Night shifts increase breast cancer risk, especially for nurses 

• Night shifts increase breast cancer risk, especially for nurses: A meta-analysis confirms a positive association between long-term night shift work and an increased overall risk for cancer in women, particularly breast cancer. In North America and Europe, working the night shift was associated with a 32% increased risk for breast cancer. Night nurses were found to have a "remarkable" 58% increased risk. For every 5 years a woman spent working nights, breast cancer risk increased by 3.3%. The review, published online January 8, 2018 in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, was led by Xuelei Ma, PhD, from the West China Medical Center of Sichuan University, Chengdu. Hence, long-term night shift workers should undergo regular physical examinations and screenings for cancer.
• IMA sends Rs 50-crore legal notice to motivational speaker. The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has sent a legal notice to a "motivational speaker" for allegedly referring to doctors as "murderers in white coats" and projecting them in bad light on an online public platform. Stating that the video posted on YouTube has caused a loss of reputation to medical professionals, the doctors body has claimed Rs 50 crore in damages for defaming them. The association has also sought an apology from the speaker and the removal of the video from the Internet, IMAs KK Aggarwal said. Its national president Ravi Wankhedkar said the video will further worsen the doctor-patient relationship. The speaker in the video - Indian Medical System Ki Asliyat - purportedly describes how doctors allegedly mislead patients to make money and meet test and surgery targets.

He has allegedly referred to doctors as "safed coat ke khooni lootere (murderers in white coats)." Following the IMA action, the Delhi Medical Association (DMA), too, has sent a notice to the speaker while the Jaipur Medical Association has approached a court. "Our client has been shocked and surprised to see the impugned video as the same contains several false, and baseless averments and is a result of incorrect and grossly irresponsible publicising/posting," the DMA notice read. "The impugned video is not only a glaring case of incorrect posting based on utter conjectures and surmises, having no rational basis whatsoever but the same has been published with malafide intent to adversely affect and besmirch the name and repute of the medical professional of our country," it read (PTI | Jan 9, 2018, 22:17 IST, New Delhi).

• ICMRs guidelines to address vitamin D deficiency in children: ICMR has come out with new regulatory guidelines saying that Indian children should have a daily intake of 400 to 1000 IU and 600 to 1000 IU of vitamin D for children less than a year and u to 18 years respectively. But as per Indian experts, similar oral dosing of vitamin D concentration has not had the desired effect on the Indian children. In India oral doses of up to 2000 IU per day are barely able to maintain vitamin D sufficiency. A dose of 60,000 IU achieved vitamin D sufficient status in only 47% girls at the end of one year.

• MRI not dangerous for those with pacemakers: Patients who have permanent pacemakers or implantable cardioverter-defibrillators are often denied the opportunity to undergo MRI because of safety concerns. New research in the New England Journal of Medicine argues such safety concerns are incorrect and outdated. These concerns exist because of previous case reports in which appropriate protocols were not followed. Nazarian and a team of researchers performed a prospective, nonrandomized study of 1,509 patients to assess the safety of MRI at a magnetic field strength of 1.5 Tesla. 58 percent had a pacemaker and 42 percent were fitted with an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator; no devices were considered “MRI-conditional.” In total, no long-term, clinically relevant adverse events were reported during the study. But in nine MRI exams a patient’s device reset to a backup mode—a finding that was transient in eight of the nine instances.

Precautions

o    Use 1.5-tesla magnet

o    Limit specific absorption rate to 1.5 W/kg for a maximum of 30 minutes

o    Informed consent

o    Stand-by cardiologist and pacemaker technician