health – News Stories About health - Page 35

Apr 2, 2007 8:42 AM CDT

UK Women Limited to One Embryo

Agency will ration IVF to stem problematic multiple births

(Newser) - British women trying to get pregnant via In Vitro Fertilization will be limited to having one embryo implanted at a time, in a move by the government to stem the surge of problematic multiple births, the Guardian reports. Only women with particularly low chances of conception will still be allowed...

'Roid Rage May Be Misplaced

Apr 2, 2007 7:33 AM CDT

'Roid Rage May Be Misplaced

J.C. Bradbury says it's expansion, not drugs, that's damaged baseball

(Newser) - As opening day dawns, expect another season of home-run antics in lieu of your dad's short-ball game. But J.C. Bradbury argues in the New York Times that it's talent dilution, not steroids, that's changed the game: When the league expanded in the 90s, so did the number of hittable...

Heart Valve Grown
From Stem Cells

Apr 2, 2007 7:11 AM CDT

Heart Valve Grown From Stem Cells

Could be available for human transplants in three years

(Newser) - A British team has grown a human heart valve from stem cells—a breakthrough certain to ignite as much controversy as hope. Sir Magdi Yacoub, professor of cardiac surgery at Imperial College, tells the Guardian that growing a whole human heart from stem cells is less than a decade away:...

FDA Panel Passes First Cancer Vaccine

Mar 30, 2007 11:20 AM CDT

FDA Panel Passes First Cancer Vaccine

Prostate treatment recruits immune system to fight tumors

(Newser) - A cancer drug that's the first to harness the body's immune system to destroy tumors got a thumbs-up from the FDA's advisory panel, the New York Times reports. If approved, Provenge, a prostate cancer treatment, would be the first of the "cancer vaccines"—experimental therapies that commandeer a...

Alzheimer's Patients Dying In Prescription Scandal

Mar 30, 2007 10:13 AM CDT

Alzheimer's Patients Dying In Prescription Scandal

Sedatives shown to double death rates

(Newser) - Sedatives commonly prescribed to Alzheimer's and dementia patients are leading to their premature death, new research reported in the Guardian concludes. The drugs, called neuroleptics, combat the diseases' more alarming symptoms, including agitation and hallucinations. Their widespread off-label use in the U.K.—where they're licensed only for...

Condom-Hating Health Official Steps Down

Mar 30, 2007 10:00 AM CDT

Condom-Hating Health Official Steps Down

Bush's top family planning official resigns after legal action against him

(Newser) - Bush's top family planning official resigned unexpectedly yesterday, on the heels of a legal action against him in Massachusetts, the Boston Globe reports. The lawsuit initiated by Medicaid targets Dr. Eric Keroack's private practice in Marblehead. Abortion rights groups protested his appointment five months ago, claiming he opposed birth control...

Twins Found to Be "Semi-identical"

Mar 30, 2007 6:21 AM CDT

Twins Found to Be "Semi-identical"

Children neither fraternal nor identical

(Newser) - A new kind of twin has been discovered, neither strictly identical nor fraternal. Now toddlers, the babies look identical but one is anatomically male while the other has ambiguous genitalia. Genetic tests show the children are identical on their mother's side but share only half their father's DNA.

Red Meat
May Harm Sons' Sperm

Mar 28, 2007 8:23 AM CDT

Red Meat May Harm Sons' Sperm

Lower fertility found in men whose moms scarfed beef during pregnancy

(Newser) - Men whose mothers ate a lot of beef during pregnancy have lower sperm counts, finds a study attempting to track the effect of growth hormones fed to cattle. While the specific chemicals weren't identified, sons of pregnant women who ate beef more than seven times a week were three times...

Tony Snow's Cancer Recurs

Mar 28, 2007 7:53 AM CDT

Tony Snow's Cancer Recurs

(Newser) - White House press secretary Tony Snow has cancer again, and this time it's spread to his liver. Doctors discovered the recurrence when they removed a growth from his lower abdomen yesterday. Snow, who's 51, underwent surgery and chemotherapy for colon cancer two years ago.

New Breast Scan Beats Mammogram

Mar 27, 2007 12:58 PM CDT

New Breast Scan Beats Mammogram

Uses near-infrared rays to illuminate tumors and sort benign from malignant

(Newser) - A new type of breast scan promises to pick up the tumors mammograms often miss and to distinguish between benign and malignant masses—without surgery. The technology relies on harmless near-infrared light to illuminate the masses, which glow when exposed to a particular chemical combination.

U.K. Nurses Enter Abortion Battleground

Mar 27, 2007 12:53 PM CDT

U.K. Nurses Enter Abortion Battleground

Could perform early-term procedures under new reading of 40-year-old law

(Newser) - Specially trained nurses should be allowed to perform early-term surgical abortions without a doctor present, two U.K. medicos are arguing, based on a "wide interpretation" of Britain's 1967 Abortion Act. Though British nurses are currently allowed to carry out drug-induced abortions, they have been barred up to now...

Stents Show No Lasting Benefit In Heart Study

Mar 27, 2007 8:17 AM CDT

Stents Show No Lasting Benefit In Heart Study

Better blood flow doesn't translate in to fewer heart attacks

(Newser) - Stents used to open arteries are no more useful than conventional drug treatment for patients who haven't yet had a heart attack, a new study reveals. In more than 2,000 patients over five years, those who had surgery suffered the same number of heart attacks, strokes, and deaths as...

Implant Tricks Brain To Lower Blood Pressure

Mar 26, 2007 10:42 AM CDT

Implant Tricks Brain To Lower Blood Pressure

Implant delivers shocks to lower blood pressure

(Newser) - A pacemaker-like implant that relies on small electrical shocks may cut the risk of heart attack and stroke in half for patients with drug-resistant hypertension, a new study shows. The device, which sends electrical shocks through the neck's carotid arteries, tricks the brain into thinking blood pressure is even higher...

ADD Meds Prescribed
For Weight Loss

Mar 23, 2007 10:12 AM CDT

ADD Meds Prescribed For Weight Loss

Doctors are using Adderall for pediatric obesity, pleasing parents but raising ethical alarms

(Newser) - Pediatricians are giving Adderall, the pill that got America's kids to pay attention in class, to patients without ADHD but looking to shed extra pounds. One of the drug's side effects is appetite suppression, and "off-label" prescriptions are working for some chunky but otherwise normal teenagers. Parents worried about...

Elizabeth Edwards's
Cancer Recurs

Mar 23, 2007 8:14 AM CDT

Elizabeth Edwards's Cancer Recurs

2008 candidate will continue his campaign

(Newser) - Presidential contender John Edwards and his wife Elizabeth announced today that the breast cancer she battled after the last election cycle has recurred and advanced to Stage IV. The cancer has spread to her bones, a lung, and possibly other organs, her oncologist explained, and is now inoperable. The...

Court Orders Abortion Access in Poland

Mar 21, 2007 9:16 AM CDT

Court Orders Abortion Access in Poland

Even where abortion is severely restricted, it must be available to women legally entitled

(Newser) - Even countries that severely restrict abortion must make them available to those who are entitled to them by law, the European court of human rights ruled yesterday. A Polish mother sued because her fourth pregnancy's damage to her failing eyesight made her legally eligible for an abortion to preserve her...

Modified Mosquitoes Could Fight the Spread of Malaria

Mar 20, 2007 8:06 AM CDT

Modified Mosquitoes Could Fight the Spread of Malaria

(Newser) - Genetically modified mosquitoes that cannot pass on malaria may help reduce the spread of the disease that now causes a million deaths a year, mostly children. A new study shows that the lab-designed bugs could out-breed their natural competition, eventually driving them out altogether and eliminating the route through which...

Richardson
Backs Medical Marijuana Law

Mar 18, 2007 10:45 PM CDT

Richardson Backs Medical Marijuana Law

Presidential contender downplays political costs

(Newser) - New Mexico governor Bill Richardson, who's been pushing for a law to legalize marijuana for medical use since he took office in 2002, will finally get a chance sign one. And he's not going to sweat the political consequences, he says. The bill that passed the New Mexico legislature Wednesday,...

The Moral-Hazard Myth

Mar 18, 2007 8:43 PM CDT

The Moral-Hazard Myth

Why Our Insurance Systems Doesn't Work

(Newser) - Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point and Blink, examines the premise underlying U.S. health insurance known by the Dickensian term: Moral Hazard. The theory of Moral Hazard describes the notion that insurance can change peoples’ behavior. Without deductibles, co-payments and other barriers to use, people will use too...

Is Your Cat Making You Neurotic?

Mar 15, 2007 3:29 PM CDT

Is Your Cat Making You Neurotic?

(Newser) - A parasite that reproduces in cats, previously linked to schizophrenia in infected humans, has now, bizarrely, been implicated in mass personality changes in geographic areas where incidence of infection is high. A U.S. Geological Survey study of 39 countries shows that high infection rates of the Toxoplasma gondii parasite...