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Opaque procedure pricing barrier to healthcare reforms

US investigators report great difficulty in obtaining price information for total hip arthroplasty from healthcare providers, with many institutions and physicians unable to provide reasonable price estimates.

15 Feb 2013

Protein test may help identify bacterial COPD exacerbations

Increased serum levels of pancreatic stone protein/regenerating protein may help identify bacteria-related exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, say researchers.

15 Feb 2013

India announces plans to improve adolescent health, evaluate progress on child survival

"India's health ministry has announced plans to improve the health of adolescents and also to evaluate progress of states and districts on child survival under a fresh package of initiatives to reduce mortality among children under five years old," BMJ reports.

15 Feb 2013

People with resilient personality profile more likely to have greater energy levels

People with a more resilient personality profile are more likely to have greater energy levels. That's one of the conclusions from a four-year research project led by Antonio Terracciano, associate professor of geriatrics at the Florida State University College of Medicine. His findings are outlined in "Personality, Metabolic Rate and Aerobic Capacity," published in PLOS ONE, a peer-reviewed, open access journal.

15 Feb 2013

Magazine examines maternal mortality in Africa; Ghanaian TV series aims to improve maternal health

The U.N.'s Africa Renewal reports on maternal mortality in sub-Saharan Africa, citing a U.N. report released in May 2012, "Trends in Maternal Mortality: 1990 to 2010," which "shows that maternal mortality has declined by 41 percent in the past 10 years in" the region.

15 Feb 2013

Researchers solve complete 3-D structure of E6 proteins in HPV 16

For the first time, researchers from the Laboratoire biotechnologie et signalisation cellulaire at the Strasbourg-based Ecole supérieure de biotechnologie (CNRS/Université de Strasbourg) and Institut de génétique et de biologie moléculaire et cellulaire (CNRS/Université de Strasbourg/Inserm) have solved the three-dimensional structure of an important oncoprotein involved in cell proliferation and in the development of the human papilloma virus (HPV).

14 Feb 2013

Laparoscopic proctectomy stands up to open surgery

Laparoscopic surgery produces comparable results to open surgery for rectal cancer, show the findings of the first, large, randomized trial of the technique.

14 Feb 2013

Hospital mortality performance not boosted by readmission failure

Researchers say they have found no evidence of a link between hospital performance as measured by 30-day mortality rates and that by 30-day readmission rates in US hospitals.

14 Feb 2013

The Atlantic examines 'paradigm shift' in global health response

"The world has an 'historic opportunity' to contain and end three of humanity's deadliest scourges by focusing on their 'hot zones,' according to Mark Dybul, the newly appointed director of the Geneva-based Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria," the Atlantic reports in an article examining a "paradigm shift" in the global health response.

14 Feb 2013

Study: No link between hospital readmissions and saving patient lives

A Journal of the American Medical Association study released Tuesday has found that higher hospital readmissions don't lead to fewer patient deaths.

14 Feb 2013

USAID blog reports on India's Call to Action Summit for Child Survival, Development

In a post in USAID's "IMPACTblog," Ariel Pablos-Mendez, assistant administrator for global health at USAID, provides an overview of India's "Call to Action Summit for Child Survival and Development," which took place last week, writing, "Led by India's Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, the Summit called for an accelerated response to decrease child mortality across the country."

14 Feb 2013

Violence against pregnant women in India contributes to high maternal mortality, the Atlantic reports

The Atlantic examines the issue of violence against pregnant women in India. "In the aftermath of the high-profile gang rape of a 23-year-old medical student, discussions have raged in India about the regularity of violence against women," the magazine writes, adding, "As has been widely noted, the causes of the violence run deep. But they also are broad."

14 Feb 2013

New drug delivery system can reduce size of ovarian tumors by as much as 83%

By loading fragile RNA into silicon nanoparticles, researchers from The Methodist Hospital and two other institutions found a new drug delivery system can reduce the size of ovarian tumors by as much as 83 percent -- and stop tumor growth in chemotherapy-resistant ovarian cancer tissue.

13 Feb 2013

Excess weight gain, obesity during pregnancy may increase risk of macrosomia

Epidemiologists at Boston University School of Public Health (BUSPH) have found that pre-pregnancy obesity and excess weight gain during pregnancy in African-American women are associated with an increased risk of giving birth to an abnormally large baby.

13 Feb 2013

Early detection, treatment needed to reduce risk of death and CVD in older Cushing's disease patients

Even after successful treatment, patients with Cushing's disease who were older when diagnosed or had prolonged exposure to excess cortisol face a greater risk of dying or developing cardiovascular disease, according to a recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

13 Feb 2013

University of Utah geneticists engineer mice that develop clear cell sarcoma

Geneticists led by University of Utah Nobel Prize Laureate Mario R. Capecchi, Ph.D., have engineered mice that develop clear cell sarcoma (CCS), a significant step in better understanding how this rare and deadly soft tissue cancer arises. The mouse model also can potentially speed the development of drugs to target genes that must be activated for the cancer to form.

13 Feb 2013

Bronchiectasis finding reveals COPD patients at mortality risk

Bronchiectasis is independently associated with mortality risk among patients with moderate-to-severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, Spanish research shows.

12 Feb 2013

Congenital anomaly prevalence should spark ART policy change

Assisted reproductive technology may be associated with the increased proportion of multiple birth infants affected by congenital abnormalities since the 1980s, European research suggests.

12 Feb 2013

Three North Korean doctors killed in Nigeria; Government, U.N. agencies condemn murders of polio workers

"Three North Korean doctors have been killed in a pre-dawn attack in Nigeria's northeastern town of Potiskum, police say," but "[t]he motive of Sunday's attack was not immediately clear," Al Jazeera reports.

12 Feb 2013

Florida Hospital, Sanford-Burnham and Takeda renew research agreement

Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham) and Florida Hospital announced today that they have renewed a research agreement with Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited (Takeda) to extend their collaboration to discover and evaluate new therapeutic approaches to obesity. The collaboration uses a research and drug-development model that creates an early feedback loop in the discovery pipeline.

12 Feb 2013