Fruit Flies May Pave Way to New Treatments for Age-related Heart Disease
The tiny Drosophila fruit fly may pave the way to new methods for studying and finding treatments for heart disease, the leading cause of death in industrialized countries, according to a collaborative study by the Burnham Institute for Medical Research, UC San Diego (UCSD) and the University of Michigan.
The study reports that mutations in a molecular channel found in heart muscle cell membranes caused arrhythmias similar to those that are found in humans, suggesting that understanding how this channel’s activity is controlled in the cell could lead to new heart disease treatments. Led by Burnham’s Professor Rolf Bodmer, Ph.D., and Staff Scientist Karen Ocorr, Ph.D., these new results, to be published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, will be made available by priority publication at the journal’s website during the week of February 26, 2007.
Innovative Treatment for Migraines Combines Botox and Surgery
Five years ago, Sharon Schafer Bennett suffered from migraines so severe that the headaches disrupted her life, kept her from seeking a job and interfered with participation in her children’s daily activities.
Now, thanks to an innovative surgical technique performed by a UT Southwestern Medical Center plastic surgeon who helped pioneer the procedure, the frequency and intensity of Mrs. Bennett’s migraines have diminished dramatically - from two to three per week to an occasional one every few months.
Diabetes case tied to growth hormone ‘doping’
Athletes who take growth hormone in an effort to enhance their performance risk developing diabetes, two doctors from the UK warn in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
In the paper, Dr. James Young and Aresh Anwar from University Hospital Coventry and Warwick, Warwickshire, describe what they believe is the first reported case of diabetes associated with taking high doses of growth hormone.
Strep linked to movement disorder in children
Group A streptococcal infection appears to be associated with changes in behavior and the development of a movement disorder in elementary school children, according to a report in the current issue of Biological Psychiatry.
There is renewed interest in the relationship between strep infections and behavioral and movement disorders, the authors explain, but the extent of strep’s role in these disorders has not been defined. Symptoms that characterized the movement disorder observed in these children include involuntary, rapid, jerking movements that can be subtle or pronounced, also referred to as chorea.
Mammography results poorly communicated to blacks
African American women are less likely than whites to receive adequate communication of their mammography results, a new study conducted in Connecticut shows.
When a black woman’s results were abnormal, they were more likely to be poorly communicated to her than when the results were normal. But the reverse was true for whites.
Experimental vaccine given during pregnancy reduces stillbirths from common virus
Researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health have developed an experimental vaccine that reduces stillbirths among rodents born to mothers infected with cytomegalovirus (CMV) - a common virus that can also cause mental retardation and hearing loss in newborn children who were infected in early fetal life.
Estimates place the number of U.S. children born with CMV each year at about 40,000, and there is no vaccine or treatment for pregnant women who have the infection. In a 2000 report, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences listed as a top priority the development of a vaccine to prevent cytomegalovirus during pregnancy.
Surgery linked to breast cancer racial disparity
Racial disparity in death rates between African American and other women with breast cancer may be due in part to surgery which may encourage the growth of the tumour, an international team of researchers said.
African American women are often diagnosed with breast cancer at an earlier age and have a higher risk of dying from the illness. The average age when their disease is detected is 46, compared to 57 years old for white women.
Distress may persist after waking during surgery
Patients who wake up from general anesthesia during surgery and have a clear memory of the event may develop acute distress and emotional reactions, investigators in Sweden report, and in some patients, long-term psychological symptoms may persist.
Dr. Peter Samuelsson and his associates, from County Hospital in Kalmar, interviewed 2,681 consecutive surgical patients between 2001 and 2002 who underwent general anesthesia 1 to 3 days earlier.
Smoking changes brain the same way as drugs do
Smoking causes long-lasting changes in the brain similar to changes seen in animals when they are given cocaine, heroin and other addictive drugs, U.S. researchers said on Tuesday.
A study of the brain tissue of smokers and nonsmokers who died showed that smokers had these changes, even if they had quit years before, the team at the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) reported.
Italian doctors transplant HIV-infected organs
Italian doctors mistakenly transplanted organs from an HIV-positive donor into three recipients, the head of a Florence hospital said on Tuesday.
Doctors at Careggi hospital told reporters that an infected woman’s liver and kidneys were transplanted after a laboratory biologist incorrectly wrote on her medical records that she had tested negative for HIV.
Pregnancy hormone increases nerve cells’ insulation, restores damage
A hormone produced during pregnancy spontaneously increases myelin, which enhances signaling within the nervous system, and helps repair damage in the brain and spinal cord, according to new animal research.
The findings, published in the February 21 Journal of Neuroscience, indicate that the hormone prolactin promotes an increase in myelin production and may have a use in treating multiple sclerosis (MS).
A black and white look at breast cancer mortality
African and African American women are more likely to die of breast cancer than their white counterparts because they tend to get the disease before the menopause, suggests new research from the University of East Anglia and the Children’s Hospital Boston in collaboration with researchers in the US and Italy.
A racial disparity in mortality rates from breast cancer in the US first appeared in the 1970s coinciding with the introduction of mammography. The new research, published in The International Journal of Surgery, posits that the reason for this is not reduced access to medical care, but because surgery in pre-menopausal women could encourage growth of the cancer.
Older Adults May be Unreliable Eyewitness, Study Shows
A University of Virginia study suggests that older adults are not only more inclined than younger adults to make errors in recollecting details that have been suggested to them, but are also more likely than younger people to have a very high level of confidence in their recollections, even when wrong. The finding has implications regarding the reliability of older persons’ eyewitness testimonies in courtrooms.
The study, “I misremember it well: Why older adults are unreliable eyewitnesses,” is published in a recent issue of the Psychonomic Bulletin & Review.
Newborns with respiratory distress potentially have rare genetic disease
Newborns with respiratory distress should be evaluated for primary ciliary dyskinesia, a rare genetic disease that has features similar to cystic fibrosis, says Thomas Ferkol, M.D., from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. He reports finding that about 80 percent of patients with primary ciliary dyskinesia (PCD) have a history of newborn respiratory distress.
“The diagnosis of PCD requires a high index of suspicion, but PCD must be considered in any term newborn who develops respiratory distress or persistent hypoxemia (low oxygen in the blood), especially those who have reversed internal organs or an affected sibling,” says Ferkol, director of the Division of Pediatric Allergy and Pulmonary Medicine at Washington University School of Medicine and St. Louis Children’s Hospital.
Learning to Prevent Medical Mistakes in Caring for Stroke Patients
Medical errors and adverse events can happen in patients with stroke, and hospital procedures need to be modified to reduce the likelihood of error and patients getting hurt, according to a study published in the February 20, 2007, issue of Neurology®, the scientific journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
For the study, researchers analyzed provider-reported adverse events and errors within a voluntary and mandatory event reporting system in stroke patients admitted to Strong Memorial Hospital at the University of Rochester Medical Center in Rochester, New York, between July 2001 and December 2004. Adverse events are defined as an injury to a patient occurring during medical management, not necessarily because of an error. Medical errors are defined as incorrect actions or plans that may or may not cause harm to a patient.
