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Author Interviews, Cancer Research, JAMA, MRI, Prostate Cancer / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Martha Elwenspoek PhD Research Associate in Epidemiology and Health Services Research NIHR CLAHRC West, Bristol MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Prostate cancer is one of the most common cancers in men. Prostate cancer is usually diagnosed by taking 10 to 14 systematic samples from the prostate guided by ultrasound. However, these biopsies are unpleasant for patients, can miss cancer even when it’s present, can misclassify the severity of the cancer, and can cause side effects, such as bleeding and infection. If biopsies could be targeted better, men wouldn’t have to undergo so many and there would be less risk of getting a misleading result. Multiparametric MRI (mpMRI) scans are sometimes used before doing a biopsy to help diagnose prostate cancer, and while this approach is now being recommended by the UK National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) their use isn’t widespread. (more…)
Addiction, Author Interviews, Occupational Health / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Devan Hawkins ScD Instructor of Public Health School of Arts and Sciences MCPHS University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: As has been well established, mortality due to opioids has been increasing rapidly in recent years. We were interested in understanding whether mortality rates may be high among workers in certain industries and occupations for two primary reasons. First, if we were to find that mortality rates differed according to industry and/or occupation it might indicate that some aspect of these industries and occupations put workers at elevated risk for opioid-related overdose death. Second, interventions could be created to target these workers and hopefully prevent more deaths. (more…)
Author Interviews, Sleep Disorders / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Shahab Haghayegh, Ph.D. Candidate Department of Biomedical Engineering Cockrell School of Engineering University of Texas at Austin MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: I'm a sleep researcher and I wanted to find the link between warm bath and sleep. Body temperature which is involved in the regulation of the sleep/wake cycle, exhibits an endogenous circadian cycle, that is a 24-hour pattern, being highest by 2-3°F in the late afternoon/early evening than during sleep when it's lowest. The average person’s circadian cycle is characterized by a reduction in core body temperature by ~ 0.5 to 1° F the hour or so before one’s usual sleep time, dropping to its lowest level between the middle and later span of nighttime sleep. It then begins to rise, acting as a kind of a biological alarm clock wake-up signal. The temperature cycle leads the sleep cycle and is an essential factor in achieving rapid sleep onset and high efficiency sleep. (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, Gender Differences, JAMA, Surgical Research / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Maria S. Altieri, MD, MS Invasive Surgery Stony Brook, NY MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: For majority of residents, training years coincide with prime child bearing years.  Historically, surgical residency has not been conducive for having children, as it is one of the most demanding experiences, requiring long hours, high stress levels, and the acquisition of clinical and technical skills over a short period of time. However, with recent trends towards a more favorable work-life balance and the 80-hour work week, more male and female residents are having children or considering having children during training.  Thus, the topic of parental leave during residency is becoming more fundamental.  However, there is little research on the attitudes of residents towards their pregnant peers and parental leave. We wanted to examine the perceptions of surgical trainees towards parental leave and pregnancy during residency.  Through understanding the perceptions of current residents, obstacles could be identified which could lead to potential changes in policies that could help to normalize parenthood and parental leave during surgical training.    (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Mental Health Research / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nathan W. Link, PhD Department of Sociology, Anthropology, & Criminal Justice Rutgers University Camden, NJ 08102 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Much literature documents the physical and mental health problems ailing prisoners and those incarcerated in jails. Some research finds that incarceration can bring about or exacerbate these mental and physical health conditions. Beginning from this premise, we ask how this damaged health status influences former prisoners’ ability to return home and remain crime free. We examined physical health limitations and depression among a longitudinal sample of prisoners in twelve U.S. states and found that both dimensions of health problems lead to further criminal behavior and in turn reincarceration. This effect is of health conditions is indirect; it affects crime and reincarceration through adverse impacts on employment and family relationships—factors long known to be related to criminal offending. In this way, we now know that not only can incarceration lead to health problems, but health problems can lead to incarceration. This is important in a society with leading incarceration levels and wide health disparities across race and socioeconomic status. (more…)
AHA Journals, Author Interviews, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, Technology / 07.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Kang Lee, PhD Dr Eric Jackman Institute of Child Study University of Toronto Toronto, Canada MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We use a technology called transdermal optical imaging I and my postdoc invented to record facial blood flow using a regular video camera on the smartphone. This technology capitalizes on the fact that light travels beneath the facial skin and reflect off the hemoglobin under the skin. Our technology captures the minute reflected photons to decode facial blood changes due to our pulses and other physiological activities. Using machine learning, a neural network model learns to use the facial blood flow to predict blood pressures taken with a FDA approved scientific blood pressure measurement instrument. We then use the final model to predict the blood pressures of a new group of participants whose data had never been used in the model training. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Opiods / 06.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Lauren A. Hoffman, Ph.D. Research Fellow Recovery Research Institute Center for Addiction Medicine Massachusetts General Hospital Harvard Medical School MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?   Response: In 2017, an estimated 11.4 million Americans reported past-year opioid misuse1 and opioid-related overdose accounted for more than 47,000 deaths2. Prior research has helped further our understanding of the prevalence and consequences of opioid misuse, but we know substantially less about recovery from opioid use problems. Recovery-focused research conducted to-date has largely focused on alcohol use disorder, the most common type of substance use disorder. Characterizing recovery from opioid use problems and the pathways that individuals take to resolve such problems can ultimately help identify effective ways to address opioid misuse. Using data from the first national probability-based sample of US adults who have resolved a significant substance use problem (National Recovery Survey3), we provide the first national prevalence estimate of opioid recovery, and characterize treatment/recovery service use and psychological well-being in individuals who resolved a primary problem with opioids, relative to individuals who resolved a primary alcohol problem. We focused our cross-sectional investigation of service use and well-being on 2 time-horizons associated with continued vulnerability: <1 year since problem resolution (early-recovery) and 1 – 5 years since problem resolution (mid-recovery). (more…)
Author Interviews, Dental Research, JAMA, OBGYNE, Pediatrics, Vitamin D / 06.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Hans Bisgaard, DMSc, MD Head of COPSAC, Professor Professor of Pediatrics, University of Copenhagen Founder and Head of the Copenhagen Prospective Studies on Asthma in Childhood; Gentofte Hospital, University of Copenhagen and Naestved Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Enamel defects is a global health challenges affecting typically 1/3 of school children and more in some regions. It leads to break down of the teeth and caries later on. MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings? Response: Supplementation with high-dose vitamin D compared to standard dose in the third pregnancy trimester in a mother child cohort of 588 pairs lead to a significant reduction of enamel defects. Enamel defects was found in 28% of children by age 6 after standard dose of vitamin D supplementation (400 i.u.), compared to 15% after 7-fold higher dose vitamin D.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Heart Disease, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 05.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Muhammad Ali Chaudhary, MD Research Scientist Center for Surgery and Public Health Department of Surgery Brigham and Women’s Hospital Harvard Medical School Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Many studies have documented disparities in cardiovascular care for minorities, specifically African Americans compared to white patients. Coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) is a common procedure in the United States, and the outcomes and post-surgical care for African Americans tend to be worse. We examined whether patients insured through TRICARE — a universal insurance and equal-access integrated healthcare system that covers more than 9 million active-duty members, veterans and their families — experienced these disparities. We found no racial disparities in quality-of-care outcomes, providing insights about the potential impacts of universal insurance and an equal-access health care system. The study included 8,183 TRICARE patients, aged 18-64, who had undergone CABG. The study took its data from TRICARE health care claims from the Military Health System Data Repository for the years of 2006 to 2014. (more…)
Author Interviews, Autism, Pediatrics / 05.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Andrey Vyshedskiy PhD Boston University, Boston MedicalResearch.com: What gave you the idea for the paper?   Response: I have been interested in the physical properties of imagination since I was nine years old, and was involved in related research since my undergraduate studies. Having been trained in neuroscience, I set out to understand the neurological basis of imagination pertaining to the differences between humans and other animals. In 2008, after fifteen years of research, I allowed myself to speculate on the subject, and published the first edition of “On the Origin of the Human Mind.” From that period to the present day, I have continued to work on the same subject. (more…)
Author Interviews, Biomarkers, Cancer Research / 05.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Emeritus Professor Attila Lorincz, PhD Centre for Cancer Prevention Queen Mary University of London  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The vast majority of women with cervical lesions are not at risk for cancer, however, because there is no way to accurately identify the very small proportion of women at risk of cervical cancer a recommendation for treatment is commonly given by doctors. Surgery on women with cervical lesions is risky for future pregnancies and can cause harm to the baby. Occasionally there are also problems in physical recovery and the mental well-being of the treated women. We wanted to see if the S5 DNA methylation test could identify the women who need treatment. We ran a two-year follow-up study on 149 young women with moderate dysplasia in Finland. Our results showed that the S5 test was by far the best method to reveal which women needed treatment.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, Lancet, Mayo Clinic, Technology / 02.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Paul Friedman, M.D. Professor of Medicine Norman Blane & Billie Jean Harty Chair Mayo Clinic Department of Cardiovascular Medicine Honoring Robert L. Frye, M.D. MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Atrial fibrillation is an irregular heart rhythm that is often intermittent and asymptomatic.  It is estimated to affect 2.7–6.1 million people in the United States, and is associated with increased risk of stroke, heart failure and mortality. It is difficult to detect and often goes undiagnosed. After an unexplained stroke, it is important to accurately detect atrial fibrillation so that patients with it are given anticoagulation treatment to reduce the risk of recurring stroke, and other patients (who may be harmed by this treatment) are not. Currently, detection in this situation requires monitoring for weeks to years, sometimes with an implanted device, potentially leaving patients at risk of recurrent stroke as current methods do not always accurately detect atrial fibrillation, or take too long. We hypothesized that we could train a neural network to identify the subtle findings present in a standard 12-lead electrocardiogram (ECG) acquired during normal sinus rhythm that are due to structural changes associated with a history of (or impending) atrial fibrillation.   Such an AI enhanced ECG (AI ECG) would be inexpensive, widely available, noninvasive, performed in 10 seconds, and immensely useful following embolic stroke of unknown source to guide therapy. To test this hypothesis, we trained, validated, and tested a deep convolutional neural network using a large cohort of patients from the Mayo Clinic Digital Data Vault. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, NYU, Ophthalmology, Pharmaceutical Companies / 02.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Cassandra L. Thiel, PhD Assistant Professor NYU Langone School of Medicine Department of Population Health NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service NYU Tandon School of Engineering MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Most healthcare professionals and researchers are aware that the healthcare sector makes up about 18% of the US Gross Domestic Product. What many do not realize is that all of that economic activity results in sizable resource consumption and environmental emissions. The healthcare industry is responsible for 10% of the US’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and 9% of air pollutants.1 Sustainability in healthcare is a developing field of research and practice, and my lab offers data and information by quantifying resource use and emissions of healthcare delivery. We started looking at cataract surgery a few years ago, in part because operating rooms (ORs) typically represent the largest portion of spending and garbage generation in a hospital.2,3 Cataract surgeries are interesting because they are one of the most common surgeries performed in the world. In the US, we spend $6.8 billion on them each year. Any changes we can make to individual cases would have much larger, global impacts. I studied cataract surgeries at a world-renowned, high-volume eye surgery center in India and helped validate that clinical care could be designed in a way that was effective, cost-efficient, and resource efficient. Compared to the same procedure in the UK, this surgery center generates only 5% of the carbon emissions (with the same outcomes).2 This site’s standard policy is to multi-dose their eye drops, or use them on multiple patients until the bottle was empty. As such, the site generated very little waste. Returning to the US, I observed cataract cases and heard the complaints of OR staff that they had to throw out many partially used or unused pharmaceuticals. In reviewing the literature, we could not find a study that quantified how much we were throwing away and what it cost us to do so. We, therefore, set up a study to look at this particular issue. (more…)
Annals Internal Medicine, Author Interviews, CDC, Hospital Acquired, Infections / 02.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Snigdha Vallabhaneni, MD, MPH Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Atlanta, GA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?  Response: We are concerned about the fungus Candida auris (or C. auris) because it causes serious infections, is often resistant to medications, and continues to spread at alarming rates in U.S. healthcare settings. Candida. auris  primarily affects patients in who are hospitalized for a long time or are residents of nursing homes that take care of patients on ventilators. C. auris is still rare in the United States and most people are at low risk of getting infected. People who get C. auris or other Candida infections are often already sick from other medical conditions and often have invasive medical care, including ventilators for breathing support, feeding tubes, central venous catheters, and have received lots of antibiotics. Many patients infected and colonized with C. auris move frequently between post-acute care facilities and hospitals, which increases the risk of spreading C. auris between facilities. (more…)
Accidents & Violence, Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, JAMA, Ophthalmology / 01.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Daejoon Alex Hwang, PhD Instructor in Ophthalmology Investigator, Schepens Eye Research Institute of Mass. Eye and Ear Harvard Medical School MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?   Response: Yellow night driving glasses are sold with promises to reduce headlight glare from oncoming traffic and help aging individuals see better at night. Despite a 1997 ruling by the Federal Trade Commission against one company’s claims, the products still remain popular online. We tested three commercially available yellow lens night driving glasses and compare their effectiveness with clear lens glasses on our novel headlight glare simulator in the driving simulator. (more…)
Author Interviews, Dermatology, JAMA / 01.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Eunyoung Cho, Sc.D. Associate Professor Director of Research, Department of Dermatology The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University Associate Professor, Department of Epidemiology Brown School of Public Health Channing Division of Network Medicine Brigham and Women's Hospital MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) is a common skin cancer in people with fair skin. Vitamin A is a fat-soluble vitamin that is naturally present in many foods such as green leafy vegetables, fruits including cantaloupe, apricots, and mangos, and dairy products. We studied whether vitamin A intake is beneficial against SCC risk because there are few ways to prevent skin cancer. (more…)
Author Interviews, Endocrinology, Hormone Therapy, JAMA, Schizophrenia / 01.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Mark Weiser, M.D. Associate Director for Treatment Trials The Stanley Medical Research Institute Kensington, MD 20895 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Over the years many theories have been proposed explaining schizophrenia, and studies tested compounds based on these theories.  Some showed improvement in symptoms, but these positive findings were often not later replicated, and the theory discarded. Over the past 15 years several studies performed in Australia by Dr. Jayshri Kulkarni (Molecular psychiatry. 2015;20(6):695) showed positive effects of estrogen patches on symptoms in women with schizophrenia. (more…)
Author Interviews, Gastrointestinal Disease, JAMA, Outcomes & Safety, Surgical Research / 31.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Ninh T. Nguyen, MD Department of Surgery University of California Irvine Medical Center Orange, California MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The US World & News Report publishes each year on top ranked hospitals for specific specialties. These ratings are promoted nationally and used by patients and physicians in making decisions about where to receive care for challenging conditions or common elective procedures. Bariatric, colorectal and hiatal hernia procedures are common gastrointestinal operations being performed at most hospitals. Seeking care for these operations specifically at top 50 ranked hospitals can pose significant logistic and financial constraints for most patients. The objective of this study was to determine whether top ranked hospitals (RHs) in Gastroenterology & GI Surgery (GGS) have improved outcomes for advanced laparoscopic abdominal surgery compared to non-ranked hospitals (NRHs). (more…)
Alzheimer's - Dementia, Author Interviews, Genetic Research / 31.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Amy Dunn, PhD Kaczorowski lab The Jackson Laboratory  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Environmental factors, such as a poor diet, are known risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease. But the mechanisms are complex, and it is not known how such environmental perturbations interact with individual genetic variation to confer disease risk. Previous studies have not adequately addressed how the combination of genetic variant and environmental factors combine to alter cognitive response to a poor diet. To investigate gene-by-environment interactions, we fed either a normal diet or a high-fat diet to a genetically diverse Alzheimer’s disease mouse model population starting at six months of age and monitored metabolic and cognitive function. We observed accelerated working memory decline in the mice on the high-fat diet after eight weeks, with substantial gene-by diet effects on both cognitive and metabolic traits. Metabolic dysfunction was more closely related to cognitive function in mice carrying Alzheimer’s mutations than in those without. Interestingly, the high-fat diet affected metabolic function differently in female versus male mice.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Lifestyle & Health, PNAS, Psychological Science, University Texas / 31.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: John M. Griffin PhD James A. Elkins Centennial Chair in Finance McCombs School of Business The University of Texas  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: The importance of personal traits compared to context for predicting behavior is a long-standing issue in psychology. Yet, we have limited evidence of how predictive personal conduct, such as marital infidelity, is for professional conduct. We use data on usage of a marital infidelity website as a measure of marital infidelity and find that it is strongly correlated with professional conduct in four different professional settings. (more…)
Author Interviews, Exercise - Fitness, JAMA, Lifestyle & Health / 31.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Wei Bao, MD, PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Epidemiology College of Public Health, University of Iowa Iowa City, IA 52242  and Yang Du University of Iowa MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: In 2008, the US Department of Health and Human Services released the first federal Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, which recommended that people should do at least 150 minutes moderate- to vigorous-intensity aerobic activity. This key recommendation has been reaffirmed in the 2018 recently updated Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans. In addition, the new 2018 Guidelines for the first time discussed health risks of sedentary behaviors. Insufficient physical activity and long sitting time have long been recognized as risk factors for major chronic diseases and mortality. Therefore, we were curious whether there have been a significant changes in adherence to the Physical Activity Guidelines in US adults since the release of the first edition of the federal guidelines in 2008 and whether sedentary behavior in US adults changed during the same period. (more…)
Author Interviews, Coffee, Hepatitis - Liver Disease, JAMA, OBGYNE, Pediatrics / 30.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Prof Hui Wang PhD Wuhan University China MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: We started our work in the adverse outcome of maternal caffeine intake during pregnancy about 15 years ago. Then, we found that prenatal caffeine intake could result in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in the offspring. However, the underlying mechanism was unclear. So, we start the current work, and found that hat maternal caffeine intake disrupts liver development before and after birth, which might be the trigger of the adult non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in the offspring rats. Moreover, we further found that the fetal programming of liver glucocorticoid – insulin like growth factor 1 axis, a new endocrine axis first reported by our team, might participate in such process.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Frailty, Geriatrics, Heart Disease / 29.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr-Dalgaard MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We know that having atrial fibrillation puts you at a higher risk of falls, especially if you are elderly and frail. Additionally, some of the medications used to treat it can cause bradycardia (low heart rate), which could itself increase the risk of falls. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate if common medications used to treat atrial fibrillation in older patients were associated with fall-related injuries and syncope (fainting). The medications investigated were rate-lowering drugs (beta-blockers, digoxin, verapamil, diltiazem) and the anti-arrhythmic drugs (amiodarone, propafenone, and flecainide). (more…)
Author Interviews, Blood Pressure - Hypertension, JAMA, Stroke / 29.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: "Blood Pressure Monitor" by Medisave UK is licensed under CC BY 2.0Kazuo Kitagawa, MD PhD Department of Neurology Tokyo Women's Medical University Tokyo, Japan MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings Response:   Reduction in blood pressure (BP) reduces the rates of recurrent stroke, but the optimum BP target remained unclear. The results of RESPECT Study together with up-dated meta-analysis showed the benefit of intensive blood pressure lowering (<130/80 mmHg) compared with standard BP lowering (<140/90 mmHg).  (more…)
Annals Internal Medicine, Author Interviews, Heart Disease / 29.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jeffrey L Jackson, MD, MPH Medical College of Wisconsin Milwaukee, Wisconsin MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Unfortunately,  most systematic reviews exclude non-English trials, mostly for convenience, but nearly all systematic reviews wind up excluding at least 1 non-English trial.  We looked at whether this was justified, since Google Translate is a free and easily usable platform.  We had native-language speakers in 9 languages (Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Romanian, Russian and Spanish) abstract data and had another researcher abstract all the articles using Google Translate. We found that there was over 90% agreement and that the few differences were due to human error, not to problems with the translations. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Pediatrics / 29.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Daniel B. Horton, MD, MSCE Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Epidemiology Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School Rutgers Center for Pharmacoepidemiology and Treatment Science Rutgers School of Public Health  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: In 2008, several professional groups made recommendations against the use of cough and cold medicines in young children: the US Food and Drug Administration, for children younger than age 2; cough and cold medicine manufacturers, for children younger than age 4; and the American Academy of Pediatrics, for children younger than age 6. Prior studies showed equivocal findings on the effect of those professional recommendations on physicians' behavior. We studied how trends of physicians' recommendations of cough and cold medicines for children changed after 2008 for different age groups and different kinds of medicines, including cough and cold medicines with and without opioids as well as single-agent antihistamines.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA / 28.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: blood-tests-lab-testsRenuka S Bindraban, MD and Prabath W. B. Nanayakkara, MD, PhD Section of Acute Medicine Department of Internal Medicine Amsterdam Public Health Research Institute Amsterdam UMC Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, the Netherland  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It is well known that a significant portion of healthcare activities is considered of low-value. Eliminating such low-value care is often targeted in efforts to both contain rapidly increasing healthcare costs as well as maintain high-quality care. In this context, our study focused on reducing unnecessary laboratory testing. In 2008, our study group performed a multifaceted intervention aimed at reducing unnecessary diagnostic testing at the Internal Medicine department of the Amsterdam University Medical Center, location Vrije Universiteit (VU). In the ‘Reduction of Unnecessary Diagnostics Through Attitude Change of the Caregivers’, we implemented this successful intervention in the Internal Medicine departments of four large teaching hospitals in the Netherlands. The intervention included creating awareness through education and feedback, intensified supervision of residents, and changes in order entry systems. (more…)
Author Interviews, Psychological Science / 27.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Robin Kowalski, Ph.D. Centennial Professor, Clemson University Department of Psychology Clemson University Clemson, SC 29634 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings?  Response: These two studies stemmed from an idea that I had been mulling over for a couple of years. We are so quick to offer advice to others and to seek advice from others, but what about the advice we would offer to ourselves, particularly our younger selves. As it turns out, we have plenty of advice to offer to our younger selves. There wasn’t a single participant in our research who found it impossible to generate advice for their younger self and a third of participants spontaneously think about this advice at least once a week. Although the advice that people offered their younger self fell into a number of different categories, the three most common were relationships (e.g., don’t let her go), education (e.g., finish school), and the self (e.g., you are worthy). Following the advice was important. Approximately two-thirds of respondents said they followed the advice they offered their younger self. Those who did thought their younger self would view them most positively now than those who did not follow the advice. People also said following the advice brought them closer to their ideal selves (the person they ideally wanted to be). The advice that people offered was more often than not tied to a pivotal event that had occurred in their life. Some of these pivotal events were negative and some were positive. Not surprisingly, regret was more often tied to negative than positive pivotal events, and this regret was just as often tied to actions (things people had done) as inactions (things they had not done). (more…)
Aging, Author Interviews / 27.07.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jay Olshansky, Ph.D. Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics School of Public Health University of Illinois Chicago Chicago, Illinois MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: In 2011 I published the first scientific evaluation of the observed longevity of all of the U.S. presidents. Since then, I've been contacted by the media every four years to comment on the ages of the presidential candidates. This is relevant because the number of older candidates is on the rise, and their ages are getting higher. A reporter from the Washington Examiner contacted me this time around to comment once again, and wanted to know whether I was planning on doing another analysis. When I looked at the list of candidates that were much older this time around, I thought it would be a good idea to see what science had to say about the health and longevity prospects of all of the candidates. This way we could at least offer a scientific explanation of whether age should be relevant at all when choosing a presidential candidate. (more…)