Author: healthadmin

Cancer, a disease that claims more than 26,000 lives every day, faces physical, mental and economic toll on millions of people, according to a report released today by the World Health Organization (WHO). Cancer remains the second leading cause of death worldwide after cardiovascular disease, with an estimated 20.6 million new infections and nearly 10 million deaths annually. Reversing this trend will require a fundamental shift to a human-centered approach that responds to the health needs and lived experiences of affected people and communities. Without urgent action, the number of annual cancer cases is projected to rise to nearly 35…

New York City is suing several major chemical companies for contaminating the environment with PFAS, commonly known as forever chemicals.In a lawsuit filed Thursday, New York Attorney General Letitia James accuses major chemical companies, including DuPont de Nemours and 3M, of knowingly and permanently contaminating the state’s environment with chemicals linked to health problems such as cancer and birth defects. The lawsuit alleges that the manufacturer misled the public by making consumer products containing PFAS and failing to warn the public about the risks. The state is seeking a court order to stop selling products containing PFAS without warning labels…

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania, New York University, and the University of Pennsylvania’s Linguistic Data Consortium have received a two-year, $4 million grant from the Wellcome Trust to develop a scalable, AI-powered platform to train mental health clinicians. STELLAR (Steering-Vector Enhanced LLM Agents for Realistic Digital Twins in Mental Health) creates virtual patients, known as “digital twins,” in the form of AI-driven simulations that allow trainees to practice clinical interviews with patient profiles that can precisely adjust for psychiatric symptoms. One of the challenges in educating mental health clinicians is preparing trainees for the complexities of real-world clinical conversations,…

Ruthia He, founder and former CEO of telehealth startup Done Global, was sentenced Tuesday to six years in prison and a $1 million fine in connection with the Adderall fraud scheme. He was found guilty in November of conspiring to distribute Adderall and other stimulants online, along with a former top doctor at a telemedicine company. A San Francisco jury found He and the company’s former clinical president, David Brody, guilty of two counts of conspiracy (one related to health care fraud) and four counts of distribution of a controlled substance. He was also convicted of conspiracy to obstruct justice.…

The type and amount of toys available in a home may reflect more than just a family’s purchasing habits. Having a large variety of toys in the home is associated with infants’ advanced interaction skills and early language development. These behavioral patterns were recently detailed in a study published in the Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. Interactions in early childhood shape how the brain develops during adulthood. Everyday objects and playthings become tools that parents use to interact with their young children. These tools range from items that encourage formal learning, such as books and shape sorters, to objects that…

A new study from the University of Southern California’s Schaefer Center for Health Policy and Economics finds that Medicare prescriptions for Wegobee have skyrocketed since the program began covering the anti-obesity drug to prevent heart disease, but only for a fraction of beneficiaries who would be eligible for the treatment. Medicare covers GLP-1 for type 2 diabetes, but is prohibited from paying for obesity drugs. However, in March 2024, Medicare clarified that health plans administering Part D benefits may cover Wegovy to reduce the risk of heart complications for beneficiaries with obesity or heart disease, after the U.S. Food and…

A team of researchers from Freiburg investigated how random sounds played during sleep affect the consolidation of new memories. This result shows that untargeted acoustic stimulation disrupts deep sleep. As a result, the slow brain waves characteristic of this sleep phase occur less frequently and spread irregularly throughout the brain. It is precisely these changes that prevent new memories from becoming established. In recent years, sleep research has focused intensively on the question of whether targeted auditory stimulation during sleep can improve the consolidation of new memories. A Freiburg research team led by neuropsychologists Professor Monika Schoenauer and Dr. Nora…

Cachexia is a condition in which patients with cancer or other chronic diseases become unwell and lose weight. This condition is often accompanied by symptoms of brain-related diseases, such as loss of appetite, and can lead to loss of muscle and often fat. This debilitating state can make patients unable to tolerate treatment or participate in clinical trials, so many patients end up dying from cachexia rather than cancer, the researchers said. Despite its toll, cachexia is poorly understood and efforts to treat it have had little success. Now, a new study led by researchers at NYU Langone Health and…

Frazier Healthcare Partners announced Tuesday that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire MatrixCare, a cloud-based electronic health record (EHR) provider, from health tech company ResMed. The healthcare private equity firm plans to acquire MatrixCare for $490 million in an all-cash transaction, according to a filing by ResMed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The agreement includes MatrixCare and related software products sold under its brand, such as Healthcare First and Citus. MatrixCare is a subsidiary of Resmed, a healthcare technology company that provides solutions to more than 15,000 providers in skilled nursing, senior living, long-term care,…

New research published in journal neuropharmacology Our findings suggest that chronic alcohol consumption affects the brain differently depending on the underlying characteristics of Alzheimer’s disease. The findings show that alcohol alters key brain circuits responsible for decision-making in opposite directions, depending on whether the brain is burdened by amyloid plaques or tau tangles. This provides evidence that the relationship between alcohol use and cognitive decline is highly complex and dependent on a person’s unique biological state. Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive brain disease traditionally characterized by the accumulation of two distinct proteins. Amyloid beta forms sticky plaques on the outside…