Body

The number of physicians with board certification in emergency medicine is unlikely to meet the staffing needs of U.S. emergency departments in the foreseeable future, if ever; according to a study from a research team based at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH). In the December issue of Academic Emergency Medicine, the investigators report finding that staffing every emergency department with board-certified emergency physicians does not appear to be feasible, given their projections for the field.

(PHILADELPHIA) Researchers at Thomas Jefferson University have found that a lower dose of fractionated stereotactic radiotherapy for acoustic neuromas results in better hearing preservation and has the same tumor local control rate as a higher dose of therapy. The study appeared online in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology*Biology*Physics.

Lean muscle-mass may give even obese people an advantage in battling cancer, a University of Alberta study shows.

The study, published in Lancet Oncology, provides evidence that varying body compositions of cancer patients likely plays a role in survival rates, activity levels during the illness and potentially, even the reaction to chemotherapy treatment.

It's time patient consent forms came back full circle to a tool for patient education, rather than the waiver of liability they have become. The original purpose of the consent forms was for a surgeon or doctor to inform the patient of common or serious risks associated with the procedure to be performed. However, the way current consent forms are written – as formal, legal documents – plants a litigious relationship in both the patient's and the surgeon's mind even before treatment has begun.

An international research team has compiled the first catalogue of tissue-specific pathologies underlying hundreds of inherited diseases. These results provide information that may help treat conditions such as breast cancer, Parkinson's disease, heart disease and autism. The report from scientists at the Technical University of Denmark and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) will appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and has been published online.

WASHINGTON — Policymakers, the media, and the public should focus on 20 specific health indicators as "yardsticks" to measure the overall health and well-being of Americans, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. By providing information that can be compared over time, these 20 indicators will also help Americans track the nation's progress on improving our health and the effectiveness of public health and care systems, the report says.

A recent study in the Journal of Political Economy sheds light on the role racial prejudice plays in the wage gap between whites and blacks in the U.S.

Prejudice accounts for approximately one-quarter of the racial wage gap, costing a black worker up to $115,000 over a lifetime depending upon where he or she lives, according to study authors Kerwin Kofi Charles from the Harris School of Public Policy Studies at the University of Chicago and Jonathan Guryan from Chicago's Booth School of Business.

A study by Baxter, et al. released this week and scheduled to be published in the Jan. 6, 2009, edition of Annals of Internal Medicine, concluded that while screening colonoscopy is associated with fewer deaths from colorectal cancer, the association is primarily limited to deaths from cancer developing in the left side of the colon.

Los Angeles, CA – December 17, 2008 – A new study in the journal Personal Relationships reveals that women prefer mates who are recognized by their peers for their skills, abilities, and achievements, while not preferring men who use coercive tactics to subordinate their rivals. Indeed, women found dominance strategies of the latter type to be attractive primarily when men used them in the context of male-male athletic competitions.

Columbus, OH – December 17, 2008 – Entertainment-education is a common strategy for incorporating health and other educational messages into popular entertainment media. Its goal is to positively influence awareness, knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors in viewers. Examples include a video game that teaches children conflict resolution skills, or a television show that presents an embedded message regarding condom efficacy.

Finnish scientists have reported a breakthrough in the attempts to understand the development of type 1 diabetes. They discovered disturbances in lipid and amino acid metabolism in children who later progressed to type 1 diabetes, also known as juvenile diabetes. The alterations preceded the autoimmune response by months to years. The study may prompt new approaches for prediction and prevention of type 1 diabetes in pre-autoimmune phase of the disease.

Global challenges need global solutions. The 2nd ESF Science Policy conference held in Stockholm, Sweden on 26 and 27 November 2008, brought together heads and senior representatives of ESF's 80 Member Organisations in 30 countries, representatives of ESF's international partner organisations and others for a discussion on the big global scientific challenges and how to best collaborate in addressing them. Issues were discussed both on a European and global level and a variety of speakers ranging from science, science policy, politics and the industry contributed to the discussion.

WASHINGTON, DC — The incomes of American families with children have become increasingly stratified since 1975, with income inequality increasing two-thirds during a 30-year period, according to findings published in the December issue of the peer-reviewed science journal American Sociological Review.

A paper published online by the journal Circulation on 8 December 2008 concluded that, while men and women have a similar in-hospital death rate following acute myocardial infarction, women with STEMI had an adjusted mortality rate almost twice as high as men (10.2% versus 5.5%). These differences were associated with a lower likelihood of reperfusion therapy in women. The paper was widely reported in the press, with suggestions of disparity in care and outcome after AMI.

Two new studies suggest that male circumcision may assist in the prevention of human papillomavirus (HPV) infection, particularly infection with the high-risk subtypes associated with cervical, penile, and other cancers. Both studies are published in the January 1 issue of The Journal of Infectious Diseases, now available online.