Monthly Archives: September 2026

Patient Voices Must Play a Greater Role in Shaping Generative AI for Cancer Care

Flinders University researchers were part of an international team that examined how people affected by cancer view the growing use of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in cancer care. Their scoping review identified 2,441 records but found only 32 studies that explored the perspectives of cancer patients, survivors and carers on the use of generative AI in their care.

Overall, people affected by cancer generally viewed generative AI favourably when it made health information easier to access, understand and read. However, most studies focused on using AI to provide cancer information or simplify clinical reports, leaving many other potential applications of the technology in cancer care largely unexplored.

“Designing AI for patients is not the same as designing it with them,” says Dr Bradley Menz, a Research Fellow in the College of Medicine and Public Health at Flinders University. “If these tools are going to influence cancer care, then patients, survivors and carers need a meaningful role in shaping how they are designed, governed and used.”

The review found that several important aspects of engagement with generative AI had received only limited attention. These included patients’ willingness to use AI, their familiarity with the technology, whether AI-generated responses aligned with their expectations, and concerns about privacy. Trust also appeared to depend on whether AI responses were perceived as accurate, personalised and emotionally appropriate.

Significant gaps emerged in the issues researchers had explored with people affected by cancer. Among the 32 studies included in the review, only three examined perspectives on accountability, while none assessed views relating to safety, transparency, equity or the preservation of human autonomy. The findings suggest that research has yet to fully address some of the broader ethical and practical questions surrounding AI in oncology.

“Gaining perspectives from cancer patients might help inform the design and implementation of generative AI that best serves oncology patients, including improved interface design, patient education, consent processes, workflow integration, governance, monitoring and feedback mechanisms,” says Associate Professor Ashley Hopkins from the College of Medicine and Public Health at Flinders University.

The researchers say future studies should examine patient perspectives with greater breadth and depth. Existing research has concentrated primarily on comprehension, usefulness, relevance, trust, accuracy and clarity, while giving considerably less attention to how patients view the wider implications of introducing generative AI into cancer care.

The team hopes the review will encourage more detailed research into the use of generative AI in oncology, particularly research that actively involves people affected by cancer. Understanding their perspectives could help determine how AI influences uptake, engagement and effectiveness, while identifying concerns about its broader impacts and ensuring future technologies better reflect the needs and expectations of the people they are intended to serve.

More information: Bradley Menz et al, Perspectives of people affected by cancer toward generative AI in oncology: A scoping review of applications, evidence gaps, and future priorities, European Journal of Cancer. DOI: 10.1016/j.ejca.2026.116990

Journal information: European Journal of Cancer Provided by Flinders University

Community Dementia Prevention Shows Promise for Strengthening Attention

Leave a Reply

As populations age worldwide, preventing cognitive decline has become an increasingly important public health priority. Although intensive clinical trials have shown that multidomain lifestyle interventions can support brain health, translating these resource-intensive approaches into practical, scalable programmes for local communities remains a challenge.

Addressing this gap, a collaborative research team led by Kumamoto University, together with researchers from the National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology (NCGG) and National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taiwan, evaluated a community-adapted brain health programme in Kikuyo Town, Kumamoto Prefecture, Japan. The study explored whether evidence-based dementia prevention strategies could be successfully incorporated into routine municipal health services.

Published in Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics, the study involved 50 community-dwelling older adults who participated in a 24-week programme. Rather than focusing on a single aspect of health, the intervention combined several lifestyle approaches associated with healthy ageing and cognitive well-being.

Participants took part in aerobic exercise, resistance training and dual-task cognitive exercises, while also receiving nutritional guidance. A dedicated daily notebook encouraged participants to monitor their lifestyle habits and progress, helping them incorporate healthier behaviours into everyday life. This multidomain approach was designed to be practical enough for implementation within a community setting.

Participation and satisfaction were particularly encouraging. The programme achieved an average attendance rate of 91.5%, while 98% of participants reported that they enjoyed the sessions. These high levels of engagement suggest that a structured dementia prevention programme can be both feasible and appealing to older adults when adapted to a municipal setting.

Following the six-month intervention, participants showed statistically significant improvements in attention scores and dietary balance scores. Attention scores improved significantly from baseline (p=0.019), while general memory scores remained stable. The findings suggest that attention may be particularly responsive to short-term, community-based multidomain interventions and could serve as a useful outcome when evaluating similar programmes.

Exploratory analysis provided further insight into who might benefit most. Participants who began the programme with lower attention scores experienced the greatest short-term improvements. Dietary balance scores also improved significantly, indicating that participants were able to make meaningful changes to their eating habits alongside their participation in physical and cognitive activities.

The researchers emphasise that the study was a practical implementation evaluation rather than a confirmatory clinical trial, so the findings should be interpreted accordingly. Nevertheless, the strong participation, high satisfaction and measurable improvements in attention and dietary habits demonstrate the potential for evidence-based dementia prevention strategies to move beyond controlled research environments and into everyday community life. The findings offer local governments a practical model for developing sustainable programmes that promote brain health, healthier lifestyles and independence among older residents.

More information: Naoto Kajitani et al, Attention as a potentially responsive cognitive outcome in a community-based multidomain dementia prevention program (the community-adapted J-MINT Brain Health Program in Kikuyo Town, Japan), Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics. DOI: 10.1016/j.archger.2026.106347

Journal information: Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics Provided by Kumamoto University

Stanford Medicine Research Suggests Health Warnings Could Reduce Youth Social Media Use

Leave a Reply

Pop-up health warnings highlighting the potential harms of social media, including mental health consequences, could encourage young people to reduce their social media use, according to a new Stanford Medicine study. An online experiment involving more than 1,000 teenagers and young adults also found that warning messages increased participants’ awareness of the potential risks associated with social media.

The research, published online Sept. 4 in JAMA Health Forum, was inspired by a 2024 call from then-U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, MD, to introduce health warning labels for social media, similar to warnings used for tobacco, alcohol and other potentially harmful products. Since then, California, Colorado, Minnesota and New York have passed legislation requiring social media warnings, with California’s law scheduled to take effect Jan. 1, 2027.

Lead author Anna Grummon, PhD, assistant professor of pediatrics at Stanford Medicine, said warning labels could be one of several strategies to encourage healthier social media habits. However, researchers have had limited evidence about what such warnings should say or whether different wording might influence their effectiveness. The study therefore examined which messages young people perceived as most likely to discourage social media use.

Researchers surveyed 1,012 participants, approximately half of whom were teenagers aged 13 to 17 and half young adults aged 18 to 29. They tested 14 social media warning messages and a control message unrelated to social media. The warnings addressed several potential health concerns, including addiction, negative body image, sleep disruption, depression, anxiety, overall mental health harms and the lack of evidence that social media is safe for young people.

Participants viewed the messages in random order, presented as though they were pop-ups on an Instagram page. They rated how much each message discouraged them from wanting to use social media and how much it increased their awareness of potential harms. Researchers also tested California’s legislated warning and a message encouraging users to take a screen-time break, similar to approaches already used by some social media platforms.

Overall, participants rated the health warnings as more effective than the control message. Most health-related warnings were also perceived as more effective than simply suggesting a screen-time break. Messages focusing on overall mental health harms, depression and anxiety received the strongest responses, suggesting that these topics may be particularly meaningful and relevant to young social media users.

The findings were also notably similar between teenagers and young adults. Senior author Thomas Robinson, MD, the Irving Schulman, MD, Professor in Child Health, said researchers had expected some differences because the digital environment changes rapidly and people only a few years apart may have different experiences with social media. Instead, both age groups consistently indicated that the warnings could discourage their social media use. California’s longer and more complex warning also performed relatively well compared with the other health warnings tested.

The researchers caution that the study measured participants’ perceptions and intentions rather than actual changes in social media use. The next step will be to determine whether well-designed warnings can produce meaningful behavioural changes in real-world settings. Although warning labels have been shown to influence behaviour with products such as tobacco and alcohol, social media presents different challenges because warnings would likely appear as recurring pop-up messages rather than permanent labels. Further research will be needed to determine how warnings should be worded, presented and timed to encourage healthier social media habits.

More information: Anna Grummon et al, Designing Social Media Health Warnings for Teenagers and Young Adults, JAMA Health Forum. DOI: 10.1001/jamahealthforum.2026.3014

Journal information: JAMA Health Forum Provided by Stanford Medicine

Taking a Dip in Rivers and Lakes May Increase Risk of Stomach Bugs and Rashes

Leave a Reply

People swimming in rivers and lakes may face a greater risk of skin conditions and stomach bugs, according to a new study from the University of East Anglia. Researchers found that freshwater swimmers were more than twice as likely to develop skin problems. At the same time, higher levels of bacteria associated with faecal pollution were linked to an increased risk of gastrointestinal illness. The findings come as open-water swimming continues to grow in popularity and concerns about water quality increase.

The researchers analysed data from 2,368 volunteers who participated in a randomised controlled trial at four freshwater bathing sites in Hungary. Participants were randomly assigned either to swim for 10 minutes, including at least three full head immersions, or to remain on shore without entering the water. This allowed researchers to compare illness rates between swimmers and non-swimmers directly.

Prof Paul Hunter, who led the analysis, said swimmers were more than twice as likely to experience skin problems such as rashes, ulcers or itching compared with those who stayed dry. The risk of gastrointestinal illness also increased as levels of E. coli and certain viruses that infect bacteria in the human gut rose in the water, indicating greater faecal contamination.

Importantly, all four bathing sites met European bathing-water standards during the trial. Despite this, researchers still found a relationship between microbial contamination and illness. For every tenfold increase in E. coli concentration, the risk of gastrointestinal illness rose by about 73 per cent. Higher levels of somatic coliphages, viruses that infect bacteria, were associated with a 45 per cent increase in risk.

The researchers said E. coli and somatic coliphages may be better indicators of illness risk in rivers and lakes than intestinal enterococci, a group of bacteria emphasised in some international water-quality guidelines. They also suggested that freshwater and coastal waters may require different approaches to monitoring because bacterial indicators can behave differently in the two environments.

Skin complaints, meanwhile, increased among swimmers regardless of measured levels of faecal contamination. Prof Hunter said this could result from naturally occurring organisms rather than sewage pollution. One possibility is cercarial dermatitis, commonly known as “swimmer’s itch”, an itchy rash caused by parasites associated with waterfowl. Agricultural or industrial contaminants could also contribute to skin problems.

The findings could have implications for the UK, where open-water swimming has become increasingly popular, and sewage discharges into rivers and other waterways have generated public concern. Prof Hunter said the results were consistent across the four Hungarian locations, despite differences in water type and quality, and were also consistent with an earlier German study. This suggests the identified relationships could potentially apply to UK waters as well.

However, the researchers stressed that illness was relatively uncommon and generally mild and short-lived. Just over two per cent of participants developed gastrointestinal illness, while a similar proportion reported skin problems; respiratory, ear and eye infections were rare. The researchers concluded that monitoring E. coli and related microbial indicators remains important for protecting swimmers. The work formed part of Epibathe, a European collaboration investigating health risks associated with marine and freshwater recreational sites.

More information: Edward K.S. Lam et al, A Randomised Controlled Trial Assessing Infectious Disease Risks from Bathing in Inland Recreational Waters, International Journal of Hygiene and Environmental Health. DOI: 10.1016/j.ijheh.2026.114888

Journal information: International Journal of Hygiene and Environmental Health Provided by University of East Anglia

Social Media: Uncovering the Bigger Picture

Leave a Reply

As extreme heat becomes more frequent and intense across California, understanding which communities are most affected and what support they need is increasingly important for protecting public health. A new University of California, Irvine study suggests that everyday conversations on social media could provide valuable insights into how people experience and respond to extreme heat.

Researchers analysed 24,598 heat-related posts on Twitter, now X, from across California between 2016 and 2022. They found that where people lived, how they travelled and the resources available to them were associated with differences in how they discussed extreme heat, including its effects on daily life and the strategies they used to cope. The findings were published in Environmental Research Communications.

“Social media gives us another window into how people are experiencing heat in their daily lives,” said senior author Suellen Hopfer, associate professor of health, society and behaviour at UC Irvine. She said these insights could help public health officials understand who heat-safety messages are reaching, identify communication gaps and better support particularly vulnerable communities.

Rather than focusing only on temperatures or heat-related illnesses, the researchers examined posts describing coping strategies and the effects of heat on everyday activities. Coping strategies included staying hydrated, using air conditioning, visiting a pool or changing exercise times. In contrast, reported impacts included health concerns, disrupted work, cancelled activities, concerns about pets or plants and increased household expenses. These patterns were compared with county-level indicators involving income, housing, transportation and tree canopy.

The researchers also used a large language model to sort thousands of posts according to how people discussed heat. The model’s classifications were checked against posts manually categorised by the research team. Depending on the category, including heat impacts, coping strategies and other content, the model achieved accuracy ranging from 74 to 90 per cent, demonstrating the potential of automated language analysis for examining large volumes of social media conversations.

Some of the clearest differences involved housing. Counties with higher proportions of people living in RVs, vans or boats were 15 per cent less likely to have positive heat-related posts and had 22 per cent lower odds of posts discussing coping strategies. Because these types of housing may have poor insulation and become dangerously hot, the findings suggest that residents could benefit from targeted communication about indoor heat safety.

Transportation patterns revealed another potential vulnerability. Counties with larger percentages of residents who walked, cycled or used public transport to commute had substantially greater odds of negative heat-related posts and posts describing effects on daily life. Counties with larger Hispanic populations also showed a slightly higher likelihood of posts about heat’s impacts and a lower likelihood of posts discussing coping strategies. The researchers caution, however, that social media activity should not be considered a direct measure of population-level vulnerability.

The researchers see social media as a complement to, rather than a replacement for, established public health surveillance. Heat-related posting increased as average monthly temperatures rose, suggesting online conversations can capture experiences that conventional datasets may miss. Combined with information about housing, transportation and socioeconomic conditions, these signals could help officials develop more targeted warnings, practical guidance and longer-term strategies, moving beyond one-size-fits-all messaging towards interventions that reflect how different communities experience and cope with extreme heat.

More information: Nicolas Rodriguez Garcia et al, Online expressions of heat risk: social media posting and social vulnerability in California, Environmental Research Communications. DOI: 10.1088/2515-7620/ae9359

Journal information: Environmental Research Communications Provided by University of California – Irvine

Low Prices, Higher Health Risks? The Dollar Store Grocery Trade-Off

Leave a Reply

Consumers may save money by buying groceries at dollar stores, but those savings could come with health trade-offs. New research from the University of California, Riverside has found an association between greater access to dollar store food and higher rates of obesity, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and type 2 diabetes across the United States.

The study, published in BMC Public Health, also found that greater access to traditional grocery stores was associated with better health outcomes. The relationships remained even after researchers accounted for socioeconomic factors such as income and unemployment. Despite their growing role as food retailers, dollar stores are classified by the U.S. Census as general merchandise outlets rather than grocery stores, meaning they are often overlooked in studies of food access and consumption.

“Higher grocery costs are pushing people to buy highly processed, lower quality food at dollar stores, and it is negatively impacting their health in a similar way to fast food,” said Ryan Bruellman, a UC Riverside doctoral student in genetics, genomics and bioinformatics and the study’s first author. Bruellman began the research out of an interest in unconventional places where Americans increasingly purchase groceries.

To investigate their potential health impact, Bruellman analysed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s 500 Cities Project, which covers major metropolitan areas and cities across the continental United States. The study examined Dollar General, Dollar Tree, 99 Cents Only Stores and Family Dollar, which together represented about 34,000 locations. According to Bruellman, dollar stores now collectively outnumber traditional grocery stores across the country.

Using geographic information system software, Bruellman mapped the number of dollar stores and traditional grocery stores located within a 10-minute drive of residential areas. He then compared store accessibility with community health data and a social vulnerability index, which reflects socioeconomic challenges that can make it more difficult for residents to afford groceries and access other resources.

Dollar store access was significantly associated with poorer health outcomes across regions, although the strength of the relationship varied geographically. The effects were particularly notable in the South and Midwest, where dollar stores and traditional grocery stores were found in roughly equal proportions. Results also differed between individual cities. In Philadelphia, for example, the data did not fully capture bodegas and independent grocery stores, which may provide residents with additional food choices and reduce reliance on dollar stores.

Bruellman emphasised that the concern is not low prices themselves, but the nutritional quality of the foods commonly available at these outlets. Rather than reducing the number of dollar stores, he suggested improving the selection of healthier foods. Partnerships between dollar stores and local farmers, for example, could make fresh fruits and vegetables more readily available to customers who already depend on these stores for groceries.

Other approaches could include locating farmers’ markets and food banks closer to communities heavily served by dollar stores. Such measures could expand access to nutritious foods without removing an important source of affordable groceries. Ultimately, Bruellman hopes the findings will encourage policymakers and researchers to look beyond conventional supermarkets when considering food access and public health. “The overarching thing is we shouldn’t think of traditional grocery stores as the only places to get food. People need to look beyond that,” he said.

More information: Ryan Bruellman et al, Beyond proximity: how food quality in dollar and grocery stores influences health, BMC Public Health. DOI: 10.1186/s12889-026-28145-y

Journal information: BMC Public Health Provided by University of California – Riverside

Study Reveals Potential Downsides of Social Media Algorithms

Leave a Reply

Social media algorithms have become highly effective at matching users’ viewing habits with personalised content, but new research suggests those recommendations may also be linked to mental health. Psychologists at The University of Texas at Dallas examined how algorithm-selected social media content relates to emotional processing in the brain and symptoms of depression.

The proof-of-concept study, published in Computers in Human Behavior, was led by Dr. Alva Tang, assistant professor of psychology in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences. Researchers recruited 60 young adults with an average age of 20 and assessed them using validated measures of anxiety and depression before examining their responses to social media videos.

Participants watched two sets of videos. One consisted of personalised recommendations drawn from their own Instagram or TikTok accounts, while the other featured general trending videos. Researchers recorded participants’ brain activity using electroencephalography (EEG), focusing on frontal alpha asymmetry, a measure associated with emotional processing and motivation. Greater left-sided activity is generally associated with more positive emotional processing, while greater right-sided activity is linked to negative processing and withdrawal-related behaviour.

Unlike previous studies that have relied largely on surveys and self-reported social media habits, the researchers were able to examine emotional processing as participants viewed recommended content in real time. The study also accounted for overall screen time, allowing researchers to look beyond how long participants used social media and focus instead on what their algorithms showed them.

The results indicated that participants with more depressive symptoms tended to receive recommendations containing more depressive content. Their brain activity while viewing personalised recommendations also showed patterns associated with more negative emotional processing. Importantly, these patterns differed from participants’ responses when they watched generally trending videos, suggesting that personalised feeds may play a distinctive role in users’ emotional experiences.

Researchers described the findings as evidence of a potential feedback loop. A user who is already experiencing depressive symptoms may interact with certain types of content, leading the algorithm to recommend more material with similar emotional characteristics. Continued engagement with that content could then reinforce negative emotional responses. The researchers stressed that participants used their own phones and feeds, meaning the research team did not select the personalised videos they viewed.

Social relationships, including friendships and romantic relationships, were the most common subjects among videos recommended to the young adults. Participants with more depressive symptoms were more likely to encounter negative relationship content, such as arguments or conflicts, while viewing fewer positive relationship videos was associated with brain activity reflecting more negative emotional processing. The researchers noted that people experiencing depression may also be more inclined to focus on negative information while overlooking positive material.

The researchers hope the findings will encourage healthier and more deliberate social media habits rather than simply focusing on reducing screen time. They suggest users can influence their recommendations by following and interacting with positive content and limiting engagement with unwanted material. The team is now collecting data from teenagers aged 13 to 16 for a potential long-term study examining how algorithmic recommendations may affect emotional well-being over time.

More information: Carole Leung et al, Neural emotional processing of personally recommended short-video content and depressive symptoms, Computers in Human Behavior. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2026.109098

Journal information: Computers in Human Behavior Provided by University of Texas at Dallas

Extreme Heat and Cold Tied to Increased Heart Failure Hospitalisation Risk

Leave a Reply

Short-term exposure to both cold and hot temperatures may increase the risk of hospitalisation for heart failure, according to a study published in JACC, the flagship journal of the American College of Cardiology, and presented simultaneously at ESC Congress 2026. The findings from Sweden highlight how temperature extremes may contribute to sudden worsening of heart failure and underscore the need for health systems to prepare for environmental stressors.

Researchers said the study addresses an important gap in understanding how extreme temperatures affect people with heart failure in Nordic countries. Sweden and other high-latitude regions experience frequent cold weather. Still, they are also facing increasing exposure to heat as the climate warms, potentially creating new health risks in populations less accustomed to high temperatures.

“To the best of our knowledge, no previous study has examined the short-term associations between extreme temperature events or continuous non-optimal ambient temperatures and heart failure hospitalisations within a Nordic population,” said lead author Wenli Ni, PhD, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

The researchers analysed approximately 482,000 heart failure hospitalisations recorded in the Swedish National Patient Register between 2006 and 2021. Cold spells were defined as at least two consecutive days with daily temperatures at or below the fifth percentile between October and March. Heat waves were defined as temperatures at or above the 95th percentile between April and September, based on municipality-specific temperature distributions.

Cold spells were associated with an increased risk of heart failure hospitalisation two to six days after exposure, with the association reaching statistical significance between three and five days. Exposure to lower ambient temperatures was similarly linked to increased hospitalisation risk within three to six days, with the strongest evidence appearing three to five days after exposure.

Higher ambient temperatures showed a different pattern. Exposure to hotter temperatures was associated with an increased risk of heart failure hospitalisation within zero to three days, suggesting that heat may have a more immediate effect. However, the researchers found no significant association between formally defined heat waves and heart failure hospitalisation.

The different timing of cold- and heat-related risks could have implications for how health systems respond to weather conditions. The authors said the delayed increase in hospitalisations following cold exposure may support closer monitoring of vulnerable patients in the days after cold-weather alerts. At the same time, the more immediate effects associated with higher temperatures could require faster responses during periods of hot weather.

In an accompanying editorial, Tiantian Li, PhD, deputy director of the National Institute of Environmental Health at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing, argued that growing evidence on temperature-related cardiovascular risks should be translated into practical prevention strategies. “We can no longer practice cardiovascular medicine in a meteorological vacuum,” Li said, calling for stronger early-warning systems that can turn epidemiological evidence into timely action to protect people at cardiovascular risk.

More information: Wenli Ni et al, Cold Spells, Heat Waves, and Nonoptimal Air Temperature and Risk of Heart Failure Hospitalization in Sweden, Journal of the American College of Cardiology. DOI: 10.1016/j.jacc.2026.07.008

Journal information: Journal of the American College of Cardiology Provided by American College of Cardiology