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Health officials announce physician quiz campaign to help reduce medical errors

HHS and other health officials on Monday announced a new campaign designed to limit surgical complications by encouraging patients to quiz their doctors about medical procedures, CQ HealthBeat reports.

24 Oct 2006

New Hampshire citizens health initiative to promote electronic prescriptions

New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch (D) and Citizens Health Initiative -- which includes doctors, pharmacists, insurers and representatives from hospitals -- on Thursday announced a goal for all doctors in the state to be able to use electronic prescription systems by 2008, Foster's Daily Democrat reports.

24 Oct 2006

Use of subcutaneous injections of Epogen for dialysis patients could save Medicare $537 million annually

Administering the anti-anemia drug Epogen to kidney dialysis patients by subcutaneous injections rather than intravenously could save the federal government hundreds of millions of dollars annually, the Boston Globe reports.

24 Oct 2006

Paroxetine effective in treating patients with compulsive hoarding syndrome

In a paper published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, Sanjaya Saxena, M.D., Director of the Obsessive-Compulsive Disorders (OCD) Program at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) School of Medicine, reports the surprising finding that the serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SRI) medication, paroxetine, is effective in treating patients with compulsive hoarding syndrome.

24 Oct 2006

Prevalence of overweight and obesity increasing in Indo-Asian population

Worldwide, Indo-Asian people are among the populations at greatest risk for heart disease. Also, associations between body mass index (BMI) and chronic disease may differ between Indo-Asian and Western populations.

24 Oct 2006

Implantable chip to establish new nerve connections in brain area that controls movement

Researchers at the University of Washington (UW) are working on an implantable electronic chip that may help establish new nerve connections in the part of the brain that controls movement.

24 Oct 2006

Benign virus previously used as a marker in tracing human migration may be unreliable

...according to researchers at Penn State. Results of this study also suggest that some viruses might be undergoing much higher rates of evolution than previously thought.

24 Oct 2006

New study to evaluate whether nutrient-based factors slow the progression of age-related macular degeneration

UT Southwestern Medical Center is participating in a nationwide study investigating whether modified combinations of vitamins, minerals and fish oil products can slow the progression of vision loss from age-related macular degeneration.

24 Oct 2006

Biomarkers in blood indicate likelihood of having another stroke

People who have just suffered their first ischemic stroke, a blood clot in the brain, often have elevated inflammatory biomarkers in their blood that indicate their likelihood of having another stroke or an increased risk of dying, according to Columbia University Medical Center researchers at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.

24 Oct 2006

Women feel less trusting at work than men do

Women feel less trusting in their relationships at work than men do, a new study shows.

24 Oct 2006

Researchers identify peptide that spurs cargo transport in nerve cells

For the first time, researchers have identified a peptide that can spur cargo transport in nerve cells, a discovery that could help scientists better understand nerve cell function and test possible therapies for neurodegenerative diseases.

24 Oct 2006

Veggies best to fight mental decline in old age

Researchers in the United States say it is vegetables rather than fruit that protect those over 65 from a decline in cognitive ability.

24 Oct 2006

Racial disparities exist in pulmonary hypertension mortality and morbidity

African-American women have the highest mortality rate for idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension (IPAH), according to new research.

24 Oct 2006

New method for targeting malignant brain tumors

A new method for targeting malignant brain tumors through inducing the cancerous cells to "commit suicide" has been developed by a team of researchers headed by a Hebrew University of Jerusalem professor of biochemistry.

24 Oct 2006

ODC genetic variation impacts aspirin's effectiveness in preventing colon cancer

Dartmouth researchers are among a team of doctors that have learned more about how people may or may not benefit from taking aspirin in the effort to curb colon cancer.

24 Oct 2006

Scientists explain how transport proteins can move in cells without bumping into or sticking to anything

Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) in Dresden, along with a colleague from the University of Florida in the United States, have been carrying out research into how transport proteins can move in cells without bumping into or sticking to anything.

24 Oct 2006