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Federal appeals court strikes down Arizona ban on abortions after 18 weeks of pregnancy

Federal appeals court strikes down Arizona ban on abortions after 18 weeks of pregnancy

A federal appeals court struck down an Arizona law Tuesday that bans most abortions in that state after 18 weeks of pregnancy. The three-judge panel said the law violates a woman's constitutional right to end a pregnancy before a fetus can survive outside the womb -- typically 24 weeks. [More]

First Edition: May 22, 2013

Today's headlines include reports about how the Medicaid expansion is shaking out in Virginia and Texas, as well as a report about the role health care is playing as the House attempts to negotiate an immigration reform measure. [More]
Children exposed to secondhand smoke are more likely to grow up aggressive, antisocial

Children exposed to secondhand smoke are more likely to grow up aggressive, antisocial

Children who are exposed to secondhand smoke in early childhood are more likely to grow up to physically aggressive and antisocial, regardless of whether they were exposed during pregnancy or their parents have a history of being antisocial, according to Linda Pagani and Caroline Fitzpatrick of the University of Montreal and its affiliated CHU Sainte-Justine hospital. [More]

Study: Regardless of pain, women are more likely to be prescribed pain-relieving drugs

Regardless of pain, social class or age, a woman is more likely to be prescribed pain-relieving drugs. A study published in Gaceta Sanitaria (Spanish health scientific journal) affirms that this phenomenon is influenced by socioeconomic inequality between genders in the Autonomous Community in which the patient resides. [More]
Viewpoints: Slowing health costs; What causes genetic testing to be so expensive; Iowa governor offers Medicaid supports a 'glimmer of hope'

Viewpoints: Slowing health costs; What causes genetic testing to be so expensive; Iowa governor offers Medicaid supports a 'glimmer of hope'

We have done it. We have decreased the increase in the cost of healthcare. ... Is this decline the desperately needed bend in the healthcare cost curve or just the impact of the depressed economy? ... A slower growth of healthcare cost would mean less burden on the individual family, freeing that family to invest in and live a higher quality of life. [More]

State roundup: Nearly 13,000 Calif. hospital workers set to strike

Respiratory therapists, nursing aides, surgical technicians and other patient care workers plan to stage a walkout starting Tuesday morning at five University of California medical centers. More than 12,000 workers from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees are expected to participate in the two-day strike over staffing, pay and pension reform, union officials said. An additional 3,400 workers from the University Professional and Technical Employees union plan a one-day sympathy strike (Gorman, 5/21). [More]
Obesity directly tied to several cancers

Obesity directly tied to several cancers

"Obesity is a major risk factor for developing cancer, roughly the equivalent of tobacco use, and both are potentially reversible. Further, obese cancer patients do worse in surgery, with radiation or on chemotherapy - worse by any measure." Karen Basen-Engquist, Ph.D., Director of MD Anderson's new Center for Energy Balance in Cancer Prevention and Survivorship and professor of Behavioral Science. [More]
Making gold nanoparticles more effective against ovarian cancer cells

Making gold nanoparticles more effective against ovarian cancer cells

Positively charged gold nanoparticles are usually toxic to cells, but cancer cells somehow manage to avoid nanoparticle toxicity. Mayo Clinic researchers found out why and determined how to make the nanoparticles effective against ovarian cancer cells. [More]
Findings suggest that a prosaposin-based drug could block metastasis spread

Findings suggest that a prosaposin-based drug could block metastasis spread

By studying the roles two proteins, thrombospondin-1 and prosaposin, play in discouraging cancer metastasis, a trans-Atlantic research team has identified a five-amino acid fragment of prosaposin that significantly reduces metastatic spread in mouse models of prostate, breast and lung cancer. [More]

Traffic-related pollutants exacerbate asthma in pregnant women

Air pollutants from traffic are associated with increased asthma severity levels in pregnant asthmatic women, according to a new study. [More]

Women are less likely than men to receive care in trauma center after severe injury

Women are less likely than men to receive care in a trauma center after severe injury, according to a new study of almost 100,000 Canadian patients. [More]
Study: 3/4 women experience constipation and other bowel disorders during their pregnancies

Study: 3/4 women experience constipation and other bowel disorders during their pregnancies

Nearly three out of four pregnant women experience constipation, diarrhea or other bowel disorders during their pregnancies, a Loyola University Medical Center study has found. [More]

Nominated Va. Lt. Gov. likened Planned Parenthood to KKK; Ark. judge halts abortion ban

A man nominated Saturday for lieutenant governor of Virginia made comments last year that likened Planned Parenthood to the KKK. In Arkansas, a judge delayed a law that would ban most abortions there after 12 weeks of pregnancy. [More]
Stronger epigenetic changes in estrogen responsive genes linked to postpartum depression

Stronger epigenetic changes in estrogen responsive genes linked to postpartum depression

The epigenetic modifications, which alter the way genes function without changing the underlying DNA sequence, can apparently be detected in the blood of pregnant women during any trimester, potentially providing a simple way to foretell depression in the weeks after giving birth, and an opportunity to intervene before symptoms become debilitating. [More]

Viewpoints: Sebelius' 'ethical line'; As tricky phase of health law approaches, concerns about exchanges opening on time

One of the biggest questions hanging over the health-care system is how many young Americans will sign up for coverage once the Affordable Care Act begins to phase in this October. If too few buy insurance on the markets that the government is creating, insurance companies would be stuck covering primarily the old and the sick. They would have to pay out more per customer. [More]

First Edition: May 20, 2013

Today's headlines include reports about the policy and political issues currently surrounding the health law's implementation. [More]
Study provides strong hook for off-the-news feature on adolescent girls and risks of tanning

Study provides strong hook for off-the-news feature on adolescent girls and risks of tanning

Prom season and summer approach, and with them teenage girls seeking suntans. New research published in the May issue of Pediatrics finds that the number of children diagnosed with melanoma has increased an average 2% a year since the 1970s, with the incidence of melanoma significantly higher among white girls, age 15-19, than among boys and younger children. [More]

Major breakthrough in IVF treatment

Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, today announced the publication of a recent study in Reproductive BioMedicine Online on 5-day old human blastocysts showing that those with an abnormal chromosomal composition can be identified by the rate at which they have developed to blastocysts, thereby classifying the risk of genetic abnormality without a biopsy. [More]
College females exceed national drinking guidelines for drinking more frequently than males

College females exceed national drinking guidelines for drinking more frequently than males

In order to avoid harms associated with alcohol consumption, in 2009 the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism issued guidelines that define low-risk drinking. These guidelines differ for men and women: no more than four drinks per day, and 14 drinks per week for men, and no more than three drinks per day, and seven drinks per week for women. [More]

Research: Women's reproductive function may be tied to their immune status

New research indicates that women's reproductive function may be tied to their immune status. Previous studies have found this association in human males, but not females. [More]