Health Shorts: Cholesterol, Health care, Cancer rates

Cholesterol can hit post-holiday highs 

The holiday season may confer an unwanted gift: higher cholesterol. 

Danish researchers studied 25,764 people in Copenhagen whose average age was 59. All had blood drawn regularly to test lipid levels. None were on cholesterol-lowering medicines. 

Average total cholesterol in the group over the whole year was 205, just over the recommended guideline of 200. Average LDL, or “bad” cholesterol, was 116, just above the 100 level considered healthy. 

But over three successive years in the first week of January, the average cholesterol was 240 and the average LDL was 143, both well into the unhealthy range. In June, the average cholesterol was 197 and the average LDL was 108. Nearly twice as many people had unhealthy lipid levels in January as in June. 

The study, in the journal Atherosclerosis, controlled for sex, age, body mass index, diabetes, smoking, alcohol consumption and other factors. 

The senior author, Dr. Anne Langsted of the Herlev and Gentofte Hospital in Denmark, said that lack of exercise and indulgence in high-fat food at that time of year may be to blame. But, she said, “A steady high cholesterol is what’s dangerous. We can’t say for sure, but the peaks at Christmas may not be so important if you have a good level the rest of the year.”

— Nicholas Bakalar, The New York Times

Billions go into selling you health care

Hoping to earn its share of the $3.5 trillion health care market, the medical industry is pouring more money than ever into advertising its products — from high-priced prescriptions to do-it-yourself genetic tests and unapproved stem cell treatments.

Spending on health care marketing doubled from 1997 to 2016, soaring to at least $30 billion a year, according to a study in JAMA.

"Marketing drives more testing. It drives more treatments. It's a big part of why health care is so expensive, because it's the fancy, high-tech stuff things that get marketed," said Steven Woloshin, co-director of the Center for Medicine and Media at The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy and Clinical Practice. His study captured only a portion of the many ways that drug companies, hospitals and labs promote themselves.

Advertising doesn't just persuade people to pick one brand over another, said Woloshin. Sophisticated campaigns make people worry about diseases they don't have and ask for drugs or exams they don't need.

Consumer advocates say that taxpayers pay the real price.

"Whenever pharma or a hospital spends money on advertising, we the patients pay for it — through higher prices for drugs and hospital services," said Shannon Brownlee, senior vice president of the Lown Institute, a nonprofit that advocates for affordable care. "Marketing is built into the cost of care."

— Liz Szabo, Kaiser Health News

Excess weight contributes to cancer rates 

More than 7 percent of cancer cases in the United States are attributable to excess body weight, a new study reports. 

Previous studies have established an association between body fat and at least a dozen cancers, with the highest risks for liver, uterine and esophageal cancers. 

The new report, in JAMA Oncology, found that from 2011 to 2015, among people 30 and older, 4.7 percent of cancers in men and 9.6 percent of those in women were attributable to excess weight — some 37,670 cancers in men, and 74,690 in women every year. 

The lead author, Farhad Islami, a scientific director at the American Cancer Society, said that the fat-attributable portion of cancer cases will be likely to increase in coming years with increasing obesity. 

“A range of interventions could be useful,” he said. “Zoning and licensing to encourage more fresh food outlets, taxes on sugary beverages, interventions at school and in the workplace. It’s important to have authorities at the state and local level implement some interventions to lower body weight.”

— Nicholas Bakalar, The New York Times