Stents Work Well, But Are Costly: Will Hospitals Continue To Use Them?
...r time. In that system, the benefit of stenting in reducing the needfor patients to return to the hospital will likely be recognized. Peterson said that the trade-off between new, but costly, improvementsin patient care and the ability of hospitals and other providers to absorbthe differences in reimburseme...Benefits Of New Diet Drug Don't Outweigh Risks
...e help of appetite suppressants is as effective at reducing mortality as losing weight through more conventional techniques such as reducing dietary fat and increasing exercise." He emphasized that the burden of proof rests with the advocate...Drug And Radiation Treatment May Shrink Pancreatic And Gastric Tumors
...sts have developed a drug and radiation regimenfor reducing locally advanced and inoperable tumors in the pancreas andstomach. The finding may be an important step toward a therapy for pancreatic andstomach malignancies. No effective treatments for these cancers currentlyexist. Indeed, the five-year survival...ACTG Protocol 185 Enrollment Halted
...tant information regarding the efficacy of AZT for reducing mother-to-child HIV transmission. Although the s...swer the question of whether HIVIG is effective in reducing perinatal HIV transmission, the results not only confirm the effectiveness of AZT in preventing such...New Drug For Parkinson's Disease Proves Effective, Study Finds
... be more effective than other dopamine agonists in reducing tremors and movement problems. Inaddition, unlike current drugs, pramipexole dihydrochloride does not cause lightheadedness resulting from a noticeable drop in blood pressure when a patient stands up. Dr. Kieburtz says that's probably because the dru...Cancer Protection Compound Abundant In Broccoli Sprouts
... and may offer asimple, dietarymeans of chemically reducing cancer risk," says Paul Talalay, M.D., J.J. AbelDistinguishedService Professor of Pharmacology. Talalay's research team fed extracts of the sprouts to groups of 20 femalerats for fivedays, and exposed them and a control group that had not receiv...Jefferson Researcher Finds New Digital X-Ray Technology May Cut Costs And Improve Patient Care
...eplace the current film X-ray technology, while reducing health care costs and improving patient care, s...ital X-ray. This new technology can result in reducing the cost of processing, storing and transporting images, so radiologists will be able to proce...Benefits Of Annual Mammography Outweigh Radiation Risks Of Cancer
...age 40 is not only safe but highly effective in reducing breast cancer deaths. Stephen A. Feig, M.D., pr...from mammography," he notes. The possibility of reducing risk from mammography has been raised because of increased breast cancer incidence observed among...Drug Regimen Reduces Atrial Fibrillation After Heart Surgery
...thousand dollars less per case. In addition, reducing the occurrence of atrial fibrillation lowers the risk of stroke, which is a possible complication of atrial fibrillation, and decreases the need to shock the heart (defibrillation) to regulate the heartbeat. "The amiodarone treatment resulted in...Cardiovascular Costs, Deaths Projected To Rise In 1998
...ercent from 1979 to 1995. "If we have any hope of reducing the high cost of cardiovascular disease in bothhuman and economic terms," says Hill, "we have to look at causes, or riskfactors, and we must act to prevent disease. We need to understand, for example,that there are several major, but controllable ris...Researchers Finding May Boost Effectiveness Of Anti-HIV Drugs
...educe the cost of the now-very-expensivetherapy by reducing the dose needed to get enough of the drugs into thebloodstream, where it can attack HIV. "Protease inhibitors work very well and have resulted in many patientsbecoming healthier," said Dr. Richard B. Kim, assistant professor of Medicineand P......terneuron Pharmaceuticals Inc. has shownpromise of reducing stroke-related injury by stablizing cell membranes longenough to prevent large-scale brain cell damage after stroke. The clinical trial, involving nearly 400 patients in 33 centers nationwide,showed no statistically significant difference in five a...Tighter Chemical Binding = Better Meds
...ctivedrug that can be given in lower dosages, thus reducing unwantedside-effects," says Yale chemistry professor William L. Jorgensen, whospecializes in tweaking chemical compounds to tighten their ties to targetproteins. Using sophisticated computer graphics and his knowledge of thethree-dimensional structu...Clinical Pharmacists Improve Outcomes Of Heart Failure Patients
...nagement of heart failure appears to save money by reducing the frequency ofhospital re-admissions and allows cardiologists more time to devote to thenon-pharmaceutical aspects of patient care. More than 3 million Americans suffer from the debilitating effects ofheart failure, with 400,000 new cases d...Fat: It's Not For Breakfast Anymore; Study Finds Fat Linked To Clotting
...pt as low aspossible, and this is best achieved by reducing the total amount of fat ratherthan by changing fat composition," says Mennen, who is now a researcher atINSERN, in France. Factor VIIa circulates in the bloodstream, and elevated levels can "leadto an explosive" formation of the enzyme throm...Studies Look At Threshold Effect Of Cholesterol-Lowering "Statin" Drugs
...o individuals who have had a heart attack get from reducing their low-density lipoprotein, (LDL), or 'bad' cho...e scientists concluded that more might begained by reducing LDL to very low levels, such as below 100 mg/dL, but thisneeds confirmation in new trials. In anothe...Effective Obesity Treatment Likely To Require Targeting Of Multiple Weight Control Systems
...ample of the difficulty of achieving weight lossby reducing calorie intake. When calories are cut, insulin and leptin levelsdecrease, and hormones secreted by the adrenal cortex (glucocoricoid or GChormones) increase -- a combination that activates nerve pathways that stimulateappetite and promote weight gain...Filmless System Puts X-Ray Images On The Web
...he Internet, providing fastermedical diagnoses and reducing costs. A new imaging system eliminates fi...cal costs by eliminatingduplication of studies and reducing the length of hospital stays for somepatients." A radiologist on one floor, for example, and...Unhealthy Lifestyles Not Primary Cause Of High Mortality Rates
...vidual health behaviors have limited potential for reducing socioeconomic disparities in mortality. This gap is due to more than lifestyle choices and therefore would persist even with improved health behaviors," Lantz said. "The bottom line here is that income differences in mortality are due to a l......beneficial and to determine their overall effectin reducing deaths from heart attacks. The study combines four large-scale drugtrials in Australia, Canada, China, Europe, the Mediterranean, Scandinavia,South Africa and South America. In each study, people receiving ACE-inhibitors were compared to the control...