Folks fretting about the coronavirus are forgetting there’s another virus already running rampant in the United States, one that’s killed nearly 20 times as many people in this country alone. Influenza has already taken the lives of 10,000 Americans this season, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At least 19 million… read on >
Nearly half of antibiotic prescriptions for Medicaid patients appear to be inappropriate, new research suggests. That kind of overprescribing raises risks for everyone, experts say, as bacteria gain more chances to mutate around the life-saving drugs. For the study, researchers analyzed 298 million antibiotic prescriptions filled by 53 million Medicaid patients between 2004 and 2013.… read on >
Gastrointestinal bleeding in patients taking blood thinners for an irregular heartbeat should prompt doctors to check for colon cancer, a new study advises. Researchers looked at more than 125,000 patients in Denmark with the heart rhythm disorder atrial fibrillation (a-fib). They reported that those with gastrointestinal bleeding were 11 to 24 times more likely than… read on >
More Americans are expected to be evacuated from the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in China, as U.S. health officials reported a 12th domestic case of coronavirus late Wednesday. Earlier Wednesday, two planes carrying 350 Americans landed at an Air Force base in California. Some of those passengers were then flown to Marine Corps Air… read on >
People afflicted with cluster headaches miss work twice as often as colleagues without the debilitating headaches, a new study finds. Cluster headaches are extremely painful headaches that last from 15 minutes to three hours, for many days, or even weeks, in a row. They’re more common in men. For the study, Swedish researchers compared more… read on >
A breakthrough study has identified a class of natural gene variants that may protect against Alzheimer’s disease. For the study, researchers at University College London analyzed DNA from more than 10,000 people — half with Alzheimer’s and half without. The investigators found that these gene variants reduce the functioning of proteins called tyrosine phosphatases. These… read on >
A new discovery could lead to better treatments for multiple sclerosis (MS) and other autoimmune diseases, such as psoriasis and rheumatoid arthritis, researchers report. MS occurs when immune cells get into the central nervous system (the brain and spinal cord), causing nerve damage that results in neurological problems. However, the cause is unclear. Studies in… read on >
Teaching parents how to talk to their babies could help boost their children’s language development, researchers say. The University of Washington study didn’t look at so-called baby talk, which typically consists of silly sounds and nonsense words. Instead, the researchers focused on what’s called parentese. This is proper speech with elongated vowels and exaggerated tones… read on >
WEDNESDAY, Feb. 5, 2020 (HealthDay News) –While health experts worry that the coronavirus outbreak in China could become a pandemic as infections surpassed 24,500 worldwide, U.S. officials said Tuesday night that another round of evacuations of Americans from China was underway. The U.S. State Department said that two planes with Americans on board had left… read on >
Burns on the face, arms and hands that require skin grafts. Acne boils and ugly rashes. Black hairy tongue and other oral lesions. These are some of the ways that vaping can do serious damage to someone’s skin, a new evidence review shows. For example, an estimated 2,035 people with electronic cigarette burn injuries were… read on >
