Author Interviews
05 Oct Acne Linked To Longer Telomeres and Better Aging
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_18697" align="alignleft" width="112"]
Dr. Simon Ribero[/caption]
Simone Ribero, M.D., Ph.D.
University of Turin
Department of Medical Sciences
Turin. Italy &
King’s College London
Department of Twin Research and Genetic Epidemiology
St Thomas’ campus
London
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: For many years dermatologists have identified that the skin of acne sufferers appears to age more slowly than in those who have not experienced any acne in their lifetime.
We have demonstrated in our paper that there is an association between acne and longer telomere length that means that acne patients , with the same anagraphic age , have a younger chronological age.
05 Oct Electronic cigarettes increase endothelial progenitor cells in the blood of healthy volunteers
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28559" align="alignleft" width="180"]
Dr. Lukasz Antoniewicz[/caption]
Lukasz Antoniewicz MD, PhD candidate
Karolinska Institutet
Department of Clinical Sciences
Danderyd University Hospital
Stockholm, Sweden
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Electronic cigarette sales increase exponentially on a global scale without knowledge about possible negative effects on human health. We performed an exposure study in young healthy volunteers and analyzed blood samples for endothelial progenitor cells and microvesicles. Increase in those markers may reflect vascular injury, inflammation and platelet activation.
05 Oct Depression Common in Lung Cancer and Linked To Mortality
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28555" align="alignleft" width="96"]
Dr. Donald Sullivan[/caption]
Donald R. Sullivan, M.D., M.A.
Assistant Professor, Division of Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine
Oregon Health & Science University
Investigator, VA Portland Health Care System
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: There is an inextricably link between physical and mental health, and all too often clinicians focus solely on the physical components of disease. A life-threatening diagnosis such as cancer often evokes significant psychological distress and lung cancer patients are at significantly risk. Up to 44% of lung cancer patients experience depression symptoms and 5-13% major depressive disorder, higher than most other cancers. Previous studies have demonstrated the development of depression or depression symptoms at lung cancer diagnosis can increase patient mortality, but there is a paucity of research exploring how longitudinal changes in depression symptoms impact patient outcomes.
04 Oct Autoimmune Specialty Drug Spending Doubles, Accounting for 10 Percent of Drug Expenses
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28545" align="alignleft" width="125"]
Dr. Kevin Bowen[/caption]
Kevin Bowen MD MBA
Senior Health Outcomes Researcher
Prime Therapeutics LLC
1305 Corporate Center Drive
Eagan, MN 55121
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
• Autoimmune specialty drugs now account for about one of every 10 dollars of combined drug expense through the medical and pharmacy benefits in a commercially insured population.
• The autoimmune drug class is one of the fastest growing, with this study finding a doubling in autoimmune drug expenditures and a 38 percent increase in utilization, in the most recent four years.
• Integrated analysis of medical and pharmacy claims is essential for this category of drugs because more than 25 percent of autoimmune specialty drug use is paid through the medical benefit and medical claims diagnosis coding provides a means of determining what conditions were treated with drugs covered by pharmacy claims.
04 Oct Cosentyx Offers Longer-Term Treatment Option for Patients With Moderate To Severe Plaque Psoriasis
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28541" align="alignleft" width="135"]
Dr. Craig Leonardi[/caption]
Craig Leonardi, MD
Adjunct Professor of Dermatology
Saint Louis University School of Medicine
Saint Louis, Missouri
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: A2304E1 is a multicenter, double-blind and open-label extension study to evaluate the long-term safety and efficacy of Cosentyx in patients with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. Patients who completed 52 weeks of the core SCULPTURE and STATURE studies and re-consented to treatment were eligible for the extension, and continued the same Cosentyx dose and regimen that they were receiving in their core study. Patients did not have to achieve a PASI 75 response at the end of their core study to enroll.
A total of 642 patients entered the extension study: 168 continued on Cosentyx 300 mg every 4 weeks, 152 continued on Cosentyx 150 mg every 4 weeks, 172 continued on Cosentyx 300 mg retreatment-as-needed, and 150 continued on Cosentyx 150 mg retreatment-as-needed. At the end of Week 156, the study was open-label and patients could continue their assigned dose and regimen or switch to 300 mg every 4 weeks based on the investigator’s judgment.
Results presented at EADV focus on those patients from the SCULPTURE core study who enrolled in the extension study. The primary endpoint of this extension study was overall safety and tolerability. Secondary efficacy measures included the proportion of patients achieving PASI 75, PASI 90 and PASI 100.
04 Oct Epidemic of HPV Associated Throat Cancer in Men
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28537" align="alignleft" width="133"]
Dr. Eric Genden[/caption]
Eric M Genden, MD, FACS
Isidore Friesner Professor and Chairman
Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery
The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this report? How has the clinical picture of HPV infections of oral and throat cancers changed over the past two decades?
Response: There has been no change however there has been a epidemic of viral induced throat cancer in men. The HPV virus has been established a the causative agent in cervical cancer in women. It has now been identified as a major causative agent in tonsillar and base of tongue cancer.
04 Oct Breast Cancer Mortality Varies By Latina Subgroups
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28533" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Bijon Hunt[/caption]
Bijou R. Hunt, MA
Sinai Urban Health Institute, Sinai Health System
Chicago, IL
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in Hispanic women, as well as the leading cause of cancer death for this group. Research has shown that there are differences by Hispanic subgroup in various causes of death, including cancer, but we haven’t seen data on breast cancer specifically among Hispanic subgroups. The most important question we wanted to address with this study was: do breast cancer prevalence and mortality vary by Hispanic subgroup?
04 Oct Leukoencephalopathy As Marker of Cognitive Impairment After Chemotherapy For Childhood ALL
Posted at 00:06h
in Author Interviews, Cancer Research, Cognitive Issues, Education, Lancet, Leukemia, Mental Health Research, Pediatrics
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Yin Ting Cheung, PhD
Department of Epidemiology and Cancer Control and
Noah D Sabin, MD
Department of Diagnostic Imaging
St Jude Children's Research Hospital
Memphis, TN
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Long-term survivors of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who are treated with high-dose intravenous methotrexate or intrathecal chemotherapy are at risk for neurocognitive impairment, particularly in cognitive processes such as processing speed, attention and executive function. However, many children who receive these therapies do not experience significant impairments, suggesting the need for biomarkers to identify patients at greatest risk. Prior research from our team demonstrated that, during chemotherapy, patients were at risk for white matter changes in the brain, also known as leukoencephalopathy. No studies documented the persistence or impact of brain leukoencephalopathy in long-term survivors of childhood ALL treated on contemporary chemotherapy-only protocols.
In this study, we included prospective neuroimaging from active therapy to long-term follow-up, and comprehensive assessment of brain structural and functional outcomes in long-term survivors of ALL treated with contemporary risk-adapted chemotherapy. We demonstrated that survivors who developed leukoencephalopathy during therapy displayed more neurobehavioral problems at more than 5 years post-diagnosis. Moreover, these survivors also had reduced white matter integrity at long-term follow-up, and these structural abnormalities were concurrently associated with the neurobehavioral problems.
03 Oct Mechanism of Injury Makes A Difference In Risk of Venous Thromboembolism
Posted at 17:51h
in Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Clots - Coagulation, JAMA, Surgical Research, Thromboembolism
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Charles A. Karcutskie IV, MD, MA
Postdoctoral Research Fellow
University of Miami Miller School of Medicine
Department of Surgery
Divisions of Trauma, Surgical Critical Care, and Burns
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Our research group at the Ryder Trauma Center have recently done several studies showing various differences in outcomes and risk based on mechanism of injury. Additionally, venous thromboembolism (VTE) is another topic that our group has focused on in the past several years. Because trauma patients are inherently at a higher risk for VTE due to the nature of their injury, we questioned whether the most important risk factors for VTE were different after blunt or penetrating trauma. At our institution, we assess VTE risk with the Greenfield Risk Assessment Profile, which is a list of several risk factors that each have weight toward an overall risk score. We took these risk factors and analyzed them individually based on mechanism of injury. We found that the factors that contribute to the VTE risk are different based on injury mechanism: After blunt trauma, transfusion status, neurologic status, and pelvic fracture contributed most. After penetrating trauma, vascular injury, severe abdominal injury, and age 40-59 years contributed most. This tells us that mechanism of injury may need to be incorporated into the risk assessment in order to discover the highest risk patients.
03 Oct Current Web-Based Risk Tool May Overestimate Risk of Pre-Diabetes
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28458" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Dr. Saeid Shahraz[/caption]
Dr. Saeid Shahraz
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Tufts Medical Center
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: American Diabetes Association (ADA) has set up a lower cut point for diagnosing prediabetes ( those with Impaired Fasting Glucose 100 mg/dL) compared to the World Health Organization's cut point, which is 110 mg/dL. This arbitrariness in cut point definition triples the number of cases labeled as prediabetes.
Along with lowering the diagnostic threshold by the ADA, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the American Medical Association (AMA), and the ADA endorsed and advertised a web-based risk model to define high-risk population for prediabetes. The risk engine asks a few questions ( age, sex, family history of diabetes, history of gestational diabetes and high blood pressure, physical activity and weight) and outputs a score that defines if the person is at risk for prediabetes. We suspected that the risk engine might overestimate the risk.
03 Oct The “Surprise Question” May Help Stimulate Palliative Care Discussions
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28516" align="alignleft" width="155"]
Dr. Joshua Lakin[/caption]
Joshua R. Lakin, MD
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Harvard Medical School
Dana Farber Cancer Institute
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Research has increasingly shown the benefits of early palliative care interventions, especially in those around communication about patient goals and preferences in serious illness. These benefits include improved quality of life and psychological outcomes for patients as well as eased bereavement and decision making for loved ones. We have a large gap to fill in initiating early goals and values conversations with our patients and there are a myriad of systems failures and clinician barriers that do not allow us to do this work in a timely and effective way. Doing so with limited resources, both in specialty palliative care and in the many frontline clinicians doing this work, requires targeting our resources carefully.
Doing these conversations earlier means identifying patients upstream, before they are in the last days of life. The Surprise Question – “Would you be surprised if this patient died in the next year?” – has emerged as an attractive option for screening for early palliative care interventions. It has been studied primarily in dialysis and cancer patients and has been demonstrated to have a strong association with risk of death. We set out to test it in a more diverse primary care population.
03 Oct Urinary Citrate Excretion May Be Indirect Biomarker of Bone Health
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jonas Esche Dipl.-Mol. Biomed University of Bonn Institute of Nutritional and Food Sciences DONALD Study MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Modern western diets increase diet-dependent acid load and net acid excretion which are suggested to have adverse long-term effects on bone. Urinary potential renal acid load (uPRAL) is an established parameter to assess nutritional acid load. Urinary citrate, on the other hand, integrates nutritional and also systemic influences on acid-base homeostasis with high citrate indicating prevailing alkalization. Against this background urinary citrate excretion was used as a new index of acid-base status and its relationship with bone strength and long-term fracture risk was examined.03 Oct Cell Biomarkers To Distinguish Deadly From Less Aggressive HPV Oral Cancers
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28510" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Dr. Elizabeth Franzmann[/caption]
Elizabeth Franzmann, M.D.
Scientific Founder and Chief Scientific Officer
Vigilant Biosciences
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Head and neck cancer involves cancers of the oral cavity, oropharynx and larynx. It is difficult to treat. Part of the challenge is that it is distinguishing the patients with tumors that are going to behave aggressively from those with less aggressive disease. As a result, many patients undergo treatment that may be more intensive and morbid than they need while others need more aggressive treatment. Tissue markers associated with prognosis may be able to help clinicians differentiate patients who need more aggressive treatment from those whose treatment can be less intensive. CD44 is a cell surface glycoprotein and tumor-initiating marker. CD44 and another surface protein, EGFR, are involved in tumor extension and are associated with poor prognosis. Certain forms of Human Papillomavirus (HPV) are known to cause oropharyngeal cancer and are associated with a good prognosis. P16 is a surrogate marker for the kind of HPV that causes cancer. Understanding the relationships between how these markers are expressed in cancer tissue may direct patient treatment in the future.
03 Oct Detecting Underlying Cardiovascular Disease in Young Competitive Athletes
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. James McKinney MD MSc FRCP(C) Division of Cardiology University of British Columbia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Sudden cardiac death (SCD) is the leading medical cause of death in young athletes. Sporting activity may predispose athletes with underlying cardiovascular conditions to develop life threatening ventricular arrhythmias during physical exercise. Despite being a relatively rare event, the death of a young healthy person is a tragic event that is difficult to comprehend. The prevalence of an underlying cardiovascular disorder in young athletes that predisposes to SCD is approximately 0.3%. Sudden cardiac death is often the first clinical manifestation of an underlying cardiovascular condition; up to 80% of athletes are previously asymptomatic. Pre-participation screening is the systematic practice of medically evaluating athletes for the purpose of identifying (or raising suspicion of) abnormalities that could provoke sudden death. There is agreement amongst sporting and medical bodies that athletes should undergo some form of pre-participation screening. An Achilles’ heel of screening is the significant number of false-positive screens that require subsequent costly secondary testing to rule out disease. Prevention of sudden cardiac death among athletes is a common goal, however the optimal strategy for its achievement is uncertain.03 Oct What Interventions Can Reduce Epidemic Physician Burnout?
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28502" align="alignleft" width="166"]
Dr. Colin West[/caption]
Colin P. West, MD, PhD, FACP
Divisions of General Internal Medicine and Biomedical Statistics and Informatics
Departments of Internal Medicine and Health Sciences Research
Mayo Clinic
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Physician burnout has reached epidemic levels, as documented in national studies of both physicians in training and practicing physicians demonstrating burnout rates in excess of 50%. Consequences include negative effects on patient care, professionalism, physicians’ own care and safety, and the viability of health-care systems. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to better understand the quality and outcomes of the literature on approaches to prevent and reduce burnout.
We identified 2617 articles, of which 15 randomized trials including 716 physicians and 37 cohort studies including 2914 physicians met inclusion criteria. Across interventions, overall burnout rates decreased from 54% to 44%, emotional exhaustion score decreased from 23.82 points to 21.17 points, and depersonalization score decreased from 9.05 to 8.41. High emotional exhaustion rates decreased from 38% to 24% and high depersonalization rates decreased from 38% to 34%.
03 Oct Police Body-Worn Cameras Drastically Reduce Complaints Against Police
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Barak Ariel, PhD Jerry Lee Fellow in Experimental Criminology and Lecturer in Experimental Criminology University of Cambridge Alex Sutherland, D.Phil. RAND Europe MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The very first randomised-controlled experiment on cameras in Rialto (California) was originally intended to ‘cut red tape’, but Rialto Police Department decided instead to look at whether wearing the cameras could help reduce complaints and police use-of-force. That study found that cameras did cut use-of-force and complaints, with the latter almost to zero in the 12 months of the experiment. Given that each complaint costs, millions of dollars in the US, there was a lot of interest following that study, and that research was seen as crucial in the widespread adoption of Body-Worn Cameras in the US and other countries. Although Rialto is typical of a lot of mid-sized police forces in the US, it is just one location at one time – so the roll out that was taking place had a very weak evidence base. The same results might not be found in other locations and given that many police forces started to roll out cameras without evidence, there was a strong justification for replicating the study. This paper (and two others already published) report results from x10 RCTs that took place in the UK and US, with more than 2 million residents, over a period of a year.03 Oct Sharp Rise in Heroin Use Among Young Adults Who Use Nonmedical Prescription Opioids
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28490" align="alignleft" width="165"]
Dr. Silvia Martins[/caption]
Silvia S. Martins, MD, PHD
Associate Professor of Epidemiology
Department of Epidemiology
Mailman School Of Public Health
Columbia University
New York, NY 10032
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Given the high probability of nonmedical use among adolescents and young adults, the potential development of prescription opioid use disorder secondary to nonmedical use among youth represents an important and growing public health concern. Still, no study had investigated time trends, specifically if prescription opioid use disorder has increased in the past decade among adolescents, emerging adults and young adults who are nonmedical users of prescription opioids.
30 Sep No Link Found Between Vasectomy and Developing or Dying From Prostate Cancer
Posted at 23:01h
in Author Interviews, Journal Clinical Oncology, Prostate Cancer, Surgical Research, Urology
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
[caption id="attachment_28482" align="alignleft" width="134"]
Dr. Eric Jacobs[/caption]
Eric Jacobs, PHD
Strategic Director, Pharmacoepidemiology
American Cancer Society, Inc.
250 Williams St.
Atlanta, GA 30303
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Vasectomy is a common, inexpensive, and very effective method of long-term birth control. However, in 2014, an analysis from a large epidemiologic cohort study, the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, found that vasectomy was associated with about 10% higher overall risk of prostate cancer and about 20% higher risk of fatal prostate cancer. Together with other researchers at the American Cancer Society, I analyzed the association between vasectomy and fatal prostate cancer among more than 363,000 men in the Cancer Prevention Study II (CPS-II) cohort, age 40 and older, who were followed for up to 30 years. This is the largest prospective analysis of vasectomy and fatal prostate cancer to date. We also examined vasectomy and prostate cancer in a subset of about 66,000 CPS-II study participants who were followed for new diagnoses of prostate cancer.
We found no link between having had a vasectomy and risk of either developing or dying from prostate cancer.
30 Sep Mibefradil Dihydrochoride with Hypofractionated Radiation for Recurrent Glioblastoma
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28487" align="alignleft" width="175"]
Dr. Nataniel Lester-Coll[/caption]
Nataniel Lester-Coll, MD
Chief Resident in Radiation Oncology at Yale
New Haven, Connecticut
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Recurrent Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) has limited treatment options and the prognosis is poor. Mibefradil diydrochloride was identified using a high-throughput compound screen for DNA double stranded break repair inhibitors. Mibefradil was found to radiosensitize GBM tumor cells in vitro and in vivo. Based on these findings, we sought to determine the maximum tolerated dose of mibefradil and radiation therapy in a Phase I recurrent GBM study. Eligible patients with recurrent Glioblastoma Multiforme received Mibefradil over a 17 day period, with hypofractionated radiation (600 cGy x 5 fractions). There are 18 patients currently enrolled who have completed treatment. Thus far, there is no clear evidence of radionecrosis. A final dose level of 200 mg/day was reached as the maximum tolerated dose. The drug was very well tolerated at this dose. We saw intriguing evidence of enhanced local control in selected cases. Patients enrolled in a translational substudy who received Mibefradil prior to surgery were found to have adequate levels of Mibefradil in resected brain tumor tissue.
30 Sep Histone Switch Allows Some Cancer Cells To Become Immortal
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28461" align="alignleft" width="180"]
Dr. Paola Scaffidi[/caption]
Paola Scaffidi, PhD
Group Leader
Cancer Epigenetics Laboratory
The Francis Crick Institute
London
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Every cancer is different, but even within the same tumor cells are highly diverse, and only some of them are truly immortal and drive tumor growth. This is quite surprising if we think that cancer arises from one cell that keeps replicating itself. So why are some cancer cells more dangerous than others? And why do some cells "get tired" along the way and, at some point, stop dividing?
In our study we describe one cellular mechanism that provides some answers to these questions. We have found that to be able to divide indefinitely, cancer cells have to strongly reduce the levels of a nuclear protein called histone H1.0. This is needed to allow activation of many genes important for cancer cell proliferation, which otherwise would be somehow "hidden" within the cell nucleus. Importantly, though, while tumors grow, some cells raise back the levels of H1.0, which hides these genes again and makes the cells stop proliferating. So the end result is that within the same tumor we have a mix of cells, some which keep these important genes on, while others switch them off and, as a consequence, lose their ability to divide, and differentiate into a more mature state.
30 Sep Breastfeeding Is a Women’s Health Issue
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28454" align="alignleft" width="125"]
Dr. Melissa Bartick[/caption]
Melissa C. Bartick, M.D.
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Department of Medicine, Cambridge Health Alliance, Cambridge
Harvard Medical School, Boston
Massachusetts
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: There has never been a study that combined maternal and pediatric health outcomes and costs into a single model. My colleague Arnold Reinhold and I had published a pediatric study in 2010, which was widely publicized but needed to be updated. My colleagues and I published a maternal study in 2013. But the two studies had different methodologies, and so the total costs could not be simply added together.
Here, we wanted to get a picture of the impact of breastfeeding in the US public health as whole, by creating a single model that combined maternal and pediatric outcomes. That had never been done before.
30 Sep Triclosan-Containing Sutures Reduced Surgical Infections in Children
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Marjo Renko MD PEDEGO Research Unit University of Oulu Oulu, Finland MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: For over a decade there has been suture materials containing antiseptic agent in the market. Trials in adults have shown some possible benefits from these sutures as in some studies they have reduced occurrence of surgical site infections. Only one small study had so far been published in children and thus we decided to carry out a large trial comparing sutures containing triclosan with ordinary ones. Our trial included over 1500 children who came to Oulu University Hospital for surgery. Surgical site infections were carefully monitored. Surgical site infections occurred in 2.6 % of the children who received absorbing sutures containing triclosan while that occurred in 5,4 % of the children who received ordinary sutures.30 Sep Survey Reveals Communication Gaps Between Oncologists and Patients With Advanced Breast Cancer
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28448" align="alignleft" width="120"]
Dr. Adam Brufsky[/caption]
Adam Brufsky, MD, PhD, FACP
Medical Director of the Women's Cancer Center
University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
- The Make Your Dialogue Count survey was conducted by Harris Poll on behalf of Novartis between June 20 and August 22, 2014. A total of 359 surveys were collected among women 21 years+ living with advanced breast cancer in addition to 234 caregivers of women with advanced breast cancer and 252 licensed oncologists who treat at least five advanced breast cancer patients per month within the United States. Novartis conducted the survey with guidance from oncologists, patient advocacy experts and a psychologist to better understand the dialogue around treatment goals and decisions that takes place among advanced breast cancer patients, caregivers and oncologists.
- Main survey findings show communication gaps exist in discussions between patients and oncologists, particularly around treatment plans and goals.
- 89% of patients and 76% of oncologists said that it’s important or very important to discuss long-term treatment plans beyond the current recommended treatment at their initial advanced breast cancer diagnosis. Yet, 43% of patients reported that this did not take place.
- 70% of patients and 65% of oncologists said that it’s important or very important to refer patients to support services at their initial advanced breast cancer diagnosis. Yet, only 36% of patients reported that this was something their doctor did.
- 23% of oncologists said that at times their emotions have kept them from sharing certain information with their advanced breast cancer patients, and 27% of oncologists said that, in certain situations, they do not discuss with patients the fact that advanced breast cancer is incurable.
30 Sep Inverse Association Between Mediterranean Diet and Cardiovascular Disease
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Nita Forouhi, MRCP, PhD, FFPHM Programme Leader MRC Epidemiology Unit University of Cambridge School of Clinical Medicine Institute of Metabolic Science Cambridge Biomedical Campus MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The benefits of the Mediterranean diet for cardiovascular health are well documented in countries of the Mediterranean region and some other countries, but there is little such evidence in the UK general population. Our work fills this research gap. In our study we followed up 23,902 initially healthy Britons living in Norfolk (Eastern England) for an average of 12 to 17 years, and determined the occurrence of new cases of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and deaths due to CVD during that time period. Our results showed that those adults who adhered to a Mediterranean diet had 6% to 16% lower risk of developing CVD, compared to those who had dietary habits further away from the Mediterranean-type diet pattern. This was the case even when we accounted for several important risk factors and correlates of CVD, including as age, sex, body mass index, lifestyle habits such as smoking, alcohol intake and physical activity, and socio-economic factors. We also modelled what would happen in the study population if all the participants increased their adherence to the Mediterranean-type diet. From this we estimated that nearly 4% of all new cardiovascular disease cases, or 12.5% of cardiovascular deaths in the population could potentially be avoided. This is novel information about the potential health benefit of a Mediterranean-type diet in a UK context. However, we should remember that our study was an observational study, not a clinical trial with a dietary intervention, and thus we cannot imply a cause and effect relationship between increasing adherence to the Mediterranean diet and reduction in cardiovascular disease. We defined the Mediterranean diet using a 15 point score based on guideline recommendations from a Mediterranean dietary pyramid published by the Mediterranean Diet Foundation. The recommendations had not previously been specifically tested for their associations with health, so our findings, for the first time, show the utility of the Mediterranean dietary pyramid.29 Sep Male Basketball Players With LVH Most At Risk of Sudden Cardiac Arrest and Death
MedicalResearch.com Interview with:
Kimberly G. Harmon, MD
University of Washington
Seattle, WA 98195.
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
Response: Sudden cardiac death (SCD) in a young athlete is tragic devastating families and communities. It has been characterized as “rare” by some, however, previous studies have looked at broad age ranges of athletes and used various methods to determine the incidence rate, sometimes only including athletes which have events during school sponsored events. In addition, many studies only look at sudden cardiac death and do not include sudden cardiac arrest (SCA) where the athlete has a cardiac arrest but is resuscitated and survives. SCA is important to include as ideally we would like to prevent both SCA and SCD in athletes. In this paper, over 1/3 of all US high school athletes were studied for six years to determine the incidence and the causes of SCA/D. Media reports were used to identify cases and then autopsies were obtained in those who died.
29 Sep Ingestible Sensor Demonstrates Positive Effects of Cinnamon
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28438" align="alignleft" width="180"]
Prof. Kourosh Kalantar-Zadeh[/caption]
Distinguished Professor Kourosh Kalantar-Zadeh
RMIT's School of Engineering
Australia
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
1- The development of "swallow-able gas sensor capsules". This was the final test on animals and focused on the measurement of a food supplement (cinnamon) to show the extraordinary capability of this noninvasive tool that will revolutionise the future of Gastroenterology and Food Sciences
2- That cinnamon can improve the health of the stomach, and hence our overall health, by adjusting the acidity and enzymatic secretion in the stomach. So the good effect of cinnamon is not just a grandparent old advice - It is real.
29 Sep Widespread Rotavirus Vaccination Has Greatly Reduced Infections in Children
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Harvey Kaufman MD Quest Diagnostics Madison, New Jersey MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Quest Diagnostics is the leading provider of diagnostic information services, meaning we provide information and insights from our laboratory test services. This includes analyzing results of our laboratory test data in order to provide insights into health, wellness and disease to help providers, patients and health plans make better healthcare decisions. A Quest Diagnostics Health Trends™ study published in the Pediatrics evaluated 276,949 de-identified test results from children ages infant through 9 years over an 11-year period to determine trends in laboratory rotavirus detection and the impact of the rotavirus vaccine on rotavirus detection. Vaccination is recommended for infants. In the study, two patients groups were evaluated for rotavirus vaccine – likely vaccinated (children who were infants after vaccine availability) and unlikely vaccinated (children who were infants prior to vaccine availability).28 Sep Vitamin B3 in Pregnancy and Atopic Dermatitis in Childhood
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Sarah El-Heis MBBS, MRCP (London) Clinical Research Fellow MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit University of Southampton Southampton General Hospital Southampton MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Atopic eczema is a common, multifactorial and potentially distressing skin condition. Evidence that it partly originates in utero is increasing with some studies suggesting links with aspects of maternal diet during pregnancy. Nicotinamide is a naturally occurring nutrient that is maintained through the dietary intakes of vitamin B3 and tryptophan. As a topical treatment it has been used in the management of some skin conditions including atopic eczema, and has been shown to have anti-inflammatory effects, to stabilise mast cells and to alter lipids in the outer layers of the skin. The objective of our study was to examine the link between maternal serum concentrations of nicotinamide and related tryptophan metabolites to the risk of atopic eczema in the offspring. We found that maternal late pregnancy concentrations of nicotinamide and related metabolite concentrations were not associated with offspring atopic eczema at age 6 months. Higher maternal serum concentrations of nicotinamide and anthranilic acid were, however, associated with a 30% lower risk of eczema at age 12 months.28 Sep Statins Reduce Inflammation As Well As LDL
MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28426" align="alignleft" width="200"]
Dr. Johan Frostegård[/caption]
Dr. Johan Frostegård MD PhD
Professor of medicine
Karolinska Institutet's Institute of Environmental Medicine and
Consultant at Karolinska University Hospital's Emergency Clinic
MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?
Response: Statins are one of the worlds most sold medications, which has generated large profits, but also, in my opinion, helped many people. Still, side effects are much discussed after more than 2 decades of use, as exemplified by a current debate between Lancet and BMJ (the former has the opinion that side effects are not major issues, but the latter do not agree). Also the exact role of LDL (low density lipoprotein, also known as the ”bad cholesterol”) as a risk factor is discussed, and can vary, according to many researchers. LDL levels are important among middle aged persons, especially men, as a risk markers for cardiovascular disease, especially myocardial infarction. LDL is most likely less important as a risk factor in individuals above 60 years of age, and also among women – as compared to middle aged men.