Pepper Component Hot Enough to Trigger Suicide in Prostate Cancer Cells
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Capsaicin, the stuff that turns up the heat in jalapen~os, not only causes the tongue to burn, it also drives prostate cancer cells to kill themselves, according to studies published in the March 15 issue of Cancer Research.
According to a team of researchers from the Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, in collaboration with colleagues from UCLA, the pepper component caused human prostate cancer cells to undergo programmed cell death or apoptosis.
Growth of Hypertension Poses Challenges In Training And Research
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A looming shortage of specialists, and the need for research focusing on prevention as well as treatment, are two of the most important challenges in managing an inexorable growth in the incidence of hypertension, according to two dozen experts who attended the Seventh Annual Winter Conference of the American Society of Hypertension (ASH).
The day-long January 13th meeting in Coconut Grove, Florida was convened by ASH president Thomas D. Giles, MD, professor of medicine at the Louisiana State University School of Medicine in New Orleans, as a forum to address “The Future of Hypertension Training and Research in Academic Medicine.” It was attended by twenty four of the nation’s foremost experts in hypertension, representing eighteen schools of medicine and academic medical centers, two government institutions devoted to healthcare research, and two of the nation’s leading pharmaceutical companies.
Creative new therapies for atherosclerotic disease
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Patients with a build-up of plaque in arteries in the heart, brain and leg face a high risk of major cardiovascular complications.
Researchers worldwide are responding to that threat by gathering comprehensive data and developing innovative new therapies, according to studies presented at the American College of Cardiology’s 55th Annual Scientific Session in Atlanta, Ga. ACC.06 is the premier cardiovascular medical meeting, bringing together more than 30,000 cardiologists to further breakthroughs in cardiovascular medicine.
“These new studies help us not only to understand the scope of the problem, but also to evaluate the effectiveness of new therapies for atherosclerotic disease, wherever it occurs in the body,” said George A. Beller, M.D., F.A.C.C., University of Virginia Health Center.
Anti-clotting drugs beat heparin for heart attack
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Heart attack patients treated with anti-thrombosis drugs instead of the blood-thinner heparin are less likely to die or have another heart attack, researchers told a meeting of cardiologists on Tuesday.
“This is a better blood-thinning strategy for patients who have a heart attack,” said Harvard Medical School professor Dr. Elliott Antman, lead investigator of the trial comparing the drug Lovenox to heparin.
Lovenox, sold by France’s Sanofi Aventis , is designed to block thrombin, a blood protein that plays a key role in the formation of new blood clots. It is given by injection.
New device for fixing holes in hearts of young stroke patients
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As many as one in four adults is walking around with a “hole” between the upper chambers of the heart. Most of them will never know it.
The person who learns about the “hole” in his or her heart does so when he or she suffers symptoms of a mini-stroke (TIA) or a more-debilitating stroke. And it is usually only then that the person learns the term Patent Foramen Ovale (PFO), a persistent opening in the upper wall of the heart which did not close completely after birth.
B vitamins and folic acid don’t cut the risk of further heart attacks
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Scientists have found that levels of the amino acid homocysteine may be high in people destined for a heart attack or stroke, and some studies in the past have linked homocysteine to an increased risk of heart disease.
But according to two new studies, it seems lowering homocysteine levels with B vitamins and folic acid does not reduce the risk of recurrent cardiovascular disease after a heart attack.
They both also found a harmful effect from the combined B vitamin treatment was suggested and say such treatment should not be recommended.
Study finds aspirin still the best for heart risk
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Adding the blood-thinning drug Plavix to a daily dose of aspirin does not lower the risk of death, heart attack or stroke in high-risk patients, researchers said on Sunday.
“The overall findings were negative, but a benefit was seen in patients with established cardiovascular disease,” said Dr. Deepak Bhatt, associate director of the Cleveland Clinic Cardiovascular Coordinating Center and the study’s lead investigator.
Food-allergic teens often take risks with food
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A substantial number of teenagers with food allergies admit to “risk-taking” behavior such as not reading food labels or knowingly eating foods labeled “may contain” allergens, a survey shows.
The poll of 174 food-allergic individuals whose average age was 16 years also shows that many of them do not always carry self-injectable epinephrine—the medication that is immediately needed in the case of a severe allergic reaction.
Whether or not they pack their EpiPens depends largely on where they are going, who they will be with, and how convenient it is to carry it. If the purse is small or the clothes tight-fighting, odds are they won’t carry it.
Understanding prostate cancer hormone therapy “syndrome”
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Men with prostate cancer may be put on hormone therapy, to block testosterone production in an effort to halt or slow tumor growth. While some health effects of so-called “androgen deprivation therapy” (ADT) for prostate cancer are clearcut—for example sexual dysfunction—there is this whole set of less specific, more vague symptoms, like changes in mood, memory, feeling unwell, being tired. A new study suggests that these symptoms are likely due to the fact that the patients are older, sicker and have more advanced disease.
“Androgen deprivation is probably not playing a big role in causing these symptoms,” said Dr. Vahakn B. Shahinian of the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.
Calcium improves pregnancy outcomes
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In pregnant women with low calcium intake, treatment with calcium supplements can reduce the severity of preeclampsia—a potentially serious complication of pregnancy characterized by elevated blood pressure and protein in the urine—as well as cut maternal illness and infant death, according to a study by the World Health Organization.
“Pregnant women with limited access to dairy products or those with absorption issues, such as lactose intolerance, are likely to have low calcium intake and, based on our findings, should receive calcium supplements,” lead author Dr. Jose Villar, from the Geneva-based United Nations group, told Reuters Health.
CRP may help predict lung cancer risk in smokers
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Measuring blood levels of C-reactive protein (CRP)—a marker of inflammation—may help identifying smokers with abnormal lesions in their airways that are likely to progress, new research suggests.
CRP levels are commonly used to gauge inflammation, which is thought to play a role in the development of abnormal airway lesions and lung cancer. Still, it was unclear if CRP testing could predict when such lesions are likely to progress to more advanced stages.
Sleep: not enough, too much may up diabetes risk
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Research hints that not getting enough sleep each night, or getting too much sleep, may increase a person’s risk of developing non-insulin dependent (type 2) diabetes, independent of other factors.
“Sleep duration may be a novel risk factor for the development of clinical diabetes,” conclude the researchers in the March issue of Diabetes Care.
Dr. Henry Klar Yaggi from Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut and two colleagues studied the long-term (15-year) impact of sleep duration on the development of diabetes in more than 1,100 middle-aged and elderly men who were free of diabetes in 1987-1989 and were followed until 2004.
Program spots asthma in preschoolers
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A pilot program of The New York Academy of Medicine identifies 2-year-olds with probable asthma and facilitates treatment. The initiative has significantly curbed asthma symptoms among children in subsidized preschool and Head Start programs in East Harlem and the Lower East Side.
In East Harlem, which has been the epicenter of the asthma epidemic in NYC, asthma is “kind of off their radar” in participating preschools, Dr. Sebastian Bonner, staff asthma expert at the Academy told Reuters Health. “They are really dealing with other things like diabetes, obesity and issues that are harder to address.”
Saliva-based tests detect oral cancer
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Early diagnosis of oral cancer and Sjogren’s syndrome, an autoimmune disease involving dry eyes, dry mouth and rheumatoid arthritis, may soon be possible with saliva-based tests, according to two presentations today at the annual meeting of the American Association for Dental Research.
“If we can catch someone with oral cancer at stage 2 instead of stage 4, we can improve this person’s 5-year survival rate by 50 percent, which would be of tremendous service not only to the quality of life of the individual, but also to the healthcare burden of the country,” said senior investigator Dr. David Wong.
Early periodontal treatment leads to lower medical costs
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Chronic conditions such as diabetes mellitus (DM), coronary artery disease (CAD), and cerebrovascular disease (CVD) have been associated with periodontal disease.
These conditions can be extremely costly to treat, and it has been unclear if earlier periodontal treatment could lead to a reduction in overall risk and medical expenditures.
At the 35th Annual Meeting of the American Association for Dental Research, a team of investigators from the Columbia University School of Dental & Oral Surgery (New York, NY) and Aetna Dental (Pittsburgh, PA) reported findings from a study that investigated the effect of early periodontal treatment on Per Member Per Month (PMPM) costs for DM, CAD, and CVD, in a population of 144,225 patients with both medical and dental insurance.
