Concussions among US adolescents

During our waking hours, the brain is receiving a near-constant influx of sensory signals of various strengths. For decades, scientists have wondered why some signals rise to the light of conscious awareness while other signals of a similar strength remain in the dark shadows of unconsciousness. What controls the gate that separates the shadows and the light? In a new study from the Department of Anesthesiology and Center for Consciousness Science at Michigan Medicine, researchers identify a key area in the cortex that appears to be the gate of conscious awareness. "Information processing in the brain ...

WASHINGTON, May 4, 2021 -- Spinal fusion is frequently performed to restore spinal stability in patients with spinal diseases, such as spinal stenosis, vertebral fractures, progressive deformities, and instability. In the past two decades, there has been marked increase in the number of people over 65 years in age who have needed spinal fusion surgery. While autogenous bone grafts have long been considered the reference standard for spinal fusion, painful pseudoarthrosis remains a leading cause of poor clinical outcomes. Many researchers have consequently focused on ...

WASHINGTON, May 4, 2021 -- Scientists from Texas A&M have developed an extension to an ordinary cellphone that turns it into an instrument capable of detecting chemicals, drugs, biological molecules, and pathogens. The advance is reported in Reviews of Scientific Instruments, by AIP Publishing. Modern cellphones include high-quality cameras capable of detecting low levels of light and eliminating digital noise through software processing of the captured images. Recent work has taken advantage of this sensitivity to produce cellphone cameras that ...

SAN ANTONIO (May 4, 2021) - Risk-reducing mastectomy saves lives of women who, because of hereditary or other risk factors, may have a very high lifetime risk of developing breast cancer, according to two new journal articles written to guide physicians and patients. All of these women should also discuss with their physicians nonsurgical options such as screening and medications to reach the best, customized treatment strategy, the essays mention. Both articles, published May 4 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), are by END ...

WHO Benjamin Rome, MD, Instructor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and researcher in the Program On Regulation, Therapeutics, And Law (PORTAL) in the Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics, Brigham and Women's Hospital; corresponding author of a paper published in JAMA Network Open. WHAT When drug manufacturers raise the list price for brand-name prescription drugs, do patients' out-of-pocket costs rise too? A new study published in JAMA Network Open by Dr. Benjamin Rome and colleagues in the Brigham's Division of Pharmacoepidemiology and Pharmacoeconomics finds that more than half of patients may experience increases in out-of-pocket spending when drug ...

BOSTON - Researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) appear to have solved the 120-year-old mystery surrounding the failing health of famed Antarctic explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton over the course of his daring expeditions to Antarctica in the early part of the twentieth century. In a paper published online in the END ...

Researchers have found that people who live beyond 105 years tend to have a unique genetic background that makes their bodies more efficient at repairing DNA, according to a study published today in eLife. This is the first time that people with 'extreme longevity' have had their genomes decoded in such detail, providing clues as to why they live so long and manage to avoid age-related diseases. "Aging is a common risk factor for several chronic diseases and conditions," explains Paolo Garagnani, Associate Professor at the Department of Experimental, Diagnostic ...

Studying protein changes in the kidneys as we age, as well as the transcription of genes into proteins, helps provide a full picture of the age-related processes that take place in these organs, says a study in mice published today in eLife. Aging causes many changes in the body and in essential organs such as the kidneys, which function less efficiently later in life. Age-related changes in the kidneys have mostly been reported by looking at the transcription of genes - the process by which a segment of DNA is copied into RNA. The current study suggests that this approach, combined with studying changes in proteins, gives us a better understanding of age-related changes in the kidney and may point to new approaches for treating ...

TAMPA, Fla. (May 4, 2021) -- Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation, or rTMS, was FDA approved in 2008 as a safe and effective noninvasive treatment for severe depression resistant to antidepressant medications. A small coil positioned near the scalp generates repetitive, pulsed magnetic waves that pass through the skull and stimulate brain cells to relieve symptoms of depression. The procedure has few side effects and is typically prescribed as an alternative or supplemental therapy when multiple antidepressant medications and/or psychotherapy do not work. Despite increased use ...

LONDON, ON - New findings from Ontario have shown that children born in Sarnia have a higher risk of developing asthma compared to neighbouring cities. A research team from Lawson Health Research Institute and Western University, using provincial data from ICES, found that higher air pollution exposure in the first year of life very likely contributed to this higher risk. Their results are published today in CMAJ Open. Summary of study results: -Children born in Sarnia in the 1990s and early 2000s were disproportionally at a higher risk of developing asthma in the first few years of life, compared to neighbouring cities. -Air pollution exposure ...