Researchers comparing air quality in six U.S. cities were “stunned” to learn “that people living in cities with the dirtiest air died on average two years earlier than residents of cities with the cleanest air. The difference in death rates was linked to elevated levels of fine-particle pollution.”

Lung diseases like cancer, emphysema, fibrosis, and asthma are almost all initiated or aggravated by the inhalation of particles and gases, reports Joseph Brain, Drinker professor of environmental physiology at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH).

TUESDAY, Sept. 9 (HealthDay News) -- According to a new study, the majority of East Coast hospitals report giving formula sample packs to new moms, even though most major medical organizations oppose this practice.

The study, published in the September issue of the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, surveyed 1,295 hospitals in 21 Eastern states and the District of Columbia.

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 27 (HealthDay News) -- Compared to mothers who don't spank their children, mothers who've spanked their child in the past year are three times more likely to use harsher forms of punishment.

That's the conclusion of a new study from the Injury Prevention Research Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

WEDNESDAY, July 30 (HealthDay News) -- People whose mothers have had Alzheimer's disease may be predisposed to the mind-robbing condition, a new study finds.

The link may be a dysfunction in how the brain handles sugar -- something that's probably genetic and starts years before symptoms of Alzheimer's appear, researchers say.

MONDAY, May 5 (HealthDay News) -- When infants in low-income families are watching television or videos, their mothers seldom speak to them, a U.S. study finds.

By Amanda Gardner
EmpowHer's HealthDay Reporter

SUNDAY, May 4 (HealthDay News) -- New research shows that only half of American mothers intend to have their teenaged daughters vaccinated against human papillomavirus (HPV) if the girls are under the age of 13, despite government guidelines that suggest the opposite.

THURSDAY, April 17 (HealthDay News) -- Mothers who breast-feed while on certain seizure medications do not appear to harm their children's cognitive development, a new study finds.

FRIDAY, April 11 (HealthDay News) -- Three-quarters of the 68 countries most in need of improving mother and child mortality rates have made little, if any, progress in meeting internationally set goals over the past three years, according to a series of new reports.

The Countdown to 2015 for Maternal, Newborn and Child Survival, an international group that monitors these goals, still holds hope that progress can be made quickly in these underachieving nations, according to reports this week in a special edition of The Lancet.