Impact of Shifting From Office Work to Telework on Workers' Physical Health: A Longitudinal Study.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study is to clarify the longitudinal association between teleworking and physical health changes of Japanese workers before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS: Participants were in a certain company who received mandatory health examinations in 2019 and 2020. In June 2020, the participants were asked about frequency of teleworking, which was introduced owing to the COVID-19. Whether physical health differed by the frequency of teleworking was analyzed. RESULTS: The participants were 3689 workers. Frequency of teleworking were associated with more deleterious changes in diastolic blood pressure, antilipidemic drug use, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, Glutamic Oxaloacetic Transaminase(GOT), Glutamic Pyruvic Transaminase(GPT), metabolic syndrome, and insufficient walking time among men. In contrast, no significant changes were observed in women. CONCLUSIONS: Male workers who teleworked more frequently were more likely to experience a deterioration in their physical health within 1-year compared with those who worked at the office.

Determination of Optimal Daily Magnesium Intake among Physically Active People: A Scoping Review.

Little is known about the optimal daily magnesium (Mg) intake for individuals with high levels of physical activity. The aim of this study was to clarify the optimal dietary Mg intake for people with high levels of physical activity in a scoping review. In this review, we searched MEDLINE and Japan Medical Abstracts Society for studies published up to May 31, 2020. We conducted two searches, one for studies using gold standard measurement methods such as the balance method and factorial calculation (Search 1), and the other for studies using estimation from daily food intake (Search 2). We also performed a meta-analysis of studies that compared the Mg intake among physically active people with the Mg intake among controls. After the primary and secondary screening, 31 studies were included in the final review. All of the included studies examined professional or recreational athletes. We found no studies that examined the optimal intake of Mg using gold standard measurement methods. The Mg intake among physically active individuals was below the recommended dietary allowance in most studies. In five studies that conducted meta-analyses, physically active individuals had significantly higher intakes of Mg than controls, although these levels were still below the recommended dietary allowance. The present review revealed that evidence regarding the optimal daily magnesium intake is currently scarce, and further studies are needed.

[Serum total cholesterol levels and eligibility for long-term care insurance: a prospective cohort study of the Tsurugaya project].

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between serum total cholesterol levels and certification eligibility for long-term care insurance in elderly Japanese individuals. METHODS: The Tsurugaya Project was a comprehensive geriatric assessment conducted for community-dwelling elderly individuals aged ≥70 years in the Tsurugaya area, Sendai, Japan. Of the 2,925 inhabitants, 958 subjects participated in the Tsurugaya Project. For this analysis, we used 827 subjects who gave informed consent and were not qualified for long-term care insurance at the time of the baseline survey. Subjects were followed up for 6 years. We classified the subjects into 4 quintiles and used the fourth quintile (212-230 mg/dL) as a reference for statistical analysis. We used Cox proportional hazards model to estimate the hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) of certification eligibility for long-term care insurance according to total cholesterol levels in serum. RESULTS: During 6 years of follow-up, a total of 214 subjects were qualified for long-term care insurance certification. The lowest serum total cholesterol level (<177 mg/dL) was significantly associated with increased eligibility for long-term care insurance certification. Compared with the fourth quintile, multivariate HRs (95%CIs) of long-term care insurance certification were 1.91 (1.23-2.98), 1.36 (0.85-2.18), 0.99 (0.62-1.56), 1.38 (0.88-2.17), for <177 mg/dL, 177-194 mg/dL, 195-211 mg/dL, and ≤231 mg/dL, respectively. Moreover, the association was statistically significant even after excluding subjects with a history of liver disease or cancer, an abnormality in the liver function test, or high levels of high-sensitivity C-reactive protein. CONCLUSION: Low serum total cholesterol levels were significantly associated with increased eligibility for long-term care insurance certification even after adjusting for a variety of confounding factors.

Lactation pattern and the risk for hormone-related female cancer in Japan: the Ohsaki Cohort Study.

Although breastfeeding is associated with a reduction in the risk for breast cancer, its relationship with another hormone-related female cancer, endometrial cancer, has not been fully investigated. The objective of the present study was to prospectively examine the association between lactation pattern and the risk for incidence of breast cancer and endometrial cancer in Japanese women. We analyzed data for 26 680 women registered in the Ohsaki National Health Insurance Cohort Study, who were 40-79 years old at the baseline. During the 11 years of follow-up, we identified 148 incident cases of breast cancer and 32 incident cases of endometrial cancer. Compared with breastfeeding only, multivariate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals for the risk of breast cancer incidence were 1.12 (0.92-1.37) for women who had performed mixed feeding and 1.80 (1.14-2.86) for those who fed their babies only with formula (P-trend=0.014). For endometrial cancer incidence, multivariate hazard ratios and 95% confidence intervals were 1.32 (0.86-2.03) for women who had performed mixed feeding and 3.26 (1.23-8.61) for those who had performed only formula feeding (P-trend=0.018). Our findings appear to raise the possibility that nonbreastfeeding is positively associated with the risks for both breast cancer incidence and endometrial cancer incidence. Confirmation of our findings would require further investigation.