Graduate student Michael Schappe (left) and Bimal Desai, PhD, have discovered a switch that could let doctors shut down inflammation. Credit: Josh Barney | University of Virginia Health System A new discovery about the immune system may allow doctors to treat harmful inflammation that damages the brain in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s. It might […]
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Credit: CC0 Public Domain A diet rich in saturated fat and sugar not only leads to obesity, it creates inflammation in the nucleus accumbens, a part of the brain that controls mood and the feeling of reward. And this inflammation can lead to depressive, anxious and compulsive behaviour and disrupt metabolism, according to a new […]
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Amjad Horani, MD, listens to the breathing of Azaylea Ramirez, 3, of Keota, Okla. Using cells from children diagnosed with primary ciliary dyskinesia, a genetic lung disease Azaylea has, Horani and colleague Steven Brody, MD, have figured out how mutations disrupt the clearing of the airways. Credit: Karen Elshout Respiratory infections peak during the winter […]
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Special Issue: Seniors Print this issue Take Care of Yourself While Caring for Others It can be a labor of love, and sometimes a job of necessity. Millions of Americans provide unpaid care for someone with a serious health condition each year. These often-unsung heroes provide hours of assistance to others. Yet the stress and […]
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Credit: CC0 Public Domain Aortic aneurysm – the dilation of the aorta – is a serious condition that lacks effective drug treatment. Researchers at Karolinska Institutet report in the journal PNAS, however, that a common asthma drug can retard the development of aortic aneurysm in mice. “Our results are exciting and open the way for […]
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Credit: Yale University Yale School of Public Health researchers have developed a new method to predict likely resistance paths to cancer therapeutics, and a methodology to apply it to one of the most frequent cancer-causing genes. That gene, KRAS, is mutated in approximately 20 percent of all human cancers and has a major presence in […]
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The immune system plays a pivotal role in the amount of pain and disease progression experienced by patients with osteoarthritis (OA), McMaster University researchers have found. This discovery could lead to new strategies for improving joint pain management and immune function in older adults with arthritis. The study, published in the medical journal Osteoarthritis and […]
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Credit: CC0 Public Domain Have you resolved to take better care of yourself in the new year? Here’s a relatively painless way to do it: Catch a few more zzz’s every night. A third of American adults don’t get enough sleep, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Chronic poor sleep has been […]
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Special Issue: Seniors Print this issue Make the Most of Your Appointment Patients and health care providers share a very personal relationship. Doctors need to know a lot about you, your family, and your lifestyle to give you the best medical care. And you need to speak up and share your concerns and questions. Clear […]
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Cancer screening can save lives. Mammographies reduce the chance women will die of breast cancer, and colonoscopies reduce the chance people will die of colon cancer. But should my 93-year-old father receive a screening colonoscopy? The test is uncomfortable, carries risks, and costs money. Even more importantly, my dad probably won’t live long enough to […]
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Pediatric dentist Darsi Perusini (right) talks with patient Amanda Ross and her four-month-old daughter Charlotte, who is expecting her first tooth next month. Credit: Tarwinder Rai Along with genetic traits, parents can also pass on cavities to their babies, says a University of Alberta pediatric dentist. “Tooth decay is a transmissible disease,” said Darsi Perusini. […]
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Researchers hope that their work will lead to a new approach to designing and evaluating polymer stents and other types of degradable medical devices. Credit: Pei-Jiang Wang Many patients with heart disease have a metal stent implanted to keep their coronary artery open and prevent blood clotting that can lead to heart attacks. One drawback […]
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Autistic characters in children’s books are few and far between. Credit: Shutterstock The children’s writer Michael Morpurgo has written a new novel inspired by his autistic grandson, which is set to be published later this year. Flamingo Boy is set in the Camargue in the south of France during World War II and features a […]
Continue Reading ...Around the world bacteria are developing new strategies that render them resistant to antibiotics, resulting in an increasing number of patients dying from untreatable infections. Experts now agree that unless we discover new medicines soon, the post-antibiotic era may be upon us, effectively pushing human healthcare back to the 1940s. In particular, a class of […]
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Histopathogic image of senile plaques of amyloid beta seen in the cerebral cortex in a patient with Alzheimer’s disease of presenile onset. Credit: KGH, Source: Wikimedia Commons A UCL-led team has developed a cognitive test to detect subtle memory deficits years before Alzheimer’s disease symptoms develop, set out in a new paper published in The […]
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