Health News

Vitamin D - How Much Is Too Much?

Date: Jun-13-2012
Vitamin D is vital for absorbing and maintaining calcium levels in the body, and therefore reducing the risk of fractures from falls and broken hips. Vitamin D is also beneficial for fighting cardiac disease, depression and various types of cancers and although scientists are aware of the fact that a Vitamin D deficiency is unhealthy, new research has now revealed that excessive Vitamin D levels are also unhealthy...

Huge Increase In Radiation Exposure From Diagnostic Imaging

Date: Jun-13-2012
It is easy to have sympathy for doctors and hospital staff. With better technology available to look inside a patient´s body, the temptation to use it as often as possible must be huge. Since the mid 90s, with more advanced computers and better, cheaper scanning equipment more widely available, the use of computed tomography has trippled between 1996 and 2010, while magnetic resonance imaging has qradrupled, and there as been a substantial increase in estimated radiation exposure...

Female Hormones Impact On Gum Disease Risk

Date: Jun-13-2012
Women need to take better care of their teeth and gums than men, according to a comprehensive review of women's health studies. The review, entitled 'Women's Health: Periodontitis and its Relation to Hormonal Changes, Adverse Pregnancy Outcomes and Osteoporosis' by Charlene Krejci, associate clinical professor at the Case Western Reserve University School of Dental Medicine, is featured in the May issue of Oral Health and Preventive Dentistry and reveals that women's health issues are associated with gum disease...

Newborns Account For 40% Of Child Deaths, But Only 6% Of World's Foreign Assistance For Maternal And Child Health Mentions Them

Date: Jun-13-2012
Save the Children has released a pioneering report on newborn survival over the last decade that shows the world has greatly overlooked a key area for reducing child deaths - newborn care.* The world has achieved remarkable progress on reducing child deaths - from 12.4 million in 1990 to 7.6 million in 2010 - but that progress isn't reaching newborn babies at the same pace, the report shows. As a result, newborns (infants in the first month of life) now account for more than 40 percent of child deaths. However, the new report finds that globally only 0...

From Infection To Inflammation To Cancer: Scientists Offer New Clues

Date: Jun-13-2012
Chronic inflammation of the liver, stomach or colon, often as a result of infection by viruses and bacteria, is one of the biggest risk factors for cancer of these organs. Scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US have been researching this for over three decades, and now in a new paper published online this week they offer the most comprehensive clues so far about the potential underlying molecular mechanisms. A bacterium called Helicobacter pylori causes stomach ulcers and cancer in humans...

Diesel Exhaust Fumes Cause Cancer, WHO

Date: Jun-13-2012
Following a week-long meeting of international experts, the World Health Organization's (WHO's) cancer panel has classified diesel engine exhaust as carcinogenic or cancer-causing to humans, more than 20 years after it was classified as "probably carcinogenic to humans". The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) told the press on Tuesday that it had based its decision on "sufficient evidence that exposure is associated with an increased risk for lung cancer"...

Hospital Noise Spoiling Patient's Sleep

Date: Jun-13-2012
Anyone who has been sick can appreciate the joy of a good night's sleep, but in a large institution like a hospital, there are necessities of running the establishment that can disturb a patient's peace. All the more so with all manner of electronic equipment, cell phones, alarms, intercoms and such like, that produce sounds to wake the dead. However the association between noise disruption and sleep patterns had not been studied in great detail...

Healthy Older Women Affected By Alzheimer's Risk Gene

Date: Jun-13-2012
A team led by investigators at the Stanford University School of Medicine has found that the most common genetic risk factor for Alzheimer's disease disrupts brain function in healthy older women but has little impact on brain function in healthy, older men. Women harboring the gene variant, known to be a potent risk factor for Alzheimer's disease, show brain changes characteristic of the neurodegenerative disorder that can be observed before any outward symptoms manifest...

Cough Relief With Sucrose And Menthol

Date: Jun-13-2012
Millions of Americans reach for their cough drops or syrup at the first sign of a cough. However, scientists are unsure if and how these popular remedies work. Now, new findings from the Monell Center suggest that sucrose and menthol, ingredients commonly regarded as flavorings in these preparations, each act independently to reduce coughing. Cough is a vital protective reflex that clears the respiratory tract of threats from mechanical stimuli like food and chemical stimuli such as airborne toxins and pollutants...

Hepatocyte Cell Transplantation Enables 'New' Liver Generation

Date: Jun-13-2012
Researchers in Japan have found that hepatocytes, cells comprising the main tissue of the liver and involved in protein synthesis and storage, can assist in tissue engineering and create a "new liver system" in mouse models when donor mouse liver hepatocytes are isolated and propagated for transplantation. Their study is published in a recent issue of Cell Transplantation (21:2/3), now freely available on-line...