A new study of people at a Colorado sexually transmitted disease clinic found that about half of those who regularly used condoms reported mishaps ranging from breakage to slippage.
The condom problems spelled trouble, at least for men. The risk of gonorrhea and chlamydia grew by several times among the heterosexual men who reported condom “errors.”
“This shows that errors do undermine consistent condom use,” said study co-author Dr. Judith Shlay of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center. “It’s not just consistent use, it’s consistent and correct use that’s important.”
The new study, which appears in the September issue of the journal Sexually Transmitted Diseases, looked at surveys filled out by 26,291 homosexual men and heterosexual men and women who visited the clinic between January 2001 and January 2003. Only 13 percent said they used condoms consistently. Of those people, nearly 2,000 answered questions. Among women, 57 percent reported condom mishaps, compared with 48 percent of heterosexual men and 33 percent of gay men. Condom breakage was the most commonly reported problem. The next most common mishaps were slippage and failing to put on a condom before intercourse. Other problems included leakage and putting the condom on inside out.
For heterosexual men, condom mishaps increased their chances of having gonorrhea by 5.5 times and chlamydia by 3.2 times. Their risk of having urethritis, a urinary tract infection, more than doubled. For unknown reasons, however, among women and gay men, condom mishaps didn’t boost the risks of the STDs studied.
Diabetes and heart disease
A new analysis of studies strongly suggests that people with diabetes keep tight reins on their blood sugar levels if they want to ward off heart disease.
Chronically high blood sugar levels increase the risk of cardiovascular disease by 15 to 18 percent for people with diabetes, according to the analysis, which appears in the Sept. 21 online issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.
The new analysis–in which researchers pooled the results of 13 studies involving 9,000 subjects–provides strong evidence that chronically high sugar levels increase the risk of large-vessel disease, which translates to having strokes and heart attacks, said study author Dr. Sherita Golden, an assistant professor of medicine and epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
Teen drinking still high
Levels of teen drinking are still high enough to pose considerable health risks, a new federal study finds.
“Over the past 10 years we haven’t really made a dent in the number of kids engaging in this behavior,” said study author Vivian B. Faden of the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. Alcohol is the No. 1 drug of choice among children and adolescents, Faden said. She and her colleagues analyzed three federally funded surveys. The study appears in the September issue of Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research.
Rates for any alcohol drinking in the 30 days before the surveys ranged from 20 percent of 8th graders to nearly half of all 12th graders. Rates for binge drinking during a previous two-week period ranged from 12 percent of 8th graders to 29 percent of 12th graders. Binge drinking is defined as four or more drinks for a girl and five or more for a boy.
