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Offering Multiple Sclerosis sufferers emotional support through group therapy sessions could improve their quality of life and save the NHS almost £500 per patient, a study at The University of Nottingham has discovered.

Researchers are now planning a larger multi-centre study into the issue to establish whether psychological therapy should be incorporated into the MS services currently provided by the NHS.

Researchers at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center have developed a tool to rapidly assess the risk of aggressive and violent behavior by children and adolescents hospitalized on psychiatric units. Ultimately, they hope to use the questionnaire to improve treatment and prevention of aggressive behavior in schools and in the community.

A study providing preliminary validation of the Brief Rating of the Child and Adolescent Aggression (BRACHA) tool is published online in the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law.

New Rochelle, NY, June 10, 2011—New clinical guidelines developed by an expert panel that include 100 evidence-based recommendations for optimal care of patients with hyperthyroidism and other causes of thyrotoxicosis are presented in the current issue of Thyroid, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. (www.liebertpub.com).

For Immediate Release – June 13, 2011 – (Toronto) – The latest survey of Ontario adults from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) shows increasing rates of daily drinking and cannabis use and high levels of psychological distress. The results of the 2009 CAMH Monitor survey, the longest running survey tracking mental health and addiction indicators among adults in Ontario, were published today.

Alcohol

A deep-sea mystery has been solved with the discovery that the tiny 3 mm long marine animals, eaten by herring, cod and mackerel, use the same buoyancy control as whales.

A new study published in the journal Clinical & Experimental Allergy reveals that keeping a dog or cat in the home does not increase children's risk of becoming allergic to the pets.

Parents of young children frequently want to know whether keeping a dog or cat in their home will increase the risk of their children becoming allergic to their pets.

For the first time, scientists have used large-scale DNA sequencing data to investigate a long-standing evolutionary assumption: DNA mutation rates are influenced by a set of species-specific life-history traits. These traits include metabolic rate and the interval of time between an individual's birth and the birth of its offspring, known as generation time.

A new study has determined predictors that can better identify patients who will benefit from a potentially toxic second course of treatment, which offers a small but real chance of cure in select patients with head and neck cancer. Published early online in Cancer, a peer-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, the findings could help guide treatment decisions for head and neck cancer patients.

Hamilton, ON (June 13, 2011) - Proposals recommending routine screening of all children for autism gets a thumbs down from researchers at McMaster University.

In a study in the online edition of the journal Pediatrics, the researchers say there is "not enough sound evidence to support the implementation of a routine population-based screening program for autism."

Each one of us receives approximately 60 new mutations in our genome from our parents.

This striking value is reported in the first-ever direct measure of new mutations coming from mother and father in whole human genomes published today.

It sounds like something out of a comic book or a science fiction movie – a living laser – but that is exactly what two investigators at the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at Massachusetts General Hospital have developed. In a report that will appear in the journal Nature Photonics and is receiving advance online release, Wellman researchers Malte Gather, PhD, and Seok Hyun Yun, PhD, describe how a single cell genetically engineered to express green fluorescent protein (GFP) can be used to amplify the light particles called photons into nanosecond-long pulses of laser light.

A dramatically better computer tool for finding the genetic missteps that fuel cancer has been developed by St. Jude Children's Research Hospital – Washington University Pediatric Cancer Genome Project investigators. Researchers are using the new algorithm to help identify the chromosomal rearrangements and DNA insertions or deletions unique to cancer.

The use of bariatric surgery among older, severely obese patients was not associated with a decreased risk of death, according to a study in the June 15 issue of JAMA. This study is being released early online to coincide with its presentation at the AcademyHealth Annual Research Meeting.