Treatment of bites by adders and exotic venomous snakes BMJ Volume 331, pp 1244-7
Life threatening snake bites are uncommon in the UK but can happen, especially in children, and should not be underestimated, says an expert in this week’s BMJ.
Antivenom, the only specific antidote is underused in the UK.
As well as bites by the UK’s only indigenous venomous snake, the adder, doctors should also be aware that large numbers of dangerous snakes are kept sur
Short-term use of painkiller drugs in the same family as ibuprofen does not increase the risk of having a heart attack. The results of a large study, published today in the open access journal BMC Medicine, confirm that taking traditional non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) in the recommended dose for less than a year does not increase the risk of having a heart attack. When taken regularly for more than one year, however, some traditional NSAIDs can slightly increase the risk of non-fa
A pair of articles from The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center makes the case that patients would receive better care if physicians and researchers would address the issue of tobacco use after a cancer diagnosis and monitor tobacco use during clinical trials that test new agents.
One study, to appear in the January issue of the journal Cancer but available online Nov. 28, suggests that the time to help tobacco users quit is the moment they are diagnosed with canc
The farther away a woman lives from a radiation therapy facility, the less likely she is to get lumpectomy with adjuvant radiation therapy for early stage breast cancer, and may instead get mastectomy, according to a new study. Published in the January 1, 2006 issue of CANCER, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, the study reveals that being older, of Hispanic origin, or unmarried at diagnosis were also associated with decreased likelihood of treatment with lumpectomy and rad
During the congress of the Sociedad Española de Cardiología (Spanish Cardiology Association), held recently in Barcelona, specialists from Navarre received the prize for the best paper presented, from amongst the hundreds presented. It involved research on hypertension undertaken jointly by scientists from the Navarre Health Service and two centres at the University of Navarra: the Centre for Applied Medical Research (CIMA) and the University Hospital.
The paper was entitled, “La cardiot
Cancer of the pancreas is the number five in the list of deaths due to cancers in Spain and the third causing deaths due to digestive tumour. Moreover, the survival rate for patients with which it is possible to carry out a complete resection of the tumour does not reach 25% within five years. This is because, although good localised control, metastasis occurs, the principal cause of death in cancer of the pancreas.
Over the last few years the approach to this disease has improved considerab
Exercise is good for your physical health. We have known this for a long time. We also know that physical activity is good for the brain and alleviates depression and stress. What’s more, training improves both memory and learning capacities. On the other hand, exaggerated exercise, when the body doesn’t have a chance to recover, has a negative effect, with fewer brain cells as a result. This is shown in a dissertation from the Sahlgrenska Academy at Göteborg University in Sweden. Moderation
A team of British scientists at Manchester and Lancaster Universities has turned established thinking on its head in a bid to understand the serious and often deadly condition, hydrocephalus, commonly known as ‘water on the brain’.
A simple dietary supplement taken during pregnancy could prevent the brain defect resulting from hydrocephalus, revolutionary research suggests.
Now, parents of children suffering from the condition in the United States have stumped up the m
A highly dexterous, bio-inspired artificial hand and sensory system that could provide patients with active feeling, is being developed by a European project.
Funded by the Future and Emerging Technologies initiative of the IST programme, the CYBERHAND project aims to hard wire this hand into the nervous system, allowing sensory feedback from the hand to reach the brain, and instructions to come from the brain to control the hand, at least in part.
Coordinated by Profe
Method tracks water molecules in blood
The holiday season is notorious for the emotional stress it evokes. Now, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have come up with a non-invasive way to see the effects of psychological stress in an area of the brain linked to anxiety and depression. This research has important implications for how practitioners treat the numerous long-term health consequences of chronic stress.
In the study, which is repo
Treating lupus patients suffering from kidney inflammation with a medicine known as mycophenolate mofetil may be more effective in inducing remission than treating them with the standard regimen of intravenous cyclophosphamide (Cytoxan), a new clinical trial indicates.
The study, published in Thursday’s issue (Nov. 24) of the New England Journal of Medicine, also showed that mycophenolate mofetil produced fewer complications, researchers found.
Such results could be an im
New application of fMRI technique may help physicians better diagnose and treat the effects of stress
Using a novel application of an fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) technique, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have, for the first time, visualized the effects of everyday psychological stress in a healthy human brain. Their work, performed at Penn’s Center for Functional Neuroimaging, provides a neuro-imaging marker of psychological s
University of Pittsburgh researchers report a high level of effectiveness in re-opening completely blocked internal carotid arteries (ICA) as late as two to three days after acute stroke symptoms by using stents. The study at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine’s Department of Neurology and University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s (UPMC) Stroke Institute, is in the November issue of Stroke, a peer-reviewed publication of the American Heart Association.
“This re
Peroneal nerve injury in traumatic knee dislocation is common, especially in high-speed collisions or sports injuries. “Because of its superficial course and proximity to the underlying bone, the peroneal nerve is susceptible to direct injury during contact sports and to indirect injury during knee trauma,” said the authors.
Clinically, the nerve is usually inspected during reconstructive knee surgery if pain and a sensory deficit on the anterolateral skin of the leg is appare
The image quality for detecting prostate cancer is significantly better for MRI at 1.5 T using an endorectal-body phased-array coil as compared with the 3.0 T imaging using the torso phased-array coil, a recent study found.
The study, consisting of 24 patients with prostate cancer, compared the use of MRI at 1.5 and 3.0 T in terms of image quality, tumor delineation, and depiction of staging criteria. MRI using an endorectal coil was found to be superior to the conventional bo
BACKGROUND: Neonatal mortality rates–that is, mortality in the first 28 days–in the United States fell significantly between 1940 and 2000 from 28.8 deaths per live birth to 4.6 deaths. Yet ethnic and racial disparities have persisted or increased during that time. Deaths among very low-birthweight infants (VLBW) account for more than half the infant deaths in the United States. The researchers sought to determine whether there is a correlation between mortality among VLBW infants a
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