NUTS ASPIRIN COFFEE: All good for us? Why?

  To see the picture you'll have to click on: http://quiltcutie.blogspot.com/2013/11/nuts-aspirin-coffee-all-good-for-us-why.html.  When you get to the bottom you'll know why.

Amazing how quickly some news items get around!  There is a new paper by Dr. Ying Bao  (and six others) in the New England Journal of Medicine.  It is about nuts: they help you stay alive, apparently.   

In the last 24 hours I have heard about this study on TV (once), radio (twice), and read about it in two newspapers.  Contrast this with the cancer-sniffing-dogs story that broke in early September on “Sixty Minutes”, of all places, but has just now made it to the NY Times.  Maybe the Times was saving it for a slow-news day?  Anyway:

The nut result falls out of two massive studies, conducted on medical professionals, which lasted for a long time.  After “controlling” for potential confounding factors, nut-eaters appeared to die less (at any given age, of course; we all die eventually) than do non-nut-eaters.  Die of things like cancer and heart disease, that is – people who only eat nuts while driving rapidly on the freeway probably gain no net benefit.  The question of “why” doesn’t seem to have a definite answer as yet; there was some mention of reducing cholesterol (heart) and inflammation (cancer), but a detailed explanation was lacking.  The result apparently is robust statistically; although maybe we should get Dr. Ioannidis involved.  Moreover, it was logically dose-dependent: the more nuts you ate, the less likely you were to die.  So, pass the nut bowl.

As you can imagine, there are many “confounding factors" to be "controlled" for.  That is, maybe the cause and effect chain only carries nuts along for the ride.  To make up a stupid example:  When I drink beer with my buddies I often eat nuts.  I don’t doubt that there are many more beer-drinkers  like me.  So, maybe it is the beer that reduces mortality.  Or, to make it even more absurd, note that many people who drink beer drink too much, get a headache, then take aspirin.  It has been shown that aspirin is effective against some cancers, and also thins the blood, hence helps with stroke.  So maybe it’s the aspirin that goes along with the beer that accompanies the nuts that deserves the credit.  These are the sort of things that need to be controlled for.  Again, calling Dr. Ioannidis.

One disturbing fact about this study is that it was partially funded by the United Nut Pickers of the World, or some such body.  It is stated that they had no hand in the design of the experiment  nor interpretation of the results.  I’m sure that’s true – isn’t it?

Here are the links:

The popular press version:  http://www.foxnews.com/health/2013/11/21/study-says-nut-eaters-have-lower-cancer-heart-disease-risk/

The paper itself:  http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1307352

My references to Dr. Ioannidis:  http://ljb-quiltcutie.blogspot.com/2013/11/beware-greeks-bearing-manuscripts.html

 Like I've said many times before:  I am from a generation that used dial telephones attached to the wall.  It is a wonder I have learned as much about computers as I have.  But - I have hit an intractable impasse:  I cannot get this damned Blogger program to allow me to post a picture.  As you may know, I have two blogs; the other one is called Let's Fight Back against Ovarian Cancer.  I semi-abandoned it months ago.  The interesting thing to me is that this orphan blog site will allow me to post the picture I wanted to post here - but not "Myrl's Blog".  As I am aware that most of you mainly use my painfully crafted blog essays as background for a picture gallery, I direct you to that other blog site.  I will keep on experimenting.   I will now try abject. groveling  surrender, in the hope that the computer gods will relent. 

The next day:  groveling didn't work.