April 2017 Health Newsletter

A recent study by the Journal of the American College of Surgeons looked at how many people had heard of something called "overlapping surgery." Overlapping Surgery is when a surgeon performs a critical part of an operation, then leaves a non-critical part to a different surgeon in training, or a physician's assistant, so they can head to a totally different surgery and do the same thing. A common scenario is when the main surgeon leaves closing incisions to an underling so they can move to a different procedure with a different patient. According to the study, although common practice, only a tiny margin of the people surveyed had heard of this practice (4% out of over 1,400 respondents). Almost all of the respondents thought that the patient should be informed of it before going under the knife. Specifically, they thought that patients should know who will perform what aspect of the surgery, including who would be in the room and the role of trainees. Therefore, if you or a loved one is going under the knife, ensure to thoroughly ask who will be involved with all aspects of the surgery so you remain fully informed.

According to a recent review of research by The BMJ, the tie between obesity and 11 different types of cancers has been strengthened. According to Reuters, the review looked at a larger group of hundreds of studies published in the past that specifically examined the relationship between obesity and 36 types of cancers. Scholars looked for signs that the already-established link between cancer and obesity had been exaggerated, and in the process found a stronger correlation between obesity and 11 specific cancers. In particular, cancers of the organs in the digestive tract as well as women’s reproductive organs were found to have the strongest links to obesity. These include kidney, colon, pancreas, and rectal cancer as well as bone marrow, ovarian, and breast cancer. In addition to these findings, the research review also found a strong connection between a high BMI (body mass index, which measures the ratio of weight to height) and cancers in the pancreas, kidney, esophagus, liver, and bone marrow. Excess weight carried around the midsection also has risk factors for cancer, as women with extra weight and belly fat were found to have an increased chance of developing endometrial cancer. In fact, the risk increases the higher the waist-to-hip ratio (the measurement for belly fat). The takeaway? People can lower their risk for cancer by staying at a consistently healthy weight.