Alcohol, Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard / 11.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: John F. Kelly, Ph.D., ABPP. Recovery Research Institute Elizabeth R. Spallin Professor of Psychiatry in Addiction Medicine Harvard Medical School   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Alcohol use disorder is one of the leading causes of disease, disability, and preventable death worldwide. Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is a widespread international recovery support organization designed to address it. While it has remained popular and influential for many decades, until recently the quantity and quality of the research on AA and clinical treatments designed to stimulate AA involvement – Twelve-Step Facilitation (TSF) treatments – had not been evaluated adequately. This systematic review and meta-analysis used the rigor of the Cochrane review system to subject AA/TSF to the same scientific standards as other clinical interventions.   (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care / 10.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Olivier Wouters, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Health Policy Department of Health Policy London School of Economics and Political Science London MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Although both Democrats and Republicans consider lowering prescription drug prices a priority, lobbyists and campaign donors in the pharmaceutical industry may counteract efforts by federal and state governments to decrease these costs. In this study, I tracked every dollar spent by the pharmaceutical and health product industry on lobbying and campaign contributions in the US from 1999 to 2018. These data were obtained from the Center for Responsive Politics and the National Institute on Money in Politics—two non-profit, non-partisan US organizations.  (more…)
Allergies, Asthma, Author Interviews, Dermatology, Pediatrics / 10.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Marcella Aquino, M.D. Hasbro Children's Hospital Department of Pediatrics Division of Allergy & Immunology Associate Professor of Pediatrics   Daphne Koinis-Mitchell PhD Professor (Research) in the Departments of Psychiatry and Human Behavior and Pediatrics Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University Providence, Rhode Island 02903   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Urban minority children with asthma are at increased risk for sleep loss and poorer sleep quality secondary to socio-contextual stressors (poverty, stressors of urban living) and the underlying challenges related to following possibly complex asthma treatment regimens. Atopic dermatitis (AD) is very frequently seen in children with asthma and increases the risk for poor quality sleep, for example difficulty falling asleep, awakenings during the night, difficulty awakening in the morning, and/or daytime sleepiness.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Fertility / 10.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Julia Stern (Jünger) Georg-August-University Göttingen Georg-Elias-Müller-Institute of Psychology Biological Personality Psychology Göttingen  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The main background for this study was the Good Genes Ovulatory Shift Hypothesis. This Hypothesis is quite famous in evolutionary social sciences. It claims that women’s mate preferences should shift across their ovulatory cycle, regulated by changing hormone levels (mainly estradiol and progesterone). More precisely, when fertile, women should be sexually attracted to men who displayed assumed indicators of genetic quality, e.g. dominant behavior, whereas when not fertile, women should prefer to mate with potential long-term partners. This Hypothesis has received criticism in the recent years, because of studies not finding any evidence for it, studies with positive evidence were criticized for methodological problems, and studies claiming that previously presumed indicators of good genes do not really display good genes at all. All this criticism led to a debate about the existence of mate preference shifts across women’s ovulatory cycle. My colleagues and I wanted to contribute to this debate by conducting a large study with strong research methods. (more…)
Author Interviews, Biomarkers, Lung Cancer, Stanford / 09.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Professor Dr. Andreas Keller Stanford University School of Medicine Office Department of Neurology and Neurological Sciences Chair for Clinical Bioinformatics Saarbrücken, Germany MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Lung cancer is among the three most common cancers and the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide. The overall low survival rate of patients with lung cancer calls for improved detection tools to enable better treatment options and improved patients’ outcomes. To detect lung tumors, liquid biopsy-based strategies are increasingly explored, that are biomarkers, which are identifiable in body fluids such as human blood. The clinical application of biomarkers is, however, largely hampered by the relatively small numbers of cases that have been analyzed in the majority of the preclinical studies including the studies on lung cancer.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, JAMA, Nutrition, Social Issues / 09.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Alon Peltz, MD MBA MHS  Department of Population Medicine Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Thank you for taking an interest in our study. This study represented a collaboration between investigators from Harvard Medical School and Boston University School of Medicine. SNAP is an important U.S. federal aid program that serves nearly 40 million persons annually with well-established health, nutrition, and financial benefits. Families can be eligible for the SNAP program under “federal” rules or “categorical eligibility” rules that extend SNAP support to otherwise ineligible families who receive benefits under certain social assistance programs, such as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families. In July 2019, the U.S. Department of Agriculture proposed new SNAP policies that would limit qualifications via the categorical eligibility route. Although these new policies have not been finalized, it is estimated that 1 in 10 U.S. families currently participating in SNAP may lose their benefits. We wanted to investigate the potential ramifications of these changes to help inform policymakers of the vulnerabilities of the families who receive SNAP benefits and may be at risk for disenrollment if the proposed policies are implemented. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, Infections / 07.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Steve Miller MD MBA Chief Clinical Officer Cigna MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: With diagnoses of coronavirus increasing, Cigna is committed to helping contain the virus, removing barriers to testing and treatment, and giving peace of mind to its clients and customers. (more…)
Author Interviews, Infections, Technology / 06.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Arni S.R. Srinivasa Rao, PhD Professor, Division of Health Economics and Modeling, DPHS Director - Laboratory for Theory and Mathematical Modeling Department of Medicine - Division of Infectious Diseases Medical College of Georgia Department of Mathematics, Augusta UniversityArni S.R. Srinivasa Rao, PhD Professor, Division of Health Economics and Modeling, DPHS Director - Laboratory for Theory and Mathematical Modeling Department of Medicine - Division of Infectious Diseases Medical College of Georgia Department of Mathematics, Augusta University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response:  This is a methodological study with a flowchart, algorithm, and theory to enable quicker identification of individuals at risk of coronavirus based on CDC's guidelines on COVID-19.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Melanoma, Psychological Science / 05.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Sinead Langan. FRCP MSc PhD Professor of Clinical Epidemiology Wellcome Senior Clinical Fellow Faculty of Epidemiology and Population Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine London, U.K. MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Psychological stress is commonly cited as a risk factor for melanoma, but clinical evidence is limited. We wanted to test the hypothesis that acute severe stress increases the risk of melanoma and melanoma progression. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brain Injury, Exercise - Fitness, Pediatrics / 05.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Robert F. Heary, M.D. Co-Director, Reynolds Family Spine Laboratory Director, Spine Center of New Jersey Professor, Rutgers New Jersey Medical School Newark, New Jersey MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This article was written to assess the relative danger versus safety of youth football.  As this is a hot-button topic in the world of neurosurgery and neurology, we decided to look into this issue. In a suburban town, middle school football players were studied.  They wore helmets with accelerometers mounted inside the hemet to measure how many hits the player absorbs and the magnitude of the force behind the hits.  Also, soft “guardian caps” we worn over the outside of the helmets during practices. For all football activities (practices and games), the helmets were worn and data were accumulated.  In addition, specialized coaching related to safe tackling techniques was provided. (more…)
Author Interviews, Compliance, Electronic Records, JAMA, University of Pennsylvania / 05.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Alexander C. Fanaroff, MD, MHS Assistant Professor of Medicine, Division of Cardiovascular Medicine University of Pennsylvania MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: This is a secondary analysis of the ARTEMIS, a cluster randomized trial of copayment assistance for P2Y12 inhibitors in patients that had myocardial infarction. One of the primary endpoints of ARTEMIS was persistence with P2Y12 inhibitors: Did the patient continue to take a P2Y12 inhibitor over the entire 1 year following MI? In ARTEMIS, we captured persistence data in two ways, patient report and pharmacy fill records. What we did in this study was to look at the agreement between persistence as measured by these two methods. (more…)
Author Interviews, BMJ, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Heart Disease, Nutrition / 05.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jean-Philippe Drouin-Chartier, RD PhD Assistant Professor, Faculty of Pharmacy, Université Laval Researcher, NUTRISS Center of INAF, Université Laval Visiting Scientist, Department of Nutrition Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is a leading cause of death worldwide. Eggs are a major source of dietary cholesterol, but they are also an affordable source of high-quality protein, iron, unsaturated fatty acids, phospholipids, and carotenoids. However, because of the cholesterol content in eggs, the association between egg intake and CVD risk has been a topic of intense debate in the past decades. Many prospective studies on the association between egg intake and cardiovascular disease risk have provided conflicting findings. The aim of our study was to prospectively examine the association between egg consumption and risk of CVD in three cohorts of US men and women, and to conduct a systematic review and a meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies on eggs and CVD.  (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, USPSTF / 04.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Chyke A. Doubeni, M.D., M.P.H. Director, the Mayo Clinic Center Health Equity and Community Engagement Research Department of Family Medicine Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Cognitive impairment is a serious public health problem that affects millions of Americans as they age; it can lead to frustrating challenges that impact their everyday lives, such as trouble remembering, learning new things, or organizing their thoughts. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, Pharmaceutical Companies / 04.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Olivier Wouters, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Health Policy Department of Health Policy (COW 2.06) London School of Economics and Political Science MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Drug companies often point to high research and development costs as justification for the rising prices of new medicines. Yet most prior analyses of research and development costs have been based on confidential data voluntarily supplied by drug companies to researchers with financial ties to the industry. Independent teams have not been able to verify those findings. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, University of Pittsburgh / 04.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Inmaculada Hernandez, PharmD, PhD Assistant Professor of Pharmacy and Therapeutics University of Pittsburgh School of Pharmacy MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Prior research found that list prices of drugs more than doubled in the last decade. However, because prior research was based on list prices, it did not account for manufacturer discounts, which have also increased in the past few years. We leveraged net pricing data from the investment firm SSR health to estimate increases in drug prices after accounting for discounts. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, JAMA, Pediatrics / 03.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Hooman Azad First author and a 3rd year medical student Feinberg School of Medicine Northwestern University Eric Fleegler, MD MPH FAAP Senior author and Pediatric Emergency Physician Boston Children’s Hospital Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Emergency Medicine Harvard Medical School MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Pediatric firearm violence is a public health crisis. The firearm fatality rate has increased by >50% over the past 10 years. Over our 26-year study period (1991-2016), 13,697 children under the age of 15 died at the hands of a firearm. Laws have been employed to try to reduce these deaths, and Child Access Prevention (CAP) laws, which aim to hold parents liable for the safe storage of their firearms, were passed in 25 states between 1989-2000. No new state passed a CAP laws after the year 2000. Child Access Prevention laws come in two flavors – recklessness laws that hold firearm owners liable for directly providing firearms to a minor, and negligence laws that hold the firearm owner liable for the unsafe storage of firearms with variability in how storage is defined and what penalties are imposed. (more…)
Author Interviews, Nutrition, Pediatrics, Sugar / 03.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lori Spruance PhD Assistant Professor, Public Health College of Life Sciences Brigham Young University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: I was interested in studying this phenomenon after I attended a research conference presentation where the presenter was describing results from a study where they found that children between ages 6-11 who were physically active drank more sugar-sweetened beverages than children in that age group who were not physically active. The presenter suggested that they believed this was due to youth sports and Gatorade consumption. I was really intrigued by the fact that kids were getting physical activity, but had really high sugar-sweetened beverage intake. Prior to the study, I did some qualitative interviews with parents of children involved in youth sports. During these interviews, parents discussed the “snack culture” and the shame they sometimes feel being the “healthy parent”. I really wanted to investigate further what was happening. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Omega-3 Fatty Acids / 03.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lee Hooper PhD, RD Reader in Research Synthesis, Nutrition & Hydration Norwich Medical School Norwich, UK  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Polyunsaturated fats are common healthy eating choices, and fish oil (long-chain omega-3 including EPA and DHA) and flaxseed (containing alpha-linolenic acid, ALA, a plant-based omega-3) supplements are commonly consumed. Worldwide cardiovascular disease was responsible for 37% of premature deaths due to non-communicable disease in 2012, and cancers were responsible for 27%.  Small effects of omega-3 and polyunsaturated fats on cardiovascular diseases and cancers could have big effects on worldwide health. (more…)
Addiction, Author Interviews, JAMA, Pediatrics / 02.03.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Karl Alcover, PhD Postdoctoral Research Associate Behavioral Health Innovations Washington State University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It has been a public health focus to prevent early exposure to drugs. Our paper shows that the average age of initiation of drug use among adolescents and young adults has been increasing from 2004 to 2017. We found that 12 of 18 drugs (including alcohol and tobacco products) had statistically increasing average ages of initiation. To our knowledge, no studies have documented these findings. We think this is great news because delaying initiation of drugs prevents early exposure, which we know is associated with various long-term negative health outcomes. Also, these promising trends may serve as initial evidence that prevention strategies, especially those that focus on adolescents and young adults, are working. (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Hearing Loss / 28.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Julia Sarant, PhD Associate Professor Department of Audiology and Speech Pathology Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences Melbourne School of Health Sciences MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Dementia is a rapidly growing global problem. Hearing loss has been identified by the Lancet Commissions as a modifiable risk factor for dementia. There is no treatment for dementia. This study investigated the effect of hearing aid use on cognition over time in older adults, objectively assessing hearing loss treatment, compliance and benefits while controlling for the effects of other known risk factors for dementia.  (more…)
Asthma, Author Interviews, Genetic Research, Nature / 28.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Zbigniew Zasłona PhD Luke A. J. O’Neill PhD Professor (Chair of Biochemistry) School of Biochemistry and Immunology Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Asthma is the most common disease in childhood and the most common respiratory condition in Ireland. It is a disease of environmental and genetic components. It is important to point out that although Ireland has very good air quality, asthma prevalence is very high (the second highest in Europe), and although asthma is not a single gene disease (such as cystic fibrosis) it is very important to study genetic variations in Irish population. Therefore in this study we put emphasis on the genetic component of asthma, rather than environmental factors, especially given that asthma heritability has been estimated as high as 60%. Prevention of asthma by reducing exposure to common risk factors, such as air pollution, will not stop the asthma epidemic in Ireland, as inferior air quality is not an issue. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Mental Health Research / 28.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Aristotle Voineskos MD, PhD, FRCPC Director, Slaight Family Centre for Youth in Transition and Head, Kimel Family Translational Imaging-Genetics Laboratory Campbell Family Mental Health Research Institute CAMH University of Toronto MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Uncontrolled studies in humans have shown conflicting results regarding effects of antipsychotic medications on brain structure. Recent studies in animals (e.g. rats and non-human primates) show that these medications may be associated with brain volume loss. To date, our knowledge of the effects of antipsychotic medications on brain structure in humans have been limited by the lack of a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial with brain imaging. Ours is the first such study. It is considered unethical to do such a study in people with schizophrenia, because of the life-saving benefits of these medications in this illness. However, in people with depression also experiencing psychosis, it was possible to do such a study once people experienced remission from their illness. (more…)
Author Interviews, Dermatology, Immunotherapy, Science / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Brian S. Kim, MD, MTR, FAAD Associate Professor of Medicine (Dermatology) Co-Director, Center for the Study of Itch and Sensory Disorders Division of Dermatology, Department of Medicine Washington University School of Medicine St. Louis, MO 63110 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It has been known well for decades that a specific part of your immune system called the “type 2 immune response” is overactive in atopic disease. Indeed, that is what new drugs like dupilumab block so effectively and thus revolutionized the treatment of atopic disorders just in the last few years. In fact, our lab focuses predominantly on this part of the immune system. However, increasingly it is becoming recognized that the immune system is not just about whether it is “on or off” but rather a balance like yin and yang. Along these lines, we noticed that a cell that could theoretically counterbalance atopic inflammation was significantly deficient in many patients with eczema. This cell is the natural killer (NK) cell. (more…)
Author Interviews, BMC, Breast Cancer, Cancer Research, Weight Research / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Carolyn Ee PhD NICM Health Research Institute Western Sydney University Australia MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Worldwide and in Australia, breast cancer is the most common cancer in women. Weight gain is common after diagnosis of breast cancer and may increase tumour recurrence risk, mortality rate, and worsen quality of life. As there was no national data on the prevalence of weight gain after breast cancer in Australia, we undertook a national survey which was open to any woman living in Australia who had breast cancer. (more…)
AACR, Author Interviews, Cancer Research, Genetic Research, Yale / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lajos Pusztai, M.D, D.Phil. Professor of Medicine Director, Breast Cancer Translational Research Co-Director, Yale Cancer Center Genetics and Genomics Program Yale Cancer Center Yale School of Medicine New Haven, CT 05620  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We analyzed breast cancer tissues obtained before any therapy and the same cancers after 20 weeks of chemotherapy. This setting is ideal to find out what genomic changes have occurred in cancers that survived therapy. Due to the paucity of such specimens few other studies exist in this space. (more…)
Aging, Author Interviews, JAMA / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Konstantin G. Arbeev, PhD Associate Research Professor Biodemography of Aging Research Unit (BARU) Social Science Research Institute (SSRI) Duke University Dr. Abraham Aviv, MD Department Pediatrics Director, The Center of Human Development and Aging Rutgers New Jersey Medical School MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: A body of research has shown that having comparatively short leukocyte telomere length (LTL) is associated with increased risk of death in adults.    (more…)
Author Interviews, Fertility, Heart Disease, JAMA, OBGYNE / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Shi Wu Wen PhD Senior Scientist, Clinical Epidemiology Program Professor, Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology University of Ottawa MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Previous studies have shown that having a baby as a result of using assisted procedures such as IVF nearly doubles the chance that a baby will have heart problems. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Cognitive Issues, Social Issues / 27.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nancy J. Donovan, M.D. Chief, Division of Geriatric Psychiatry Brigham and Women’s Hospital Assistant Professor of Psychiatry Harvard Medical School Boston, MA 02115  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Prior research has shown that widowed older adults are more likely to experience cognitive decline than those who are married. However, there have been no prior studies of widowhood as a risk factor for cognitive decline due to Alzheimer’s disease, the most common cause of severe cognitive impairment. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JACC, Women's Heart Health / 26.02.2020

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Haider Aldiwani, MD Fellow in Internal Medicine and C. Noel Bairey Merz, MD, FACC, FAHA Director Barbra Streisand Women’s Heart Center Smidt Heart Institute, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center Los Angeles, CA, 90048   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in women in the United States. Women are found to have a higher prevalence of ischemia but no obstructive coronary artery disease (INOCA) compared to men. These women are often labeled as “normal” and their symptoms and cardiovascular risk are not managed appropriately. Women with INOCA are higher risk of developing major adverse cardiovascular events including death, myocardial infarction (MI), stroke and heart failure hospitalization. Presenting symptoms of ischemia are variable and more often labelled “atypical” in women.  (more…)