Culture

Los Angeles, CA (April 17, 2012) Deadly police shootings, racial profiling and discriminatory law enforcement are once again in the forefront of national debate. Police killings of unarmed civilians in New Orleans and Seattle have generated local protests and national controversies. Accusations of racial profiling have been lodged against police departments in those and other cities as well as the Maricopa County sheriff's office in Arizona.

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Researchers are developing a technique that uses nanotechnology to harvest energy from hot pipes or engine components to potentially recover energy wasted in factories, power plants and cars.

"The ugly truth is that 58 percent of the energy generated in the United States is wasted as heat," said Yue Wu, a Purdue University assistant professor of chemical engineering. "If we could get just 10 percent back that would allow us to reduce energy consumption and power plant emissions considerably."

LONDON, ON, – Older patients taking a common cholesterol medication should be cautious of the impact on their kidney health. In a new study by Dr. Amit Garg, Scientist at the Lawson Health Research Institute and the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences (ICES), and colleagues, one in 10 new older fibrate users experienced a 50 per cent increase in their serum creatinine.

(Boston) - Voluntary testing and counseling (VT/C) for HIV or sexually transmitted infections (STI) among cocaine and heroin users who were treated in the emergency department (ED), accompanied by referral to drug treatment, was associated with reduction in unprotected sex acts and fewer sex acts while high according to researchers from Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) and Boston Medical Center (BMC).

These findings currently appear on-line in Academic Emergency Medicine.

Existing scientific literature suggests the U.S. government nutritional program known as WIC improves birth outcomes of children, but new research is unable to find either a positive or negative impact on infant health.

WIC, which serves 53 percent of all U.S. infants, is for low-income pregnant women and their young children under five who are at or below 185 percent of the federal poverty level. The program provides grocery store food vouchers or electronic benefit transfer cards for healthy and nutritious food, and free prenatal care and health and nutritional counseling.

Seriously injured trauma patients transported to hospitals by helicopter are 16 percent more likely to survive than similarly injured patients brought in by ground ambulance, new Johns Hopkins research shows.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In a study that included data on more than 200,000 adults with serious injuries admitted to level I or II trauma centers, transport by helicopter compared with ground emergency medical services was associated with improved survival to hospital discharge, according to a study in the April 18 issue of JAMA, a theme issue on comparative effectiveness research.

Adil H. Haider, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.S., of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, presented the findings of the study at a JAMA media briefing at the National Press Club.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – More involvement by patients, clinicians and others in the health care community in developing comparative clinical effectiveness research studies will make such studies far more useful in clinical decision-making, according to the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, in an article published in the April 18 issue of JAMA, a theme issue on comparative effectiveness research.

BOSTON—Adding the drug bevacizumab (Avastin) to the standard chemotherapy regimen for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) – an approach approved by the FDA in 2006 – did not lead to significantly increase survival rates for patients over the age of 65 enrolled in Medicare, a new study by Dana-Farber Cancer Institute researchers has found.

The study is being published in the April 18 Journal of the American Medical Association, a these issue on comparative effectiveness research.

Baltimore, MD – April 17, 2012. If you are severely injured, a helicopter flight to a top-level trauma center will boost your chance of survival over ground transport. That's the conclusion of a rigorous, national comparison of the effectiveness of helicopter versus ground emergency medical services, published in the April 18, 2012, issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

A new evaluation by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine of the physical rehabilitation response after the 2010 Haiti earthquake, finds that many hands didn't always make light work.

Thousands of people became disabled during and after the 2010 earthquake, and physical rehabilitation interventions were crucial to the emergency response. The rehabilitation sector alone involved 125 organisations including UN agencies, government, international and Haitian NGOs.

Alexandria, VA – The idea that the Arctic is changing is not breaking news. Sea-ice extent has been declining by 12 percent per decade since 1979, and the ice is thinning too. Because of this, new shipping routes are becoming accessible during the summer months, and the Arctic is beginning to attract parties interested in resource exploration, scientific research and tourism. Therefore, a more accessible Arctic not only means environmental changes, but also changes in our economy and our national security.

Anaesthetists have identified a major shortfall in funding for emergency laparotomies in England and have called for a national database to establish a more accurate picture of outcomes and costs. Figures published in the May issue of Anaesthesia suggest a shortfall of £300 million per year for emergency midline general surgical laparotomies, 32% of the total cost of care.

Los Angeles, CA (April 16, 2012) While theories about race, gender, and math ability among high school students have long been debated, a recent study in Gender & Society, the outlet for feminist social science, unsurprisingly found that math teachers, are in fact, biased toward their white male students.

• Tattoos and body piercings have become more popular in western societies.
• A new study asked individuals exiting a bar to take a breathalyser test and then correlated those findings with their tattoos and/or piercings.
• This study was the first in France to find more alcohol per liter of exhaled breath in association with tattooing and body piercings.