Health News

Hope For New Drug Delivery Systems Following Creation Of Flexible, Nanoscale 'Bed Of Nails'

Date: Jan-17-2013
Researchers at North Carolina State University have come up with a technique to embed needle-like carbon nanofibers in an elastic membrane, creating a flexible "bed of nails" on the nanoscale that opens the door to development of new drug-delivery systems. The research community is interested in finding new ways to deliver precise doses of drugs to specific targets, such as regions of the brain. One idea is to create balloons embedded with nanoscale spikes that are coated with the relevant drug...

Improving Emotion Regulation Skills In Borderline Personality Disorder

Date: Jan-17-2013
Originally, the label "borderline personality disorder" was applied to patients who were thought to represent a middle ground between patients with neurotic and psychotic disorders. Increasingly, though, this area of research has focused on the heightened emotional reactivity observed in patients carrying this diagnosis, as well as the high rates with which they also meet diagnostic criteria for posttraumatic stress disorder and mood disorders. New research now published in Biological Psychiatry from Dr...

Neuron Creation In Brain Disrupted By Lack Of Protein Sp2

Date: Jan-17-2013
A protein known as Sp2 is key to the proper creation of neurons from stem cells, according to researchers at North Carolina State University. Understanding how this protein works could enable scientists to "program" stem cells for regeneration, which has implications for neural therapies. Troy Ghashghaei and Jon Horowitz, both faculty in NC State's Department of Molecular Biomedical Sciences and researchers in the Center for Comparative Medicine and Translational Research, wanted to know more about the function of Sp2, a cell cycle regulator that helps control how cells divide...

Gene Sequencing Program Gives Researchers New Leads To Improve Cancer Treatment

Date: Jan-17-2013
It started with a 44-year-old woman with solitary fibrous tumor, a rare cancer seen in only a few hundred people each year. By looking at the entire DNA from this one patient's tumor, researchers have found a genetic anomaly that provides an important clue to improving how this cancer is diagnosed and treated. Researchers at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center sequenced the tumor's genome through a new program called MI-ONCOSEQ, which is designed to identify genetic mutations in tumors that might be targeted with new therapies being tested in clinical trials...

Genetically Engineered Bacteria May Improve The Efficacy Of Vaccines For Flu, Pertussis, Cholera, HPV

Date: Jan-17-2013
Researchers at The University of Texas at Austin have developed a menu of 61 new strains of genetically engineered bacteria that may improve the efficacy of vaccines for diseases such as flu, pertussis, cholera and HPV. The strains of E. coli, which were described in a paper published this month in the journal PNAS, are part of a new class of biological "adjuvants" that is poised to transform vaccine design. Adjuvants are substances added to vaccines to boost the human immune response...

Smoking Status Seems To Be Most Important Prognostic Factor, Not EGFR Mutation, In Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

Date: Jan-17-2013
Recent studies have demonstrated that molecular-targeted agents, such as epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKI), may prolong survival of selected patients based on tumor biomarkers. The presence of mutation in the EGFR gene is known as a predictive marker for the response to treatment. However, whether or not these EGFR mutations are prognostic factors for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) has not been known...

In Non-Small-Cell Lung Cancer, Patients With EGFR Exon 20 Insertions Have Poorer Prognosis

Date: Jan-17-2013
Exon 20 insertions are the third most common family of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations found in non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Little is known about cancers harboring these mutations aside from their lack of response to EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors, impairing the development of effective targeted therapies...

In Stage I Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer, Comparable Patterns Of Failure Exist Between SBRT, Lobectomy Or Pneumonectomy

Date: Jan-17-2013
For patients with medically operable clinical stage I non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), lobectomy or pneumonectomy is the standard approach. For patients with medically inoperable stage I NSCLC, stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) has become a standard of care. Researchers from the Washington University School of Medicine wanted to compare the patterns of failure (primary tumor control, local control, regional control, and distant control) between each method...

Wanting May Be More Important Than Having

Date: Jan-17-2013
Materialistic consumers may derive more pleasure from desiring products than they do from actually owning them, and are willing to overspend and go into debt because they believe that future purchases will transform their lives, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. "Thinking about acquisition provides momentary happiness boosts to materialistic people, and because they tend to think about acquisition a lot, such thoughts have the potential to provide frequent mood boosts. But the positive emotions associated with acquisition are short-lived...

Brief, Practical Intervention Can Improve Physician-Patient Communication Relating To Newly Prescribed Medications

Date: Jan-17-2013
When it comes to prescribing medications to their patients, physicians could use a dose of extra training, according to a new study led by a UCLA researcher. In previous studies, Dr. Derjung Tarn and her colleagues found that when doctors prescribed medicines, the information they provided to patients was spotty at best, they rarely addressed the cost of medications and they didn't adequately monitor their patients' medication adherence...