Doctors advised about deaths and new stents
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a notice to doctors Wednesday about problems, including more than 60 deaths, associated with the new drug-coated stents made by Cordis Corporation, a subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson.
Approved by the FDA in April, the stents have been considered an improvement over bare metal stents. Both devices are used to open blocked arteries. It’s unknown whether the new device is associated with more problems than traditional stents. Read more from the FDA.
Beware the student spoof
I offer the following link as a cautionary tale to other health writers. Don't believe every press release you read.
Real people and abortion ban
Boston Globe correspondent Carol Cruzan Morton interviews a couple who terminated a pregnancy with a procedure that could be eliminated by the Partial Birth Abortion Ban recently passed by Congress.
A doctor's quote from the story:
"If the ban goes through and truly eliminates this as a choice, women who find out that something is terribly wrong with their babies will have to remain pregnant," said Dr. Stephen Carr, a maternal fetal medicine specialist with a high-risk obstetrics practice at Women and Infants Hospital in Providence. "It's a different kind of heartache. Instead of the heartache of terminating, it is the heartache of delivering and watching what happens then."
Read the article.
New site for evidence in medicine
One of my favorite web sites, Cochrane Consumer Network, is now Informed Health Online. It will still provide consumer-oriented health information from the Cochrane Collaboration, an international group dedicated to the best evidence in medicine.
Expanded features include a “Did you know?” item that will change daily, a new featured web site, a historical segment and a cartoon.
Otherwise known as flatulence
The "average male fart is made up of about 110 milliliters of gas (almost half a cup), with 80 milliliters for a woman's (a third of a cup)." For more on this topic, click here.
Aspirin associated with pancreatic cancer
Women who take aspirin regularly may be at greater risk of pancreatic cancer, according to a study presented today at a meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston analyzed surveys of more than 88,000 nurses who took part in the Nurses’ Health Study. Those nurses who took aspirin regularly over a long period were at a 58 percent greater risk of developing pancreatic cancer.
The absolute risk of pancreatic cancer was low. In the entire group of 88,378 nurses, there were 161 cases of pancreatic cancer over 18 years. Read an abstract (go to study No. A162).
How to avoid ER on Halloween
"The most common injuries on Halloween are eye injuries from sharp objects, burns from flammable costumes and injuries from collisions with motor vehicles," said Dr. Brian Hancock, president of the American College of Emergency Physicians in a press release today.
The group recommends avoiding dark colors for costumes and adding reflective tape to make your child more visible to drivers.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has more Halloween warnings, including information on safe makeup ingredients and costume contact lenses.
Talking web site designed for senior citizens
The National Institutes of Health announced today a new talking web site for seniors. A viewer can click the "turn speech on" button, move the cursor around the screen and the web site will read the text aloud. "Enlarge text" and "high contrast" are other options that make the text easier to read.
Health topics include Alzheimer's disease, arthritis, balance problems, breast cancer, colorectal cancer, exercise for older adults, hearing loss, lung cancer and prostate cancer.
The business behind saw palmetto
Saw palmetto, an herbal remedy used to treat swollen prostate, is the fifth most popular medicinal herb. Find out where it comes from and how it’s processed in this comprehensive New York Times article by Teresa Burney.
Diabetes warning coming for schizophrenia drugs
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration will require labels on several drugs used to treat schizophrenia to include new warnings about the associated risk of developing diabetes. Psychiatric News writer Jim Rosack details the controversy behind the new warnings in this article.
Abuse in childhood linked to adult illness
Dr. Vincent Felitti is studying what he calls "reverse alchemy" -- how the gold of childhood can be turned into the lead of adult ill health by abuse, family alcoholism and violence.
So far, his study of 17,421 adults from Kaiser Permanente’s Department of Preventive Medicine in San Diego, Calif., has shown that adverse childhood experiences are vastly more common than recognized and have a powerful relation to adult health a half-century later.
Felitti says his findings should shape the future practice of medicine. He will be the keynote speaker at the Family Policy Council’s Network Partners’ Summit Nov. 17-19 in Silverdale, Wash. For information on the summit, click here.
Are hospitals ready for SARS?
"It is not possible to predict whether SARS will reappear, but it could from its original animal reservoir, persistent infection in humans, or the laboratory."
That’s a line from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention draft recommendations for hospitals and public health agencies on preparedness for another outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.
The draft recommends hospitals screen all pneumonia patients by asking them about travel to countries affected by SARS and two other questions. Hospitals also should provide surgical masks to patients with respiratory illnesses and separate them from other patients. And hospitals should consider installing plexiglass barriers between patients and staff in registration and triage areas. Read the draft.
Lecture: herbal medicine
Four out of 10 Americans take dietary supplements such as echinacea, saw palmetto and glucosamine.
A lecture titled "Herbal Medicine: Ancient Practice Meets Modern Science" will be webcast Wednesday, Oct. 22, at 9 a.m. Pacific. Norman R. Farnsworth of the College of Pharmacy, University of Illinois at Chicago, will discuss his research.
Here’s a link that will tell you more and get you to the webcast. It's part of a National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine lecture series.
Some dialysis patients recover kidney function
Doctors may be sentencing too many patients to a lifetime of dialysis, according to a study from the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston. Researchers followed 150 patients from January 1999 to December 2001. Of those, eight patients were able to recover their kidney function and remain dialysis-free for an average of 20 months.
Doctors should keep checking the kidney function of patients on dialysis, especially those who have good "residual renal function," which means the ability to make a good amount of urine, the study’s lead author said.
The findings were published yesterday in the online journal "BMC Nephrology." Read the abstract.
Gobbledygook of the week
Regular readers of this blog know I share the best and worst of the advertising hype that crosses my desk in the newsroom. The following sentence, from a press release, manages to squeeze in the buzzwords of the day while squeezing out any possible meaning:
"By integrating secure messaging with existing information systems, BLANK AGENCY positions itself at the forefront of an increasing trend among healthcare organizations to leverage secure messaging to integrate information flows and produce tangible benefits in health care quality, affordability and outcomes."
Hunh?
Exercise benefits Alzheimer's patients
A study in today’s Journal of the American Medical Association finds a connection between exercise, caregiver training and improved mood and health for people with Alzheimer’s disease. The lead researcher is Linda Teri at the University of Washington. Read more.
More about monkeys
There’s a story behind the story of the monkeys with brain implants controlling a robotic arm with their minds. The research, published Monday in the inaugural issue of the online journal, PLoS Biology, gained a great deal of media attention.
PloS Biology is one of several "open access" publications of the Public Library of Science. Its contents will be offered free on the Web (thus "open access"). Researchers pay $1,500 to publish their papers. The fee covers peer review and other costs.
The open access movement has detractors, who question the "pay to publish" requirement and skeptics, who wonder if open access journals can make it financially.
Here’s an article in The Scientist's daily news about open access.
I'm not a vegetarian -- yet
"AUGUSTA, Ga. -- Government inspectors monitoring the automated processing line at the Shapiro Packing meat plant here over the past three years repeatedly discovered sides of beef mottled with cattle manure, a host for bacteria that can be deadly to consumers."
That's the first paragraph of an article in today's New York Times. Read on if you dare.
Seeking lessons in history
Were three heart attack deaths this year in people recently vaccinated against smallpox related to the vaccine? Earlier this week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published an analysis of what happened after a 1947 smallpox vaccination campaign in New York City. The analysis found no increase in cardiac deaths, although approximately 6 million New York City residents were vaccinated.
"The findings are consistent with a growing body of evidence suggesting that ischemic cardiac deaths observed after the 2003 campaign might have been unrelated to vaccine," says the Oct. 3 Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
Breast cancer prevention for survivors edges forward
Kudos to the New England Journal of Medicine for its early website posting today of a study that will be of interest to breast cancer survivors and their doctors.
The large, double-blind, placebo-controlled study showed cancer-prevention promise for letrozole therapy for women who have taken tamoxifen for five years. There are downsides and unanswered questions, but patients and doctors now have immediate access to the full text of the study and two accompanying editorials.
More information: good.
Nutrition note for pregnant women
Pregnant women taking their vitamins will appreciate this New York Times story. Vitamins fed to pregnant mice worked to turn off a trigger gene for obesity in their offspring. Scientists are learning how maternal nutrition can change gene function without altering the offspring’s DNA sequence.
Webcast to answer Medicare reform questions
A panel of health policy experts will answer audience questions on Medicare reform, including the proposed prescription drug benefit, on Wednesday, Oct. 15, at 11 a.m. Pacific.
The panel will be:
-- Joe Antos, Wilson H. Taylor Scholar in Health Care and Retirement Policy at the American Enterprise Institute
-- Marilyn Moon, vice president and director of health for the American Institutes for Research
-- Tricia Neuman, vice president and director of the Medicare Policy Project at the Kaiser Family Foundation.
The event is sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation’s online information service kaisernetwork.org.
To participate, go to this "Ask the Experts" link. To test your media player now, go to this "How to View" link.
Resources on patient safety
Medical complications, including hospital-acquired infections, kill 32,000 people each year and add $9 billion to health-care costs, according to a Journal of the American Medical Association study published yesterday.
Consumers Union warns of a bill in Congress that could stop states from reporting hospital patient and quality-of-care data at its Stop Hospital Infections web site.
And read what the American Hospital Association is doing to address patient safety.
Rush to judgment?
Let’s take a look at the prescription drugs that radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh allegedly purchased from a former housekeeper.
My source is "The Johns Hopkins Consumer Guide to Drugs."
OxyContin is the brand name for oxycodone hydrochloride, a painkiller. Its side effects include dizziness, constipation and confusion.
Hydrocodone is the active ingredient in brand-name painkillers that include Lorcet and Vicodin. Side effects include constipation, itching, ringing or buzzing in the ears and a false sense of well-being.
Study links certain med schools with higher rates of malpractice claims
Graduates of certain medical schools are more likely to be sued for malpractice than others, according to a new study published in the medical journal Quality and Safety in Health Care.
The study raises questions about how medical schools could prevent some malpractice lawsuits, perhaps by training future doctors to communicate more openly with patients about errors.
Researchers found a tenfold difference between the school with the lowest rate of malpractice claims against its graduates and the school with the highest rate.
The study didn't reveal the names of the worst and best medical schools because the American Medical Association database the researchers used required confidentiality.
Hospitals get a reality check from the doughnut crowd
Take a look at how two non-profit Illinois hospitals are competing for cardiac and stroke patients through advertising in this story from The State Journal-Register in Springfield, Ill. I admire the way reporter Dean Olsen gets reaction to the advertising from real people at a doughnut shop.
Study finds kids carry antibiotic-resistant bacterium
Indiscriminate use of antibiotics has given rise to resistant strains of bacteria that make serious infections harder to treat. A new study of children under age 7 found that 8 percent carried antibiotic-resistant S. pneumoniae – a rate much higher than would have been seen a decade ago.
Children in group child care were four times more likely to carry the antibiotic-resistant bacterium. Those who recently had used antibiotics or who had a respiratory infection were also more likely to carry resistant strains.
The Harvard Medical School study of 742 Massachusetts children is in the October issue of Pediatrics.
Find more information about antibiotic resistance at this Centers for Disease Control and Prevention web site.
Chat about alternative medicine for cancer patients
It's estimated that eight out of 10 cancer patients use some type of alternative medicine along with conventional treatments.
A live online chat about current research on alternative medicine for cancer patients will be Tuesday, Oct. 7, at 11 a.m. Pacific.
The featured expert is Dr. Stephen Straus, director of the federally funded National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
To participate, go to People Living With Cancer, the patient information site of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
Politicians playing doctor? You decide
The House of Representatives today passed a bill banning so-called "partial birth abortions." Take a look at what the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists has to say.
Reseach-based tips in your pocket
A research-based "Pocket Guide to Good Health for Adults" -- with tips on good health habits, worthwhile tests and immunizations -- is available on the Web in English and in Spanish.
Copies are also available by calling (800) 358-9295 or sending an e-mail to ahrqpubs@ahrq.gov.
The guide is written in plain language. Here’s an example: "Tests such as a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) blood test or a digital rectal exam can help detect prostate cancer, but these tests also have risks. They sometimes have false positive results, which may lead to avoidable anxiety and unnecessary biopsies and treatment. It is not yet clear whether these tests save lives."
Waking up to great radio
Congratulations to National Public Radio’s Joe Palca for breaking down barriers between reporter and listeners this morning with his first-person account of his experience as a sleep researcher. I loved it. To listen, click here.
Boss man gets free heart scan
Among today’s e-mail press releases promoting health-related services and products was this:
"CEO heart attacks: courtesy heart scan, early warning Executive Detection reveals heart disease in 30 seconds"
"Boca Raton FL -- October 1, 2003 -- BodyView announces a courtesy 30-second early warning Executive Detection heart scan. Presented to select corporate CEOs, BodyView’s Executive Detection is part of a cardiac healthcare program that reveals early indications of heart disease, the major cause of death in the U.S.
"A confidential report is issued upon completion that includes the CEOs vital body composition and identifies other abnormal structures subsequent to full maturation."
The press release goes on to say that the CEOs offered the free scans by the Florida company "are expected to introduce BodyView programs to the Human Resources decision makers within their organizations."
I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. Click on my name below this posting to send me an e-mail.
