A team of scientists at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) has published new evidence suggesting that the brain’s protective shield — known as the blood-brain barrier (BBB) — remains largely intact in a commonly used mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease. The discovery challenges long-standing assumptions that Alzheimer’s disease causes the BBB to “leak,” potentially reshaping how researchers think about drug delivery for the disease. The study, published July 23 in Fluids and Barriers of the CNS, was conducted by a research team ...

A new class of highly efficient and scalable quantum low-density parity-check error correction codes, capable of performance approaching the theoretical hashing bound, has been developed by scientists at Institute of Science Tokyo, Japan. These novel error-correction codes can handle quantum codes with hundreds of thousands of qubits, potentially enabling large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computing, with applications in diverse fields, including quantum chemistry and optimization problems. In recent years, quantum computers have begun to handle double-digit quantum bits, or qubits. However, many essential applications targeted by quantum computers, such as quantum chemistry, ...

Rapidly aging populations and rising cases of lifestyle-related diseases (LRDs), like diabetes and hypertension, are driving significant financial strain on government budgets. While regular health checkups under a standardized government program can be a solution, it is not well understood how these initiatives benefit different socioeconomic sections of the society and their economic feasibility. Most studies have documented how health checkup programs affect salaried or employed workers, examining the program’s role in informing individuals about their health status and risks. However, ...

DARIEN, IL – The Associated Professional Sleep Societies is accepting research abstracts and session proposal submissions for SLEEP 2026, the 40th annual meeting of the APSS, which will be held June 14 to 17 at the Baltimore Convention Center. Research abstracts will be accepted for oral and poster presentations in two tracks: basic and translational sleep and circadian science and clinical sleep science and practice. Accepted abstracts will be published online in a supplement of the journal Sleep. The APSS Program Committee is also accepting proposals for postgraduate courses and other sessions including bench-to-bedside sessions, clinical workshops, discussion ...

A team led by UCL (University College London) and Imperial College London researchers has shown for the first time how life-saving antibiotics called polymyxins pierce the armour of harmful bacteria. The findings, published in the journal Nature Microbiology, could lead to new treatments for bacterial infections – especially urgent since drug-resistant infections already kill more than a million people a year. Polymyxins were discovered more than 80 years ago and are used as a last-resort treatment for infections caused ...

Toronto, ON, September 29, 2025 – Individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) account for more than one in five patients who have been in Ontario’s mental health beds for over a year, according to a new study from researchers at ICES and the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). The findings suggest that people with IDD have different support needs compared with patients without IDD as they are more likely to have moderate or severe cognitive impairment, difficulty caring for themselves, and few social supports, which may contribute to challenges transitioning out of hospital and into the community. Enhancing specialized ...

At a glance: Correctly distinguishing between look-alike tumors found in the brain during surgery can guide critical decisions in real time while patient is still in the operating room. A new AI tool outperformed humans and other models in distinguishing glioblastoma from another type of cancer that appears similar under a microscope. The new AI tool has a built-in uncertainty feature that flags tumors the model has not encountered before and marks them for human review. A Harvard Medical School–led research team has developed an AI tool that can reliably tell apart two look-alike cancers found in the ...

They were the first generation of Americans to grow up with ultra-processed foods all around them – products typically loaded with extra fat, salt, sugar and flavorings. They were children and young adults at a time when such products, designed to maximize their appeal, proliferated. Now, a study shows, 21% of women and 10% of men in Generation X and the tail end of the Baby Boom generation, now in their 50s and early 60s, meet criteria for addiction to these ultra-processed foods. That rate is far higher than it is among ...

A new study from Karolinska Institutet, published in the scientific journal The BMJ, shows how a simple blood analysis can predict the risk of developing severe liver disease. The method may already start to be applied in primary care to enable the earlier detection of cirrhosis and cancer of the liver. “These are diseases that are growing increasingly common and that have a poor prognosis if detected late,” says Rickard Strandberg, affiliated researcher at Karolinska Institutet’s Department of Medicine in ...

The review demonstrates that vaccines for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are both safe and effective in protecting groups who are most at risk for serious illness, including older adults and infants.   RSV is a common virus that causes coughs and colds but can also lead to life-threatening lung infections like pneumonia. Children under the age of two months are at the highest risk of severe RSV infection and death, with older adults also vulnerable to severe disease.   An international group of researchers analysed 14 ...

Vienna, Austria: The first detailed analysis of unplanned births that occurred outside the hospital setting in Austria has shown that, although such deliveries are rare, they pose challenges for emergency teams that attend, especially if babies are born prematurely [1]. In a study presented at the European Emergency Medicine Congress today (Monday), the researchers found that between 2017 and 2024 there were 173 unplanned, out-of-hospital births in the Styria region of Austria, of which 16 (9%) were premature (less than 37 weeks’ gestation). The most premature ...

Vienna, Austria: Hypnosis can significantly improve patients’ tolerance of masks to help them breathe when they are suffering from acute respiratory failure, according to a pilot study presented at the European Emergency Medicine Congress today (Monday) [1]. People who come to hospital with breathing problems are often given non-invasive ventilation (NIV) via a mask and tubes connected to a machine in order increase the amount of oxygen in their blood and lower carbon dioxide levels. However, some ...

Vienna, Austria: Injuries occurring to people who ride e-scooters cost Irish hospitals an average of €1,726 per patient, and researchers have calculated the total overall cost to one hospital in a single year was €128,650. Dr Thomas Suttie, a senior house officer in emergency medicine at Connolly Hospital Blanchardstown, Abbotstown, Dublin, Ireland, told the European Emergency Medicine Congress today (Monday): “In 2021 we published the number of patients who came to the emergency department of ...

People whose fathers smoked during puberty seem to age faster than expected, according to research presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Congress in Amsterdam, the Netherlands [1].   The researchers found signs of faster biological ageing, compared to chronological age, in people whose fathers began smoking at age 15 or younger. They say smoking during puberty may create damage in boys’ developing sperm cells that can be passed on to their children.   The researchers call for stronger efforts to prevent tobacco use in teenagers, not only ...

People who have obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA) may suffer worse symptoms if they live in areas with higher levels of air pollution, according to a multi-national study presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Congress in Amsterdam, the Netherlands [1].   Patients with OSA often snore loudly, their breathing starts and stops during the night, and they may wake up several times. Not only does this cause excessive sleepiness, but it can also increase the risk of high blood pressure, stroke, heart disease and type 2 diabetes. OSA is very common, ...

Patients with recurring prostate cancer who were treated with a new PSMA-targeted radioligand therapy before stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) went more than twice as long without their disease worsening compared with those who received SBRT alone, according to new clinical trial results from UCLA Health Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers.    Findings from the trial, presented today at the 2025 American Society for Radiation Oncology Annual Meeting in San Francisco, showed that men who received the radioligand drug ...

SAN FRANCISCO, September 28, 2025 — A single course of low-dose radiation therapy may provide a safe and effective alternative treatment option for people with painful knee osteoarthritis according to a new randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial. The study showed patients with mild to moderate knee osteoarthritis reported significant reductions in pain and improved physical function in the four months after receiving the low dose of radiation, which was just a small fraction of what’s used to treat cancer. Because the study included a control group with simulated treatment, the researchers could distinguish ...

SAN FRANCISCO, September 28, 2025 — A new clinical trial finds that people with a limited number of metastases from recurrent prostate cancer lived significantly longer without disease progression when they received a radiopharmaceutical drug before targeted radiation, compared with radiation alone. The phase II LUNAR trial is the first randomized study to show that a treatment established for later-stage prostate cancer can delay progression and defer hormone therapy when added to high-precision radiation ...

SAN FRANCISCO, September 28, 2025 — A new randomized study finds that a lab test that reads tumor genes can identify which patients with recurrent prostate cancer will benefit from adding hormone therapy to radiation after surgery — the first predictive biomarker in this setting. In the first prospective, randomized trial to validate a predictive gene expression test for hormone therapy in prostate cancer, patients with a prostate tumor subtype known as luminal B had much lower risks of recurrence and metastasis when radiation was complemented by apalutamide, a type of hormone therapy. Patients without this tumor subtype, however, saw no improvement. ...

Singing can improve the quality of life of people with lung disease and help reduce their symptoms, according to a gold-standard randomised-controlled trial presented at the European Respiratory Society Congress in Amsterdam, the Netherlands [1]. The study was presented by Professor Natasha Smallwood from Monash University, Melbourne, Australia. Professor Smallwood told the Congress: “Chronic breathlessness is a common and highly distressing symptom for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and interstitial lung disease. Yet there is a lack ...

Children with asthma who use at-home monitoring are around half as likely to visit the emergency department or be hospitalised, compared to those who only receive care from their medical team, according to research presented at the European Respiratory Society (ERS) Congress in Amsterdam, the Netherlands [1]. Remote monitoring also helped keep children’s symptoms under control.   At-home monitoring involved children and their families using an app approximately once a month to answer questions ...

Findings from a trial comparing the real-world effectiveness of asthma inhalers could reshape how children with asthma are treated. In the first randomised controlled trial to investigate the use of a 2-in-1 inhaler as the sole reliever therapy for children aged 5 to 15, an international team found the combined treatment to be more effective than salbutamol, the current standard for asthma symptom relief in children, with no additional safety concerns.  The results show that using a single 2-in-1 anti-inflammatory reliever inhaler – ...

A widely available and affordable drug has been shown to be effective in treating seriously ill COVID-19 patients, according to a new international study led by researchers at the Australian National University (ANU) in collaboration with King’s College London. The study analysed data from almost 500 patients hospitalised with COVID-19 across six countries. Patients who inhaled heparin were half as likely to require ventilation and had a significantly lower risk of dying compared with those receiving standard care. Heparin, a drug traditionally injected to treat blood clots, was tested in this study in an inhaled form, targeting the lungs directly. As well as acting as an anticoagulant, ...

Vienna, Austria: One of the largest international surveys into job satisfaction among emergency department workers has revealed that while the majority found their work satisfying and rewarding, there are still many areas where improvements are needed, according to research presented at the European Emergency Medicine Congress today (Sunday) [1]. The paper, “Global Job Satisfaction Among Emergency Medicine Professionals: Results from the 2025 Emergency Medicine Day Survey”, is published today in the European Journal ...

Eating fruit may reduce the effects of air pollution on lung function Eating fruit may reduce the effects of air pollution on lung function, according to research presented at the European Respiratory Society Congress in Amsterdam, the Netherlands [1]. The study was presented by Pimpika Kaewsri, a PhD student from the Centre for Environmental Health and Sustainability at the University of Leicester, UK. She explains: “Over 90% of the global population is exposed to air pollution levels that exceed WHO guidelines, and ample ...