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Chinese SFDA approves MIT's MED-JET needle-free injection system

Medical International Technology Inc. is pleased to announce its progress in China. Based on the results obtained in two separate pivotal clinical trials over the past six months, the Chinese SFDA authorities have approved and issued to our Joint Venture Corporation the official licence to sell MED-JET products.

3 Feb 2011

Miracle baby after radical new procedure for uterine fibroids

Amy Cordle is the first woman in Australia to become a mother after undergoing a radical new procedure. On Australia Day, the 31-year-old Albert Park woman’s little “miracle” arrived when daughter Neroli was born.

3 Feb 2011

Innovative Heart Attack Rapid Response Team for snow shoveling heart attacks

Loyola's innovative Heart Attack Rapid Response Team (HARRT) is on staff 24/7 to perform emergency surgery on patients who have experienced heart attacks from shoveling snow or other causes.

3 Feb 2011

Blood clotting protein could be used as 'biomarker' for mucopolysaccharide diseases

University of Manchester scientists have shown that a protein involved in blood clotting can be used to diagnose and subsequently monitor the treatment of a group of childhood genetic diseases.

3 Feb 2011

Chances of surviving cardiac arrests high in large public venues having AEDs

A study of more than 14,000 men and women whose hearts stopped suddenly suggests that the chances of survival are very high if such cardiac arrests are witnessed in large public venues, including airports, sports arenas or malls. The reasons, researchers say, are that almost four out of five such cases appear to be due to a survivable type of heart rhythm disruption and that big places with lots of people are more likely to have an automated external defibrillator, or AED device, handy, along with those who can apply it as well as CPR.

3 Feb 2011

Stockpiling flu drugs, vaccines reduces impact of pandemic, but option out of reach for most countries, study finds

"Stockpiling antiviral flu drugs and vaccines saves lives and reduces disease in a flu pandemic," but the cost to maintain such a stockpile and deploy interventions in the event of an outbreak "is too expensive for around two thirds of the world's population, scientists said on Wednesday," Reuters reports.

3 Feb 2011

PanCare Childhood and Adolescent Cancer Survivor Care and Follow-up Studies to kick off in Lund, Sweden

By learning more about these late effects of treatment, the health care services can, on the one hand, improve and reduce the intensity of the treatment, and, on the other hand, find appropriate ways to care for those suffering from side-effects of the treatment in adolescence and adulthood.

3 Feb 2011

Physicians should contribute some efforts to improve patient safety, outcomes

Efforts to keep hospital patients safe and continually improve the overall results of health care can't work unless medical centers figure out a way to get physicians more involved in the process.

3 Feb 2011

New device to treat heart hiccups

"It took off to about 160 beats per minute and then dropped to 50. It seemed confused. Then it went back to normal," recalled Tsuji, 47, an avid cyclist, of that day in 2003. "I didn't notice any symptoms at that point, so I blew it off. I figured there was something wrong with it."

3 Feb 2011

New England Journal publishes fidaxomicin Phase 3 trial results against CDI

Optimer Pharmaceuticals, announced The New England Journal of Medicine has published results from the North American Phase 3 trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of the Company's novel antibiotic fidaxomicin as a treatment for patients with Clostridium difficile infection.

3 Feb 2011

Inspiration presents IB1001 PK data for treatment of hemophilia B

Inspiration Biopharmaceuticals, today presented pharmacokinetic data on its lead product, IB1001, a recombinant factor IX for the treatment and prevention of bleeding in individuals with hemophilia B.

3 Feb 2011

NHS awards £350,000 for study on physician assistants

Physician assistants are a new addition to medical teams in Britain, although well established in other developed countries including the United States, Netherlands and Australia. Now a team led by Kingston University and St George's, University of London, is aiming to find out more about their contribution to healthcare in England with the first full-scale evaluation of their role in general practice.

3 Feb 2011

Limited school closures ineffective, strain hospital ICUs during epidemics

Selective schools closures has been considered as a means of reducing transmission between children and hence reducing the number of cases at the peak of an epidemic but new research led by researchers at the University of Warwick shows that limited school closures are ineffective and that only significant widespread school closures would have real effect on the spread of a epidemic and the strain placed on hospital intensive care units.

3 Feb 2011

First therapeutic vaccine designed from dendritic cells of patient achieves significant response

The therapeutic vaccines are a priority research line of the HIVACAT, the catalan programme for the development of therapeutic vaccines and prevention against the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). This type of therapeutic vaccine helps the patients who are carriers of the virus, combat infection and control the appearance of AIDS in the same way as with the current antiretroviral treatments.

3 Feb 2011

Intermittent use of preventive malaria drugs in children found to help prevent malaria transmission, studies say

Three studies published on Tuesday in PLoS Medicine show that "intermittent use of preventive antimalarial drugs can be beneficial in curbing the spread of the disease in children," Agence France-Presse reports (2/1).

3 Feb 2011

Malaria transmission to decline in Burundi because of global warming

Malaria transmission will not increase because of global warming in the African nation of Burundi according to a statistical analysis by researchers in Austria and Burundi. Writing in the International Journal of Global Warming, the team explains that rising temperatures will lead to lower humidity and rainfall which will shorten the lifespan of mosquitoes carrying malaria.

3 Feb 2011

Fidaxomicin demonstrates 45% reduction in recurrences vs. existing treatment for C. difficile infection

Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) is a significant and growing problem in hospitals and other health care facilities, but no new drugs to treat the condition have been developed in several decades. However, a large-scale, phase 3 trial conducted by Canadian and U.S. researchers shows that the new antibiotic Fidaxomicin is superior to existing treatments, demonstrating a 45 percent reduction in recurrences vs. the existing licensed treatment.

3 Feb 2011

Lead exposure can lead to high blood pressure in pregnant women: Study

Even minute amounts of lead may take a toll on pregnant women, according to a study published by Lynn Goldman, M.D., M.S., M.P.H., Dean of George Washington University's School of Public Health and Health Services in D.C., and colleagues, in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives.

3 Feb 2011

Losartan improves effectiveness of nanotherapeutics against cancer

Low doses of an inexpensive, FDA-approved hypertension medication may improve the results of nanotherapeutic approaches to cancer treatment. In a report in the early edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators describe experiments showing that the generic drug losartan, by modifying the network of collagen fibers that characterizes most solid tumors, improved the effectiveness of two nanotherapeutics against several types of cancer.

3 Feb 2011

Viewpoints: N.Y. Times slams Vinson ruling as WSJ, Wash post parse it; Violence in hospitals; Bending health cost curve

A ruling by a Federal District Court judge in Florida that the entire health care reform law is unconstitutional was a breathtaking example of judicial activism and overreach. It is hard not to believe this decision was driven at least in part by ideology.

3 Feb 2011