Saving House from Foreclosure The collapse of the housing bubble in mid-2006 triggered a mortgage crisis that has severely impacted our nation's economy. Excessive subprime lending during the boom created a vulnerable banking industry. Holders of adjustable-rate mortgages found themselves forced into foreclosure when home values fell and they were unable to refinance their homes. Zero money down and "liar loans" (loans issued by lenders who failed to verify borrower income), weakened banks as homeowners defaulted. Borrowers who had overextended themselves by ...

Researchers at the University of Illinois have become the first to record an airglow signature in the upper atmosphere produced by a tsunami using a camera system based in Maui, Hawaii. The signature, caused by the March 11 earthquake that devastated Japan, was observed in an airglow layer 250 kilometers above the earth's surface. It preceded the tsunami by one hour, suggesting that the technology could be used as an early-warning system in the future. The findings were recently published in the peer-reviewed Geophysical Research Letters. The observation confirms a ...

One of the most common reasons that people stay in difficult marriages, even if they would like to get a divorce, is "for the sake of the children." People assume that it is better for their children to have both parents in the home, even in an unhappy marriage, than to have to grow up as children of divorced parents. However, there is debate among mental health professionals about which is more detrimental to children in the long run: having divorced parents or having parents who stay together but who are unhappy. Traditional Notions About Divorce and Children Conventional ...

A new study by researchers at Hospital for Special Surgery has identified patients who are at a higher risk of morbidity and mortality when undergoing knee replacement surgery in both legs at the same time. The study found that patients who have a history of significant medical problems, especially congestive heart failure or pulmonary hypertension, are at increased risk for major complications. "What we sought to do for the first time with this study, was to provide evidence-based risk stratification for who should be considered at high risk for morbidity and mortality ...

The old adage is that money can't buy you love; but in today's society, money and finances are inextricably linked together. Once you say "I do", a number of things change with regard to your finances. Basically, one spouse's financial habits will affect the other's credit history, as married couples incur shared responsibility on home equity loans, joint credit cards, and other financial obligations. With America's high divorce rate, prenuptial agreements are no longer limited to celebrities and multi-millionaires. While only three percent of first marriages ...

Two years ago, researchers at UCLA found that specific regions in the brains of long-term meditators were larger and had more gray matter than the brains of individuals in a control group. This suggested that meditation may indeed be good for all of us since, alas, our brains shrink naturally with age. Now, a follow-up study suggests that people who meditate also have stronger connections between brain regions and show less age-related brain atrophy. Having stronger connections influences the ability to rapidly relay electrical signals in the brain. And significantly, ...

MAYWOOD, Ill. -- For kidney disease patients, a large belt size can double the risk of dying. A study lead by a Loyola University Health System researcher found that the larger a kidney patient's waist circumference, the greater the chance the patient would die during the course of the study. The study by lead researcher Holly Kramer, MD, MPH, and colleagues is published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases. Waist circumference was more strongly linked to mortality than another common measure of obesity, body mass index (BMI). BMI is a height-to-weight ratio. ...

The serious bus accidents of 2011 have put U.S. bus safety into question. Are tour buses, school buses and city buses safe? If not, are there steps that can be taken to improve safety? This article will explore recent bus accidents, current and proposed bus regulations, and initiatives in place to improve bus safety. Bus Accidents in 2011 Two significant bus accidents have made the news in the last few months. In May, a tour bus travelling from Greensboro, North Carolina to New York City crashed in Virginia, killing four people and injuring dozens more. The bus driver ...

Since the birth of the industrial revolution, ocean pH has dropped by 0.1 units. That might not sound like much until you realise that a 0.1 unit fall is a 30% increase in acidity. And, with predictions that ocean pH will continue plummeting, ecologists are becoming increasingly concerned about the impact of ocean acidification on marine populations. Brian Gaylord and his colleagues from the University of California at Davis explain that the open-coast mussel, Mytilus californianus, is a foundation species for many coastal ecosystems on the exposed northwestern coasts of ...

Cincinnati, OH, July 14, 2011 -- Incidents of young athletes collapsing during sports practice due to an undiagnosed heart condition are alarming, and have led some health care professionals to call for mandatory electrocardiogram (ECG) screenings before sport participation. Others, however, question the validity of such a mandate. A new study soon to be published in The Journal of Pediatrics examines the accuracy and effectiveness of pre-sport participation ECGs. Dr. Allison Hill and colleagues from Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children's ...

Divorce entails both physical and financial separation from one's spouse. And, as the U.S. slowly emerges from a severe recession, many people contemplating divorce are concerned about the effect of divorce on their finances. However, understanding how property division works in divorce and its impact on one's finances can help allay some anxiety over the process. Because Texas is a community property state, almost all assets -- whether physical or financial -- either spouse acquires during a marriage is classified as martial property. When a couple gets divorced in ...

STANFORD, Calif. — Pediatric cardiologists are prone to misinterpreting electrocardiograms when using the results to determine whether young athletes have heart defects that could make exercising perilous, according to a new study from the Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital. This is the first research to examine the acumen of pediatric cardiologists from several health-care institutions in using ECGs to detect rare heart conditions associated with sudden cardiac death. Public outcries about sudden cardiac deaths among athletes ...

A recent multi-center study determined that women with generalized tonic-clonic seizures (GTCS) had a greater number of seizures during anovulatory cycles—menstrual cycles where an egg is not released—than in cycles where ovulation occurs. According to the study publishing today in Epilepsia, a journal of the International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE), reproductive steroids may play a role in GTCS occurrence. Medical evidence has shown that sex hormones, estradiol and progesterone, have neuroactive properties that can affect seizures. Previous studies by Andrew Herzog, ...

The Tennessee legislature has amended the state's DUI laws so that as of January 1, 2012, no driver with a prior DUI conviction is allowed to refuse a blood or breath test to check the driver's blood alcohol level. Drivers suspected of DUI who have a child or children under 16 years old in the vehicle also are unable to refuse a BAC test. The new law is aimed at curbing repeat DUI offenses. The Damaging Effects of Drunk Driving in Tennessee In 2008, 386 people died in alcohol-related auto accidents in Tennessee. Police arrest about 4,000 repeat offender DUI suspects ...

Ocean acidification, a consequence of climate change, could weaken the shells of California mussels and diminish their body mass, with serious implications for coastal ecosystems, UC Davis researchers will report July 15 in the Journal of Experimental Biology. California mussels (Mytilus californianus) live in beds along the western coast of the United States from Alaska to California. More than 300 other species share the beds or depend on the mussels in some way. "Because these mussels play such an ecologically critical role, a decline in their numbers could impact ...

As counterintuitive as it may seem, going to a hospital may kill a person. According to the New York Times, the fourth-leading cause of death in the United States is hospital-acquired infections -- infections like pneumonia that patients contract while receiving treatment for other ailments. Such infections cost the health-care system over $40 billion annually. Across the country, hospitals have taken steps to decrease the occurrence of hospital-acquired infections, making remarkable progress in some areas. Yet, studies show there is still a long way to go. Safety ...

Researchers at the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM) are among the many scientists around the world trying to unearth our nervous system's countless mysteries. Dr. Artur Kania, Director of the IRCM's Neural Circuit Development research unit, and a postdoctoral fellow in his laboratory, Dr. Tzu-Jen Kao, recently uncovered a new piece of the puzzle. Scientists studying neural development aim to provide insight into the mechanisms that build our nervous system, which contains networks of specialized cells called neurons. Neurons send signals to one another ...

Carrying adequate insurance coverage can provide peace of mind by ensuring that you have a safety net if you are injured. However, even after you have paid your premiums, some insurers are less than forthcoming in holding up their end of the bargain. For some companies, finding any way to avoid paying the settlement you deserve is business as usual. Business Considerations and Strategic Withholding Of course, most insurers are for profit businesses, and no one expects such organizations to operate at a loss. But, a problem arises when the bottom line overshadows paying ...

Despite the formula being recommended in public health guidelines set out by the Australasian Society of Clinical Immunology and Allergy, the new study, published online in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, found there was no benefit in using hypoallergenic (partially hydrolysed whey) formula to prevent allergies in high-risk infants up to seven years of age, compared to a conventional cow's milk based formula. The trial, which is one the largest to test the effect of hypoallergenic baby formula, involved 620 infants and assessed whether using the formula ...

Around the country -- in states including Maine, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Wisconsin and Colorado -- legislators have proposed sweeping changes to the workers' compensation benefits system. These reforms have been presented under the guise of reducing operating costs for businesses to draw employers to the state and keep local employers happy. However, the proposed changes could severely limit the workers' compensation benefits available to deserving injured workers. Lawmakers claim that the changes they offer are only designed to thwart people trying to take advantage ...

Premier Surfaces, an Atlanta granite countertops fabricator with additional locations in Alabama, is organizing a series of company-sponsored fundraisers to benefit Dylan, the two and a half year old son of a Premier Surfaces employee. Dylan, who has been diagnosed with Tubeulour Sclerosis, suffers from seizures caused by two tumors in his brain. The tumors were removed through surgery on July 8th, and Dylan is expected to remain in the hospital for several weeks of recovery. The money raised by the Atlanta countertops company will help to cover the family's extensive medical ...

What if, instead of waiting days or weeks for a cast to be produced and prosthetic dental implants, false teeth and replacement crowns to be made, your dentist could quickly scan your jaw and "print" your new teeth using a rapid prototyping machine known as a 3D printer? Researchers in Iran explain how medical imaging coupled with computer-aided design could be used to create a perfect-fit blueprint for prosthetic dentistry, whether to replace diseased or broken teeth and jaw bone. The blueprint can then be fed into a so-called 3D printer to build up an exact replica ...

Milan, Italy, July 14, 2011 – Brain damage can cause significant changes in behaviour, such as loss of cognitive skills, but also reveals much about how the nervous system deals with consciousness. New findings reported in the July 2011 issue of Elsevier's Cortex demonstrate how the unconscious brain continues to process information even when the conscious brain is incapacitated. Dr Stéphane Simon and collaborators in Professor Alan Pegna's laboratory at Geneva University Hospital, studied a patient brain damaged in an accident who had developed prosopagnosia, or face ...

Philadelphia, PA, 14 July, 2011 - Whether we choose to accept or fight it, the fact is that we will all age, but will we do so successfully? Aging successfully has been linked with the "positivity effect", a biased tendency towards and preference for positive, emotionally gratifying experiences. New research published in Biological Psychiatry now explains how and when this effect works in the brain. German neuroscientists studied this effect by using neuroimaging to evaluate brain engagement in young and old adults while they performed a specialized cognitive task that ...

Business Monitor International has announced the release of its newest report, which examines the state of the industry infrastructure in Greece. This is currently a turbulent time for Greece's economy, as there have been protests about tax rises, job losses and a number of strikes at power plants. The impact of fluctuations in the infrastructure market is likely to be felt in Greece's construction industry which is currently struggling to cope with reduced demand for its services. Business Monitor International's report covers all the major areas of the infrastructure ...