Media Coverage

The discovery is important, says AIDS researcher Thomas Hope, professor of cell and developmental biology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, because fighting a virus like HIV requires knowing your enemy. “It’s important for us to understand all the strains that are out there, it’s important for us to understand that the (test) we are using will catch this new virus.” Current treatments for HIV, which can reduce viral load and prevent illness, are effective against variants of the HIV virus, including the new subtype, meaning that a new strain is not a new public health crisis.

“It could be the environment, diet, exposure to issues in their life experience,” noted Dr. Clyde Yancy, national spokesperson for the American Heart Association and chief of cardiology at Northwestern University in Chicago. It could also be “something they were exposed to, like violence and trauma,” he noted in a phone interview. The study was not designed to determine how stress might raise hypertension risk and cannot say whether reducing stress would lower that risk, Spruill said.

According to Dr. Hans Breiter, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, we’re a long way from fully understanding what marijuana does to the brain. “Marijuana is a complex plant with at least 104 distinct compounds within it that can have variable psychoactive and neuroactive effects,” said Breiter, whose research focuses on addiction, including the impact of cannabis use. “Psychoactive effects are the main things one would be acutely concerned about for driving, operating heavy machinery or for any type of process that involves complex decision-making and risk benefit analysis of this sort.”

Sad to say so long to the streaming sun and warm summertime air? It only makes sense that we are. Here comes the season of closed windows, more gray skies, and (for some of us) waking up in complete darkness. All of those things are reasons enough to wake up feeling a little less chipper during the winter months than you might feel during the warm days of summer, explains Kevin Most, DO, Chief Medical Officer and a family medicine physician at Northwestern Medicine Central DuPage Hospital.

Several states are pushing to make the twice-yearly time change a thing of the past. In Illinois, the Senate is scheduled to take up a bill next week to make daylight saving time permanent. And it’s not just politicians who want to beat the clock. Dr. Phyllis Zee, a neurologist and director of the Center for Circadian and Sleep Medicine at Northwestern Medicine, is sounding the alarm on the negative health and productivity outcomes of the seasonal time shift.

Northwestern Medicine Lake Forest Hospital earlier this month launched a new “telepsych” program after noticing an increase in emergency patients experiencing a mental health crisis, said Patti Gobel, a social worker and manager of the case management department. Because the hospital does not have a behavioral health unit in the building, there’s not always a psychiatrist available on-site for a live consultation.

This is particularly true for those who skimp on sleep during the workweek, added Dr. Phyllis Zee, the chief of sleep medicine at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. “For most people,” she said, “it’s a good idea to get an extra hour of sleep because sleep is important for memory, appetite, mood, immune and cardiovascular functions.” Our day will appear to be longer on November 3 because of the rules of the Daylight Saving Time system, which was developed more than 100 years ago and formally adopted in the US in 1966.

The study “elegantly” illustrates the importance of deep sleep, according to Dr. Phyllis Zee, a sleep medicine specialist not involved in the work. It “helps to explain how and why sleep is important for keeping neurons healthy — facilitating the removal of toxic molecules,” said Zee, a professor of neurology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, in Chicago. “One can think of sleep as a top way to take care of your brain,” she said.

“Research studies have examined the effects of short-term bouts of overeating on subsequent food intake, hunger, weight, and metabolism in the days following. These studies suggest that it may take 2-4 days for us to return to baseline, and that many people don’t ever fully compensate for the excess calories, even after short bouts of overeating (such as may occur over a holiday weekend),” says Lisa Neff, MD, an endocrinologist at Northwestern Medicine. “Over time, this may contribute to weight gain and increase the risk for weight-related medical issues, such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure, and diabetes.”

Federal law allows states to remain on standard time year-round but only Hawaii and most of Arizona have chosen to. Proposed legislation in several states would have them join suit – or switch to year-round daylight saving time, which would require congressional approval. Roenneberg and Northwestern’s Zee are co-authors of a recent position statement advocating returning to standard time for good, written for the Society for Research on Biological Rhythms.