Pain News and Research

Latest Pain News and Research

Scientists discover a way to accurately map typhoid outbreaks in the city

In the mid-nineteenth century, John Snow mapped cases of cholera in Soho, London, and traced the source of the outbreak to a contaminated water pump. Now, in a twenty-first century equivalent, scientists funded by the Wellcome Trust working in Kathmandu, Nepal, have combined the latest in gene sequencing technology and global positioning system (GPS) case localisation to map the spread of typhoid and trace its source.

18 Oct 2011

Roundup: Many who swarmed LA free clinic last year are still without health care; Texas Planned Parenthood clinic struggles

They came with rotting teeth, shattered glasses and broken bodies. In the predawn darkness outside the Los Angeles Sports Arena, they lined up last year by the thousands, waiting as the sun burned their backs for healthcare they could not afford. Many needed more than the volunteer doctors and dentists at the Remote Area Medical clinic could give. When the glasses ran out, they settled for eye exams. Instead of root canals, they got teeth pulled. They pointed to the holes in their smiles with relief. At least the pain had stopped.

18 Oct 2011

California Medical Association with 35,000 doctors in tow wants to legalize and regulate marijuana

Along with other supporters of legalizing marijuana, now there is the California Medical Association. The CMA that includes 35,000 doctors has adopted an official policy that recommends the legalization and regulation of cannabis. California Medical Association adopted the new stance at its annual meeting Friday in Anaheim.

17 Oct 2011

AQI activates Anesthesia Incident Reporting System to improve patient safety

The Anesthesia Quality Institute (AQI) has activated the first nationwide system to collect individual adverse events from anesthesia, pain management and perioperative care.

15 Oct 2011

HHWC medical doctors provide insight into depression

A staggering 230 million antidepressant prescriptions are filled each year. Yet the face of depression does not always fit the mold: a successful career, loving spouse, wonderful children, seemingly good health and finances. From the outside life appears perfect, so why are Americans depressed?

15 Oct 2011

ApoPharma receives FDA approval for Ferriprox to treat transfusional iron overload

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today approved Ferriprox (deferiprone) to treat patients with iron overload due to blood transfusions in patients with thalassemia, a genetic blood disorder that causes anemia, who had an inadequate response to prior chelation therapy.

15 Oct 2011

CooperVision's voluntary recall of Avaira Toric contact lenses continues

In full cooperation with the United States Food and Drug Administration, CooperVision, Inc. is continuing to work with the FDA, distributors, customers, eye care practitioners and lens wearers to complete the worldwide recall initiated on August 19, 2011 on certain lots of Avaira Toric contact lenses.

14 Oct 2011

Million Hearts initiative strikes at leading killer of Americans

The number of Americans who report they have coronary heart disease – which includes heart attack and angina (chest pain) – continues to decline but rates vary widely from state to state and by race and ethnicity, according to a new report published today in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

14 Oct 2011

Current ultrasound guidelines for detection of miscarriage may lead to wrong diagnosis

Current guidelines that help clinicians decide whether a woman has had a miscarriage are inadequate and not reliable, and following them may lead to the inadvertent termination of wanted pregnancies. This is the conclusion of a series of papers published in the international journal Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology.

14 Oct 2011

Grim economic times could cause men to seek more sexual partners

Grim economic times could cause men to seek more sexual partners, giving them more chances to reproduce, according to research by Omri Gillath, a social psychology professor at the University of Kansas.

14 Oct 2011

Nature publishes Sangamo's gene correction strategy for A1AT deficiency

Sangamo BioSciences, Inc. (Nasdaq: SGMO) announced the publication of a preclinical study demonstrating highly specific, functional correction of the alpha 1-antitrypsin (A1AT) gene defect in patient-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) using zinc finger nucleases.

14 Oct 2011

Headache are among the top reasons for medical evacuation of soldiers

Headaches, a virtually universal human complaint at one time or another, are among the top reasons for medical evacuation of military personnel from Iraq and Afghanistan, and for ongoing depletion of active-duty ranks in those countries, according to research led by Johns Hopkins specialists. Just one-third of soldiers sent home because of headaches return to duty in either place, the research shows.

14 Oct 2011

Avita Medical introduces ReCell Spray-On Skin for chronic leg ulcers

Avita Medical Ltd., the regenerative medicine company, announced today that it has launched ReCell Spray-On Skin for the treatment of chronic leg ulcers, a market estimated at over US$1 billion.

14 Oct 2011

Potential new protein target for sickle cell disease

National Institutes of Health-funded scientists have corrected sickle cell disease in adult laboratory mice by activating production of a special blood component normally produced before, but not after, birth.

14 Oct 2011

Researchers control itch without dulling morphine's pain-killing effects

Itching is one of the most prevalent side effects of powerful, pain-killing drugs like morphine, oxycodone and other opioids. The opiate-associated itch is so common that even women who get epidurals for labor pain often complain of itching. For many years, scientists have scratched their own heads about why drugs that so effectively suppress pain also induce itch.

14 Oct 2011

Longer looks: Miss. ballot-initiative on abortion; personal fortune may have helped Herman Cain battle cancer; for doctors, breaking up is hard to do

One evening in late September John Perkins, a veteran of the civil-rights movement, attended a rally at a Baptist church in Jackson in support of what he called "a total justice issue," … It was concerned with Amendment 26, a measure on Mississippi's ballot this November that defines a person as being "every human being from the moment of fertilisation, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof". The reason for the measure is straightforward; its consequences less so. The Supreme Court, in its landmark Roe v Wade ruling in 1973, held that the right of a woman to terminate her pregnancy in the first trimester was guaranteed by her constitutional right to privacy.

14 Oct 2011

Patients with episodic gallbladder pain may benefit from cholecystectomy

According to a new study in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, better understanding of a patient's abdominal pain could help physicians know which patients will benefit most from surgical removal of the gallbladder.

14 Oct 2011

Hydromorphone can be as effective as diacetylmorphine in treating heroin addiction

A clinical trial to test better treatment options for chronic heroin addiction is expected to begin in Vancouver at the end of this year. Led by researchers from Providence Health Care and the University of British Columbia, it's the only clinical trial of its kind in North America.

13 Oct 2011

SWHR hosts Capitol Hill briefing, The War Within: Women and Autoimmunity

50:1, 9:1, 2:1 these are just some ratios of autoimmune disease disparities between women and men. The Society for Women's Health Research (SWHR) hosted the Capitol Hill briefing, The War Within: Women and Autoimmunity, on Tuesday, October 11 to address these concerns.

13 Oct 2011

Study finds 22% of psoriasis patients with symptoms of psoriatic arthritis

If you have psoriasis or a family history of psoriasis and you are experiencing joint pain and swelling, you could have psoriatic arthritis, a serious disease that may lead to joint destruction and disability.

13 Oct 2011