StemCell Therapy

Mikel Darling

In an age where music documentaries are all the rage, particularly those chronicling the rise of hip-hops most iconic and influential figures, veteran director Allen Hughes latest film project, The Defiant Ones, stands in a class of its own. The documentary, released in four parts, focuses on rap legend Dr. Dre and record executive Jimmy Iovines tenured partnership and the impact their union has had on the music industry as a whole. The Defiant Ones finds Hughes taking one of the greatest, yet most rehashed stories ever told and giving it added context and character by attacking it from a unique vantage point.

While Dr. Dre and Iovines deal to sell their Beats Electronics empire to Apple in 2014, and their musical partnershipwhich dates back to 1992stand as the crux of the documentaries narrative, Hughes delves even deeper, beginning at their respective genesis. Dre, an impoverished kid from Compton, and Iovine, a native of Red Hook, Brooklyn and the product of a working class family. Candid commentary from Dr. Dres mother Verna Griffin, who provides never-before-seen home footage and photos, includes revelations of the abuse she suffered from Dr. Dres biological father and stepfather, and fond memories of her sons earliest forays into music.

Rare nuggets like Alonzo Williams recollection of becoming privy to Dr. Dres prodigious talent and enlisting him as a member of his World Class Wrecking Cru are appreciated, but the insights The Defiant Ones provides while covering the life and times of Jimmy Iovine are pure gold. In addition to highlighting his work as an engineering and production vanguardhe helped jumpstart the careers of Hall of Fame rockers Bruce Springsteen, Patti Smith and Stevie NicksThe Defiant Ones dispels the notion of Iovine being a music industry blue blood. His beginnings as a failed musician and a novice engineer are documented, as well as the paranoia and uncertainty that engulfed him while toiling with obscurity during the 1970s.

The life and career of a star like Dr. Dre are typically dissected to the most minute detail in standard music docs, however, figures like Iovine, who control many of the strings being pulled behind the scenes, are usually cloaked with an air of anonymity. The result is an enigma, akin to the man referenced in blaxploitation films of old. The Defiant Ones brings one of the most talked about high ranking executives in rap history and strips him to his bare essentials, giving him an identity beyond that of a stuffy check writer. Hes presented as a true champion of artistic expression and creativity.

In addition to Dr. Dre and Iovine, the players that benefited from or helped facilitate the pairs rise also make appearances throughout The Defiant Ones, providing their own view of the men while detailing how their respective roles held together the fabric of the bigger picture. Rapper The D.O.C. speaks candidly about the events that led to the nearly fatal 1989 car crash that cost him his voice and career as a rap artist, as well as his experience of being the unsung cog in the machine that was Ruthless Records and N.W.A. Then there are executives Doug Morris and Ted Field, who recall the formation of Interscope Records and their own roles in the creation of one of the biggest juggernauts in music history.

The Defiant Ones does a great job in unmasking both Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine and humanizing their guts and glory. One of the more compelling moments is Dr. Dre addressing the infamous 1991 attack on TV host Dee Barnes, which has long served as a dark stain on his otherwise storied career. After years of avoiding the subject all together, Dre owns up to his actions and attacks it head on. He subsequently closes an ill-fated chapter and avoids making The Defiant Ones a one-sided affair, as director Hughes examines both men from all angles, flattering or otherwise.

The first two parts of The Defiant Ones focuses more so on the music, whereas the last two include insight on Dr. Dres comeback with Aftermath Records and his discovery of Eminem. However, the latter parts focus more on his transformation from controversial rapper and record producer into a family man, business mogul and philanthropist. Jimmy Iovine, who is often criticized for capitalizing off the explosion and fetishization of gangster rap, shares his own reservations about the toll the drama and violence surrounding the music took on him and his business partners. He also opens up about his bitter war with Time Warner over his indecision to part ways with Dr. Dre in the wake of the East Coast vs. West Coast war.

Pulling together a cast that includes talents spanning multiple generationsTom Petty, Fab 5 Freddy, Gwen Stefani and Kendrick Lamar, to name a fewand encapsulating more than 45 years worth of history is no easy feat in any capacity, let alone when the subjects are two of the most important figures in entertainment responsible for the career of dozens of other transcendent figures. But Allen Hughes accomplishes this and more with The Defiant Ones, a glimpse into the love, loyalty and longevity of two of the greatest men to ever impact pop culture as we know it.

To experience The Defiant Ones for yourself, the episodes are currently available on HBO GO and HBO NOW.

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Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine's Love for Music, Loyalty and Longevity Explored in 'The Defiant Ones' - XXLMAG.COM

BIEN Chair Louise Haagh spoke basic income at Journey to 100, a longevity-themed conference held last month in Guernsey.

Guernsey, an island with a population of about 63,000, aspires to join the worlds blue zones regions boasting an exceptionally high proportion of centenarians and become the first country with a life expectancy over 100. To begin pursuing this goal, Guernseys Dandelion Foundation and Evolution of Medicine founder James Maskell organized Journey to 100, a world-exclusive conference held on June 30 in St. Peter Port.

In additional to diverse experts in areas such as medicine, nutrition, and sustainable agriculture, the events 20 speakers included BIEN Chair Louise Haagh (University of York), who spoke about basic income as a means to rethink and change the way our institutions are governed. Haagh stressed that basic income is neither a radical restructuring of the current welfare state, nor mere business as usual, but a chance to pause and rethink our systems of social insurance; in contrast to welfare programs that impose strict terms and conditions on recipients, basic income, would allow all people to enjoy independence in the form of selvstaendiggrelse to stand in themselves.

Watch the full conference, including Haaghs talk (beginning around 6 hr 30 min), below:

Kate McFarland has written 447 articles.

Kate has previously made a living as a professional student (current interests: philosophy of language, pragmatics, sociolinguistics), but is retired for the time being. Regarding her present work in the UBI community, you may read more here. If you think that market norms pretty much suck, and you're interested in the hypothesis that UBI could help to support a society in which people work predominantly out of non-financial motivations, please feel free to connect with her (Facebook works well). Same goes if you're interested in UBI out of a general opposition to job/career culture.

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GUERNSEY: BIEN Chair discusses basic income at longevity event - Basic Income News

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Twin study reveals strong genetic influences on how infants visually explore social world

Using eye-tracking technology, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta have found compelling evidence that genetics plays a major role in how children look at the world and whether they have a preference for gazing at peoples eyes and faces or at objects. The discovery adds new detail to understanding the causes of autism spectrum disorder. Studying twins, the researchers found that where babies focus their eyes is under stringent genetic control.

New research has uncovered compelling evidence that genetics plays a major role in how children look at the world and whether they have a preference for gazing at peoples eyes and faces or at objects.

The discovery by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta adds new detail to understanding the causes of autism spectrum disorder. The results show that the moment-to-moment movements of childrens eyes as they seek visual information about their environment are abnormal in autism and under stringent genetic control in all children.

The study is published online July 12 in the journal Nature.

Now that we know that social visual orientation is heavily influenced by genetic factors, we have a new way to trace the direct effects of genetic factors on early social development, and to design interventions to ensure that children at risk for autism acquire the social environmental inputs they need to grow and develop normally, said lead author John N. Constantino, MD, the Blanche F. Ittleson Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at Washington University. These new findings demonstrate a specific mechanism by which genes can modify a childs life experience. Two children in the same room, for example, can have completely different social experiences if one carries an inherited tendency to focus on objects while the other looks at faces, and these differences can play out repeatedly as the brain develops early in childhood.

The researchers studied 338 toddlers ages 18 to 24 months using eye-tracking technology, developed at Emory, allowing them to trace young childrens visual orientation to faces, eyes or objects as the children watched videos featuring people talking and interacting.

The children, who were part of the Missouri Family Registry, a database of twins that is maintained at Washington University School of Medicine, included 41 pairs of identical twins such twins share 100 percent of their DNA and 42 sets of fraternal twins who share only about 50 percent of their DNA. In addition, the researchers studied 84 unrelated children and 88 children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder.

Constantino, with fellow investigators Warren R. Jones, PhD, and Ami Klin, PhD, of Emory University School of Medicine, evaluated the eye-tracking data. Each twin was tested independently, at different times, without the other twin present.

How much one identical twin looked at another persons eyes or face was almost perfectly matched by his or her co-twin. But in fraternal twins, eye movements in one twin accounted for less than 10 percent of the variation in the eye movements of his or her co-twin. Identical twins also were more likely to move their eyes at the same moments in time, in the same directions, toward the same locations and the same content, mirroring one anothers behavior to within as little as 17 milliseconds. Taken together, the data indicate a strong influence of genetics on visual behavior.

The moment-to-moment match in the timing and direction of gaze shifts for identical twins was stunning and inferred a very precise level of genetic control, said Constantino, who directs the William Greenleaf Eliot Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at Washington University. We have spent years studying the transmission of inherited susceptibility to autism in families, and it now appears that by tracking eye movements in infancy, we can identify a key factor linked to genetic risk for the disorder that is present long before we can make a clinical diagnosis of autism.

The effects persisted as the children grew. When the twins were tested again about a year later, the same effects were found: Identical twins remained almost perfectly matched in where they looked, but fraternal twins became even more different than they were when initially evaluated.

Autism spectrum disorder is a lifelong condition that affects about 1 in 68 children in the United States. It is known to be caused by genetic factors, and earlier work by the Emory University team had shown that babies who look progressively less at peoples eyes, beginning as early as 2-6 months of age, have an elevated risk for autism. Meanwhile, Constantino and others in the group have studied how subtle behaviors and symptoms that characterize autism aggregate in the close relatives of individuals with autism, as a way to identity inherited susceptibilities that run in families and contribute to autism risk.

Studies like this one break new ground in our understanding of autism spectrum disorder: Establishing a direct connection between the behavioral symptoms of autism and underlying genetic factors is a critical step on the path to new treatments, said Lisa Gilotty, PhD, chief of the Research Program on Autism Spectrum Disorders at the National Institute of Mental Health, which provided support for the study in tandem with the Eunice Kennedy Shriver Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Those new treatments could include interventions that motivate very young children to focus their gazes more on faces and less on objects.

Testing infants to see how they are allocating visual attention represents a new opportunity to evaluate the effects of early interventions to specifically target social disengagement, as a way to prevent the most challenging disabilities associated with autism, said senior author Warren R. Jones, PhD, director of autism research at the Marcus Autism Center at Emory. Such interventions might be appropriate for infants showing early signs of risk or those who have been born into families in which autism has affected close relatives. In addition, learning why some infants who tend to not look at eyes and faces develop without social disability is another priority.

The small percentage of healthy children who tended to avoid looking at eyes and faces may provide researchers with insight on how to successfully compensate for those tendencies and therefore inform the development of higher-impact interventions that will produce the best possible outcomes for infants with inherited susceptibility to autism.

In addition to Constantino, the research team at Washington Universityincluded Anne L. Glowinski, MD, a professor of child psychiatry and associate director of child and adolescent psychiatry;Natasha Marrus, MD, PhD, an assistant professor of child psychiatry; and Stefanie F. Kennon-McGill, PhD, a postdoctoral research associate in psychiatry.

As identical twins watched videos, they almost always looked for the same things at the same times and in the same places. Where gazes fell is marked by the plus signs. Fraternal twins didnt match as well as identical twins, indicating that genes control where children look.

Constantino JN, Kennon-McGill S, Weichselbaum C, Marrus N, Haider A, Glowinski AL, Gillespie S, Klaiman C, Klin A, Jones W. Infant viewing of social scenes is under genetic control and is atypical in autism. Nature. Published online July 12, 2017.

This work was supported by grants from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the National Institute of Mental Health of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), grant numbers HD068479 and U54 HD087011 (to Constantino and the Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Center at Washington University) and MH100029 (to Jones and Klin at Emory). Other support was provided by the Missouri Family Register, a joint program of Washington University and the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.

Washington University School of Medicines 2,100 employed and volunteer faculty physicians also are the medical staff of Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Childrens hospitals. The School of Medicine is one of the leading medical research, teaching and patient-care institutions in the nation, currently ranked seventh in the nation by U.S. News & World Report. Through its affiliations with Barnes-Jewish and St. Louis Childrens hospitals, the School of Medicine is linked to BJC HealthCare.

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In autism, genes drive early eye gaze abnormalities - Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis

Killer T cells surround a cancer cell. Credit: NIH

Early phase Northwestern Medicine research has demonstrated a potential new therapeutic strategy for treating deadly glioblastoma brain tumors.

The strategy involves using lipid polymer based nanoparticles to deliver molecules to the tumors, where the molecules shut down key cancer drivers called brain tumor initiating cells (BTICs).

"BTICs are malignant brain tumor populations that underlie the therapy resistance, recurrence and unstoppable invasion commonly encountered by glioblastoma patients after the standard treatment regimen of surgical resection, radiation and chemotherapy," explained the study's first author, Dr. Dou Yu, research assistant professor of neurological surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.

The findings were published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Using mouse models of brain tumors implanted with BTICs derived from human patients, the scientists injected nanoparticles containing small interfering RNA (siRNA)short sequences of RNA molecules that reduce the expression of specific cancer promoting proteinsdirectly into the tumor. In the new study, the strategy stopped tumor growth and extended survival when the therapy was administered continuously through an implanted drug infusion pump.

"This major progress, although still at a conceptual stage, underscores a new direction in the pursuit of a cure for one of the most devastating medical conditions known to mankind," said Yu, who collaborated on the research with principal investigator Dr. Maciej Lesniak, Michael J. Marchese Professor of Neurosurgery and chair of neurological surgery.

Glioblastoma is particularly difficult to treat because its genetic makeup varies from patient to patient. This new therapeutic approach would make it possible to deliver siRNAs to target multiple cancer-causing gene products simultaneously in a particular patient's tumor.

In this study, the scientists tested siRNAs that target four transcription factors highly expressed in many glioblastoma tissuesbut not all. The therapy worked against classes of glioblastoma BTICs with high levels of those transcription factors, while other classes of the cancer did not respond.

"This paints a picture for personalized glioblastoma therapy regimens based on tumor profiling," Yu said. "Customized nanomedicine could target the unique genetic signatures in any specific patient and potentially lead to greater therapeutic benefits."

The strategy could also apply to other medical conditions related to the central nervous systemnot just brain tumors.

"Degenerative neurological diseases or even psychiatric conditions could potentially be the therapeutic candidates for this multiplexed delivery platform," Yu said.

Before scientists can translate this proof-of-concept research to humans, they will need to continue refining the nanomedicine platform and evaluating its long-term safety. Still, the findings from this new research provide insight for further investigation.

"Nanomedicine provides a unique opportunity to advance a therapeutic strategy for a disease without a cure. By effectively targeting brain tumor initiating stem cells responsible for cancer recurrence, this approach opens up novel translational approaches to malignant brain cancer," Lesniak summed up.

Explore further: Cold virus, stem cells tested to destroy deadly brain cancer

More information: Dou Yu et al, Multiplexed RNAi therapy against brain tumor-initiating cells via lipopolymeric nanoparticle infusion delays glioblastoma progression, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2017). DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1701911114

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Nanomedicine opens door to precision medicine for brain tumors - Phys.Org

At the meeting, the panel of experts did not question the lifesaving potential of the treatment in hopeless cases. But they raised concerns about potentially life-threatening side-effects short term worries about acute reactions like those Emily experienced, and longer-term worries about whether the infused cells could, years later, cause secondary cancers or other problems. So far, no such long-term problems have been detected, but not enough time has passed to rule them out.

Another parent at the meeting, Don McMahon, described his son Connors grueling 12 years with severe and relapsing leukemia, which started when he was 3. Mr. McMahon displayed painful photographs of Connor, bald and intubated during treatment. And he added that chemotherapy had left his son infertile. A year ago, the family was preparing for a bone-marrow transplant when they learned about T-cell treatment. Connor underwent the cell treatment at Duke University, and he has since returned to playing hockey. Compared with standard treatment, which required dozens of spinal taps and painful bone-marrow tests, the T-cell treatment was far easier to tolerate, Mr. McMahon said, and he urged the panel to vote for approval.

The treatment was developed by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania and licensed to Novartis.

Use will not be widespread at first, because the disease is not common. It affects only 5,000 people a year, about 60 percent of them children and young adults. Most children are cured with standard treatments, but in 15 percent of the cases like Emilys and Connors the disease does not respond, or it relapses.

Analysts predict that these individualized treatments could cost more than $300,000, but a spokesman for Novartis declined to specify a price.

Because the treatment is complex and patients need expert care to manage the side effects, Novartis will initially limit its use to 30 or 35 medical centers where staff will be trained and approved to administer it, the company said.

As to whether the treatment, known as CTL019, will be available in other countries, a Novartis spokeswoman said by email: Should CTL019 receive approval in the U.S., it will be the decision of the centers whether to receive international patients. We are working on bringing CTL019 to other countries around the world. She added that the company would file for approvals in the European Union later this year.

The treatment requires removing millions of a patients T-cells a type of white blood cell and genetically engineering them to kill cancer cells. The technique employs a disabled form of H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS, to carry new genetic material into the T-cells to reprogram them. The process turbocharges the T-cells to attack B-cells, a normal part of the immune system that turn malignant in leukemia. The T-cells home in on a protein called CD-19 that is found on the surface of most B-cells.

The altered T-cells called chimeric antigen receptor cells are then dripped back into the patients veins, where they multiply and start fighting the cancer.

Dr. Carl H. June, a leader of the University of Pennsylvania team that developed the treatment, calls the turbocharged cells serial killers. A single one can destroy up to 100,000 cancer cells.

In studies, re-engineering cells for treatment sometimes took four months, and some patients were so sick that they died before their cells came back. At the meeting, Novartis said the turnaround time was now down to 22 days. The company also described bar-coding and other procedures used to keep from mixing up samples once the treatment is conducted on a bigger scale.

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FDA Panel Recommends Approval for Gene-Altering Leukemia Treatment - New York Times

Precision medicine is, ironically, an imprecise term.

As it is often used today, the phrase suggests that precision is novel to the practice of medicine, and to many, it means incorporating sophisticated genetic testing into its practice.

The term can even suggest that there are now possibilities of miracle cures that were never possible before.

Sometimes healthcare organizations encourage that attitude through their marketing and advertising, but to a degree, that kind of thinking more represents hype than substance.

And while genetic testing and the information it can provide can help better tailor treatment options for individual patients, especially in cancer care, experts say healthcare executives and clinicians must be careful not to encourage false hope among vulnerable patients and their families.

Yet in a time of rapid evolution of more precise and tailored treatment options, executives and clinicians are charged with divining the difficult calculus between the possible and the practical in their precision medicine organizational structure and service offerings.

In reality, precision has always been the goal of physicians as medicine has evolved over the past couple of hundred years, says Robert Mennel, MD, director of the Baylor Precision Medicine Institute in Dallas.

"In some areas we're there. We have well-accepted tests for certain diseases that, if you're not using them, I would consider to be malpractice in many situations," he says.

However, even top-level academic medicine is still quite far away from being able to look at an individual's whole genome and predict a therapy for every disease.

"But the promise of precision medicine is there, and medicine 10 years from now is going to be quite different than it is now," he says.

One area where genetic testing is ready for prime time is in noninvasive prenatal testing, says Scott A. Beck, administrator of the Center for Individualized Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

Read more here:
Precision Medicine: Integration May Be Closer Than You Think - HealthLeaders Media

Mouse intestinal organoids that scientists genetically engineered to study colon cancer. Using gene editing technology, the investigators fused together the genes Ptprk and Rspo3 to determine their effect on cancer development. Credit: Cornell University

Genetic mutations caused by rearranged chromosomes drive the development and growth of certain colorectal cancers, according to new research conducted by Weill Cornell Medicine investigators.

Many of the genetic mutations present in colorectal cancer have been known for decades. But their exact role in cancer's development and progression has not been clear. "We knew that these mutations existed, but not whether they contribute to the disease," said Lukas Dow, an assistant professor of biochemistry in medicine and a member of the Sandra and Edward Meyer Cancer Center at Weill Cornell Medicine. "So we are interested in whether they are actually driving cancer and whether they can potentially be targets for drugs that treat it."

In a paper published July 11 in Nature Communications, Dow and his colleagues describe how large pieces of chromosomes are deleted or inverted, resulting in new, mutated so-called fusion genes created from parts of two other genes that are responsible for the formation of some colon cancers.

The researchers used the gene editing technology CRISPR, which allows scientists to easily alter any piece of DNA in an organism, to cut the DNA in normal human intestinal cells and create fusion genes. In this way, they engineered the genetic mutations in two genes Rspo2 and Rspo3 known to be associated with colorectal cancer. They then created mice containing these genes to study the genes' effect on colon cancer development.

Though CRISPR has received a lot of attention in the last several years, this is the first time the tool has been used this way. "We created the first CRISPR-based transgenic animal model for inducing large-scale chromosomal rearrangements," Dow said.

These chromosomal rearrangements in the Rspo genes did in fact initiate growth of colon cancer in the mice. The mice containing the engineered genes developed multiple precancerous tumors that are the precursors to colorectal cancer. "This is the first evidence that these specific fusions can drive tumor development," Dow said.

Dow's team went on to treat the mice that developed cancer with an experimental drug, LGK974, which blocks a protein necessary for Rspo fusion genes to cause disease. "The tumors shrank and the mice were fine as long as they continued to take LGK974," Dow said. In addition, the drug only suppressed growth of the cancer cells; it had no obvious negative effect on healthy cells in the mouse intestine.

The study's results hold particular promise for the treatment of colorectal cancer in humans, Dow said. This form of cancer has historically been a difficult disease to treat. Chemotherapy drugs have limited impact against colorectal cancer and developing targeted therapies drugs that target aspects of cancer cells that make them different from healthy cells has proven difficult. "Our results give us confidence that if we can deliver LGK974 effectively to patients with these fusion genes," Dow said, "then we should be able to see some tumor response with these targeted agents."

Explore further: Novel gene editing approach to cancer treatment shows promise in mice

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'Fusion genes' drive formation and growth of colorectal cancer - Medical Xpress

By R. Scott Nolen

Posted July 12, 2017

World Veterinary Association President Ren Carlson addresses the AVMA House of Delegates in 2015. (Photo by R. Scott Nolen)

For the past three years, Dr. Ren Carlson has been president of the World Veterinary Association, the internationally recognized voice of global veterinary medicine. A federation of roughly 90 veterinary organizations representing 500,000 veterinarians on six continents, the WVA focuses on all species and aspects of the veterinary profession.

Yet, despite its credentials, the WVA is arguably one of the least understood veterinary organizations among U.S. veterinarians. Dr. Carlson understands; for 34 years, most of her time and attention were spent in private clinical practice, with the last 15 years devoted to running her own small animal practice in Chetek, Wisconsin.

"Veterinarians are busy with so many other things that it's a real challenge to look beyond their own communities," she said.

Dr. Carlson admittedly knew little about the WVA prior to 2011 when, as AVMA president, she represented the AVMA at the general assembly of the World Veterinary Congress in Cape Town, South Africa. She came away from the meeting excited about the AVMA's potential to influence global veterinary medicine through the WVA. So excited, in fact, that in 2014, Dr. Carlson successfully ran a global campaign as a candidate for the WVA presidency.

"It's amazing," she remarked. "I'm this person from a town of 2,000 people in Wisconsin, and I'm president of an international organization representing fellow veterinarians around the world." Dr. Carlson's three-year term ends in late August when the WVC convenes in Incheon, South Korea. She will carry on as the AVMA director of international affairs for another two years, a position she was first appointed to in 2013.

Headquartered in Brussels, the WVA promotes veterinary medicine globally by working with various international entities, including the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the World Health Organization, and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. From 2014-17, the four strategic priorities for WVA have been animal welfare improvement, pharmaceutical stewardship, veterinary education, and zoonotic disease prevention. For example, the WVA Animal Welfare Committee and Advisory Group developed fact sheets for veterinarians and associations on such topics as working equids, transportation of food animals, and owned and unowned free-roaming dogs.

In March 2015, Dr. Carlson appeared before a WHO advisory committee to testify against curbing ketamine abuse by scheduling the anesthetic as a controlled substance under the 1971 U.N. Convention on Psychotropic Substances.

"The WVA is fully aware of the potential public health problems caused by illicit use of ketamine and agrees with the need for narcotic and psychotropic drugs to be controlled and strictly regulated. However, these measures must be science-based and proportional, and should not unnecessarily hamper the use by veterinary surgeons that would risk the health and welfare of the animals under their care," Dr. Carlson told the committee.

"Such international scheduling of ketamine," she concluded, "may lead to ketamine shortages to veterinary and medical clinicians, especially in remote areas."

Another way the WVA supports veterinary medicine is by helping member organizations advocate for the veterinary profession in their country or region. "If veterinarians aren't there, making policy and being vocal, then someone else makes those decisions," Dr. Carlson noted.

The WVA supports and promotes the harmonization of basic core competencies in all veterinary education programs that offer a veterinary degree. Additionally, the WVA has partnered with the World Continuing Education Alliance to offer free and discounted CE to any veterinarian in the world through the Continuing Education Portal on the WVA website. A customized portal for veterinary associations to offer their members is available for a fee.

This May, the WVA and Health for Animals, an international association representing the global animal medicine industry, together launched a website designed to educate the public on the importance of animal health.

The enthusiasm that swept Dr. Carlson into the WVA presidency has not waned, even though it's one of the most demanding jobs she's ever had. In addition to being the public face of the world association, she chairs the WVA Council of 17 members that meets every six weeks via teleconference and in person once a year during the World Veterinary Congress. The council chair, Dr. Carlson explained, has "enormous influence" because that person sets the agenda and manages the meeting.

One of the greatest obstacles facing the WVA, according to Dr. Carlson, is proving its value to grass-roots members. "Quite honestly, I don't think a lot of AVMA's members know or even understand why the AVMA is a member of the WVA," she said.

"It's a difficult sell, but we need to belong because the WVA needs representatives from strong associations like AVMA to lead," Dr. Carlson continued. "The United States is looked to as a leader. Once there's buy-in from us, that brings credibility and visibility, whatever the issue or organization, and other countries want to follow.

"Animal health and welfare are directly related to human health and welfare. A strong general membership across the world allows the WVA to have greater influence and impact to improve animal and public health around the world."

AVMA weighs stepped-up role in global food security (April 15, 2017)

Former AVMA officer elected WVA president (Dec. 1, 2014)

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AVMA's champion for global veterinary medicine - American Veterinary Medical Association

Posted July 12, 2017

Dr. Anthony Pease

Dr. Anthony Pease became chief medical officer for the Western Veterinary Conference on May 15, succeeding Dr. Don Waldron, who held the office for five years.

Since 2008 Dr. Pease has been a faculty member of the Michigan State University College of Veterinary Medicine, where he is currently an associate professor in the Small Animal and Large Animal clinical sciences departments.

"(Dr. Pease's) dedication to lifelong learning will complement WVC's ongoing mission to provide quality continuing education to veterinary professionals," said WVC CEO David Little. "Dr. Pease will lead WVC's educational program, ensuring relevancy and innovation within our curriculum across the Annual Conference, Hands-on Labs at WVC's Oquendo Center, On the Road, and career-building courses as well as new initiatives."

Over the past five years, Dr. Pease has taught ultrasound courses at the Oquendo Center in Las Vegas.

Dr. Pease is a diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Radiology and served as president of the specialty college in 2014. He has chaired the Clinical Programs Committee for Michigan State's veterinary college since 2013.

"I am thrilled to join the WVC team and lead the veterinary curriculum for its world-renowned clinical facility, the Oquendo Center. This appointment is in lockstep to further educate, challenge, and train global veterinary professionals as I've done throughout my career," said Dr. Pease, a 1999 graduate of the Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine.

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Western names Pease chief medical officer - American Veterinary Medical Association

By Malinda Larkin

Posted July 12, 2017

Many veterinary colleges have long been promoting diversity and inclusion, but now the AVMA Council on Education has codified these practices, approving revisions to six of its 11 Standards of Accreditation during its spring meeting, March 25-28.

The desire to have the concepts of diversity and inclusion better integrated into accreditation standards is nothing new. In fact, it was a prominent point of discussion during the North American Veterinary Medical Education Consortium. This series of three national meetings in 2010 brought together hundreds of stakeholders to discuss core competencies needed by graduates, and to review and explore progress in developing new educational models for delivery of the veterinary curriculum.

One of the core competencies for graduating veterinarians that came from NAVMEC was diversity and multicultural awareness, specifically: "Veterinarians demonstrate an understanding of the manner in which culture and belief systems impact delivery of veterinary medical care while recognizing and appropriately addressing biases in themselves, in others, and in the process of veterinary medical care delivery."

An example of the revisions is Standard 11 (Outcomes Assessment), which now says that institutions must be able to observe, assess, and document that students demonstrate "ethical and professional conduct; communication skills including those that demonstrate an understanding and sensitivity to how clients' diversity and individual circumstance can impact health care."

In Standard 9 (Curriculum), newly adopted wording states that veterinary schools must provide opportunities throughout the curriculum for students to gain and integrate an understanding of the important influences of diversity and inclusion in veterinary medicine. This includes the impact of implicit biases related to an individual's personal circumstances on the delivery of veterinary services.

Veterinary colleges also are now required to cultivate a diverse faculty through their hiring policies and retention practices, consistent with applicable law. These institutions must also demonstrate ongoing efforts to achieve parity in advancement opportunities and compensation, according to changes to Standard 8 (Faculty). Student recruitment and admission practices, too, must be nondiscriminatory, as per changes to Standard 7 (Admissions).

Further, a veterinary college must be able to show a commitment to diversity that extends to the overall academic environment. This is interpreted as the college being an institution "that does not discriminate and seeks to enhance diversity, consistent with applicable law. Diversity may include, but is not limited to, race, religion, ethnicity, age, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, cultural and socioeconomic background, national origin, and disability."

The COE had received a number of public comments on the proposed changes; most were in support of the revisions. On the basis of the public comments, the council also revisedand ultimately approvedlanguage that clarified the COE's intent and was less prescriptive, according to the council's newsletter.

"The intent of the council is not to require colleges to meet specific numeric goals; rather, to have appropriate policies, processes, and practices in place that, in keeping with the mission of the college, are designed to promote the recruitment and retention of a diverse academic community and to promote, from qualified applicants, the recruitment and admittance of a diverse student body, consistent with applicable law. In addition, the council believes that, within the framework of the law that each college must function, diversity may be utilized as part of a holistic admission process," the COE wrote in the newsletter.

In addition to language incorporating diversity and inclusion in the standards, the council also modified the following language:

The revised COE standards are posted on the AVMA website.

AAVMC continues to move the needle on diversity (May 1,2015)

Certificate programs promote diversity in veterinary medicine (Nov. 1, 2014)

Dialogue about diversity reveals tensions (May 1, 2013)

We're all in this together (May 15, 2011)

Speakers share strategies to increase diversity (Oct. 1, 2010)

Read more:
Diversity, inclusion added to accreditation standards - American Veterinary Medical Association

The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) is pleased to announce that Dr. Kent McClure has joined our team as Chief of Governmental Relations. In this newly created position, hell lead the AVMAs federal and state advocacy efforts to further elevate the success of our advocacy work.

Dr. McClure brings tremendous experience in advocacy at the federal and state level, said AVMA CEO Dr. Janet Donlin. The AVMA is already home to the leading advocacy staff for veterinary medicine in the nation, and the addition of Dr. McClure in this new position is going to take our advocacy work to the next level.

Dr. McClure previously served as General Counsel for the Animal Health Institute, where he worked on the development of policy that impacts the veterinary profession, animal health product research and commerce. Dr. McClure has served as a member of the AVMA Judicial Council, a trustee on the AVMA-Professional Liability Insurance Trust, a liaison to the AVMA Council on Biologic and Therapeutic Agents, and a member of the board of directors of the National Association for Biomedical Research. He also worked as an attorney at Cowles & Thompson and practiced veterinary medicine in Texas. He holds a DVM from the Texas A&M College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences and a J.D. from University of Texas School of Law.

Im excited to join the AVMA and use my experience to advocate for the veterinary profession and sound public policy, said Dr. McClure. We have a lot of exciting opportunities in front of us, and Im looking forward to working with our talented team to protect, promote and advance veterinary medicine.

The AVMA has also promoted Dr. Ashley Morgan to Director of State Advocacy. Dr. Morgan has served as an assistant director in the AVMAs governmental relations division since 2008, during which time she honed her expertise on pharmaceutical issues and built relationships with state veterinary medical associations across the country. In her new role, Dr. Morgan will be responsible for providing vision and leadership for the AVMAs state advocacy efforts. Dr. Morgan holds a DVM from Cornells College of Veterinary Medicine and is a Certified Association Executive.

Read more:
Dr. Kent McClure joins the AVMA to lead advocacy efforts - American Veterinary Medical Association

As a child, I used to dread going for my annual checkup. Whether it was the anxiety of receiving shots or being poked and prodded, the lollipop at the end never really made up for the angst beforehand. With age comes wisdom, however, and I now understand why a health check is important for the human body to function properly.

In a security scenario, a health checkup has become indispensable, from basic patch hygiene to monitoring the configuration of a security information and event management (SIEM) solution itself. Thats why IBM Security and ScienceSoft have joined forces to introduce the Health Check Framework Manager app for IBM QRadar to help security analysts conduct checkups on their QRadar deployment.

The app allows access to set up and administrate the Health Check Framework (HCF) for IBM QRadar SIEM. The HCF helps analysts understand the state of QRadar performance to identify whether its flawless or has misconfigurations that may result in overlooked attacks on the IT environment.

The HCF monitors a variety of essential QRadar performance parameters through 60 operational metrics and 25 health markers. The solution delivers statistics such as as events per second (EPS) and flow per interval (FPI), event and flow timelines, and incoming log data quality according to a preset schedule or on demand.

Once the checkup is complete, the HCF automatically generates a comprehensive report and sends it to QRadar admins. The report delivers a detailed analysis of QRadars essential features, showing whether the parameters meet the baseline requirements. It also provides a clear vision of the deployment state and pinpoints anomalies to address.

Overall, the Health Check Framework Manager app delivers:

The HCF is a unique solution to review the QRadar operational state. Manual checks can consume unreasonable amounts of human effort and time, since the average number of events per second checked with QRadar can reach 10,000 or higher. Developing custom add-ons is more expensive compared to the HCF.

One recent high-level project involved delivering the HCF for QRadar to a big North American bank that services more than 15 million clients worldwide. The banks broad IT environment required an automated monitoring tool. The HCF and Manager app were installed to detect and report any deviations in the security network so the banks security team could respond quickly and prevent the instances of missed offenses.

Regular health checks are vital for any security tool to ensure proper functioning, so dont put off that checkup any longer. Make an appointment with the security doctor by downloading the new app on IBM Security App Exchange to integrate HCF and QRadar SIEM.

Watch the on-demand webinar: Improve Threat Visibility and Operational Efficiency

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Preventative Medicine: Get a Health Check for Your SIEM - Security Intelligence (blog)

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Theres been a lot of uncertainty about the possibilities for startup entrepreneurs in the healthcare sector. Biotech is too slow andtoo risky, the naysayers complain, to be a solid venture. Luckily, such old school cowardice is gradually being debunked. In an age where consumers are increasingly in control of theirhealth, the potential for startup success in theindustry has never been more real.

Related: 4 Ways Entrepreneurs Can Innovate in the Healthcare Space

Dr. Tonmoy Sharma didnt come to the United States to be an entrepreneur. By the time he joined the American Psychiatric Association in 2004, he had already studied medicine on three continents and had almost 20 years of experience as a physician. Dr. Sharma opened a six-bed facility to treat addiction in 2009, and now hes CEO of a booming healthcare business, Sovereign Health, thats changing the way addiction is treated. And its surpassed the national average in clinical effectiveness. "With all of the recognitions Sovereign Health has received over the past few years, says Veena Kumari, Sovereigns Chief Scientific Officer, I wasn't surprised to see such impressive clinical outcomes for Sovereign Health's programs.

But many are still surprised to see that successful healthcare and innovative entrepreneurialism have such a fertile overlap. Here are some reasons you should be thinking about making a move to the medical economy.

Theres venture capital looking for the next great startup right now. That money will find someone, and it could be you. The last quarter of 2015 saw 172 VC deals in the biotechnology and medical devices sectors, to the tune of $2 billion in investment capital. How quick is your math? Thats an average investment of about $11.6 million per deal.

If youve got a big idea for the world of medicine, and can organize a team of crackshot scientists(or maybe you have medical background and want to go into business), nows not the time to hold back. Get out there and start pitching for startup capital.

Related: 3 Mobile Solutions to Healthcare Industry Problems

Lets be honest, we dont need another Snapchat. What we do need are better vaccines, more cost-effective medicines, customer friendly healthcare systemsand preventative medicine for the underprivileged. Theres a humanitarian element to this, but theres also the fact that its simply good business. Before anything else, all successful businesses meet a need.

Consumers are increasingly interested in preventative maintenance and personal wellness. This presents myriad opportunities for nonmedical health sectors like the $16 billion yoga industry.

Innovating on the ground floor in wellness doesnt require a PhD, it just takes good business sense and a willingness to help people look out for their own health. How about an app that helps you find healthy options when youre dining out? HealthyOut beat you to that one, but keep thinking in that direction. The next great health and wellness idea is right around the corner.

The medical economy is stable. Healthcare expenses for the average American family are starting to level out. Theyre up by just 4.3 percent this year, the smallest increase the post-9/11 era has seen. This is good for consumers, although health care expenses still put a lot of pressure on most Americans and their employers.

Its also good for entrepreneurs, who can help consumers find ways to make their dollars work for them more efficiently. With good businesses working in their favor, costs dont need to be so high, and innovative companies can still be lucrative. The days of exploitative big pharma preying upon sick Americans are finally on the wane, and that means the little guy can step in and help clean up the mess.

Related: Healthcare Franchises May Be Just What the Doctor Ordered

We may not know what the future holds for Snapchat and Silicon Valley tech, but people will always need healthcare services --which means the healthcare industry isnt going anywhere either. Its a good sector to stake your claim in just for that. So when youre thinking about your next big idea, consider the possibilities in this overlooked dark horse of a startup sector. If you put your efforts to work in the healthcare industry, you just might find it rewarding in all the right ways.

Chirag Kulkarni is a serial entrepreneur and advisor. He is the CEO of Insightfully, which is using AI to discover what employees skills and passions are to reallocate human capital within the enterprise. He has also spoken at Accenture, In...

Continued here:
3 Reasons Entrepreneurs Should Consider the Opportunities in Healthcare - Entrepreneur

LONDON Greater consumption of coffee could lead to a longer life, according to two new studies published Monday.

The findings have resurfaced the centuries-old conversation on coffees health effects.

One study surveyed more than 520,000 people in 10 European countries, making it the largest study to date on coffee and mortality, and found that drinking more coffee could significantly lower a persons risk of mortality.The second study was more novel, as it focused on non-white populations. After surveying over 185,000 African-Americans, Native Americans, Hawaiians, Japanese-Americans, Latinos and whites, the researchers found that coffee increases longevity across various races.

People who drank two to four cups a day had an 18% lower risk of death compared with people who did not drink coffee, according to the study. These findings are consistent with previous studies that had looked at majority white populations, said Veronica Wendy Setiawan, associate professor of preventative medicine at USCs Keck School of Medicine, who led the study on nonwhite populations.

Given these very diverse populations, all these people have different lifestyles. They have very different dietary habits and different susceptibilities and we still find similar patterns, Setiawan said.

The new study shows that there is a stronger biological possibility for the relationship between coffee and longevity and found that mortality was inversely related to coffee consumption for heart disease, cancer, respiratory disease, stroke, diabetes and kidney disease.

The study on European countries revealed an inverse association between coffee and liver disease, suicide in men, cancer in women, digestive diseases and circulatory diseases. Those who drank three or more cups a day had a lower risk for all-cause death than people who did not drink coffee.

Both studies were published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

We looked at multiple countries across Europe, where the way the population drinks coffee and prepares coffee is quite different, said Marc Gunter, reader in cancer epidemiology and prevention at Imperial Colleges School of Public Health in the UK, who co-authored the European study.

The fact that we saw the same relationships in different countries is kind of the implication that its something about coffee rather than its something about the way that coffee is prepared or the way its drunk, he said.

The biological benefits and caveats

Coffee is a complex mixture of compounds, some of which have been revealed in laboratories to have biological effects, Gunter said.

Studies have shown that certain compounds have neuroprotective and anti-inflammatory properties that can help reduce risk for illnesses like Parkinsons disease.

In the European study, people who were drinking coffee tended to have lower levels of inflammation, healthier lipid profiles and better glucose control compared with those who werent. It is still unclear which particular compounds provide health benefits, but Gunter said he would be interested in exploring this further.

Both studies separated smokers from nonsmokers, since smoking is known to reduce lifespan and is linked to various deceases. However, they found that coffee had inverse effects on mortality for smokers too.

Smoking doesnt seem to blunt the effects of coffee, Gunter said. It didnt matter whether you smoked or not. There was still a potential beneficial affect of coffee on mortality.

However, Dr. Alberto Ascherio, professor of Epidemiology and Nutrition at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, said people should be wary of this finding.

Even if it was in some way true, it doesnt make sense to me, because by smoking, you increase your mortality several-fold. Then, if you reduce it by 10% drinking coffee, give me a break, said Ascherio, who was not involved in the study.I think its a dangerous proposition because it suggests that a smoker can counteract the effects of smoking by drinking coffee, which is borderline insane.

The studies complement work that has been done on coffee and mortality, he said, and it has been reasonably documented that coffee drinkers have a lower risk of death.

With all observations from previous studies, however, its difficult to exclude the possibility that coffee drinkers are just healthier to begin with, Gunter said.

People who avoid coffee, particularly in places like the US and Europe where drinking the beverage is very common, may do so because they have health problems. Their higher mortality rate could be a result of them being less healthy to begin with.

I think that the solid conclusion is that if youre a coffee drinker, keep drinking your coffee and be happy, Ascherio said. And if youre not? I think you can go on drinking your tea or water without a problem.

Meanwhile, Gunter and Setiawan stand a bit more firmly on coffee as a health benefit.

The takeaway message would be that drinking a couple cups of coffee a day doesnt do you any harm, and actually, it might be doing you some good, he said.

Moderate coffee consumption can be incorporated into a healthy diet and lifestyle, Setiawan said. This studies and the previous studies suggest that for a majority of people, theres no long term harm from drinking coffee.

But as you know, the news on coffee has not always been positive. And the argument over the merits of your daily cup of joe dates back centuries. Lets take a look at the timeline.

1500s headline: Coffee leads to illegal sex

Legend has it that coffee was discovered by Kaldi, an Ethiopian goatherd, after he caught his suddenly frisky goats eating glossy green leaves and red berries and then tried it for himself. But it was the Arabs who first started coffeehouses, and thats where coffee got its first black mark.

Patrons of coffeehouses were said to be more likely to gamble and engage in criminally unorthodox sexual situations, according to author Ralph Hattox. By 1511 the mayor of Mecca shut them down. He cited medical and religious reasons, saying coffee was an intoxicant and thus prohibited by Islamic law, even though scholars like Mark Pendergrast believe it was more likely a reaction to the unpopular comments about his leadership. The ban didnt last long, says Pendergrast, adding that coffee became so important in Turkey that a lack of sufficient coffee provided grounds for a woman to seek a divorce.

1600s headline: Coffee cures alcoholism but causes impotence

As the popularity of coffee grew and spread across the continent, the medical community began to extol its benefits. It was especially popular in England as a cure for alcoholism, one of the biggest medical problems of the time; after all, water wasnt always safe to drink, so most men, women and even children drank the hard stuff.

Local ads such as this one in 1652 by coffee shop owner Pasqua Rose popularized coffees healthy status, claiming coffee could aid digestion, prevent and cure gout and scurvy, help coughs, headaches and stomachaches, even prevent miscarriages.

But in London, women were concerned that their men were becoming impotent, and in 1674 The Womens Petition Against Coffee asked for the closing of all coffeehouses, saying in part: We find of late a very sensible Decay of that true Old English Vigour. Never did Men wear greater Breeches, or carry less in them

1700s headline: Coffee helps you work longer

By 1730, tea had replaced coffee in London as the daily drink of choice. That preference continued in the colonies until 1773, when the famous Boston Tea Party made it unpatriotic to drink tea. Coffeehouses popped up everywhere, and the marvelous stimulant qualities of the brew were said to contribute to the ability of the colonists to work longer hours.

1800s headline: Coffee will make you go blind. Have a cup of hot wheat-bran drink instead

In the mid-1800s America was at war with itself and one side effect is that coffee supplies ran short. Enter toasted grain-based beverage substitutes such as Kelloggs Caramel Coffee and C.W. Posts Postum (still manufactured). They advertised with anti-coffee tirades to boost sales. C.W. Posts ads were especially vicious, says Pendergrast, claiming coffee was as bad as morphine, cocaine, nicotine or strychnine and could cause blindness.

1916 headline: Coffee stunts your growth

While inventions and improvements in coffee pots, filters and processing advanced at a quick pace throughout the 1900s, so did medical concerns and negative public beliefs about the benefits of coffee.

Good Housekeeping magazine wrote about how coffee stunts growth. And concerns continued to grow about coffees impact on common aliments of the era, such as nervousness, heart palpitations, indigestion and insomnia.

1927 headline: Coffee will give you bad grades, kids

In Science Magazine, on September 2, 1927, 80,000 elementary and junior high kids were asked about their coffee drinking habits. Researchers found the startling fact that most of them drank more than a cup of coffee a day, which was then compared to scholarship with mostly negative results.

1970s and 80s headline: Coffee is as serious as a heart attack

A 1973 study in the New England Journal of Medicine of more than 12,000 patients found drinking one to five cups of coffee a day increased risk of heart attacks by 60% while drinking six or more cups a day doubled that risk to 120%.

Another New England Journal of Medicine study, in 1978, found a short-term rise in blood pressure after three cups of coffee. Authors called for further research into caffeine and hypertension.

A 38-year study by the Johns Hopkins Medical School of more than a 1,000 medical students found in 1985 that those who drank five or more cups of coffee a day were 2.8 times as likely to develop heart problems compared to those who dont consume coffee. But the study only asked questions every five years, and didnt isolate smoking behavior or many other negative behaviors that tend to go along with coffee, such as doughnuts. Or Doooonuts, if youre Homer Simpson.

Millennium headline: Coffee goes meta

Now begins the era of the meta-analysis, where researchers look at hundreds of studies and apply scientific principles to find those that do the best job of randomizing and controlling for compounding factors, such as smoking, obesity, lack of exercise and many other lifestyles issues. That means that a specific study, which may or may not meet certain standards, cant tip the balance one way or another. We take a look at some of the years. The results for coffee? Mostly good.

2001 headline: Coffee increases risk of urinary tract cancer

But first, a negative: A 2001 study found a 20% increase in the risk of urinary tract cancer risk for coffee drinkers, but not tea drinkers. That finding was repeated in a 2015 meta-analysis. So, if this is a risk factor in your family history, you might want to switch to tea.

2007 headline: Coffee decreases risk of liver cancer

Some of these data analyses found preventive benefits for cancer from drinking coffee, such as this one, which showed drinking two cups of black coffee a day could reduce the risk of liver cancer by 43%. Those findings were replicated in 2013 in two other studies.

2010 headline: Coffee and lung disease go together like coffee and smoking

A meta-analysis found a correlation between coffee consumption and lung disease, but the study found it impossible to completely eliminate the confounding effects of smoking.

2011 headline: Coffee reduces risk of stroke and prostate cancer

A meta-analysis of 11 studies on the link between stroke risk and coffee consumption between 1966 and 2011, with nearly a half a million participants, found no negative connection. In fact, there was a small benefit in moderate consumption, which is considered to be three to five cups of black coffee a day. Another meta-analysis of studies between 2001 and 2011 found four or more cups a day had a preventive effect on the risk of stroke.

As for prostate cancer, this 2011 study followed nearly 59,000 men from 1986 to 2006 and found drinking coffee to be highly associated with lower risk for the lethal form of the disease.

2012 headline: Coffee lowers risk of heart failure

More meta-analysis of studies on heart failure found four cups a day provided the lowest risk for heart failure, and you had to drink a whopping 10 cups a day to get a bad association.

2013 headline: Coffee lowers risk of heart disease and helps you live longer

For general heart disease a meta-analysis of 36 studies with more than 1.2 million participants found moderate coffee drinking seemed to be associated with a low risk for heart disease; plus, there wasnt a higher risk among those who drank more than five cups a day.

How about coffees effects on your overall risk of death? One analysis of 20 studies, and another that included 17 studies, both of which included more than a million people, found drinking coffee reduced your total mortality risk slightly.

2015 headline: Coffee is practically a health food

As a sign of the times, the U.S. Department of Agriculture now agrees that coffee can be incorporated into a healthy lifestyle, especially if you stay within three to five cups a day (a maximum of 400 mg of caffeine), and avoid fattening cream and sugar. You can read their analysis of the latest data on everything from diabetes to chronic disease here.

2017 headline: Yes, coffee still leads to a longer life

The largest study to date on coffee and mortality surveyed 520,000 people in 10 European countries and found that regularly drinking coffee could significantly lower the risk of death.

Another study with a focus on non-white populations and had similar findings. That study surveyed 185,000 African-Americans, Native Americans, Hawaiians, Japanese-Americans, Latinos and whites. The varying lifestyles and dietary habits of the people observed in both studies led the authors to believe that coffees impact on longevity doesnt have to do with how its prepared or how people drink it it has to do with the beverages biological effect on the body.

But stay tuned. Theres sure to be another meta-study, and another opinion. Well keep you updated.

Read more:
Drinking More Coffee Leads to a Longer Life, Two Studies Say - wnep.com

A study done by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health indicates that adults over age 60 and teens do about the same level of physical activity. According to the CDC, out of ten high school students, less than three do 60 minutes of physical activity a day. The same is true of older adults, raising concerns that both of these age groups are at risk for diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and other illnesses. This study backs up these findings.

The research gathered data from 12,529 individuals using information from the National Health and Nutritional Examination Surveys done in 2003-04 and 2005-06. During these surveys, individuals work activity monitoring devices for seven days except when in the shower or sleeping. The devices recorded all activity within that period. The end result showed that neither teens nor those over age 60 met the World Health Organizations physical activity guidelines.

These findings were published in Preventative Medicine on May 30, 2017.

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Diabetes Health in The News: Teens and 60-Year- Olds Do the Same Level of Physical Activity - Diabetes Health (press release)

Tulane University scientists will get $12 million for animal studies to test drug combinations to treat Lassa fever and to develop a vaccine for the deadly virus, which can attack internal organs and cause bleeding from the mouth, nose and other places.

Tulane's medical school says a team led by Robert Garry is getting grants from the National Institutes of Health for two five-year studies.

One, getting $5.7 million, will evaluate a drug mixture to treat the virus, which is common in parts of West Africa. The other will provide $6.3 million to develop a vaccine based on a recently discovered possible target for antibodies on the surface of the virus, a news release Tuesday said.

"In West Africa, we need a drug to treat acutely infected patients as well as a preventative measure to stop it," said Garry, professor of microbiology and immunology at Tulane University School of Medicine. "Vaccine initiatives in rural Africa are difficult so you are never going to be able to vaccinate everyone. You need to be able to treat people when they get sick."

Some 100,000 to 300,000 people a year get sick from the virus, most often transmitted in food contaminated with rat feces or urine. About 5,000 of them die, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's website.

Garry said the vaccine will include both Lassa and Ebola fever glycoproteins surface structures that can be targeted to keep a virus from infecting host cells.

"Ebola is likely to come back, and Lassa isn't going away so you have to protect against both," Garry said. "We think we can do it with one shot."

The other project will test three antibodies that have done well in early animal studies, to see which mixtures work best. Tulane is working on this project with scientists at Zalgen Labs in Germantown, Maryland; The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla, California; the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston and the Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute in La Jolla.

___

Online:

Lassa fever: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs179/en/

Medical school: http://www2.tulane.edu/som/

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: https://www.cdc.gov/vhf/lassa/index.html

Excerpt from:
Tulane gets $12M for Lassa fever animal studies - Lexington Herald Leader

NEGAUNEE TOWNSHIP, Mich. (WLUC) In the last decade, tobacco use has declined nationally, but the U.P. smoking rate of 23 percent remains higher than both state and national averages.

Tobacco's negative effects hit rural areas like the U.P. harder than urban ones, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A CDC study found adolescents in rural regions begin smoking earlier than those in urban areas. That's a problem, since adolescents' brains are still developing and more vulnerable to addiction.

The likelihood for addiction is greater, said Dr. Kevin Piggot, a family and preventative medicine physician. So when you talk to most adults in regards to when they began smoking, they began in their teenage years.

As cigarette smoking declined, use of other tobacco products like e-cigarettes and chewing tobacco rose.

But we do know still nicotine is present, Dr. Piggot said. Nicotine is an addictive substance and the whole issue of becoming addicted results for many people in a lifelong use of that substance.

Experts said quitters who get both medication and therapy have the best chance of success. But those resources can be hard to find in some parts of the U.P.

If we look up here where we may not have active tobacco cessation classes going on, resources to counselors that can work with somebody quitting tobacco, then that can be a limitation, said Sarah Derwin, health educator at the Marquette County Health Department.

For a link to a list of cessation resources, click here.

See original here:
Tobacco use continues in UP - UpperMichigansSource.com

The Center for Sight provides free eye surgery at its annual Mission Cataract event.

For the past two years Daniel Medrano-Luna has lived inside a thick haze.

Through the fog of cataracts, the 68-year-old walked over two hours to his church every Sunday for Mass, before hitching back to his campsite in Bradenton. If no one picked him up on his way back home, he would sleep outside and take a bus back Monday.

Homeless and without insurance, Medrano-Luna had little hope for an eye appointment with an opthamologist, let alone corrective surgery.

But that changed when Medrano-Luna was approved for a free cataract surgery at the Center for Sight in Sarasota. The center opened its doors Wednesday for its annual Mission Cataract event, in which staff members offer free cataract eye surgeries to people who cant afford it.

Nearly 100 patients signed up for the Wednesday event and some will return on July 19, the second day of surgeries, to have the cataract in their other eye removed. Medrano-Luna and his girlfriend Lynn Atyeo arrived by bus early. They were worried after the surgery because they didnt know if they could afford to come back for the follow up appointment Thursday.

These past few months have been very rough, Atyeo said. Ive been very sick and Ive been living off disability. I try to feed the both of us with my food stamps.

Atyeo helps translate for Medrano-Luna, who immigrated to the United States from Mexico in 1981. After the surgery, when the two began asking for donations for the appointment the next day, center staff members instead scheduled a transport bus to pick them up.

Oh bless you and thank you all so much, Atyeo said after one staff member confirmed the follow up. The couple will return next week so that Medrano-Luna can have the cataract in his other eye removed.

Cataracts develop as the lens of the eye becomes foggy or opaque, leading to blurred vision. The surgery is considered a minor outpatient procedure in which the doctor removes the lens and replaces it with a clear artificial lens.

Dr. William Soscia has been a surgeon with the Center for Sight and its Mission Cataract event for nearly a decade.

Its an exciting day for all of us, Soscia said. When we were at the beginning phases of our career, for me 20 years ago when I was in med school, I was asked why I wanted to do this. The answer was to take care of people.

The nurses and surgeons donate their time on both days that the center provides the free surgeries. Soscia said that about five years ago Dr. David Shoemaker founded the Center for Sight Foundation, which raised money for the event. The team has expanded the services to offer more than 100 surgeries over the two Wednesdays.

We all come in here with a smile. We all come in here excited because we are all doing this to help people, Soscia said. It feels like a million bucks.

Soscia estimated that the surgery and services administered to the patients would cost around $3,000 to $5,000 for each eye. Many of the patients have developed cataracts in both eyes. But giving sight back to those who couldnt afford it otherwise has a clear impact on those helping to provide the service.

I was in Ghana, Africa, in 2000 and that was a great experience. But this has a particular special feeling because it's in the town we live in, Soscia said. We get to take care of the people who are working and living in the same place as us.

Some patients traveled across Florida for the procedure. Ed Brown, 54, drove hours from north of Gainesville. Hehad to leave his job as a forklift driver after cataracts diminished his vision. For more than a year he was without a job, struggling to complete even simple tasks.

I looked high and low for someone to help me, Brown said. But you get stuck in that rut and you cant get out."

He found out about the free surgery online and applied. Upon receiving the call, Brown said he called his girlfriend and mother and told them the good news. Over the next few weeks hell be spending time with some family that lives in Sarasota while he recovers.

Its overwhelming. I can see everything where before I couldnt see anything, Brown said. I dont think Ive ever seen this good out of this eye. This is awesome."

In the future, Brown said he plans to support the Center for Sight and the Cataract Mission.

Im going to give back, Brown said. Ive talked to some people who have donated to and thats what Im going to do.

Read the original post:
Sarasota cataract center restores sight for the needy - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Meibomian gland dysfunction -also known as dry eye syndrome - is on the rise among women due to excess make-up of the eyes. Though not taken seriously, the condition leads to blepharitis, extreme blurred vision, said doctors.

Latest medical cases revealed that though MGD until now was seen due to ageing, now the trend has changed and it is occurring among young women as well.

"The changing trend of make-ups causing MGD is dangerous. Eyeliner and other make-up usually clog the meibomian glands leading to formation of painless lumps in the eyelids hence obstructing the vision," said Mahipal Sachdev, Director, Centre for Sight, a chain of eye centres in North India.

Elaborating on the condition, Sachadev, who often sees young women with MGD says that the meibomian produce oils that prevent the tears from evaporating quickly. Whenever the glands do not function properly, the blockage in the gland restricts it from producing oil.

"The oil may sometimes thicken leading to cause benign lumps in the eyelids known as chalazion. MGD is the most known and leading cause of dry eye syndrome, blepharitis and in extreme cases loss of vision," said Sachdev.

Medical Sciences says that there are around 40 such glands that produce oil that flows out of the eyes as tears to keep the eyes moistened. Thickening of this oil restricts its flow causing accumulation and blockage, forming a lump in the eyelid. A blocked oil gland causes this condition of red swollen eyelids.

"Around 40 per cent of the women with high usage of eye make-up products tend to get affected with oil gland blockages. Parabens and yellow wax used in mascara and eyeliners to stiffen them to make it waterproof are the same chemicals that also clog the oil glands leading to MGD, chalazion, dry eye syndrome and blepharitis," Parul Sony, senior consultant and director of Gurgram's Complete Eye Care.

Stating that anti-ageing eye creams contain retinoids that has also been linked to thickening and degeneration, Sony said that such make-ups kill the blood cells in the meibomian gland ducts.

A study by Canada's University of Waterloo said people who apply eyeliner on the inner eyelid run the risk of contaminating the eye and causing vision trouble.

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Vision problems on the rise due to heavy eye make-up - Indulge (press release) (registration)

AN ELDERLY Bundaberg woman is furious she has to travel out of town to have sight-saving surgery.

The 71-year-old, who asked to remain anonymous, can't understand why cataract surgery is no long available in the Rum City.

A cataract is a clouding of the lens in the eye which leads to a decrease in vision.

The woman was advised the surgery contract was given to an ophthalmologist in Hervey Bay and it was her only option.

"It's not easy for somebody who can't see or drive to get to Hervey Bay, she said.

"And it's day surgery so you need to have someone collect you.

Symptoms include blurry vision, seeing faded colours and halos around light and trouble with bright lights and seeing at night.

Surgery involves removing the natural lens and inserting an artificial one.

The said if there were no ophthalmologist in the Bundaberg area she would understand, but while there were at least two in town she found it baffling.

If the option to go to Brisbane was on the table the woman said she would take it, because transport would be easier.

"It's just crazy the blind have to travel two towns away to get the surgery, she said.

"My first eye was done here but because they've changed it I have to leave Bundaberg.

Wide Bay Hospital and Health Service chief executive Adrian Pennington said before 2015 cataract surgery was not available in Wide Bay at all.

"Wide Bay Hospital and Health Service has recently negotiated a new contract with Hervey Bay Surgical Hospital to provide cataract surgery for all Wide Bay public patients, he said.

This means people's only options were either to sit on a lengthy waiting list in Brisbane while their eyesight deteriorated further, or to pay privately - often at a cost of thousands of dollars.

"Travelling to Brisbane also means significant inconvenience, he said.

"Importantly, the new contract with Hervey Bay Surgical Hospital is delivering cataract surgery at a better price than our previous contract, meaning these services can sustainably be provided locally in Wide Bay.

Mr Pennington said under the arrangements, patients got high-quality care at the right time in their home region, and could claim the Patient Travel Subsidy if eligible.

He said patients were given comprehensive information about public transport options if they were unable to drive, and support and advice was available from the hospital's Patient Travel office.

"While we appreciate that for some patients this will mean travelling out of their immediate area, we still believe this is the best possible outcome for the majority of the community we serve.

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Patients with low vision must go to Bay for surgery to see - Bundaberg News Mail