Author: healthadmin

Following the court defeat, Trump administration health officials revised the governing documents of a key federal vaccine commission to expand its membership, sharpen its focus on the potential harms of vaccines and empower allies of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The new charter for the committee that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on the use of vaccines appears aimed at avoiding the kinds of legal challenges that currently bog down the appointed agency. Additionally, the document places greater emphasis on the role of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in researching injuries that may be associated…

In December, Vanda Pharmaceuticals received FDA approval for its motion sickness drug Nereus. But more patients may be waiting for the oral treatment, as the Washington, D.C.-based company is testing it to prevent the nausea and vomiting associated with GLP-1 treatment. Vanda has begun a placebo-controlled Phase 3 study called Thetis to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Nereus in patients receiving high doses of GLP-1 agonists. The primary endpoint was the proportion of patients free of emetic episodes. The study follows a successful Phase 2 trial that featured a similar design in which patients were pretreated with Nereus or…

Exposure to “permanent chemicals” during pregnancy may increase the risk of childhood asthma, according to a new study from Sweden. Researchers at Lund University have found that prenatal exposure to extremely high levels of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances known as PFAS in drinking water is consistent with high rates of childhood asthma in communities that have dealt with decades of pollution. The findings, published Thursday in the journal PLOS Medicine, are noteworthy. Exposure to PFAS causes a myriad of well-documented health effects, but its association with asthma has not been well studied. “We were surprised because we had no expectations…

How does the brain eliminate waste products? It relies on a specialized drainage network known as the lymphatic system. Scientists have been working to understand how this system works, pushing brain imaging techniques to new limits in the process. New research published in iscience Researchers at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) have provided the first direct evidence in humans of a previously unknown control point in this system. That structure is the middle meningeal artery (MMA), and it is now thought to play an important role in how the brain removes fluid and waste products. Real-time MRI reveals…

Because we’re glued to screens all day long, we often ignore sensations other than sound and sight. Yet they are always working. When we pay more attention, we feel the rough or smooth surfaces of things, the stiffness of our shoulders, the softness of bread. In the morning, we might feel the tingle of toothpaste, hear or feel the sound of water in the shower, smell shampoo, and later, smell freshly brewed coffee. Aristotle said that we have five senses. But he also said that the world is made up of five elements and we no longer believe that. And…

The Trump administration is tightening its grip on the EPA’s science operations as it prepares to relocate employees from once-respected research departments. According to an internal memo obtained by POLITICO’s E&E News, the agency’s new, smaller Office of Science has laid out policies for how the agency will approve new research and make research findings available to the public. Additionally, the remaining EPA scientists in the now-disbanded Office of Research and Development were reassigned earlier this week, including some who will have to transfer if they want to continue working at the agency. Chris Frey, who led the EPA’s Office…

Although high blood pressure is treatable with medication and lifestyle changes, it remains a leading cause of death in the United States. More than half of adults in the United States have blood pressure above 130/80 mmHg, the threshold for hypertension, and the condition is particularly prevalent in low-income areas. A new study by Tulane University researchers found that a team-based program in community clinics was more effective at lowering blood pressure in low-income patients than standard care alone. This research New England Medical JournalThe study was conducted at 36 federally qualified health centers in Louisiana and Mississippi. These nonprofit…

Researchers from Radboud University, Oxford University, and Cambridge University set out to test a surprising idea. Can we simply change people? expect How can I change my preference for sweet drinks? Their findings were; JNeuroscisuggests the answer is “yes”. The research team surveyed 99 healthy adults with an average age of 24. The participants were chosen because they had similar opinions about sugar and artificial sweeteners. Most people reported that they liked both about equally. But when researchers subtly changed what participants believed they were drinking, their experiences changed. When people are told that they are drinking a drink containing…

Mount Sinai ophthalmologists unveil a new surgical technique that allows eye surgeons to measure and respond to critical intraocular fluid dynamics in real time. This is an advancement that has the potential to significantly improve the accuracy and outcomes of glaucoma and other eye surgeries. The technology, called miDOC (micro-interventional Dynamic Outflow Curve), will be introduced by Sean Iantuleff, MD, MPH, professor of ophthalmology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and director of ophthalmology innovation and technology at New York Eye, Ear, and Throat (NYEE) at Mount Sinai, at the prestigious Charles D. Kelman Innovator Lecture at…

While the personalized approach has dramatically improved outcomes for many patients with non-Hodgkin B-cell lymphoma (a blood cancer that develops in immune cells called B cells), the same is not true for patients with a rarer type of lymphoma that originates from immune cells called T cells. Peripheral T-cell lymphomas consist of a variety of blood cancers with unique biology, and survival rates vary widely. Dr. Jia Luan, a lymphoma expert and professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College, and her collaborators are working to change that. We previously thought we could treat all non-Hodgkin lymphomas with a…