Introducing a protocol for using robotic pets in memory care
You might think it was a typical therapy session at a long-term care facility. In a quiet room, a therapist sets down a pet carrier, brings out a cat, and sets it on a resident’s lap. As the resident gently strokes the cat’s fur, it purrs, and the therapist asks the resident questions about their […]
How Technology Is Changing The Way We Deal With Mental Health
Mental health help is now at your fingertips. Text therapy is becoming a popular way to communicate with a therapist, and that comes with both benefits and disadvantages. Meanwhile, some celebrities are reducing mental health stigmas by using social media to open up publicly about their experiences.
Celebrities Open Up About Marriage Counseling
Michelle Obama devoted part of her book “Becoming” to going to couples therapy with Barack, and it turns out the celebrity pair is just one of many going to counseling.
Walk It Off: Exercise Therapy for Meniscal Tears on Par With Surgery
Exercise-based physical therapy remained noninferior to arthroscopic partial meniscectomy for treating degenerative meniscal tears, according to longer-term data from the ESCAPE trial, suggesting physical therapy be the preferred treatment over surgery. By the 5-year mark, patient-reported knee function after 16 sessions of physical therapy was non-inferior to that observed after surgery, with a between-group difference […]
Novel Focal Therapy Yields Low Rate of Serious Prostate Cancers
The use of a novel focal therapy technique called high-frequency irreversible electroporation (H-FIRE) for the treatment of localized prostate cancer resulted in a 6-month clinically significant prostate cancer (csPCa) rate lower than previously seen with other energy platforms, according to Chinese investigators. Among the 100 patients who received H-FIRE and were biopsied at 6 months, […]
Study identifies receptor that could alleviate need for chemo, radiation pre-T cell therapy
Before a patient can undergo T cell therapy designed to target cancerous tumors, the patient’s entire immune system must be destroyed with chemotherapy or radiation. The toxic side effects are well known, including nausea, extreme fatigue and hair loss. Now a research team, led by UCLA’s Anusha Kalbasi, MD, in collaboration with scientists from Stanford […]
T-Cell Receptor Gene Therapy Shows Promise in Pancreatic Cancer
A novel T-cell receptor (TCR) gene therapy may be effective in treating patients with pancreatic cancer and other cancers that express the KRAS G12D mutation, researchers have found. Their case study — published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) — showed that a heavily pretreated patient with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma achieved a deep […]
Vaginal Estrogen ‘Underutilized’ in Women With GSM After Breast Cancer
NEW ORLEANS — While vaginal estrogen therapy is safe and effective for genitourinary syndrome of menopause (GSM), few women who have had breast cancer use it, researchers reported here. Breast cancer survivors with GSM were half as likely to be prescribed vaginal estrogen compared to women with GSM and no history of breast cancer (11% […]
How tumor cells use mitochondria to keep growing
Hormone therapy is often used to treat prostate cancer that has spread to other parts of the body, but many patients develop resistance to hormone therapy, causing their disease to become more aggressive and potentially more deadly. “One of the big challenges we have in the field is that the majority of prostate cancer therapies […]
A novel therapy ameliorates obesity and Type 2 diabetes in mice fed a high-fat diet: This therapy, using sustained release of nitric oxide, may be a novel, efficient and safe way to prevent and treat multiple metabolic diseases.
A novel therapy developed at the University of Alabama at Birmingham ameliorates obesity and Type 2 diabetes in mice fed a high-fat diet. The therapy acts through sustained release of nitric oxide, a gaseous signaling chemical whose most important function in the body is relaxing the inner muscles of blood vessels. “Because reduced bioavailability of […]