Health News

Guidelines For Treating Type 2 Diabetes In Kids, First Ever

Date: Jan-29-2013
The first ever guidelines for managing type 2 diabetes in children aged from 10 to 18 years have been issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP). The AAP explained that over the last thirty years, childhood obesity rates have risen "dramatically" throughout the country, bringing with them several health problems, including type 2 diabetes...

ALS May Be Prevented By Eating Colorful Fruits And Vegetables

Date: Jan-29-2013
Eating bright colored foods, especially those that are yellow, orange, and red, may prevent or slow the onset of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The study, published in the journal Annals of Neurology, confirmed that colorful carotenoids prevented the onset of ALS, while diets high in lycopene, beta-cryptoxanthin, and vitamin C did not decrease ALS risk. Carotenoids are what make fruits and vegetables a bright red, orange, or yellow color, and are a dietary source of Vitamin A.  Earlier research reported that oxidative stress contributes to the development of ALS...

Edge™ Radiosurgery Suite Receives FDA 510(k) Clearance For Non-Invasive Surgical Procedures

Date: Jan-29-2013
Varian Medical Systems (NYSE: VAR) has received FDA 510(k) clearance for the company's Edge™ radiosurgery suite, a new dedicated system for performing advanced radiosurgery using innovative real-time tumor tracking and motion management technologies. "The Edge suite represents a new paradigm in radiosurgery, offering clinicians a system that combines Varian's world-class technologies in an end-to-end solution for planning and delivering radiosurgery treatments," said Chris Toth, vice president of marketing for Varian's Oncology Systems business...

A Major Step Toward Realizing Renal Regeneration

Date: Jan-29-2013
The research group led by Associate Professor Kenji Osafune and his colleague Shin-ichi Mae, both from Center for iPS Cell Research and Application (CiRA), Kyoto University in Japan, has succeeded in developing a highly efficient method of inducing human induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells to differentiate into intermediate mesoderm, the precursor of kidney, gonad, and other cell lineages. This represents a major step toward realizing renal regeneration...

Mouse Model Of Prostate Cancer Improves Understanding Of Complex Stress-Cancer Interactions

Date: Jan-29-2013
Not surprisingly, a cancer diagnosis creates stress. And patients with prostate cancer show higher levels of anxiety compared to other cancer patients. A new study by researchers at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center indicates that stress is not just an emotional side effect of the diagnosis; it also can reduce the effectiveness of prostate cancer drugs and accelerate the development of prostate cancer. The findings are published in the February issue of the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The Wake Forest Baptist team, headed by George Kulik, D.V.M., Ph.D...

Yoga May Have Positive Effects On Major Psychiatric Disorders, Including Depression, Schizophrenia, ADHD And Sleep Complaints

Date: Jan-29-2013
Yoga has positive effects on mild depression and sleep complaints, even in the absence of drug treatments, and improves symptoms associated with schizophrenia and ADHD in patients on medication, according to a systematic review of the exercise on major clinical psychiatric disorders. Published in the open-access journal, Frontiers in Psychiatry, the review of more than one hundred studies focusing on 16 high-quality controlled studies looked at the effects of yoga on depression, schizophrenia, ADHD, sleep complaints, eating disorders and cognition problems...

New Target Identified For Rheumatoid Arthritis

Date: Jan-29-2013
Researchers at Hospital for Special Surgery have identified a potential new target for drugs to treat patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), a protein known as IRHOM2. The finding could provide an effective and potentially less toxic alternative therapy to tumor necrosis factor-alpha blockers (TNF-blockers), the mainstay of treatment for rheumatoid arthritis, and could help patients who do not respond to this treatment. Efforts to develop drugs that hone in on this new target are underway...

Bullying More Likely When Kids Considered 'Cool'

Date: Jan-29-2013
Bullying, whether it's physical aggression or spreading rumors, boosts the social status and popularity of middle school students, according to a new UCLA psychology study that has implications for programs aimed at combating school bullying. In addition, students already considered popular engage in these forms of bullying, the researchers found. The psychologists studied 1,895 ethnically diverse students from 99 classes at 11 Los Angeles middle schools. They conducted surveys at three points: during the spring of seventh grade, the fall of eighth grade and the spring of eighth grade...

Inflammation During Pregnancy Linked To Autism Risk

Date: Jan-29-2013
Maternal inflammation during early pregnancy may be related to an increased risk of autism in children, according to new findings supported by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), part of the National Institutes of Health. Researchers found this in children of mothers with elevated C-reactive protein (CRP), a well-established marker of systemic inflammation. The risk of autism among children in the study was increased by 43 percent among mothers with CRP levels in the top 20th percentile, and by 80 percent for maternal CRP in the top 10th percentile...

Magnetic Levitation Makes In Vitro Lung Tissue More Realistic, Could Speed Toxicity Tests

Date: Jan-29-2013
In a development that could lead to faster and more effective toxicity tests for airborne chemicals, scientists from Rice University and the Rice spinoff company Nano3D Biosciences have used magnetic levitation to grow some of the most realistic lung tissue ever produced in a laboratory. The research is part of an international trend in biomedical engineering to create laboratory techniques for growing tissues that are virtually identical to those found in people's bodies...