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AMA not happy with proposed national register of doctors

The Australian Medical Association (AMA) says a national register of doctors to protect patients from rogue practitioners may do more harm than good.

25 Mar 2008

Australia's seniors to be moved out of hospitals

The Rudd government has promised funding to enable elderly patients to be moved out of high-care hospital wards.

25 Mar 2008

When should children infected with HIV start medication?

The advent of effective medications for treating HIV dramatically improved the outlook for both adults and children infected with HIV who had access to treatment, but the optimal timing for starting treatment remains controversial, particularly in children.

25 Mar 2008

Standard low-dose birth control pill can actually help women conceive

Women who have tried to conceive using in vitro fertilization (IVF) methods are painfully aware that timing is of the essence.

25 Mar 2008

New hope for children with bilateral Wilms tumors

Physicians at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have demonstrated that children with bilateral Wilms tumor, a cancer of the kidneys, can retain normal function in both kidneys by undergoing a procedure called bilateral nephron-sparing surgery, even when preoperative scans suggest that the tumors are inoperable.

25 Mar 2008

How Staphylococcus aureus resists our natural defenses

Researchers at the University of Washington have uncovered how the bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, including the notorious MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staph aureus) "superbug" strains, resists our body's natural defenses against infection.

25 Mar 2008

Research to lead to brain tumor therapies

Unique human in vitro model (cell culture) research currently underway at the Peninsula Medical School in the South West of England is set to identify and develop therapies for the treatment of multiple tumours in the brain.

25 Mar 2008

Researchers find evidence of periodontal disease leading to gestational diabetes

A study by a New York University dental research team has discovered evidence that pregnant women with periodontal (gum) disease are more likely to develop gestational diabetes mellitus than pregnant women with healthy gums.

25 Mar 2008

Hospitals that participate in clinical trials may provide better patient care

Hospitals that participate in clinical trials appear to provide better care for patients with heart attacks or other acute heart events and have lower death rates than hospitals that do not participate in clinical trials, according to a report in the March 24 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

25 Mar 2008

Military to fight Dengue fever in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Since the beginning of the year across the state of Rio, 49 people have died from the potentially deadly fever, the vast majority of victims have been in the city itself, with hospitals struggling to cope.

24 Mar 2008

Hard to treat TB case diagnosed in Britain

Health officials in Britain say they are dealing with the country's first case of a rare strain of tuberculosis (TB) which is almost untreatable.

24 Mar 2008

Hospitals in NSW accused of 'cooking the books'

As a result of allegations that triage times had been altered to meet department targets, Gosford Hospital, on the central coast, and Ryde Hospital, in Sydney's north-west have both been audited by the Health Department.

24 Mar 2008

Study looks at continuous deep sedation for patients nearing death

The use of continuous deep sedation for patients nearing death in the Netherlands is increasing, while cases of euthanasia have declined, according to a study published on bmj.com.

24 Mar 2008

Cigarette smokers treated for brain aneurysm with coil embolization at higher risk of recurrence

Cigarette smokers who were treated for cerebral aneurysms with coil embolization (blocking of a blood vessel) are at greater risk of developing another aneurysm, say neurological surgeons at Jefferson Hospital for Neuroscience in Philadelphia in the first-known study of its kind.

24 Mar 2008

Sanitation investment in poor countries would yield $9-to-1 benefits in productivity, health and other benefits

Experts estimate that $9 in productivity, health and other benefits are returned for every dollar invested installing toilets for people in countries that today are off-track in meeting the UN Millennium Development Goal (MDG) for sanitation.

24 Mar 2008

New genetic clue to Parkinson's disease

Researchers at Rhode Island Hospital and The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University have discovered a gene that could hold the key to developing new treatments for Parkinson's disease – a progressive and often debilitating movement disorder that affects as many as one million Americans.

24 Mar 2008

New poll debates quality U.S. health care system

A recent survey by the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and Harris Interactive, as part of their ongoing series, Debating Health: Election 2008, finds that Americans are generally split on the issue of whether the United States has the best health care system in the world (45% believe the U.S. has the best system; 39% believe other countries have better systems; 15% don't know or refused to answer) and that there is a significant divide along party lines.

24 Mar 2008

Eye test peers into heat-related multiple sclerosis symptoms

A bodysuit that heats or cools a patient, combined with painless measurements of eye movements, is providing multiple sclerosis researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Center with a new tool to study the mysterious link between body temperature and severity of MS symptoms.

24 Mar 2008

Deadly genetic disease prevented before birth in zebrafish with genetic patch

By injecting a customized "genetic patch" into early stage fish embryos, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis were able to correct a genetic mutation so the embryos developed normally.

24 Mar 2008

Are dual cord blood banks the answer to increasing stem cell demand?

In this week's BMJ, two senior doctors, Professors Nicholas Fisk and Rifat Atun, analyse the UK's growing cord blood banking industry and the potential impact of a new bank that provides blood for both personal and public use.

24 Mar 2008