Health News

A Mix Of Water, DNA, And Gold Particles Could Detect Infectious Diseases

Date: Jun-01-2013
A "cocktail" of a drop of blood, a dribble of water, and a dose of DNA powder with gold particles may lead to quicker diagnosis and treatment of many infectious diseases in the near future. The new cocktail mix has been developed by researchers from University of Toronto's Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering (IBBME) and its details have been published in the journal Angewandte Chemie . It consists of the same technology that is used in over-the-counter pregnancy tests and could be used to detect diseases from HPV and HIV to malaria...

Magnesium Sulfate Injections Put Fetus At Risk

Date: Jun-01-2013
The FDA has just announced that is does not advise doctors to administer magnesium sulfate injections to pregnant women for more than 5 days as a means of preventing pre-term labor. The use of the drug to prevent pre-term labor is not approved by the FDA, however, doctors often use it "off-label". The FDA reported that there are numerous risks associated with the administration of magnesium sulfate injection to pregnant women for longer than 5 days...

Pitt-Led Team Describes Molecular Detail Of HIV's Inner Coat, Pointing The Way To New Therapies

Date: Jun-01-2013
A team led by researchers at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine has described for the first time the 4-million-atom structure of the HIV's capsid, or protein shell. The findings, highlighted on the cover of the May 30 issue of Nature, could lead to new ways of fending off an often-changing virus that has been very hard to conquer. Scientists have long struggled to decipher how the HIV capsid shell is chemically put together, said senior author Peijun Zhang, Ph.D., associate professor, Department of Structural Biology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine...

Does Type 2 Diabetes Really Exist?

Date: Jun-01-2013
The term 'type 2 diabetes' is leading medical researchers astray, and resulting in sub-optimal treatment for patients, says a leading diabetes expert in a Viewpoint published in The Lancet. According to Professor Edwin Gale, of Southmead Hospital, Bristol, UK, applying the term 'Type 2 diabetes' to the complex and varied set of symptoms experienced by people with the condition is what logicians call a category error, when a problem is assigned to a category inappropriate to its solution...

Exposure To Dry-Cleaning Solvent And Degreaser TCE Linked To Increased Risk Of Some Cancers

Date: Jun-01-2013
Trichloroethylene (TCE) exposure has possible links to increased liver cancer risk, and the relationship between TCE exposure and risks of cancers of low incidence and those with confounding by lifestyle and other factors need further study, according to a study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. TCE is a chlorinated dry-cleaning solvent and degreaser that has been widely used for approximately the last 100 years and has shown carcinogenicity in rodents...

How Are Visual Illusions Used In Medicine And Arts And What Was Their Role In History?

Date: Jun-01-2013
A conference at the University of Leicester will explore the medical, psychological, historical and religious uses of visual illusions Experts from around the world are set to gather in Leicester to discuss how optical illusions have played an important part in medicine and art through the centuries. A University of Leicester conference will assess visual illusions throughout history in light of recent findings which show that visual illusions can alter brain function and pain...

Mortality Among US White Women: Study Helps Explain Growing Education Gap

Date: Jun-01-2013
Less-educated white women were increasingly more likely to die than their better-educated peers from the mid-1990s through the mid-2000s, according to a new study, which found that growing disparities in economic circumstances and health behaviors - particularly employment status and smoking habits - across education levels accounted for an important part of the widening mortality gap...

Sapiens Reports Positive Preliminary Results From Intra-Operative Deep Brain Stimulation Study

Date: Jun-01-2013
First proof for steering brain stimulation in patients using Sapiens' SureStim-1 lead Sapiens Steering Brain Stimulation B.V. (Sapiens), an emerging medical device company developing brain stimulation products, today announced positive preliminary results from the intra-operative "FAME" clinical study of its SureStim-1 deep brain stimulation lead. The preliminary data were presented today by neurosurgeon Dr. P.R. Schuurman at the 16th international meeting of the World Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery in Tokyo...

The Brain Makes Its Own Version Of Valium

Date: Jun-01-2013
Researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine have found that a naturally occurring protein secreted only in discrete areas of the mammalian brain may act as a Valium-like brake on certain types of epileptic seizures. The protein is known as diazepam binding inhibitor, or DBI. It calms the rhythms of a key brain circuit and so could prove valuable in developing novel, less side-effect-prone therapies not only for epilepsy but possibly for anxiety and sleep disorders, too. The researchers' discoveries were published in the journal Neuron...

Five Epigenetic Biomarkers Associated With Better Weight Loss Response

Date: Jun-01-2013
Would you be more likely to try a diet and exercise regimen if you knew in advance if it would actually help you lose weight? Thanks to a new report published in the June 2013 issue of The FASEB Journal, this could become a reality. In the report, scientists identify five epigenetic biomarkers in adolescents that were associated with a better weight loss at the beginning of a weight loss program. Not only could this could ultimately help predict an individual's response to weight loss intervention, but it may offer therapeutic targets for enhancing a weight loss program's effects...