The Health News USA January 16 2018

• President Donald Trump’s White House physician declared him in “excellent health” after the president received his first medical checkup at Walter Reed military hospital on Friday, undergoing a physical examination amid suggestions in a recent book and by his detractors that he’s mentally unfit. The 6-foot-3 Trump weighed 236 pounds, and his BM1 of 29.5 put him in the category of being overweight for his height.
• Dallas County sued a slew of drug companies and doctors this week over their alleged roles in the deadly opioid epidemic, joining dozens of other governments nationwide that have launched court battles. The 59-page claim filed Monday in Dallas County court accuses at least 11 pharmaceutical companies — including Purdue Pharma, which makes the bestselling painkiller OxyContin — and 3 local doctors of knowingly pushing addictive drugs on patients while claiming they were safe.
• According to a recent study, one out of two teenagers feels “addicted” to their phone.
  Statistics like this may have fueled 2 major Apple investors to push the company to offer more flexible parental controls — in fact, Apple has already announced that it’s working on new ways to protect kids from smartphone addiction. According to a global survey by online security company AVG Technologies, 54% of kids think their parents check their devices too often and 32% of them “feel unimportant” when their parents are distracted by their phones.
  

News on Health Professional Radio. Today is the 16th of January 2018. Read by Tabetha Moreto.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/article194330754.html

President Donald Trump’s White House physician declared him in “excellent health” after the president received his first medical checkup at Walter Reed military hospital on Friday, undergoing a physical examination amid suggestions in a recent book and by his detractors that he’s mentally unfit. Trump spent about three hours at the medical facility in Bethesda, Maryland, outside Washington, for the Friday afternoon checkup, his first as president, before departing for Florida for the weekend.
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The examination lasted several hours and measured things like Trump’s blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar, heart rate and weight. The White House did not provide specific results of those tests.

While the exams are not mandatory, modern presidents typically undergo them regularly and release a doctor’s report declaring they are “fit for duty.” Two months before the November two thousand sixteen election, Trump released a five-paragraph letter from his longtime physician, Doctor Harold Bornstein, who concluded that Trump “is in excellent physical health.”

The two thousand sixteen letter put Trump’s blood pressure and cholesterol measurements in the healthy range, though he uses a cholesterol-lowering statin medication. His electrocardiogram, chest X-ray, echocardiogram and blood sugar were normal. The six-foot-three Trump weighed two hundred thirty six pounds, and his body mass index of twenty nine point five put him in the category of being overweight for his height.Trump was seventy when he took office on January twenty, two thousand seventeen, making him the oldest person ever elected to the nation’s highest office. Trump likes fast food along with well-done steaks, chocolate cake and double scoops of vanilla ice cream. He reportedly drinks twelve Diet Cokes a day.

https://www.dallasnews.com/news/dallas-county/2018/01/11/dallas-county-sues-big-drug-companies-opioid-epidemic

Dallas County sued a slew of drug companies and doctors this week over their alleged roles in the deadly opioid epidemic, joining dozens of other governments nationwide that have launched court battles. The fifty nine-page claim filed Monday in Dallas County court accuses at least eleven pharmaceutical companies — including Purdue Pharma, which makes the bestselling painkiller OxyContin — and three local doctors of knowingly pushing addictive drugs on patients while claiming they were safe. The three doctors have all been convicted of illegal “pill mill” over-prescription practices.
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Painkiller abuse has led to tens of thousands of deaths nationwide, and experts say the trend has led to more people using heroin, an opioid that can be cheaper and easier to obtain than prescription drugs.  Every day, ninety one Americans die on average from opioid overdoses, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In Dallas County, at least one thousand nine hundred twenty eight people have died of opioids or heroin overdoses since two thousand eleven, according to a Dallas Morning News review of autopsy records.

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Dozens of local and state governments have filed lawsuits against the major opioid manufacturers. Many are still winding their way through court. Last year, West Virginia secured a multimillion-dollar settlement with two drug distributors.

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2018/01/12/teen-cellphone-addiction-how-bad-has-it-gotten.html

According to a recent study, one out of two teenagers feels “addicted” to their phone.
Statistics like this may have fueled two major Apple investors to push the company to offer more flexible parental controls — in fact, Apple has already announced that it’s working on new ways to protect kids from smartphone addiction.

Clinical psychologist Doctor Sanam Hafeez told Fox News:“The smartphone manufacturers should have a warning or some educational or timeout mechanism that helps teens and adults use phones in a healthier way.”
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The data points to several adverse health effects. Research published in Clinical Psychological Science found that teens who spend five or more hours per day on their devices are seventy one percent more likely to have one risk factor for suicide, like depression or suicidal ideation.
A two thousand seventeen study published in the journal Child Development compared teens from the seventies, eighties and nineties, and found today’s teens are taking longer to engage in both the pleasures and the responsibilities of adulthood.

For example, from two thousand ten to two thousand sixteen, only thirty two percent of eighth graders had worked for pay, down from sixty three percent from those surveyed in the early nineteen nineties. With some research estimating that seventy eight percent of teens check their phones at least hourly, it may be difficult to decipher whether or not your child is truly “addicted to their phone.”

According to a global survey by online security company AVG Technologies, fifty four percent of kids think their parents check their devices too often and thirty two percent of them “feel unimportant” when their parents are distracted by their phones.