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New computer models successfully link donors and kidney transplant patients

New computer models can now link strangers in a life-saving chain of kidney transplants, promising to increase the number of transplants and overcome obstacles posed by logistics or donors who renege, a team of researchers report in the current edition of the New England Journal of Medicine.

11 Mar 2009

Iron may be a suitable approach for developing novel cancer treatments

Rapid growth of cancer cells and their frequent divisions have their price: Cancer cells need considerably more energy than healthy cells.

11 Mar 2009

Trends in heart attack explained

Explaining trends in heart attack: prevention has improved, mortality rates are down, hospitalisation remains the same

11 Mar 2009

Alzheimer's marker amyloid beta 42 linked to brain damage

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have linked a potential indicator of Alzheimer's disease to brain damage in humans with no signs of mental impairment.

11 Mar 2009

Outspoken health care reformer, Obama advisor, visits URMC

David Blumenthal, M.D., M.P.P., a key health care advisor to President Barack Obama during the 2008 campaign, will speak at the University of Rochester Medical Center on Friday, April 3, for the 10th annual Saward-Berg lecture.

11 Mar 2009

Study methods influence estimates of lead time and overdiagnosis in prostate cancer

In prostate cancer, estimates of lead time (how long screening advances diagnosis of cancer) and overdiagnosis (the fraction of cancers detected by screening that would not have been diagnosed during the patient's lifetime without screening) vary widely, depending on the definition of lead time used, the population, and the estimation methodology, according to a report in the March 10 online issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

11 Mar 2009

Financial incentives stimulate changes in medical practice

A large group of California physicians given financial incentives to improve the quality of medical care have begun to embrace an array of changes important to advancing quality, according to a RAND Corporation study issued today.

11 Mar 2009

Simple test helps predict heart attack risk

The use of common and readily available screening tests - like the ankle brachial index (ABI) - along with traditional risk scoring systems - such as the Framingham Risk Score - has the potential to prevent devastating heart attacks in thousands of individuals who are not originally thought to be at high risk (according to Framingham alone), say researchers at the Society of Interventional Radiology's 34th Annual Scientific Meeting.

11 Mar 2009

Saving limbs with drug-eluting stents

Attempts to treat critical limb ischemia in peripheral arterial disease (PAD) patients with below-the-knee angioplasty are still thwarted by restenosis (the re-narrowing of the artery at the site of angioplasty or stenting), the need for repeat treatments and the continued progression of atherosclerotic disease, leading to tissue death (gangrene) and amputation.

11 Mar 2009

Interventional radiology makes complicated C-sections safer

Innovative, interventional radiology treatments are making childbirth safer for women who have C-sections that are complicated by massive bleeding and for those who suffer from the pregnancy condition of "invasive" placenta.

11 Mar 2009

Risk factors for flat head syndrome

A new study by physician researchers from Hasbro Children's Hospital and Children's Hospital Boston identifies risk factors for the severity of asymmetrical head shapes, known as deformational plagiocephaly (DP), or more commonly as flat head syndrome.

11 Mar 2009

Migraines increase stroke risk during pregnancy

Women who suffer migraines are at an increased risk of stroke during pregnancy as well as other vascular conditions such as heart disease, high blood pressure and blood clots, concludes a study published on bmj.com.

11 Mar 2009

Interventional treatment can be recommended as first-line treatment for 'silent killer'

Endovascular or endograft repair, a minimally invasive interventional radiology treatment that uses stent grafts to treat abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAA), has low re-intervention rates that are comparable to those reported for open surgical repair-and can be recommended as first-line treatment, according to a study released at the Society of Interventional Radiology's 34th Annual Scientific Meeting.

11 Mar 2009