America’s charter schools serve a larger percentage of minority and low-income students than do the nation’s traditional public schools, according to a comprehensive new study of the growing charter movement.
That’s partly because charters remain a predominantly urban phenomenon, the researchers found, with charter schools three times as likely as regular public schools to be in located in a big city.
“One of driving forces behind charter schools has be
Findings signify need for patient education on complications of misusing painkillers
According to a study supported by the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA), over-the-counter and prescription painkillers are often used inappropriately and there is an alarming number of people who are ignorant to the potential side effects. Despite the widespread use of store-bought and prescription painkillers, also known as non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), this is
Latest advances in health psychology may help physicians implement improved HIV care
Initial results from the OpenMind study, the largest behavioural study to look at both patients’ and physicians’ perceptions of HIV care in treatment-experienced patients, were revealed today at EACS. The study’s findings are anticipated to help physicians implement improved care to HIV patients and help pave the way for better acceptance and integration of other new innovative drugs such as monocl
Nearly a third of surveyed physicians do not keep a record when patients report domestic violence. Published today in the open access journal BMC Family Practice, a study of clinicians’ reports on patients who experienced domestic violence also reveals that 90% of the clinicians surveyed do not document domestic violence adequately. Their reports do not record whether they offered support and information about domestic violence to patients who might have needed it.
Megan Gerber, from Ha
The cognitive cost of being a twin: evidence from comparisons within families in the Aberdeen children of the 1950s cohort study, BMJ Online First
Social and economic circumstances do not explain why twins have significantly lower IQ in childhood than single-born children, according to a study in this week’s BMJ.
Researchers studied 9,832 single-born children and 236 twins born in Aberdeen, Scotland between 1950 and 1956, using a previous child development survey as
Counting calories isn’t the best way to lose weight, according to a new Brigham Young University study that suggests that an approach toward food called “intuitive eating” is better at producing lower cholesterol levels, body mass index scores and cardiovascular disease risk.
“The basic premise of intuitive eating is, rather than manipulate what we eat in terms of prescribed diets — how many calories a food has, how many grams of fat, specific food combinations or anything like t
Manufacturing competition
A new study of nearly 650 Georgia manufacturing companies underscores the importance of innovation as a competitive strategy – at a time when international outsourcing continues to impact Georgia’s manufacturing community.
The 2005 Georgia Manufacturing Survey shows that companies basing their competitive strategies on the development of innovative products or processes enjoy higher returns on sales, pay better wages and have less to fear
USC Study suggests alternative approach to anti-aging research in humans
A counterintuitive experiment has resulted in one of the longest recorded life-span extensions in any organism and opened a new door for anti-aging research in humans.
Scientists have known for several years that an extra copy of the SIR2 gene can promote longevity in yeast, worms and fruit flies.
That finding was covered widely and incorporated into anti-aging drug development programs at seve
A surprising new study by an international team of researchers has concluded Earth’s continents most likely were in place soon after the planet was formed, overturning a long-held theory that the early planet was either moon-like or dominated by oceans.
The team came to the conclusion following an analysis of a rare metal element known as hafnium in ancient minerals from the Jack Hills in Western Australia, thought to be among the oldest rocks on Earth. Hafnium is found in assoc
Immigrant youth are better able to handle discrimination, have fewer emotional problems, and get along better in school and in the community when they remain strongly attached to their own ethnic culture rather than try to melt into a national culture, a Queen’s University-based international psychological study has found. They do even better when they have a double attachment to both the national society and to their heritage culture.
Encompassing more than 5,000 interviews wi
Finding advances efforts to tailor drugs to individual patients
Having high blood pressure and a particular genetic alteration dramatically increases the risk of heart attack, stroke or death, and may explain why some hypertensive patients fare worse than others – even if they take the same medication, University of Florida researchers announced this week.
The discovery, reported at the annual Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association, brings scientists a
New findings may help with social interaction
New brain imaging research at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill indicates that when people with autism look at a face, activity in the brain area that responds is similar to that of people without autism.
The finding is surprising, as it is widely known that autistic individuals tend to avoid looking directly at faces. The research also counters previous published reports that the face-processing area at the back
Haphazard activation of secondary signaling pathways may fuel cancer’s genesis
When found at abnormally high concentrations, two proteins implicated in many human cancers have the potential to spur indiscriminate biochemical signaling inside cells, chemists at Harvard University have found. Their finding may expand scientists’ current understanding of oncogenesis — that cancer arises when an oncoprotein becomes overactive, ramping up the biochemical pathways that it n
For weight loss in obese adults
A new study shows that treatment with a lifestyle modification program of diet, exercise and behavioral therapy when used in combination with the weight loss medication sibutramine (Meridia®) resulted in significantly greater weight loss among obese adults than treatment with the medication alone. The study, conducted by researchers from the University of Pennsylvania, appears in the November 17, 2005 issue of The New England Journal of Medi
USC study finds common pollutants linked to fetal growth retardation
Babies born to women exposed to high ozone levels during pregnancy are at heightened risk for being significantly underweight, according to researchers at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California.
Women who breathe air heavily polluted with ozone are at particular risk for having babies afflicted with intra uterine growth retardation-which means babies only fall within the
Assay powerfully identifies patients’ short-term risk of death
A large-scale international study has demonstrated the usefulness of a blood test to confirm or exclude the diagnosis of acute heart failure in emergency room patients and shows that the test also can identify patients at a higher risk for death. The report from investigators in the U.S., the Netherlands, Spain and New Zealand also clarifies the importance of age-specific levels of a protein called NT-proBNP t
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