Health News

Being sexually coerced not an uncommon experience for young men, teenage boys

Date: Mar-27-2014
A large proportion of teenage boys and college men report having been coerced into sex or sexual behavior, according to research published by the American Psychological Association.A total of 43 percent of high school boys and young college men reported they had an unwanted sexual experience and of those, 95 percent said a female acquaintance was the aggressor, according to a study published online in the APA journal Psychology of Men and Masculinity.

Less children found to be at risk of low vitamin D levels

Date: Mar-27-2014
Under new guidelines from the Institute of Medicine, the estimated number of children who are at risk of having insufficient or deficient levels of vitamin D is drastically reduced from previous estimates, according to a Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine study.The study, led by Holly Kramer, MD, MPH, and Ramon Durazo-Arvizu, PhD, is published online ahead of print in the Journal of Pediatric Endocrinology and Metabolism.

Virtual reality-based therapy helps veterans overcome posttraumatic stress disorder

Date: Mar-27-2014
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is common among military veterans and together with the often-related anxiety, depression, and psychological and emotional impairment can dramatically affect quality of life. A type of virtual reality (VR) treatment called Graded Exposure Therapy (GET) can improve PTSD symptoms and may also have a positive impact on these associated disorders, as described in an article in Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., publishers.

Inducing biological tissue damage with plasma tool may destroy cancer cells

Date: Mar-27-2014
Plasma medicine is a new and rapidly developing area of medical technology. Specifically, understanding the interaction of so-called atmospheric pressure plasma jets with biological tissues could help to use them in medical practice. Under the supervision of Sylwia Ptasinska from the University of Notre Dame, in Indiana, USA, Xu Han and colleagues conducted a quantitative and qualitative study of the different types of DNA damage induced by atmospheric pressure plasma exposure, the paper is published in EPJ D as part of a special issue on nanoscale insights into Ion Beam Cancer Therapy.

Children suffer impaired learning of the natural world when exposed to books which have animals with human traits

Date: Mar-27-2014
A new study by University of Toronto researchers has found that kids' books featuring animals with human characteristics not only lead to less factual learning but also influence children's reasoning about animals.Researchers also found that young readers are more likely to attribute human behaviors and emotions to animals when exposed to books with anthropomorphized animals than books depicting animals realistically.

Response of unborn children to glucose associated with mother's insulin sensitivity

Date: Mar-27-2014
A study published in Diabetologia (the journal of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes) is the first to provide direct evidence that fetal brain response to a dose of sugar given orally to its mother is associated with the mother's insulin sensitivity. This may indicate that the risk of subsequent obesity and diabetes may be pre-programmed in the womb. The study is by Dr Hubert Preissl and Dr Andreas Fritsche, University of Tübingen, Germany and German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD), Neuherberg, Germany, and colleagues.

New design could reduce threat of infection from millions of urinary catheters

Date: Mar-27-2014
For the millions of people forced to rely on a plastic tube to eliminate their urine, developing an infection is nearly a 100 percent guarantee after just four weeks. But with the help of a little bubble-blowing, biomedical engineers hope to bring relief to urethras everywhere.About half of the time, the interior of long-term urinary catheters become plagued by biofilms - structures formed by colonies of bacteria that are extremely difficult to kill.

In Alzheimer's disease, lipid rafts participate in the renewal of brain neurons

Date: Mar-27-2014
Research over decades has implicated aberrant autophagy and lysosomal function as reliable markers and therapeutic targets for neurodegenerative diseases. Lipid rafts are shown to participate in lysosomal reproduction, and some lysosomal storage diseases are proposed to result from the accumulation of lipids in late endosomal/lysosomal compartments. Prof.

Women with PCOS may suffer psychiatric complications, menstrual irregularity

Date: Mar-27-2014
Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), a hormone imbalance that causes infertility, obesity, and excessive facial hair in women, can also lead to severe mental health issues including anxiety, depression, and eating disorders. A study supervised by Columbia University School of Nursing professor Nancy Reame, MSN, PhD, FAAN, and published in the Journal of Behavioral Health Services & Research, identifies the PCOS complications that may be most responsible for psychiatric problems.

The effects of an antimicrobial peptide on bacterial cells decoded

Date: Mar-27-2014
Small peptides attack bacteria in many different ways and may well become a new generation of antibiotics. Biologists at the Ruhr-Universitat Bochum (RUB) have been researching how such peptides kill bacterial cells. "It is quite possible that, in ten years time, all of the currently marketed antibiotics will lose their power, because bacteria will have become resistant against all active agents," says Junior Professor Dr Julia Bandow. Consequently, it is high time to develop new antibacterial drugs.