ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ A small, easily implantable device called the Lung Volume Reduction Coil (LVRC) may play a key role in the treatment of two types of emphysema, according to a study conducted in Europe. Results of the study indicate the beneficial effects of the device persist more than a year after initial treatment. The study will be presented at the ATS 2013 International Conference. "LVRC treatment results in significant and clinically relevant improvements in lung function, ability to exercise and quality of life for patients with emphysema," said ...

ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ Air pollutants from traffic are associated with increased asthma severity levels in pregnant asthmatic women, according to a new study. "Air pollution is a known trigger for asthma symptoms," said lead author Janneane Gent, PhD, Research Scientist in Epidemiology (Environmental Health) at the Yale School of Public Health. "In our study, exposures were assessed using a sophisticated air pollution modeling system (Community Multiscale Air Quality, CMAQ) that permits community-level estimates (i.e., close to where the subject resides) instead ...

ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ Both fine-particle air pollution and noise pollution may increase a person's risk of developing cardiovascular disease, according to German researchers who have conducted a large population study, in which both factors were considered simultaneously. "Many studies have looked at air pollution, while others have looked at noise pollution," said study leader Barbara Hoffmann, MD, MPH, a professor of environmental epidemiology at the IUF Leibniz Research Institute for Environmental Medicine in Germany. "This study looked at both at the same ...

ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ Living near a major roadway during the prenatal period is associated with an increased risk of respiratory infection developing in children by the age of 3, according to a new study from researchers in Boston. "The connection between in utero and early life cigarette smoke exposure and adverse infant respiratory outcomes is well-established, but the relation of prenatal ambient air pollution to risk of infant respiratory infection is less well-studied," said lead author Mary Rice, MD, a pulmonary and critical care fellow at Massachusetts ...

ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ A new study conducted by Boston researchers reports that the link between asthma and early childhood use of acetaminophen or ibuprofen may be driven by underlying respiratory infections that prompt the use of these analgesics, rather than the drugs themselves. The results of the new study will be presented at the ATS 2013 International Conference. Analgesics like ibuprofen and acetaminophen are routinely given to treat fever in infants, and several studies have shown a link between the use of analgesics during infancy and the subsequent ...

ATS 2013, PHILADELPHIA ─ People who are consistently exposed to both wood smoke and tobacco smoke are at a greater risk for developing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and for experiencing more frequent and severe symptoms of the disease, as well as more severe airflow obstruction, than those who are exposed to only one type of smoke, according to the results of a new population-based study conducted by researchers in Colombia. The results of the study will be presented at the ATS 2013 International Conference. "Although previous studies have shown ...

Much of the May/June 2013 issue of Annals of Family Medicine and the entirety of an accompanying supplement published in partnership with the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality are about changing primary care practice. Practice transformation on a large scale toward the patient-centered medical home model of care is a cornerstone of health care reform efforts in the United States, and the research and commentary in this issue can serve as a roadmap to achieve practice transformation. Not only do the articles address the opportunities, challenges, costs, processes ...

OAKLAND, Calif., May 20, 2013 — Whole-cell pertussis vaccines were more effective at protecting against pertussis than acellular pertussis vaccines during a large recent outbreak, according to a new Kaiser Permanente study published in Pediatrics. Whole-cell pertussis vaccines, also called DTwP, were available from the 1940s to 1990s, but were associated with safety concerns that ultimately led to the development of acellular pertussis vaccines, which are also called DTaP. By the late 1990s, the United States had switched from whole-cell to acellular vaccines for all ...

Future teams of subterranean search and rescue robots may owe their success to the lowly fire ant, a much-despised insect whose painful bites and extensive networks of underground tunnels are all-too-familiar to people living in the southern United States. By studying fire ants in the laboratory using video tracking equipment and X-ray computed tomography, researchers have uncovered fundamental principles of locomotion that robot teams could one day use to travel quickly and easily through underground tunnels. Among the principles is building tunnel environments that ...

A cocktail of non-pathogenic bacteria naturally occurring in the digestive tract of healthy humans can protect against a potentially lethal E. coli infection in animal models according to research presented today at the 113th General Meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. The research, conducted by scientists at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor, could have important implications for the prevention or even treatment of this disease. Enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC) O157:H7 is a food-borne pathogen that has been responsible for ...

ANN ARBOR—Whooping cough has exploded in the United States and some other developed countries in recent decades, and many experts suspect ineffective childhood vaccines for the alarming resurgence. Some say the vaccine wears off quicker than public health officials had previously believed. Others suggest that the vaccine protects against illness but does not prevent transmission of the bacterial disease, which is also known as pertussis. But a University of Michigan-led research team has concluded that neither of these proposed mechanisms for the resurgence of pertussis ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Hospitals with the highest rates of cardiac arrests tend to have the poorest survival rates for those cases, new University of Michigan Health System research shows. Meanwhile, hospitals that do the best job of preventing cardiac arrest among their patients tend to be better at saving patients with cardiac arrest, according to the findings that appear in JAMA Internal Medicine. These results were not entirely expected, say researchers. For conditions other than cardiac arrest, higher volume has been associated with better outcomes for patients. ...

COLUMBUS, Ohio – New research suggests that for some hospitalized ICU patients on mechanical ventilators, using headphones to listen to their favorite types of music could lower anxiety and reduce their need for sedative medications. In a clinical trial, the option to listen to music lowered anxiety, on average, by 36.5 percent, and reduced the number of sedative doses by 38 percent and the intensity of sedation by 36 percent compared to ventilated intensive care unit patients who did not receive the music intervention. These effects were seen, on average, five days into ...

PHILADELPHIA—With little evidence to guide them, many hospital intensive care units (ICUs) have been employing critical care physicians at night with the notion it would improve patients' outcomes. However, new results from a one-year randomized trial from researchers at Penn Medicine involving nearly 1,600 patients admitted to the Hospital of the University Pennsylvania (HUP) Medical ICU suggest otherwise: Having a nighttime intensivist had no clear benefit on length of stay or mortality for these patients, not even patients admitted at night or those with the most critical ...

Older prostate cancer patients with other underlying health conditions should think twice before committing to surgery or radiation therapy for their cancer, according to a multicenter study led by researchers in the UCLA Department of Urology. The study reports the 14-year survival outcomes of 3,000 men diagnosed with prostate cancer between 1994 and 1995. The results suggest that older patients with low- to intermediate-risk prostate cancer and who have at least three underlying health problems, or comorbidities, were much more likely to die of something other than ...

Among intensive care unit patients receiving acute ventilatory support for respiratory failure, use of patient-preferred music resulted in greater reduction in anxiety and sedation frequency and intensity compared with usual care, according to a study published online by JAMA. The study is being released early online to coincide with its presentation at the American Thoracic Society international conference. "Critically ill mechanically ventilated patients receive intravenous sedative and analgesic medications to reduce anxiety and promote comfort and ventilator synchrony," ...

The early (within 24 hours of intensive care unit [ICU] admission) provision of intravenous nutrition among critically ill patients with contraindications (a condition that makes a particular procedure potentially inadvisable) to early use of enteral nutrition (such as through a feeding tube) did not result in significant differences in 60 day mortality or shorter ICU or hospital length of stay, compared with standard care, according to a study in the May 22/29 issue of JAMA. The study is being released early online to coincide with its presentation at the American Thoracic ...

Salamanders' immune systems are key to their remarkable ability to regrow limbs, and could also underpin their ability to regenerate spinal cords, brain tissue and even parts of their hearts, scientists have found. In research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences researchers from the Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute (ARMI) at Monash University found that when immune cells known as macrophages were systemically removed, salamanders lost their ability to regenerate a limb and instead formed scar tissue. Lead researcher, Dr James ...

A clinical trial of 75 patients hospitalized with acute decompensated heart failure (ADHF) suggests that aggressive fluid and sodium restriction has no effect on weight loss or clinical stability at three days but was associated with an increase in perceived thirst, according to a study published Online First by JAMA Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication. Sodium and fluid restrictions are nonpharmacologic measures widely used to treat ADHF despite a lack of clear evidence of their therapeutic effect, the authors write in the study background. "We conclude that ...

A study of older patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) suggests that new use of the long-acting bronchodilators β-agonists and anticholinergics was associated with similar increased risks of cardiovascular events, according to a study published Online First by JAMA Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication. COPD affects more than 1 in 4 Americans older than 35 years of age and is the third leading cause of death in the United States. Medications are a mainstay of management of the disease. While there is little controversy about the effectiveness ...

Use of the newer, more expensive intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) and use of the older conformal radiotherapy (CRT) after surgical removal of all or part of the prostate gland were associated with similar morbidity and cancer control outcomes, according to a study published Online First by JAMA Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication. Gregg H. Goldin, M.D., of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and colleagues analyzed data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results-Medicare-linked database to identify patients who received IMRT or CRT. ...

Hospitals with higher rates of survival among patients who experience in-hospital cardiac arrest also appear to have a lower incidence of in-hospital cardiac arrest, according to a study published Online First by JAMA Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication. Lena M. Chen, M.D., M.S., of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and colleagues identified 102,153 cases of in-hospital cardiac arrest at 358 hospitals between January 2000 and November 2009. The median (midpoint) hospital cardiac arrest incidence rate was 4.02 per 1,000 admissions, and the median hospital ...

A study by Alexandra L. C. Martiniuk, M.Sc, Ph.D., of The George Institute for Global Health, Sydney, Australia, and colleagues suggests less sleep per night is associated with a significant increase in the risk for motor vehicle crashes for young drivers. (Online First) Questionnaire responses were analyzed from 19,327 newly licensed drivers from 17 to 24 years old who held a first-stage provisional license between June 2003 and December 2004. Researchers also analyzed licensing and police-reported crash data, with an average of 2 years of follow up. On average, ...

Parents who share a bed with their breastfed baby could face a fivefold increase in the risk of cot death, even if the parents do not smoke, according to a new study. The research was led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and is published in BMJ Open. Cot death – also known as sudden infant death syndrome (SIDs) – remains a major cause of death among babies under 1 year of age in high income countries. There is already a general consensus that sleeping with a baby increases the risk of cot death if the parents smoke or if the mother has been drinking ...

New Rapid Diagnostic Test for Worm Infection Provides Substantial Improvement Over Current Standard, According to New African Field Study; Provides Compass to Guide Public Health Efforts to Halt Debilitating Lymphatic Filariasis (Elephantiasis) Two Studies on Efforts to Eliminate Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) in Africa: a. In a First for East Africa, Scientists Provide Detailed Evidence that Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) May Be Eliminated After 14 Years of Long-term Mass Drug Treatment b. Onchocerciasis (River Blindness) Could Make Comeback in Northwestern ...