Categories
Cardiovascular
Diagnostics
Endocrinology
Health Insurance
Medical Devices
Mental Health
Nutrition
Oncology
Public Health
Sexual Health
Popular Articles

Revealing A Surprising Link Between Diabetes And Alzheimer's Disease
Blindness, heart disease, nerve damage, and kidney failure are not the only complications facing the nation"s estimated 24 million people with diabetes. Although not widely known, those with the disease face up to double the risk of developing Alzheimer"s disease (AD) than non-diabetics, according to an article scheduled for the May 18 issue of Chemical & Engineering News, ACS" weekly newsmagazine.
generic viagra online
Covidien Announces Health Canada Approval For Its Generic Myocardial Perfusion Imaging Kit
Covidien (NYSE: COV), a leading global provider of healthcare products, announced that Health Canada has approved the Company"s Abbreviated New Drug Submission (ANDS) for its Kit for the Preparation of Technetium Tc 99m Sestamibi Injection. Covidien"s generic product is fully substitutable for Cardiolite®, a myocardial perfusion imaging agent used for detecting coronary artery disease.
News of the day
Stimulus Funds Help Community Health Centers Expand Services, Remain Open
Nearly 1,200 community health centers nationwide have received a boost of funding from the federal economic stimulus package, which is helping some of the facilities that were on the verge of closing remain open and continue treating low-income and uninsured patients, PBS" "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer" reports. More people are seeking care at such facilities as they lose their jobs and employer-sponsored health insurance as a result of the economic recession. At the same time, funding for the centers has dropped because of cutbacks in state and local funding and lower not-for-profit donations and grants. The stimulus package provides a total of $20 billion for clinics to maintain and increase services. "NewsHour" profiles community health centers in Lorain, Ohio, which likely would have closed without the additional funds from the economic stimulus package (Bowser, "NewsHour with Jim Lehrer," PBS, 5/26).
Public Health

Heaviest Smokers Face Greatest Risk Of Death After Lung Cancer Diagnosis

It"s common knowledge that smoking raises risks of lung cancer. And yet researchers haven"t known whether continued smoking by lung cancer patients would increase the risk of the cancer"s spread. Researchers at West Virginia University studying the relationship between death rates from lung cancer and how much a person smoked have found that smoking intensity in fact predicts how the disease will progress. Patients who smoked two packs a day had a 58 percent higher risk of their lung cancers returning or spreading compared with nonsmoking patients. Smoking intensity is one of only two factors found to predict lung-cancer mortality, according to the study published in the May issue of the journal Lung Cancer. The other factor is the stage of the cancer when diagnosed. Almost 350 patients with non-small cell lung cancer were studied. Males older than age 60 were found to be the heaviest smokers at the time of diagnosis. Patients who smoked more than 61 packs a year had the greatest risk of their cancers recurring, and their survival times were shortest. They were 41 percent more likely to die from lung cancer than patients who smoked less. "This study is important because lung cancer causes more deaths than any other type of cancer," said lead investigator Nancy L. Guo, Ph.D., a researcher with the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center. "Because five-year survival rates of patients with non-small cell lung cancer are only about 15 percent, it"s useful to know which patients are most likely to have their tumors come back," she said. "Our study showed that those who smoked more than 61 packs a year are more likely to develop tumor recurrence and should be considered for more aggressive therapy." Chemotherapy drugs could be offered to prevent recurrence and spread of tumors, the authors said. And the heaviest smokers might also be targeted for measures to help them quit smoking. Patients older than age 60 smoked, on average, 164 packs a year. Males smoked 189 packs a year compared with females" average of 112. Patients with stage 3 tumors smoked an average of 198 packs a year. The study is titled "Impact and interactions between smoking and traditional prognostic factors in lung cancer progression." In addition to the Mary Babb Randolph Cancer Center, the study also involved researchers from the WVU Department of Community Medicine. West Virginia University Health Sciences Center


Add your comment:
Name:
Site address: http://
Your message:
Enter today\\\\'s date, 2 digits
(spam protection):

© Copyright 2009