OAK BROOK, Ill. – Researchers may have discovered one reason that African Americans are at increased risk for heart attacks and other cardiovascular events. According to a new study published online in the journal Radiology, African Americans have increased levels of non-calcified plaque, which consists of buildups of soft deposits deep in the walls of the arteries that are not detected by some cardiac tests. Non-calcified plaque is more vulnerable to rupturing and causing a blood clot, which could lead to a heart attack or other cardiovascular event. According to ...

OAK BROOK, Ill. – Breast cancer screening with mammography results in a significant reduction in breast cancer mortality, according to long-term follow-up results of a large-scale Swedish trial. The results are published online in the journal Radiology. "Mammographic screening confers a substantial relative and absolute reduction in breast cancer mortality risk in the long-term," said Stephen W. Duffy, M.Sc., professor of cancer screening at Queen Mary, University of London. "For every 1,000 to 1,500 mammograms, one breast cancer death is prevented." The Swedish Two-County ...

PHILADELPHIA — Patients treated with sunitinib and sorafenib responded to the flu vaccine, which suggests the agents do not damage the immune system as much as previously feared, according to a study in Clinical Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research. Keith Flaherty, M.D., director of developmental therapeutics at the Massachusetts General Hospital and a senior editor of Clinical Cancer Research, said the findings have broad implications beyond questions of patient management. "The damage that chemotherapy does to normal, healthy ...

This press release is available in French.LONDON (28 JUNE 2011)—A new analysis of progress in the global fight against malaria finds a four-fold increase in annual funding for malaria research and development (R&D) in just 16 years—increasing from US$121 million in 1993 to US$612 million in 2009, with a particularly rapid increase since 2004. The funding has generated the strongest pipeline of malaria control and prevention products in history. The report warns, however, that even a small decline in annual funding could jeopardize this pipeline, derail development of ...

Alameda Services, a Health Information Technology (HIT) consulting and training organization specializing in workforce development, has been recognized as a training affiliate for the CEHRS Exam, administered by the National Healthcare Association (NHA). As an affiliate, Alameda Services is able to prepare students for the rigorous national certification as part of its program. Students and healthcare providers often report a higher level of recruitment, retention and placement among those who obtain the electronic health record (EHR) certification. More information about ...

Results from the longest running breast screening trial show that screening with mammography reduces the number of deaths from breast cancer. The study*, by researchers at Queen Mary, University of London, shows that the number of deaths that are prevented goes up year after year. The results are new evidence of the long-term benefits of regular breast screening. Senior author, Professor Stephen Duffy explained: "Breast cancer can take many years to develop so to tell if screening is effective, we need to see how women fair in the long-term. "In this study, we've ...

Baltimore, Maryland, June 28, 2011 – Nurses, occupational and physical therapists, case managers and education staff, all working together at a 300-bed Nebraska rehabilitation hospital, have successfully implemented a team approach to dramatically reduce infections from urinary catheters, the most prevalent type of infection acquired in healthcare settings. The interdisciplinary team at Madonna Rehabilitation Hospital in Lincoln, one of the largest free-standing rehabilitation hospitals in the country, reduced catheter associated urinary tract infections (CAUTIs) by 89 ...

triCerat is excited to announce its debut at IT decisions in London, June 28-29 at the QEII Conference Centre in Westminster, London. IT decisions addresses the current, significant developments affecting IT systems in the real world. The two-day program includes sessions on virtualization, storage, cloud computing, software-as-a-service (SaaS), mobile and wireless accessibility, security, green IT, and more. The 30-minute sessions and roundtable discussions were designed with time-efficiency in mind for the busy IT executive. Keynote speaker Tim Jennings, Research Fellow ...

Baltimore, Maryland, June 28, 2011 – Nurses on a surgical intensive care unit (SICU) at a large academic medical center cut bloodstream infections to zero and saved more than $200,000 during a six-month period. The University of Maryland Medical Center SICU sustained a rate of zero central line-associated bloodstream infections (CLABSIs) for a 25-week period, eliminating 14 CLABSIs and saving 2-3 lives when compared to the same time period in the previous year, according to results of an intensive, six-month nursing initiative presented today at the 38th Annual Educational ...

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- A research team led by University at Buffalo chemists has used synchrotron light sources to observe the electron clouds on the surface of graphene, producing a series of images that reveal how folds and ripples in the remarkable material can harm its conductivity. The research, scheduled to appear June 28 in Nature Communications, was conducted by UB, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the Molecular Foundry at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), and SEMATECH, a global consortium of semiconductor manufacturers. Graphene, ...

Gothic Cabinet Craft (http://www.gothiccabinetcraft.com), one of the largest manufacturers and retailers of real wood furniture in the North Eastern United States, today announces the release of their new iPhone app for furniture shoppers, ShopGothic. A free app, ShopGothic was designed to aid in the furniture shopping process of Gothic Cabinet Craft's customers. "No more guessing what color will best match existing furniture," says Aristidis Zaharopoulos, President of Gothic Cabinet Craft, Inc. "We found that to be a problem for many of our customers. ...

Cardiovascular disease (CVD), driven by the global pandemics of obesity and diabetes, poses a daunting challenge to clinicians in the 21st century. Despite progress, there is still much to be done to improve the control of dyslipidaemia, a key risk factor. In Europe, as many as one-half of patients are inadequately treated.1,2 The first European guidelines specifically focused on managing dyslipidaemias offer new hope.3,4 Experts from the European Atherosclerosis Society (EAS) and the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) worked together to develop these guidelines. The ...

DETROIT – Brigid Waldron-Perrine, Ph.D., a recent graduate from Wayne State University, and her mentor, Lisa J. Rapport, Ph.D., professor of psychology at Wayne State University's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, found that if traumatic brain injury (TBI) victims feel close to a higher power, it can help them rehabilitate. The study was recently published in Rehabilitation Psychology. Traumatic brain injury is a disruption of normal brain function after a head injury and affects 1.7 million Americans annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. ...

DALLAS – June 28, 2011 – UT Southwestern Medical Center maternal-fetal specialists have confirmed a potential new protocol to protect pregnant women who are at risk for hepatitis B, a health problem that affects 2 billion people worldwide. An accelerated hepatitis B vaccination schedule for high-risk pregnant women was found effective and well-tolerated. The findings appear in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology. While the normal three-shot regimen of hepatitis B vaccine for adults – given over a six-month period – has long been recommended for pregnant women, that ...

The c-JUN protein was initially described in the late 1980s as the mammalian equivalent of a protein responsible for causing cancer in birds. Intense research in a number of labs has subsequently led to a basic understanding of how the protein works. c-JUN is a transcription factor that modifies (phosphorylates) key regulatory proteins in the cell, thereby activating or deactivating them and leading to unregulated cell division and hence cancer. It has also become clear that c-JUN acts not on its own but in conjunction with an array of further proteins that modulate ...

A team of researchers investigated a desert tortoise from the Southwest USA and northwestern Mexico. What was thought to be a simple problem in species identification turned out to be a very complex matter. Their investigations required forensic genetics and several other methods. In the end, they found it necessary to describe a new species. More than that, the discovery has very important implications for conservation and the development of the deserts of southern California. Since the original description of Agassiz's Land Tortoise, scientifically called Gopherus agassizii, ...

Whether in a leading or supporting role, third-party firms specializing in a vendor's applications implement them more adeptly than the vendor itself for all but one vendor -- often by a wide margin, according to a new KLAS study. For the report, Clinical Implementation Services: High in Demand But More Specialized in Need, healthcare providers reported contracting out implementation work to 30 different companies, from smaller boutique firms to the software vendors themselves. Every vendor, except for Epic, was outstripped by third-parties specializing in the vendors' ...

At their largest US show to date, Florence & the Machine debuted new music to a sold-out Greek Theatre in Berkeley, CA (produced under the direction of Another Planet Entertainment). Playing under the stars to a capacity crowd, the band celebrated their debut album, Lungs (released 2009), with a 90-minute set that set the stage for a victory lap across America. The band reveled in the moment, clearly excited to deliver fresh material. What Water Gave Me offered the audience insight into the band's creative process as they flesh out ideas for a new release. Highlighted ...

Milan, Italy, 28 June 2011 – Egocentric, self-centred, and insensitive to the needs of others: these social problems often arise in people with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) and have been attributed in part to a loss of emotional empathy, the capacity to recognise and understand the emotions of other people. Given that traumatic brain injuries are becoming more common, and resulting empathy deficits can have negative repercussions on social functioning and quality of life, it is increasingly important to understand the processes that shape emotional empathy. A new ...

Biocides turn out to be less toxic for the environment if they are subjected to microencapsulation, due to the fact that this process forms shell(s) for the substance. This is the conclusion of chemist Ms Mariluz Alonso in a thesis defended at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). In this research, she chose a number of biocides and other complementary substances, seeking a micro-encapsulation which, besides being compatible with the environment, is more soluble in water, more manageable for the operator, with better conditions of conservation, and effective against ...

On June 22, 2011, the Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf set a new world record for magnetic fields with 91.4 teslas. To reach this record, Sergei Zherlitsyn and his colleagues at the High Magnetic Field Laboratory Dresden (HLD) developed a coil weighing about 200 kilograms in which electric current create the giant magnetic field – for a period of a few milliseconds. The coil survived the experiment unscathed. "With this record, we're not really that interested in reaching top field values, but instead in using it for research in materials science," explains Joachim ...

Designer lingerie seller Journelle, Inc. has launched a Facebook contest that awards the winner with $1,200 worth of lingerie. To be eligible to win Journelle's "Calendar Girl" sweepstakes and receive $100 worth of fine lingerie every month for a year, contestants must complete an entry form with her name, date of birth, e-mail address, telephone number, and click on Journelle's "Like" button on Facebook . Entrants must be 18 years of age or older. The contest ends at midnight on July 4, 2011. Purchases from a Journelle store are not required for ...

"White pasta is one example of a product which in some cases has received a bad reputation because of a high GI. However, white pasta produces just as good a blood glucose response as wholewheat pasta", says Liza Rosén, doctor in applied nutrition at Lund University in Sweden. The reason why wheat pasta has sometimes been assigned a confusingly high value is that GI only considers the entire area under the blood sugar curve. In contrast to what many believe, GI does not take fluctuations in blood sugar into account. This puts foods with a long and fairly low curve at ...

Designing fiber optic networks involves finding the most efficient way to connect phones and computers that are in different places – a costly and time-consuming process. Now researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a model that can find optimal connections 10,000 times more quickly, using less computing power to solve the problem. "Problems that used to take days to solve can now be solved in just a few seconds," says Dr. George Rouskas, computer science professor at NC State and author of a paper describing the new method. The model could solve ...

Targeted multi-drug treatments for hepatitis C patients that could stop the virus in its tracks have come a step closer, thanks to researchers at the University of Leeds, UK. The study by Dr Stephen Griffin and colleagues, published in the journal Hepatology, reveals how two prototype small molecule drugs, known as p7 inhibitors, can each attack different parts of the hepatitis C virus. Their findings suggest that p7 inhibitors could be a powerful way of suppressing hepatitis C, when used together with the latest generation of 'direct-acting' drugs. More than 170 million ...