Health

A new study suggests that IBM’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Watson may well be a very useful tool for identifying possible therapeutic options for cancer patients. The study was led by the University of North Carolina Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and focused on the identification of possible treatment options based on the genetics of the patient’s tumor.

New research funded by Arthritis Research UK suggests that ensuring sufferers of rheumatoid arthritis are getting enough vitamin D may help alleviate their symptoms, or even prevent the onset of rheumatoid arthritis altogether.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the US has just approved the first digital pill for sale in the US. The pill, called Abilify MyCite, contains aripiprazole as the active ingredient. The development of the pill is a collaboration between the manufacturer of Abilify, Otsuka, and Proteus Digital Health who created the sensor.

Many people find that they have an adverse reaction to eating wheat, and may be advised to avoid high-gluten foods in the future. That is the conventional wisdom, developed as a result of a connection that has been forged between gluten and the impaired ability to process it as normal in some individuals.

Sleep deprivation is regarded as a major public health issue, by those who study it and its effects at least. Research has shown that life-threatening mistakes for patients made by resident physicians can increase as much as seven times over in response to sleep-robbing schedules for these doctors. Sleep deprivation is linked to deficits in cognition, memory and vigilance, and is as a result discouraged in people who work in areas such as heavy industry and nuclear power.

The AIDS virus, HIV, continues to threaten communities globally, affecting more than 35 million people each year. Although there have been attempts to develop vaccines for this life-threatening syndrome, it is the virus’ genetic diversity that has posed challenges in the past.

Many of us might wish that we had the same energy levels and good health that we enjoyed when we were younger, but we know that the passage of time affects us all eventually. Now though, new research has uncovered a potential therapy to reverse at least some of the effects associated with growing older.

Worldwide, over 300 million people suffer from asthma, with this leading to nearly 400,000 deaths every year. A new study has shown that asthma sufferers could potentially reduce the chance of suffering an attack by taking Vitamin D supplements in combination with their standard asthma medication.

Today, a new plan to bring about an end to cholera has been launched by the Global Task Force on Cholera Control (GTFCC). The strategy, titled ‘Ending Cholera: A Global Roadmap to 2030’ provides a clear plan to reduce worldwide cholera deaths by 90 percent by 2030, with the hope of eliminating the transmission of this deadly disease in up to 20 different countries.

With purposeful, high-technology inventions flooding the market, it comes as no surprise that hospitals and clinics around the world are resorting to and beginning to implement ingenious devices to assist doctors, ultimately for the welfare of patients. One such product is the medical camera.

Currently, clinicians tend to agree that patients who are in a persistent vegetative state (PVS) for over twelve months have sustained irreversible damage and may never regain any level of consciousness. A new study, released this week, throws a different light on this commonly accepted belief, and may well change the way that the treatment of these patients is managed in the future. 

In 2004, biotechnology company Genentec, a subsidiary of Roche, was approved for the first anti-cancer drug, Avastin (bevacizumab), specifically prescribed to patients with metastatic tumors in the cervix, lung, kidney, ovary or colon. The therapeutic was largely successful, bringing in $7 billion in sales worldwide.