Public Health

Ever wonder where all that food your teenager devoured was going? Not only does the food go into the teen's daily activities--running, doing homework, breathing and playing video games, but food converted to energy also fuels growth of new tissues--bones, vessels, cartilage, muscle.  In poorer areas of the world, part of the energy yielded by food might be deflected for the body's defense system in fighting disease. Children and teens in such conditions will not grow as tall or big as their healthy counterparts who were able to allocate more of their energy stores directly to growth. In…

You have a burning chest pain and a doctor looks at a squiggly-lined graph to determine the cause. That graph, an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG), can help the doctor decide whether you're having a heart attack or an acid attack from last night's spaghetti. Correct interpretation may prompt life-saving, emergency measures; incorrect interpretation may delay care with life-threatening consequences. Currently, there is no uniform way to teach doctors in training how to interpret an ECG or assess their competence in the interpretation. To address the lack of uniformity, a team of physicians from…

Some people have a fear of plane crashes, others of tiny little spiders.   Going to the beach?   You may worry about sharks.    But few people worry about diabetes, even though 24 million people have it.  According to a new survey by the American Diabetes Association, more people reported fear of being in a plane crash, hit by lightning, attacked by a shark, or bitten by a snake, than a fear of developing diabetes. “Unfortunately, people don’t seem to take diabetes seriously and they don’t seem to realize that diabetes – if left untreated or poorly treated – can be a…

College students are under quite a bit of pressure these days. Trust me, I know. Working to make enough for tuition, fighting with endless hours of homework and worrying about living expenses on top of the exam you have to study for... it can be quite overwhelming. With all the complaints of stress affecting a student's academic performance, University of Minnesota researchers decided to test the reliability behind them. The study released by the University of Minnesota Boynton Health Service, called Health and Academic Performance: Minnesota Undergraduate Students, shows a direct link…

Bioniche Life Sciences Inc., a research-based, technology-driven Canadian biopharmaceutical company, today announced that Econiche(TM), the world's first vaccine designed to reduce the shedding by cattle of Escherichia coli (E. coli) O157:H7, has received full licensing approval from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA). Econiche is now available for unrestricted use by Canadian cattle producers and their veterinarians. Econiche is a Canadian discovery developed by Bioniche Life Sciences Inc. The vaccine has the potential to significantly reduce the amount of E. coli O157 shed into the…

Anyone with a nose knows the rotten-egg odor of hydrogen sulfide - the polite term is 'gas' when it is generated by bacteria living in the human colon. An international team of scientists has discovered that cells inside the blood vessels of mice naturally make the gassy stuff, and that it controls blood pressure.  Having discovered that hydrogen sulfide, or H2S, is produced in the thin, endothelial lining of blood vessels, the researchers report today in Science that H2S regulates blood pressure by relaxing blood vessels. As the newest member of a family of so-called gasotransmitters,…

Canada continues to export asbestos to developing countries, despite limiting its use in Canada, write Dr. Amir Attaran, David Boyd and Dr. Matthew Stanbrook in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.  And it's both hypocritical and dangerous to importing countries, they write. Canada is opposed to placing chrysotile, the main asbestos fiber used today, under the Rotterdam Convention's notification and consent process, despite chrysotile being deemed a human carcinogen by the World Health Organization (WHO). There is some disagreement about the impact of asbestos.  The 100,000…

A revolutionary heart operation technique using cutting edge technology will be performed on Monday 20 October and broadcast live to delegates at the Heart Rhythm Congress 2008 taking place in Birmingham. The procedure to tackle heart rhythm disorder will be performed by Dr Andre Ng, Senior Lecturer in Cardiology at the University of Leicester and a Consultant Cardiologist at the University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. He will use technology that allows rapid and accurate location of the origin of the heart rhythm disturbance in a 3-dimensional geometry of the heart chambers and guides…

A single molecule in the intestinal wall, activated by the waste products from gut bacteria, plays a large role in controlling whether the host animals are lean or fatty, a research team, including scientists from UT Southwestern Medical Center, has found in a mouse study. When activated, the molecule slows the movement of food through the intestine, allowing the animal to absorb more nutrients and thus gain weight. Without this signal, the animals weigh less.  The study shows that the host can use bacterial byproducts not only as a source of nutrients, but also as chemical signals to…

Eating too much fructose can induce leptin resistance, a condition that can easily lead to becoming overweight when combined with a high-fat, high-calorie diet, according to a new study with rats. Although previous studies have shown that being leptin resistant can lead to rapid weight gain on a high-fat, high-calorie diet, this is the first study to show that leptin resistance can develop as a result of high fructose consumption. The study also showed for the first time that leptin resistance can develop silently, that is, with little indication that it is happening. Leptin as regulator…