Health News

"I'm Not Just Fat, I'm Old!"

Date: Feb-21-2013
Similar to talking about being fat, talking about being old is an important an indicator of body dissatisfaction, shows research in BioMed Central's open access journal Journal of Eating Disorders. Body dissatisfaction is known to be correlated with, and predictive of, physical and mental health problems including binge eating, emotional eating, stress, low self-esteem, depression, and use of unhealthy weight control behaviours. High levels of talking about weight and being fat, 'fat talk', is known to be a good indicator of body dissatisfaction...

BUSM Researchers Propose Potential Epigenetic Mechanisms For Improved Cancer Therapy

Date: Feb-21-2013
A review article by researchers at Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) proposes a new epigenetic hypothesis linked to tumor production and novel ideas about what causes progenitor cells to develop into cancer cells. Published in the February 2013 issue of Epigenomics, the article provides examples of how epigenetic drug treatments could be beneficial in treating cancers while also decreasing the likelihood of cancer relapse. The article was written by researchers at the Boston University Cancer Center...

Gains Made Towards Treatment Of Rare Bone Disease

Date: Feb-21-2013
Elusive substrate protein identified in the most common form of heritable rickets Diagnosed in toddlers, X-linked hypophosphatemia (XLH) is the most common form of heritable rickets, in which soft bones bend and deform, and tooth abscesses develop because infections penetrate soft teeth that are not properly calcified. Researchers at McGill University and the Federal University of Sao Paulo have identified that osteopontin, a major bone and tooth substrate protein, plays a role in XLH. Their discovery may pave the way to effectively treating this rare disease...

Asia Pacific Region Hit By Creeping Epidemic Of Obesity

Date: Feb-21-2013
Over eating, sedentary lifestyles, cultural attitudes, and lack of prevention programmes are to blame for the rising epidemic of obesity in the Asia Pacific region. Overweight and obesity has quadrupled in China and societies still label people of healthy weight as poor. Prevention is an important theme at the 19th Asian Pacific Congress of Cardiology being held 21-24 February 2013 in Pattaya, Thailand. Experts from the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) will lead a one day collaborative programme on 23 February...

Scrap "Unwinnable" Drugs War And Divert Funds Into Curbing Global Antibiotic Misuse

Date: Feb-21-2013
Antibiotic resistance poses far more serious threat to human health, claims ethicist Governments around the world should stop squandering resources fighting an "unwinnable war" against illegal drugs, such as cocaine and heroin. Instead, they should use the cash to curb antibiotic misuse, which poses a far more serious threat to human health, claims a leading ethicist in the Journal of Medical Ethics...

Study Puts Patients In Control Of GP Consultation Times, UK

Date: Feb-21-2013
Asking patients to choose their preferred length of consultation time when booking a GP appointment may increase satisfaction levels for patients and doctors, suggests a study1 in the March issue of the British Journal of General Practice (BJGP). Dr Rod Sampson and colleagues from the Cairn Medical Practice in Inverness conducted an experiment in which 174 patients visiting the surgery over a five week period were invited to choose between 5, 10, 15 or 20 minute consultations when making their appointment...

Digital Processing System Avoids 17.4 Million Drug Errors In US In 1 Year

Date: Feb-21-2013
But potential to avoid more than 50 million if more widely adopted in hospitals Processing a prescription through an electronic ordering system can halve the likelihood of a drug error, and avert more than 17 million such incidents in US hospitals in one year alone, indicates research published online in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association. And if much more widely adopted than at present, the system has the potential to cut out 50 million drug errors a year, calculate the researchers...

Research To Measure Understanding Of Age-Related Fertility Decline And Family Planning

Date: Feb-21-2013
Researchers in Southampton are conducting the largest survey of its kind to find out what men and women know about age-related fertility decline and the impact it has on planning a family. The University of Southampton together with Princess Anne Hospital in Southampton, are looking to recruit more than 2000 people from all over the country to the online study. Researchers hope to gain insight into the attitudes of people towards egg freezing, their intentions regarding having children and what people think ovarian awareness is...

Air Pollution Increases Mortality Risk In Cardiovascular Disease

Date: Feb-21-2013
Air pollution contributes to an increased number of deaths among patients who have been admitted to hospital with heart attacks, according to a study published online in the European Heart Journal [1]. The largest study yet to investigate the links between fine air-borne particulate matter (PM) and patient survival after hospital admission for acute coronary syndrome (ACS) found death rates increased with increased exposure to PM2.5 - tiny particles that measure 2.5 micrometers (μm) in diameter or less, approximately 30 times smaller than a human hair [2]...

Male Spatial Superiority May Be A Result Of Natural Selection

Date: Feb-21-2013
Males and females differ in a lot of traits (besides the obvious ones) and some evolutionary psychologists have proposed hypotheses to explain why. Some argue, for example, that males' slight, but significant, superiority in spatial navigation over females - a phenomenon demonstrated repeatedly in many species, including humans - is probably "adaptive," meaning that over the course of evolutionary history the trait gave males an advantage that led them to have more offspring than their peers. A new analysis published in The Quarterly Review of Biology found no support for this hypothesis...