Body

Since 1987, when a surgeon at Children's Hospital of The King's Daughters developed a minimally-invasive surgery to correct sunken chest, the procedure has been adopted world-wide as a standard of care and continually refined to increase its effectiveness and safety, according to a paper published in the December issue of the Annals of Surgery.

Despite the common clinical practice among surgeons to discontinue their patients' anti-platelet therapy prior to surgery, a recent study of patients undergoing carotid endarterectomy (CEA) indicated that this practice may be unnecessary. The study will be published in the December issue of the Annals of Vascular Surgery.

Researchers have long known that the devastating disease called Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) is caused by a single mutation in a gene called dystrophin. The protein encoded by that gene is critical for the integrity of muscle; without it, they are easily damaged. But new findings in mice reported online in the journal Cell on December 9th by researchers at Stanford suggest that disease symptoms, including progressive muscle weakening leading to respiratory failure, only set in when skeletal muscle stem cells can no longer keep up with the needed repairs.

STANFORD, Calif. — For years, scientists have tried to understand why children with Duchenne muscular dystrophy experience severe muscle wasting and eventual death. After all, laboratory mice with the same mutation that causes the disease in humans display only a slight weakness. Now research by scientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine, and a new animal model of the disease they developed, points a finger squarely at the inability of human muscle stem cells to keep up with the ongoing damage caused by the disorder.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Older people who live in racially segregated neighborhoods with high crime rates have a much higher chance of developing cancer than do older people with similar health histories and income levels who live in safer, less segregated neighborhoods.

EUGENE, Ore. -- (Dec. 9, 2010) -- When their razor-sharp mandibles wear out, leaf-cutter ants change jobs, remaining productive while letting their more efficient sisters take over cutting, say researchers from two Oregon universities.

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The risk of esophageal cancer among patients who suffer from gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) is not as high as many may think, according to new research from University of Michigan gastroenterologists.

GERD is considered a relative risk for developing esophageal adenocarcinoma, but the absolute risk is not known, says Joel Rubenstein, M.D., M.Sc., an investigator with the Department of Veterans Affairs Center for Clinical Management Research in Ann Arbor and Assistant Professor in the University of Michigan's Department of Internal Medicine.

New clinical strains of cholera appear to have evolved a distinctly different mechanism to cause the same disease according to research published in the current issue of the online journal mBio®.

Vibrio cholerae is the causative agent for the diarrheal disease cholera. While there are more than 200 different serogroups only the O1 and the O139 strains have been known to cause epidemic and pandemic outbreaks of disease, using a toxin-coregulated pilus (TCP) and cholera toxin (CT), which other strains lack.

WASHINGTON — A new National Research Council report finds no scientific basis that more stringent testing of meat purchased through the government's ground beef purchase program and distributed to various federal food and nutrition programs -- including the National School Lunch Program -- would lead to safer meat.

SAN ANTONIO — Exemestane, an aromatase inhibitor that blocks production of estrogen, may provide another post-surgery option for postmenopausal women with hormone-receptor positive, early-stage breast cancer.

In the first head-to-head adjuvant clinical trial comparing two aromatase inhibitors, anastrozole and exemestane, the drugs resulted in similar survival rates and prevention of breast cancer recurrences. Some differences in the side effect profile were seen, including a potential difference in the risk of developing osteoporosis.

Halting the growth of melanoma tumors by targeting the MIC-1 protein that promotes blood vessel development in tumors may lead to better treatment of this invasive and deadly cancer, according to Penn State College of Medicine researchers in The Foreman Foundation Research Laboratory.

When it comes to health care blue lights, are usually most useful on the top of ambulances but now new research led by the University of Warwick has found a way to use blue light to activate what could be a highly potent platinum-based cancer treatment.