Health News

Interferon May Be Harmful In Re-Treatment Of Chronic Hepatitis C

Date: Feb-01-2013
People with hepatitis C and chronic liver disease who relapsed or failed to respond to initial treatment are unlikely to improve on interferon retreatment. In fact, they may face an increased risk of dying sooner, and are likely to experience a variety of adverse effects, according to an updated systematic review published in The Cochrane Library. Hepatitis C affects around 170 million people worldwide. In some cases, infection leads to chronic liver disease, liver failure or liver cancer, eventually resulting in death. Treatment is based on antiviral drugs...

Tuberculosis Conceals Itself In Bone Marrow Stem Cells

Date: Feb-01-2013
Scientists at the Forsyth have gained new insight on how Tuberculosis (TB) remains a global epidemic. Although drugs have been available to fight TB for 50 years, the disease still infects nearly 2.2 billion people worldwide and causes 1.7 million annual deaths. This is largely attributed to the bacteria's ability to stay dormant in the human body and later resurface as active disease. The Forsyth team, and its collaborators from Stanford University, has recently discovered that Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria that causes TB, can lay dormant and thrive within bone marrow stem cells...

Tenofovir Gel Wins Out In Drug Absorption Study, But HIV Prevention Trials Say Differently

Date: Feb-01-2013
A novel head-to-head study looking at differences in how the antiretroviral (ARV) drug tenofovir gets absorbed in the body as either an oral tablet or a vaginal gel found tenofovir gel can achieve substantially higher concentrations of active drug in vaginal tissue than the oral tablet, suggesting that tenofovir gel should be highly effective in protecting women against HIV transmitted through vaginal sex...

Discovered Of New Kind Of Neuron In The Skin Improves Understanding Of The Sensation Of Touch

Date: Feb-01-2013
The skin is a human being's largest sensory organ, helping to distinguish between a pleasant contact, like a caress, and a negative sensation, like a pinch or a burn. Previous studies have shown that these sensations are carried to the brain by different types of sensory neurons that have nerve endings in the skin. Only a few of those neuron types have been identified, however, and most of those detect painful stimuli...

Empathy Peaks In Late Middle-Age

Date: Feb-01-2013
According to a new study of more than 75,000 adults, women in that age group are more empathic than men of the same age and than younger or older people. "Overall, late middle-aged adults were higher in both of the aspects of empathy that we measured," says Sara Konrath, co-author of an article on age and empathy forthcoming in the Journals of Gerontology: Psychological and Social Sciences. "They reported that they were more likely to react emotionally to the experiences of others, and they were also more likely to try to understand how things looked from the perspective of others...

Scientists Unveil A Superbug's Secret To Antibiotic Resistance

Date: Feb-01-2013
Worldwide, many strains of the bacterium Staphyloccocus aureus are already resistant to all antibiotics except vancomycin. But as bacteria are becoming resistant to this once powerful antidote, S. aureus has moved one step closer to becoming an unstoppable killer. Now, researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have not only identified the mechanism by which vancomycin resistance spreads from one bacterium to the next, but also have suggested ways to potentially stop the transfer...

Risk Of Type 2 Diabetes Increased By Binge Drinking By Causing Insulin Resistance

Date: Feb-01-2013
Binge drinking causes insulin resistance, which increases the risk of Type 2 diabetes, according to the results of an animal study led by researchers at the Diabetes Obesity and Metabolism Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The authors further discovered that alcohol disrupts insulin-receptor signaling by causing inflammation in the hypothalamus area of the brain. The results are published in the journal Science Translational Medicine...

Animal Group Claims European Chemical Agency Guilty Of Maladministration

Date: Feb-01-2013
In response to a complaint by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), the European Ombudsman has launched an inquiry into the actions of the European Union (EU) agency responsible for the administration of the REACH chemical-testing program, which is expected to consume millions of animals in toxicity tests. PETA's complaint, submitted in July 2012, alleges that the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) is not properly investigating cases in which animal testing could be avoided under the rules of REACH...

HIV Care Improves With Patient Satisfaction

Date: Feb-01-2013
In a study of patients at two HIV clinics in the Houston area, researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center found that those who were satisfied with the care they received had higher adherence to care and higher retention rates. Their report appears in PLOS ONE. "Poor retention is a big problem with HIV care," said Dr. Bich Dang, instructor of medicine - infectious diseases at BCM and first author of the paper. "Even though there are about 1...

Recently Identified Immune Cells Possible Therapeutic Target For Eczema

Date: Feb-01-2013
The increasing incidence of allergic skin diseases, and the accompanying economic burden and heightened risk of developing other allergic conditions, have spurred researchers to look for better ways to control these immune system-based disorders. Atopic dermatitis, more commonly called eczema, now affects 10 to 20 percent of children in the United States and direct health-care costs exceed $3 billion, according to the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases...