☤ Medicine Press Releases

Digital CBT treatment reduced cardiac-related anxiety and improved patients' quality of life and physical function after a heart attack. This is shown in a new randomised study published in Journal of the American College of Cardiology, in which researchers at Karolinska Institutet compared digital CBT with standard care. Many people who suffer a heart attack develop persistent anxiety related to their heart, such as fear of new cardiac events or avoidance of everyday activities such as physical activity. The study involved 96 people who had had a heart attack at least six months earlier and who experienced significant ...

As whole-person care accelerates across the U.S. health care system, clinicians face a persistent and consequential gap: the lifestyle and upstream health factors that drive chronic disease remain largely unmeasured, undocumented, and uncompensated in health care data systems. To close that gap, the American College of Lifestyle Medicine (ACLM) has launched the Lifestyle Medicine Whole Person Health Index (LMWPHI)— a point-of-care assessment tool designed to support the delivery of whole-person care in everyday clinical practice. The LMWPHI, central to operationalizing high-quality, evidence-based, high-value care, is embedded within ...

Fukuoka, Japan—In the fight against climate change, solar power is a promising alternative to fossil fuels. Every second, Earth receives an enormous amount of energy from the Sun. Yet solar cells capture only a fraction of it, constrained by a “physical ceiling” that seemed impossible to break. In a paper published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society on March 25, a research team led by Kyushu University in Japan, in collaboration with Johannes Gutenberg University　 (JGU) Mainz in Germany, used a molybdenum-based metal complex called “spin-flip” emitter to harvest ...

Prostate cancer affects one in five Australian men, making it the most common cancer in the country. Now, researchers at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research have produced the world’s most detailed cellular ‘atlas’ of early-stage prostate cancer, revealing the earliest changes that lead to the disease. The study describes a never-before-identified cell type and shows that many cells appearing healthy under the microscope have already begun their journey towards malignancy. These findings could reveal new risk factors, lead to earlier detection methods and help determine which patients are at risk of developing aggressive disease. The study was published in ...

The article, titled "Emerging roles of immune cell-derived neurotransmitters in immunity and disease," published on March 17, 2026, in Immunity & Inflammation, provides a timely and authoritative review of how innate and adaptive immune cells—including macrophages, dendritic cells, natural killer cells, T cells, and B cells—produce and respond to classic neurotransmitters. This previously underappreciated facet of immunology is now recognized as a critical bridge connecting the nervous and immune systems, with profound implications for understanding health and disease. The review begins by establishing that neurotransmitter ...

Scientists have long-studied the role of dopamine, a chemical in the brain that helps control learning and movement, in order to better understand Parkinson’s disease, schizophrenia, and depression—afflictions caused, in part, by a disruption or alteration of dopamine activity. In a study of laboratory rats, New York University neuroscientists have uncovered a new dynamic in dopamine function: the timing of the interaction of two neurotransmitters—dopamine and acetylcholine—determines whether or not dopamine is effective in guiding learning or effective movement.  “This study addresses ...

Scientists have created the first microlasers capable of detecting individual molecules and even single atomic ions, a breakthrough that could significantly advance early disease diagnosis and molecular-scale medical testing.  Microlasers are tiny glass beads measuring around just 0.1 mm  - (the width of a human hairI)  to  0.01mm – (the length of a single bacterium). With a central cavity that acts as a tiny mirror, they emit and bounce  light in a circular motion around the bead.  This circular path of trapped ...

In a bid to better understand, and potentially treat, a host of conditions that affect early cognition, neurodevelopment and the brain later in life, investigators at Johns Hopkins Medicine and colleagues throughout the world have been mapping the molecular construction of the human brain. These models, which are supported in part by federal and international research grants, are helping researchers study genetic links and pathways involved in a variety of conditions, ranging from autism spectrum disorder, which affects about 1 in 31, or 3%, of children in the U.S., to Alzheimer’s disease, which is estimated to affect more than 7 million U.S. adults, including ...

The first large-scale genetic study of E. coli’s protective armour has identified the five capsule types that are responsible for 70 per cent of all multidrug-resistant bloodstream infections in Europe. Researchers, including those at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, the University of Oslo, and their collaborators, analysed over 18,000 bacterial genomes from samples across all continents to investigate E. coli’s armour and find new ways to penetrate it.   The study, published today (25 March) in Nature Microbiology, uncovered 90 different types of protective capsules, ...

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection worldwide and can cause various types of cancer. Prophylactic HPV vaccination is highly effective and has been recommended in Switzerland since 2007 for girls and young women aged 11 to 26 – and since 2015 also for boys and young men. Catch-up vaccination is also available for women up to the age of 45. HPV vaccination is well documented among adolescents across Switzerland, with an uptake of 71% for girls and 49% for boys between 2020 and 2022. However, data on HPV vaccination among adults ...

Research Highlights: People born to mothers where the birth included a placental abruption (placenta separates from the uterus before delivery) may have a higher risk of developing or dying from cardiovascular disease than those whose birth did not have this complication. People born to mothers who had a placental abruption are about three times more likely to be hospitalized for cardiovascular disease by the age of 28, and about 4.6 times as likely to die from a cardiovascular event in that timeframe, compared to people born to mothers with pregnancies that were not complicated by placental abruption. Researchers say that placental ...

Rutgers Health research shows the risk of developing early cardiovascular disease or dying from cardiovascular disease by the age of 28 was 4.6 times higher among people born to mothers who had a placental abruption during their pregnancy. This finding was compared to people whose birth didn’t not have this complication, according to a study by lead author Cande Ananth, chief of the division of epidemiology and biostatistics in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences ...

The ability to sense environmental temperature, which helps animals move away from sub-optimal locations and find those with ideal temperatures, involves various channels on sensory neurons that open at specific temperature ranges. In research published in FEBS Open Bio, scientists found that one such channel—called the transient receptor potential channel TRPM8—from several salamanders that prefer cooler environments exhibits significantly diminished cold sensitivity compared with TRPM8 from frogs, which prefer warmer climates. The ...

A new paper in Genome Biology and Evolution, published by Oxford University Press, indicates that while the COVID-19 virus has developed rapidly since 2019, it has done so within limited genetic channels. These genetic limits have remained unchanged. Despite scientists’ earlier fears about dramatic, rapid evolution of the COVID-19 virus, it appears recent changes in the virus were relatively constrained; the virus altered by combining pre-existing mutations. The virus has not expanded the number of genetic routes it can take to evolve. SARS-CoV-2 underwent rapid evolution after first infecting humans in late 2019, resulting in new viral variants with properties that ...

Feeding the global population currently requires clearing vast forests for soy plantations or heavily depleting the oceans for fish meal. What if the agricultural industry could bypass the farm and the sea entirely, opting instead to brew high-quality food from a problematic greenhouse gas? A rigorous new life-cycle assessment demonstrates that cultivating methane-consuming microbes is far more than an experimental concept—it is a highly lucrative, environmentally superior reality. Driving this evaluation are corresponding authors Yanping Liu and Ziyi Yang from the Beijing ...

By Tiffany Dobbyn, UC Davis Packaged foods offer convenience for families and individuals, but they can be a major source of saturated fat, sodium and added sugars, which when consumed in excess contribute to chronic disease. To help people build healthier diets, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration proposed a new front-of-package nutrition label in January 2025 that would inform consumers about the presence of these nutrients. While the FDA works to finalize the label, a research team led by the University of California, ...

Preparing a home cooked meal at least once a week may cut older people’s risk of dementia by 30%, suggests research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health.  And this risk may be 70% lower in older novice cooks with few culinary skills, the findings indicate.  Over the past few decades, people have increasingly come to rely on restaurants, takeaways, and frozen food rather than cooking their meals at home, note the Japanese researchers.  But for older people, meal preparation is not only an important source of physical activity, but also cognitive ...

Maternal deaths rise by around 11% in countries that rely on US aid following a switch from a Democratic to a Republican administration, suggest the findings of a data analysis published in the open access journal BMJ Global Health. This is equivalent to around 45 additional deaths for every 100,000 live births, eroding a fifth of the decline in global maternal deaths that has been achieved since 1985, conclude the researchers. US foreign aid for family planning and reproductive health services has been heavily influenced by changes in the implementation of the Mexico City Policy—first introduced as the US Policy on Population ...

Barcelona, Spain: Women who are treated with mastectomy for breast cancer often choose to have surgery to reconstruct the breast using an implant. But hard, painful scar tissue can form around the implant, especially when women have radiotherapy as part of their treatment.   New research, presented at the 15th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona today (Wednesday), shows that the risk of this scarring and the need for further corrective surgery could be reduced if women are given a polyurethane-coated breast implant. These implants are made of silicon, but they have a spongy outer layer, ...

Barcelona, Spain: The chances of breast cancer recurring remain very low when patients are treated with radiotherapy that is tailored to their individual risk following chemotherapy and surgery. These are the findings of a ten-year study presented at the 15th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona today (Wednesday).   In the study, radiotherapy treatment was selected according to whether there were still signs of breast cancer cells in patients’ lymph nodes after chemotherapy and surgery. For women with no signs of cancer remaining in the lymph nodes, this approach meant minimal or even no radiotherapy. Scaling treatment ...

In a paradigm breaking study, Dr. Pavan Reddy, director of the Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center at Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) and his team, in collaboration with Drs. Arul Chinnaiyan, S P Hicks Endowed Professor of Pathology, and Marcin Cieslik, assistant professor of pathology, both from University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center, discovered a novel way the immune system, specifically T-cells, attack their target cells, reshaping long-held assumptions in immunology and demonstrating direct implications for the field of cancer immunology and bone marrow transplantation. The study appeared in Nature Immunology. The immune system relies on molecules called ...

ANN ARBOR, Michigan — When a person with cancer finds out they carry an inherited genetic variant that puts them at higher risk of cancer, the results can help inform their treatment or steps to prevent additional cancer.   But what about their family members who may also have inherited that genetic variant? While oncologists focus on the patient in front of them, no one follows up with family members who may be at increased risk of cancer.   “Few medical tests have implications for others beyond the patient. But with germline genetic testing, the results can be very significant to the ...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE A recently released prospective analysis of the first eight years of the Johns Hopkins Medicine-led Zero TB in Kids program shows that significant reduction of tuberculosis (TB) transmission and burden (the total impact of health problems — specifically death, morbidity and disability — on a population) among schoolchildren in high-burden areas can be achieved using existing TB screening, treatment and follow-up protocols.  The study — funded by the federal government’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) — appears in the March 2026 issue ...

IDE Technologies, a world leader in desalination and advanced water treatment solutions, and Rice University’s Water Technologies Entrepreneurship and Research (WaTER) Institute, a multidisciplinary center advancing innovative water treatment technologies, energy transitions and resilient infrastructure, are proud to announce their strategic collaboration. This partnership brings together IDE’s international and long-standing proven expertise in commercial water treatment and the WaTER Institute’s ...

Scientists at Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute and an international team of collaborators have defined a new genetic disease marked by premature aging and deficits in brain function. The researchers published results on March 19, 2026, in Nature Communications that describe the first known project to combine genome sequencing with cellular reprogramming to identify which gene mutation is at fault and study how it causes the symptoms observed in patients suffering from this newly discovered disease. “Our collaborator identified a family of patients whose teenaged members had whitening hairs and other characteristics associated with premature aging conditions ...