Link between skin temperature and migraines

A new study shows that women with colder skin temperatures are more likely to have migraines.

Migraine sufferers have colder noses and hands than people without migraines, possibly due to underlying blood vessel abnormalities, says a study published online in Autonomic Neuroscience. Migraine headaches are considered a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases and stroke, but few studies have examined skin-temperature changes as a marker of vascular health, researchers said.

The study compared skin temperature in the face and hands of 41 Finnish women, 12 with migraines and 29 without headaches. A family history of migraine headaches was reported by 85% of migraine subjects and 31% of controls.

Half of the migraine subjects had headaches only on the right side and five had migraines accompanied by visual disturbances called aura. A digital infrared camera was used to measure skin temperature on the nose, cheeks, forehead, hands and fingertips in migraine subjects during a headache-free period, and in controls. The results were compared.

The average temperature of the nose and hands was about 3.6-degrees Fahrenheit lower in migraine subjects than controls. Of the migraine patients, 58% had skin temperatures below 86 degrees Fahrenheit, which is considered a normal skin temperature, in both the nose and fingers.

By comparison, the nose and finger temperatures were below 86 Fahrenheit in 31% and 40% of controls respectively.

Subjects with right-sided migraines had significantly higher blood pressure and lower hand and finger temperatures than healthy controls. The difference in fingertip temperatures was almost 9 degrees Fahrenheit, researchers said.

Of the controls with cold hands, half had a family history of migraine. Skin-temperature changes were unrelated to headache aura.

Colder extremities in migraine patients were likely due to constricted peripheral arteries or impaired function of the autonomic nervous system, which controls the heart and internal organs, the study suggests.

Caveat: The study and didn't include men. Subjects' vascular health wasn't measured. Healthy individuals may have cold extremities, researchers said.

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Sleep apnea can worsen skin cancer outcomes

A recent study showed that people with sleep apnea had significantly worse melanoma and skin cancer outcomes.

A bad night’s sleep can be the result of stress, poor diet, or simply not getting enough hours of rest. If you begin to fall into a pattern of back-to-back sleepless nights and find yourself experiencing daytime sleepiness, slow reflexes, and poor concentration, you may be suffering from a common sleep disorder — sleep apnea. The common yet underrecognized condition affects the way that approximately 22 million Americans breathe when they sleep at night, according to the American Sleep Apnea Association. Eighty percent of moderate and severe cases of obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) are undiagnosed, putting patients at risk for high blood pressure, chronic heart failure, and other cardiovascular problems.

The sleep disorder has also been linked to a higher prevalence of cancer mortality. In sleep apnea, there is a lack of adequate air flow traveling into the lungs through the mouth and nose, causing a reduction in oxygen levels in the blood. This common trait in sleep apnea is known to play an important role during the various stages of tumor formation and progression. In fact, the severity of the sleep disorder may predict the risk of malignant skin melanoma, according to a new study.

Findings presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Annual Congress in Barcelona unveiled the link between skin cancer and sleep apnea in humans. Previous studies have examined the link between the sleep disorder and both mortality and incidence rates from cancer. However, this is the first study to analyze the relationship between a specific cancer — skin melanoma — and sleep apnea in humans. The researchers measured the aggressiveness of melanoma, along with the presence and severity of sleep apnea, in 56 patients diagnosed with malignant skin melanomas.

Sixty-one percent of patients with malignant skin melanomas had sleep apnea, while 14.3 percent had severe sleep apnea. The results of the study revealed that as the severity of sleep apnea increased, the progression of skin melanoma also increased. Extreme sleep apnea was also associated with a higher growth rate or depth of invasion of the tumor, reports Science Daily.

"This is the first study in a human sample to show that sleep apnea can worsen the outcomes of melanoma." said lead author of the study, Dr. Francisco Campos-Rodriguez, from the Hospital de Valme in Seville, Spain.

While most patients with sleep apnea suffer specifically from OSA, central sleep apnea is the second most common type of sleep apnea diagnosed. This type of sleep disorder happens when the brain doesn’t send the right signals to the muscles that are responsible for controlling breathing, according to the University of Maryland Medical Center. Some people even suffer from a combination of the two types of sleep apneas — known as complex sleep apnea.

The research findings by Campos-Rodriguez and his colleagues could have important clinical implications, if applied to a larger sample size. "If the results are confirmed in larger studies, this would have important clinical implications, particularly as sleep apnea can be easily treated and this could open up new therapeutic possibilities for people with both conditions,” Campos-Rodriguez said. The researchers have begun a bigger trial that will further analyze the link between the sleep disorder and skin melanoma, involving 450 patients with cutaneous melanoma. This study could provide a breakthrough in the treatment of skin cancer patients with sleep apnea.

According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 120,000 new cases of melanoma will be diagnosed in the United States in a year. The most preventable cause of skin melanoma is exposure to the sun.

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Facial cues of sleep deprivation

A study shows that certain facial cues of sleep deprivation, such as distinctions with the eyes, mouth and skin, signal to others that a person is sleep deprived.

A new study finds that sleep deprivation affects facial features such as the eyes, mouth and skin, and these features function as cues of sleep loss to other people.

Results show that the faces of sleep-deprived individuals were perceived as having more hanging eyelids, redder eyes, more swollen eyes and darker circles under the eyes. Sleep deprivation also was associated with paler skin, more wrinkles or fine lines, and more droopy corners of the mouth. People also looked sadder when sleep-deprived than after normal sleep, and sadness was related to looking fatigued.

"Since faces contain a lot of information on which humans base their interactions with each other, how fatigued a person appears may affect how others behave toward them," said Tina Sundelin, MSc, lead author and doctoral student in the department of psychology at Stockholm University in Stockholm, Sweden. "This is relevant not only for private social interactions, but also official ones such as with health care professionals and in public safety."

The study, which appears in the September issue of the journal Sleep, was conducted at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden. Ten subjects were photographed on two separate occasions: after eight hours of normal sleep and after 31 hours of sleep deprivation. The photographs were taken in the laboratory at 2:30 p.m. on both occasions. Forty participants rated the 20 facial photographs with respect to 10 facial cues, fatigue and sadness.

According to the authors, face perception involves a specialized neuronal network and is one of the most developed visual perceptual skills in humans. Facial appearance can affect judgments of attributes such as trustworthiness, aggressiveness and competence.

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Study claims the secret to young-looking skin is sleep

A study claims that those who get poor quality sleep have more signs of aging skin than those who get better quality sleep.

Want better, younger looking skin? Get better sleep, a new study finds.

In a small study at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland, Ohio, poor sleepers were found "to show increased signs of skin aging and slower recovery from a variety of environmental stressors," such as ultraviolet radiation, the researchers said. The study, presented at the International Investigative Dermatology Meeting in Edinburgh, Scotland, was commissioned by Estée Lauder.

"While chronic sleep deprivation has been linked to medical problems such as obesity, diabetes, cancer and immune deficiency, its effects on skin function have previously been unknown," said head researcher Dr. Elma Baron.

The study involved 60 women between the ages of 30 and 49, with half of participants falling into the poor quality sleep category. The classification was made on the basis of average duration of sleep and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, a standard questionnaire-based assessment of sleep quality.

Poor quality sleepers showed increased signs of intrinsic skin aging including fine lines, uneven pigmentation and slackening of skin and reduced elasticity. The researchers found that good quality sleepers recovered more efficiently from stressors to the skin, such as sunburns.

Self perception of attractiveness was also significantly better among subjects who slept well compared to those who didn't.

If you think you fall in the poor sleeper category, WebMD and the Mayo Clinic offer the following tips to boost your zzzs: Stick to a regular sleep schedule, even on weekends. Eat well, and avoid caffeine in the evenings or overeating before bedtime. Also try sleep accessories, such as a white noise machine or ear plugs, to block out distractions. Exercise during the day, which can aid sleep, and try to clear your mind from too much clutter before bedtime by writing in a journal beforehand, for example. Though you may think chronic sleep deprivation is just stress-related, it could also be caused by an underlying medical problem like sleep apnea, so it's a good idea to talk to your doctor.

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Scientists create brain cells from human skin in possible breakthrough for autism, Alzheimer's research

Brain and skin from common stem cells. JR

Scientists who have generated brain tissue from human skin are claiming a major breakthrough.

The researchers wrote on the University of Cambridge website that their findings could speed up the hunt for new treatments for diseases of the cerebral cortex, such as epilepsy and autism, to neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease.

"Today’s findings will enable scientists to study how the human cerebral cortex develops, how it ‘wires up’ and how that can go wrong (a common problem leading to learning disabilities)," they wrote.

Their findings were published in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

Created cerebral cortex cells – those that make up the brain’s grey matter -- will allow them to "recreate brain diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, in the lab," they wrote, providing "previously impossible insight."

It may also allow them to develop and test new drugs to stop the diseases progressing.

Britain's Sunday Telegraph reported that until now, it has only been possible to generate tissue from the cerebral cortex by using controversial embryonic stem cells, obtained by the destruction of an embryo.

...

''We can study brain development and what goes wrong when it is affected by disease in a way we haven't been able to before. We see it as a major breakthrough in what will now be possible.''

Read more: http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/united-kingdom/120213/brain-tissue-skin-alzheimers-epilepsy-stroke-cambridge-university