Chrissy
01-20-2009, 02:33 PM
Does sickness affect the sexes differently?
GUARDIAN NEWS SERVICE
By Lucy Atkins in London
Researchers have found that rheumatoid arthritis affects women more severely than men. So do other conditions affect the genders differently, asks Lucy Atkins.
We often make glib assumptions about the differences between how men and women respond to health complaints. Designed to endure the agony of childbirth, women are often thought to have higher pain thresholds, while men are frequently teased about coping poorly with colds. But how much solid evidence is there of a disparity in how the genders are affected by illness?
It is well known that women in many countries tend to live longer than men (current figures for the UK have it at four years). Women visit their doctors more and smoke and drink less than men, and their hormones help protect them from heart disease until the menopause. We also know that some diseases affect men more than women, and vice versa.
Relatively little, however, is known about how differently men and women's bodies deal with the same illnesses, once they have them.
A Finnish study has broken new ground by showing that women experience more severe symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis - the chronic joint disease - than men. When researchers studied 6,000 people they found that women had worse pain, swelling and exhaustion than men, when the disease was at exactly the same stage.
"Hormones probably play a big part in this," says Professor Alan Silman, clinical director of the Arthritis Research Campaign. The female hormone, oestrogen, increases inflammation, exacerbating the painful swelling of joints.
Differences between the male and female body build might also be to blame. "Men have a greater muscle mass than women and strong muscles allow the body to function more efficiently, thereby minimising the strain on joints," says Silman. And women's weight distribution is usually lower than men's, which puts more pressure on the hips and knees.
read more ....
http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/099200901210302.htm
GUARDIAN NEWS SERVICE
By Lucy Atkins in London
Researchers have found that rheumatoid arthritis affects women more severely than men. So do other conditions affect the genders differently, asks Lucy Atkins.
We often make glib assumptions about the differences between how men and women respond to health complaints. Designed to endure the agony of childbirth, women are often thought to have higher pain thresholds, while men are frequently teased about coping poorly with colds. But how much solid evidence is there of a disparity in how the genders are affected by illness?
It is well known that women in many countries tend to live longer than men (current figures for the UK have it at four years). Women visit their doctors more and smoke and drink less than men, and their hormones help protect them from heart disease until the menopause. We also know that some diseases affect men more than women, and vice versa.
Relatively little, however, is known about how differently men and women's bodies deal with the same illnesses, once they have them.
A Finnish study has broken new ground by showing that women experience more severe symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis - the chronic joint disease - than men. When researchers studied 6,000 people they found that women had worse pain, swelling and exhaustion than men, when the disease was at exactly the same stage.
"Hormones probably play a big part in this," says Professor Alan Silman, clinical director of the Arthritis Research Campaign. The female hormone, oestrogen, increases inflammation, exacerbating the painful swelling of joints.
Differences between the male and female body build might also be to blame. "Men have a greater muscle mass than women and strong muscles allow the body to function more efficiently, thereby minimising the strain on joints," says Silman. And women's weight distribution is usually lower than men's, which puts more pressure on the hips and knees.
read more ....
http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/099200901210302.htm