Your Health

By Janice M. Horowitz

GOOD NEWS

AH, SWEET GINSENG Used for centuries to fight off ills from fatigue to infirmity, the fleshy roots of the ginseng plant may have a role in treating diabetes. A preliminary study suggests diabetics who take a 3-g capsule of American ginseng--the only kind tested--before eating may be able to curtail the tendency of blood-sugar levels to soar after a meal. But before you stock up, better wait for more definitive studies.

BEYOND VIAGRA Ready for an alternative to the little blue impotence pill? An advisory panel to the FDA--whose recommendations the agency usually follows--has, ahem, doled out support for Uprima, a new impotence drug that works by targeting chemicals in the brain thought to be responsible for an erection. (Viagra, by contrast, increases blood flow to the penis.) Uprima can act in as little as 10 min. and succeeds in 60% of men, but it's not without risks: 1 in 30 subjects who took it either fainted or suffered serious drops in blood pressure.

BAD NEWS

SNOOZE ALARM You may hate having a bedmate who snores, especially if the snoring is a result of sleep apnea--a condition in which breathing stops repeatedly for brief moments throughout the night. But think what the problem is doing to your partner. Researchers report that folks with severe sleep apnea--more than 30 breathing lapses an hour--are twice as likely to have high blood pressure as silent snoozers. The constant gasping for air prevents restful sleep, which probably affects blood pressure.

HORMONES AND THE HEART More confusion for women on hormone-replacement therapy: a second look at data released two years ago about women with heart disease suggests that estrogen and progestin may slightly lower the risk of heart attack among subjects with high levels of a form of cholesterol called lipoprotein-a. In women with normal or low levels of the cholesterol, however, the hormones seemed to raise the heart-attack risk. You should probably discuss this latest hormone dilemma with your doctor--and stand by for more conclusive data.

--By Janice M. Horowitz

Sources: Good News--Archives of Internal Medicine (4/10/00); FDA. Bad News--(1 & 2) Journal of the American Medical Association (4/12/00)