Opinion | Measles’ Deadliest Sequelae
Claire Panosian Dunavan is a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a past-president of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. In the late 1990s, my long-time colleague, Pam Nagami, MD, met a petite, Indian-American student she later called “Manju” when writing a terrific […]
Could Arthritis Enhance Male Fertility?
Infertility does not seem to be a problem for men with inflammatory joint diseases, a large Scandinavian study indicated. In fact, men with arthritis showed lower rates of childlessness relative to a control group, and had fathered more children on average, according to Gudrun David Sigmo, of Stavanger University Hospital in Norway, and colleagues. National […]
Opinion | Gonorrhea, Then and Now
Claire Panosian Dunavan is a professor of medicine and infectious diseases at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and a past-president of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene. Last month, an article in Nature about a novel oral treatment for gonorrhea brought good news for anyone who might one day contract […]
Clinical Challenges: Test Your Knowledge of Axial Spondyloarthritis
A MedPage Today Clinical Challenges series on axial spondyloarthritis reviewed the disease’s features and pathogenesis; difficulties in diagnosis and monitoring; and current options for therapy. The following is a three-question quiz to test your knowledge on each aspect of the series. Nancy Walsh earned a BA in English literature from Salve Regina College in Newport, […]
Is red meat intake linked to inflammation?
Inflammation is a risk factor for many chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease (CVD), and the impact of diet on inflammation is an area of growing scientific interest. In particular, recommendations to limit red meat consumption are often based, in part, on old studies suggesting that red meat negatively affects inflammation — yet more recent studies […]
Opinion | Stethoscope Hygiene: The Next Frontier in Infection Control?
Dhand is an infectious diseases physician. The evolution of modern medicine has led to a critical reliance on stethoscopes in the daily care of our patients. Stethoscopes, also considered to be the “third hand,” are used routinely by almost all healthcare providers across a variety of patients and hospital locations with more than 5.5 billion […]
All the immunity, none of the symptoms
Worldwide, more than a million deaths occur each year due to diarrheal diseases that lead to dehydration and malnutrition. Yet, no vaccine exists to fight or prevent these diseases, which are caused by bacteria like certain strains of E. coli. Instead, people withbacterial infections must rely on the body taking one of two defense strategies: […]
Dementia Risk Higher for Elite Soccer Players
Men who played elite soccer were more likely to develop neurodegenerative diseases — notably, dementia — as they aged, a study in Sweden showed. The risk of neurodegenerative disease was 46% higher among soccer players who played in the Swedish top division than in the general population (HR 1.46, 95% CI 1.33-1.60), according to Peter […]
Microprotein increases appetite in mice: Scientists discovered more than 3,800 small proteins involved in metabolism and found that one microprotein, Gm8773, increases feeding activity in mice–providing a potential new approach to encourage weight gain in people with cancer and other diseases
Obesity and metabolic diseases, such as diabetes, are extremely common in the United States. Tiny proteins called microproteins have long been overlooked in research, but new evidence demonstrates that they have an important role in metabolism. Salk scientists have discovered that both brown and white fat is filled with thousands of previously unknown microproteins, and […]
Common food dye can trigger inflammatory bowel diseases, animal study suggests: Allura Red (also called FD&C Red 40 and Food Red 17), is a common ingredient in candies, soft drinks, dairy products and some cereals
Long-term consumption of Allura Red food dye can be a potential trigger of inflammatory bowel diseases (IBDs), Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, says McMaster University’s Waliul Khan. Researchers using experimental animal models of IBD found that continual exposure to Allura Red AC harms gut health and promotes inflammation. The dye directly disrupts gut barrier function […]