VA, NIH launch study of Gulf War Illness
New research may help identify biomarkers and potential treatments
2023-04-17
(Press-News.org) The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and National Institutes of Health have launched a study to gain a better understanding of the chronic symptoms of Gulf War Illness. The disease affects multiple systems in the body and includes chronic symptoms such as fatigue, headache, memory and cognitive difficulties, joint and muscle pain, poor sleep, and problems with gastrointestinal and respiratory function. It affects about a third of the nearly 700,000 men and women who served in the Persian Gulf during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm.
“This is an important collaboration that we hope will lead to many answers to those suffering from Gulf War Illness,” said Walter Koroshetz, M.D., director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, part of NIH. “Taking advantage of the resources available only at NIH, this comprehensive study will take a new look at this illness and uncover biological mechanisms that may pave the way to treatments.”
“Effective treatments for Gulf War Illness have remained elusive, forcing healthcare providers to mostly focus on easing patient symptoms,” said Rachel Ramoni, D.M.D., Sc.D., VA’s chief research and development officer. “VA and NIH’s collaboration will bring together experts who will meticulously investigate the underlying causes of symptoms. With the help of the veterans who volunteer for the study, researchers will lay the groundwork for care that will meaningfully improve the lives of the hundreds of thousands of veterans living with Gulf War Illness.”
VA researchers will screen 1990-91 era Gulf War veterans through the Miami VA Medical Center and the California and Washington, D.C., sites of VA’s War Related Illness and Injury Study Center. Potential study participants will be referred to NIH to gain more insight into Gulf War Illness. Researchers from NIH will seek to identify how the illness presents itself – in ways that can be measured or observed – in each participant. The research will focus on the immune and autonomic nervous systems, as well as the body’s energy-production pathways.
Eligible veterans will be invited to the NIH Clinical Center for up to two weeks for comprehensive testing. Among other tests, the research protocol includes administering a peak exercise challenge to trigger symptom flares. The procedure has been used to explore the mechanisms of other chronic illnesses, such as myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome.
VA researchers will also maintain a data repository of participants, oversee veterans’ overall experience in the study, and help to communicate individual participants’ study findings to their VA care providers as appropriate.
The study is expected to last five years. Initial enrollment began in July 2022 and focused on Gulf War veterans who were enrolled in other studies. Enrollment is now open to those from the larger Gulf War veteran community, with the first participant arriving to the NIH Clinical Center on April 16, 2023. Interested veterans can visit the study website to learn more at https://research.ninds.nih.gov/patients/va-nih-project-depth.
###
The NINDS is the nation’s leading funder of research on the brain and nervous system. The mission of NINDS is to seek fundamental knowledge about the brain and nervous system and to use that knowledge to reduce the burden of neurological disease.
About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.
END
ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:
2023-04-17
DALLAS, April 17, 2023 — Legalization of marijuana, for both medical and recreational use, is on the rise across the U.S. The American Heart Association, the world’s leading nonprofit organization focused on heart and brain health for all, warns that using marijuana may increase your risk of deadly cardiovascular diseases, heart attacks and strokes, according to research evidence noted in two scientific statements published by the Association.
The Association’s 2020 scientific statement Medical Marijuana, Recreational Cannabis, and Cardiovascular Health, ...
2023-04-17
EMBARGOED UNTIL 17-APR-2023 11:00 ET
Basel, April 17, 2023 Using a new approach for studying live embryonic mouse brains at single-cell resolution, researchers have identified an active multi-layer circuit that forms in the cortex during an unexpectedly early stage of development. Perturbing the circuit genetically led to changes similar to those seen in the brains of people with autism. The findings are reported today in Cell by a team based at the Institute of Molecular and Clinical Ophthalmology Basel.
“Understanding the detailed development of cell types and circuits in the cortex can provide ...
2023-04-17
A research model of dietary intake in 184 countries, developed by researchers at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, estimates that poor diet contributed to over 14.1 million cases of type 2 diabetes in 2018, representing over 70% of new diagnoses globally. The analysis, which looked at data from 1990 and 2018, provides valuable insight into which dietary factors are driving type 2 diabetes burden by world region. The study was published April 17 in the journal Nature Medicine.
Of the 11 dietary factors considered, three had an outsized contribution to the rising global incidence of type 2 diabetes: ...
2023-04-17
Scientists can now use light to activate protein functions both inside and outside of living cells. The new method, called light-activated SpyLigation, can turn on proteins that are normally off to allow researchers to study and control them in more detail. This technology has potential uses in tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, and understanding how the body works.
Proteins perform nearly every important task in biology, including processing DNA, metabolizing nutrients, and fighting off infections. When, where, and how proteins become active is important for a variety of biological processes. Increasingly, ...
2023-04-17
About The Study: In this national multicenter cohort study of inpatients with COVID-19, early administration of dexamethasone was associated with significantly reduced odds of mortality or discharge to hospice in those requiring supplemental oxygen or mechanical ventilation and/or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation but not in those requiring no supplemental oxygen or noninvasive positive pressure ventilation. These results support the continued use of systemic dexamethasone in patients hospitalized with COVID-19.
Authors: Laine ...
2023-04-17
The standard treatment for patients with multiple myeloma often includes stem cell transplantation in which the patient’s own stem cells are harvested and stored while the patient receives intensive chemotherapy to kill the cancer. Then, the patient’s stem cells are returned to the patient to help with recovery. But for a significant proportion of patients, the number of stem cells that can be harvested is not optimal for transplant and negatively affects patient outcomes.
However, an international phase 3 clinical trial led by physicians at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has shown that the investigational ...
2023-04-17
Immunotherapy, particularly CAR T-Cell treatment for cancer, is extending the lives of many patients. But sometimes the therapy randomly migrates to places it shouldn’t go, tucking into the lungs or other noncancerous tissue and causing toxic side effects. A University of Rochester/Wilmot Cancer Institute team discovered the molecule responsible for guiding T cells toward tumors, setting the stage for scientists to improve upon the groundbreaking treatment.
The next step is to find a drug that can manipulate the ...
2023-04-17
Poverty has long been linked to shorter lives. But just how many deaths in the United States are associated with poverty? The number has been elusive – until now.
UC Riverside paper published Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association associated poverty with an estimated 183,000 deaths in the United States in 2019 among people 15 years and older.
This estimate is considered conservative because the data is from the year just prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused spikes in deaths worldwide and continues to take its toll.
The analysis found that only heart disease, ...
2023-04-17
Self-assembled peptide supramolecular hydrogels have shown great application prospects in various areas, including tissue engineering, drug delivery, and biosensing.
Precisely and flexibly controlling the mechanical properties of peptide hydrogels to match the targeted applications is important. The common methods to regulate the mechanical properties of supramolecular hydrogels generally include: changing the formula (different peptide sequences, adding cross-linking agents) or changing the environmental conditions (concentration, temperature, pH and ions), both of which inevitably change the chemical composition of the ...
2023-04-17
Bifunctional acid−base catalysts are highly desirable for industrially relevant chemical processes. Owing to their ability to activate electrophiles and nucleophiles simultaneously, they allow the catalysis to proceed synergistically and cooperatively. Solid acid−base catalysts are particularly advantageous since they are reusable and result in no waste products. However, controlling the structure of such catalysts for cooperatively workable active sites is challenging. Simple and effective methods that enable the synthesis of high-performance solid acid−base ...
LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES:
[Press-News.org] VA, NIH launch study of Gulf War Illness
New research may help identify biomarkers and potential treatments
