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Hookworms can prevent asthma

A study conducted in Vietnam has added further weight to the view that parasitic gut worms, such as hookworm, could help in the prevention and treatment of asthma and other allergies.

29 Sep 2009

Blood vessels in the retina may help predict risk of heart attack or stroke

For centuries eyes have been seen as windows to the soul. But medical researchers now believe the eyes may also offer vital clues to your risk of heart disease and stroke.

28 Sep 2009

NIH funds Brown University's Samoan genotyping project

Do some people have special "susceptibility" genes that make them vulnerable to obesity and diabetes, triggered by poor diet and less exercise?

28 Sep 2009

Study on how epigenetic changes contribute to congnitive decline

The National Institutes of Health has awarded Rush University Medical Center approximately $5.5 million in grants to study how epigenetic changes - chemical modifications to genes that result from diet, aging, stress, or environmental exposures - define and contribute to memory formation and cognitive decline. Results from the studies could profoundly alter the way the medical community understands, diagnoses, and treats Alzheimer's disease, according to the researchers.

28 Sep 2009

Increasing insulin levels can aid muscle building in the elderly

Recently, scientists have recognized that loss of responsiveness to insulin plays a major role in the loss of physical strength that occurs as people grow older. Now, University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston researchers have demonstrated that by increasing insulin levels above the normal range in elderly test subjects, they can restore the impaired muscle-building process responsible for age-related physical weakness.

28 Sep 2009

Improving the accuracy of violent behaviour prediction may alleviate negative effects of violence

In the future, diagnosing severe personality disorders, evaluating the childhood environment, assessing alcohol consumption and the analysis of the MAOA genotype may provide more accurate means for assessing risk among violent offenders, according to the Finnish research carried out jointly at the University of Helsinki and the Helsinki University Central Hospital Psychiatry Centre.

28 Sep 2009

Researchers measure the brain activity in infants

Do infants only start to crawl once they are physically able to see danger coming? Or is it that because they are more mobile, they develop the ability to sense looming danger? According to Ruud van der Weel and Audrey van der Meer, from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, infants' ability to see whether an object is approaching on a direct collision course, and when it is likely to collide, develops around the time they become more mobile. Their findings have just been published online in the Springer journal Naturwissenschaften.

27 Sep 2009

URMC study provides a new focus on health care in young adulthood

When adolescents graduate to young adulthood, their preventive care tends to fall by the wayside. A recent study has found that young adults are much less likely to use ambulatory or preventive care, even though their mortality rate is more than twice that of adolescents.

25 Sep 2009

Careful follow-up after eradication therapy for peptic ulcer needed

Although it has been demonstrated that Helicobacter pylori causes gastric cancer, it is still controversial that whether H. pylori eradication therapy is effective in primary prevention of gastric cancer. This is especially important for Yamagata Prefecture, a region of Japan with the second highest incidence of gastric cancer in the world.

25 Sep 2009

The Australian Institute of Policy and Science awards Dr Jake Baum for malaria research

Research aimed at developing drugs that stop malaria parasites from spreading throughout the body has seen Dr Jake Baum, from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, named a Young Tall Poppy by the Australian Institute of Policy and Science.

25 Sep 2009

Dental plaque increases neutrophil activity in black males

Will neglecting to brush your teeth damage more than just your smile? Can failing to attack dental plaque increase your risk of heart damage?

25 Sep 2009

Link between flicking colours and epileptic fits discovered

Researchers have discovered that epileptic brains are more ordered than non-epileptic ones and also that certain flicking colours seem more likely to cause fits.

25 Sep 2009

Severe plagiocephaly in babies can lead to ear infections

The recommendation to lay babies on their backs to sleep has reduced sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), but has led to an increased number of infants with a skull deformity called deformational (or positional) plagiocephaly. Now new research suggests that infants with more severe plagiocephaly may have a higher rate of middle ear abnormalities associated with ear infections (otitis media), reports the September issue of The Journal of Craniofacial Surgery. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health, a leading provider of information and business intelligence for students, professionals, and institutions in medicine, nursing, allied health, and pharmacy.

25 Sep 2009

Fear of back pain from care work is predictive of actually developing it

Whether from heaving, twisting, bending or bad lifting postures, it's well known that caring for the sick or elderly can lead to back pain. This often results in time off work or dropping out of caring professions altogether. Now Danish research published in the online open access journal BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders suggests that the fear of getting back pain from care work is predictive of actually developing it.

24 Sep 2009

Research study links cancer to excess body weight

At least 124,000 new cancers in 2008 in Europe may have been caused by excess body weight, according to estimates from a new modelling study. The proportion of cases of new cancers attributable to a body mass index of 25kg/m2 or more were highest among women and in central European countries such as the Czech Republic, Latvia, Slovenia and Bulgaria.

From The University of Manchester 24 Sep 2009

Women usually tightlipped about bladder problems

Women may be known as the more talkative sex, but when it comes to a certain sensitive health topic, their lips are sealed, according to a new "Bladder Talk" survey of 780 women aged 35 and older in North America (U.S. and Canada) sponsored by TENA(R), the worldwide leader in the management of bladder protection, and conducted by Harris Interactive.

24 Sep 2009

Study on leisure experiences of women with intellectual disabilities in group homes

Brenda Rossow-Kimball, who did post-graduate research with Donna Goodwin, in the Faculty of Physical Education and Recreation, investigated the leisure experiences of five women with intellectual disabilities in two group homes. They found major differences in how leisure was experienced in each group home. In one, the women were provided with support and encouraged to make their own decisions about how they used their leisure time; there was a genuine interest in the women engaging in independent spontaneous leisure, according to Rossow-Kimball. In the other home leisure was supervised by the staff, scheduled into the activities of the home, and managed by the staff, which, the researchers say, doesn't teach the women how to discover what they like to do for leisure.

24 Sep 2009

Research study links high-fructose diet to increased blood pressure in men

A high-fructose diet raises blood pressure in men, while a drug used to treat gout seems to protect against the blood pressure increase, according to research reported at the American Heart Association's 63rd High Blood Pressure Research Conference.

24 Sep 2009

Study on adults living with autism spectrum disorders in England

The first ever major study into adults living with autism was published today (Tuesday 22nd September) by the NHS Information Centre. The report, entitled 'Autism Spectrum Disorders in adults living in households throughout England 2007' was written by Professor Terry Brugha, a Consultant Psychiatrist with Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust and Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Leicester with a team of UK researchers.

23 Sep 2009

Depression, obesity and alcoholism interrelated in young women

There is new evidence that depression, obesity and alcohol abuse or dependency are interrelated conditions among young adult women but not men. Usinng data collected when young adults were 24, 27 and 30 years of age, a team of University of Washington researchers found that nearly half the sample of 776 young adults tracked during the study met the criteria for one of these conditions at each of these time points.

23 Sep 2009