Healthcare News and Research

Latest Healthcare News and Research

Playing games helps control hospital infections

Games based learning may provide an innovative approach to the control of health care associated infections in hospitals.

18 Sep 2007

Hospital comparison web sites can be misleading

A review of six publicly available hospital comparison Web sites suggests that they display inconsistent results and use inappropriate or incomplete standards to measure quality, according to a report in the September issue of Archives of Surgery, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

18 Sep 2007

Largest study ever to look at possible heart risks with ADHD medications

Two U.S. Department of Health and Human Services agencies will collaborate in the most comprehensive study to date of prescription medications used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the potential for increased risk of heart attack, stroke or other cardiovascular problems.

18 Sep 2007

How can a medical center foster a culture of ethics in research?

An article published in the September issue of Academic Medicine, titled "Developing a Research Ethics Consultation Service to Foster Responsive and Responsible Clinical Research," argues for the importance of collaboration between researchers and ethicists and describes the establishment of a new Research Ethics Consultation Service at Weill Cornell Medical College.

17 Sep 2007

Cryoablation for treating arrhythmias

When out-of-control nerve impulses cause the heart to beat irregularly, cardiologists often use heat during a minimally invasive outpatient procedure to destroy the defective signaling pathways and restore the rhythm to order.

17 Sep 2007

New understandings of diagnosis, treatment and prevention of COPD

The Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) has released new standards for the diagnosis, management and prevention of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

17 Sep 2007

Organ transplantation for HIV-positive patients

Not long ago, organ transplantation was not considered an option for HIV infected patients.

17 Sep 2007

The importance of gene regulation for common human disease

A new study published in Nature Genetics on Sunday 16 September 2007 show that common, complex diseases are more likely to be due to genetic variation in regions that control activity of genes, rather than in the regions that specify the protein code.

17 Sep 2007

GP performance related payments for tackling heart disease are too complex

They should be simplified and based more on disease treatment and prevention and less on risk factor measurement, experts advise in this week's BMJ.

17 Sep 2007

Agfa HealthCare signs multi-million dollar five-year radiology informatics agreement with Adventist Health System

Agfa HealthCare, a leading provider of IT-enabled clinical workflow and diagnostic imaging solutions, announces today that it has inked a second, five-year agreement to provide Enterprise PACS technology for the entire Florida Division of Adventist Health System (Orlando, Florida, US).

14 Sep 2007

Mathematical models to calculate cyclic recurrences of disease

Since the days of Hippocrates, people have known that certain illnesses come and go with the seasons. More recently, researchers have learned that these cyclic recurrences of disease, known as seasonality, are often related to the weather.

13 Sep 2007

Major hospital IT and picture archiving and communications project underscores leading position of Agfa HealthCare

Agfa HealthCare, a leading provider of IT-enabled clinical workflow and diagnostic imaging solutions, announces today that it has successfully installed its ORBIS Hospital Information System (HIS) together with its Picture Archiving and Communications system (PACS) IMPAX in the Salzburger Landeskliniken (SALK) in Austria.

12 Sep 2007

Higher education levels were strongly associated with decreased cancer mortality

A new American Cancer Society study finds having at least some education beyond high school is associated with a decreased risk of cancer death.

12 Sep 2007

Immigrants and health care: sources of vulnerability

Expanding opportunities for immigrants to obtain legal residency and citizenship may be the best option to offer them better access to health care, according to an article published today by the RAND Corporation in the journal Health Affairs.

12 Sep 2007

Novel angiogenic drugs could revolutionize treatment of peripheral arterial disease

Decision Resources, one of the world's leading research and advisory firms for pharmaceutical and healthcare issues, finds that the market entry of novel angiogenic agents, including a future blockbuster drug from Genzyme, could revolutionize symptomatic treatment of peripheral arterial disease (PAD).

12 Sep 2007

Higher education associated with lower cancer death rate

Having at least some education beyond high school is associated with a decreased risk of dying from cancer among black and white men and women, according to a study published online September 11 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

12 Sep 2007

New gel to treat retinal diseases in development

New research presented at the British Pharmaceutical Conference (BPC) in Manchester shows that a new gel for under the eyelid could provide an innovative way of delivering drugs to treat age-related retinal diseases such as wet macular degeneration - potentially making some invasive eye injections a thing of the past.

11 Sep 2007

Micro-needles a safe alternative to hypodermic syringes

New research presented at the British Pharmaceutical Conference (BPC) in Manchester shows that micro-needles may be a safer and less painful method for delivering vaccines and other medicines traditionally administered using a hypodermic syringe.

11 Sep 2007

$One in two women at high risk of bone fractures don't receive preventative treatment$

One in two women at high risk of bone fractures don't receive preventative treatment

One in two women at high risk of bone fractures don't receive preventative treatment, according to new research presented at the British Pharmaceutical Conference (BPC) in Manchester.

11 Sep 2007

California passes historic HIV testing bill

AIDS Healthcare Foundation (AHF), the operator of the largest non-government HIV testing program in California, today praised the California Legislature for its passage of Assembly Bill 682, California's Routine HIV Screening Bill, which cleared the Assembly on final concurrence (64-0) today after clearing the Senate in a 38 to 1 vote late last week.

11 Sep 2007