Health News

Globalizing Biosimilars Products, 20-22 May 2013, Seoul, Korea

Date: Apr-08-2013
The market for biologics is growing at nearly twice the rate of Pharma as a whole. Given their often high costs compared to chemical-based traditional pharmaceuticals, this trend is placing increasing financial pressure on healthcare budgets. Against this context, biosimilar medicines offer a major opportunity to provide greater access to affordable health care. In order to be cost-effective, a biosimilar product needs access to global markets based on a single development programme that meets the requirements of regulators internationally...

Distorted Thinking In Gambling Addiction: What Are The Cognitive And Neural Mechanisms?

Date: Apr-08-2013
Fascinating new studies into brain activity and behavioural responses have highlighted the overlap between pathological gambling and drug addiction. The research, which is presented at the British Neuroscience Association Festival of Neuroscience (BNA2013) today (Monday) has implications for both the treatment and prevention of problem gambling...

Compound In Red Meat, Energy Drinks, Raises Heart Risk Via Gut Bacteria

Date: Apr-08-2013
Researchers in the US have discovered a surprising new connection between red meat and heart risk that involves bacteria living in the gut. Gut bacteria digest L-carnitine, a compound abundant in red meat and added to popular energy drinks, to produce trimethylamine-N-oxide (TMAO), a metabolite already suspected of helping to clog up arteries. Previous studies that have tied red meat consumption to increased cardiovascular risk have shown while some of the raised risk is due to the fat and cholesterol in red meat, these culprits aren't enough to explain all of it...

Chocolate Infused With Fruit Juice Has 50 Percent Less Fat

Date: Apr-08-2013
Already renowned as a healthy treat when enjoyed in moderation, chocolate could become even more salubrious if manufacturers embraced new technology for making "fruit-juice-infused chocolate," a scientist said. The presentation was part of the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society, which continues through Thursday. Stefan A. F. Bon, Ph.D., who led the research, explained that the technology would allow manufacture of chocolate with fruit juice, vitamin C water or diet cola replacing up to 50 percent of the fat...

Dangerous Plaque May Be Detected By MRI Measure Of Blood Flow Over Atherosclerotic Plaque

Date: Apr-08-2013
Researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) have shown that using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to measure blood flow over atherosclerotic plaques could help identify plaques at risk for thrombosis. The findings, which appear in the March issue of Circulation Cardiovascular Imaging, offer a non-invasive application in the diagnosis and treatment of patients with atherosclerosis. Atherosclerosis is a chronic disease of the human vascular system associated with lipid (cholesterol) accumulation and inflammation...

The Impact Of Traumatic Brain Injury On Sexuality And The Importance Of Rehabilitation Strategies

Date: Apr-08-2013
Each year more than three million Americans are living with traumatic brain injury (TBI), a condition that is associated with physical, cognitive, and emotional problems that often affect their sexuality, and subsequently their marital stability, identity, and self-esteem. Taking an in-depth look at the impact of TBI on sexuality, an investigative team critically reviews fourteen studies representing a collective study sample of nearly 1,500 patients, partners, spouses, control individuals, and rehabilitation professionals to examine brain injury and sexuality...

Cells From Patients' Blood Could Be Developed As Treatments For Blood, Heart And Circulatory Diseases

Date: Apr-08-2013
Scientists have shed light on a common bleeding disorder by growing and analysing stem cells from patients' blood to discover the cause of the disease in individual patients. The technique may enable doctors to prescribe more effective treatments according to the defects identified in patients' cells. In future, this approach could go much further: these same cells could be grown, manipulated, and applied as treatments for diseases of the heart, blood and circulation, including heart attacks and haemophilia...

Poor Bone Health, Muscle Fatigue Due To Vitamin D Deficiency Effectively Treated With Supplements

Date: Apr-08-2013
Vitamin D is vital for making our muscles work efficiently and boosting energy levels, new research from Newcastle University has shown. A study led by Dr Akash Sinha has shown that muscle function improves with Vitamin D supplements which are thought to enhance the activity of the mitochondria, the batteries of the cell. A hormone normally produced in the skin using energy from sunlight, Vitamin D can also be found in a few foods - including fish, fish liver oils, egg yolks and fortified cereals but it can also be effectively boosted with Vitamin D supplements...

Breakthrough In Chemical Crystallography

Date: Apr-08-2013
A research team led by Professor Makoto Fujita of the University of Tokyo, Japan, and complemented by Academy Professor Kari Rissanen of the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland, has made a fundamental breakthrough in single-crystal X-ray analysis, the most powerful method for molecular structure determination. The team's breakthrough was reported recently in Nature. X-ray single-crystal diffraction (SCD) analysis has the intrinsic limitation that the target molecule must be obtained as single crystals...

Arsenic Added To Beers By Widely Used Filtering Material

Date: Apr-08-2013
The mystery of how arsenic levels in beer sold in Germany could be higher than in the water or other ingredients used to brew the beer has been solved, scientists announced at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society, the world's largest scientific society. The meeting, which features almost 12,000 reports and other presentations, continues through Thursday. Mehmet Coelhan, Ph.D...