Transmission of antibiotic-resistant bacteria linked to previous intensive care unit room occupants
...f VRE. This additional risk occurred despite the fact that the room cleaning procedures of the hospital in the study exceed national guidelines, indicating that such guidelines do not prevent transmission of disease-causing bacteria. However, the low overall risk among patients exposed to the bacteria ...10 top Australian scientists predict major medical advances
...atitis C, and for major diseases like diabetes. In fact Melbourne's Diabetes Vaccine Development Centre is about to start clinical trials for a new vaccine for Type 1 Diabetes. Building New Nerve Pathways Australian-invented bionic ears, or Cochlear implants, that allow deaf children to hear will be f...Sperm banks unpopular with patients MUHC researchers investigate why
...t a major consideration in most cases, despite the fact that private clinics charge between $200-500 Ca per year to bank sperm. Interestingly the study also revealed that Quebecers are less likely than patients of immigrant descent to choose sperm banking as an option to father children in the future....New blood tests aid detection of latent tuberculosis
...ore accurate than the tuberculin skin test. The fact that the blood tests do not usually indicate disease in healthy people is especially important in populations that have had the bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine. BCG is the most widely used vaccine in the world; to date, more than three billion...Short episodes of manic symptoms may indicate bipolar disorder in some youth
...sifications of bipolar disorder, mostly due to the fact that their manic episodes did not last long enough. However, these youth with "subthreshold" mania were similar in most ways to children and adolescents who met the full diagnostic criteria for bipolar disorder. "Some children with bipolar disorder...Study identifies part of brain responsible for tone deafness
...ains of people suffering from tone-deafness are in fact lacking in white matter. The study published in the current issue of Brain was conducted by a team of researchers from the Universit de Montral, the Montreal Neurological Institute and the Newcastle University Medical School. Tone deafness (or con...Weight training does not increase strength but may slow progression in OA patients
...his is not particularly surprising in light of the fact that half of the patients did not have any knee pa...ed slightly during the remainder of the study. The fact that patients showed gains in isotonic strength (i.e. weight lifted with exercise machines such as l...Exercise prior to hip and knee replacement reduces need for inpatient rehabilitation
...erience increased function prior to surgery. The fact that the patients responded differently depending upon what joint was being replaced suggests the need for different approaches for people with osteoarthritis of the hip and knee. Also, because several participants who dropped out of the study did so...Hold the Hookah: Researcher warns against trendy tobacco use
...ure, it is more tolerable to inhale deeply, and in fact you need more force to pull air through the high resistance of the water pathway," Loffredo said. "That means the tobacco smoke can be penetrating deeper in a person's respiratory tract than cigarette smoke does. The damage could be even worse than s...Study calls for 39 percent more family physicians
...ians available to care for patients, including the fact that the number of internal medicine physicians practicing as generalists is decreasing. There also is a trend toward an increasing proportion of non-physician providers, such as physician's assistants and nurse practitioners limiting their practice ...Reforms to gun dealer sales practices reduce supply of new guns to criminals
...table to those reforms--a finding supported by the fact that the study authors saw no change in gun trafficking in three comparison cities in the Midwest. Daniel Webster, ScD, MPH, lead author of the study and co-director of the Johns Hopkins's Center for Gun Policy and Research, said, "There is a long-s...Landmark study of islet transplantation reveals potential benefits in uncontrolled type 1 diabetes
...lticenter study, its most important finding is the fact that even islet transplant recipients who never get off insulin or who return to insulin use over time show real improvement. "This isn't an all-or-nothing procedure; it's not an issue of getting patients off insulin all together and keeping them ...Long-term outcomes for prostate cancer show IMRT Curative: 89 percent disease-free 8 years later
...llowed many for as long as ten years. Despite the fact that some patients had an aggressive form of their disease with high Gleason scores and PSA (prostate specific antigen) levels, the overwhelming majority of patients had good tumor control with neither recurrence of their original cancer nor developm...Study suggests menthol cigarette smokers may have more difficulty quitting smoking
...bles, most of this difference was explained by the fact that African Americans were both more likely to smoke menthols and less likely to quit smoking. "Among smokers who tried to quit, menthol seemed unrelated to quitting, but menthol was associated with a lower likelihood of trying to quit in the first...New path from estrogen to survival in breast cancer cells described
...prolonging life span in both yeast and worms. "The fact that these molecules, which maintain life span in other species, has been found to be involved in suppressing cancer development seems important to us," Yeh said. "The reason people live longer is that they don't develop cancer as readily." Players...Researchers examine why food tastes bad to chemotherapy recipients
...ment, as well as its taste and odor assessment. In fact there are some 33 identified flavors of drinking water acknowledged by the American Water Works Association and Research Foundation (AwwaRF). They range in description from "wet paper" to "crushed grass" to "peaty" to "plastic." Several years ago, ...Outpatient thyroid surgery safe for most patients, study shows
... "We don't just send everybody home," he says. The fact that the patient feels uncomfortable leaving the hospital that quickly is reason enough for him to stay longer than two hours, he says....MRIs made safe for people with modern defibrillators and pacemakers
...zen potentially life-saving diagnoses, despite the fact that the tiny, battery-driven heart devices, which help the body's main pump maintain a beat, have long been considered unsafe and off limits for testing. "The risk to patients of burning heart tissue or misfiring is still there," Halperin cautions...Mirrors in the mind: New studies elucidate how the brain reflects onto itself the actions of others
...ctions of oneself with those of another, we are in fact highly adept at distinguishing our own actions from those of someone else. The basis for this distinction is explored in the study reported by Simone Schtz-Bosbach, Patrick Haggard, and colleagues, who used an established method--the so-called rubber...Survey: Caregivers of people with mental illness say treatment disruption has serious consequences
...ing but treatable illnesses." Survey findings and fact sheets on schizophrenia, schizoaffective and bipolar disorder and the caregiver perspective are available at www.wfmh.org ....