DURHAM, N.C. -- For chronically lonely adolescents, even the rare invitation to a social event is likely to be met with suspicion: "It's not that I'm worthy, I just got lucky," they'll tell themselves.

And when not included in a gathering of peers, the chronically lonely teen will attribute it to some personal flaw.

New York, NY - Recent studies conclude that people with epilepsy have a 27-fold greater risk of sudden death than people without the disorder. However, many of these deaths could be prevented through greater identification of epilepsy as a cause of death, and in educating the public more effectively about the disease's life-threatening dangers.

These are the opinions shared by some of the country's leading epilepsy researchers at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York, in an opinion article published online December 16 in the journal Neurology. The authors call for a broad public health campaign and improved cause-of-death reporting.

The 2015 Monitoring the Future survey (MTF) shows decreasing use of a number of substances, including cigarettes, alcohol, prescription opioid pain relievers, and synthetic cannabinoids ("synthetic marijuana"). Other drug use remains stable, including marijuana, with continued high rates of daily use reported among 12th graders, and ongoing declines in perception of its harms.

The MTF survey measures drug use and attitudes among eighth, 10th, and 12th graders, and is funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health. The survey has been conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor since 1975.

Nearly 185 million adults and 24 million children in the United States are overweight or obese. In Philadelphia, an estimated 68 percent of adults are overweight or obese. Beyond impaired cognitive function, poor sleep is associated with a host of chronic health problems including depression, obesity, and hypertension. Additionally, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 50 to 70 million U.S. adults experience sleep or wakefulness disorders.

Weight loss due to dietary changes can improve sleepiness at any weight, says a study published in the journal Sleep, which the authors say reaffirms how weight fluctuations impact numerous aspects of sleep independent of body weight.

Almost 70 percent of Americans are overweight or obese, according to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health. Strategies for fighting obesity, such as pharmacological and behavioral approaches to decrease food intake, have been only marginally successful. Patients who have undergone various surgeries for the gastrointestinal system have found success, but these are extreme measures. Scientists are hopeful that increasing energy expenditure with brown or brite/beige fat cells could be an effective way to fight obesity.

One of every three deaths in the U.S. in 2013 were from heart disease, stroke and other cardiovascular diseases, while heart disease and stroke were the top and second killers worldwide, according to American Heart Association's 2016 Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics Update, which uses data from the AHA, the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other government sources.  

In the U.S. the data showed:

• cardiovascular diseases claimed 801,000 lives;

• heart disease killed more than 370,000 people;

• stroke killed nearly 129,000 people;

• about 116,000 of the 750,000 people in the U.S. who had a heart attack died;

Quebec's legislation on medical aid in dying has many aspects in common with laws passed in Belgium and the Netherlands in 2002 to regulate euthanasia, but it is more restrictive in nature because it only concerns people at end-of-life.

This was observed by Jocelyne St-Arnaud, a professor of ethics in health at the University of Montréal's Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, during a seminar she gave on December 2 as part of the Séminaires de l'IRSPUM series.

Daejeon, Republic of Korea, Dec. 16, 2015 -- When a fake phone company released its line of products, NoPhones, a thin, rectangular-shaped plastic block that looked just like a smartphone but did not function, many doubted that the simulated smartphones would find any users. Surprisingly, close to 4,000 fake phones were sold to consumers who wanted to curb their phone usage.

As smartphones penetrate every facet of our daily lives, a growing number of people have expressed concern about distractions or even the addictions they suffer from overusing smartphones.

Santa Claus performers struggle with fulfilling the role of jolly old St. Nicholas due to an acute awareness of the sensitivities around interactions with children in modern times, according to 15 formal interviews with Santa performers comprising 14 male Santa performers aged between 52 and 81 and one female grotto assistant who performed in the guise of an elf, aged 32.

Psychologists say they have evidence of tool use by greater vasa parrots (Coracopsis vasa). They determined this by studying ten captive parrots and seeing that the birds adopt a novel tool-using technique to acquire calcium from seashells. They also noted active sharing of tools among themselves.