World / Health & Beauty
ETH Zurich And IBM Improve Diagnosis Of Osteoporosis
03.07.2008 06:19
medicalnewstoday.com
With the goal of developing an accurate, powerful and fast method to automate the ana-lysis of bone strength, scientists of the ETH Zurich Departments of Mechanical and Pro-cess Engineering and Computer Science teamed up with supercomputing experts at IBM's Zurich Research Laboratory. The breakthrough method developed by the team combines density measurements with a large-scale mechanical analysis of the inner-bone microstructure.
World
Orthopedics
Fireworks Should Be Breathtaking, Not Bone-Shattering
03.07.2008 06:19
medicalnewstoday.com
Fourth-of-July fireworks always draw a crowd but those beautiful bursts of color can lead to catastrophic injuries if not used with care. This Independence Day, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) advises Americans to enjoy the spectacular celebrations but urges adults and children to exercise extreme caution by leaving fireworks to the professionals. According to the U.S.
World
Orthopedics
Low "Good" HDL Cholesterol Linked To Memory Decline
03.07.2008 06:18
medicalnewstoday.com
A new study from the UK suggests that low levels of the "good" HDL cholesterol is linked to poor memory, and decline in memory, in middle aged adults. The study is the work of researchers at University College, London, and is published in the 30th June issue of the Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology journal of the American Heart Association.
World
Alzheimer's Disease
Brain 'trick' Offers Treatment Hope For Alzheimer's
03.07.2008 06:18
medicalnewstoday.com
Scientists in the UK and Canada have made a significant step forward in the search for new drugs to treat Alzheimer's disease. An ageing population means that neurodegeneration, such as Alzheimer's disease, is one of the major health problems in the developed world. But researchers at the University of York and Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, have designed an enzyme inhibitor which could 'trick' the brain and so help to halt neurodegeneration.
World
Alzheimer's Disease
Are Men Or Women More Likely To Have Memory Problems In Very Old Age?
03.07.2008 06:18
medicalnewstoday.com
Women over age 90 are significantly more likely to have dementia compared to men in their 90s, according to a study published in the July 2, 2008, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Research shows that dementia risk for both men and women increases from age 65 to 85, but this most recent study is one of few that looks at people over age 90.
World
Alzheimer's Disease
Drink up as summer heats up to avoid dehydration
03.07.2008 05:35
usatoday.com
Drinking enough water seems intuitive, but when it becomes an afterthought, people exercising or working outdoors can easily ...
USA
Health & Beauty
Q&A: Figure out the right amount of fluids
03.07.2008 05:35
usatoday.com
Barry Popkin, director of the University of North Carolina's Interdisciplinary Obesity Center, has studied the relationship between ...
USA
Health & Beauty
New test could track tumors in 'real time'
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
Doctors have developed new technology to measure cancer cells that break off from lung tumors and travel through the blood. These ...
USA
Health & Beauty
Mom charged with denying son cancer medication
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
A woman has been charged with withholding cancer medication from her 8-year-old autistic son, who prosecutors say likely will ...
USA
Health & Beauty
Floods leave 20 times more mosquitoes in parts of Midwest
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
First came the floods now the mosquitoes. An explosion of pesky insects are pestering clean-up crews and just about anyone venturing ...
USA
Health & Beauty
FDA panel urges more testing for diabetes drugs
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
Diabetes drugs should face tougher safety standards that could cost manufacturers millions but protect patients from unforeseen ...
USA
Health & Beauty
U.N. adopts new baby formula standards
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
A U.N. food commission has adopted a new standard for the production and handling of powdered infant formula in a bid to prevent ...
USA
Health & Beauty
U.S. military intelligence tracking medical threats
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
A U.S. military intelligence unit that had tracked medical threats to troops worldwide is expanding its mission to include civilians ...
USA
Health & Beauty
100 more labs join FDA effort to test beyond tomatoes
03.07.2008 05:34
usatoday.com
In efforts to trace the source of the salmonella outbreak that has sickened more than 800 since April, federal agencies are now ...
USA
Health & Beauty
Yoga, meditation improve health by switching off stress genes
03.07.2008 05:27
b4uindia.com
Scientists have achieved a significant breakthrough in understanding how relaxation techniques like yoga, meditation, and prayer improve health. Research collaborators from the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind/Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and the Genomics Center at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) say that such relaxation techniques work by changing patterns of gene activity that affect how the body responds to stress. The changes were seen in long-term practitioners as well as in newer recruits during the study, published the open-access journal PLoS. "It's not all in your head. What we have found is that when you evoke the relaxation response, the very genes that are turned on or off by stress are turned the other way. The mind can actively turn on and turn off genes. The mind is not separated from the body," Live Science quoted Dr. Herbert Benson, president emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind/Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, as saying. Dr. Gerry Leisman, director of the F.R. Carrick Institute for Clinical Ergonomics, Rehabilitation and Applied Neuroscience at Leeds Metropolitan University in the U.K., agreed: "It's sort of like reverse thinking: If you can wreak havoc on yourself with lifestyle choices, for example, [in a way that] causes expression of latent genetic manifestations in the negative, then the reverse should hold true." Leisman added: "Biology is not entirely our destiny, so while there are things that give us risk factors, there's a lot of 'wiggle' in this. This paper is pointing that there is a technique that allows us to play with the wiggle." Benson, a pioneer in the field of mind-body medicine, first described the relaxation response 35 years ago. Mind-body approaches that elicit the response include meditation, repetitive prayer, yoga, tai chi, breathing exercises, progressive muscle relaxation, biofeedback, guided imagery and Qi Gong. "Previously, we had noted that there were scores of diseases that could be treated by eliciting the relaxation response -- everything from different kinds of pain, infertility, rheumatoid arthritis, insomnia," Benson said. During the study, Benson and his colleagues compared gene-expression patterns in 19 long-term practitioners, 19 healthy controls, and 20 newcomers who underwent eight weeks of relaxation-response training. The researchers observed that over 2,200 genes were activated differently in the long-time practitioners relative to the controls, and 1,561 genes in the short-timers compared to the long-time practitioners. They also found that some 433 of the differently activated genes were shared among short-term and long-term practitioners. Upon further genetic analysis, the researchers saw observed changes in cellular metabolism, response to oxidative stress and other processes in both short- and long-term practitioners. All such processes might contribute to cellular damage stemming from chronic stress. Robert Schwartz, director of the Texas A&M Health Science Center's Institute of Biosciences and Technology in Houston, said that the study was relatively small. He, however, added that the study was "unique and very exciting. It demonstrates that all these techniques of relaxation response have a biofeedback mechanism that alters gene expression." He pointed out that the researchers looked at blood cells, which consist largely of immune cells. "You're getting the response most probably in the immune cell population," he said. "We all are under stress and have many manifestations of that stress. To adequately protect ourselves against stress, we should use an approach and a technique that we believe evokes the relaxation response 20 minutes, once a day," Benson added. (ANI)
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