The Guardian reports on research from Bristol Univeristy that has found that the children of women who are depressed during preganancy are more likely to become depressed themsleves.
The study suggests that this is due to levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which are raised in depression and may affect the development of the foetus in the womb.
The study also showed that post-natal depression was a risk factor for their children, but only for’mothers with low educational attainment’.
Carmine Pariante, professor of biological psychiatry at King’s College London’s Institute of Psychiatry, said: ‘The message is clear: helping women who are depressed in pregnancy will not only alleviate their suffering but also the suffering of the next generation.’
Good news for those who have been forgetting to take their supplements - Vitamin D has ‘no effect’ on the healthy according to the BBC.
A study published in The Lancet has found that vitamin D has no beneficial effect on bone density and therefore healthy adults do not need to take vitamin D supplements.
However the University of Auckland researchers said people should not stop taking supplements and ‘did find a small but statistically significant increase in bone density at the neck of the femur near the hip joint.’ Although as the BBC reports: ‘According to the authors, this effect is unlikely to be clinically significant.’
And if you’ve been looking forward to that weekend lie-in, well it won’t do you as much good as you think, says the Daily Mail. While sleeping in at the weekend does make you feel less stressed and sleepy and reduces inflammation within the body, it won’t help restore the ability to concentrate, American researchers have found.
The paper says: ‘Even a few days of lost sleep can have adverse effects, including increased daytime sleepiness, worsened daytime performance, an increase in molecules that are a sign of inflammation in the body, and impaired blood sugar regulation.’
