Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012: A new study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, reinforces current thinking that smoking negatively affects treatment response in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients treated with anti-tumour necrosis factor (anti-TNF) drugs. This American study, the largest of its kind, followed 2,811 treatment naïve patients initiated onto anti-TNF therapy. Of the study group, 19% (n=521) were smokers and 81% (n=2,290) were non-smokers. Smokers had significantly higher scores on the Clinical Disease ...

Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012: A new study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, shows that lung changes in association with anti-citrullinated protein autoantibody (ACPA) status are a primary manifestation of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Study findings show that 51% of RA patients (n=105) had identifiable lung changes (as measured by high resolution computer tomography [HRCT]) as compared to 28% of healthy controls (n=43). In addition, ACPA presence – but not smoking status – was associated with HRCT changes. This ...

Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012: According to a study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, patients with psoriatic arthritis (PsA) who are starting anti-tumour necrosis factor (anti-TNF) treatment and adhere to a hypocaloric diet have a significantly greater chance of achieving minimal disease activity (MDA, an important measure of disease activity) at six months compared to those on a standard diet. The results of an Italian study of 138 obese PsA patients demonstrated that those who achieved a ≥10% weight ...

Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012: A new Phase III study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, shows that patients with active psoriatic arthritis (PsA) treated with Ustekinumab (UST) 90mg were more than twice as likely to achieve the study's primary endpoint, ACR20* at 24 weeks, than those treated with placebo (49.5% vs 22.8%). 42.4% of patients treated with UST 45mg were also more likely to achieve ACR20 at 24 weeks compared to placebo. Significant improvements were also seen with UST 45mg and 90mg in ACR50* (24.9% ...

Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012 : A new study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, shows that early menopause predicts a milder form of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). New insights on factors influencing RA are good news for sufferers of the chronic inflammatory disease that currently affects over 2 million women in Europe. 1,2 The study, based on 134 incident RA cases, found that patients aged over 45 years with a history of early menopause were 50% less likely to develop severe RA (16% versus 35%) and more likely to develop ...

Berlin, Germany, June 8 2012: Results of a study presented today at EULAR 2012, the Annual Congress of the European League Against Rheumatism, suggest that the newly developed RABBIT Risk Score, which calculates the risk of serious infections in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) who are treated with anti-tumour necrosis factor drugs (anti-TNFs) or conventional disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) is a valid and effective tool for rheumatologists to predict risk of serious infection. The German study used data from 2,603 patients enrolled in the RABBIT ...

June 8, 2012, New York, NY—In 2011, 13.7 million young adults ages 19 to 25 stayed on or joined their parents' health plans, including 6.6 million who would likely not have been able to do so before passage of the Affordable Care Act, according to a new Commonwealth Fund report. However, not all young adults have parents with health plans they can join, and many still experience gaps in coverage and face medical bill problems and medical debt. Nearly two of five (39%) young adults ages 19 to 29 went without health insurance at some time in 2011, and more than one-third ...

Small firms feeling the squeeze following the Royal Mail's decision to increase the price of first and second class stamps at the end of last month are being offered a helping hand by Bolton-based online parcel delivery firm Parcel2Go. The company says businesses and individuals can try to beat the Royal Mail price increase by becoming Parcel2Go users and benefiting from the vast range of reliable and cost-effective UK express delivery solutions available through the website. With just a few clicks of a mouse, customers can order delivery services from some of the ...

Any experienced bingo player can tell you that one of the keys to success in playing bingo online is choosing the right bingo website. Many bingo websites are all talk and no show, or do not give players the generous offers that they desire and deserve. One feature on bingo websites that every new player should look out for is no deposit required bingo. This means that when players register, they are given free cash to be used towards trying bingo games on the website, without spending a penny of their own money! While players cannot withdraw this cash for personal ...

The difference between online bingo players and traditional bingo hall players is that the bingo lovers on the Internet like to play bingo at their own convenience - anytime, anywhere. Whether it is at the coffee shop or in the comfort of one's home, bingo games can be played online anywhere, as long as there is an Internet connection and a computer! What could be better than playing great bingo matches and winning money on the go? It is easy to see then why so many people are interested in trying their hand at online bingo. However, it can be difficult to know how and ...

According to the Direct Marketing Association, email marketing campaigns produce an average return of more than $50 for each dollar spent. Given that email marketing is pretty cost effective anyway, this statistic does make it seem a no-brainer. Certainly, we at Prompt Proofing have noticed that, whenever we send out a mass email, it generates new orders. These orders come from our existing customers, since they are the ones who have agreed to receive email from us. If people have not used your services, or purchased one of your products, for a while, you may well have ...

Unlike their visual cousins, the neurons that control movement are not a predictable bunch. Scientists working to decode how such neurons convey information to muscles have been stymied when trying to establish a one-to-one relationship between a neuron's behavior and external factors such as muscle activity or movement velocity. In an article published online June 3rd by the journal Nature, a team of electrical engineers and neuroscientists working at Stanford University propose a new theory of the brain activity behind arm movements. Their theory is a significant departure ...

LA JOLLA, CA – A new study led by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute suggests that the replication process for DNA—the genetic instructions for living organisms that is composed of four bases (C, G, A and T)—is more open to unnatural letters than had previously been thought. An expanded "DNA alphabet" could carry more information than natural DNA, potentially coding for a much wider range of molecules and enabling a variety of powerful applications, from precise molecular probes and nanomachines to useful new life forms. The new study, which appears in the June ...

A new model for understanding how nerve cells in the brain control movement may help unlock the secrets of the motor cortex, a critical region that has long resisted scientists' efforts to understand it, researchers report June 3 in Nature. Scientists at Washington University in St. Louis, Stanford University and Columbia University have shown that the motor cortex's effects on movement can be much more easily understood by looking at groups of motor cortex neurons instead of individual nerve cells. In the study, scientists identified rhythmic brain cell firing patterns ...

MAYWOOD, Il. -- Lower-income cancer patients are less likely to participate in cancer clinical trials, according to a study co-authored by Loyola University Medical Center oncologist Kathy Albain, MD, FACP. Patients with incomes of less than $50,000 per year were 27 percent less likely than higher-income patients to participate in clinical trials, and those with incomes less than $20,000 were 44 percent less likely to participate. Fifty-three percent of patients with incomes less than $20,000 per year expressed concerns about their costs of participating in clinical trials. ...

DURHAM, N.C. – A new cancer treatment that links chemotherapy with an agent that homes in on specific breast cancer cells was significantly better than the current drug regimen at keeping patients' advanced tumors from progressing, according to results from a Phase III clinical trial led by Kimberly Blackwell, M.D., of the Duke Cancer Institute. Participants with invasive breast cancer who took the investigational drug, called trastuzumab emtansine, or T-DM1, also had fewer and less harsh side effects than study participants who received a standard treatment. The ...

Cold Spring Harbor, NY and Washington, DC – An international research team involving 17 institutions including Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has published the most comprehensive analysis to date of the maize genome. It is an achievement that substantially increases scientists' understanding of differences across related but different species of the plant, which most North Americans call corn, as well as the nature of differences found within individual maize species. The research is expected to speed development of improved varieties of corn, which is one of the ...

New hope has arrived for migraine sufferers following a Griffith University study with the people of Norfolk Island. Led by Professor Lyn Griffiths from the University's Griffith Health Institute, the team has identified a new region on the X chromosome as playing a role in migraine. The research provides compelling evidence for a new migraine susceptibility gene involved in migraine. The study also indicated that there may be more than one X chromosomal gene involved and implicated a gene involved in iron regulation in the brain. All females have two X chromosomes ...

Efforts to "green" operating rooms can result in cost savings for hospitals and reduce the environmental impact without compromising patient care, argues an analysis published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). "The operating room is a disproportionate contributor to health care waste and represents a high-yield target for change," writes Dr. Yoan Kagoma, Schulich School of Medicine & Dentistry, Western University, London, Ontario, with coauthors. Operating rooms produce approximately 20%-33% of all waste in hospitals, and much of this waste is subjected ...

Acetaminophen, a widely available over-the-counter medication, can cause liver toxicity in children if doses are exceeded, and more public education is needed to warn of potential adverse effects, states an article published in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). "Acetaminophen overdose is a major cause of acute liver failure and is the most common identifiable cause of acute liver failure in children," writes Dr. Rod Lim, Department of Pediatrics, Children's Hospital, London Health Sciences Centre, London, Ontario, with coauthors. "Repeated supratherapeutic ...

Canada should ban off-label use of antibiotics in farm animals because it contributes significantly to antibiotic resistance in humans, states an editorial in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal). Off-label use means using antibiotics for purposes other than those indicated on the label. "Of greatest concern is the promotion of resistance to antibiotics that may currently represent the last resort for treating some highly resistant infections in humans," writes Barbara Sibbald, Deputy Editor, CMAJ. Other countries and regions are far ahead of Canada in limiting ...

MINNEAPOLIS – Contrary to earlier reports, a new study suggests that soy protein may not preserve overall thinking abilities in women over the age of 45, but may improve memory related to facial recognition. The study is published in the June 5, 2012, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. "Soy is a staple of many traditional Asian diets and has been thought possibly to improve cognition in postmenopausal women," said study author Victor W. Henderson, MD, MS, with Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif., and a Fellow with ...

Roughly 100,000 years ago, human evolution reached a mysterious bottleneck: Our ancestors had been reduced to perhaps five to ten thousand individuals living in Africa. In time, "behaviorally modern" humans would emerge from this population, expanding dramatically in both number and range, and replacing all other co-existing evolutionary cousins, such as the Neanderthals. The cause of the bottleneck remains unsolved, with proposed answers ranging from gene mutations to cultural developments like language to climate-altering events, among them a massive volcanic eruption. ...

UPTON, NY - Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have identified key elements in the biochemical mechanism plants use to limit the production of fatty acids. The results suggest ways scientists might target those biochemical pathways to increase the production of plant oils as a renewable resource for biofuels and industrial processes. "Now that we understand how this system operates - how plants 'know' when they've made enough oil and how they slow down production - we can look for ways to break the feedback loop so they keep making ...

SANTA CRUZ, CA--Giant insects ruled the prehistoric skies during periods when Earth's atmosphere was rich in oxygen. Then came the birds. After the evolution of birds about 150 million years ago, insects got smaller despite rising oxygen levels, according to a new study by scientists at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Insects reached their biggest sizes about 300 million years ago during the late Carboniferous and early Permian periods. This was the reign of the predatory griffinflies, giant dragonfly-like insects with wingspans of up to 28 inches (70 centimeters). ...