Category: Health

{In a clinical trial conducted among adults in 11 hospitals, researchers have shown that a hand-held EEG device approved in 2016 by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that is commercially available can quickly and with 97 percent accuracy rule out whether a person with a head injury likely has brain bleeding and needs further evaluation and treatment.}

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 2.5 million Americans each year show up to the emergency room with suspected head injuries. Most of these people receive a CT scan, and more than 90 percent of the scans show no structural brain injury, creating needless radiation exposure and medical costs estimated at about $1,200 per scan.

In a report on their clinical trial, described online March 31 in Academic Emergency Medicine, the researchers say the new device — which measures electrical activity in the brain and then uses an algorithm to decide if a patient is likely to have brain bleeding — can help with clinical decision-making and triage of patients, and could reduce the need for CT scans.

“Before our study, there were no objective, quantitative measures of mild head injury other than imaging,” says lead investigator Daniel Hanley Jr., M.D., the Legum Professor of Neurological Medicine and director of the Brain Injury Outcomes Program at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. “This work opens up the possibility of diagnosing head injury in a very early and precise way.

“This technology is not meant to replace the CT scan in patients with mild head injury, but it provides the clinician with additional information to facilitate routine clinical decision-making,” says Hanley. “If someone with a mild head injury was evaluated on the sports or battlefield, then this test could assist in the decision of whether or not he or she needs rapid transport to the hospital. Alternatively, if there is an accident with many people injured, medical personnel could use the device to triage which patients would need to have CT scans and who should go first. Those showing a ‘positive’ for brain injury would go first.”

The study only looked at adults and didn’t assess how well the device could predict traumatic brain injuries in children or teens.

The study, Hanley says, was designed to test the accuracy and effectiveness of AHEAD 300, a device developed by BrainScope Company Inc. of Bethesda, Maryland, that is now available to a limited audience through a centers of excellence program. Throughout its eight years of development, the company has tested this and prior generations of the device in multiple human trials. The point of the device is to assess the likelihood that a patient has more than 1 milliliter of bleeding in the brain and needs immediate evaluation by medical personnel.

To begin, the researchers recruited 720 adults who came to 11 Emergency Departments across the nation between February and December 2015 with a closed head injury, meaning the skull was intact. Participants were between 18 and 85 years old, and 60 percent were men. Upon entry to the Emergency Department, each physician performed standard clinical assessments for head injuries used at their site. A trained technician then administered the Standardized Assessment of Concussion and the Concussion Symptom Inventory to characterize the patient’s symptoms, and then used the AHEAD 300 device to measure electroencephalogram (EEG) data — essentially tracking and recording brain wave patterns — from patients while they reclined quietly for five to 10 minutes. The device includes a disposable headset that records the EEG data from five regions on the forehead and feeds the signals back to the hand-held AHEAD 300 device in real time. In addition, the technician entered certain clinical/demographic information into the device, including age; the Glasgow Coma Scale score, which rates how conscious a person is; and if there was a loss of consciousness related to the injury.

The device was programmed to read approximately 30 specific features of brain electrical activity, which it uses an algorithm to analyze, and how the patient’s pattern of brain activity compared to the same pattern of brain activity considered normal. For example, it looked for how fast or slow information traveled from one side of the brain to the other, or whether electrical activity in both sides of the brain was coordinated or if one side was lagging.

The accuracy of the device was tested using CT scans from the participants. The presence of any blood within the intracranial cavity was considered a positive finding, indicating brain bleeding. After 72 to 96 hours, the researchers followed up with phone calls to the patients and/or looked at medical records after 30 days to further confirm the accuracy of each participant’s injury status.

Of the 720 patients, 564 turned out not to have traumatic brain injuries, and 156 did have them, as determined by independently measured and judged CT scan assessments.

On the basis of AHEAD 300 classification, the researchers sorted patients into “yes” or “no” categories, indicating likely traumatic brain injury with over 1 millimeter of bleeding or not. Of 564 patients without brain bleeding, as confirmed with CT scans, 291 patients were scored on the AHEAD 300 as likely not having a brain injury. Of the 156 patients with confirmed brain bleeding, 144, or 92 percent, were assessed as likely to have an injury by the AHEAD 300 classification. Of those confirmed with brain bleeding via CT scan, 12 participants, or 8 percent, had some intracranial bleeding, and five participants, or 3 percent, had more than 1 milliliter of blood in the brain.

Because many of the incorrect yes/no classifications don’t contain information about how close a patient is to the cutoff, the researchers then created three categories to sort patients by — “yes,” “no” and “maybe” — to see if this boosted the accuracy of the device. The maybe category included a small number of patients with greater-than-usual abnormal EEG activity that was not statistically high enough to be definitely positive. When the results were recalculated on the three-tier system, the sensitivity of detecting someone with a traumatic brain injury increased to 97 percent, with 152 of 156 traumatic head injuries detected, and 99 percent of those had more than or equal to 1 milliliter of bleeding in the brain. None of the four false negatives required surgery, returned to the hospital due to their injury or needed additional brain imaging.

The trial results also show the device predicted the absence of potentially dangerous brain bleeding 52 percent of the time in the participants tested with the yes/no classification. Using the yes/no/maybe classification, the device classified 281 patients as having a brain injury, correctly predicting whether someone didn’t have a head injury 39 percent of the time. The researchers say these predictive capabilities improve on the clinical criteria currently used to assess whether to do a CT scan — known as the New Orleans Criteria and the Canadian Head CT rules — and predicted the absence of brain bleeding more than 70 percent of the time in those people with no more than one symptom of brain injury, such as disorientation, headache or amnesia.

As with a typical EEG, the test doesn’t cause any type of sensation or risk. There is a small chance of skin irritation from the discs that read the electrical activity.

Although an exact cost hasn’t been set by BrainScope, the maker of the device, the company says it will be a fraction of the cost of a CT scanner, which starts at $90,000 and goes up to $2.5 million depending on the capabilities, and it will be cheaper and significantly faster to administer. In September 2016, the device was cleared by the Food and Drug Administration for use in a clinical setting.

Source:Science Daily

{Findings suggest that excessive consumption of some food supplements may have undesirable effects on subsequent generations}

The father’s lifestyle affects the cognitive skills of his offspring — at least in mice. Scientists at the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) have now shown that if male rodents are fed a diet rich in folic acid, methionine and vitamin B12, their progeny do not perform well in memory tests. The diet influences so-called epigenetic patterns in the genome, and this reprogramming is transferred to some degree to the next generation through the sperm. This suggests that the intake of high concentrations of such methyl donors could also have side effects in humans, for example if they consume excessive amounts of energy drinks or folic acid pills. Dan Ehninger and colleagues report on these findings in the journal Molecular Psychiatry.

Evidence is accumulating, at least in animal studies, that child development is affected not only by the mother’s diet and lifestyle prior to conception, but also by environmental factors the father is exposed to. For example, if male rodents are put on a diet particularly rich in fats, they will pass on a tendency to become diabetic to their offspring. One possible cause for phenomena like this are diet-induced DNA methylation changes, i.e. alterations in tiny chemical tags attached to the DNA that can control the activity of genes. If particularly large quantities of these methyl tags are supplied in the diet, this may hamper the expression of genes affected by increased DNA methylation.

The effects of a methyl donor-rich diet

“For a long time, it was assumed that these paternal epigenetic marks are erased completely after the fusion of sperm and egg cell,” explains Dr. Dan Ehninger, who leads a research group at the DZNE’s Bonn site. However, we know today that part of the paternal DNA methylation survives this process. In collaboration with colleagues at the Helmholtz Zentrum München and the Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices, Ehninger’s team examined whether these epigenetic changes are associated with cognitive alterations in offspring mice. Towards this end, the scientists put male mice on a diet rich in methyl donors and cofactors required for methyl group metabolism: This diet contained high concentrations of methionine, folic acid, vitamin B12, choline, betaine and zinc. A second group of male rodents was given a standard diet. After six weeks, the male mice were mated with female mice and their offspring subjected to careful analyses. The result: the offspring of the male mice fed with methyl donors performed less well in all learning and memory tests. “We were able to show that even a transient change in the paternal diet can cause impaired learning skills in offspring. This affected in particular the ability to properly learn a spatial navigation task,” says Ehninger.

Abnormalities were found not only in the animals’ behavior, but also in their brains: Nerve connections in the hippocampus — a brain region which is important for memory — reacted quite sluggishly to electrical stimuli, indicating that their adaptiveness — the so-called neuronal plasticity — was impaired in offspring mice. In line with this, a gene called “Kcnmb2” which is involved in neuroplasticity, was downregulated in progeny of the fathers that received the methyl donor-rich diet.

Excessive amounts of food supplements could have side effects

All this are merely results of animal experiments. However, humans can also be exposed to high doses of methyl donors, says Ehninger. This may apply in particular to countries like the USA, where there is a widespread consumption of products fortified with folic acid. “Methyl donor deficiencies are well known to have adverse health consequences that can be prevented with dietary supplements. However, our study suggests that excessive consumption may be associated with adverse effects as well,” says the scientist. In the future, he intends to determine whether epigenetic traits can also be passed on by humans to their offspring and which environmental factors may have an influence on this. Does the father’s age alter DNA methylation patterns, thus influencing health of the next generation? Ehninger reckons: “To date, such epigenetic mechanisms and their intergenerational influences have certainly received too little attention.”

Source:Science Daily

{When you look at your nails, what do you see? Do you see dirty and unappealing nails or are your hands blessed with healthy looking nails.}

You too can have those wonderful nails that you’ve been dreaming of.

{{1. Keep your nails dry and clean }}

It’s important to keep your nails dry, as prolonged contact with water can weaken your nails and contribute to split fingernails. So make sure you wipe your hands dry with water after contact with water.

Keeping your fingers dry and clean will also prevent the growth and spread of bacteria.

{{2. Observe good diet }}

Foods rich in iron, vitamin D and calcium are very important if you want healthy looking nails. Fragile nails could be caused by iron deficiencies. Eat foods like liver, egg yolks, vegetables, dairy products and beans.

{{3. Trim your nails }}

Practice good hygiene by trimming your nails with a nail cutter and not your teeth, to keep your nails low and give it a good shape.

{{4. Moisturize your hands and nails }}

Apply your hand lotion into your nails and cuticle to keep it well moisturised.

{{5. Wash your hands}}

Whenever you handle greasy and oily substances or any dirty substance that can soil your nails, make sure you wash your hands very well when you are done.

Your nails are very important to your hands, so they ought to be clean and healthy.

Source:Elcrema

{Mayo Clinic researchers used electrical stimulation on the spinal cord and intense physical therapy to help a man intentionally move his paralyzed legs, stand and make steplike motions for the first time in three years.}

The case, the result of collaboration with UCLA researchers, appears in Mayo Clinic Proceedings. Researchers say these results offer further evidence that a combination of this technology and rehabilitation may help patients with spinal cord injuries regain control over previously paralyzed movements, such as steplike actions, balance control and standing.

“We’re really excited, because our results went beyond our expectations,” says neurosurgeon Kendall Lee, M.D., Ph.D., principal investigator and director of Mayo Clinic’s Neural Engineering Laboratory. “These are initial findings, but the patient is continuing to make progress.”

The 26-year-old patient injured his spinal cord at the sixth thoracic vertebrae in the middle of his back three years earlier. He was diagnosed with a motor complete spinal cord injury, meaning he could not move or feel anything below the middle of his torso.

The study started with the patient going through 22 weeks of physical therapy. He had three training sessions a week to prepare his muscles for attempting tasks during spinal cord stimulation. He was tested for changes regularly. Some results led researchers to characterize his injury further as discomplete, suggesting dormant connections across his injury may remain.

Following physical therapy, he underwent surgery to implant an electrode in the epidural space near the spinal cord below the injured area. The electrode is connected to a computer-controlled device under the skin in the patient’s abdomen. This device, for which Mayo Clinic received permission from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for off-label use, sends electrical current to the spinal cord, enabling the patient to create movement.

After a three-week recovery period from surgery, the patient resumed physical therapy with stimulation settings adjusted to enable movements. In the first two weeks, he intentionally was able to:

Control his muscles while lying on his side, resulting in leg movements
Make steplike motions while lying on his side and standing with partial support
Stand independently using his arms on support bars for balance Intentional, or volitional, movement means the patient’s brain is sending a signal to motor neurons in his spinal cord to move his legs purposefully.
“This has really set the tone for our post-surgical rehabilitation — trying to use that function the patient recovered to drive even more return of abilities,” says Kristin Zhao, Ph.D., co-principal investigator and director of Mayo Clinic’s Assistive and Restorative Technology Laboratory.

The Mayo researchers worked closely with the team of V. Reggie Edgerton, Ph.D., at UCLA on this study, which replicates earlier research done at the University of Louisville. The Mayo study marks the first time a patient intentionally controlled previously paralyzed functions within the first two weeks of stimulation.

The data suggest that people with discomplete spinal cord injuries may be candidates for epidural stimulation therapy. However, more research is needed into how a discomplete injury contributes to recovering function.

Teams from Mayo Clinic’s departments of Neurosurgery and Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, and the Division of Engineering collaborated on this project.

“While these are early results, it speaks to how Mayo Clinic researchers relentlessly pursue discoveries and innovative solutions that address the unmet needs of patients,” says Gregory Gores, M.D., executive dean of research, Mayo Clinic. “These teams highlight Mayo Clinic’s unique culture of collaboration, which brings together scientists and physician experts who work side by side to accelerate scientific discoveries into critical advances for patient care.”

Source:Science Daily

{Insufficient sleep, a common problem that has been linked to chronic disease risk, might also be an unrecognized risk factor for bone loss. Results of a new study will be presented Saturday at the Endocrine Society’s 99th annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.}

The study investigators found that healthy men had reduced levels of a marker of bone formation in their blood after three weeks of cumulative sleep restriction and circadian disruption, similar to that seen in jet lag or shift work, while a biological marker of bone resorption, or breakdown, was unchanged.

“This altered bone balance creates a potential bone loss window that could lead to osteoporosis and bone fractures,” lead investigator Christine Swanson, M.D., an assistant professor at the University of Colorado in Aurora, Colo., said. Swanson completed the research while she was a fellow at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, Ore., with Drs. Eric S. Orwoll and Steven A. Shea.

“If chronic sleep disturbance is identified as a new risk factor for osteoporosis, it could help explain why there is no clear cause for osteoporosis in the approximately 50 percent of the estimated 54 million Americans with low bone mass or osteoporosis,” Swanson said.

Inadequate sleep is also prevalent, affecting more than 25 percent of the U.S. population occasionally and 10 percent frequently, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report.

The 10 men in this study were part of a larger study that some of Swanson’s co-authors conducted in 2012 at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Mass. That study evaluated health consequences of sleep restriction combined with circadian disruption. Swanson defined circadian disruption as “a mismatch between your internal body clock and the environment caused by living on a shorter or longer day than 24 hours.”

Study subjects stayed in a lab, where for three weeks they went to sleep each day four hours later than the prior day, resulting in a 28-hour “day.” Swanson likened this change to “flying four time zones west every day for three weeks.” The men were allowed to sleep only 5.6 hours per 24-hour period, since short sleep is also common for night and shift workers. While awake, the men ate the same amounts of calories and nutrients throughout the study. Blood samples were obtained at baseline and again after the three weeks of sleep manipulation for measurement of bone biomarkers. Six of the men were ages 20 to 27, and the other four were ages 55 to 65. Limited funding prevented the examination of serum from the women in this study initially, but the group plans to investigate sex differences in the sleep-bone relationship in subsequent studies.

After three weeks, all men had significantly reduced levels of a bone formation marker called P1NP compared with baseline, the researchers reported. This decline was greater for the younger men than the older men: a 27 percent versus 18 percent decrease. She added that levels of the bone resorption marker CTX remained unchanged, an indication that old bone could break down without new bone being formed.

“These data suggest that sleep disruption may be most detrimental to bone metabolism earlier in life, when bone growth and accrual are crucial for long-term skeletal health,” she said. “Further studies are needed to confirm these findings and to explore if there are differences in women.”

Source:Science Daily

{Instant noodles are perhaps one of the most sought after foods by people around the world. They have really unique tastes and smells, they are easy to make, and above all, like the name implies, they are a fast food. But despite all these added values that come with noodles, they also have their negative sides. Let me show you some things about instant noodles that make them unsafe for you.}

* Noodles inhibit the absorption of nutrients for children under 5.

* There is an ingredient in instant noodles called ‘Styrofoam’. This substance has been said to cause cancer.

* Instant noodles are mostly enriched with carbohydrates, but no vitamins, fiber and minerals. This makes them junk foods. Junk foods are unhealthy.

* Instant noodles are power packed with high amounts of sodium. Excess consumption of sodium can lead to heart disease, stroke, hypertension and kidney damage.

* A substance known as Monosodium Glutamate (MSG) is used to enhance the flavour of instant noodles. Some people react badly to MSG, and for people like this, when consumed, they end up suffering from headaches, facial flushing, pain, burning sensations.

* Perhaps you didn’t know this — eating noodles is the leading cause of obesity. Noodles contain fat and large amounts of sodium, which causes water retention in the body and surely it leads to overweight, and of course, you know how dangerous obesity can be. It can lead to heart complications.

* Instant noodles are bad for the digestive system. A regular consumption of instant noodles can cause one irregular bowl movements and bloating.

* A regular consumption of instant noodles can tend to affect the body’s metabolism, because of the chemical substances they’re made with, like additives, coloring and preservatives inside the noodles.

Alright, so now you know what dangers you may be exposing yourself to when you consume instant noodles excessively. Remember it’s not really eating it that’s the problem. It’s your addiction and excessive consumption of it.

Source:Elcrema

{Doctors for the first time can determine which medication is more likely to help a patient overcome depression, according to research that pushes the medical field beyond what has essentially been a guessing game of prescribing antidepressants.}

A blood test that measures a certain type of protein level provides an immediate tool for physicians who until now have relied heavily on patient questionnaires to choose a treatment, said Dr. Madhukar Trivedi, who led the research at UT Southwestern Medical Center’s Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care.

“Currently, our selection of depression medications is not any more superior than flipping a coin, and yet that is what we do. Now we have a biological explanation to guide treatment of depression,” said Dr. Trivedi, Director of the depression center, a cornerstone of UT Southwestern’s Peter O’Donnell Jr. Brain Institute.

The study demonstrated that measuring a patient’s C-reactive protein (CRP) levels through a simple finger-prick blood test can help doctors prescribe a medication that is more likely to work. Utilizing this test in clinical visits could lead to a significant boost in the success rate of depressed patients who commonly struggle to find effective treatments.

A major national study Dr. Trivedi led more than a decade ago (STAR*D) gives insight into the prevalence of the problem: Up to a third of depressed patients don’t improve during their first medication, and about 40 percent of people who start taking antidepressants stop taking them within three months.

“This outcome happens because they give up,” said Dr. Trivedi, whose previous national study established widely accepted treatment guidelines for depressed patients. “Giving up hope is really a central symptom of the disease. However, if treatment selection is tied to a blood test and improves outcomes, patients are more likely to continue the treatment and achieve the benefit.”

The new research published in Psychoneuroendocrinology measured remission rates of more than 100 depressed patients prescribed either escitalopram alone or escitalopram plus bupropion. Researchers found a strong correlation between CRP levels and which drug regimen improved their symptoms:

For patients whose CRP levels were less than 1 milligram per liter, escitalopram alone was more effective: 57 percent remission rate compared to less than 30 percent on the other drug.
For patients with higher CRP levels, escitalopram plus bupropion was more likely to work: 51 percent remission rate compared to 33 percent on escitalopram alone.
Dr. Trivedi noted that these results could readily apply to other commonly used antidepressants.

“These findings provide evidence that a biological test can immediately be used in clinical practice,” he said.

Dr. Trivedi identified CRP as a potential marker for depression treatments because it has been an effective measure of inflammation for other disorders such as cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

While previous research to establish CRP as an antidepressant marker used levels three to five times higher than the latest study, “my theory was that you don’t need that high of an inflammation to experience the sickness of depression,” Dr. Trivedi said. “Even a little inflammation may be sufficient for the patients to experience some of these symptoms of depression.”

The next step is to conduct larger studies to verify CRP’s role with other antidepressants and find alternative markers where CRP does not prove effective. Dr. Trivedi said these studies could lead to additional useful biological tests that can be used in practice.

“Both patients and primary-care providers are very desperately looking for markers that would indicate there is some biology involved in this disease. Otherwise, we are talking about deciding treatments from question-and-answer from the patients, and that is not sufficient,” said Dr. Trivedi, a Professor of Psychiatry who holds the Betty Jo Hay Distinguished Chair in Mental Health and is the inaugural holder of the Julie K. Hersh Chair for Depression Research and Clinical Care.

The data reviewed for the study came from the CO-MED trial, which was funded by the National Institute of Mental Health. The work was also supported through UT Southwestern’s Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care and The Hersh Foundation.

Other UT Southwestern researchers include Dr. Manish Jha, Dr. Abu Taher Minhajuddin, Dr. Bharathi Gadad, Dr. Tracy Greer, Bruce Grannemann, Dr. Abigail Soyombo and Taryn Mayes. Dr. A. John Rush, Professor Emeritus, Duke-National University of Singapore also collaborated on the publication.

“With advances in technology and our understanding of the biology of depression, our ongoing work with additional biomarkers is likely to yield tests for other subtypes of depression,” said Dr. Jha, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry.

Source:Science Daily

{Clinical trials found that it is safe to regularly infuse brain and lung cancer patients with 800 — 1000 times the daily recommended amount of vitamin C as a potential strategy to improve outcomes of standard cancer treatments. In a work presented March 30, 2017 in Cancer Cell, University of Iowa researchers also show pathways by which altered iron metabolism in cancer cells, and not normal cells, lead to increased sensitivity to cancer cell death caused by high dose vitamin C.}

“This paper reveals a metabolic frailty in cancer cells that is based on their own production of oxidizing agents that allows us to utilize existing redox active compounds, like vitamin C, to sensitize cancer cells to radiation and chemotherapy,” says co-author Garry Buettner, who was one of the first to propose that cancer cells might have a vulnerability to redox active compounds over 40 years ago. Buettner, along with study senior authors Bryan Allen and Douglas Spitz, are faculty members at the University of Iowa’s Department of Radiation Oncology, Free Radical and Radiation Biology Program, in the Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The 11 evaluable patients enrolled in the brain cancer safety trial received three infusions of vitamin C a week for 2 months followed by two infusions per week for 7 months while receiving standard care radiation and chemotherapy. The goal of each infusion was to raise the concentration of vitamin C in a patient’s blood to 20,000 μM, as compared to a blood level of about 70 μM found in most adults. The high dose is necessary because vitamin C has a half-life of about two hours in the circulation of humans. The treatment was generally well tolerated; with modest side effects including frequent trips to the bathroom and dry mouth. Rarely, some patients developed high blood pressure that subsided quickly following infusion.

Why is this approach safe? Vitamin C, even at high levels, isn’t toxic to normal cells. The research group at Iowa found, however, that tumor tissue’s abnormally high levels of redox active iron molecules (a by-product of abnormal mitochondrial metabolism) react with vitamin C to form hydrogen peroxide and free radicals derived from hydrogen peroxide. These free radicals are believed to cause DNA damage selectively in cancer cells (versus normal cells) leading to enhanced cancer cell death as well as sensitization to radiation and chemotherapy in cancer cells.

“This is a significant example of how knowing details of potential mechanisms and the basic science of redox active compounds in cancer versus normal cells can be leveraged clinically in cancer therapy,” says co-senior author Douglas Spitz, who focused on the biochemical studies. “Here, we verified convincingly that increased redox active metal ions in cancer cells were responsible for this differential sensitivity of cancer versus normal cells to very high doses of vitamin C.”

The safety study sets the stage for phase II clinical trials looking at whether high dose vitamin C is effective at extending overall lifespan and quality of life for patients undergoing radiation and chemotherapy. The researchers are currently enrolling patients with stage 4 lung cancer and will soon begin enrolling people with glioblastoma multiforme (brain cancer) in these phase II trials. They are hopeful that brain cancer responses to radiation and chemotherapy can be enhanced in these phase II trials. This guarded optimism is based on the phase I trial data showing an increase in overall survival of 4-6 months in 11 glioblastoma multiforme patients (18-22 months) versus the 14-16 months survival typically seen with the standard treatment.

“The majority of cancer patients we work with are excited to participate in clinical trials that could benefit future patient outcomes down the line,” says co-senior author Bryan Allen, who led the clinical side of the study. “Results look promising but we’re not going to know if this approach really improves therapy response until we complete these phase II trials.”

The cost per patient above standard insurance billing for the phase II vitamin C glioblastoma multiforme protocol is approximately $8000 spread over 9 months of test infusions. This cost can be less than a single dose of some immunotherapy and/or chemotherapy drugs.

Source:Science Daily

{Suffering through a cold is annoying enough, but if you’re lonely, you’re likely to feel even worse, according to Rice University researchers.}

A study led by Rice psychologist Chris Fagundes and graduate student Angie LeRoy indicated people who feel lonely are more prone to report that their cold symptoms are more severe than those who have stronger social networks.

“Loneliness puts people at risk for premature mortality and all kinds of other physical illnesses,” LeRoy said. “But nothing had been done to look at an acute but temporary illness that we’re all vulnerable to, like the common cold.”

The study is the subject of a paper published this week in Health Psychology.

The researchers drew a distinction between feeling lonely and actual social isolation.

“This paper is about the quality of your relationships, not the quantity,” LeRoy said. “You can be in a crowded room and feel lonely. That perception is what seems to be important when it comes to these cold symptoms.”

Carrying out this task meant finding lonely people, isolating them — and giving them a cold.

A total of 159 people age 18-55, nearly 60 percent of them men, were assessed for their psychological and physical health, given cold-inducing nasal drops and quarantined for five days in hotel rooms.

The participants, scored in advance on the Short Loneliness Scale and the Social Network Index, were monitored during and after the five-day stay. After adjusting for demographics like gender and age, the season, depressive affect and social isolation, the results showed those who felt lonely were no more likely to get a cold than those who weren’t.

But those who were screened in advance for their level of loneliness and became infected — not all of the participants did — reported a greater severity of symptoms than those recorded in previous studies used as controls. The size of the participants’ social networks appeared to have no bearing on how sick they felt.

“Previous research has shown that different psycho-social factors like feeling rejected or feeling left out or not having strong social bonds with other people do make people feel worse physically, mentally and emotionally,” LeRoy said. “So we had that general framework to work with.”

The effect may be the same for those under other kinds of stress, Fagundes said. “Anytime you have an illness, it’s a stressor, and this phenomenon would probably occur,” he said. “A predisposition, whether it’s physical or mental, can be exaggerated by a subsequent stressor. In this case, the subsequent stressor is getting sick, but it could be the loss of a loved one, or getting breast cancer, which are subjects we also study.

“What makes this study so novel is the tight experimental design. It’s all about a particular predisposition (loneliness) interacting with a particular stressor,” he said.

“Doctors should take psychological factors into account at intake on a regular basis,” Fagundes said. “It would definitely help them understand the phenomenon when the person comes in sick.”

“We think this is important, particularly because of the economic burden associated with the common cold,” LeRoy added. “Millions of people miss work each year because of it. And that has to do with how they feel, not necessarily with how much they’re blowing their noses.”

The findings are also an incentive to be more socially active, she said. “If you build those networks — consistently working on them and your relationships — when you do fall ill, it may not feel so bad.”

{{

}}

Source:Science Daily