Passenger Van Safety Concerns Raised Again The early October crash in Georgia of an overloaded 15-passenger van is raising awareness of the dangers of the vehicles. Four people in a church group died in the crash; another 15 suffered injuries when a tire blew out on the 1987 van, causing it to overturn. CBC News reported that the vehicle flipped several times, ejecting occupants. An Appeal to Pull the Vehicles off Roads The single-vehicle crash came just three days after two Canadian mothers who lost sons in van accidents appealed to transportation ministers ...

Rodriguez MD, a new Lawrenceville clinic and bilingual Lawrenceville family practice near Gwinnett Medical Center recently offered free community care to local area residents. On September 10 - 11, 2010 the medical practice offered free walk-in health checks for all ages and sports physicals for kids under 18. Patients who attended the event were able to learn about their health and how to obtain proper care if a problem is identified. "Health screenings can detect problems that would otherwise go unnoticed," explains Neville Street, the practice's Administrative Director. ...

Foster Care Associates (FCA) has reaffirmed its status as the UK's leading independent fostering agency through the publication of recent Ofsted inspection results. Assessing the quality and standard of services provided in its North West and South West regions, Ofsted judged each category and the region as a whole as 'Outstanding' - a fantastic achievement for the fostering agency. The inspectors found extensive evidence to underpin their judgment, particularly from children and young people and the agency's foster carer colleagues. The results further support the ...

House of Fraser presents Casa Couture, a new homeware collection launching exclusively this autumn. Casa Couture offers a capsule collection of high quality homeware with an emphasis on simple, clean detailing. Created for a sophisticated, design-conscious customer, the range offers a refined, calming collection of homeware that is exceptionally stylish. In a muted colour palette of soft mineral hues, an understated elegance runs through the heart of the Casa Couture collection. Providing a stylish living room look, a neutral-coloured corner sofa unit is the ideal ...

Oxford Valley Mall and its more than 120 retail stores are sponsoring the "Big sMALL Walk for Breast Cancer" at the mall on Saturday, October 23 starting at 7:30 am for the benefit of The Bott Cancer Center at Holy Redeemer Hospital in Meadowbrook, PA. The indoor Walk-A-Thon is intended to increase awareness and raise funds to combat this prevalent disease. Says Jim Malervy, Director of Marketing at the Oxford Valley Mall: "Many Walk-A-Thons are ten miles or more, but we want to make our event accessible to as many people as possible. Hence the "sMALL Walk"--it's only ...

As online poker moves further into the mainstream of Internet activities, more individuals are venturing into this frontier. While some of us play for entertainment, most are looking to make a few extra dollars, if not more. To make that happen, you'll need to know the ins and outs of how to play poker online. MyPokerBasics is a free poker portal dedicated to teaching you how to play poker in less than 15 minutes. Unlike many poker schools, MyPokerBasics.com does not waste time with lengthy explanations of each and every aspect of the game, instead incorporating a step ...

LiveDealerCasino.org is pleased to make known the publication of its new and ever growing Live Dealer Blackjack Guide. The online gambling portal was designed to cater to players who have acquired an interest in one of the latest fashions of Internet gambling, appropriately termed live dealer blackjack. Throughout the ages, technological advancements have enhanced nearly every aspect of our human lives. Just as seedy backroom saloons gave way to magnificent, luxurious casinos, and land-based casinos gave way to Internet gambling sites, the two have now been conjoined ...

SportsUntapped.com is proud to announce the release of all new picks and previews for all of your favorite major league sporting events. The online sportsbook industry is currently overloaded with favorable odds on NFL and MLB match ups. The National Football League (NFL) just kicked off the season last month, and with week 5 of play wrapping up last weekend, it is becoming more and more apparent who might actually have a shot at the Super Bowl as the year dwindles down. The online sportsbook industry offers NFL fans the perfect opportunity to place wagers on the ...

Any family who has sent a child off to school knows how expensive it can be. Paper, pens, books, notebooks, backpacks, new clothes ... the list seems to be never-ending. This year, Fort Worth insurance agent Linda Allen decided to lend a helping hand, so she gave away school bags on Aug. 7 and 14 in front of her State Farm office in Saginaw. "As a mom, I know how expensive school supplies can be, and bags are always needed," said Allen. The response to Allen's offer was overwhelming. She gave away more than 300 school bags in just three hours each day. "We had a ...

Merrill Corporation (www.merrillcorp.com), a leading provider of technology-enabled services, today announced that Merrill DataSite was recently selected as the "Product/Service of the Year" during the 2nd International M&A Advisor Awards. The award was presented at a luncheon at the Cornell Club in New York City on Sept. 27, 2010. The awards luncheon was held to honor dealmakers and firms "whose activities set the standard for the industry," according to the M&A Advisor, an organization that serves professionals in the M&A marketplace. Since its inception, Merrill ...

Inchwear, a Florida-based apparel company, has launched its fall 2010 collection including a line of graphic tees, which boast and promote a man's manhood in a unique and hilarious manner. This line is the first collection from Inchwear, but not the last. The company plans to launch more lines of fashion apparel including several more lines of t-shirts, long sleeve shirts, underwear, and swimwear. They are also in the process of producing apparel for a ladies line as well. Inchwear's line is designed for the confident male to humorously promote the size of his manhood, ...

In response to our ever-increasing list of partners, sponsors and delegates, FMA was recently faced with two choices: increase the size or the frequency of our events. For those of you who have already worked with us, it is the intimate scale and personalized approach of our congresses that play such a crucial role in the continuing success of our partners. We are proud to announce the roll-out of three new events to be held over the course of the upcoming months, maintaining the same quality and integrity you have come to expect from FMA Congresses and look forward to ...

RICHLAND, Washington – A redesign of sodium-nickel chloride batteries promises to overcome some of the obstacles long associated with rechargeable batteries. Replacing their typical cylindrical shape with a flat disc design allows the battery to deliver 30 percent more power at lower temperatures, according to work published by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in the October 8 issue of ECS Transactions, a trade journal. Researchers say these sodium-beta batteries could eventually be used in electricity substations to balance the generation and delivery of wind and ...

Australian scientists have developed a potentially groundbreaking new measure of the health of an embryo and the likelihood of a successful pregnancy in IVF treatment. The research could lead to significantly improved birth rates in IVF to help the one in six Australian couples experiencing infertility to achieve their dream of parenthood. It also has the potential to predict the gender of an embryo prior to implantation. The research by the University of Melbourne and Repromed was presented this week at the Fertility Society of Australia annual scientific meeting ...

Scientists from the Niels Bohr Institute have been studying distant galaxies, which are among the most active star-forming galaxies in the Universe. They form around 1,000 new stars a year – a 1,000 times more than our own galaxy, the Milky Way. The findings have been published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. "The galaxies are located in the far distant Universe – when the universe was 3 billion years old (equivalent to only 20 percent of its current age). It is a period of the Universe when the galaxies were very active, almost teenager-like and ...

Using a combination of high-powered computers and advanced experimental magnetic resonance data, a Florida State University biophysical chemist has developed techniques that improve the way scientists can study and predict the structure and dynamics of proteins found in the human body. His innovations could ultimately shorten the time it takes researchers to develop new, more effective drugs and better understand biomedical processes that underlie a variety of health conditions. The new techniques "allow us to more accurately understand protein behavior and function at ...

DALLAS – Oct. 11, 2010 – The use of estrogen therapy by postmenopausal women might increase the risk of developing kidney stones, according to findings by UT Southwestern Medical Center researchers. In a study available online and in today's issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine, investigators found that estrogen therapy after menopause increased a woman's chances of developing kidney stones by approximately 20 percent. This discovery calls into question the long-held belief that estrogen might actually protect women from the disease, and clinicians need to keep ...

ANN ARBOR, Mich. – A study published in Journal of Women's Health shows a rapid increase in the number of hospitalizations due to diabetes for young adults – particularly young women. Diabetes hospitalizations were up by 66 percent for all ages and sexes, but the number of diabetes hospitalizations among younger adults, ages 30-39, more than doubled from 1993 to 2006. This pattern of hospitalizations echoes the dramatic increase in rates of obesity across the United States in the last 30 years, according to the study by the University of Michigan Health System. Young ...

Contrary to some previous, highly publicized, reports, ocean acidification is not likely to worsen the hearing of whales and other animals, according to a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) scientist who studies sound propagation in the ocean. Tim Duda, of WHOI's Applied Ocean Physics & Engineering Department, undertook a study in response to warnings that as the ocean becomes more acidic—due to elevated levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2)--noise from ships will be able to travel farther and possibly interfere with whales and other animals that rely on ...

Scientists have shed light on how malaria is able to resist treatment with a leading drug. Researchers have identified a gene that enables the parasite that causes the infection to resist treatment with the plant-based remedy artemisinin. In many countries where the parasite has developed resistance to previously effective common treatments such as chloroquine, artemisinin remains the only effective treatment against the infection. However, malarial resistance to artemisinin appears to be developing, potentially creating problems in controlling malaria. Identification ...

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Despite an international effort to raise awareness about epilepsy in resource-poor nations, a recently published study found nearly 50 percent of pharmacies in Zambia do not carry antiepileptic drugs, seriously hampering efforts to tackle one of the most cost-effective chronic conditions to treat. The study, recently published in the American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, was led by Gretchen Birbeck, an associate professor of neurology and ophthalmology and director for the International Neurologic & Psychiatric Epidemiology Program in ...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.— It may seem obvious that dunking relatively spherical objects in a sauce — blueberries in melted chocolate, say — will result in an array of completely encapsulated berries. Relying on that concept, fabricators of spherical nanoparticles have similarly dunked their wares in protective coatings in the belief such encapsulations would prevent clumping and unwanted chemical interactions with solvents. Unfortunately, reactions in the nanoworld are not logical extensions of the macroworld, Sandia National Laboratories researchers Matthew Lane and Gary ...

Many young people with mental health problems are at risk of falling through a huge gap in provision when they move from adolescent to adult care services, according to new research from the University of Warwick. A team led by Professor Swaran Singh at Warwick Medical School looked at the transition from child mental health services to adult mental health services and found for the vast majority of users the move was "poorly planned, poorly executed and poorly experienced". In a study published in The British Journal of Psychiatry, the research team looked at 154 service ...

Donor kidneys can be successfully transplanted even if there is strong tissue incompatibility between donor and recipient. An interdisciplinary working group headed by Dr. Christian Morath, senior consultant at the Department of Nephrology at Heidelberg University Hospital (Medical Director: Professor Dr. Martin Zeier) and Professor Dr. Caner Süsal, head of antibody laboratory in the Department of Transplantation Immunology, showed in a study of 34 sensitized high-risk patients that the success rate in these patients was not different from the success rate of patients with ...

MADISON — The mathematical skills of boys and girls, as well as men and women, are substantially equal, according to a new examination of existing studies in the current online edition of journal Psychological Bulletin. One portion of the new study looked systematically at 242 articles that assessed the math skills of 1,286,350 people, says chief author Janet Hyde, a professor of psychology and women's studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. These studies, all published in English between 1990 and 2007, looked at people from grade school to college and beyond. ...