lower value in those with diabetes is likely due to greater use of statins, Aguree noted. In contrast, compared with controls, those in the asthma-diabetes group had significantly lower levels of HDL cholesterol, while triglycerides and the triglyceride/HDL ratio were higher ( P < .001 for all). Systolic blood pressure was also significantly higher in the comorbid group ( P < .001), as was diastolic blood pressure, although to a lesser extent ( P = .012). A1c levels were 5.41% in controls and 5.46% in the asthma-only group, both significantly lower than levels in the diabetes group (7.34%) and the comorbid group (7.11%), Aguree said. Log-CRP values were 0.530 units higher in the asthma-diabetes group than in controls ( P < .001), as were hs-CRP (1.70 mg/L vs 0.60 mg/L, P < .001). Aguree and colleagues are now expanding their analysis to include longitudinal data and evaluate integrated interventions, such as combined anti-inflammatory and glucose-lowering medications, as a means of reducing the burden of both conditions. Aguree had no disclosures. Wu declared receiving funding from the National Institutes of Health and the American Lung Association.
