Top medical innovations treat headaches, diabetes
October 31st, 2012
An Autonomic Technologies Inc. (ATI) Neurostimulator, an almond-size device that is implanted in the mouth to relief severe headaches, is pictured in this undated handout photo. The best medical innovations for next year include the device and a hand-held scanner resembling a blow dryer that detects skin cancer, the Cleveland Clinic said on October 31, 2012
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Novo shares drop on U.S. scrutiny of insulin drug
October 26th, 2012
COPENHAGEN | Fri Oct 26, 2012 4:26am EDT COPENHAGEN (Reuters) – Shares in Denmark’s Novo Nordisk fell as much as 5 percent on Friday, after a U.S.
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School "hand hygiene" plan shows no asthma benefit
October 24th, 2012
By Amy Norton NEW YORK | Wed Oct 24, 2012 5:08pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – An arsenal of hand sanitizers, hygiene education and good old-fashioned soap failed to prevent asthma attacks among school children in one Alabama county. For children with asthma, the common cold is the top trigger of symptom attacks. So in theory, cleaner hands at school could mean fewer colds being passed around – and fewer asthma attacks
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Eat chocolate, win the Nobel Prize?
October 10th, 2012
By Frederik Joelving NEW YORK | Wed Oct 10, 2012 5:12pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Of all the chocolate research out there, the most unabashed tribute to the “dark gold” has to be a study just published in one of the world’s most prestigious medical journals. Drum roll, please: The higher a country’s chocolate consumption, the more Nobel laureates it spawns per capita, according to findings released today in the New England Journal of Medicine. And guess who leads the pack?
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Finding a new virus: Spit, sequencing and serendipity
September 28th, 2012
A SARS coronavirus is seen in this undated handout photograph released in London September 28, 2012. Credit: Reuters/Health Protection Agency/Handout By Kate Kelland, Health and Science Correspondent LONDON | Fri Sep 28, 2012 9:43am EDT LONDON (Reuters) – Professor Maria Zambon’s first thought when her team of scientists matched a virus from a patient’s sputum to one never before seen in humans was: “Oh no, this is going to be tricky.” In her north London laboratory last Saturday, an email came in from another specialist virology team in The Netherlands with a 99.5 percent match to a virus from the same family as SARS, a disease that emerged in 2002 and killed 800 people
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Insight: Fear and suspicion in Pakistan hamper global polio fight
September 27th, 2012
1 of 2. A health worker administers a polio vaccine to a child during a nationwide drive against the disease in a hospital in Islamabad August 8, 2007. Credit: Reuters/Faisal Mahmood By Kate Kelland and Jibran Ahmad LONDON/PESHAWAR | Thu Sep 27, 2012 1:45pm EDT LONDON/PESHAWAR (Reuters) – When Bill Gates hears about children like Fahad Usman, a two-year-old Pakistani boy crippled by polio before he learned to walk, the billionaire philanthropist sounds frustrated and fired up
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India "gutka" chewing tobacco habit a tough nut to crack
September 6th, 2012
By Annie Banerji NEW DELHI | Thu Sep 6, 2012 1:56am EDT NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Ten Indian states have banned a popular form of chewing tobacco in a major policy shift that may save millions of lives and strike a blow at the global tobacco industry, already reeling from new anti-smoking laws around the world. But an estimated 65 million Indians use “gutka” – a heady form of chewing tobacco made of crushed betel nut, nicotine and laced with thousands of chemicals – and furious manufacturers are fighting to have the bans overturned. Companies such as Delhi-based DS Group are dragging states to courts, complaining that the billion-dollar industry should be regulated as tobacco and not as food and that the bans threaten the livelihoods of millions of farmers and street vendors scattered from Bangalore to New Delhi
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Driver’s seat safer than sidewalk for older adults
August 23rd, 2012
By Natasja Sheriff NEW YORK | Thu Aug 23, 2012 4:14pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Driving gets more dangerous with age, but older adults may be more vulnerable while walking on the sidewalk than behind the wheel, says a new study. Researchers who reviewed data on road accident deaths in the UK found that pedestrians over 70 were five times more likely to die from being hit by a car each time they went out than those age 21 to 29. But elderly drivers were no more likely to die on the road than those in their twenties.
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Fall risk may rise after cataract surgery
August 17th, 2012
By Amy Norton NEW YORK | Fri Aug 17, 2012 4:05pm EDT NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Contrary to some past research, a new study finds that elderly adults who have cataract surgery could face an increased risk of falls and fractures in the next year – at least if they have only one eye done. The increase was seen mostly in patients age 80 and up, and researchers say it’s not clear what factors – related to the surgery or not – might explain the added risk
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