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Penn awarded $2.1 million grant for cardiovascular research

Cardiac researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have received a $2.1 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to pioneer studies in cardiovascular disease management and participate in a novel collaboration network to develop and implement research in this critically important field.

12 Oct 2007

Guidance for public health planners on people living with advanced cancer

The World Health Organisation (WHO) has released its first guide on planning palliative care services for people living with advanced stages of cancer.

8 Oct 2007

Cancer trial combines multiple drugs to attack blood vessel formation in patients with kidney cancer

In the first clinical trial of its kind, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Abramson Cancer Center will lead a nationwide test of anti-cancer drug combinations that target blood vessel growth in patients with advanced kidney cancer.

4 Oct 2007

Default options for medicine, healthcare

Anyone who has ever tried to set up an internet account or wants to make a purchase on a company's website, has experienced the ‘default option,' an event or condition that will be set in place if no alternative is actively chosen.

3 Oct 2007

Medicare part B premiums to increase by 3.1% in 2008 to $96.40 per month

CMS on Monday announced that the standard monthly premium for Medicare Part B, which covers physician visits and outpatient hospital care, will increase by $2.90, or 3.1%, to $96.40 in 2008 -- the smallest increase since 2000, when the premium remained the same, the New York Times reports.

2 Oct 2007

Eldely and disabled not at increased risk of physician-assisted death

Claims that vulnerable groups, such as the elderly and people with physical or mental disabilities, are at an increased risk of physician assisted death are not supported by evidence, says an expert in this week's BMJ.

29 Sep 2007

Report shows PA hospitals national leaders in health IT adoption, investment

Despite high barriers, Pennsylvania's hospitals have established a leadership position in the adoption of health information technology (IT) as compared to their peers nationwide.

28 Aug 2007

Refusal of medical and surgical interventions common among chronically ill elderly

Chronically ill older persons frequently refuse medical and surgical interventions recommended by their physicians, according to a recent study by Yale School of Medicine researchers.

9 Aug 2007

Bcl-3 protein regulates inflammation by blocking ubiquitination

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine recently identified how a regulatory protein called Bcl-3 helps to control the body's inflammation response to infection by interfering a critical biochemical process called ubiquitination.

8 Aug 2007

Discovery of molecular pathway that detects and eliminates defective messenger RNAs from red blood cells

Other such pathways - known as surveillance pathways - operate in a more general way, in many cell types. Knowing how this specific surveillance system works can help researchers better understand hereditary diseases, in this case, thalassemia, a form of anemia, which is the most common genetic disorder worldwide.

3 Aug 2007

Active management of risk in pregnancy lowers Cesarean rates

At a time when national rates of cesarean delivery have climbed above 30%, a four-year study of patients receiving an alternative method of obstetric care experienced a significantly lower rate of cesarean births, according to a study published in the current issue of the Annals of Family Medicine .

1 Aug 2007

New target for muscular dystrophy drug therapy

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine report how the gene for utrophin, which codes for a protein very similar to dystrophin, the defective protein in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), puts the brakes on its own expression in muscle cells, thereby suggesting a new target for treatment.

13 Jul 2007

Uncooked fish linked with liver cancer in Asia

An age old preference for eating uncooked fish dishes like koi-pla puts people in SE Asia at risk of ingesting trematodes that can cause a type of liver cancer called cholangiocarcinoma (cancer of the bile ducts), say researchers in this week's PLoS Medicine.

10 Jul 2007

OncoLife web-based cancer survivorhip care plan

A team of cancer specialists from OncoLink.org, the award-winning cancer Web-based resource of the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania, has launched OncoLife, the first and only individualized plan-of-care based on the national Institute of Medicine's recommendations for adult cancer survivors.

4 Jul 2007

New drug resistance screening method

A growing number of drug-resistant strains of HIV are a threat to the effectiveness of current treatments despite anti-HIV drug cocktails decreasing the number of HIV-related deaths and improving the quality of life for HIV patients.

29 Jun 2007

One in 10 hospice patients are referred too late for services

The study is based on surveys completed by bereaved family members and designed to gauge the quality of hospice programs, which provide medical care with social, emotional and spiritual support for the dying.

29 Jun 2007

More common for children with complex chronic conditions to die in their home than in a hospital

It is becoming more common for children with complex chronic conditions to die in their home than in a hospital, although black and Hispanic children with these conditions are less likely to die in their home, according to a study in the June 27 issue of JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association, a theme issue on chronic diseases of children.

27 Jun 2007

Mild cognitive disorder often an early symptom of Alzheimer's disease

Using new MRI techniques to analyze tissue composition and structure in the brain, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the National Institute on Aging successfully detected mild cognitive disorder (MCI), a condition in which patients suffer mild memory problems and is often an early symptom of Alzheimer's disease (AD).

14 Jun 2007

COX inhibitors may weaken protective qualities of estrogen therapy

Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine found in a database study of women heart patients that COX inhibitors such as traditional nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) may undermine any purported protection against heart disease in participants taking estrogen therapy.

24 May 2007

Mammals have the power to regenerate

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have found that hair follicles in adult mice regenerate by re-awakening genes once active only in developing embryos.

18 May 2007