San Diego, CA (October 19, 2012) – New data being presented at IDWeek 2012TM shows the fatal risk that influenza poses even for children without underlying health conditions and the effectiveness of school-based vaccination programs in protecting student populations. Together, these findings support the crucial public health message that families should take the flu virus seriously every year. One study viewed influenza from an epidemiological perspective, analyzing U.S. pediatric influenza-associated deaths over an eight-year period and finding that 43 percent of the ...

Istanbul, Turkey – 20 October 2012: Women are more likely to die from a myocardial infarction than men, according to research presented at the Acute Cardiac Care Congress 2012. The gender gap in mortality was independent of patient characteristics, revascularisation delays and revascularisation modalities. Women also had longer treatment delays, less aggressive treatment, more complications and longer hospital stays. The study was presented by Dr Guillaume Leurent from the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire in Rennes, France. The Acute Cardiac Care Congress 2012 is the ...

Istanbul, Turkey – 20 October 2012: The Acute Cardiac Care Congress 2012 is the first annual meeting of the newly launched Acute Cardiovascular Care Association (ACCA) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC). It takes place from 20 to 22 October in Istanbul, Turkey, at the Istanbul Lufti Kirdar Convention and Exhibition Centre (ICEC). Primary percutaneous coronary intervention (pPCI), also called balloon treatment, opens the coronary vessel and is preferred over intravenous (IV) medicine (called thrombolysis) to dissolve blood clots in patients with heart attacks. ...

Istanbul, Turkey – 20 October 2012: Coronary angioplasty improves survival in all patients with out of hospital cardiac arrest, according to research presented at the Acute Cardiac Care Congress 2012. The study was presented by Dr Annamaria Nicolino from the Santa Corona General Hospital in Pietra Ligure, Italy. The Acute Cardiac Care Congress 2012 is the first annual meeting of the newly launched Acute Cardiovascular Care Association (ACCA) of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC). It takes place during 20-22 October in Istanbul, Turkey, at the Istanbul Lufti Kirdar ...

DETROIT – A novel therapy that uses donated human stool to treat the deadly and contagious C.diff infection is safe and highly effective, according to a Henry Ford Hospital study. Researchers found that 43 of 49 patients recovered swiftly after treatment and had no adverse complications from C.diff three months later. Treatment is performed either through a nasogastric tube or colonscopy on an outpatient or inpatient basis. Mayur Ramesh, M.D., a Henry Ford Infectious Diseases physician and senior author of the study, says the treatment, while appearing unconventional, ...

DETROIT – The national practice guideline for treating MRSA-related pneumonia is seven to 21 days. A Henry Ford Hospital study found that effective treatment can be done in half the time. Researchers found that 40 percent of patients were treated for eight to 13 days on a therapy of the antibiotics vancomycin or linezolid, and had the highest survival rate. The Henry Ford study is believed to be the first to evaluate the length of treatment for MRSA-related pneumonia. The study is being presented Friday at the annual Infectious Diseases Society of America meeting ...

Intervention stopped early in NIH-funded study of weight loss in overweight and obese adults with type 2 diabetes after finding no harm, but no cardiovascular benefits An intensive diet and exercise program resulting in weight loss does not reduce cardiovascular events such as heart attack and stroke in people with longstanding type 2 diabetes, according to a study supported by the National Institutes of Health. The Look AHEAD (Action for Health in Diabetes) study tested whether a lifestyle intervention resulting in weight loss would reduce rates of heart disease, stroke, ...

In a key step toward creating a working quantum computer, Princeton researchers have developed a method that may allow the quick and reliable transfer of quantum information throughout a computing device The finding, by a team led by Princeton physicist Jason Petta, could eventually allow engineers to build quantum computers consisting of millions of quantum bits, or qubits. So far, quantum researchers have only been able to manipulate small numbers of qubits, not enough for a practical machine. "The whole game at this point in quantum computing is trying to build a ...

Converging scientific evidence – not to mention a great deal of life experience – tells us that self-control is an important ability. It helps us keep our cool, get things done, and resist the things that tempt us. Scientists believe that gaining a clearer understanding of how self-control works could provide critical insights into addressing some of the large-scale problems facing society today, including obesity and addiction. Numerous studies have found evidence for the idea of self-control as a limited resource, but emerging research suggests that this model may not ...

LA JOLLA, CA---- By reprogramming skin cells from Parkinson's disease patients with a known genetic mutation, researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies have identified damage to neural stem cells as a powerful player in the disease. The findings, reported online October 17th in Nature, may lead to new ways to diagnose and treat the disease. The scientists found that a common mutation to a gene that produce the enzyme LRRK2, which is responsible for both familial and sporadic cases of Parkinson's disease, deforms the membrane surrounding the nucleus of a ...

AUGUSTA, Ga. – Daily sessions of whole-body vibration may combat prediabetes in adolescents, dramatically reducing inflammation, average blood glucose levels and symptoms such as frequent urination, researchers report. In mice that mimic over-eating adolescents headed toward diabetes, 20 minutes of daily vibration for eight weeks restored a healthy balance of key pro- and anti-inflammatory mediators and was better than prescription drugs at reducing levels of hemoglobin A1c, the most accurate indicator of average blood glucose levels, said Dr. Jack C. Yu, Chief of the ...

Spectroscopic observations of distant galaxies taken with the 10-meter telescopes at the W. M. Keck Observatory on Hawaii, when combined with images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope plus supercomputer simulations to help interpret the observations, together reveal a major surprise: that a standard assumption about the evolution of galaxies is not correct. Astronomers had thought that disk galaxies (like our own Milky Way) had largely finished forming by about 8 billion years ago, as indicated by the rates at which stars are formed in the Universe. Therefore, many astronomers ...

New neuroscience research is confirming an old adage about the power of a handshake: strangers do form a better impression of those who proffer their hand in greeting. A firm, friendly handshake has long been recommended in the business world as a way to make a good first impression, and the greeting is thought to date to ancient times as a way of showing a stranger you had no weapons. Now, a paper published online and for the December print issue of the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience on a study of the neural correlates of a handshake is giving insight into just ...

The Who asked "who are you?" but Dartmouth neurobiologist Jeffrey Taube asks "where are you?" and "where are you going?" Taube is not asking philosophical or theological questions. Rather, he is investigating nerve cells in the brain that function in establishing one's location and direction. Taube, a professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, is using microelectrodes to record the activity of cells in a rat's brain that make possible spatial navigation—how the rat gets from one place to another—from "here" to "there." But before embarking to go ...

Prapiroon is both extra-large and now extra-tropical in the western North Pacific Ocean. NASA's Terra satellite captured an image of the large storm after Prapiroon became extra-tropical. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Extra-tropical Storm Prapiroon on Oct. 19 at 01:15 UTC (Oct. 18, 9:15 p.m. EDT). The storm appeared on the MODIS image to be as large as the main island of Japan and the strongest thunderstorms and heaviest rainfall appeared north of the center of circulation ...

VIDEO: A study of 544 star-forming galaxies observed by the Keck and Hubble telescopes shows that disk galaxies like our own Milky Way unexpectedly reached their current state long after much... Click here for more information. A comprehensive study of hundreds of galaxies observed by the Keck telescopes in Hawaii and NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has revealed an unexpected pattern of change that extends back 8 billion years, or more than half the age of the universe. "Astronomers ...

Contact: Lisa Craig (Burnaby resident), 778.782.7140, licraig@sfu.ca Carol Thorbes, PAMR, 778.782.3035, cthorbes@sfu.ca Photos on Flickr: http://at.sfu.ca/lutURE END ...

The death of a child is a tragic event for a family, bringing with it feelings of numbness, anger, guilt and denial. And, unfortunately, for many families, the loss becomes too much to bear. A new study co-conducted by a researcher at Rochester Institute of Technology uncovers the strong connection between the death of a child and the mortality of the mother, regardless of cause of death, gender of the child, marital status, family size, income or education level of the mother. Javier Espinosa, assistant professor in RIT's College of Liberal Arts and an expert in health ...

Boulder, Colo., USA – Geosphere, The Geological Society of America's peer-reviewed online journal, has added papers to four special issues: Origin and Evolution of the Sierra Nevada and Walker Lane; CRevolution 2: Origin and Evolution of the Colorado River System II; Exploring the Deep Sea and Beyond; and Making the Southern Margin of Laurentia. Geosphere specializes in accommodating animations, sound, and movie files, along with high-resolution figures. Abstracts for these and other Geosphere papers are available at http://geosphere.gsapubs.org/. Representatives of the ...

Enhanced local electric fields are predominant in nonlinear optical properties, particularly in surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS), which is a sensitive technique used for the detection of trace amounts of chemicals. Analysis of the electric fields around nanostructures indicates that they can provide a basic foundation to obtain greater SERS intensity. Professor ZHANG Zhongyue and his group from the College of Physics and Information Technology at Shaanxi Normal University have proposed a novel scheme to enhance the local electric fields around nanostructures. The ...

NEW ORLEANS – Robert Block, MD, FAAP, outgoing president of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), will address attendees at the AAP National Conference & Exhibition Saturday, Oct. 20, at 10:40 a.m. during the opening plenary session at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans. Dr. Block will lead a discussion on the "soul of a pediatrician," and how a pediatrician's devotion and compassion for children must persist as the world of medicine changes around us. Dr. Block will also focus on his yearlong theme of "all adults were once children," to promote ...

NEW ORLEANS -- A study conducted by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has documented that boys in the U.S. are experiencing the onset of puberty six months to two years earlier than reported in previous research. The study, "Secondary Sexual Characteristics in Boys: Data from the Pediatric Research in Office Settings Network," will be published in the November 2012 Pediatrics and published online Oct. 20 to coincide with the AAP National Conference & Exhibition in New Orleans. The trend toward earlier onset of puberty in girls is now generally accepted and supported ...

NEW ORLEANS – Cyberbullying – the use of the Internet, phones or other technologies to repeatedly harass or mistreat peers – is often linked with teen suicide in media reports. However, new research presented on Saturday, Oct. 20, at the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) National Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans, shows that the reality is more complex. Most teen suicide victims are bullied both online and in school, and many suicide victims also suffer from depression. For the abstract, "Cyberbullying and Suicide: A Retrospective Analysis of 41 Cases," researchers ...

NEW ORLEANS – In vitro fertilization (IVF) may significantly increase the risk of birth defects, particularly those of the eye, heart, reproductive organs and urinary systems, according to new research presented Saturday, Oct. 20, at the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) National Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans. According to the study, despite increasing use of IVF in the United States, associations between birth defects and IVF are poorly understood. Management of birth defects comprises a large part of pediatric surgical care and demands significant health ...

Traffic Accidents Increase as Texas Oil and Gas Industry Grows Here are some alarming statistics for workers in the busy oil and gas industry in Texas. From 2003 to 2008, the leading cause of death for oil field workers nationwide was highway accidents, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. And in 2010, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported that almost 40 percent of fatalities in the oil and gas industry resulted from motor vehicle accidents. Many Texas communities are currently seeing big increases in traffic volume ...