December 12, 2006, 5:08 AM CT

It Gives Much More To Quitting Than Exercise

A study of more than 36,000 women by researchers from the Universities of Minnesota and Pennsylvania found that a high level of physical activity in women who smoked reduced their risk of developing lung cancer by nearly three quarters, compared with smokers who did no exercise.

Published in the recent issue of Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers & Prevention, the study also found 'moderate' activity among smokers was associated with a 65 per cent risk reduction, and lower relative risks were also seen in former smokers who had moderate or high activity levels.

However, the researchers pointed out that despite seeing benefits in exercise, the absolute risk of developing lung cancer is still very large in current and former smokers regardless of activity level.

The study's lead author, Kathryn Schmitz, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, explained: "Smokers who exercise are at a 35 per cent lower risk of developing lung cancer relative to smokers who don't exercise, but if you smoke at all, your risk of developing lung cancer is 10- to 11- fold higher than if you didn't smoke".

"The most important thing a smoker can do to reduce risk is to quit smoking. That said, exercising and being active can offer a marginal change in risk," she added.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

December 8, 2006, 4:51 AM CT

Mood Makes Food Taste Different

Feeling anxious? Your mood may actually change how your dinner tastes, making the bitter and salty flavours recede, as per new research.

This link between the chemical balance in your brain and your sense of taste could one day help doctors to treat depression. There are currently no on-the-spot tests for deciding which medicine will work best in individual patients with this condition. Scientists hope that a test based on flavour detection could help doctors to get more prescriptions right first time.

It has long been known that people who are depressed have lower-than-usual levels of the brain chemicals serotonin or noradrenaline, or in some cases both. A number of also have a blunted sense of taste, which is presumably caused by changes in brain chemistry.

To unpick the relationship between the two, Lucy Donaldson and her colleagues at the University of Bristol, UK, gave 20 healthy volunteers two antidepressant drugs, and checked their sensitivity to different tastes. The drug that raised serotonin levels made people more sensitive to sweet and bitter tastes, the team reports in the Journal of Neuroscience1. The other, which increased noradrenaline, enhanced recognition of bitter and sour tastes.

In healthy people, volunteers whose anxiety levels were naturally higher were less sensitive to bitter and salty tastes.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

December 7, 2006, 9:58 PM CT

New Approach To Melanoma Treatment

While investigating a fungus known to cause an infection in people with AIDS, two grantees of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), unexpectedly discovered a potential strategy for treating metastatic melanoma, one of the deadliest forms of skin cancer. The treatment approach, which involves combining an antibody with radiation, has since been further developed and is expected to enter early-stage human clinical studies in 2007.

"This is an excellent example of how scientific research in one discipline may have payoffs in a completely unpredictable way," says NIAID Director Anthony S. Fauci, M.D. "This important AIDS-related research has led to the development of a promising therapeutic strategy for a terrible cancer that affects thousands of people each year".

Arturo Casadevall, M.D., Ph.D., of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine at Yeshiva University, in New York City, and his research team began studying the biology of the skin pigment melanin to better understand why its synthesis plays a role in the process whereby certain yeast-like fungi, specifically Cryptococcus neoformans, cause disease in some people. C. neoformans can cause cryptococcosis, a potentially fatal fungal infection that can lead to inflammation of the brain and death in people with AIDS and other immunocompromised individuals.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

December 5, 2006, 5:09 AM CT

Can the Stanley Cup playoffs harm your hearing?

During last year's NHL playoffs, Edmonton Oilers' fans tried to earn the title of loudest arena in the game, but new University of Alberta research shows that even a few hours of exposure to that level of noise can be harmful.

Bill Hodgetts from the U of A's Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine and Dr. Richard Liu, from the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry measured the noise levels during games three, four and six during the Stanley Cup finals against the Carolina Hurricanes last year. Liu attended the games and wore a noise dosimeter near his ear every second of the entire game. No matter where he went in the building, the dosimeter would sample his noise exposure. The research is published in the current edition of the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

The researchers found that for the levels experienced in game three, it took less than six minutes to reach the maximum allowable daily noise dose. Or everyone at the game received approximately 8100 per cent of their daily noise dose without any hearing protection. "Given the vast numbers of fans that do not wear hearing protection to hockey games, thousands are at risk for hearing damage," said the researchers.

Most people don't consider the risk of excessive noise exposure when participating in leisure activities, say the researchers, even though such noise over a period of a few hours can be harmful. "The risk of hearing loss for those who attend hockey games frequentlyseason ticket holders, workers in the arena, hockey players themselveswarrants serious consideration," they write in the paper. Even the cheapest foam earplugs would make a difference.........

Posted by: Jim      Permalink         Source

December 1, 2006, 4:47 AM CT

Weight Training Intensity And Growth Hormone Levels

A study published in the recent issue of the American Journal of Physiology-Endocrinology and Metabolism looked at different forms of growth hormone, used different testing methods, and varied weight training regimens. The research found that the role of growth hormone in women's muscle development may be more complicated than previously thought.

"We found that growth hormone was responsive to moderate and heavy exercise regimens having 3-12 repetitions with varying weight loading," said the study's principal author, William J. Kraemer. "Women need to have heavy loading cycle or workout in their resistance training routines, as it helps to build muscle and bone".

The study, "Chronic resistance training in women potentiates growth hormone in vivo bioactivity: characterization of molecular mass variants," was carried out by Kraemer, Jeff S. Volek, Barry A. Spiering and Carl M. Maresh of the University of Connecticut, Storrs; Bradley C. Nindl, U.S Army Research Institute of Environmental Medicine, Natick, Mass.; James O. Marx, The University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; Lincoln A. Gotshalk, University of Hawaii at Hilo; Jill A. Bush, University of Houston, Texas; and Jill R. Welsch, Andrea M. Mastro and Wesley C. Hymer, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Penn. The The American Physiological Society published the study.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 30, 2006, 4:22 AM CT

First-Ever Stem Cell Transplant In Human Brain

Neurosurgeons and physicians at Doernbecher Children's Hospital, Oregon Health & Science University, Nov. 14, performed the first transplant of purified human fetal neural stem cells into the brain of a study participant with neuronal ceroid lipofuscinosis (NCL), also known as Batten disease. NCL is a rare and fatal neurodegenerative disorder that affects infants and children.

The transplant is the focus of a Phase 1 clinical trial to evaluate the safety and preliminary efficacy of HuCNS-SC(TM) - a proprietary human central nervous stem cell product developed by StemCells, Inc., Palo Alto, Calif. This one-year trial will involve up to six children with NCL.

"Doernbecher's specialists are privileged to care for this child and family and to push forward groundbreaking work in degenerative brain diseases," said co-principal investigator Nathan Selden, M.D., Ph.D., F.A.C.S., F.A.A.P., who performed the surgery. "Our team is pleased that our patient's recovery thus far has been as expected".

The research team will continue to concentrate their efforts on the health and well-being of the study participant and family and will, along with Stem Cells, Inc., provide periodic updates as appropriate until the trial is completed.

In the interest of confidentiality, the research team requests that all parties avoid interfering with the study participant and family during recovery from surgery.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 29, 2006, 9:34 PM CT

Preserve Fertility After Cancer

The Center for Reproductive Research at Northwestern University is launching a new, experimental research program for young women who may be at risk to lose their ovarian function and fertility following therapy for cancer.

The program, in which a woman's ovary is removed and frozen for possible future use, is being led by Teresa Woodruff, Ph.D., associate director of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University and executive director of the Institute for Women's Health Research at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine. The long-term goal of the program is to be able to extract and mature eggs from cryopreserved (frozen) ovarian tissues to initiate pregnancies once cancer therapy has been completed.

"This breakthrough may permit not only the potential preservation of fertility options for women and girls with cancer, but also can be applied to normal in vitro fertilization patients. This procedure, when developed, could radically change the way infertility is viewed, reduce and eliminate embryo storage and provide better options for women who do not respond to hormonal treatment, " said Woodruff.

In recognition of the Cancer Center's commitment to providing fertility options to women and men with cancer, it has been recognized as a Fertile Hope Center of Excellence, the fifth medical center in the country to receive this designation. Fertile Hope is a non-profit organization that assists cancer patients faced with infertility.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 29, 2006, 5:02 AM CT

Predicting Outcome of Child Heart Surgery

Georgia Tech and Emory University scientists have developed an innovative new technology that will help pediatric cardiac surgeons design and test a customized surgical procedure before they ever pick up a scalpel. With a better understanding of each child's unique heart defect, surgeons could greatly improve the likelihood that children with complex defects requiring multiple surgeries over a period of several years could have smoother recoveries and an improved quality of life after their operations.

The technology, known as image-based surgical planning and developed with the help of pediatric heart specialists and pediatric surgeons at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and Emory University, creates a three-dimensional model of the child's heart with data from the child's MRI scans at different times in the cardiac cycle, also called a 4D MRI. The models allow surgeons to visualize the direction of blood flow and determine any energy loss in the heart. So if a surgeon were planning a certain correction to an area of a child's heart, a model created by the system would show the surgeon how well blood would flow through the newly configured heart.

The goal of the Georgia Tech/Emory project is to create a complete system that allows surgeons to get a detailed look at the child's heart functions with the new MRI system, design surgical procedures for optimum post-operative performance and evaluate the heart's performance with a sophisticated blood flow computer simulation.........

Posted by: Kevin      Permalink         Source

November 29, 2006, 4:25 AM CT

Don't Understand Prescription Medicine Labels?

When Michael Wolf paged though dusty, yellowing pharmacists logs from the 1890s at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, he found the following entry about a druggists encounter with a confused patient: Shake well, a patient apparently read out loud to the pharmacist from his prescription bottle label. Does that mean I shake myself".

It sounds like the punch line of a bad joke, but it wasnt. And the confusion experienced by that patient more than a century ago hasnt changed much.

Many people still dont fully understand the seemingly simple label instructions on their prescription medication, according to a new study of low-income patients by Wolf, Ph.D., assistant professor of medicine at Northwestern Universitys Feinberg School of Medicine. The study was published Nov. 29 online in Annals of Internal Medicine (www.anals.org). Wolf is presenting a position piece on how to improve those labels Nov. 29 at the American College of Physicians Foundation conference in Washington, D.C.

Wolf found that nearly half of the patients in the study misinterpreted at least one or more out of the five prescription labels they were shown. Patients with low literacy made the most mistakes and frequently were unable to grasp four out of five label instructions. But even people with a high-school education and higher had problems.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 23, 2006, 5:26 AM CT

The 'Freakonomics of food'

Do you hate Brussels sprouts because your mother did" Does the size of your plate determine how hungry you feel" Why do you actually overeat at healthy restaurants".

"You can ask your smartest friend why he or she just ate what they ate, and you wont get an answer any deeper than, 'It sounded good,'" says Brian Wansink, Ph.D.), author of "Mindless Eating: Why We Eat More Than We Think," and Professor and Director of the Cornell Food and Brand Lab.

Dubbed the "Freakonomics of food" by the Canadian Broadcasting Commission, Mindless Eating, uses hidden cameras, two-way mirrors, and hundreds of studies to show why we eat what and how much we eat. "The unique thing about his work is that it cleverly answers everyday questions about food and shows translates them into Good News how we can improve it," said Seth Roberts, Ph.D., a psychology professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

Take how much we eat. Wansink claims we typically dont overeat because we are hungry or because the food tastes good. Instead we overeat because of the cues around us family and friends, packages and plates, shapes and smells, distractions and distances, cupboards and containers.

Consider your holiday ice cream bowl. If you spoon 3 ounces of ice cream onto a small bowl, it will look like a lot more than if you had spooned it into a large bowl. Even if you intended to carefully follow your diet, the larger bowl would likely influence you to serve more. This tricks even the pros.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source