Study of energy and health in Africa focuses spotlight on charcoal and forest management
... Berkeley, and the Harvard School of Public Health finds that promoting cleaner, more efficient technologies for producing charcoal in Africa can save millions of lives and have significant climate change and development benefits. The African continent, as well as many developing nations in Asia and Latin...Charcoal and forest management could reduce greenhouse gas levels & save lives in Africa
...Berkeley, and the Harvard School of Public Health, finds that promoting cleaner, more efficient technologie...caused by the pollution from such fires. The study finds that smoke from wood fires used for cooking will cause about 10 million premature deaths among women...Not enough evidence that multivitamins prevent infections in the elderly
... supplements prevent infections in elderly people, finds a study published online by the BMJ today. Ageing is associated with an increased risk of infection. So, as the number of elderly people in developed nations continues to rise, there has been great interest in the use of supplements to help prevent i...Cultural and social factors influence prostate cancer treatment
...r-reviewed journal of the American Cancer Society, finds non-medical variables, such as marital status, high school education, and race/ethnicity may play a larger role in patients' treatment decisions than previously believed. Prostate cancer is now detected earlier than ever because of the introduction...Lack of clinical trial participation may contribute to lower survival rates
A new study finds poor survival rates among young adults and older adolescents with some cancers may be partially explained by the lack of participation in clinical trials. The study, published in the May 1, 2005 issue of CANCER ( http://www.interscience.wiley.com/can...Scientist works on innovative treatments for brain tumors
...targeting the therapy to these receptors, the drug finds and kills the cancer cells. While the first generation of the drug is being tested in patients, the grant will allow Debinski to work to improve this treatment approach. For example, he hopes to re-engineer Il 13 so that it recognizes cancer cells an...New generation contact lenses cut risk of severe eye infection
...n silicone hydrogel lenses cut that risk fivefold, finds research in the British Journal of Ophthalmology. The findings are based on a year long study of patients attending the Royal Eye Hospital in Manchester, UK, with acute eye problems. All those wearing contact lenses were asked to supply details of le...Traffic fumes damage DNA, finds a small study in Occupational and Environmental Medicine. To gauge the levels of exposure to traffic fumes, the research team assessed the amount of a chemical called 1-OHPG in the urine of 47 female motorway toll-booth operators and 27 female office...Obtaining patient consent for clinical audit is unworkable without extra resources
...cessful unless extra resources are made available, finds a study published online by the BMJ today. The 1998 Data Protection Act strengthened controls on the use of personal data, but the Health and Social Care Act 2001 allows patient identifiable information to be made available in certain circumstances, ...Acupuncture relieves pelvic pain during pregnancy
...d are effective complements to standard treatment, finds a study published online by the BMJ today. Pelvic girdle pain is a common complaint among pregnant women worldwide, but no cure exists. Researchers in Sweden identified 386 pregnant women with pelvic girdle pain. Women were randomly divided into thre...Costs of antidepressants could have funded effective alternatives
... psychological treatments of proven effectiveness, finds a study published online by the BMJ today. Prescribing of antidepressant drugs has risen dramatically in the United Kingdom since the early 1990s. Cognitive behaviour therapy is an effective alternative to drugs, but has not been developed for widesp...'Chemistry and Flavor of Hispanic Foods' one-day symposium, March 15
...d tortilla chips are number one snack food, survey finds Snack food consumption is on an upswing, with a mind-boggling array of new and innovative choices introduced to consumers in the past few years. Researchers at Oklahoma State University and Cornell University surveyed the snack preferences of 1200 ...Researchers say breast cancer in Africa may provide clues to the disease in African-Americans
A new review finds similarities between the clinical presentation and course of breast cancer in Africans and African-Americans, suggesting that genetic factors may play a significant role in the racial differences encountered in the epidemiology of breast cancer in Am...Mountain life spells longer life
...dwellers live longer than people in lowland areas, finds research in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health. The findings are based on tracking the cardiovascular health and death rates of 1150 inhabitants of three villages not far from Athens, Greece, for a period of 15 years. In Greece, deaths...European folic acid policies are not effective enough
... folic acid supplementation in half the countries, finds a study in this week's BMJ. Each year, more than 4500 pregnancies in the European Union are affected by neural tube defects. Researchers examined trends in the prevalence of neural tube defects in 16 European countries between 1980 and 2001, accordin...Study shows faces are processed like words
...s from New York University, conducted a study that finds individuals use letters to recognize words and facial features to recognize faces. To reach this finding, experiments were performed in which observers were asked to focus on a black dot, to the right of which was a letter. To the left of the dot ...Training could remove racial bias from police reactions
...shing in the latest issue of Psychological Science finds that extensive training with a computer simulation where the race of a suspect is unrelated to the presence of a weapon can eliminate racial bias. Fifty police officers from Florida with two to thirty years of experience participated in one hundred ...Air pollution thickens the blood
...atter, thickens the blood and boosts inflammation, finds experimental research in Occupational and Environmental Medicine . This may help to explain why air pollution is associated with an increased risk of heart attacks, stroke, and worsening respiratory problems. The research team tested the inflammator...Lead in the environment causes violent crime, reports University of Pittsburgh researcher at AAAS
...searchers on the subject. "When environmental lead finds its way into the developing brain, it disturbs neural mechanisms responsible for regulation of impulse. That can lead to antisocial and criminal behavior," reported Herbert L. Needleman, M.D., professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the University ...Most episodes of HIV 'blips' not clinically significant in patients receiving HAART
...me issue on medical applications of biotechnology, finds most blips in the study population appear to be random variations rather than clinically significant elevations in viremia. Richard E. Nettles, M.D., from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, and colleagues investigated the nature ...