October 16, 2014 – Families of patients with mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) may expect them to return to normal quickly—after all, it's "just a concussion." But mild TBI can have a lasting impact on families as well as patients, according to a review in the November issue of American Journal of Nursing. The journal is published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, a part of Wolters Kluwer Health. "With the increasing numbers of people with mild TBI in the community, it's crucial for nurses to make this a part of assessment for early recognition and intervention," ...

A new expert panel report, Energy Prices and Business Decision-Making in Canada: Preparing for the Energy Future, released today by the Council of Canadian Academies, details how Canadian businesses have historically been successful in responding to fluctuating energy prices, but this should not be considered a predictor for future resiliency or competiveness. The energy environment is evolving with advances in oil and gas extraction, the development of alternative energy sources, changes within the electricity market, and new regulatory requirements. Understanding the ...

Research to be published in the International Journal of Web-Based Communities suggests that the familiar interfaces of online social networking sites might be adapted to allow us to interact more efficiently with our networked devices such as cars, domestic appliances and gadgets. The concept would also extend to the idea of those devices connecting with each other as necessary to improve efficiency of heating and lighting, make our home entertainment systems smarter and much more. Are you Facebook friends with your microwave oven, is your car? Does your washing machine ...

Emily loves Justin - Stop global warming - Two more weeks till I graduate!: The exchange of information in public toilets is widespread. It also occurs in the world of white-footed sportive lemurs. Only instead of writing on the walls, they use scent-marks in order to communicate with their own kind. In a study published online in Springer's journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, Iris Dröscher and Peter Kappeler from the German Primate Center (DPZ) have found that the urine left on latrine trees serves as a method to maintain contact with family members. It also ...

The number of overweight persons is greatly increasing worldwide - and as a result is the risk of suffering a heart attack, stroke, diabetes or Alzheimer's disease. For this reason, many people dream of an efficient method for losing weight. An international team of researchers led by Professor Alexander Pfeifer from the University Hospital Bonn, have now come one step closer to this goal. The scientists discovered a new way to stimulate brown fat and thus burn energy from food: The body's own adenosine activates brown fat and "browns" white fat. The results are now being ...

Rice is one of the few cereal grains consumed by people with celiac disease, as it does not contain gluten. However, it can have high concentrations of a toxic substance – arsenic – as revealed by the analyses of flour, cakes, bread, pasta and other foods made with rice, conducted by researchers from the Miguel Hernández University of Elche, Spain. The European Union is working to establish the maximum quantities of arsenic in these products. Celiac disease affects almost 1% of the population of the western world, a group which cannot tolerate gluten ...

Pre-eclampsia, the potentially deadly condition that affects pregnant women, may be caused by problems meeting the oxygen demands of the growing fetus, according to an editorial in the November issue of Anaesthesia, the journal of the Association of Anaesthetists of Great Britain and Ireland (AAGBI). The finding has promoted the co-author of the editorial, Associate Professor Alicia Dennis, Consultant Anaesthetist & Director of Anaesthesia Research at the Royal Women's Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, to call for the name of the condition to be changed to make women ...

This news release is available in French. Although progress has been made in recent years, the matter of youth suicide in Quebec still needs to be more effectively addressed. In fact, a new study in the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry shows that more lives could be saved through early detection and increased public awareness and information sharing among professionals. For this research, a team of scientists from the Douglas Mental Health University Institute and McGill University studied 67 suicide completers ages 25 and under and matched them with 56 living control ...

A study recently published in the Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology shows that for Ebola, measles, syphilis and many other conditions with skin manifestations the mortality rates are hundreds of times higher in developing countries than they are in developed countries. The case of Ebola, the paper writes, "Highlights the importance of monitoring disease burden in the developing world even when the burden is low." "Our goal is to provide information about trends and patterns to bring to light what's going on around the world so that funds can be allocated ...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — River beds, where flowing water meets silt, sand and gravel, are critical ecological zones. Yet how water flows in a river with a gravel bed is very different from the traditional model of a sandy river bed, according to a new study that compares their fluid dynamics. The findings establish new parameters for river modeling that better represent reality, with implications for field researchers and water resource managers. "The shallow zones where water in rivers interacts with the subsurface are critical environmentally, and how we have modeled ...

A new study brings good news to all the brothers out there: Having a sibling is just as good for you as it is for your sister. That's surprising to family scholars because boys typically report that they benefit less than girls from peer relationships. "In our study, most relationships were not as important for boys as they were for girls," said study co-author Laura Padilla-Walker. "But the sibling relationship was different – they seemed to report relying on sibling affection just as much as girls do. It's an area where parents and therapists could really help ...

PULLMAN, Wash. – Washington State University researchers have developed a new catalyst that could lead to making biofuels cheaply and more efficiently. Led by Voiland Distinguished Professor Yong Wang, the researchers mixed inexpensive iron with a tiny amount of rare palladium to make the catalyst. Their work is featured on the cover of the October issue of the journal ACS Catalysis. Removing oxygen for better fuel Researchers, government leaders and industry leaders are interested in renewable biofuels as a way to reduce national dependence on fossil fuels and ...

ANN ARBOR—Adults over 50 who feel comfortable about aging are more proactive in getting preventive health care services, a new University of Michigan study found. Sometimes, the older population does not visit their doctor because they believe that physical and mental declines typify old age, says Eric Kim, a U-M doctoral student in clinical psychology. They think that lifestyle changes will not make a difference, making them less likely to seek preventive care. This is not true and also not a healthy mindset, he says. Studies show that older adults can go down ...

Kyoto, Japan — Researchers in Japan have developed a novel yet simple technique, called "diffusion driven layer-by-layer assembly," to construct graphene into porous three-dimensional (3D) structures for applications in devices such as batteries and supercapacitors. Their study was recently published in the journal Nature Communications. Graphene is essentially an ultra-thin sheet of carbon and possesses exciting properties such as high mechanical stability and remarkable electrical conductivity. It has been touted as the next generation material that can conceivably ...

Sudden unexpected death in epilepsy (SUDEP) is concerning and many—even those with seizure disorders—may not be aware of this condition. New research published in Epilepsia, a journal published by Wiley on behalf of the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE), reports that 76% of caregivers are more likely to have heard of SUDEP compared with 65% of patients with epilepsy. Dr. Barbara Kroner, an epidemiologist with RTI International in Rockville, Maryland and lead author of the study says, "When someone with epilepsy dies suddenly we want to understand ...

Beijing, 16 October 2014: The use of electronic health care services (versus more traditional methods) to reduce the high incidence of heart disease in China will be debated by leading cardiologists from around the world in Beijing, from 16 to 19 October 2014. The 25th Great Wall International Congress of Cardiology & Asia Pacific Heart Congress & International Congress of Cardiovascular Prevention and Rehabilitation (GW-ICC & APHC & ICCPR 2014) will advocate a patient centered health care model that maximizes the use of limited medical resources so patients can improve ...

1985 was one of the worst years in living memory for the flamingo population of the Camargue, France. Over a 15 day period in January, temperatures plummeted, the lagoons, ponds and salt pans where the birds feed froze and by the time the Arctic blast had loosened its grip, almost one third of the population was dead. 'The 1985 mass-mortality shocked a generation of conservationists,' says David Grémillet from the CEFE-CNRS, France. Alan Johnson, a conservation scientist at the Tour du Valat research center, France, who dedicated 50 years of his life to protecting ...

The study, from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the specialist cancer agency of the World Health Organization, is the first to try and quantify the worldwide extent of each of the two main types of oesophageal cancer: squamous cell carcinoma, or SCC for short; and adenocarcinoma. Rates of SCC have remained fairly stable or have even fallen over the past few years, but those of adenocarcinoma have risen, particularly in high income countries. In 2012, oesophageal cancer was the eighth most common cancer worldwide. The researchers used data from ...

Over the past 20 years, a growing body of evidence has linked exposure to metal fumes with a heightened risk of developing, and dying from, bacterial lobar pneumonia. It is not clear exactly why this happens, but there are indications that the tiny particles in welding fumes boost the stickiness of pneumococcal bacteria to the cells lining the airways of the lungs. The scientific evidence was sufficient to prompt the government's independent advisory body, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), to recommend in 2011 that employers offer welders a ...

Contrary to current dietary recommendations, slow and steady weight loss does not reduce the amount or rate of weight regain compared with losing weight quickly, new research published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology has found. The study, led by Joseph Proietto, Sir Edward Dunlop Professor of Medicine at the University of Melbourne and Head of the Weight Control Clinic at Austin Health in Australia, set out to examine whether losing weight at a slow initial rate, as recommended by current guidelines worldwide, results in larger long-term weight reduction and less ...

The Lancet is pleased to announce the publication of a new Series on Universal Health Coverage in Latin America. Health system reform and universal health coverage in Latin America Overcoming social segregation in health care in Latin America Social determinants of health, universal health coverage, and sustainable development: case studies from Latin American countries Leading the way towards universal health coverage: a call to action Series comments The Series will be launched on Thursday 16 October, at the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) headquarters ...

WASHINGTON – The popularity of E-cigarettes could lead to the "demise" of cigarette smoking and save thousands of lives, but not until they are proven safe and are regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). That's the message from two Georgetown University Medical Center researchers in a perspective piece published Oct. 16 in the New England Journal of Medicine. In "The FDA, E-Cigarettes, and the Demise of Combusted Tobacco," Nathan K. Cobb, MD, and David B. Abrams, PhD, call on the FDA "to accelerate their regulations to eliminate uncertainty regarding ...

Changing laws to make it more difficult to sue physicians for medical malpractice may not reduce the amount of "defensive medicine" practiced by physicians, according to a new RAND Corporation study. Studying the behavior of emergency physicians in three states that raised the standard for malpractice in the emergency room to gross negligence, researchers found that strong new legal protections did not translate into less-expensive care. The findings are published in the Oct. 16 edition of the New England Journal of Medicine. "Our findings suggest that malpractice ...

PHILADELPHIA – Ninety percent of children and adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who had relapsed multiple times or failed to respond to standard therapies went into remission after receiving an investigational personalized cellular therapy, CTL019, developed at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. The results are published this week in The New England Journal of Medicine. The new data, which builds on preliminary findings presented at the American Society of Hematology's annual meeting in December 2013, include results ...

PHILADELPHIA—A perspective piece in this week's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine from a student at the University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine addresses the evolution of diversity in medical education. "It's not a numbers game anymore," says author Mark A. Attiah, a medical student pursuing both a Master's in translational research and bioethics. "Diversity is a mindset that extends into the classroom and the hospital." Achieving diversity in today's medical schools goes beyond bringing underrepresented students into the fold, he says. ...