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Keys To Having A Restful Sleep

HIGH POINT, N.C. (WGHP) — Rest is critical for our bodies to recharge and it has a big impact on our overall health.

Dr. Andrew Namen, a pulmonologist at Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist and the medical director of the hospital's sleep programs, addresses how to achieve restful sleep on this week's House Call.

A minimum of 7 hours are recommended for healthy sleep.

If you are not suffering from memory loss, you don't need naps during the day.

Maintaining a level of alertness are a few personal ways to measure if you are getting quality sleep.

Keeping a sleep diary can help you keep track of this. There are also apps/watches to help track this.

Making sure when you go to bed, it is for SLEEP.

Focus on cutting out light exposure, changing your eating times – don't eat a heavy meal before sleep, don't work out before sleeping.

AI Tool Helps Clinicians To Identify And Treat Lung Cancer At Their Early Stages

A new artificial intelligence (AI) tool is helping physicians at Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist better predict and diagnose lung cancer in patients.

Wake Forest Baptist was the first academic medical center in the U.S. To begin using this technology, which is still not widely available across North Carolina and much of the country.

Through training on more than 70,000 computerized tomography (CT) scans, the AI tool can predict the likelihood of lung cancer based on imaging nodule characteristics and classify patients into high-risk, intermediate-risk, or low-risk categories.

This technology helps pulmonologists and radiologists better detect and track suspicious lung nodules that are cancerous in order to identify patients who should receive timely biopsies and treatment, while reducing unnecessary biopsies for patients who are classified as low risk.

According to the National Cancer Institute, lung cancer kills more Americans than any other cancer. Early detection can reduce deaths, but false-positive results often lead to increased anxiety and follow-up imaging.

We are proud to be an early adopter of proven and innovative technologies that enable our clinicians to identify and treat lung cancer at their early stages when it's possible to cure the cancer. The exciting part of this artificial intelligence lung cancer prediction tool is that it enhances our decision making, helping doctors intervene sooner and treat more lung cancers at an earlier stage."

Dr. Christina Bellinger, director of Wake Forest Baptist's interventional pulmonary program and associate professor of pulmonary, critical care, allergy and immunologic diseases at Wake Forest University School of Medicine

Bellinger and her Wake Forest University School of Medicine colleagues were involved in a study, led by the University of Pennsylvania, and published in Radiology, that found computer-aided diagnosis improves risk assessments for pulmonary nodules that are unclear and helps clinicians better recommend earlier treatment options for patients.

In addition to the AI tool, Wake Forest Baptist uses robotic bronchoscopy to help Bellinger and other specially trained physicians on her team reach and diagnose small lung nodules that are difficult to access through traditional bronchoscopy.

"This technology is already changing lives," Bellinger said. "We are getting better samples, diagnosing cancer earlier and improving patient outcomes."

Wake Forest Baptist's lung cancer screening program is a Screening Center of Excellence, designated by the Lung Cancer Alliance, and the health system's Comprehensive Cancer Center is one of only 53 to carry the National Cancer Institute designation.

The AI tool is developed by Optellum and the robotic bronchoscopy platform is developed by Intuitive.

Source:

Journal reference:

Kim, R. Y., et al. (2022). Artificial Intelligence Tool for Assessment of Indeterminate Pulmonary Nodules Detected with CT. Radiology. Doi.Org/10.1148/radiol.212182.

Black Residents Of Louisiana File Landmark Lawsuit

In the United States, a landmark lawsuit filed in a federal court in Louisiana on Tuesday by residents of the state's "Cancer Alley" declares an "environmental and public health emergency." It calls for an end to any new heavy industry, including fossil fuel, petrochemical plants, and related infrastructure in St. James Parish.

Members of Inclusive Louisiana, Mount Triumph Baptist Church, and RISE St. James brought the action against the local government, citing decades of environmental racism and discriminatory building of industrial facilities in predominantly Black communities in St James Parish. They cite "a legacy of slavery and white supremacy in Louisiana and St. James Parish specifically" that has forced "plaintiffs' members [to] reside in some of the most polluted, toxic – and lethal – census tracts in the country."

"Every one of us has had stories about our own health and health of our relatives and friends who have had cancer, respiratory conditions, burning of our eyes and skin conditions, COPD [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease], and chronic coughs. Today it's time to stop packing our neighborhoods with plants that produce toxic chemicals and pollute our air and water," said plaintiff Barbara Washington of Inclusive Louisiana at a press conference. "We deserve to live free from pollution."

More than 200 industrial plants – primarily fossil fuel and petrochemical operations – line an 85-mile stretch along the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge dubbed "Cancer Alley." Toxic air pollutant releases have resulted in some of the highest cancer risk to residents anywhere in the nation and documented elevated cancer rates.

While no new facilities have been built in the majority white communities in St. James Parish over the last 46 years, new projects continue to be greenlit in the majority Black districts, the suit contends.

"Enough is enough," said Shamyra Lavigne of Rise St. James.

On Monday, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the world's leading authority on climate science, published a call to action for governments to rapidly phase out fossil fuels, the primary driver of the climate crisis, to scale up renewable energy, and prioritize equity, climate justice, social justice, inclusion, and a just transition.

Myrtle Felton of Inclusive Louisiana announced the groups were launching a campaign to imagine a new economy, "one that isn't weighed down by pollution, dying industry, and one where everyone has an opportunity and no one needs to suffer."

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