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Discovery opens door to 'personalized' asthma therapy

In the last few years, "personalized medicine" using genetic or other molecular biology-based diagnostic tests to customize treatment for a particular patient has emerged as a powerful new tool for health care.

18 Jan 2008

Alzheimer's molecule is a smart speed bump on the nerve-cell transport highway

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine discovered that proteins carrying chemical cargo in nerve cells react differently when exposed to the tau protein, which plays an important role in Alzheimer's disease.

18 Jan 2008

Altering brain's lipid metabolism reduces Alzheimer's plaques in mice

Increasing levels of a protein that helps the brain use cholesterol may slow the development of Alzheimer's disease changes in the brain, according to researchers studying a mouse model of the disease at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

18 Jan 2008

Smallest particles from vehicle emissions may promote hardening of the arteries

Patients prone to heart disease may one day be told by physicians to avoid not only fatty foods and smoking but air pollution too.

18 Jan 2008

Male and female doctors have divergent views on women and depression

Women and men doctors have some divergent views about women and depression, according to a recent survey conducted by the Society for Women's Health Research, a Washington, D.C., based advocacy organization.

17 Jan 2008

Selective reporting of antidepressant trials exaggerates drug effectiveness

Selective publication in reporting results of antidepressant trials exaggerates the effectiveness of the drugs, according to a report in the January 17 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

17 Jan 2008

Rare lung disease cells indicate higher death risk

Large numbers of certain cells in the lungs of patients diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis may increase their chance of death, University of Cincinnati (UC) researchers have discovered.

17 Jan 2008

New device quickly detects early Alzheimer's

The latest medications can delay the onset of Alzheimer's disease, but none are able to reverse its devastating effects.

17 Jan 2008

New clues about BRCA1 role in breast cancer

A breast cancer gene's newly discovered role in repairing damaged DNA may help explain why women who inherit a mutated copy of the gene are at increased risk for developing both breast and ovarian cancer.

17 Jan 2008

New drug lets kids feel good in their skin

Maria Anichini, a 20-year-old junior at Columbia College, zipped up a fetching black lace cocktail dress with spaghetti straps to go out with friends the other night.

17 Jan 2008

School attendance linked to lower risk of HIV among young people in rural South Africa

The study, a collaboration between the School of Public Health, University of the Witwatersrand and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), examined sexual behaviour and HIV prevalence among 916 young men and 1003 young women aged 14 to 25 in rural South Africa.

17 Jan 2008

International congress on gait and mental function

There is a widespread misunderstanding that stance and gait are automatic processes, i.e. not controlled by the human brain. However, the fact that many patients with brain disorders are no longer able to walk and engage in simple conversation at the same time makes it abundantly clear that our consciousness and our thinking do indeed control such apparently simple actions.

17 Jan 2008

Gene markers located for hereditary prostate cancer

Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Brady Urological Institute, Wake Forest University and the Karolinska Institute in Sweden have identified an array of gene markers for hereditary prostate cancer that, along with family history for the disease, appear to raise risk to more than nine times that of men without such markers.

17 Jan 2008

Cell death suppression increases efficacy of M2 vaccines

Significant public attention has recently been focused on the development of new anti-influenza (flu) vaccines that provide protection against a broad spectrum of viral strains.

17 Jan 2008

Black women get breast cancer two decades earlier than white women

Black British women in Hackney, East London, are diagnosed with breast cancer 21 years younger than white British women, according to a Cancer Research UK study published online in the British Journal of Cancer.

17 Jan 2008

An emerging candidate for protecting patients from liver injury after abdomen surgery

Many patients worldwide are going to receive major abdomen surgery or intestine transplantation every year and expect to be afflicted with liver injury afterwards.

17 Jan 2008

New technique could dramatically lower costs of DNA sequencing

Using computer simulations, researchers at the University of Illinois have demonstrated a strategy for sequencing DNA by driving the molecule back and forth through a nanopore capacitor in a semiconductor chip.

16 Jan 2008

Smoking belies milder disease but worse prognosis for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis patients

Smokers and ex-smokers with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF), an untreatable progressive lung disease that usually leads to death within a few years of diagnosis, have a worse prognosis than non-smokers, according to research from London.

16 Jan 2008

Shift work may increase the risk of enforced early retirement among women

The findings are based on just under 8000 male and female employees, who were part of a large health and work study (Danish Work Environment Cohort Study), which began in 1990, and data from the national welfare register.

16 Jan 2008

Interventions for food insecurity and developmental risk in children

Researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) and Boston Medical Center (BMC), in collaboration with researchers from Arkansas, Maryland, Minnesota and Pennsylvania, have found that children living in households with food insecurity , are more likely to be at developmental risk during their first three years of life, compared to similar households that are not food insecure.

16 Jan 2008