A survey of nearly 700 surgical residents in 17 U.S. medical centers finds that more than half failed to report needle-stick injuries involving patients whose blood could be a source of HIV, hepatitis and other infections.
PLoS ONE has just published a study which defines a gene locus on chromosome 1 that predicts prognosis of brain tumor patients and may even set the basis for the development of more efficient drugs to combat brain cancer.
The increased incidence of chronic conditions among American children predicts serious strains on health care and social welfare systems in the future, caution investigators from Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard School of Public Health.
It is estimated that between 10 and 17% of the population has suffered tinnitus at some time in their lives, according to a number of international studies. Tinnitus is understood as the perception of noise in the ears or inside the head although there is no external source of sound, without any vibratory cochlear activity taking place (which occurs when an external noise is produced). Depending on the intensity of the symptom, the patient may have their everyday life affected. In extreme cases the discomforts may make working routines impossible or negatively affect normal daily life.
More than 300,000 patients receive mechanical ventilation during intensive care per year in the United States, even though the hospital mortality rate for ventilated patients can approach 50 percent. New findings indicate that medical patients with an alcohol-use disorder (AUD) are more likely to require mechanical ventilation, and/or need it for a longer period of time.
Most patients who survived severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) had good physical recovery, but they or their caregivers often reported a decline in mental health one year later, according to a study in the June 25 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.
Physicians have recognized scoliosis, the abnormal curvature of the spine, since the time of Hippocrates, but its causes have remained a mystery — until now. For the first time, researchers have discovered a gene that underlies the condition, which affects about 3 percent of all children.
Stroke is a leading cause of hospital admission among older adults. Yet more hospital readmissions after stroke are for pneumonia or for heart disease than for another stroke, according to a study published in the June 2007 issue of the journal Stroke. This finding may alter the standard medical management of post-stroke patients.
Researchers in Delft University of Technology?s Kavli Institute of Nanoscience in The Netherlands have cast new light on the workings of the important cancer inhibitor topotecan. Little had been known about the underlying molecular mechanism, but the Delft scientists can now view the effects of the medicine live at the levelin of a single DNA molecule.
MRSA Superbug, a drug-resistant staph bacteria, is found in at least five percent of patients who are staying in hospitals, nursing homes, or long term care facilities in US.