12/03/08
A New Pill for Jet Lag
Is there a medical condition more emblematic of the modern age than jet lag? Dislocated and deadened, the sleep-starved traveler wanders through meetings or tourist sites in a somnambulant haze. Now an experimental drug promises to reset the body's internal clock and banish jet lag zombies for good — and, surprise, it comes in a pill. More...
12/03/08
Radiologists read scans better
Radiologists in the study said they read CT scans more meticulously and felt more empathy when they saw a patient's face, although it's not clear whether the photo actually improved their accuracy in interpreting the test results.
Yehonatan N. Turner, M.D., a radiology resident at Shaare Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem, Israel, came up with the idea of adding photos to patients' files after reading dozens of CT scans as a medical resident. "I noticed that I know the patient's liver and spleen better than I know him," he says. "I thought maybe attaching the patient's photograph to the file may make the scan unique and important." More...
12/03/08
Mentally Ill Die Younger
Cynthia Scott is your average health conscious 56-year-old. She watches what she eats, drinks lots of water and takes a multivitamin every morning. She goes for frequent walks and visits her doctor regularly for check-ups, including cholesterol and diabetes screenings. More...
12/03/08
Less sun, more depression
Cootey, a stay-at-home dad in Salt Lake City, Utah, has struggled with depression for 16 years and shares his story with others on his blog, The Splintered Mind.
He said he started to notice last year that his depression was harder to manage in the winter. His challenge, he told CNN, is "keeping a positive and upbeat attitude in the face of a chemical onslaught induced by winter." More...
12/02/08
Avoid germs while traveling
Gendreau studies germiness while traveling, and he knows just how infectious travel can be.
"The risk of contracting a contagious illness is heightened when we travel within any enclosed space, especially during the winter months, when most of the respiratory viruses thrive," Gendreau said.
Studies show that germs can travel easily on an airplane, where people are packed together like sardines. More...
12/02/08
Allergic and wheezing
Her 30-pound pug and orange tabby scattered dead skin flakes around the house, triggering Coronado's allergic reactions. Her two daughters are also allergic, but their reactions are less severe.
Like the 10 million American pet owners with allergies, the Coronados faced a dilemma: Can human and dog co-exist in the same house?
"We love them," said Coronado about her family's pets. "They're adorable. They're really our babies. They're part of the family. We could never live without them." More...
12/02/08
Tainted milk deaths rise
Six Chinese infants may have died from consuming melamine-tainted milk powder, twice the number previously reported by the government, the Ministry of Health said Monday.
The Ministry of Health said it has screened more than 22 million infants and children since September 10 and found that contaminated milk has sickened nearly 300,000 children -- a six-fold increase from the previous total of about 50,000.
China's health officials had investigated 11 infant death cases and ruled out a connection to the tainted milk powder in all but six of those. The government had previously confirmed three infant deaths linked to tainted milk. More...
12/02/08
Protect your family from food poisoning
Today, the Food and Drug Administration announced that it has made “significant process” in keeping our food supply safe. As you may remember, about a year ago, the FDA launched its Food Protection Plan to protect both domestic and imported food from contamination. The plan came about after a number of high-profile cases including the outbreak of E. coli in spinach in California and the discovery of melamine in food from China. Among its accomplishments, says the FDA, is establishing offices in regions of the world where the US imports lots of food and other FDA-regulated products: China, India, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. The FDA has also OK’d the irradiation of iceberg lettuce and spinach for the control of E. coli. Critics have mixed feelings. “It’s a good thing,” says Bill Hubbard of the Alliance for a Stronger FDA. But Hubbard adds, “The key thing is if it will be funded.” More...
12/01/08
Doctors may give up vaccines
About one in 10 doctors who vaccinate privately insured children are considering dropping that service largely because they are losing money when they do it, according to a new survey.
A second survey revealed startling differences between what doctors pay for vaccines and what private health insurers reimburse: For example, one in 10 doctors lost money on one recommended infant vaccine, but others made almost $40 per dose on the same shot. More...
12/01/08
FDA sets 'safe' levels
"Amounts of the industrial chemical melamine or the melamine-like compound called cyanuric acid that are below 1.0 ppm [1,000 parts per billion] do not raise public health concerns," said Stephen Sundlof, the FDA's director of the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition.
When it became known in September that thousands of babies in China had been sickened by tainted infant formula, the FDA ordered the testing of U.S.-manufactured infant-formula products. More...
12/01/08
World AIDS Day 2008
When we commemorated the first World AIDS Day on December 1, 1988, we had little to celebrate.
The number of reported AIDS cases in the United States was nearing 80,000 and rising rapidly. Untold thousands more in this country were living with the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV. Globally, AIDS cases already had been reported from more than 135 countries. An AIDS tsunami clearly was looming, but we had few defenses at our disposal. More...
12/01/08
Challenges for eating disorder
She pulled a tray from the oven and sat down with her 9-year-old son, Drew, to frost the treats.
Then, Shock did something that might have been unthinkable for her a few years ago. She took a bite of a cookie.
Shock, 36, of Kennesaw, Georgia, spent most of her adolescence and early adulthood struggling with bulimia and an addiction to diet pills.
Long holiday seasons were always the worst, Shock said, as she dealt with the stress of trying to create a picture-perfect Thanksgiving and Christmas for her family. More...