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Pneumonia - another use for statins

Patients hospitalised because of pneumonia are at less risk of dying from the disease if they have been taking the widely used cholesterol-lowering drugs 'statins' before hospital admission.

25 Jul 2005

Nonsmokers report better health and fewer symptoms of depression than smokers

People who have successfully quit smoking cigarettes are more likely to have visited a trusted health care provider and to report good mental health than current smokers, according to a recent study.

25 Jul 2005

New treatment that boosts the stomach's 'full' signal offers new way of tackling growing obesity epidemic

A hormone found in the small intestine has provided a crucial breakthrough in developing new drugs to tackle the growing obesity epidemic, claim scientists. Obesity now affects more than half of all UK adults, costing the UK up to 3.7 billion pounds a year in sickness absence and treatments.

25 Jul 2005

Government in Ontario will pay for three new cancer drugs

Canadian Health Minister George Smitherman has announced that the government will add three new and expensive cancer-fighting drugs to the list of medications it funds.

25 Jul 2005

U.S. scientists find 3 molecules that could help fight Alzheimer's

A team of scientists at the Neuroscience Research Institute at the University of California, Santa Barbara, say they have identified three molecules that appear to stop a key culprit behind Alzheimer's disease.

25 Jul 2005

New treatment helps obese patients to feel full

In the race to develop drugs to fight obesity, researchers have found a possible new treatment to help obese patients "feel full" and have lauded it a success.

25 Jul 2005

Discovery of a receptor that appears to function as one "lock" that HSV opens to allow it to enter human cells

It's one of the most common viruses in America, and one that causes the most guilt and shame. It can get inside almost any kind of human cell, reproduce in vast numbers, and linger for years in the body, causing everything from recurrent genital blisters to sores around the mouth. Its complications can kill, and it may increase susceptibility to many nerve and brain disorders.

24 Jul 2005

Deaths from substance abuse on the increase in Northern Ireland

The UK Health Promotion Agency (HPA) says that in Northern Ireland, the number of people dying from solvent abuse has increased against trends in the rest of the UK.

23 Jul 2005

Researchers discover type of "fuel" that the heart uses can contribute to the severity of heart failures

Researchers have determined how metabolic pathways differ between healthy and failing hearts. Normally, a heart derives its energy from a balance of fatty acids and carbohydrates, specifically glucose.

21 Jul 2005

Benign breast disease - not necessarily an indicator of higher breast cancer risk

According to a new study, women diagnosed with a form of benign breast disease, but who do not have a strong family history of breast cancer, have no heightened risk of developing a tumor.

21 Jul 2005

UK medical watchdog wants more proof on value of Alzheimer's drugs

In the UK the country's watchdog for cost-effectiveness in medical treatments, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), has asked drug makers for more evidence about the benefits of their Alzheimer's medicines.

21 Jul 2005

New research finds molecular link between obesity and diabetes

Researchers say they have discovered a molecular link between obesity and type 2 diabetes, and the link could be a potential target for new drugs to treat the disease.

21 Jul 2005

Human dummy to teach medics

A new way to teach medical students will be demonstrated for the first time at Bristol University on 21 July 2005, during a joint meeting of the Physiological Society and the Federation of European Physiological Societies.

21 Jul 2005

Hearing protein TRPA1 also involved with pain perception

The same protein that “translates” sound into nerve signals to the brain and enables individuals to hear is also required for pain perception, researchers from Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine have found.

21 Jul 2005

Cocaine induces abnormal enhancement of neuronal connections

Researchers working with rats have zeroed in on the brain circuitry mechanism whose disruption contributes to the impulsive behavior seen in users of cocaine as well as other psychostimulant drugs. The same circuitry has been implicated in such disorders as schizophrenia, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder, wrote the researchers.

21 Jul 2005

Biologic treatments to treat the physical symptoms of psoriasis

More than 4.5 million adults in the United States have been diagnosed with psoriasis and 21 percent of those have moderate to severe psoriasis. This chronic condition, characterized by thick, red, scaly plaques that itch and bleed, not only makes the activities of daily life difficult, but also can affect a person's emotional well being.

21 Jul 2005

New program will help fill a drug-discovery void as pharmaceutical companies have largely abandoned natural products research

The natural world has been medicine's most effective arsenal, providing life-saving antibiotics and our most potent anti-cancer drugs.

20 Jul 2005

Protein found in fat cells is a newly discovered cause of insulin resistance

A study led by researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) has shown that a protein found in fat cells is a newly discovered cause of insulin resistance, establishing a previously unidentified molecular link between obesity and type 2 diabetes and offering a potential new target for the development of drugs to treat diabetes.

20 Jul 2005

Fertility drugs may be ineffective for women who lack a gene called the estrogen receptor beta

"What we found is that the beta estrogen receptor plays a role in moving the egg outside the ovary so it can be fertilized," said Kenneth Korach, Ph.D., Laboratory Chief at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) where the research was conducted. "We never knew before what function this receptor played in reproduction."

20 Jul 2005

Alendronate combined with calcium and vitamin D almost completely prevented further bone loss in the first 4 months afte liver transplant

A new study found that the drug used to treat osteoporosis, when used in combination with calcium and vitamin D, can prevent the additional bone loss that commonly occurs after liver transplants. The treatment also helped stabilize bone loss in patients who already had osteoporosis, and helped improve their bone mineral density (BMD).

20 Jul 2005