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Cost effectiveness of spinal surgery examined

Back pain affects more than 80 percent of people and costs more than $100 billion annually in the U.S. But is the surgery cost effective?

30 Dec 2008

Bowel cancer screening set to save thousands of lives

Bowel cancer screening is predicted to save over two and a half thousand lives every year in the UK by 2025, according to new research published in the Journal of Medical Screening.

29 Dec 2008

Physicians perform rare surgery to restore hearing to a deaf patient

Marisela Leon, 44, has neurofibromatosis type 2 -- a rare genetic condition that causes tumors to grow on nerves in the brain or spinal cord, but most commonly on the auditory nerve. Leon lost her hearing more than four years ago when surgery to remove a tumor damaged her auditory nerve.

22 Dec 2008

Safer optic nerve decompression surgery

Knowing about variations in the location of the optic nerve and ophthalmic artery can aid surgeons in performing optic nerve decompression - a delicate operation performed in patients with vision loss resulting from head injury, reports a study in the November Journal of Craniofacial Surgery.

21 Dec 2008

World-first technique used to repair an injured donor lung

For the first time in the world, transplant surgeons at Toronto General Hospital, University Health Network used a new technique to repair an injured donor lung that was unsuitable for transplant, and then successfully transplanted it into a patient.

21 Dec 2008

Battlefield acupuncture

Medical acupuncture, which is acupuncture performed by a licensed physician trained at a conventional medical school, is being used increasingly for pain control.

18 Dec 2008

Surgeons perform first simultaneous double-lung, kidney transplant in Illinois, Wisconsin

Eric McCabe of Wausau, Wis., had no earth-shaking plans for the future as he began his recovery from the rare double-lung and kidney transplant surgery he had at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Ill.

17 Dec 2008

American surgeons carry out first U.S. face transplant

Surgeons in the United States have carried out America's first face transplant at a clinic in Cleveland, Ohio where a woman has had 80% of her face replaced with that of a deceased female donor.

17 Dec 2008

GPs 'could do more' to help obese avoid surgery

Surgery to treat obesity could be avoided if GPs and healthcare trusts put more time and money into early stage weight management programmes, a senior clinical researcher will say today (Wednesday, 17 December, 2008).

From The University of Manchester 16 Dec 2008

Study highlights importance of seeking a qualified gastrointestinal endoscopist to perform a thorough colonoscopy

A study released today in the Annals of Internal Medicine found that colonoscopy is associated with lower death rates from colorectal cancer, however, the procedure missed lesions more often on the right side of the colon versus the left side.

16 Dec 2008

Home-based pulmonary rehabilitation

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is the fourth leading cause of death in Canada.

15 Dec 2008

Colonoscopy significantly reduces death from left-sided colon cancer but not from right-sided

A new study finds that colonoscopy is strongly associated with fewer deaths from colorectal cancer.

15 Dec 2008

Lumbar fusion shows long-term benefits

Lumbar fusion is becoming an increasingly common treatment for low-back pain, but its long-term effects are relatively unknown. A doctoral thesis from the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet now shows that the long-term effects are superior to those of physiotherapy.

15 Dec 2008

Tongue reconstruction at University of Michigan

The night before her surgery for tongue cancer, 30-year-old Lisa Bourdon-Krause realized she might never be able to speak to her toddler son again. So she sat up half the night recording messages to him: "Hi, how was your day?," "You're so handsome," "You have a stinky butt. I need to change you." She read two of his favorite books.

15 Dec 2008

Carrier screening for spinal muscular atrophy should be offered to all couples

Carrier screening for spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) - a serious genetic disease affecting approximately 1 in 10,000 infants that causes progressive muscle weakness and death - should be made available to all families, according to a new practice guideline issued by the American College of Medical Genetics (ACMG).

10 Dec 2008

Age has no impact on survival after bone marrow transplant

Age alone should not determine whether an older patient with acute myeloid leukemia or myelodysplastic syndrome receives a blood stem cell transplant from a matched donor, researchers of the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research reported today at the 50th annual meeting of the American Society of Hematology.

8 Dec 2008

Cartilage transplants used to repair damaged shoulder joints

Rush University Medical Center is the only hospital in Illinois - and one of only a few nationwide - using cartilage transplants to repair damaged shoulder joints.

5 Dec 2008

Novel angled gantry approach reduces breast radiation exposure

A novel angled gantry approach to coronary CT angiography reduced radiation exposure to the breast by more than 50%, according to Thomas Jefferson University researchers.

5 Dec 2008

Spinal stapling - new treatment alternative for scoliosis

Morgan Stanley Children's Hospital of NewYork-Presbyterian is one of only a few hospitals in the country to offer spinal stapling, a new treatment alternative for young people with scoliosis, an abnormal curvature of the spine that is painful and can restrict breathing.

3 Dec 2008

Preoperative radiation may improve survival rates in advanced rectal cancer patients

Patients treated with radiation prior to surgery for advanced rectal cancer have fewer instances of cancer recurrence and better overall survival rates, according to a recent Geisinger report.

3 Dec 2008