Youth who participate in school sports have less stress and better mental health as young adults, Canadian study finds

According to new research published in the Journal of Adolescent Health, young people in Canada who participate in team sports in grades 8-12 experience less stress and have better mental health as young adults.

"It's important that school administrators recognize the importance of sport participation and physical activity," said lead author Catherin M. Sabiston of the University of Toronto. "The associations we have found show a long-term impact. School sport from ages 12 to 17 protects those youth from poor mental health four years later."

Researchers noted that between 23 and 40 percent of youth report that they are depressed and experiencing high stress. The researchers wanted to see if participating in school sports would reduce the trend, Glenda Fauntleroy reports for Health Behavior News Service.

Researchers surveyed nearly 850 students from 10 schools in Canada. "Three years after graduation, participants were asked about how often they experienced depressive symptoms, the amount of stress in their lives and how they rated their mental health on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent)," Fauntleroy reports.

Those who played sports got better scores on all mental-health assessments than those who didn't play school sports. Therefore, student participation in sports was connected with "lower perceived stress and higher self-rated mental health in young adulthood," Fauntleroy writes.

Sabiston explained that the study examined school sports participation rather than extracurricular sports because students are a popular group for specific intervention strategies. Also, parents and guardians generally do not have to contribute as much time and money for children to participate in school sports.

"We can only speculate as to the unique effects," Sabiston said, "but we suspect it might be due to school sport providing adolescents with opportunities to bond with other students, feel connected to their school, interact with their peers and coaches, thus, really providing a social and active environment."

Evidence suggests that exercise gives significant psychological benefits, Jack Raglin, a professor in the department of kinesiology at Indiana University, told Fautnleroy. "Single sessions of activity reduce anxiety, improve mood and raise feelings of energy that last for several hours," Raglin said. "Long-term participation can significantly improve conditions such as clinical anxiety and depression to a degree that rivals medication, both in adults and adolescents." Other positive effects of sports participation are feelings of mastery and accomplishment, he added. (Read more)

UK receives $3.75 million from CDC to use for colorectal cancer screening in Kentucky River's headwater counties

The University of Kentucky Rural Cancer Prevention Center has received a $3.75 million, five-year grant renewal from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to use toward the prevention of colorectal cancer in Central Appalachia and other rural areas.

The UK Center is one of 26 CDC-funded Prevention Research Centers in the country, Mallory Powell reports for UKNow. It works with a team of community members, public health professionals and researchers to conduct and support community-based, participatory prevention research toward rural cancer prevention in the Kentucky River Area Development District.

Over the next five years, this $3.75 million grant will allow Dr. Richard Crosby, director of the RCPC and his team to develop, implement, and disseminate an at-home colorectal screening test that has the potential to drastically increase annual colorectal cancer screenings in rural areas, Powell reports.

Kentucky has the nation's highest rates of cancer incidence and death, with more people from Appalachian Kentucky dying from colorectal cancer than those diagnosed with the same cancer in other regions of the state.

"This is about serving Kentuckians, and we are targeting an area of rural Appalachia that has extremely high rates of colorectal cancer morbidity," Crosby told Powell. "We're focusing on a project that engages people at a point when we can still do something to prevent their death."

The at-home colorectal screening test will allow the person to collect a small stool sample per instruction in the privacy of their home and mail it in the provided kit to the lab for testing, Powell notes. The lab will then determine if there are any potentially cancerous cells. If the test comes back positive, the RCPC staff will assist the participant with further testing and treatment as needed.

Colorectal cancer is usually a slow growing cancer and has a higher survival rate if detected and treated early. Late diagnosis because of delayed or lack of screening causes the chance of survival rate to significantly drop.

Delayed or lack of screening for colorectal cancer is often a problem for people living in rural areas like Appalachia because of healthcare access, Powell notes. The Kentucky River ADD falls into this category, since all eight counties in the district are classified as health-care professional shortage Areas by the Health Services and Resources Administration. This district is also one of the poorest in the nation.

The colorectal screening work of the RCPC will build on the successes of its previous prevention program for cervical cancer prevention and screening, which is now being used in 18 local Kentucky health departments and has also been adapted for use in 30 local health departments in North Carolina.

Kentucky ranks No. 4 in painkiller prescriptions; neighboring states are first, second and third

Powerful painkillers are a contributing factor in the the rising rate of overdose deaths in the U.S., especially in Kentucky, where officials have recommended more measures be taken to monitor painkiller prescriptions. Now the government is pointing out the states whose doctors write the most prescriptions, and Kentucky ranks fourth, Mike Stobbe reports for The Associated Press.

The reports are part of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's campaign to prevent deaths from prescription opioids such as Vicodin and OxyContin. Drug overdose deaths reached 41,000 in 2011, and 41 percent of them had to do with prescription painkillers. "The state account comes from a database of U.S. retail pharmacies that fill the bulk of prescriptions," Stobbe writes.

In 2012, Southern states led the list. Kentucky ranked behind Alabama, which had 143 prescriptions for every 100 people; Tennessee, and West Virginia. Southern doctors also prescribed the most antibiotics and stimulants for children. Although chronic disease rates are often higher in the South, research has shown that doesn't explain the disparity.

"Prescriptions go up; deaths go up. Prescriptions go down; deaths go down," said CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden. However, evidence to confirm the connection is lacking. The CDC keeps track of death rates but combines all drug overdoses, including heroin and cocaine. Those rankings are not the same as the prescription list. "But officials cite studies that show higher overdose rates when there are more prescriptions of painkillers and larger doses prescribed," Stobbe writes.

To help fix the problem, officials suggest more prescription drug monitoring programs at the state level and laws to stop "pill mills," which are offices and clinics that prescribe too many addictive medicines. In Florida, pill mills became a big issue in the last 10 years, but from 2010-2011, the state set up stricter pain clinic regulations, and police did some raids. "By 2012, prescriptions for oxycodone alone fell 24 percent, and the death rate for prescription drug overdoses dropped 23 percent," Stobbe writes. (Read more)

'This kind of sloppy defiance reeks of a Podunk attitude,' Hopkinsville paper says after fair doesn't enforce smoking ban

It's been a while since we read an editorial as clear, blunt and well-taken as the one the Kentucky New Era ran about the flouting of Hopkinsville's smoking ban at the Western Kentucky State Fair, so here it is, in its entirety:

The Hopkinsville ordinance that bans smoking at most indoor public places is not enforced at the Western Kentucky State Fairgrounds convention center. That became clear last week during the fair. Despite assurances from the fair board’s leadership that smoking ban violations would be addressed, at least a few people continued to smoke cigarettes throughout fair week inside the convention center.

This is a shame on so many counts.

First, it makes a joke of the smoking ban that is intended to ensure the city’s indoor public places are healthier for everyone, especially for children and for adults who don’t smoke and don’t want to be exposed to secondhand smoke. If the fair board cannot get in line with a smoking ordinance 18 months after it went into effect, why should any store, office or restaurant in the city that’s opposed to the ban go along with it?

Second, by refusing to enforce the ban, the fair board is ignoring the fact that hundreds of people who do not smoke and do not want to be exposed to secondhand smoke will now see the convention center as one of the most undesirable places in the city. It seems to say something about the fair board’s opinion of the building. Is it that negative?

Third, the smoking violations put the fair board in conflict with the no-smoking signs the board itself must have authorized for the building’s front and rear doors. What was the purpose of the signs? It looks like window dressing to anyone who passes the threshold and then finds someone smoking in the middle of the building in the middle of the day.

Fourth, the smoking violations put the fair board in conflict with city government. The convention center and the fairgrounds are inside city limits. The smoking ban applies to the convention center. The building is not an island or a special place set off to itself.

During fair week, the convention center is one of the most public places in the city. Thousands of people, including children, pass through the building for pageants, talent shows and gardening and home goods competitions.

The fair board ought to play by the rules and respect the process that resulted in Hopkinsville City Council’s approval of the smoking ban.

If the fair board won’t obey the ordinance, city officials need to enforce the ban. If they don’t, they will risk having more people behave as if the law does not apply to them.

This kind of sloppy defiance reeks of a Podunk attitude.

That’s not the reputation Hopkinsville wants or deserves.

Drug developed to treat addiction is being abused, so much that clinics have been opened to sell it

"Suboxone, a popular and highly touted medicine designed to get people off opioids such as painkillers and heroin, is increasingly being abused, sold on the streets and inappropriately prescribed, according to doctors and drug control and law enforcement officials," Laura Ungar reports for The Courier-Journal. "The drug combines buprenorphine, an opioid, and naloxone, which counters the effects of an overdose. Prescriptions for Suboxone and its generic equivalent rose 63 percent in Kentucky between the first quarter of 2012 and the first quarter of this year, to 113,713 from 69,640."

One reason is the state's crackdown on pain clinics that were little more than pill mills. "In lieu of that, now people are opening Suboxone clinics. Many are cash-only," Leanne Diakov, general counsel for the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure, told Ungar. "We have seen some doctors in trouble with licenses or finances opening these clinics." Ungar found that 14 percent, or 45, of the 330 Kentucky physicians authorized to prescribe buprenorphine "have a history of discipline by the medical board."

Attorney General Jack Conway told Ungar that suboxone abuse "is certainly on my radar, but I've kind of been careful to tread lightly. Some people desperately need Suboxone. I view it as a treatment of last resort . . . not a magic pill for addiction." Doctors told Ungar that some addicts self-medicate with Suboxone and use it to stave off withdrawal symptoms "when they have nowhere else to turn," she writes.