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Kansas House approves 'compact' bill opposing health law; Conn., Alaska moving ahead with exchanges; Mass. reform very popular

The proposed change has the support of Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman, who chairs the exchange board. The bill would add two voting members to the board. One would be a small employer and ... [the other] would be "a consumer of specialized health care services for a disability, a chronic illness or special needs, or of health care services."

15 Feb 2012

Pregnant mothers who are vitamin D deficient raise risk of language difficulties in kids: Study

The Telethon Institute for Child Health Research study is the first to show low levels of the vitamin in utero can harm a child's language development, including the ability to pick up new words and string together sentences.

15 Feb 2012

Air pollution raises risk of stroke and cognitive decline

According to data from two studies published in the Archives of Internal Medicine exposure to air pollution may have serious cognitive and cardiovascular health consequences, even at levels currently deemed acceptable by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

15 Feb 2012

Heart attack scars mended using stem cells

Researchers from United States have successfully healed the scars caused by a heart attack using stem cells gathered from the patient's own heart. The amount of scar tissue was halved in the small safety trial reported in the Lancet medical journal. The authors said there was also an “unprecedented” increase in new heart muscle.

15 Feb 2012

IOM recommendations for healthful diet to children and adolescents not fully implemented

New research has found that the US government and schools have made mixed progress to comprehensively address food and beverage marketing practices that put young people's health at risk.

15 Feb 2012

Feds recover record amounts from fraudulent Medicare claims

Federal authorities say they recovered $4.1 billion in health care fraud judgments last year, a record high which officials on Monday credited to new tools for cracking down on deceitful Medicare claims.

15 Feb 2012

Senate Republicans ask Supreme Court to strike mandate

In a brief filed Monday, 43 Senate Republicans said that if the Supreme Court allows the mandate to buy health insurance in the Democrats' health law to stand, then Congress could require Americans to buy almost anything.

15 Feb 2012

USAID improves health through access to clean water in Timor-Leste

In this post in USAID's "IMPACTblog," Carlos dos Reis, foreign service national environmental health officer for Timor-Leste, reports on a trip to the country's remote district of Oecusse with U.S. Ambassador Judith Fergin and USAID/Timor-Leste Mission Director Rick Scott to "inaugurate the new clean water supply system built with the support of USAID."

15 Feb 2012

Greenest supercomputer to advance study of human disease

Victoria will be home to one of Australia's fastest supercomputers and the world's greenest supercomputer, the IBM Blue Gene/Q, which will be housed at the Victorian Life Sciences Computation Initiative (VLSCI) hosted by the University of Melbourne, and is aimed at advancing the study of human disease.

15 Feb 2012

Fewer people getting health insurance through employer

Fewer people - 44.6 percent of all Americans - are getting health insurance through their employer, a new Gallup poll finds. In other news, as health care costs increase, giving birth at home is becoming a more attractive option despite doctors' concerns.

15 Feb 2012

23andMe, Cleveland Clinic to discover how genes and environment influence PD

In an effort to study the interactions between genomics and Parkinson's disease, Cleveland Clinic has joined the ongoing efforts of 23andMe, a leading personal genetics company, to recruit Parkinson's patients to participate in research by contributing their DNA to a research database and completing online surveys about their health.

15 Feb 2012

Chemists adapt natural strategies to improve performance of DNA detectors

Over their 3.8 billion years of evolution, living organisms have developed countless strategies for monitoring their surroundings. Chemists at UC Santa Barbara and University of Rome Tor Vergata have adapted some of these strategies to improve the performance of DNA detectors. Their findings may aid efforts to build better medical diagnostics, such as improved HIV or cancer tests.

15 Feb 2012

Smart sensors can enable orthopaedicians to collect objective, quantifiable information

Imagine a smart sensor customized to provide vital, real-time information about a patient's recent orthopaedic surgery. Instead of relying on X-rays or invasive procedures, surgeons will be able to collect diagnostic data from an implantable sensor.

15 Feb 2012

Updated tool to track NTD funding, identify gaps

The Neglected Tropical Disease Control Program (NTD Control Program), funded by USAID and managed by Research Triangle Institute International (RTI International), has released an updated version of its NTD Funding Gap Analysis Tool (NTD-FGAT), which "helps users accurately estimate the costs and funding gaps of public health programs" and "is intended as a supplementary instrument to improve resource and strategic planning in an already existing national NTD plan," according to the Global Network for NTDs' "End the Neglect" blog.

15 Feb 2012

Health professionals should routinely recommend chemo websites for cancer patients

Doctors and nurses may be underestimating the value placed on internet chemotherapy information by cancer patients and missing out on opportunities to discuss this information with them, new research finds today.

15 Feb 2012

Study to examine relationship between oral and silent reading in children

When a beginning reader reads aloud, her progress is apparent: Hunched over a book, little index finger blazing the way, she moves intently from sound to sound, word to word. I do not like green eggs and ham! I do not like them, Sam-I-am! But when that same child reads silently, it's much harder to measure how much she is reading -- or understanding. Yet as she advances through school, teachers will expect her to learn increasingly through silent rather than oral reading.

15 Feb 2012

UCSD opens lidocaine and amiodarone clinical trial to prevent SCA

Sudden Cardiac Arrest (SCA) is the leading cause of death in the United States. This form of heart attack kills 325,000 people every year, representing one death every two minutes. Almost all SCA victims die before they even reach a hospital. To identify a drug that paramedics can use in the field, UC San Diego Health System has opened a clinical trial to evaluate two medications to help restore the heart beat.

15 Feb 2012

Critics find much to fault in Obama budget

Republicans say the budget doesn't do enough to restrain entitlement spending. Health care industry groups, meanwhile, call proposed payment cuts unfair and unworkable.

15 Feb 2012

Obama 2013 budget would cut $360 billion from Medicaid and Medicare

The budget released Monday would trim spending on federal health-care programs by about $360 billion over the next decade, primarily by reducing payments to drug companies and other providers. Starting in 2017, Obama also proposes to raise Medicare premiums for new retirees and seniors with higher incomes, start charging co-payments for home health-care services, and penalize patients who buy Medigap policies to take care of Medicare co-payments and deductibles.

15 Feb 2012

Debate shifts on contraception rule

While congressional Republicans say the fight isn't over on the administration's birth control mandate, the measured support for President Obama's compromise from some Catholic groups and a few Republicans has tamped down the political furor.

15 Feb 2012