Surveying the landscape from bench to bedside

News outlets report on various medical research and treatment developments.

The New York Times: Obama Seeking To Boost Study Of Human Brain
The Obama administration is planning a decade-long scientific effort to examine the workings of the human brain and build a comprehensive map of its activity, seeking to do for the brain what the Human Genome Project did for genetics (Markoff, 2/17).

Medpage Today: Obama Plans $3 Billion 'Brain Map'
The Obama administration wants to put its stamp on a major scientific initiative -- mapping the human brain to understand how it functions and malfunctions. The initiative is dubbed the "Brain Activity Map," according to the New York Times, which reported the administration's plan. The newspaper said the proposal will be delivered to Congress as part of the president's budget package, and will carry a price tag of roughly $300 million a year over 10 years. The effort would be a collaboration between federal agencies including the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and National Science Foundation and private organizations. The federal government, including the NIH and White House, weren't available for comment Monday on the Presidents Day holiday (Pittman, 2/18).

The New York Times: DNA Test For Rare Disorders Becomes Routine
Even if there is no treatment, there is almost always some benefit to diagnosis, geneticists say. It can give patients and their families the certainty of knowing what is wrong and even a prognosis. It can also ease the processing of medical claims, qualifying for special education services, and learning whether subsequent children might be at risk (Kolata, 2/18).

Kaiser Health News: Cancer Rehab Begins To Bridge A Gap For Patients
It was her own experience with debilitating side effects after cancer treatment that led Dr. Julie Silver to realize there is a huge gap in care that keeps cancer patients from getting rehabilitation services (Gotbaum, 2/18).