Intensive Care Unit (ICU) doctors seeking to balance the complex needs of their patients and the patients' families may make an imperfect compromise, withdrawing life support systems over a prolonged period of time. This practice is much more common than previously believed, and is also surprisingly associated with higher satisfaction with care-at least among surviving family members.
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PORTLAND, Ore. – The National Institutes of Health has awarded $4 million to a group of Philippine and American scientists led by Oregon Health & Science University to aid in the discovery of new molecules and biofuels technology from marine mollusks for development in the Philippines.
An international team of researchers led by Professors Mark Caulfield and Patricia Munroe, from the William Harvey Research Institute at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry with Chris Cheeseman at the University of Alberta in Canada and Kelle Moley at the University of Washington in USA, have shown that the SLC2A9 gene, which encodes a glucose transporter, is also a high-capacity urate transporter, and thus possibly a new drug target for gout. Their findings are published in this week's PLoS Medicine (7 October 2008).
Mayo Clinic study shows stool DNA testing for colorectal cancer has potential, but challenges remain
ROCHESTER, Minn. -- The first generation of a stool DNA test to identify early colorectal cancer has limitations, according to a Mayo Clinic-led study published in the Oct. 7, 2008, issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. Results did not corroborate findings of an earlier multicenter study that showed stool DNA testing was more accurate than fecal blood testing for colorectal cancer detection. *
STANFORD, Calif. — Pregnant women worried about their babies' genetic health face a tough decision: get prenatal gene testing and risk miscarriage, or skip the tests and miss the chance to learn of genetic defects before birth.
But a new prenatal test could make this dilemma obsolete. The new method, developed by scientists at Stanford University, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, requires only a maternal blood sample to spot chromosomal disorders such as Down syndrome.
Anti-cancer drug prevents, reverses cardiovascular damage in mouse model of premature aging disorder
An experimental anti-cancer drug can prevent -- and even reverse -- potentially fatal cardiovascular damage in a mouse model of progeria, a rare genetic disorder that causes the most dramatic form of human premature aging, National Institutes of Health (NIH) researchers reported today.
A young child arrives at the emergency room after several days of abdominal pain, vomiting, and diarrhea and is sent home with a diagnosis of viral gastritis and treatment for the symptoms. The child seems better for a while, only to return to the ER with worse symptoms and a ruptured appendix, a life-threatening complication of appendicitis.
Pneumococcal (pneumonia) vaccination was associated with a 50% lower risk of heart attacks 2 years after vaccination, suggests a large hospital-based case-control study published in CMAJ. http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg773.pdf
In a population of patients at high risk of heart attack, the study compared the rates of pneumococcal vaccine between patients having a heart attack and patients without such an event.
Community-acquired Clostridium difficile (C. difficile) infection occurred in a significant proportion of people with no recent exposure to antibiotics, with 53% having no exposure in the 45 days preceding hospitalization and 46% having no exposure in the preceding 90 days, according to a new study published in CMAJ http://www.cmaj.ca/press/pg767.pdf.
People with mild to moderate dementia are cared for largely by family physicians as well as the patient's own family, and management of care can be complex and challenging.
October 6, 2008 (Oakland, Calif.) – Infants who slept in a bedroom with a fan ventilating the air had a 72 percent lower risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome compared to infants who slept in a bedroom without a fan, according to a new study by the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research. The study appears in the October issue of the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine.
This is the first study to examine an association between better air ventilation in infants' bedrooms and reduced SIDS risk.
Fan use appears to be associated with a lower risk of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS) in rooms with inadequate ventilation, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
A survey of pediatricians found wide variation in whether and how they would disclose medical errors to patients and their families, and may be less likely to share information about errors that are less obvious to parents, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Use of the influenza vaccine was not associated with preventing hospitalizations or reducing physician visits for the flu in children age 5 and younger during two recent seasons, perhaps because the strains of virus in the vaccine did not match circulating strains, according to a report in the October issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.