Gastrointestinal Health News and Research

Latest Gastrointestinal Health News and Research

How can we know early who will benefit from tumor target therapy?

The precise tailoring of tumor target treatment for patients with cancer is an unmet challenge.

21 Nov 2007

University of Illinois at Chicago receives $2.2 million grant to develop drugs to suppress cocaine cravings

The University of Illinois at Chicago College of Pharmacy has received a $2.2 million federal grant to develop therapeutics to suppress the cravings of cocaine addicts.

19 Nov 2007

Compound of milk thistle shows anti-cancer effects

Recently, scientists demonstrated the anti-cancer effects of silibinin, a major biologically active compound of milk thistle. Being widely used as a folk remedy for liver diseases, milk thistle is safe and well-tolerated, and it protects the liver from drug or alcohol-related injury.

15 Nov 2007

Progress in in food allergy prevention

Progress has been made in food allergy prevention and management according to investigators presenting the latest research at the Annual Meeting of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI) in Dallas. Important research findings may impact diet restrictions of food allergic patients.

15 Nov 2007

Gene variants behind pancreatic stone formation

Stone formation is an important feature of chronic pancreatitis, especially tropical calcific pancreatitis (TCP), where the stones are large in size, highly irregular in shape and cause enormous tissue destruction.

14 Nov 2007

New insight into ulcerative colitis

Social, environmental and dietary changes are associated with the changes of disease spectrum in a country. Ulcerative colitis has become a commonly seen disease in China, probably due to extensive consumption of Western foods in recent years.

14 Nov 2007

Plasma serotonin levels can correlate with degree of liver insufficiency

Liver cirrhosis is a worldwide disease with an incidence of 5 - 10% and represents a major health problem everywhere. Prognosis depends on the degree of liver damage and etiology of cirrhosis.

5 Nov 2007

Endosonography-guided biliary drainage is useful in cases with failed endoscopic biliary stenting

The role of endosonography (ES) in digestive diseases is expanding gradually from diagnostic applications to therapeutic ones. The feasibility of ES-guided cholangiopancreatography was first reported by Harada et al. (pancreatography) and Wiersema et al. (cholangiography) in 1995 and 1996, respectively.

5 Nov 2007

Does neural cell adhesion molecule-180 predict survival in colorectal cancer?

When a person learns they are suffering from cancer, the first question in their mind is always: "How much time do I have?" Unfortunately, this is a question to which the researchers have long been seeking an absolute answer.

5 Nov 2007

Minority patients prefer optical colonoscopy for colorectal cancer screening

The clinical importance of colorectal cancer screening is well established, however the majority of eligible people do not undergo screening tests.

2 Nov 2007

Increased glucose level is a strong risk factor for colorectal cancer

Diabetes is a very common illness that affects more than 20 million people in the U.S. and it is estimated an additional 54 million Americans have pre-diabetes, a condition that occurs when a person's blood glucose levels are higher than normal but not high enough for a diagnosis of type 2 diabetes.

2 Nov 2007

Threshold for colectomy may be too high, warn experts

The clinical threshold for undertaking elective surgery to remove part or all of the colon (colectomy) for people with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) may be too high, warn researchers in a study published on bmj.com.

1 Nov 2007

Is it pancreatitis in acute abdominal pain in acute viral hepatitis?

Hepatitis viruses have a strong tropism for hepatocytes; viral antigen also has been detected in pancreas and gallbladder.

1 Nov 2007

ADH2 and ALDH2 are associated with esophageal cancer

As the seventh leading cause of cancer death worldwide, the occurrence of esophageal cancer varies by geographic area, ethnic group and gender.

1 Nov 2007

Clinical threshold for inflammatory bowel disease surgery may be too high

31 Oct 2007

Knowing risk can determine what kind of colon cancer screening is best

While colonoscopy has become widely used for colorectal cancer screening, nearly two-thirds of screening colonoscopies show no cancer or pre-cancerous polyps.

29 Oct 2007

Researchers find new mechanism explaining the promotional effect of H pylori on gastric cancer

The formation of a cancer is proven to be a multi-stage, multi-mechanism process by animal and human studies.

28 Oct 2007

Attenuation of NASH by stimulation of free fatty acid metabolism

Medically-complicated obesity is a societal problem that needs to be solved. Liver disease, specifically non-alcoholic steatohepatitis or NASH, is just one of the many complications of increased body weight.

28 Oct 2007

A new source of islet cells

The shortage of islet cells limits the development of islet transplantation. One new approach was reported in the October 21 issue of the World Journal of Gastroenterology because of its great significance in enhancing the output of islet cells.

25 Oct 2007

Infliximab scheduled treatment has proven to be an effective strategy in IBD patients

Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) are chronic-relapsing diseases, the clinical courses of which are characterized by periods of remission and periods of acute flare up, determining clinical symptoms which have a strong impact on the quality of life for patients.

25 Oct 2007