Scientists make strides in the study of women’s sports injuries.
Straighter legs and knock-knees may be causing female athletes to tear knee ligaments more frequently than males. The finding could help coaches to shape women’s training to reduce such injuries.
When researchers at the University of North Carolina spotted that women land with their knees straighter and closer together than do men, they asked the athletes to spring on and off platforms that measure force in sev
Severe headaches are not a sign of high blood pressure, as is commonly thought, finds research in the Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery and Psychiatry. If anything, high blood pressure seems to reduce the risk of these headaches, the study shows.
The findings are based on the blood pressure readings of over 22,000 adults who responded to a survey 11 years later in 1995 to 1997 about headache frequency.
The questionnaire showed that 28 per cent of them suffered repeated headaches, of
Both HIV-1 and HIV-2 are of zoonotic origin , and the closest simian relatives of HIV-1 and HIV-2 have been found in the common chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) and the sooty mangabey (Cercocebus atys) respectively. Given that humans come in frequent contact with primates in many parts of subsaharan Africa, particularly through hunting and handling primate bushmeat the possibility of additional zoonotic transfers of primate lentiviruses from species other than chimpanzees and sooty mangabeys has to be co
Scientists have developed a blood test that may reveal changes in the brain caused by Alzheimer’s disease. The technique, tested so far only in mice, predicts the amount of amyloid plaque (formed from clumps of proteins that kill surrounding cells) in an animal’s brain. The research, detailed in a report in the current issue of the journal Science, holds promise for the development of predictive methods to diagnose the disease years ahead of the onset of clinical symptoms.
David Holtzman of
Women with early breast cancer could avoid needless chemotherapy thanks to work carried out in Chicago on identifying biochemical markers which indicate whether or not cancer is likely to spread to other parts of the body, the 3rd European Breast Cancer Conference in Barcelona heard today (Saturday 23 March).
Ruth Heimann, Associate Professor in the department of radiation and cellular oncology at the University of Chicago, USA, said that patients with early breast cancer which has not sprea
The first clinical trial in Europe of a revolutionary approach to diagnosing breast cancer has just got under way at one of the UK’s leading breast cancer centres.
The research involves a minute endoscope, no thicker than a few strands of human hair, which can pass through the nipple and search for the earliest signs of cancer within the breast.
Consultant breast surgeon, Dr Nicolas Beechey-Newman from Guy’s Hospital in London, told a news briefing at the 3rd European Breast Cancer Confe
Swedish stem cell researchers are in a good position to become even more successful than in recent years. This can be achieved by improving the collaboration between research groups, and by increasing the number of researchers in the field through, for example, the introduction of “come-home” grants for those who have been abroad. Equally important would be economic commitment to basic research on stem cells, and the creation of regulations for emergent commercial aspects so that researchers can main
An anti-oestrogen compound, discovered only four years ago, has been found to inhibit the growth of breast cancer cells using a unique mechanism which enables it to work against tumours that are resistant to other anti-oestrogens, the 3rd European Breast Cancer Conference in Barcelona heard today (Thursday 21 March).
Yasuji Yamamoto, from the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences at the University of Tokyo in Japan, said the compound, known as TAS-108, was being assessed in phase l
Patients who are at high risk of stroke should be treated with the drug ramipril, irrespective of their initial blood pressure levels and in addition to other preventive treatments such as blood pressure lowering agents or aspirin, finds a study in this week’s BMJ.
Over 9,000 patients aged 55 or over and at high risk of stroke received either ramipril or placebo. Patients were seen after six months and then every six months for an average of four and a half years.
Although reductio
A US population study in this week’s issue of THE LANCET reports how life expectancy of people with Down’s syndrome has doubled since the early 1980s. The study also highlights the unexpected finding that Down’s syndrome appears to reduce the risk of many forms of cancer.
Down’s syndrome (characterised by three copies of chromosome 21) occurs in around one in every 800 live births. It is the most frequently identified cause of mental retardation, but information about illness and causes of d
A medical team of the Basque Country has discovered a new technique to detect cardiac fibrosis. After a research carried out during several years, it has been discovered that serum leves of PIP peptide is an indicator of increased myocardial fibrosis.
Fibrosis is formed when scar tissue is accumulated in heart. As a consequence it causes stiffening of the heart and often heart failure. In order to fight against such disease, researchers started looking for an indicator substance in blood.
Scientists at the Royal Liverpool University Hospitals in the UK have found a way of testing whether certain abnormalities in a woman’s breast are likely to go on to develop into breast cancer, the 3rd European Breast Cancer Conference in Barcelona heard today (Wednesday 20 March).
Armed with information from the test, doctors could then consider whether the at-risk women should be offered prophylactic anti-oestrogen treatment such as tamoxifen or more frequent screening.
However, D
Research from the Cancer Registry of Norway has revealed that a higher proportion of women who discover they have breast cancer between mammographic screenings have also used HRT (hormone replacement therapy) at some point in their lives, the 3rd European Breast Cancer Conference heard today (Wednesday 20 March). In addition, these women tend to have denser breasts, and this may be why their tumours were not detected during screening.
Mrs Hege Wang, a researcher at the Cancer Registry of Nor
European clinical trials are under way in Denmark and the UK testing a new breast cancer vaccine targeted against the HER-2 growth factor.
HER-2 is overexpressed in about a quarter of all breast cancers and has become a key target for new treatments, such as the monoclonal antibody therapy Herceptin.
But, the development of a vaccine by Danish pharmaceutical company Pharmexa represents an entirely novel treatment paradigm, according to Pharmexa’s manager of preclinical development a
New drug could soon thwart smallpox outbreaks
An anti-smallpox pill could be on the way if a new compound that shows promise in animal tests proves safe and effective in humans. Such a pill could provide the best method for controlling an unforeseen smallpox outbreak, its developers claim.
The need for new ways to treat smallpox has only become an issue in recent years as the threat of a deliberate release of the virus intensifies. Smallpox – a highly contagious and often let
Tooth decay could soon be detected without resorting to potentially harmful X-rays – by using a novel electrical technique developed by dental researchers at the University of Dundee in an unusual partnership with textile experts at Heriot Watt University.
Laboratory tests show the device, which measures the electrical resistance of teeth, is twice as accurate as current examination techniques and detects decay in its earliest stages when preventive treatment is still possible.
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