Latest science news in Health & Medicine
Obesity Can Increase Dementia Risk By Up To 80 Percent, Study Suggests
Obesity may increase adults' risk for having dementia. Obesity increases the risk of dementia in general by 42 percent, Alzheimer's by 80 percent and vascular dementia by 73 percent. Being...
Elderly Heart Patients With ICD Devices Live Longer After Heart Failure, Study Shows
Elderly patients diagnosed with congestive heart failure who receive implantable cardioverter-defibrillators for primary prevention of sudden cardiac death live longer than those that do not. Further, the health care costs...
Treating Stomach Bacteria May Prevent Cancer
Prompt treatment of a microbe that causes stomach ulcers and other ailments can reverse damage to the lining of the stomach and ultimately prevent one of the most lethal forms...
Molecular Change May Reveal Risk Of Leukemia Relapse
Researchers may have discovered a better way to distinguish acute leukemia patients who require aggressive treatment to prevent relapse from those who need only standard therapy for cure. The study...
Tree-lined Streets Mean Lower Rates Of Childhood Asthma, Study Suggests
Children who live in tree-lined streets have lower rates of asthma, suggests new research. The researchers base their findings on rates of asthma rates for the disease among 4 to...
Incubator Electromagnetic Fields Alter Newborns' Heart Rates
The electromagnetic fields produced by incubators alter newborns' heart rates, reveals a small study in the Fetal and Neonatal Edition of Archives of Disease in Childhood. It is not clear...
Biomarker Predicts Malignancy Potential Of HG-PIN Lesions In The Prostate
Men whose prostate cancer screenings show high grade prostatic intraepithelial neoplasia may find themselves in limbo, "stuck" between diagnoses -- they are told prostate cancer has not yet developed, but...
Chemicals From Teflon, Scotchgard Found in Human Breast Milk
Researchers have detected perfluorinated compounds, used to make Teflon, Scotchgard and grease-resistant food packaging, in human milk samples from 45 nursing mothers in Massachusetts. This is the first study to...
U.S. Senate looks at ban on bisphenol A
WASHINGTON, May 1 (UPI) -- Democrats in the U.S. Senate are proposing a bill to ban the chemical bisphenol A from plastic products made for infants and young...
Really?: The Claim: Tilt Your Head Back to Treat a Nosebleed
Medical experts say that what most people know about nosebleeds is wrong.
Vital Statistics: In Hepatitis Trends, Good News and Bad
Rates of new hepatitis A and B infections have declined to the lowest levels ever recorded, but rates of hepatitis C infections increased slightly.
Vital Signs: Nostrums: Study Critiques Antioxidant Supplements
A review of 67 randomized trials of antioxidant supplements has found no evidence that they prolong life.
Memory Training Shown to Turn Up Brainpower
A new study has found that it may be possible to train people to be more intelligent, increasing the brainpower they had at birth.
Genes Explain Race Disparity in Response to a Heart Drug
A discovery raises questions about whom to treat with beta blockers and how to decide, researchers say.
Elderly often forget dying wishes
Many elderly patients' change their mind about end-of-life treatments, such as CPR, over a year, with many forgetting their original wishes, research has shown.
Timber workers risk respiratory disease
Timber workers have high dioxin levels in their blood and many are heavily exposed to PCP, resulting in an increased risk of respiratory disease, a study has found.
Despite free testing, HIV diagnosis 'often late'
Around 40 per cent of HIV-positive Venezuelans are diagnosed late, despite the availability of free diagnosis and testing.
Cancer Could Return Unless Stored Ovarian Tissue Undergoes Adequate Testing Before Re-implantation
Cancer patients who have been successfully treated for their disease face the prospect of its return if stored ovarian (or testicular) tissue is transplanted back into their bodies without adequate...
Researchers Make Human Flu Antibodies at Record Speed [News]
A new method for swiftly producing proteins to fight infections could mean the difference between life and death during future pandemics. Researchers report in Nature today that they have perfected...
New Arenavirus Associated With Hemorrhagic Fever Discovered
Scientists have characterized "Chapare arenavirus," a previously unrecognized arenavirus, discovered in serum samples from a patient in rural Bolivia who eventually died of the infection. Named after the Chapare River...
Getting To The Roots Of Breast Cancer
The lesson learned in eradicating dandelions from your yard could apply in treating breast cancer as well, said researchers from Baylor College of Medicine. "It's not enough to kill the...
Antioxidant therapy shows early promise for preventing, perhaps reversing, Alzheimer's disease
Curbing harmful processes in the brain's vasculature set off by the enzyme NADPH oxidase may reverse some of the cognitive decline associated with Alzheimer's disease, according to new findings published...
New insights into cause of diabetes emerge from U-M research
University of Michigan researchers have new clues to what goes awry at the cellular level in type 2 diabetes.
Fluctuating diet increases risk of sudden death
New research has revealed that binge eating then dieting may significantly reduce lifespan.
Inhaled tuberculosis vaccine may be more effective than injected vaccine
A novel aerosol version of the most common tuberculosis (TB) vaccine, administered directly to the lungs as an oral mist, offers significantly better protection against the disease in experimental animals...
Harvard Medical School to reduce student debt burden
Harvard Medical School (HMS) Dean Jeffrey Flier today announced that the school is taking steps to reduce the cost of a four-year medical education by an average of $50,000 for...
Louise Ivers: 'I can’t sleep at night because of the things that I see.'
Louise Ivers gently lifted the 7-month-old by his forearms, hoping he would pull himself up as a healthy child a third his age might. But his head hung limply back, eyes...
A Genetic Cause for Iron Deficiency
The discovery of a gene for a rare form of inherited iron deficiency may provide clues to iron deficiency in the general population – particularly iron deficiency that doesn’t respond...