Health News

Ovaries Are Capable Of Producing Eggs During Adulthood

Date: Jul-26-2012
A woman's 'biological clock' refers to the fact that a woman's oocytes, i.e. immature egg cells progressively decline with age. For decades, researchers have believed that oocytes cannot be renewed in mammals after birth, a view that has created controversy in recent years. PLoS Genetics reports on an interesting new genetic study that traces the origins of immature egg cells from the embryonic period throughout adulthood, which now adds new information to the growing controversy...

Antiretroviral Therapy Reduces Risk Of Tuberculosis In HIV Patients

Date: Jul-26-2012
HIV positive people in low and middle income countries who take anti-HIV drugs (antiretroviral therapy) are considerably less likely to develop tuberculosis than those who do not take antiretroviral therapy. The finding, published in this week's issue of PLoS Medicine is irrespective of the immunodeficiency biomarker CD4 count, which indicates when HIV-positive individuals should initiate antiretroviral therapy...

Germs At The Olympics - Ways To Prevent Illness In Large Crowds

Date: Jul-26-2012
The Olympic Games in London attracts huge crowds of visitors from all around the world, who carry a world-class array of germs with them. Gregory Poland, M.D., an expert for infectious disease from the Mayo Clinic offers advice on how people can protect themselves against illness avoiding illness in mass gatherings, such as the Olympics, professional sports games, conventions, arena concert or other major events. Dr...

Malnutrition And Starvation Cause Inflamed Intestines

Date: Jul-26-2012
Starvation and malnutrition are still major problems and leading causes of mortality worldwide. Over a billion people are starving in poor countries and malnutrition affects rich countries, as well. Doctors have known for over a century that a diet lacking in protein or low levels of amino acids, which are the building blocks of proteins, can cause symptoms like diarrhea, inflamed intestines and other immune system disorders that weaken the body and can potentially prove fatal...

Arterial Inflammation Causes Increased Heart Problems In HIV Patients

Date: Jul-26-2012
A study published in a special edition of JAMA for the International AIDS Conference has revealed that the higher risk of cardiovascular disease in HIV-infected patients seems to be linked to higher inflammation in the arteries. Researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) discovered that levels of inflammation in HIV-positive people's aortas, without cardiovascular disease and no elevated traditional risk factors, were similar to those of patients with established cardiovascular disease...

Light At Night Damage May Be Reversed

Date: Jul-26-2012
A new study, published online in the journal Molecular Psychiatry, has revealed that although chronic exposure to dim light at night can lead to depressive symptoms in rodents, the symptoms are reversible by simply switching back to a normal light-dark cycle. Researchers found that hamsters that were exposed to 4 weeks of light during the dark cycle at night displayed symptoms of depression, which disappeared around two weeks, after switching back to a normal day and night cycle...

Replacing Diseased Immune System With A Healthy One To Cure Chrohn's Disease

Date: Jul-26-2012
In a new clinical trial, researchers from Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center set out to test the theory that giving Crohn's disease patients a new immune system can cure severe cases of the disease. Crohn's disease is a chronic inflammatory condition of the gastrointestinal tract with symptoms of pain, fever, diarrhea and weight loss, which usually occurs in adolescents and young adults, but which can also occur during early childhood and older age...

Impact Of Wearable Monitoring Systems On Parkinson's Patients

Date: Jul-26-2012
Parkinson's disease is the second leading neurodegenerative disease after Alzheimer's disease. Now, researchers at The Technical Research Centre for Dependency, Care and Autonomous Living (CETpD) of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, BarcelonaTech (UPC) have designed a new wearable system that will automatically regulate the delivery of medication to Parkinson's patients based on their status and improve their quality of life...

What Are The Best Methods For Treating Esophageal Cancer?

Date: Jul-26-2012
A multi-national team of researchers has found in the world's largest review on the best methods to manage and treat common pre-cancerous and cancerous conditions of the esophagus that good endoscopy equipment, more endoscopic surgery and more tissue sampling is needed to improve patient care. Around 2% of the world's population suffers from Barrett's esophagus. Men over the age of 50 living in developed countries are in the highest risk group. It is estimated that the risk of developing esophageal adenocarcinoma amongst people with Barrett's esophagus is around 0.5 to 1% per year...

Urgent Need For HIV Treatments Suitable For Young Children

Date: Jul-26-2012
An article written by an international group of researchers reports that there is an urgent need to develop formulations of current antiretroviral therapy (ART) treatments suitable for young children, in particular, tablets that are a combination of different HIV drugs, which can be dispersed or crushed and mixed with food or liquids. The article was published in this week's PLoS Medicine. Even though the risk of HIV infection is highest in young children, they also represent the group that is most neglected amongst those affected by the HIV epidemic...