Category: Health Problems

There has been a recent global rise in “green fever”, with various jurisdictions either decriminalising or legalising cannabis. But alongside relaxing the rules comes concern about the health implications of cannabis use. We often hear of a link between cannabis use and psychosis. So how strong is the link, and who is at risk? What

(HealthDay)—Patients prefer physicians who engage in face-to-face (F2F) clinic visits, rather than those using an examination room computer (ERC), according to a research letter published online April 19 in JAMA Oncology. Ali Haider, M.D., from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and colleagues conducted a randomized controlled crossover study involving 120

Women who’ve previously experienced a heart attack have twice the risk of later myocardial ischemia provoked by mental stress when compared to men with a similar history, according to a study published in Circulation. Hawkins Gay, MD, MPH, a third-year resident in internal medicine, was a co-author of the study, which sampled 418 individuals and

Children love to get toys from parents as presents. This craving for objects also underlies object hoarding disorders and shopping addiction. However, the biological causes of object pursuit have remained unknown. Part of the answer may lie with a neural circuit in the hypothalamus associated with “object craving,” according to neuroscientist Daesoo Kim from the

After surgery for breast cancer women who have undergone breast reconstruction using abdominal tissue do not have a higher risk of recurrence than women who do not undergo breast reconstruction. This has been shown by researchers at Karolinska Institutet in a study published in the British Journal of Surgery. In Sweden today, more than 90,000

A team of Russian scientists together with foreign colleagues, reports that the venom of the crab spider Heriaeus melloteei may be used as a basis for a treatment against hypokalemic periodic paralysis. This disease is caused by genetic mutation that leads to the occurrence of the so-called ω-currents, or leakage currents, via voltage-gated ion channels

Less than half the patients diagnosed with cancer respond favorably to chemotherapy, but a new method for testing how patients will respond to various drugs could pave the way for more personalized treatment. Using Doppler light scattering, like a weather radar, researchers can determine how a patient will respond to chemotherapy even before they begin

Six in seven women with a family history of breast cancer opt out of taking tamoxifen as a preventative measure, according to a study funded by Cancer Research UK and published in Breast Cancer Research and Treatment today. Researchers asked 258 healthy women across England who had been identified as having an increased risk of

For women, the answer to the loss of sexual desire does not lie in prescription pills but in the practice of mindfulness, says Lori Brotto, a UBC psychologist and sex researcher. In her first book, Better Sex through Mindfulness, Brotto, a professor in the University of British Columbia’s faculty of medicine and the executive director

A drug that failed to effectively strike larger targets in lung cancer hits a bulls-eye on the smaller target presented by a previously untreatable form of the disease, researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center report in Nature Medicine. Their research provided the scientific underpinning for clinical trials under way of the

For most people, it’s better to start taking drugs for multiple sclerosis (MS) early on rather than letting the disease run its course, according to a new guideline for treating MS from the American Academy of Neurology. The guideline is published in the April 23, 2018, online issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the

(HealthDay)—In the wake of an E. coli outbreak that has made more than 50 people in 16 states sick, Americans are now being warned to toss out any romaine lettuce they might have bought in a grocery store. On Friday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention expanded its warning from just chopped romaine

We are at risk of entering a post-antibiotic era. Each year since 2013, a major global institution —including the World Economic Forum, the World Health Organization and the United Nations General Assembly —has issued this grave warning to the world. A post-antibiotic future is daunting. When the drugs don’t work, we get sicker more often.

Natural disasters are traumatic for anyone involved but the dangers are even greater for people with dementia. A new guide from the QUT-based Dementia Centre for Research Collaboration: Carers and Consumers (DCRC-CC) aims to prepare those who care for people with dementia to cope. Created in a partnership with the Red Cross, the Preparing for

Last year the rather religious sounding film The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks was released in the US. It documents the tragic real life story of a young woman who died in the early 1950s due to rapidly growing ovarian cancer. The ‘immortal’ part refers to her cancer cells, which scientists at the John Hopkins

Cellulitis treated with a six-day course of intravenous antibiotic flucloxacillin resulted in greater rates of relapse at 90 days post treatment despite having similar short-term results to the 12-day course, according to research presented at the 28th European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ECCMID). Cellulitis, a skin infection that can become life threatening,

An analysis of electronic medical records indicates that patients who previously had a false-positive breast or prostate cancer screening test are more likely to obtain future recommended cancer screenings. Published early online in Cancer, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, the findings suggest that false-positives may be reminders to screen for cancer. Additional

Researchers have developed a vaccine for one of the most dangerous types of synthetic cathinones, or bath salts. The vaccine blunts the illegal stimulant’s effects on the brain, which could help recovering drug users who experience a relapse. Samantha McClenahan, a doctoral student at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, will present test results

Very small differences in the way a patient lies during radiotherapy treatment for lung or oesophageal cancer can have an impact on how likely they are to survive, according to research presented at the ESTRO 37 conference. These differences of only a few millimetres can mean that the radiation treatment designed to target patients’ tumours

(HealthDay)—After systolic blood pressure (BP) reaches 120 to 125 mm Hg, it increases at a relatively rapid rate toward overt hypertension, according to a study published online March 21 in JAMA Cardiology. Teemu J. Niiranen, M.D., from Boston University, and colleagues used data from the Framingham Original Cohort (1,252 participants; 63.1 percent women) to identify