Latest news with #physical health
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
'Walking cricket has changed my life'
A group of over-50's walking cricket players say the sport is helping with their physical and mental health issues. Bexhill Walking Cricket Club meet every Friday for an indoor match of the sport, which is played with a soft ball at a walking pace. Players range from people in their early 60s to mid 80s. "We've got people who have lost huge amounts of weight, and players with dementia and just some who have expanded their social circle," says chairman Laurie Ray. Andy Evans, who has prostate cancer, said the activity has helped him "mentally and physically". He said he was "well overweight", and he had been told he needed to shed some pounds. "It's changed my life now," he said. "I'm quite lucky as (the cancer) is manageable now, but this has helped my health should I ever need an operation." The club have faced other walking cricket clubs in the area, but Mr Ray says it's "about exercise more than results". John Martin, aged 80, is one of the club's oldest players. "I do walking football, table tennis and this. I just love all sports," he said. "If more people did this, their health would be so much better." Bexhill Walking Cricket Club meet on Friday's at 0930 at Bexhill Leisure Centre. Follow BBC Sussex on Facebook, X and Instagram. Send your story ideas to southeasttoday@ or WhatsApp us on 08081 002250. Walking cricket to be prescribed on NHS
BBC News
05-08-2025
- Health
- BBC News
How noise sensitivity disrupts the mind, brain and body
Though noise sensitivity is often dismissed by doctors, it can have long-term effects on our mental and physical health. Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap. There it was again: the incessant noise from my new upstairs neighbours, evidently still in the process of hanging up pictures or cobbling together new furniture. In my well-insulated building in central Berlin, the noise was well below decibels that would irritate anyone else. But it sent me into a rage. A tight sensation of stress rushed through my body. Even worse was the anxiety: "When will they ever be finished?" That's not the only noise that is bothering me. I notice the soft thudding across my ceilings as people get ready for bed. Somewhere in the building, I hear the high-pitched hum of a vacuum cleaner and the muffled thumping of a washing machine. The neighbour's dachshund yapping for a treat. And don't get me started on the leaf blowers and pressure washers outside. Noise – however slight – breaks my concentration and peace of mind. It is fair to say that I – along with 20-40% of the general population – am noise-sensitive, meaning that I feel more upset and disturbed by noise than the average person. It would be easy to dismiss noise sensitivity as a personality flaw, a symptom of generally being belligerent, whiny, and irritable. But, in recent years, scientists have learned that it has real biological roots. The brains of noise-sensitive people respond differently to sound and some may actually be born that way. What's more, it affects not only people's immediate mood but also their long-term mental and physical health. While there are few easy solutions, being aware of these effects can help noise-sensitive people take action to make their lives more tolerable. "It's been one of those what we might call a wastepaper basket sort of issues… that just gets pushed away by health professionals," says neuroscientist Daniel Shepherd of Auckland University of Technology in New Zealand. Only in recent years "have people actually really started to say, right, this is at an experiential level really impacting patients", he adds. "We really need to actually start getting a handle on this." Noise sensitivity isn't a formal medical diagnosis. People can find out if they're noise sensitive by taking questionnaires like the 21-question Weinstein's noise sensitivity scale (which asks, for instance, if you're bothered by people whispering and crinkling sweet wrappers in a movie theatre, if you get mad at people making noise when you're trying to sleep or work, even if the sound of bothers you if you're trying to concentrate.) Noise sensitivity is different from other sound-related conditions like misophonia. This is a specific decreased tolerance to certain sounds, like chewing, throat-clearing, tapping or ticking, which trigger intense feelings of disgust or rage, explains Jennifer Brout, a clinician and the founder of the US-based International Misophonia Research Network. Noise sensitivity is also different from hyperacusis, where people feel pain or extreme discomfort because they perceive sounds more loudly than they actually are. Noise sensitivity, by contrast, is a general reactiveness to all sounds, regardless of how loud they're perceived or how loud they actually are. At the very least, noise-sensitive people find sound disruptive and become annoyed, angry, or even fearful or anxious. "I remember a person describing it like having a mosquito flying around you," Shepherd says. "You just can't not attend to it." For those who are afraid of noise, the condition might make them so stressed that their bodies go into a fight-or-flight response. "Your heart rate goes up, your blood pressure goes up," says Stephen Stansfeld, a psychiatrist and professor emeritus at Queen Mary University of London. Sleep quality can also take a hit. In one 2021 study, researchers tracked the sleeping patterns of 500 adults in China and nighttime noise levels over the course of a week. They found that, while the noise itself didn't affect people's sleep quality, noise-sensitive individuals tended to find their sleep less restorative, rating their sleep as less refreshing and saying they felt moodier and had less energy during the day. Noise exposure has also been linked to a range of long-term health effects, including heart disease and diabetes – and noise-sensitive people may suffer the most from mental health impacts, Stansfeld says. In one 2021 study, Stansfeld and his colleagues surveyed 2,398 men in the Welsh town of Caerphilly who were exposed to different levels of road traffic noise. Those who were noise-sensitive were more likely to have long-term anxiety and depression. While that may be partly because anxious people are more vigilant about their surroundings and therefore more likely to notice noise, it's also possible that being noise sensitive can worsen anxiety. And, one 2023 survey of 1,244 adults living near airports in France found that people severely annoyed by aircraft noise levels – especially some noise-sensitive individuals – were more likely to rate their general health as poor. But why do some people react more negatively to noise than others? Studies on the brains of noise-sensitive people reveal some clues. When Shepherd and his colleagues hooked people up to devices that measured the electrical activity in their brains, those without noise sensitivity only showed heightened activity when the researchers played them threatening sounds. But in noise-sensitive people, "their brains tend to go up the gears irrespective of the sound, whether it's a threatening sound or a non-threatening sound", Shepherd recalls. Both Shepherd and the neuroscientist Elvira Brattico of Denmark's Aarhus University have independently found evidence that this has to do with how the brain filters out information about unimportant sounds. Shepherd's team found evidence that in noise-sensitive people, a specific clump of cells within the medial geniculate nucleus – a relay station for sound information entering the brain – are less efficient at this filtering task compared to the brains of those without the condition. Where most people can "filter this information out and get on with life, those who have noise sensitivity don't do it as easily", he says. This kind of filtering also seems to be important during sleep. While most people show patterns of electrical activity called spindles as they fall asleep, which are thought to be important in getting used to surrounding noise, people with noise-sensitivity have less of them – helping explain why they stay so reactive to sounds that normal people aren't bothered by. How brains end up this way, though, is a mystery. One Finnish study on twins suggests that noise sensitivity is often heritable, so some people might be predisposed to have it from birth. But it's also possible that people living in noisy environments develop sensitivity over time, Brattico says. People with anxiety, schizophrenia and autism are especially likely to develop noise sensitivity. While some people can get it after suffering traumatic brain injuries, for most it's usually something that persists over a lifetime, Stansfeld says. "It is very difficult, as compared to someone who's not noise-sensitive, to actually habituate to sound and actually desensitise to it." The ideal solution, of course, would be to tackle the sources of noise themselves. Urban planners could build quiet inner courtyards for residential buildings, use rubberised asphalt ingredients that reduce traffic noise, or erect sound-diffracting walls around highways and noisy areas like highways. Some cities in Belgium and France have already begun implementing such measures, as well as reducing vehicle speed limits, encouraging bike infrastructure and creating quiet zones in parks and along rivers. While noise is a real cause of health problems, "it's also one which is potentially avoidable", Stansfeld says. But progress is slow, leaving many noise-sensitive people to fend for themselves – for instance by avoiding noisy areas, soundproofing their living spaces or turning to earplugs, earmuffs or noise-cancelling headphones. But these methods often just dampen sounds rather than removing them altogether. "Even quiet noises might be annoying to a noise-sensitive person," Brattico says. More like this:• How traffic noise hurts children's brains• Why noise pollution is hurting your heart• The rise of highly sensitive parents Sometimes, treating underlying conditions like anxiety with medications may help, Stansfeld says. Cognitive behavioural therapy, a kind of talking therapy that centres on managing one's psychological reactions and behaviours, can make sense in settings where people are afraid of noise. "I treated somebody myself with cognitive behaviour therapy, and I think it could be quite helpful," Stansfeld says. Meanwhile, Brattico believes that music therapy with qualified practitioners could also be useful, which involves selecting soothing, soft music that calms people and builds positive associations with sound. For those wanting to try self-soothing, Brattico recommends music with few, soft instruments like piano or harp, such as Renaissance or Baroque chamber music. When even music is annoying, art therapy might help – "something that's relaxing and allows expressions and regulation of emotions", Brattico says. As for myself, it was earplugs, jazz-playing noise-cancelling headphones and a towel wrapped around my head, that eventually helped somewhat. Until the world around me becomes quieter, I can at least try to find some peace in my own mind. -- For more science, technology, environment and health stories from the BBC, follow us on Facebook and Instagram.
