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Fatty liver disease may raise heart disease risk in overweight, obese kids

A fatty liver disease that is not well-known in overweight and obese children may be a precursor of cardiovascular disease, researchers reported in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.

30 Jun 2008

Poor diet while pregnant can harm your baby

We all know that smoking and drinking when pregnant can harm the baby, but new research published in The Journal of Physiology suggests that poor diet may also cause long-lasting, irreversible damage in offspring from heart disease to diabetes.

30 Jun 2008

Experts say some children are fit and fat and BMI may be misleading

Scientists have questioned UK and U.S. guidelines on children's physical activity levels and say they need revising.

30 Jun 2008

Hypertension, insulin resistance and immune suppression links

Many of the 75 million Americans with essential hypertension also develop diabetes and other complications in addition to their high blood pressure, and researchers have discovered a common molecular mechanism in a strain of rat that explains why such metabolic disorders arise together in mammals.

30 Jun 2008

Watermelon provides Viagra-like effects

A cold slice of watermelon has long been a Fourth of July holiday staple. But according to recent studies, the juicy fruit may be better suited for Valentine's Day.

30 Jun 2008

A spoonful of sugar helps manage pain in newborns undergoing painful medical procedures

While the fictional character Mary Poppins may have been trying to charm her young wards into the unpleasant task of cleaning their room by singing 'A Spoonful of Sugar', her message apparently rings true to life.

30 Jun 2008

NIAID announces grants to stimulate food allergy research

Twelve investigators have received grants totaling $5 million over two years to lead high-impact, innovative studies of food allergy, a significant public health concern.

30 Jun 2008

Increasing number of severe bone infections, health complications in children linked to MRSA

The emergence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) as a major pathogen has led to more complications and longer hospital stays for children with acute bone infections, UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers report

30 Jun 2008

Low childhood IQ linked to dementia risk later in life

The researchers from Edinburgh University compared the records of 173 people who took part in the Scottish Mental Survey of 1932, a mental ability test taken by almost every child aged 11 in Scotland, they found that lower childhood IQ increased the risk of vascular dementia.

30 Jun 2008

Microscopic needles effectively deliver drugs to the eyes

A new technique that effectively delivers drugs to the eyes, using microscopic needles, could offer hope to the millions of patients worldwide suffering from common eye diseases that threaten vision such as glaucoma, macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy.

30 Jun 2008

Cancer cure in mice to be tested in humans

Scientists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center are about to embark on a human trial to test whether a new cancer treatment will be as effective at eradicating cancer in humans as it has proven to be in mice.

30 Jun 2008

Sudden loss of hearing might be an early sign of stroke

Preliminary research culled from a national medical insurance records database in Taiwan suggests that sudden loss of hearing might be an early sign of vulnerability to stroke, foreshadowing an actual cerebrovascular event by as much as two years, according to a study reported in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

27 Jun 2008

Seven elevated biomarkers predict prostate cancer risk with 86.6 percent reliability

A simple blood test screening for a panel of biomarkers can accurately predict whether a patient who has had prostate cancer surgery will have a recurrence or spread of the disease.

26 Jun 2008

Neuroscientists pinpoint how neural activity boosts blood flow to the brain

New research from Harvard University neuroscientists has pinpointed exactly how neural activity boosts blood flow to the brain. The finding has important implications for our understanding of common brain imaging techniques such as fMRI, which uses blood flow in the brain as a proxy for neural activity.

26 Jun 2008

Faulty DNA repair could be a risk factor for lung cancer in nonsmokers

People who have never smoked but whose cells cannot efficiently repair environmental insults to DNA are at higher risk of developing lung cancer than those with effective genomic repair capability, according to researchers from the Department of Epidemiology at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center.

26 Jun 2008

Can long-term use of Fosomax hinder bone healing?

There is new evidence linking risk for one kind of fracture with long-term use of bisphosphonates -- drugs like Fosamax that are prescribed to treat osteoporosis in older persons by increasing bone density in order to prevent fractures.

26 Jun 2008

Medical professionals worldwide endorse WHO checklist for safer surgery

A new safety checklist for surgical procedures developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) won the endorsements of nearly 250 health organizations from over 40 countries at a launching event yesterday at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) in Washington, D.C

26 Jun 2008

Online assistance from pharmacists helps control high blood pressure, study finds

Online-based care from a pharmacist helped people control their high blood pressure more than twice as well as people who did not have the additional resources, according to a study published in Wednesday's issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports.

26 Jun 2008

Penn researchers propose major changes to informed consent for transplantation

University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine physicians and bioethicists are calling for a new, more standardized way for patients in need of organ transplants to be informed of the risks they face. If adopted, their policy recommendations could promote greater equity in how organs are allocated while restricting patients' abilities to "cherry-pick" the best organs.

26 Jun 2008