Culture

Professional Dragon King hunter Didier Sornette from the Department of Management, Technology and Economics, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, together with his colleague Guy Ouillon, present the many facets of Dragon Kings in a review about to be published in EPJ ST. Their work¹ will appear alongside nineteen other contributions² exploring the ways in which this emerging field of statistical analysis could become further established.

The latest cardiovascular disease (CVD) prevention guidelines have been overhauled to produce a user friendly document with concise messages that awards greater weight than ever before to evidence from clinical trials and observational population studies. The "European Guidelines on Cardiovascular Disease Prevention in Clinical Practice (version 2012)" ¹ were launched at the EuroPRevent2012 meeting in Dublin, Ireland.

Breast cancer patients whose tumors express high levels of genes related to immune response are more likely to have their tumor completely eradicated by pre-operative chemotherapy compared to patients with low expression of these genes, Belgian researchers report at the 4th IMPAKT Breast Cancer Conference in Brussels, Belgium.

Their research has identified a group of patients who might be good candidates for treatments with new immune-targeting therapies.

Contrary to a trend in treatment, breast cancer patients with suspicious lymph nodes should have an ultrasound-guided axillary node biopsy, and if that biopsy is positive these patients should undergo an axillary dissection, a new study shows.

Adding digital breast tomosynthesis to 2D mammography screening results in a 40% reduction in patient recall rates compared to routine screening mammography alone, a new study shows.

The study, conducted at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, CT, of 7,578 screening mammograms, found that the recall rate was 6.6% for digital breast tomosynthesis plus 2D screening mammography. It was 11.1% for 2D screening mammography alone, said Melissa Durand, MD, one of the authors of the study.

Cervical spine CT examinations are unnecessary for emergency department (ED) patients who are a victim of "simple assault" or who have a "ground-level fall", unless the patient has a condition that predisposes the patient to spine fracture, a new study finds.

Deerfield, Ill. (May 2, 2012) -- As public health experts warn that the spread of dengue fever could prove more costly globally and cause more sickness than even malaria, a new report published today in the May issue of the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene finds each year dengue is inflicting a US$ 37.8 million burden on Puerto Rico and that every $1 invested in traditional surveillance and prevention could save $5 in costs of illness.

Neither aspirin nor warfarin is superior for preventing a combined risk of death, stroke, and cerebral hemorrhage in heart failure patients with normal heart rhythm, according to a landmark clinical trial published in today's New England Journal of Medicine.

Researchers suggest that application of Nobel-prize-winning portfolio theory could provide objective funding allocations that would improve risk/reward trade-off in years of life lost.

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is one of the largest investors in biomedical research—spending approximately $30 billion dollars annually—and must constantly evaluate how to spend those dollars in a way that adequately reflects multiple factors including disease burden.

PHILADELPHIA -- HIV patients treated with genetically modified T cells remain healthy up to 11 years after initial therapy, researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania report in the new issue of Science Translational Medicine. The results provide a framework for the use of this type of gene therapy as a powerful weapon in the treatment of HIV, cancer, and a wide variety of other diseases.

Australian researchers are calling for the open sharing of clinical trial data in the medical research community, saying it would be instrumental in eliminating bottlenecks and duplication, and lead to faster and more trustworthy evidence for many of our most pressing health problems.

Moreover, hackers should be role models for freeing up access to the "source code" of clinical trials – patient-level data – the researchers from the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney argue in a commentary published in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

Middle-aged and older adults with diabetes showed substantial survival rates in a new University of Michigan Health System study of retirees.

Survival rates were strong even for adults living in nursing homes or who have multiple health issues like dementia and disabilities that make self-managed care for diabetes difficult.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.—African-Americans with HIV are much less likely to adhere to drug therapy than others with the disease, according to a University of Michigan study.

Moreover, untreated depression may greatly hinder adherence to antiretroviral therapy (ART) for all low-income, HIV-infected patients, regardless of race.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.—New research shows that 40 percent of older Americans postponed retirement in the wake of the Great Recession.

The research, presented at the annual meeting of the Population Association of America, is the first to link actual data on household wealth just before and after the downturn to the retirement plans of a nationally representative sample of Americans age 50 and older.

On a comparative basis, use of the Pressure Right® acupressure device with ondansetron and dexamethasone was more reliable in PONV management effectiveness than the antiemetic drugs alone

Evidence-based study finds adjunctive use of Pressure Right® device enhanced the efficacy of the most commonly used prophylactic antiemetic drug combination