Medindia Health News

People Unknowingly Harbor and Spread MRSA Due to Colonization
Post-Discharge Rehab Destination is an Important Decision
S.Leone Ebola Doctor Dies While Experimental Drug Trials are Awaited
HPV Vaccine Dramatically Reduces Incidence of Genital Warts
Manner in Which TB Drug Attacks Its Target Uncovered
Miracle of How Geckos Move and Cling to Ceilings Discovered by Scientists
Right Age to Have First Baby for Women is 25, Feel Men
Women Prefer Marrying Men Who Earn More Than Them
Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococci (VRE)
Skin Creams Containing Toxic Mercury Will be Out
Special Korean "Peace and Reconciliation" Mass by Pope
Exercise Associated With Reduced Risk of Breast Cancer in African American Women, Says Study
How Frequently Should You Replace Your Pillow?
Electric Cars Fail to Rev Up Germans
Robin Williams was a Wonderful Friend and a True Talent: Bill Clinton
Gene That Controls Nerve Conduction Velocity Associated With Multiple Sclerosis
Nearly Half of Women at Risk of Preterm Birth Do Not Receive Cheap Drug That Could Prevent Newborn Deaths
Study Explains Why Seniors Don't Eat
Too Much Exercise can be Dangerous
Google's New Company Takes a Step Forward
Guinea-Bissau Shuts Border With Ebola-Hit Guinea
Viral 'Machine' Architecture Finally Rendered
Novel Drug Action Against Tumors Explained
Berlin Stage Amber Revolution Against Big Beer
WHO Hosts a Meeting on Experimental Ebola Drug Use
Neck Manipulation may be Associated With Stroke, Says Study
One in Four Americans Admits Abusing Prescription Drugs, Says Survey
New Nanosheet Can Coat Tricky Burn Wounds and Block Out Infection
Break-Through Treatment For Male Infertility Brings New Hope
New Implantable Device To Revolutionize Treatment Of Diabetes
Venoms Hold Potential to Fight Cancer, Say Scientists
Torch That Could Help Visually Impaired to See Objects
Major Role for Community Pharmacies in Tackling Health Issues Like Obesity, Smoking, Drinking
Ebola Experimental Drug Approval: WHO Allows Shortcut in Drug-vetting Procedure

People Unknowingly Harbor and Spread MRSA Due to Colonization

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People in the community unknowingly harbor and spread methicillin-resistant iStaphylococcus aureus/i, a life-threatening bacteria, due to the bacteria's nature of colonization. The inside of the front of the nose is where this bacteria is most predominant, but new research shows nearly all colonized individuals have this bacteria living in other body sites. The study was published in iInfection Control and Hospital Epidemiology/i, the journal of the Society for Healthcare ...

Post-Discharge Rehab Destination is an Important Decision

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Patients now-a-days typically do not stay in the hospital until they are completely well or totally healed, but are discharged to skilled nursing facilities for continuing or closure of care. A significant number of older patients -- about one in five -- opt for such facilities. Deciding on the right post-discharge rehabilitation destination is important to future health and quality of life. However, it is a decision for which many patients and families are unprepared ...

S.Leone Ebola Doctor Dies While Experimental Drug Trials are Awaited

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A second senior doctor in Sierra Leone succumbed to Ebola on Wednesday as west Africa anxiously awaited the arrival of experimental drugs to tackle the deadly Ebola outbreak. Sierre Leone's chief medical officer Brima Kargbo said Modupeh Cole, a senior physician in the capital Freetown, had been "instrumental in the fight against the Ebola virus". Cole's death came only a fortnight after the country's only virologist and leading Ebola expert, Umar Khan, ...

HPV Vaccine Dramatically Reduces Incidence of Genital Warts

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The HPV vaccine has dramatically reduced the rates of genital warts among young Australians from a range of backgrounds and could prove a good news for cervical cancer rates in future. The result was found in the most comprehensive assessment of its type, UNSW Australia-led research. The research, which was done in collaboration with the University of Sydney, is based on national hospital admission rates and shows a similar result in the female Indigenous population, ...

Manner in Which TB Drug Attacks Its Target Uncovered

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A clue to understanding how the most important drug for tuberculosis works to attack dormant TB bacteria in order to shorten treatment has been found by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The antibiotic Pyrazinamide (PZA) has been used to treat TB since the 1950s, but its mechanisms are the least understood of all TB drugs. The PZA findings may help researchers identify new and more effective drugs not only for TB - which can require ...

Miracle of How Geckos Move and Cling to Ceilings Discovered by Scientists

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A model that explains how geckos can run up and down walls, cling to ceilings, and seemingly defy gravity with such effortless grace has been developed by researchers at Oregon State University. The solution, outlined today in the iJournal of Applied Physics/i, is a remarkable mechanism in the toes of geckos that use tiny, branched hairs called "seta" that can instantly turn their stickiness on and off, and even "unstick" their feet without using any energy. ...

Right Age to Have First Baby for Women is 25, Feel Men

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Women Prefer Marrying Men Who Earn More Than Them

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Women opt for men who earn more than them when it comes to choosing life partners, found in a new survey. A New Zealand dating service, Elite Singles, has revealed that most women would not marry a man who earns less than they do, as 70 per cent of women admitted to seeing their partner's income as very important, Stuff.co.nz reported. The survey, which was aimed at gauging what role money plays in relationships, has shown that the idea of men as breadwinners ...

Vancomycin-Resistant Enterococci (VRE)

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Enterococci are a group of gram-negative bacteria that mostly inhabit the human gut. At present there are very few antibiotics that are capable of treating enterococcal infections but research is being done on developing many more.

Skin Creams Containing Toxic Mercury Will be Out

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Some people are slathering and even injecting creams containing toxic mercury onto or under their skin to lighten it, increasing the risk of serious health problems for themselves and others. This is in contrast with the efforts of many countries who are trying to get rid of the toxic mercury pollution. To find those most at risk, scientists are reporting today that they can now identify these creams and intervene much faster than before. They're speaking at the 248th National ...

Special Korean "Peace and Reconciliation" Mass by Pope

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Pope Francis plans to offer prayers for Korean reconciliation in Seoul next week, but without expecting to be heard, as the country pays lip-service to religious freedom but treats unsanctioned acts of devotion as criminal. The pope is scheduled to conduct a special Korean "peace and reconciliation" mass on August 18 at the end of a five-day trip to South Korea that will highlight the courage and sacrifice of early Catholic believers across the peninsula before ...

Exercise Associated With Reduced Risk of Breast Cancer in African American Women, Says Study

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In African American women, regular physical activity is linked to a decrease in the incidence of breast cancer, says study published in iCancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers (and) Prevention/i In a large prospective study of the health of black women, the Black Women's Health Study (BWHS), researchers collected information about exercise habits, such as time spent exercising per week and type of exercise. They followed more than 44,000 African American women over ...

How Frequently Should You Replace Your Pillow?

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Good comfortable pillows are the cornerstone to good night's rest and vivid, vibrant dreams. As children, we value the pillow with every fall of that milk tooth and look forward to the visit of the tooth fairy to put money or something equally valuable under it!!! An ideal pillow should be thick enough so as to hold your head in the same angle to the shoulders and spine as when you are standing. We all are aware of the importance of a good night's rest ...

Electric Cars Fail to Rev Up Germans

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Germany is ranked the most fuel-efficient country on the planet and Germans are mad about cars, but when it comes to electric vehicles, Europe's top economy is in the slow lane. And moves by the government last week to try to jump-start public interest in the technology are unlikely to change much, experts say. In 2009, Chancellor Angela Merkel set an ambitious target for one million electric cars to be on the road in Germany by 2020, and this in a ...

Robin Williams was a Wonderful Friend and a True Talent: Bill Clinton

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Bill Clinton has paid tribute to deceased star Robin Williams and described him as a "wonderful friend" and a "true talent". The former US president expressed his gratitude for the life of the 'Mrs. Doubtfire' actor, who was found dead at his waterfront home near San Francisco, on Twitter and said that he would be "missed by so many", the Mirror reported. Williams was found dead by his personal assistant at his waterfront home and sources revealed that ...

Gene That Controls Nerve Conduction Velocity Associated With Multiple Sclerosis

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A study published in iThe American Journal of Pathology/i identifies a novel gene which can control nerve conduction velocity. Investigators report that even minor reductions in conduction velocity may aggravate disease in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients and in mice bred for the MS-like condition experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). A strong tool for investigating the pathophysiology of a complex disease is the identification of underlying ...

Nearly Half of Women at Risk of Preterm Birth Do Not Receive Cheap Drug That Could Prevent Newborn Deaths

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Only half (52%) of women who are eligible to receive a simple, effective, low-cost treatment to prevent death and disability in their newborn babies are getting it, finds a major international study of more than 303 000 births in 29 low-income and middle-income countries. The findings, published in iThe Lancet/i, highlight striking gaps in the practice of using antenatal (before birth) steroid injections-known to significantly reduce the risk of death, respiratory ...

Study Explains Why Seniors Don't Eat

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Most of older adults who visit emergency departments are either malnourished or at risk for malnutrition, but not because of lack of access to health care, critical illness or dementia. Despite clear signs of malnutrition or risk of malnutrition, more than three-quarters had never previously been diagnosed with malnutrition, according to the results of a study to be published online in emAnnals of Emergency Medicine/em ("Malnutrition Among Cognitively Intact, ...

Too Much Exercise can be Dangerous

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Running more than four miles a day could be dangerous to your health, suggests a study that examined how much exercise is too much. Researchers focused on 2,400 heart attack survivors and found that the more exercise they did, the less risk they faced of dying from heart disease -- up to a point. Benefits began to decline among those who ran more than 30 miles (48 kilometers) per week. Among walkers, the turning point, when benefits were ...

Google's New Company Takes a Step Forward

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With its own website and mission statement, Google's new company aimed at addressing problems of health and aging has taken a step forward. "We're tackling aging, one of life's greatest mysteries," says the website of Calico LLC, a project announced last September by Google chief executive Larry Page. "Calico is a research and development company whose mission is to harness advanced technologies to increase our understanding of the biology that controls ...

Guinea-Bissau Shuts Border With Ebola-Hit Guinea

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Viral 'Machine' Architecture Finally Rendered

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Landy says, "It makes the system gratuitously dependent on the proteins of the cell which serve as reporters of how well the cell is doing and where it is in its life cycle." "This makes it exquisitely sensitive to the physiology of the cell." Mapping Bridges Biologists already knew all this, but they had never quite figured out how the recombination proteins in the machines bridge the two DNA sites,(i.e.,which sites were bound or ...

Novel Drug Action Against Tumors Explained

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At UC Davis, City of Hope, Taipai Medical University and National Health Research Institutes in Taiwan, researchers have discovered how a drug that deprives the cells of a key amino acid specifically kills cancer cells. Their paper, published in iProceedings of the Academy of Sciences/i, is the culmination of nearly a decade of research into the role of arginine - and its deprivation - in the generation of excessive autophagy, a process in which the cell dies ...

Berlin Stage Amber Revolution Against Big Beer

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In the capital of Germany -a land of beer-lovers, young craft brewers are taking on the mass market, promising to put diversity and flavour back into the national beverage. Upstart micro-brewers have popped up in trendy Berlin neighbourhoods, producing flavours that rebel against the uniformity of the major brands crowding supermarket shelves. The new amber revolution aims to go back to basics and revive a once-rich beer tradition in Germany and its ...

WHO Hosts a Meeting on Experimental Ebola Drug Use

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The World Health Organization is hosting a meeting to discuss the ethics of using experimental drugs, as the world scrambles to stem the rapid spread of the killer Ebola virus. The talks come as countries ravaged by the tropical disease in west Africa are gripped by panic, with drastic measures brought in to contain the epidemic causing transport chaos, price hikes and food shortages, stoking fears people could die of hunger. There is currently no available ...

Neck Manipulation may be Associated With Stroke, Says Study

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Neck manipulation treatments may be associated with strokes, reveal American Heart Association Scientific Statement written by lead author Dr. Jose Biller of Loyola University Medical Center and other stroke experts. The statement, published in the heart association's journal emStroke/em, said it cannot be stated with certainty that neck manipulation causes strokes. But a small tear in a neck artery, called a cervical dissection, is among the ...

One in Four Americans Admits Abusing Prescription Drugs, Says Survey

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A new national survey by FindLaw.com finds one in four Americans admits that they have abused prescription drugs. Prescription drug abuse is a growing problem. The National Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has classified prescription drug abuse as a national epidemic affecting millions. Prescription drug abuse involves taking a drug for reasons other than the drug's intended usage or use of a drug by someone other than the person listed ...

New Nanosheet Can Coat Tricky Burn Wounds and Block Out Infection

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Wrapping wound dressings around fingers and toes can be tricky, but for burn victims, guarding them against infection is critical. With this in mind, scientists at iTokai University/i in Japan have developed a ultrathin coatings called nanosheets that can cling to the body's most difficult-to-protect contours and keep bacteria at bay. Dr. Yosuke Okamura said that the nanosheets could adhere not only to flat surfaces, but also to uneven and irregular ...

Break-Through Treatment For Male Infertility Brings New Hope

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In a recent research conducted by Canadian scientists at the Queen's University have revealed a unique fertility treatment that could improve male infertility. Researchers have found that the protein required to stimulate the process of fertilisation can now be re-created in the lab. This synthetic version called Pulmonary Artery Wedge Pressure (PAWP) could help trigger fertilisation. The research findings promise to diagnose and treat cases of male ...

New Implantable Device To Revolutionize Treatment Of Diabetes

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Scientists at the ETH Zurich's Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering (D-BSSE) in Basel have developed a new implantable device that can monitor acid build-up in patients with diabetes as well as produce insulin. Insulin is a natural hormone produced by the beta cells in the pancreas. It allows the body to use sugar (glucose) from carbohydrates in the food for energy or to store glucose for future use. Insulin regulates blood sugar levels from ...

Venoms Hold Potential to Fight Cancer, Say Scientists

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Bee, snake or scorpion venom could form the basis of a new generation of cancer-fighting drugs, scientists find. They have developed a method for targeting venom proteins specifically to malignant cells while sparing healthy ones, which reduces or eliminates side effects that the toxins would otherwise cause. Dipanjan Pan from the emUniversity of Illinois/em, who led the study, said that they had successfully used venom toxins in tiny nanometer-sized ...

Torch That Could Help Visually Impaired to See Objects

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Enactive Torch a new device developed by scientists could help the visually impaired better navigate everyday life with the help of infra-red sensors to "see" objects in front of it. The research conducted in University of Cincinnati could help all the aging baby boomers, injured veterans, diabetics and white-cane-wielding pedestrians navigate the blurred edges of everyday life. Luis Favela, a graduate student in philosophy and psychology, has found ...

Major Role for Community Pharmacies in Tackling Health Issues Like Obesity, Smoking, Drinking

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Researchers are calling on the Government to enable community pharmacies to provide more services to help tackle major public health concerns such as obesity, smoking and alcohol because the vast majority of people in England live within easy walking distance. The Durham University study, published in iBMJ Open/i, is the first to show that most people can get to a community pharmacy easily with the greatest access in deprived areas. The findings ...

Ebola Experimental Drug Approval: WHO Allows Shortcut in Drug-vetting Procedure

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By authorising the use of experimental drugs in the fight against the deadly Ebola virus, the World Health Organisation is allowing a shortcut in drug-vetting procedures that usually take years. According to the French National Agency for Medicines and Health Products Safety (ANSM), it can take 10 to 15 years from when a drug is first tested in a laboratory to it reaching the market. After preliminary tests on animals or cells in petri dishes, a laboratory ...