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According to the Global Burden of Skin Disease, skin conditions were ranked fourth in leading causes of disability, globally, and was the 18th leading cause of DALYs (disability-adjusted life year).

Another serious condition sweeping nations is melanoma, a type of skin cancer affecting more than 85,000 individuals per year in the US alone.

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The management of type 1 diabetes mellitus is an extensive, cumbersome process for patients as it involves rigid schedules and maintenance with regard to administering insulin injections regularly.

As of 2017, according to the National Diabetes Statistics Report, more than 30 million people around the world are suffering with diabetes, a tenth of that affecting the American population.

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Obesity is a serious public health problem that is taking hold of the vast majority of countries in the developed world. For example, approximately 4 of every 10 adults in America is obese.

Obesity may have a considerable negative impact on quality of life, as it can impede normal independent movement and exercise. It may also lead to chronic health problems such as cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and non-alcoholic liver failure.

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We all know that a diet containing a lot of salt can be bad for us, leading to high blood pressure and cardiovascular disease. Despite this, an estimated 90 percent of Americans eat more than the recommended amount of 2300 mg per day.

Now, new research suggests that the harmful effects of too much salt could be worse than we originally thought.

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Melanoma is the most severe form of skin cancer. It can even be fatal, although timely detection and treatment can effectively protect against this eventuality. This treatment may come in the form of surgical incision, or as medical anti-tumour therapy.

Medical treatment for melanoma has resulted in full remission for some patients. However, adaptations in these tumours have led to relapses for others. This is true for a recently-developed treatment called anti-PD-1 therapy.

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Whilst most of us know that we need to take action and make changes to our livelihoods in order to reduce our impact on the environment, it’s sometimes hard to know where to start.

Actions such as reducing our carbon footprint through flying less is a great place to start, but if you only plan on taking an overseas holiday once a year, sometimes you might feel like you need to do more on a daily basis in order to make more of a difference.

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Newly released research suggests that the memory loss and brain degeneration commonly associated with Alzheimer’s disease might just be helped using a drug primarily developed for the treatment of diabetes.

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Beta-lactams are a class of antibiotic medications that enjoyed an initial run of efficacy against their bacterial targets. They do so by disrupting the process by which bacteria form protective cellular walls around themselves, thus killing individual units and preventing their multiplication within a host’s tissues. Examples of beta-lactams include carbapenems, cephalosporins and the classic antibiotic penicillin.

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As of 2017, more than 5 million Americans are living with Alzheimer’s, and the numbers are predicted to rise to 16 million in the next 30 years or so.

As this disease is a neurodegenerative form of dementia, including memory loss and behavioral changes, scientists around the world are trying to study components of the brain and different parts of the body in order to better understand its origin.

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Although affecting less than one million people in the United States, junctional epidermolysis bullosa (JEB) is a lethal genetic condition that causes severe blistering and erosions on the skin by means of injury or from friction by scratching. Those who survive endure chronic wounds that can often lead to skin cancer, and sometimes even death.

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A new trial funded by Diabetes UK has found that dramatic changes in the diets of people suffering from type 2 diabetes can actually reverse their symptoms, even for patients who had been diagnosed with the disease up to six years previously.

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Today, there are many projects that investigate new and emerging treatments that address a critical factor in cancer progression: the tumor microenvironment. This is a complex process, in which cancer cells adjust the conditions within, and also possibly in the immediate vicinity of, the tumor they have formed to their own ‘liking’. Tumors develop their own internal environments for a number of reasons, which include resistance to aspects of the patient’s immune system which could be capable of destroying or damaging them otherwise.

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It is accepted by many that a higher bodyweight (measured by body-mass index or BMI) increases the risk of disease and death. However, recent research trends have suggested that this relationship is not as simple as once thought. This may be related to observational associations between increasing BMI and mortality, which may lead to conclusions that a slightly higher BMI is actually protective against death. However, other researchers assert that this is not a causal relationship, mainly because it does not account for other factors such as lifestyle choices and illnesses at their onset.

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Conventional DNA sequencing is getting more powerful and time-effective. However, it is still based on amplification, which involves using a DNA polymerase such as Taq to produce numerous copies of the sequence to be analysed. The problem with amplification is that it can increase the risk of false-positive results in terms of pertinent mutations.

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The testing and analysis procedures involved in modern-day medical diagnostics is slowly moving away from what many may see as the archetypal ‘lab-based’ setting, thanks to advanced biotechnology and technology. Medical science is slowly becoming less dependent on using fiddly glass equipment and complicated protocols, and instead turning to state-of-the-art sample collectors, sensors and corresponding electronic machines that analyse the biological data they collect.

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If you were asked to define vital signs, you might volunteer such well-known metrics as pulse; heart-rate; lung capacity; blood pressure and possibly others such as blood oxygen levels. However, some scientists now assert that the speed at which an individual walks is also a compelling indicator of health and maybe even lifespan. These researchers have concluded that walking speed, technically known as gait speed, is linked to the years of life left to a population of older people who have been studied for survival parameters in a number of studies.

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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.

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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.

Rheumatoid arthritis affects over two million Americans, and is an autoimmune disorder that results in inflammation in joints but can also affect sufferer’s skin, lungs, heart, blood, eyes and nerves.

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Two-dimensional (2D) ultrasound is a straightforward and relatively cheap form of medical imaging. In skilled and experienced hands, it can be a powerful tool for visualising organs and what may be wrong with them. However, it is often regulated to use in emergency medical situations in hospital settings. Its other main use is to generate foetal imaging for obstetrics and related practices.

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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.

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