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Telenurses face conflict between what is best for patients and what services are available

Nurses who provide telephone advice services have to balance the conflicting demands of providing appropriate medical advice and acting as a gatekeeper to limited healthcare services, according to a review in the March issue of the Journal of Advanced Nursing.

Canadian researchers reviewed 16 studies carried out over the last two decades, covering more than 700 nurses in the UK, Canada, the USA and Sweden. The studies included interviews, videotaped consultations, simulated calls and stimulated recall.

Small liquid sensor may detect cancer instantly, could lead to home detection kit

COLUMBIA, Mo. – What if it were possible to go to the store and buy a kit to quickly and accurately diagnose cancer, similar to a pregnancy test? A University of Missouri researcher is developing a tiny sensor, known as an acoustic resonant sensor, that is smaller than a human hair and could test bodily fluids for a variety of diseases, including breast and prostate cancers.

Listen to the natives for better moose monitoring

Modern methods can answer a multitude of questions, but sometimes traditional techniques are superior. Authorities in northern Quebec, Canada, found this to their cost, when they relied upon statistical data to monitor moose populations.

Compostable plastics have a sweet ending

Food packaging and other disposable plastic items could soon be composted at home along with organic waste thanks to a new sugar-based polymer.

The degradable polymer is made from sugars known as lignocellulosic biomass, which come from non-food crops such as fast-growing trees and grasses, or renewable biomass from agricultural or food waste.

It is being developed at Imperial College London by a team of Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council scientists led by Dr Charlotte Williams.

Artificial foot recycles energy for easier walking

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---An artificial foot that recycles energy otherwise wasted in between steps could make it easier for amputees to walk, its developers say.

"For amputees, what they experience when they're trying to walk normally is what I would experience if I were carrying an extra 30 pounds," said Art Kuo, professor in the University of Michigan departments of Biomedical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering.

Compared with conventional prosthetic feet, the new prototype device significantly cuts the energy spent per step.

Influenza vaccines: Poor evidence for effectiveness in elderly

Evidence for the safety and efficacy of influenza vaccines in the over 65s is poor, despite the fact that vaccination has been recommended for the prevention of influenza in older people for the past 40 years. These are the conclusions of a new Cochrane Systematic Review.

Adults aged 65 and over are some of the most vulnerable during influenza season and a priority for vaccination programmes. However, very few systematic reviews of the effectiveness of vaccines in this group have ever been carried out.

Fluorescent probes light up cancerous tumors

Building on his Nobel Prize-winning work creating fluorescent proteins that light up the inner workings of cells, a team of researchers led by Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator Roger Tsien, PhD, professor of pharmacology, chemistry and biochemistry at the University of California, San Diego and the Moores UCSD Cancer Center has developed biological probes that can stick to and light up tumors in mice.

Keys and obstacles to e-health in low income countries

INDIANAPOLIS – In an essay in the February 2010 issue of Health Affairs, a special issue of the journal devoted to global e-health, William Tierney, M.D., of Indiana University School of Medicine and the Regenstrief Institute, and colleagues, who like Dr. Tierney have significant experience in the development of workable health information technology systems in low-income countries, identify critical steps toward allowing developing countries to cross the "digital divide" to realize the full potential of e-health to improve the quality and efficiency of their health care systems.

A review of vegetated buffer efficacy

MADISON, WI, February 15, 2010 -- Agricultural nonpoint source pollution has been listed as one of the leading sources of pollution in rivers and water bodies throughout the world. Environmental regulators and scientists are making concerted efforts to reduce these pollutions using mitigation tools called best management practices (BMPs). As promising and effective BMPs, vegetated buffers are gradually gaining in popularity. However, lack of quantification on their mitigation efficacies limits their implementation in agricultural fields to reduce nonpoint source pollutions.

Facing the corn nematode problem in Illinois

URBANA - Illinois farmers know corn nematodes are a problem. Nearly 80 percent of attendees at the Illinois Corn & Soybean Classics agreed this was true in surveys conducted across the state by U of I Extension Nematologist Terry Niblack. However, fewer than 20 percent plan to do anything about it.

"Farmers think corn nematodes are a big problem, but they're someone else's problem," Niblack said. "Nematodes are the most frequently overlooked cause of disease in Illinois corn."

Further doubt cast on virus link to chronic fatigue

Researchers investigating UK samples have found no association between the controversial xenotropic murine leukaemia virus-related virus (XMRV) and chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). Their study, published in BioMed Central's open access journal Retrovirology, calls into question a potential link described late last year by an American research team.

Caltech researchers create highly absorbing, flexible solar cells with silicon wire arrays

PASADENA, Calif.—Using arrays of long, thin silicon wires embedded in a polymer substrate, a team of scientists from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has created a new type of flexible solar cell that enhances the absorption of sunlight and efficiently converts its photons into electrons. The solar cell does all this using only a fraction of the expensive semiconductor materials required by conventional solar cells.

Beyond the corn field: Balancing fuel, food and biodiversity

The development of alternative fuel will greatly benefit the U.S., say scientists in an Energy Foundation-funded report published today by the Ecological Society of America (ESA), the nation's largest organization of ecological scientists. However, in order to effectively reap the social and economic benefits of biofuel production, U.S. policies need to address potential effects of land-use choices on our ecosystems.

Biofuels policy fails to achieve goals warns study

MILWAUKEE – US biofuel policies will fail to achieve the intended environmental, energy and agricultural goals, warns an article in the journal Applied Economics Perspectives and Policy (AEPP).

Marriage of microfluidics and optics could advance lab-on-a-chip devices

CAMBRIDGE, Mass., February 15, 2009 -- With a silicone rubber "stick-on" sheet containing dozens of miniature, powerful lenses, engineers at Harvard are one step closer to putting the capacity of a large laboratory into a micro-sized package.

The marriage of high performance optics with microfluidics could prove the perfect match for making lab-on-a-chip technologies more practical.