Culture

SAN ANTONIO — A large, multicenter, randomized study has shown that obese patients with HER2-positive breast cancer have larger tumors, increased lymph node involvement and, when not treated with trastuzumab, poorer long-term outcomes than normal-weight patients.

This is the first time the relationship between obesity and HER2-positive breast cancer has been studied, according to Jennifer A. Crozier, M.D., a medical resident at Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville, who presented the results at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, held Dec. 6-10, 2011.

SAN ANTONIO — Obesity is associated with worse outcomes overall in early-stage breast cancer, researchers reported at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, held Dec. 6-10, 2011.

Obesity was linked to shorter time to recurrence (TTR), disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS). The exception was treatment with endocrine therapy (mainly tamoxifen), in which obesity was associated with a protective effect.

In the fierce national debate over a new federal law that requires all Americans to have health insurance, it's widely assumed that private health insurance can do a better job than the public insurance funded by the U.S. government.

But a first-of-its-kind analysis of newly available government data found just the opposite when it comes to infants covered by insurance.

A new method for measuring narrowing in the arteries of the heart may allow patients to be assessed for a stent without having to take a drug with unpleasant side effects.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Sometimes getting something is better than nothing. That's the aim of a pilot program that allows parents with large child support debts to reduce their overall debt if they pay back at least some of what they owe in child support.

Families and states are burdened with millions of dollars in unpaid child support, and the program may help ease some of the financial strain on both parents and the government.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- The behavior of consumers who are faced with making decisions about their health is not significantly influenced by the way health messages are worded or framed, according to a large, new study by researchers at the University at Buffalo and other institutions.

Serious traumatic injuries, including major burns, set off a "genomic storm" in human immune cells, altering around 80 percent of the cells' normal gene expression patterns. In a report to appear in the December Journal of Experimental Medicine, members of a nationwide research collaborative describe the initial results of their investigation into the immune system response to serious injury, findings which have overturned some longstanding assumptions.

CHICAGO – According to the results of a new study published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, African-Americans, Hispanics and uninsured patients use fewer post-hospitalization services after traumatic injury, including home health care, skilled nursing care, and rehabilitation.

Cities are wasting the potential of smart technologies by failing to realise the value of their hidden infrastructure and digital assets.

A report published today by The Climate Group, Accenture (NYSE: ACN), Arup and Horizon Digital Economy Research at The University of Nottingham says opening up data and digital assets is critical to accelerating low carbon cities.

"Up until now infarct size has only been measured as part of clinical studies and not in routine clinical practice. The reason being that the reference method of gadolinium based contrast agents in MRI is expensive, takes a great deal of time to perform, and can only be undertaken by imaging specialists," explains EAE president Dr Luigi Badano, from the University of Padua, Italy. "The advantages of STE over MRI is that it's far quicker to use, cheaper, and can be used by cardiologists at the bedside with portable machines, and repeated serially when ever needed."

WASHINGTON -- A new report released today by the University of Victoria ranks eco-labels intended to distinguish seafood produced with less damage to the environment. It is the first study to evaluate how eco-labels for farmed marine fish compare to unlabeled options in the marketplace.

"How Green is Your Eco-label?" is designed to help seafood buyers sort through competing sustainability claims and better identify those labels that result in farming methods with less damage to the ocean. Key findings include:

When using data and information derived from patient experiences, combined with additional morbidity data on patients treated in emergency departments and those admitted to hospital, the absolute burden of injury in the UK is much higher than previously estimated, according to a study published in this week's PLoS Medicine.

Injuries in the UK are having a much greater impact on peoples' lives than previously estimated, a study has found.

The research, involving academics from The University of Nottingham, used data direct from patient experiences combined with information on the number of patients treated in emergency departments and admitted to hospital to reveal that the true impact of injuries in the UK is actually 2.6 times higher than experts believed.

MAYWOOD, Ill. -- Many heart patients in India are too poor to afford pacemakers. But a study has found that removing pacemakers from deceased Americans, resterilizing the devices and implanting them in Indian patients "is very safe and effective."

Dr. Gaurav Kulkarni of Loyola University Medical Center is a co-author of the study, published online ahead of print in the American Journal of Cardiology. Kulkarni helped conduct the research before coming to Loyola while he was a medical student in India.

Contrary to claims that U.S. presidents age at twice the normal rate, a new study finds that most U.S. presidents live longer than expected for men of their same age and era.

The research letter, by noted University of Illinois at Chicago demographer S. Jay Olshansky, is published in the Dec. 7 issue of JAMA, the Journal of the American Medical Association.