Culture

Physician-based screening for melanoma is associated with higher rates of physician-detected melanoma and detection of thinner melanoma, according to a report published Online First today by Archives of Dermatology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Removing a portion of the platysma muscle may ease symptoms for patients experiencing chronic neck stiffness and involuntary movement, according to a report in the July issue of Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

A simple eight-question survey administered soon after injury can help predict which of the 30 million Americans seeking hospital treatment for injuries each year may develop depression or post-traumatic stress, report Therese S. Richmond, PhD, CRNP, associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, and her colleagues in General Hospital Psychiatry.

CHICAGO- A new procedure is now available for the treatment of chronic bowel incontinence, a disorder impacting the lives of more than 18 million Americans. The treatment, called InterStim® Therapy is a minimally invasive procedure which uses electrical impulses to stimulate the sacral nerve and improve muscle function. It is one of the only effective long-term treatments for bowel incontinence available to patients and Northwestern Memorial Hospital is one of the first medical centers in the country to offer the procedure.

Men who are married or in common-law relationships seek medical care sooner for heart attacks compared with single, divorced or widowed men, found a new study in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) (pre-embargo link only) http://www.cmaj.ca/site/embargo/cmaj110170.pdf.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The next time you're outdoors, see if you can spot the tallest tree. If you're in the desert Southwest, this may be an easy task — trees there are few and far between, and tend to hunch low to the ground to conserve resources. In the temperate Northeast, dense forests make the exercise a bit more difficult. And in the rainy Northwest, the towering stands of sequoias often reach higher than the eye can estimate.

In the 1960 Presidential debate between John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon, television viewers picked Kennedy as the winner while radio listeners said Nixon had a better showing. On television, Nixon - who refused to wear makeup - looked pale and ill. The looks of political candidates are now a key factor influencing voters, a phenomenon identified by a number of scholars since then.

HACKENSACK, N.J. (July 18, 2011) — Researchers from the John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center presented results from 14 cancer-related studies during the recently concluded American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting, which took place June 3 – 7, 2011 in Chicago. The studies examined new cancer treatments, ways to predict the best treatment outcomes, and patient quality of life issues.

Coronary computed tomography angiography (CTA) has excellent image quality and diagnostic confidence for the entire spectrum of pediatric patients, with significant reduction of risk with recent technological advancements, according to a study to be presented at the Sixth Annual Scientific Meeting of the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) in Denver, July 14-17.

(NEW YORK, NY, July 14, 2011) – In a study, Identification of unrecognized diabetes and pre-diabetes in a dental setting, published in the July 2011 issue of the Journal of Dental Research, researchers at Columbia University College of Dental Medicine found that dental visits represented a chance to intervene in the diabetes epidemic by identifying individuals with diabetes or pre-diabetes who are unaware of their condition.

When consumers taste a chocolate bar they think is made in Switzerland, they'll prefer it over one supposedly made in China, according to new study in the Journal of Consumer Research. But if you tell them where it's from after they taste the candy, they'll prefer the Chinese chocolate.

Consumers who are in a positive mood make quicker and more consistent judgments than unhappy people, according to a new study.

"There has been considerable debate about how affect (moods, emotions, feelings) influences the quality of people's decisions," write authors Paul M. Herr (Virginia Tech), Christine M. Page (Skidmore College), Bruce E. Pfeiffer (University of New Hampshire), and Derick F. Davis (Virginia Tech). "We join this debate by looking at affect's influence on a very basic element of decision-making: deciding if an object is liked or disliked."

DETROIT – In 2005, Jeffrey Martin, Ph.D., professor of kinesiology, health and sport studies in Wayne State University's College of Education, found that children living in underserved communities are less physically active than their higher-income counterparts. Now, in a follow-up study, Martin has found environmental factors that may affect underserved children's physical activity and fitness levels: classmate support, gender and confidence. The study was published in the June 2011 issue of Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport.

Whether patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus benefit from attempts to lower their blood glucose levels to near-normal levels through treatment ("intensive blood glucose control") remains an unanswered question. The studies currently available provide indications of a benefit but also of potential harm. This is the result of a report published by the German Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG).

Of 180 patients in this study in whom a reference committee later identified coronary heart disease (CHD), 31.7% had originally been misdiagnosed by their family doctors as not having CHD ("false negative"). Stefan Bösner and his colleagues present the results of their cross-sectional study in the current edition of Deutsches Ärzteblatt International (Dtsch Arztebl Int 2011; 108[26]: 445-51).