Category: Medicine

Prostate cancer laser therapy ‘huge leap forward’

A drug activated by laser light which successfully destroys early prostate cancer while avoiding surgery side effects has been labelled a “huge leap” forward. Trial results reflected favourably on the new technique, called vascular-targeted photodynamic therapy , in comparison to standard prostate cancer care.

Call for investigation as 20 young Scots a day rejected for mental health care

NEARLY 20 children and teenagers a day in Scotland are being turned away from mental health services, amid warnings that inappropriate referrals are clogging waiting lists and young people are being left to deteriorate before finally undergoing treatment. Neil Findlay, convener of the Scottish Parliament’s Health and Sport Committee called for an investigation after 6,931 referrals to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services were rejected in 2015.

How to party on – without the hangover

… number from 10 years ago. And while more of us than ever are employing the help of professionals when it comes to our health (a recent report charted a 272 per cent increase in independent nutritionists and dieticians over the past five years), the …

New Ovarian Cancer Drug Wins Speedy FDA Approval

U.S. health officials have approved a new option for some women battling ovarian cancer: a drug that targets a genetic mutation seen in a subset of hard-to-treat tumors. The Food and Drug Administration cleared the drug, Rubraca, from Clovis Oncology Inc. for women in advanced stages of the disease who have already tried at least two chemotherapy drugs.

Ontario Proposes New Thre Year Plan To OMA

December, Ontario shared with the Ontario Medical Association a proposed three-year plan that would improve patient access to care, provide more support for family physicians, and build stability into Ontario’s health-care budget. Under the terms of the proposed plan, patients would receive more timely access to family physicians; family doctors would receive additional support; and fees paid to specialists would be reduced for certain procedures that can now be conducted with greater ease and at lesser cost.

TGA decision will boost Maxigesic sales in Australia

The Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration has today confirmed an interim decision that all medicines containing codeine be rescheduled to prescription-only medicines effective 1 February 2018. The TGA will up-schedule these products due to the risk of dependence and adverse events compared to safer analgesic products also available over-the-counter, including paracetamol-ibuprofen combinations such as Maxigesic .

Taking Psychiatric Meds Is Way More Common Than You Think

Even though there’s been a lot of buzz about destigmatizing mental health issues lately-everyone from Demi Lovato to Selena Gomez has been open about their ongoing struggles-we still have a long way to go in terms of normalizing seeking help for mental disorders. That’s why we were interested to see new research that appeared earlier this month in JAMA Internal Medicine , which examined exactly how many people in the United States are taking antidepressants, anxiety meds, and anti-psychotic medications.

Increased Cases Of Respiratory Illness In Barbados

The Ministry of Health in a statement did not give figures to indicate the number of cases, but noted that “for the subset of cases tested, the causative organism was not the flu virus but mostly Respiratory Syncytial Virus . “Nevertheless, PAHO has advised that the incidence of seasonal flu is starting to increase in North America and sporadic cases are also being seen in neighbouring islands.”

FDA Drops Boxed Warning From Chantix Label

… be observed for the occurrence of such symptoms and should be instructed to discontinue varenicline and contact a health care provider if they experience such symptoms. The E valuating A dverse Events in a GL obal Smoking C E ssation S tudy (EAGLES) …

ContraVir expands mid-stage study of tenofovir prodrug analog into higher dose

ContraVir Pharmaceuticals broadens its ongoing Phase 2a study evaluating tenofovir exalidex against Gilead Sciences’ tenofovir disoproxil fumarate in patients with chronic hepatitis B virus infection by increasing the highest planned dose to 150 mg/day from 100 mg/day. The 84-subject sequential dose escalation study is assessing once-daily doses of TXL for four weeks against 300 mg of TDF once daily.

Therapy Focus – Immunotherapy Closes In On Triple-Negative Tumors

Celgene admitted as much last week by saying it would not push a promising Abraxane-containing chemotherapy regimen into pivotal trials in this Several studies are already under way, most notably a large first-line phase III trial of Abraxane plus Roche’s anti-PD-L1 antibody Tecentriq. Early data are encouraging, and hopes are high that meaningful survival benefits will emerge in the next couple of years.

Woman is first to have baby after ovaries frozen as a child

A 24-year-old Dubai native has become the first woman to give birth after having her fertility restored from ovarian tissue frozen during her childhood. She is the first person in the world to have had a successful pregnancy using ovarian tissue that was harvested before the onset of puberty and the only person to have her ovaries transplanted back after 13 years in storage.

Advertisers and crib manufacturers fail to adhere to safe sleep recommendations for infants

A new study from the University of Alabama at Birmingham shows that national magazine advertisements and manufacturers of infant cribs continue to depict unsafe sleep environments, despite longtime guidelines established by the American Academy of Pediatrics to protect against SIDS and other sleep-related deaths. “It is important that health care providers, advertisers and crib manufacturers come together to educate parents and caregivers about safe sleep environments for children,” said Bradley Troxler, M.D., assistant professor and director of the UAB Pediatric Pulmonary Center who treats patients at Children’s of Alabama.

DPP IV Inhibitors

… Global Diabetes Expenditure: Opportunity Indicator for DPP-IV Inhibitor Market………….. II-5 Table 3: Global Health Expenditure on Diabetes by Region (2015): Spending (in US$ Billion) by People Diagnosed with Diabetes in the Age Group 20-79 …

Press release distribution, EDGAR filing, XBRL, regulatory filings

Pfizer Receives Approval in the European Union for Nimenrix in Infants Six Weeks of Age and Older )–Pfizer Inc. announced today the European Commission has approved an expanded indication for Nimenrixa Approved as First Anti-PD-1 Therapy in Japan for First-Line Treatment of Patients with Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Whose Tumors Express High Levels of PD-L1 )–KEYTRUDA Approved as First Anti-PD-1 Therapy in Japan for First-Line Treatment of Patients with Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Whose Tumors Express H… )–Madame Tussauds and country superstar Brad Paisley joined forces to pay tribute to Grand Ole Opry legend Little Jimmy Dickens by unveiling his wax figure on the R… )–Manitowoc Foodservice announces SVP, General Counsel and Secretary Maurice Jones retirement; promotes Joel Horn to SVP, General Counsel and Secretary effecti… )–Mitsubishi UFJ Capital, a … (more)

Home buyer plan short-term gain for long-term pain

Premier Christy Clark’s home-buyers plan is short-term gain for the B.C. Liberal Party and long-term pain for both those who borrow money from the government, taxpayers and the entire B.C. housing market . But for Clark this is all about getting re-elected next May. Who cares if some first-time home buyers can’t make their mortgage payments and lose their houses down the road? What’s it to her if housing prices go up for everyone because the B.C. government plan will reduce already limited supply? As flimflams go, this one is impressively slippery and a lucrative Christmas present to the B.C. Liberals’ biggest donors the real estate industry .

Elder Cosmetic Surgery

… she spent the insurance money on it. She said she wanted to look good.” That’s one thing about plastic surgery – health care insurance does not pay. It’s a cash-only business with prices as high as the traffic will bear. Another thing about plastic …

Hepatitis C is commonly spread by sharing needles and can hide for years without producing symptoms

HEPATITIS C remains a ‘major public health problem’ in the North West with more than 1,400 people infected in Bolton. According to Public Health England’s latest figures, it is estimated that 2,063 people in Bolton have been infected with Hep C. A proportion clear the infection themselves but the latest figures, collated in 2014, show 1,423 still had the infection and 388 received treatment.

Threshold Pharmaceuticals and National Cancer Institute to Collaborate on Drug Candidate TH-3424

Threshold Pharmaceuticals, Inc. , a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing novel therapies for cancer, today announced that it has entered into a collaboration with the National Cancer Institute , part of the National Institutes of Health , to study TH-3424, the company’s new drug candidate for the treatment of cancer. The collaboration will explore the effects of TH-3424 against T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia xenograft cell lines with high AKR1C3 expression.

This drugmaker is taking an unprecedented approach to getting its cancer treatment approved

As researchers look for new approaches for tough-to-treat cancer, many are looking into genetics – more specifically, they’re looking at the type of genetic mutations found in cancerous tumors. One company in particular, called Loxo Oncology is building drugs that act on those mutations, so that the type of cancer someone has wouldn’t matter so much as the genetic information gleaned from sequencing the tumor.

WebMD Predicts Cold and Flu Symptoms to Rise During the Holidays

Visitors can see a county-by-county breakdown of the cities currently impacted by cold and flu symptoms, as well as those cities expected to see an increase in the weeks ahead, on the WebMD Cold and Flu Interactive Map. According to the WebMD Cold and Flu Map, the top five cities anticipated to experience the highest levels of cold and flu symptoms are Sponsored by RB, a leading consumer health and hygiene company, the WebMD Cold and Flu interactive map leverages various data sources, including millions of WebMD Symptom Checker checks per month, to present a real-time analysis of the spread of cold and flu so that consumers can take preventative measures to keep themselves and their families healthy during the holidays.