SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) —The use of electronic discharge orders aimed at providing evidence-based decision support and clear instructions to heart failure patients helped increase compliance with quality care measures and lowered hospital readmission rates, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. Despite more widespread use of standardized discharge orders and evidence suggesting their effectiveness, little is known about how they impact adherence to quality measures or hospital readmission rates ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) – Using a telemedicine system to engage people in underserved, urban communities to measure and report their blood pressure remotely—outside of the doctor's office—appears to help them achieve blood pressure goals and improve adherence to lifestyle changes and medication recommendations, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. Overall, researchers say that just being in a system of care, with or without telemedicine, can result in important reductions in blood pressure. ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) —Women with coronary artery disease who completed a 12-week cardiac rehabilitation program were two-thirds less likely to die compared to those who were not referred to the program. In addition, the mortality benefit derived from this evidence-based program appears to be much more striking in women than men with the same condition, yet referrals and attendance among women fall short, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. "Cardiac rehabilitation can be a lifesaver, especially ...

Using zoning laws to shape the type of development and activity that occur in a neighborhood may be one way to reduce crime in urban areas, according to a new RAND Corporation study. Studying high-crime areas in the city of Los Angeles, researchers found that city blocks that included both residential and commercial zoning purposes experienced less crime than nearby blocks zoned primarily for commercial purposes. Crime was lowest in blocks zoned for residential-only uses, even in relatively high crime neighborhoods. The study found that single-use commercially zoned ...

Spouses, family members and others who provide informal care to U.S. military members after they return home from conflict often toil long hours with little support, putting them at risk for physical, emotional and financial harm, according to a new RAND Corporation report. Researchers estimate there are between 275,000 and 1 million women and men who are providing care or have provided care for military members or veterans who served in Iraq or Afghanistan. Caregivers include spouses, children and parents of military members and veterans. Despite the serious challenges ...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. - Locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck is a potentially curable disease in nearly every patient at the time of diagnosis, yet despite the most aggressive efforts, up to 30-50 percent of patients may ultimately succumb to the disease. For diseases where outcomes are so uncertain, medical science frequently addresses the need by intensifying therapy. In the case of head and neck cancer, one of the great questions of the current day is whether or not addition of multiple drugs to radiation therapy is superior to the current standard ...

Cold Spring Harbor, NY – In collaboration with colleagues at Cornell University, a team of cancer researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) has discovered cells with stem-cell properties in the ovary that can mutate to form tumors. The team demonstrated that when two important tumor suppressor genes are inactivated, a previously unknown subset of ovarian stem-like epithelial cells undergoes cancerous transformation. The findings, published today in the journal Nature, have important implications for our knowledge about ovarian cancer. "Sources of cells that ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Modest financial incentives offered over an extended period of time were significantly more likely to encourage sustained participation in a weight-loss program and long-term maintenance of weight loss than an identical program that did not offer financial rewards, according to a study being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. One hundred healthy adult employees or dependents aged 18-63 years with a body mass index between 30 to 39.9 kg/m2 were each assigned to one of four weight loss groups: ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Being overweight, especially from a young age, appears to lead to a bigger heart later in life, a condition that has been linked to serious heart problems and even death, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. Results of this longitudinal study found that people who carry excess weight over their lifetime are much more likely to have increases in left ventricular mass and relative wall thickness — both strong and independent predictors of cardiovascular morbidity and ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Suppressing a hunger-stimulating hormone with a minimally invasive procedure was safe in humans and led to significant weight loss for at least six months in a small preliminary study being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. More than two-thirds of American adults are overweight or obese, conditions that total more than $147 billion in medical costs each year. Excess weight also increases the risk for other conditions, such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and type 2 diabetes. "Weight ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Cholesterol levels seem to fluctuate significantly with the turning seasons, which may leave some people with borderline high cholesterol at greater cardiovascular risk during the winter months, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. While prior studies have shown that heart attacks and heart-related deaths increase during the winter months, researchers in Brazil were interested in finding out whether the prevalence of high cholesterol—a well-known cardiovascular risk ...

A new study from the University of Utah shows that individuals who describe themselves as being more mindful have more stable emotions and perceive themselves to have better control over their mood and behavior throughout the day. Higher mindful people also describe less cognitive and physiological activation before bedtime, suggesting that greater emotional stability during the day might even translate into better sleep. The study results will be presented later this month at the annual meeting of the American Psychosomatic Society. Prior studies of mindfulness—paying ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013)—New Orleans residents continue to face a three-fold increased risk of heart attack post-Katrina—a trend that has remained unchanged since the storm hit in 2005, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. The new data—an update to previous analyses comparing the behavioral and heart health of people before and after the storm—show this heightened risk persists even though post-Katrina patients are more likely to be prescribed medications known to prevent heart attacks such ...

A study from the University of Utah sheds new light on the health risks faced not only by military veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but by their partners as well. Results of the study will be presented later this month at the annual meeting of the American Psychosomatic Society. The study compared emotional and physiological responses of two groups of military veterans and their partners during and after engaging in a "disagreement task" set in a clinically-monitored environment. The veterans in one group had been diagnosed with PTSD, and those in the ...

Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. – Some cellular proteins have multiple, and occasionally opposing, functions. Professor Adrian Krainer [link: Faculty profile] and colleagues at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory demonstrate in a paper published online today in Molecular Cell [link: to paper via doi #] that the oncogenic protein SRSF1 can also trigger a stop in cell growth and prevent cancerous proliferation by stabilizing p53, the powerful tumor-suppressor protein. SRSF1 is a protein with many jobs. It was first described as necessary for the process in which mRNA, the messenger ...

In ten years time, routine preventive health care for adults may include genetic testing alongside the now familiar tests for cholesterol levels, mammography and colonoscopy. As genomic testing prepares to enter the realm of general medical care, an interdisciplinary team of researchers is suggesting in a commentary in the May 2013 issue of Genetics in Medicine, the peer-reviewed journal of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ACMG), that now is the time to explore genetic testing to identify people at high risk for carefully selected, preventable disease. ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Despite recommendations from leading medical groups, a surprising number of patients are not given aspirin before artery-clearing coronary angioplasty and stenting, and those patients have a significantly higher in-hospital death rate, according to research from a Michigan network being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. Aspirin use before angioplasty is a Class I recommendation of the American College of Cardiology and American Heart Association, the highest level of evidence for ACC/AHA guidelines. ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Even minor weight loss is associated with worse health outcomes among patients implanted with a certain type of defibrillator known as cardiac resynchronization therapy with defibrillator (CRT-D), according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. People with symptoms of heart failure who have an implantable CRT-D device may believe that losing weight will ultimately improve their long-term health outcomes. However, in the first study to look at weight loss and subsequent health ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) — Heart attack rates have spiked in Greece since the start of the country's financial crisis, especially among women and residents older than 45, according to a study of patient records being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. The study examined the medical records of 22,093 patients admitted to the cardiology department of the General Hospital of Kalamata over an eight-year span, with patients divided into a pre-financial crisis period from January 2004 through December 2007 or the crisis period, ...

SAN FRANCISCO (March 7, 2013) —The upheaval caused by Hurricane Katrina seems to have disrupted the usual timing of heart attacks, shifting peak frequency from weekday mornings to weekend nights, in a change in pattern that persisted a full five years after the storm, according to research being presented at the American College of Cardiology's 62nd Annual Scientific Session. The study, which could inform decisions about hospital staffing after natural disasters, compared the timing of heart attacks in patients admitted to Tulane Medical Center six years before and five ...

The liver is one of the few organs in our body that can regenerate itself, but how it occurs is a biological mystery. New research from BRIC, University of Copenhagen and the Finsen Laboratory, Rigshospitalet, has identified a protein complex that acts as a molecular switch turning on a self-regeneration program in the liver. The protein complex furthermore fine tunes liver metabolism, allowing this to run efficiently in parallel with the tissue damage repair. The new knowledge challenges the current focus on stem cells and may point towards future simplification of treatments ...

Residents of new housing developments increased their exercise and their wellbeing when they had more access to shops and parks, a new University of Melbourne study reveals. The ten year study found that the overall health of residents of new housing developments in Western Australia, improved when their daily walking increased as a result of more access to parks, public transport, shops and services. Lead researcher Professor Billie Giles-Corti, Director of the McCaughey VicHealth Centre for Community Wellbeing at the University of Melbourne said the study provided ...

Does good behavior lead to more good behavior? Or do we try to balance our good and bad deeds? The answer depends on our ethical mindset, according to new research published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science. Psychological scientist Gert Cornelissen of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and colleagues found that people who have an "ends justify the means" mindset are more likely to balance their good and bad deeds, while those who believe that what is right and wrong is a matter of principle are more likely to be consistent in ...

An air-breathing bio-battery has been constructed by researchers from the Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw. The core element providing the new power source with relatively high voltage and long lifetime is a carefully designed cathode taking up oxygen from air and composed of an enzyme, carbon nanotubes and silicate. People are increasingly taking advantage of devices supporting various functions of our bodies. Today they include cardiac pacemakers or hearing aids; tomorrow it will be contact lenses with automatically changing ...

Geneva, Switzerland (07 March, 2013) – A new survey reveals that more than half of British women did not play competitive sport or spend any time on intensive workouts such as running or cycling, in a given week. Seven months on from the 2012 Olympics, British women are still less likely than their European counterparts to devote any time to competitive sport, with Britain trailing behind Germany, Denmark, Sweden and France, according to a new multi-national survey on sport and exercise habits. Following record turn-outs for women's football at the Olympics, the countdown ...