Public Health News and Research

RSS

Health overhaul explainers and answers

NPR provides an interactive report on how a health care overhaul would affect different consumers such as the uninsured, employer insured and underinsured. It notes: "President Obama has challenged Congress to come up with a bill that provides quality, affordable health insurance to all Americans -- without adding to the deficit. See how key proposals would affect you" (Knox, 8/14).

17 Aug 2009

Scientific studies enough to warrant action on bisphenol A

Scientists, physicians, consumers and environmental health advocates today responded to an FDA staff presentation on progress of their review of bisphenol A (BPA), a synthetic sex hormone linked to cancer, diabetes, heart problems and other illness. Congressmen Henry Waxman and Bart Stupak asked for FDA to review their evaluation of BPA.

17 Aug 2009

Mandatory folic acid fortification may be unnecessary

Persistently present levels of unmetabolized folic acid found in the population indicate that introducing mandatory food fortification may result in an ‘overdosing’ effect. A study of blood donors, new mothers and babies, published in the open access journal BMC Public Health, has found that most already get enough folic acid from voluntarily fortified foods.

17 Aug 2009

GSK starts testing H1N1 vaccine; Opinion piece addresses U.S. role in helping developing countries procure vaccine

"GlaxoSmithKline has started testing its pandemic H1N1 swine flu vaccine in humans, and expects to start giving the results to government agencies next month, the drugmaker said on Friday," Reuters reports. The company "plans to conduct 16 different trials of the vaccine and to test 9,000 people in total across Europe, Canada and the United States," according to the news service (Deighton, 8/14).

17 Aug 2009

Summary of key health care provisions

With so much turmoil surrounding the federal government's health care initiatives, the Federation of American Consumers and Travelers (FACT) is attempting to create a summary of key provisions. The goal is to condense incredibly lengthy and convoluted language into something which all consumers can digest so that they can then decide which way they want their legislators to proceed.

17 Aug 2009

Abuse, self-neglect places seniors at increased risk for premature death

Older adults who are subjected to abuse or self-neglect face a greater risk of premature death than other seniors, according to a study published in the medical journal JAMA.

16 Aug 2009

Britons getting irritated by health-reform rhetoric

U.S. health care reform efforts garner attention and reaction from around the globe especially from Britain.

13 Aug 2009

Cancer mortality rates declined steadily in the last three decades

The number of cancer deaths has declined steadily in the last three decades. Although younger people have experienced the steepest declines, all age groups have shown some improvement, according to a recent report in Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

13 Aug 2009

Cancer deaths declined steadily in last three decades

13 Aug 2009

Stanford researchers want FDA to require drug makers to state how new medications compare with similar, existing treatments

The labeling information that comes with prescription drugs tells you what’s known about the medication, but researchers from the Stanford University School of Medicine think it’s high time that the labeling tell you what isn’t known.

13 Aug 2009

Building a comprehensive child vision care system

Even though universal comprehensive eye exams for children prior to starting school would result in more children being diagnosed and successfully treated for vision problems and eye diseases, requirements vary widely from state to state and only three states require eye examinations for school-age children, according to a new report from the National Commission on Vision and Health.

13 Aug 2009

$3.2M grant to explore how chemicals affect human health

Most people would agree that arsenic, lead, mercury, benzene and carbon monoxide pose dangers to humans. Not many, though, realize that the average person is exposed to about 10,000 different chemicals per day.

12 Aug 2009

U.S. health care system - “envy of the world”? not in Canada!

As members of Congress return to their states and districts to debate the merits of the Democrats’ proposals for health care reform, critics of the proposals may repeat the phrase used by some Republicans, newspaper editorials and bloggers that ‘the American health care system is the envy of the world.”

12 Aug 2009

Health Canada approves Multaq (Dronedarone) for atrial fibrillation

Sanofi-aventis Canada announced today that Multaq (dronedarone, 400 mg tablets) has received Health Canada approval for the treatment of patients with a history of, or current atrial fibrillation to reduce their risk of cardiovascular hospitalization due to this condition.

12 Aug 2009

Shwarzenegger’s cuts to HIV/AIDS programs to be protested

AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the nation’s largest non-profit HIV/AIDS healthcare provider, is joining a broad-based coalition of AIDS advocates and patients to protest draconian budget cuts that were blue lined out of the budget by California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and that will jeopardize the public health by eliminating the vast majority of funding for AIDS prevention, care and treatment.

11 Aug 2009

New insights into identifying children at risk for autoimmune brain disorders

A new study by researchers at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health's Center for Infection and Immunity indicates that pediatric obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), Tourette syndrome and/or tic disorder may develop from an inappropriate immune response to the bacteria causing common throat infections.

11 Aug 2009

New type of anti-clotting drug called Apixaban

The dean of the University of Oklahoma College of Public Health and a team of scientists worldwide have found a better way to prevent deadly blood clots after joint replacement surgery - a major problem that results in thousands of unnecessary deaths each year. The research appears this week in the New England Journal of Medicine.

11 Aug 2009

Nurses harnessing the power of wireless technologies and online communities

The Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing (JHUSON) is harnessing the power of wireless technologies and online communities to help nurses throughout the world “connect for health.” Under the direction of Associate Professor Patricia A. Abbott, PhD, RN, FAAN, the School’s Global Alliance for Nursing and Midwifery Community of Practice (GANM) has become a teacher for the 21st century, speeding new health information and know-how to nurses around the globe—from the most urbanized, high-tech cities to the most remote villages, using low bandwidth telecommunication technologies.

11 Aug 2009

Stress management to male nursing in Johns Hopkins Nursing Summer issue

The birth of a baby. A diagnosis of breast cancer. The frailty that comes with old age. They are part of the dynamic, complex, and ever-changing landscape that makes up a women's life span. Whatever the ailment, Hopkins nurses are empowering women to embrace healthier lifestyles.

11 Aug 2009

UNAIDS report says 50 million women in Asia at risk of HIV infection from intimate partners

A UNAIDS report released Tuesday at the 9th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP) in Bali, Indonesia, estimates that more than 90 percent of the 1.7 million HIV-positive women living in Asia were infected by husbands or long-term partners who engaged in "high-risk sexual behaviours," Agence France-Presse reports. The UNAIDS report also found "women accounted for 35 percent of all adult HIV infections in Asia in 2008, up from 17 percent in 1990, the AFP writes.

11 Aug 2009