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Not so dangerous Sleepless nights It’s a pain being ill
stream, causing potentially lifethreatening conditions that include sepsis and meningitis. Over65s are regarded as being at greatest risk from listeriosis, which is
INSOMNIA affects one in three Britons and most are women, although comparatively little research and few trials have concentrated on why they are more affected than men.
Sleep expert Dr Lindsay Brown attributed this lack of interest to the common and traditional assumption that female insom regarded as particularly dangerous for the over80s. nia is a ‘woman’s problem’ linked to hormonal fluctuations caused by menstruation, pregnancy and menopause.
Health professionals also pointed out that listeriosis is unusual in healthy people, including the over65s.
“There’s a catastrophic lack of knowledge about women’s health as a whole, and this is just one more lifealtering concern that’s been left on the sidelines,” Dr Brown said.
THE Gender Pain Gap not only exists, but is a common problem.
A UK study of more than 5,000 men and women aged between 18 and 65 regarding their experiences and perceptions of pain found a noticeable disparity.
Fifty per cent of the women taking part in the survey reported lack of support from GPs when trying to get help for pain, compared to only 36 per cent of men, ac cording to the Gender Pain Gap Index Report published by painkillers manufacturer Reckitt Benckiser.
Sixty three per cent of the women said that they believed men’s pain was taken more seriously owing to ‘gender discrimination’ by healthcare professionals. A further 56 per cent said they felt they were ignored or merely dismissed as ‘emotional’ compared with 49 per cent of men.
Creative women
A STUDY published in Frontiers in Psychology involved 72 women completing various tasks.
In one, they were asked to list as many uses as possible for an everyday object. In another they were shown three words and asked to produce a fourth word related to them.
After the women’s ideas were scored by four independent evaluators, the results showed that they displayed most originality during the ovulatory phase, suggesting this could be when females are at their most creative.
Leave well alone
FORMER Bake Off finalist
Kimberly Wilson, also a psychologist and nutrition expert, fears that ultraprocessed food increases waistlines and reduces IQs.
Quoting intelligence researcher James Flynn, she pointed out that IQ levels in most developed countries have fallen since the 1990s, coinciding with increased consumption of overprocessed foods.
“Don’t buy anything with more than five ingredients, don’t eat it if sugar is one of the top three ingredients and if you can’t pronounce it then don’t eat it,” Kimberley advised.
