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New study to determine the effectiveness of a new pediatric screening method for Wilson's disease

Mayo Clinic seeks normal healthy children and young adults between the ages of 3 months and 18 years for a research study to determine the effectiveness of a new pediatric screening method for Wilson's disease.

7 Jun 2004

Investigational drug, LAF237 improved glycemic control in patients with type 2 diabetes

Research presented today showed that the investigational drug, LAF237, the first in a new class, improved glycemic control in patients with type 2 diabetes. In this study, LAF237, which is administered as a tablet to be taken orally, was added to the standard diabetes treatment metformin in patients whose diabetes was not adequately controlled by metformin alone.

7 Jun 2004

Combination treatment may help type 2 diabetes patients

New research presented by Peter Weissman, M.D., from the University of Miami, at the 64th Annual Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association shows that combination treatment with rosiglitazone maleate and metformin significantly improves certain markers of cardiovascular disease risk in patients with type 2 diabetes compared to metformin alone.

6 Jun 2004

Drug Tarceva improves survival chance for patients with advanced lung cancer

Roche OSI Pharmaceuticals and Genentech today announced that their investigational drug Tarceva(TM) (erlotinib) achieved a significant 42.5% improvement in median survival compared to placebo in patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

5 Jun 2004

Breakthrough in gene therapy

Despite a roller-coaster ride of ups and downs during the past 15 years, gene therapy has continued to attract many of the world's brightest scientists. They are tantalized by the enormous potential that replacing missing genes or disabling defective ones offers for curing diseases of many kinds.

3 Jun 2004

Cancer rates falling in the US

The nation's leading cancer organizations report that Americans' risk of getting and dying from cancer continues to decline and survival rates for many cancers continue to improve.

3 Jun 2004

Bone marrow stem cells exposed to damaged liver tissue quickly convert into healthy liver cells

Bone marrow stem cells, when exposed to damaged liver tissue, can quickly convert into healthy liver cells and help repair the damaged organ, according to new research from the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center.

2 Jun 2004

Research may help to reduce infection and multiple organ failure after injury

While physicians are able to treat patients who suffer blood loss after major injuries, a large number of these patients go on to develop infections or multiple organ failure, in which the functioning of the body vital organ systems, such as the lungs, heart, kidneys of liver, go awry.

2 Jun 2004

Dow Corning breast implant claim checks to be mailed soon

Today is the effective date in the Dow Corning bankruptcy, finally allowing injured people's claims to be processed. The court-appointed claims administrator for the $2.35 billion fund said that thousands of letters will go out June 1st and that the first checks should be mailed June 15th.

2 Jun 2004

Students win awards for research into liver disease, cancer and insomnia

Targeting a range of diseases and disorders, three University of Houston students won awards at a recent symposium for research in liver disease, cancer and insomnia.

2 Jun 2004

Malaria, Africa's biggest killer

It's Africa's biggest killer, but it's not HIV. It causes economic losses of US$12 billion per year, but it's not a war. And it has slowed African economic growth by around 1.3 per cent per annum, but it’s not a famine.

2 Jun 2004

There are still benefits from hormone therapy after menopause

Despite the highly publicized closing of the Women’s Health Initiative study, the scientific community should not rule out that women may benefit from hormone therapy after menopause, say researchers at UC Davis, Duke and Harvard Universities.

31 May 2004

Women exposed in adulthood to cytomegalovirus may be at greater risk of breast cancer

A study just published in the prestigious British Journal of Cancer by researchers at the University of Otago's Christchurch School of Medicine and Health Sciences and Dunedin School of Medicine, and the University of Melbourne, has found evidence of a link between a common virus and breast cancer in women under the age of 40 years.

31 May 2004

Smoking a lot more harmful than previously thought

The U.S. Surgeon General has released a new comprehensive report on smoking and health, revealing for the first time that smoking causes diseases in nearly every organ of the body. Published 40 years after the surgeon general's first report on smoking -- which concluded that smoking was a definite cause of three serious diseases -- this newest report finds that cigarette smoking is conclusively linked to diseases such as leukemia, cataracts, pneumonia and cancers of the cervix, kidney, pancreas and stomach.

30 May 2004

Blueprint for rational design of vaccines that induce desired T-cell responses

Investigators from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health, have conducted studies in mice to gain a new picture of how the immune system’s “killer” T cells are prompted to destroy infected cells. Their insights provide a blueprint for rational design of vaccines that induce desired T-cell responses.

27 May 2004

Smoking causes diseases in nearly every organ of the body

U.S. Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona today released a new comprehensive report on smoking and health, revealing for the first time that smoking causes diseases in nearly every organ of the body.

27 May 2004

Cigarette smoking linked to leukemia

Cigarette smoking has been linked to acute myelogenous leukemia, according to The Health Consequences of Smoking: A Report of the Surgeon General, released today.

27 May 2004

New study challenges current thinking about varied response to hepatitis C treatment in different racial groups

Results of a new study published in the current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine show that in patients who have chronic hepatitis C, genotype 1 -- the most common form of the disease and difficult to treat successfully -- non-Hispanic whites achieved one of the highest response rates reported to date, but response rates in African Americans were significantly lower.

27 May 2004

Link between oral bacterium and premature babies

For years, scientists have noticed a particular oral bacterium can be found in the amniotic fluid of about 20 percent of women with premature babies.

27 May 2004

Human Genome Sciences has begun dosing patients with chronic hep C drug

Human Genome Sciences, Inc. announced today that it has begun dosing patients in a Phase 2 clinical trial of Albuferon™ (albumin-interferon alpha) in patients with chronic hepatitis C who are naïve to interferon-alpha treatments.

27 May 2004