After a decade of research, Howard Hughes Medical Institute scientists have succeeded in reprogramming adult stem cells from the testes of male mice into functional blood vessels and contractile cardiac tissue. The research offers a promising new source of stem cells for use in organ regeneration studies.
Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg filed a joint lawsuit against the maker of Vioxx for misrepresenting the dangers the drug posed to its users.
Uncontrolled patients with type 2 diabetes treated with metformin, one of the most prescribed oral medicines for this disease, were four times more likely to achieve recommended blood sugar control levels by adding Galvus® (vildagliptin) to their treatment compared to those who added a placebo, according to new clinical data[1].
Results of the first-ever clinical study in patients with osteoporosis who suffered a hip fracture show that a once-yearly infusion of Aclasta®/Reclast® (zoledronic acid 5 mg)[*] reduced the risk of subsequent fractures by 35% compared to patients treated with placebo.
The 15 minutes it took to remove Buffalo Bills player Kevin Everett off the field after he suffered a spinal cord injury may seem like a long time for someone needing acute medical care, but in fact, those minutes underscore how critical it is to carefully move a player with a suspected spinal cord injury off the field. It also highlights the challenges faced when needing to minimize any further movement to an injured spinal cord.
The most commonly used measure for pain screening may only be modestly accurate, according to researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine and the University of North Carolina. In a study that appears in the October issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine, they evaluate the usefulness of a scale that asks patients in primary care to rate their current pain from 0 (no pain) to 10 (worst pain).
A preliminary study suggests that patients with cancer in the head and neck region may have inferior performance in some driving skills compared with individuals without the disease, according to a report in the September issue of Archives of Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
For the first time scientists have been able to film, in real time, the nanoscale interaction of an enzyme and a DNA strand from an attacking virus. Researchers from the University of Cambridge have used a revolutionary Scanning Atomic Force Microscope in Japan to produce amazing footage of a protective enzyme unravelling the DNA of a virus trying to infect a bacterial host.
A University of Minnesota study of prostate cancer tumors from Caucasian and African-American men has shown no evidence that the cancer is more aggressive in black men. Lead investigator Akhouri Sinha, a professor of genetics, cell biology, and development and research scientist at the Minneapolis VA Medical Center, said the belief that black men’s tumors are more aggressive is based on studies that failed to match patients properly and used only indirect means to measure tumor aggressiveness.
Two U.S. Department of Health and Human Services agencies will collaborate in the most comprehensive study to date of prescription medications used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and the potential for increased risk of heart attack, stroke or other cardiovascular problems.