Tuesday 14 January 2014

New Blood Thinner Pill For Patients With Deep Vein Thrombosis

New Blood Thinner Pill For Patients With Deep Vein Thrombosis.
A reborn anti-clotting pill, rivaroxaban (Xarelto), may be an effective, ready and safer healing for patients coping with deep-vein thrombosis (DVT), a pair of new studies indicate. According to the research, published online Dec 4, 2010 in the New England Journal of Medicine, the knock out could bid a new option for these potentially life-threatening clots, which most typically produce in the lower leg or thigh. The findings are also slated for presentation Saturday at the annual convention of the American Society of Hematology (ASH), in Orlando, Fla.

And "These study outcomes may at all change the way that patients with DVT are treated," study author Dr Harry R Buller, a professor of drug at the Academic Medical Center at the University of Amsterdam, said in an ASH announcement release. "This new treatment regimen of oral rivaroxaban can potentially deliver blood clot therapy easier than the current standard treatment for both the patient and the physician, with a single-drug and forthright fixed-dose approach".

Another heart expert agreed. "Rivaroxiban is at least as effective as the older painkiller warfarin and seems safer. It is also far easier to use since it does not require blood testing to patch up the dose," said cardiologist Dr Alan Kadish, currently president of Touro College in New York City.

The survey was funded in part by Bayer Schering Pharma, which markets rivaroxaban most the United States. Funding also came from Ortho-McNeil, which will market the drug in the United States should it improvement US Food and Drug Administration approval. In March 2009, an FDA admonitory panel recommended the drug be approved, but agency review is ongoing pending further study.

The authors note that upwards of 2 million Americans occurrence a DVT each year. These pin clots - sometimes called "economy flight syndrome" since they've been associated with the immobilization of yearn flights - can migrate to the lungs to form potentially deadly pulmonary embolisms. The fashionable standard of care typically involves treatment with relatively well-known anti-coagulant medications, such as the word-of-mouth medication warfarin (Coumadin) and/or the injected medication heparin.

While effective, in some patients these drugs can eager unstable responses, as well as problematic interactions with other medications. For warfarin in particular, the unrealized also exists for the development of severe and life-threatening bleeding. Use of these drugs, therefore, requires sincere and continuous monitoring. The search for a safer and easier to administer curing option led Buller's team to analyze two sets of data: One that perforated rivaroxaban against the standard anti-clotting drug enoxaparin (a heparin-type medication), and the second which compared rivaroxaban with a placebo.

Saturday 11 January 2014

Traffic Seems To Increase Kids' Asthma Attacks

Traffic Seems To Increase Kids' Asthma Attacks.
Air fouling from borough traffic appears to increase asthma attacks in kids that require an emergency chamber visit, a new study reports. The effect was found to be strongest during the warmer parts of the year. The researchers who conducted the study, done in Atlanta, were tiresome to pinpoint which components of pollution recreation the biggest role in making asthma worse. So "Characterizing the associations between ambient display pollutants and pediatric asthma exacerbations, particularly with respect to the chemical composition of particulate matter, can supporter us better understand the impact of these different components and can help to inform public health behaviour decisions," the study's lead author, Matthew J Strickland, an assistant professor of environmental salubriousness at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, said in a news publicity from the American Thoracic Society.

The researchers examined the medical records of children 5 to 17 years past one's prime who had been treated in Atlanta-area emergency rooms from 1993 to 2004 because of asthma attacks. Data were gathered from more than 90,000 asthma-related visits. They then analyzed connections between the visits and common text on the levels of 11 different pollutants.

The researchers found signs that ozone worsens asthma, as they had expected. But they also found indications that components of corruption that comes from combustion engines, such as those in cars and trucks, were also linked to perilous asthma problems in kids. Results of the study were published online April 22 in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

Asthma is a lingering (long-term) lung affliction that inflames and narrows the airways. Asthma causes recurring periods of wheezing (a whistling signal when you breathe), chest tightness, shortness of breath, and coughing. The coughing often occurs at tenebrousness or early in the morning. Asthma affects people of all ages, but it most often starts in childhood.

Wednesday 8 January 2014

Normal Levels Of Vitamin D Is Associated With Improved Treatment Of Some Leukemia Patients

Normal Levels Of Vitamin D Is Associated With Improved Treatment Of Some Leukemia Patients.
Patients with a definite sort of leukemia who had scarce vitamin D levels when their cancer was diagnosed saw their disease progress much faster and were two times more fitting to die than those with adequate vitamin D levels, a new study finds. Researchers also discovered that increasing vitamin D levels in patients was linked to longer survival times, even after controlling for other factors associated with leukemia progression. This is an respected conclusion for both patients and doctors, according to the researchers at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn and the University of Iowa.

The disorder - dyed in the wool lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) - is cancer of the white blood cells (lymphocytes) and mainly affects adults. Although CLL is often diagnosed at an original stage, the standard approach is to mark time until patients develop symptoms before beginning chemotherapy, explained study author and hematologist Dr Tait Shanafelt.

Monday 6 January 2014

New Methods Of Treatment Of Intestinal Infections

New Methods Of Treatment Of Intestinal Infections.
Here's a unique construction on the old idea of not letting anything go to waste. According to a small new Dutch study, considerate stool - which contains billions of useful bacteria - can be donated from one human to another to cure a severe, common and recurrent bacterial infection. People who have the infection, called Clostridium difficile (or C difficile), observation long bouts of severe diarrhea, abdominal pain, nausea and vomiting. For many, antibiotics are ineffective.

To press matters worse, prepossessing antibiotics for months and months wipes out a large percentage of bacteria that would normally be accommodating in fighting the infection. "Clostridium difficile only grows when normal bacteria are absent," explained investigate author Dr Josbert Keller, a gastroenterologist at Hagaziekenhuis Hospital, in The Hague. The stool from a donor, conflicting with a salt solution called saline, can be instilled into the crazy person's intestinal system, almost like parachuting a team of commandos into enemy territory.

The vigorous person's abundant and diverse gut bacteria go to work within days, wiping out the stubborn C difficile that the antibiotics have failed to kill, according to the study. "Everybody makes jokes about this, but for the patients it very makes a big difference," Keller said. "People are desperate".

The research, published Jan 16, 2013 in the New England Journal of Medicine, showed that the infusion of benefactor stool was significantly more serviceable in treating iterative C difficile infection than was vancomycin, an antibiotic. Of the 16 boning up participants, 13 (81 percent) of the patients had resolution of their infection after just one infusion of stool and two others were cured with a support treatment. The approach is not new, but this research is the first controlled whack ever done, according to Dr Ciaran Kelly, a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and the designer of an editorial accompanying the research.

Previous reports have been simple case studies, which are considered less conclusive. C difficile is the most commonly identified cause of hospital-acquired communicable diarrhea in the United States, according to Kelly. The take care of of giving and receiving a stool donation is relatively simple. Study author Keller said participants typically asked lineage members to donate part of a bowel movement, thoughtful it would be more comfortable to receive such a donation of such a substance from someone they knew.

Friday 3 January 2014

Reduction Of Distress In Children During Stem Cell Transplantation

Reduction Of Distress In Children During Stem Cell Transplantation.
For children undergoing staunch cubicle transplantation, complementary therapies such as massage and humor group therapy don't seem to reduce their distress, researchers found. Stem cell transplantation is Euphemistic pre-owned to treat cancer and other illnesses, and it is a prolonged and physically demanding process that often causes children and their families lofty levels of distress, the authors of the study noted.

Previous studies have shown that complementary therapies, such as hypnosis and massage, can every so often help adult patients cope with stem cell transplantation. The results of the creative US study, which included 178 children undergoing stem apartment transplantation at four medical centers, were released online July 12 in advance of booklet in an upcoming print issue of the journal Cancer.

Wednesday 1 January 2014

Antiretroviral Therapy Works, And HIV-Infected People Live Long

Antiretroviral Therapy Works, And HIV-Infected People Live Long.
Better treatments are extending the lives of tribe with HIV, but aging with the AIDS-causing virus takes a ringing that will trial the health care system, a new report says. A survey of about 1000 HIV-positive men and women ages 50 and older living in New York City found more than half had symptoms of depression, a much higher charge than others their lifetime without HIV.

And 91 percent also had other habitual medical conditions, such as arthritis (31 percent), hepatitis (31 percent), neuropathy (30 percent) and considerable blood pressure (27 percent). About 77 percent had two or more other conditions. About half had progressed to AIDS before they got the HIV diagnosis, the appear found. "The elevated news is antiretroviral therapies are working and people are living.

If all goes well, they will have sustenance expectancies similar to those without HIV," said Daniel Tietz, executive director of the AIDS Community Research Initiative of America. "But a 55-year-old with HIV tends to appearance like a 70-year-old without HIV in terms of the other conditions they have occasion for treatment for," he said Wednesday at a meeting of the Office of National AIDS Policy at the White House in Washington, DC.

The examination included interviews with 640 men, 264 women and 10 transgender people. Dozens of experts on HIV and aging attended the meeting, which was intended to recognize the needs of older adults with HIV and to investigate ways to better services to them. Currently, about 27 percent of those with HIV are over 50. By 2015, more than half will be, said the report.

Because of their exceptional needs, this poses challenges for social health systems and organizations that serve seniors and people with HIV, Tietz said. HIV can be isolating, Tietz said. Seventy percent of older Americans with HIV active alone, more than twice the evaluate of others their age, while about 15 percent live with a partner, according to the report.

Monday 30 December 2013

Military Personnel And Their Partners Can Not Get Quality Treatment

Military Personnel And Their Partners Can Not Get Quality Treatment.
A doctor with involvement caring for armed forces personnel says the US military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" tactic puts both service members and the encyclopaedic public at risk by encouraging secrecy about sexual health issues. "Infections go undiagnosed. Service members and their partners go untreated," Dr Kenneth Katz, a medical doctor at San Diego State University and the University of California at San Diego, wrote in a commentary published Dec 1, 2010 in the New England Journal of Medicine.

And civilians "pay a price" because they have bonking with worship members who misconstrue out on programs aimed at preventing the spread of the HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, as well as other sexually transmitted diseases, Katz wrote. The soldierly is currently pondering the end of the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, which does not tolerate gay service members to serve openly. No one knows how many gays are in the armed forces. However, one 2002 work found that active-duty Navy sailors made up 9 percent of the patients who visited one homosexual men's health clinic in San Diego.

Thursday 26 December 2013

Adult Smokers Quit Smoking Fast In The US

Adult Smokers Quit Smoking Fast In The US.
The Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul axiom a abruptly decline in the number of mature smokers over the last three decades, perhaps mirroring trends elsewhere in the United States, experts say. The sink was due not only to more quitters, but fewer people choosing to smoke in the fundamental place, according to research presented Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Heart Association (AHA), in Chicago. But there was one disquieting trend: Women were picking up the habit at a younger age.

One learned said the findings reflected trends he's noticed in New York City. "I don't walk that many people who smoke these days. Over the last couple of decades the tremendous pre-eminence on the dangers of smoking has gradually permeated our society and while there are certainly people who continue to smoke and have been smoking for years and begin now, for a miscellany of reasons I think that smoking is decreasing," said Dr Jeffrey S Borer, chairman of the section of medicine and of cardiovascular medicine at the State University of New York (SUNY) Downstate Medical Center. "If the Minnesota text is showing a decline, that's doubtlessly a microcosm of what's happening elsewhere".

The findings come after US regulators on Thursday unveiled proposals to reckon graphic images and more strident anti-smoking messages on cigarette packages to endeavour to shock people into staying away from cigarettes. The authors of the redesigned study, from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, canvassed residents of the Twin Cities on their smoking habits six disparate times, from 1980 to 2009. Each time, 3000 to 6000 consumers participated.

About 72 percent of adults aged 25 to 74 reported ever having smoked a cigarette in 1980, but by 2009 that several had fallen to just over 44 percent among men. For women, the total who had ever smoked fell from just under 55 percent in 1980 to 39,6 percent 30 years later.

The arrangement of current male smokers was cut roughly in half, declining from just under 33 percent in 1980 to 15,5 percent in 2009. For women, the sip was even more striking, from about 33 percent in 1980 to just over 12 percent currently. Smokers are consuming fewer cigarettes per broad daylight now, as well, the sanctum found. Overall, men cut down to 13,5 cigarettes a prime in 2009 from 23,5 (a little more than a pack) in 1980 and there was a similar tend in women, the authors reported.

Wednesday 25 December 2013

Obesity Can Be A Barrier To Pregnancy

Obesity Can Be A Barrier To Pregnancy.
Women should deferred at least one year after having weight-loss surgery before they tax to get pregnant, researchers say. The embonpoint rate among women of child-bearing age is expected to rise from about 24 percent in 2005 to about 28 percent in 2015, and the handful of women having weight-loss surgery is increasing, the researchers noted. In a review, published Jan 11, 2013 in The Obstetrician & Gynaecologist, investigators looked at anterior studies to assess the safety, limitations and advantages of weight-loss ("bariatric") surgery, and manipulation of weight-loss surgery patients before, during and after pregnancy.

Obesity increases the peril of pregnancy complications, but weight-loss surgery reduces the danger in extremely obese women, the comment on authors said. One study found that 79 percent of women who had weight-loss surgery efficient no complications during their pregnancy. However, the review also found that complications during pregnancy can occur in women who have had weight-loss surgery.

Monday 23 December 2013

The Number Of Head Injuries Among Child Has Increased Significantly Since 2007

The Number Of Head Injuries Among Child Has Increased Significantly Since 2007.
The troop of filthy head traumas among infants and litter children appears to have risen dramatically across the United States since the onset of the in the know recession in 2007, new research reveals. The observation linking poor economics to an enhancement in one of the most extreme forms of child abuse stems from a focused analysis on shifting caseload numbers in four urban children's hospitals.

But the find may ultimately touch upon a broader nationwide trend. "Abusive head trauma - previously known as 'shaken baby syndrome' - is the foremost cause of death from child abuse, if you don't count neglect," noted swot author Dr Rachel P Berger, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. "And so, what's for here is that we saw in four cities that there was a apparent increase in the rate of abusive head trauma among children during the recession compared with beforehand".

So "Now we cognizant of that poverty and stress are clearly related to child abuse," added Berger. "And during times of financial hardship one of the things that's hardest hit are the social services that are most needed to avoid child abuse. So, this is really worrisome".

Berger, who also serves as an attending physician at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, is slated to distribute her findings with her colleagues Saturday at the Pediatric Academic Societies' annual gathering in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. To gain insight into how the fall back and flow of abusive head trauma cases might correlate with economic ups and downs, the on team looked over the 2004-2009 records of four urban children's hospitals.

The hospitals were located in Pittsburgh, Seattle, Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio. Only cases of "unequivocal" vulgar faculty trauma were included in the data. The recession was deemed to have begun on Dec 1, 2007, and continued through the end of the research period on Dec 31, 2009.

Throughout the study period, Berger and her party recorded 511 cases of trauma. The average age of these cases was a little over 9 months, although patients ranged from as childish as 9 days old to 6.5 years old. Nearly six in 10 patients were male, and about the same change were white. Overall, 16 percent of the children died from their injuries.

Saturday 21 December 2013

The Use Of Colonoscopy Reduces The Risk Of Colon Cancer

The Use Of Colonoscopy Reduces The Risk Of Colon Cancer.
In extension to reducing the jeopardy of cancer on the left side of the colon, supplementary research indicates that colonoscopies may also reduce cancer risk on the right side. The decree contradicts some previous research that had indicated a right-side "blind spots" when conducting colonoscopies. However, the right-side improve shown in the new study, published in the Jan 4, 2011 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine, was slight less effective than that seen on the left side.

And "We didn't really have brawny data proving that anything is very good at preventing right-sided cancer," said Dr Vivek Kaul, acting greatest of gastroenterology and hepatology at the University of Rochester Medical Center. "Here is a gazette that suggests that risk reduction is pretty robust even in the right side. The danger reduction is not as exciting as in the left side, but it's still more than 50 percent. That's a little conscientious to ignore".

The news is "reassuring," agreed Dr David Weinberg, chairman of medicine at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, who wrote an accompanying position statement on the finding. Though no one deliberate over ever provides definitive proof, he said, "if the data from this study is in fact true, then this gives dynamic support for current guidelines".

The American Cancer Society recommends that normal-risk men and women be screened for colon cancer, starting at discretion 50. A colonoscopy once every 10 years is one of the recommended screening tools. However, there has been some controversy as to whether colonoscopy - an invasive and expensive conduct - is truly preferable to other screening methods, such as flexible sigmoidoscopy.

Friday 20 December 2013

Physicians In The USA Recommend To Make A Mammography To All Women

Physicians In The USA Recommend To Make A Mammography To All Women.
More than three years after litigious remodelled guidelines rejected tedious annual mammograms for most women, women in all age groups continue to get yearly screenings, a imaginative survey shows. In fact, mammogram rates actually increased overall, from 51,9 percent in 2008 to 53,6 percent in 2011, even though the thin rise was not considered statistically significant, according to the researchers from Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School. "There have been no significant changes in the gauge of screening mammograms amongst any age group, but in particular among women under adulthood 50," said the study leader, Dr Lydia Pace, a global women's trim fellow in the division of women's health at Brigham and Women's.

While the study did not look at the reasons for continued screening, the researchers speculated that conflicting recommendations from various expert organizations may play a role. In 2009, the US Preventive Services Task Force, an outside panel of experts, issued supplementary guidelines that said women younger than 50 don't need routine annual mammograms and those 50 to 74 could get screened every two years. Before that, the approbation was that all women old 40 and older get mammograms every one to two years.

The recommendations ignited much controversy and renewed meditate about whether delayed screening would increase breast cancer mortality. Since then, organizations such as the American Cancer Society have adhered to the recommendations that women 40 and older be screened annually. To survive what meaning the new task force recommendations have had, the researchers analyzed evidence from almost 28000 women over a six-year period - before and after the new task force guidelines.

The women were responding to the National Health Interview Survey in 2005, 2008 and 2011, and were asked how often they got a mammogram for screening purposes. Across the ages, there was no shrink in screenings, the researchers found. Among women 40 to 49, the rates rose slightly, from 46,1 percent in 2008 to 47,5 percent in 2011. Among women venerable 50 to 74, the rates also rose, from 57,2 percent in 2008 to 59,1 percent in 2011.

Thursday 19 December 2013

Implantable Devices Are Not A Panacea, But The Ability To Relieve Migraine Attacks

Implantable Devices Are Not A Panacea, But The Ability To Relieve Migraine Attacks.
An implantable legend cryptic in the nape of the neck may represent more headache-free days for people with severe migraines that don't respond to other treatments, a supplementary study suggests. More than 36 million Americans get migraine headaches, which are marked by earnest pain, sensitivity to light and sound, nausea and vomiting, according to the Migraine Research Foundation. Medication and lifestyle changes are the first-line treatments for migraine, but not everybody improves with these measures.

The St Jude Medical Genesis neurostimulator is a short, worthless strip that is implanted behind the neck. A battery amassment is then implanted elsewhere in the body. Activating the device stimulates the occipital nerve and can hazy the pain of migraine headache. "There are a large number of patients for whom nothing works and whose lives are ruined by the always pain of their migraine headache, and this device has the potential to help some of them," said reflect on author Dr Stephen D Silberstein, director of the Jefferson Headache Center in Philadelphia.

The study, which was funded by mechanism manufacturer St Jude Medical Inc, is slated for giving on Thursday at the International Headache Congress in Berlin, and is the largest study to date on the device. The players is now seeking approval for the device in Europe and then plans to submit their data to the US Food and Drug Administration for green light in the United States.

Researchers tested the new device in 157 grass roots who had severe migraines about 26 days out of each month. After 12 weeks, those who received the untrained device had seven more headache-free days per month, compared to one more headache-free day per month seen to each people in the control group.

Individuals in the control arm did not receive stimulation until after the in front 12 weeks. Study participants who received the stimulator also reported less severe headaches and improvements in their blue blood of life. After one year, 66 percent of people in the study said they had noteworthy or good pain relief.

The pain reduction seen in the study did fall short of FDA standards, which hail for a 50 percent reduction in pain. "The device is invisible to the eye, but not to the touch," said Silberstein. The implantation practice involves local anesthesia along with conscious sedation so you are awake, but not fully aware.

There may be some mollifying pain associated with this surgery, he said. Study co-author Dr Joel Saper, creator and director of Michigan Head Pain and Neurological Institute in Ann Arbor, and a associate of the advisory board for the Migraine Research Foundation, said this treatment could be an important option for some people with migraines.

Wednesday 18 December 2013

Early Diagnostics Of Schizophrenia

Early Diagnostics Of Schizophrenia.
Certain perspicacity circuits function abnormally in children at jeopardy of developing schizophrenia, according to a new study in April 2013. These differences in imagination activity are detectable before the development of schizophrenia symptoms, such as hallucinations, paranoia and attention and tribute problems. The findings suggest that brain scans may help doctors identify and help children at endanger for schizophrenia, said the researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. People with a first-degree forebears member (such as a parent or sibling) with schizophrenia have an eight- to 12-fold increased jeopardize of developing the mental illness.

But currently there is no way to know for certain who will become schizophrenic until they begin having symptoms. In this study, the researchers performed going MRI brain scans on 42 children, age-old 9 to 18, while they played a game in which they had to identify a simple circle out of a lineup of emotion-triggering images, such as adorable or scary animals. Half of the participants had relatives with schizophrenia.

Tuesday 17 December 2013

Personal Hygiene Slows The Epidemic Of Influenza

Personal Hygiene Slows The Epidemic Of Influenza.
Simple steps, such as paw washing and covering the mouth, could be found helpful in reducing pandemic flu transmission, experts say. However, in the May result of the American Journal of Infection Control, a University of Michigan examination team cautions that more research is needed to assess the true effectiveness of so called "non-pharmaceutical interventions" aimed at slowing the cover of pandemic flu. Such measures incorporate those not based on vaccines or antiviral treatments.

On an individual level, these measures can include frequent washing of the hands with soap, wearing a facemask and/or covering the enunciate while coughing or sneezing, and using alcohol-based index sanitizers. On a broader, community-based level, other influenza-containment measures can include private school closings, the restriction of public gatherings, and the promotion of home-based work schedules, the researchers noted. "The fresh influenza A (H1N1) pandemic may provide us with an opportunity to address many exploration gaps and ultimately create a broad, comprehensive strategy for pandemic mitigation," lead novelist Allison E Aiello, of the University of Michigan School of Public Health, said in a low-down release. "However, the emergence of this pandemic in 2009 demonstrated that there are still more questions than answers".

She added: "More scrutinization is urgently needed". The call for more investigation into the potential benefit of non-pharmaceutical interventions stems from a supplementary analysis of 11 prior studies funded by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and conducted between 2007 and 2009. The in the know review found that the public adopted some possessive measures more readily than others. Hand washing and mouth covering, for example, were more commonly practiced than the wearing of facemasks.