Culture

Direct-to-consumer personal genetic profiling services that claim to predict people's health risks by analysing their DNA are often inconclusive and companies that sell them should provide better information about the evidence on which the results are based, says the UK Nuffield Council on Bioethics, in a new report on the ethics of so-called personalised healthcare services.

An ongoing Phase-II trial investigating a new, targeted therapy for metastatic urothelial cancer has generated promising early results, Italian researchers reported at the 35th Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Milan, Italy.

European researchers have proven for the first time that targeting the epidermal growth factor receptor can provide substantial clinical benefit for women with hard-to-treat triple-negative breast cancer.

Los Angeles, CA (October 11, 2010) NFL players with concussions now stay away from the game significantly longer than they did in the late 1990s and early 2000s, according to research in Sports Health (owned by American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine and published by SAGE). The mean days lost with concussion increased from 1.92 days during 1996-2001 to 4.73 days during 2002-2007.

Many cancer survivors experience changes in sexual function that leave them feeling guilty and a longing for intimacy, Australian researchers told at the 35th Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Milan, Italy. The researchers say that these sexuality and fertility concerns are often not adequately addressed by doctors.

New drugs that target specific molecular mechanisms of cancer have improved the treatment of cancer patients in recent years, but those benefits may come with a cost to the patient's sex life, researchers have found.

At the 35th Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Milan, Italy, French researchers reported on one of the few studies to investigate the impact of cancer therapy on the sexual functioning of patients.

All-Terrain Vehicles (ATVs) are associated with a significant and increasing number of hospitalizations for children in the U.S., according to a new report by the Center for Injury Research and Policy at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Over a nine- year period (1997-2006) hospitalizations for ATV injuries increased 150 percent among youth younger than 18 years, with important demographic variations. Rates increased the most dramatically in the South and Midwest, and among teens ages 15 to 17.

Bad news if you are a lobbyist claiming that females need more funding for mathematical skills than boys — the math skills of boys and girls, as well as men and women, are substantially equal, according to a new examination of existing studies in Psychological Bulletin.

One portion of the new study looked systematically at 242 articles that assessed the math skills of 1,286,350 people, says chief author Janet Hyde, a professor of psychology and women's studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Researchers looking at corals in the western tropical Pacific Ocean have found records linking a profound shift in the depth of the division between warm surface water and colder, deeper water traceable to recent global warming.

Adding the targeted drug cetuximab to a three-drug chemotherapy regimen for first-line treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer does not improve response rate, progression-free survival or overall survival, researchers reported at the 35th Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Milan, Italy.

Women who have survived breast cancer should not be denied the opportunity to breast-feed their children, say researchers who presented the results of a new study at the 35th Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) in Milan, Italy.

Winter canola might soon be the crop of choice for Pacific Northwest farmers, thanks to research by U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) scientists and their partners. The multitasking annual plant can be used to control weeds, supplement animal feed, produce biodiesel--and spark a new revenue stream for the Colville Confederated Tribes.

Australian scientists have developed a potentially groundbreaking new measure of the health of an embryo and the likelihood of a successful pregnancy in IVF treatment.

The research could lead to significantly improved birth rates in IVF to help the one in six Australian couples experiencing infertility to achieve their dream of parenthood.

It also has the potential to predict the gender of an embryo prior to implantation.

In The World as a game board – boundary crossing in online games, researchers Jonas Linderoth and Camilla Olsson at the University of Gothenburg analyse the culture of online games and the boundary-crossing community associated with the activity. The report looks at meetings with other cultures, development of language skills and players who travel to meet up with other players. But it also deals with culture clashes, exclusion and sexualisation.