Health News

Couples with young children are as likely to stay together if the mother is the main breadwinner rather than the father

Date: Feb-20-2014
A paper published in the journal Sociology says the relationships of parents are in some cases more stable if the mother earns more than the father.Dr Shireen Kanji, of the University of Leicester School of Management, and Dr Pia Schober, of the German Institute for Economic Research, Berlin, examined survey data on 3,944 British couples as their first child aged from eight months to seven years.

After nursing home discharge, many Medicare beneficiaries return to ER

Date: Feb-20-2014
Nursing homes are widely used by Medicare beneficiaries who require rehabilitation after hospital stays. But according to a recent study led by a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing, a high percentage of Medicare patients who are discharged from nursing homes will return to the hospital or the emergency room within 30 days."Nearly two million older adults use this benefit every year," said assistant professor Mark Toles, the first author of the study.

Warning - ticks may cause double trouble

Date: Feb-20-2014
As winter turns to spring and many Northern Californians plan outdoor adventures, a mysterious, potentially debilitating threat looms.A newly recognized human pathogen with unknown health consequences has been found to occur over a large part of the San Francisco Bay Area.

For heart transplant patients, blood test serves as 'crystal ball'

Date: Feb-20-2014
A new UCLA-led study shows that a blood test commonly used to determine whether heart transplant recipients are rejecting their new organ can also predict potential rejection-related problems in the future.Reporting in the online edition of the peer-reviewed journal Transplantation, researchers demonstrate how the AlloMap test, which uses a blood sample to measure changes in the expression of roughly a dozen genes, can be used over a period of time to assess the risk of dysfunction or rejection of a transplanted heart - months before such an event may occur.

Solution to molecular biology mystery may help in the design or screening for new anti-bacterial drugs

Date: Feb-20-2014
The nature of the machinery responsible for the entry of proteins into cell membranes has been unravelled by scientists, who hope the breakthrough could ultimately be exploited for the design of new anti-bacterial drugs. Groups of researchers from the University of Bristol and the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) used new genetic engineering technologies to reconstruct and isolate the cell's protein trafficking machinery.Its analysis has shed new light on a process which had previously been a mystery for molecular biologists.

Iron deficiency increases stroke risk by making blood sticky

Date: Feb-20-2014
More than 15 million people worldwide suffer a stroke every year, resulting in almost 6 million deaths. Now, new research from Imperial College London in the UK finds that iron deficiency could increase a person's risk of stroke by making the blood sticky.This is according to a study recently published in the journal PLOS One.The research team, including Dr.

Unprecedented glimpse of what happens to the heart during a heart attack

Date: Feb-20-2014
A team of researchers at the University of Florence in Italy and the University of Connecticut Health Center have used a multidisciplinary approach to provide an unprecedented glimpse of what happens to the heart during an "infarction" -- a heart attack -- by looking at how the attack affects electrical activity and calcium release in heart cells."Thanks to this method, we found electrical abnormalities and non-homogenous calcium release across failing cells," explained Claudia Crocini, who presented the research at the 58th Annual Biophysical Society Meeting.

Researchers reveal kidney cancer's weak link

Date: Feb-20-2014
A team of researchers at Chalmers University of Technology has found that kidney cancer cells have a quite different metabolism than other types of malignancies. The findings pave the way for new methods of diagnosing kidney cancer at an early stage, a feat that had eluded researchers earlier, and thereby fresh approaches to treatment.Cancer is a result of mutations in the genes of healthy cells. The transition to cancer cells involves a fundamental transformation of their metabolism, the way that they use nourishment and energy.

Human zit-causing bacterium now infecting vineyards

Date: Feb-20-2014
In a striking case of pathogen transfer involving the bacterium responsible for human acne, P. acnes, authors Campisano, et. al., report in the journal Molecular Biology and Evolution on a new type of P. acnes which exploits grapevines, dubbing it P. acnes type Zappae. They named the bacterium after the Italian term "zappa," meaning, hoe, as well as a tribute to eclectic composer Frank Zappa, who once wrote of "sand-blasted zits" in one of his most famous satirical songs, "Jewish Princess," from his controversial '79 "Sheik Yerbouti "album.

Cold chain barrier broken with revolutionary meningitis vaccine

Date: Feb-20-2014
The first mass vaccination campaign conducted in Africa with a vaccine that does not require constant refrigeration succeeded in providing complete coverage while ensuring the vaccine stayed viable even in ambient temperatures up to 39°C (102.2°F), according to a study published online in the journal Vaccine.