England's health secretary Andrew Lansley has said that his reforms for the NHS are needed because the country's health outcomes are among the poorest in Europe. But in an article published on bmj.com today, John Appleby, Chief Economist at the King's Fund, reviews the data and finds the UK in better health than Lansley suggests. It has been claimed that despite spending the same on health care, we suffer twice the rate of deaths from heart disease than France, says Appleby. The latter is true, but what this claim doesn't show is that the UK has actually had the largest ...

The 'smug marrieds' may have good reason to feel pleased with themselves as experts today confirm that long-term committed relationships are good for mental and physical health and this benefit increases over time. In an editorial published by student BMJ, David and John Gallacher from Cardiff University say that on average married people live longer. They say that women in committed relationships have better mental health, while men in committed relationships have better physical health, and they conclude that "on balance it probably is worth making the effort." Men's ...

AUSTIN, Texas—Men are more than twice as likely to continue dating a girlfriend who has cheated on them with another woman than one who has cheated with another man, according to new research from a University of Texas at Austin psychologist. Women show the opposite pattern. They are more likely to continue dating a man who has had a heterosexual affair than one who has had a homosexual affair. The study, published last month in the journal Personality and Individual Differences, provides new insight into the psychological adaptations behind men's desire for a variety ...

In the quest to develop flexible plastic electronics, one of the stumbling blocks has been creating transistors with enough stability for them to function in a variety of environments while still maintaining the current needed to power the devices. Online in the journal Advanced Materials, researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology describe a new method of combining top-gate organic field-effect transistors with a bilayer gate insulator. This allows the transistor to perform with incredible stability while exhibiting good current performance. In addition, the ...

PASADENA, Calif.—About 450 million years ago, Earth suffered the second-largest mass extinction in its history—the Late Ordovician mass extinction, during which more than 75 percent of marine species died. Exactly what caused this tremendous loss in biodiversity remains a mystery, but now a team led by researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has discovered new details supporting the idea that the mass extinction was linked to a cooling climate. "While it's been known for a long time that the mass extinction is intimately tied to climate change, ...

BEER SHEVA, ISRAEL – January 27, 2011 -- A new study by Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) researchers indicates that physicians who give second opinions may be influenced by the first opinion and other external factors. In the study, the researchers presented hypothetical scenarios with no clear cut clinical answers to a national sample of orthopedic surgeons and neurologists. Some were told that the patients had previously received treatment recommendations, but were not told what they were, while others were told the first opinion. One group was informed that ...

Viewing TV coverage of terrorist events causes deterioration of psychological resources, such as commitment and a sense of success, and to feeling threatened, which in turn can also lead to loss of resources and other negative affects. This has been found in a new study at the University of Haifa. "Mass media plays a central role in reporting on terrorism and political violence. The present study shows that watching this type of coverage on television has negative effects, even for someone who was not at all involved in an event being viewed," said Prof. Moshe Zeidner, ...

Researchers in China have demonstrated interferon-alpha (IFN-a) is associated with increased risk of atherosclerosis in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). For the first time, IFN-a priming was shown to promote lipid uptake and foam cell formation—a crucial step in plaque build-up. This activation of the IFN signaling pathway may be linked to the premature atherosclerosis risk in SLE. Full findings of this novel study are available in the February issue of Arthritis & Rheumatism, a journal published by Wiley-Blackwell on behalf of the American College of Rheumatology. ...

Philadelphia, Pa, 27 January 2010 - The growing numbers of new cases of substance abuse disorders are perplexing. After all, the course of drug addiction so often ends badly. The negative consequences of drug abuse appear regularly on TV, from stories of celebrities behaving in socially inappropriate and self-destructive ways while intoxicated to dramatization of the rigors of drug withdrawal on "Intervention" and other reality shows. Schools now educate students about the risks of addiction. While having a keen awareness of the negative long-term repercussions of substance ...

Who eats organic food when they are pregnant? Is it just certain groups? What kind of organic foods are most popular? A recent study from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health provides some answers. The study includes nearly 65,000 women in the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study. "We know little about the consumption of organic food during pregnancy, and the goal of this study was to find out what is consumed and the characteristics of women who choose organic food," said PhD student Hanne Torjusen. Questions were asked about six different food groups: milk ...

In a previous study, rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients who failed to respond to methotrexate were shown to experience positive results with fostamatinib disodium (R788), an oral spleen tyrosine kinase (Syk) inhibitor that is thought to block immune cell signaling involved with bone and cartilage destruction. In the current study, RA patients who failed to respond to biologic agents were studied. In contrast to the prior study, however, fostamatinib was not effective in this group of patients, although the drug did appear to be safe. Results of this phase II trial are published ...

Just touching it slightly with the tips of your fingers is enough. You can effortlessly write, navigate, open menu windows or rotate images on touchscreens. Within fractions of a second your touch is translated into control commands that a computer understands. At first glance, this technology borders on the miraculous, but in real life this mystery just is a wafer-thin electrode under the glass surface of the display made of indium-tin-oxide, ITO. This material is nothing short of ideal for use in touchscreens because it is excellent at conducting slight currents and lets ...

The baby and toddler phase is not necessarily the happiest time in life. Satisfaction with life and one's relationship can deteriorate for most new mothers. However, those who are satisfied with their relationship during pregnancy are most satisfied three years later. This comes from a recent study from the Norwegian Institute of Public Health. The study includes 60,000 Norwegian women with small children. "In this study we have investigated two types of satisfaction - satisfaction with the partner and general satisfaction with life - both during pregnancy and later ...

Researchers have proved that a single "master switch" enzyme, known as aldose reductase, is key in producing excess mucous that clogs the airways of people with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The enzyme's action can be blocked by drugs whose safety has been shown in clinical trials for other diseases – a discovery that could improve therapies for the 510 million people worldwide suffering from asthma and COPD. The findings are from a University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston study published in the online journal PLoS One. Using ...

Although still rare, maternal deaths related to in vitro fertilisation (IVF) are a key indicator of risks to older women, those with multiple pregnancy and those with underlying disease, warn experts in an editorial published on bmj.com today. Dr Susan Bewley and colleagues argue that serious adverse outcomes related to IVF treatment, such as ovarian hyperstimulation sydrome (a complication caused by some fertility drugs), should be systematically reported so that lessons can be learnt and appropriate action taken. In 1991, the first published report of a maternal ...

Washington, DC, January 27, 2011 – Screening patients in the intensive care unit (ICU) for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) produces cost savings for the whole hospital, according to a study that used a statistical simulation model published in the February issue of the American Journal of Infection Control, the official publication of APIC - the Association for Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology. Conducted by a team of researchers at the Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Medical Center, a 279-bed teaching hospital and outpatient facility, ...

Authored by Economics writer Romesh Vaitilingam, Recovery Britain: research evidence to underpin a productive, fair and sustainable return to growth examines some of the challenges the UK faces after the longest and deepest downturn since full records began. The report provides 20 key challenge areas and a number of policy solutions. It draws on analysis of a broad range of data sources and the work of numerous researchers and research institutions, including centres and programmes, funded by the ESRC. The report also includes a foreword to the research findings by Professor ...

A new report by an Indiana University School of Dentistry department chair with researchers from six other U.S. dental schools is calling for quick and creative solutions to address the growing scarcity of full-time faculty members within the nation's dental school programs. The report cites widening pay gaps between private practice dentists and clinical professors at dental schools as one factor in fewer dentists committing to careers in teaching. Clinical faculty also report being overwhelmed and burned out by the workload demands of teaching, clinical, research and ...

A new democracy barometer from the University of Zurich and the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB) shows the development of the thirty best democracies in the world. Den-mark, Finland and Belgium have the highest quality of democracy, whereas Great Britain, France, Poland, South Africa and Costa Rica the lowest. Moreover, the barometer shows no evidence of a crisis of democracy. Diagnoses of a crisis of democracy are as old as democracy itself; they are a common theme in the political discourse of the Western world. However, until now there was no instrument ...

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have pinpointed a crucial function for a key player in the development of the nervous system. They found that this player – a protein called Erk – is necessary for nerve fibers to be wrapped with an insulating substance called myelin, which allows messages to be sent from the brain to the peripheral limbs and back again. The finding has particular importance because several neurodevelopmental disorders have recently been linked to genetic mutations in the complex developmental cascade ...

Scientists can now manufacture a synthetic version of the self-healing sticky substance that mussels use to anchor themselves to rocks in pounding ocean surf and surging tidal basins. A patent is pending on the substance, whose potential applications include use as an adhesive or coating for underwater machinery or in biomedical settings as a surgical adhesive or bonding agent for implants. Inspiring the invention were the hair-thin holdfast fibers that mussels secrete to stick against rocks in lakes, rivers and oceans. "Everything amazingly just self-assembles underwater ...

URBANA – A new University of Illinois study provides convincing evidence that the way you prepare and consume your broccoli matters, and also suggests that teaming broccoli with broccoli sprouts may make the vegetable's anti-cancer effect almost twice as powerful. "Broccoli, prepared correctly, is an extremely potent cancer-fighting agent—three to five servings a week are enough to have an effect. To get broccoli's benefits, though, the enzyme myrosinase has to be present; if it's not there, sulforaphane, broccoli's cancer-preventive and anti-inflammatory component, doesn't ...

Researchers at the Center for Injury Research and Policy of The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital examined running-related injuries among children and adolescents 6 to 18 years old and found that an estimated 225,344 cases were treated in U.S. emergency departments from 1994 through 2007, for an average of more than 16,000 each year. During the 14-year study period, the annual number of running-related injuries increased 34 percent. According to the study, appearing in the February 2011 issue of Clinical Pediatrics, the majority of running-related ...

COLUMBIA, Mo. – In a time of shrinking budgets, one University of Missouri professor believes that the current approach to juvenile crime is much too expensive to continue – and he has the numbers to prove it. Charles Borduin, a professor of psychological sciences in the MU College of Arts and Science finds that multisystemic therapy (MST) is more effective in the lives of troubled youth and costs less. Borduin has pioneered the model for the treatment and prevention of serious mental health problems in children and adolescents throughout the course of his career. MST ...

(WASHINGTON, January 27, 2011) –Severe Combined Immunodeficiency (SCID) occurs in just one out of every 50,000 to 100,000 births in the United States, yet it is the most serious primary immunodeficiency disorder.[1] A study published today in Blood, the Journal of the American Society of Hematology (ASH), demonstrates that babies with SCID who are diagnosed at birth and receive a hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT), which is the transplantation of blood-forming stem cells, have significantly improved survival. SCID is a rare group of genetic disorders characterized ...