pSivida surges on Medidur data
Psivida (NSDQ:PSDV) shares surged today after the company said its Medidur drug-device combination met the primary endpoints in a Phase III clinical trial for treating posterior uveitis.
Medidur uses the same injectable implant and drug as the Iluvien drug-device combo pSivida licensed to Alimera Sciences (NSDQ:ALIM) for treating diabetic macular degeneration. Iluvien won FDA approval in September 2014. Like Iluvien, Medidur is designed to release the corticosteroid flucinolone acetonide over3 years after being implanted in the back of the eye.
Watertown, Mass.-based pSivida said the 129-patient, randomized and double...
Source: Mass Device - December 22, 2015 Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Brad Perriello Tags: Optical/Ophthalmic Drug-Device Combinations Clinical Trials pSivida Corp. Source Type: news
A happy coincidence for Irish tot with cochlear implants
Roisin and her cousin Mia enjoying a day at the park
Editor’s note: The thing about clichés is sometime they are just spot on. “It’s small world after all,” sprung to mind when I heard about how hearing-restoration researcher Jeffrey Holt, PhD, met Roisin Morgan, an Irish toddler with hearing loss, on an Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to Boston. Read Holt’s recount of their meeting, and watch the reunion video.
On Dec. 16, 2015, as I boarded my flight from Dublin to Boston, there was a family with a three-year-old daughter. I noticed the little girl had bilateral cochlear implants.
As the family made their...
Source: Thrive, Children's Hospital Boston - December 22, 2015 Category: Pediatrics Authors: Jeff Holt Tags: Parenting Research cochlear implant Greg Licameli Jeffrey Holt Otolaryngology Department Source Type: news
12 Amazing Things We Learned About The Human Body In 2015
The human body is a source of mystery. But every year, scientists get just a little better at understanding its secrets. Of course, 2015 has been no different. In the past year, researchers have created better access to proven therapies, developed futuristic new technologies that may change the way we approach disease and even enacted more complete disease screening processes to keep us healthy. Read on to learn more. Here’s to more scientific discoveries in 2016! @media (max-width: 969px) { #desktop { display: none; } } @media (min-width: 970px) { #mobile { display: none; } } #g-body...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - December 22, 2015 Category: Science Source Type: news
Can You Think Yourself Into A Different Person?
For years she had tried to be the perfect wife and mother but now, divorced, with two sons, having gone through another break-up and in despair about her future, she felt as if she’d failed at it all, and she was tired of it. On 6 June 2007 Debbie Hampton, of Greensboro, North Carolina, took an overdose of more than 90 pills – a combination of ten different prescription drugs, some of which she’d stolen from a neighbor’s bedside cabinet. That afternoon, she’d written a note on her computer: “I’ve screwed up this life so bad that there is no place here for me and nothing I can contr...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - November 19, 2015 Category: Science Source Type: news
A View From the Losing Side of Health Care
For the last three hours I've been crunching numbers, trying to figure out how not to pay $600 to $800 a month for a health insurance policy that won't cover any medical expenses until I've paid anywhere from $7000 to $9000 in deductibles. Then, even if the deductible is met, I'd only get partial benefits until I pay an out of pocket maximum ranging from $11,000 to $14,000. I'd reach these totals only from a catastrophic health event - a hospitalization, emergency room visit, or devastating diagnosis.
I finally conclude that I have no choice. I'll be paying for the promise of a service that I'm not likely to use in 2016. ...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - November 7, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news
pSividia eyes knee market, releases earnings
pSivida (NSDQ:PSDV) released its fiscal year earnings for 2015 yesterday and said it’s eyeing an entrance into the orthopedic knee market with a new drug-device implant.
The company said it is slated to submit an investigational new drug application with the FDA and begin a study of a new implant using its Durasert technology to treat severe osteoarthritis pain in the knee.
Psivida claims the new device would be surgically implanted in the knee and provide sustained delivery of a corticosteroid directly to the joint for approximately 6 months.
“With over 10 million cases of knee osteoarthritis and 700,000 knee ...
Source: Mass Device - September 10, 2015 Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Fink Densford Tags: Business/Financial News Drug-Device Combinations Implants Surgical pSivida Corp. Source Type: news
Bionic Eyes, Stem Cells and Gene Therapy: 3 Cutting Edge Cures for Blindness
Scientists have long known that while our eyes do most of the heavy lifting of sight—taking in particles of light, bending and refracting them, turning them into electrical impulses—we actually “see” with our brains. Between the eye and the mind, however, a lot can go wrong, and until recently, if someone’s vision started to go or was never there to begin with, there wasn’t much doctors could do about it. Now, thanks to an explosion of new research, scientists at a stage in biology where they “know a heck of a lot about the causes of vision problems,” says Dr. Paul A. Sieving...
Source: TIME.com: Top Science and Health Stories - September 9, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Alexandra Sifferlin Tags: Uncategorized argus II bionic eye blindness Cure Gene Therapy Research stem cell therapy vision loss Source Type: news
Are you thinking what I’m thinking? The rise of mind control
Mind control still sounds like the stuff of sci-fi movies. But it’s coming closer, with implants that can help people with paralysis and, further off, devices to send thoughts between humansAhundred electrodes are pressed tightly against my scalp and a mixture of salt water and baby shampoo is dripping down my back. The goings-on in my slightly agitated brain are represented by a baffling array of graphs on a screen in front of me. When I close my eyes and relax, the messy spikes and troughs become neat little waves.Next, scientists here at Newcastle University’s Institute of Neuroscience induce small electric currents...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - August 22, 2015 Category: Science Authors: Tom Ireland Tags: Neuroscience Internet Medical research Research and development Technology Source Type: news
McGuire to take reins at Second Sight, Greenberg heads board | Personnel Moves
Second Sight Medical‘s (NSDQ:EYES) newly appointed CEO Will McGuire is set to take the reins starting August 18, the company said.
Announced in June, former CEO Dr. Robert Greenberg will become chairman of the board at Second Sight, replacing Alfred Mann who will become chairman emeritus, according to the Sylmar, Calif.-based ‘bionic eye’-developing company.
“Will brings an immense depth of experience in the life sciences industry that will advance Second Sight’s commercialization of the Argus II retinal prosthesis. After a thorough search process, management and the board of directors are con...
Source: Mass Device - August 13, 2015 Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Fink Densford Tags: Business/Financial News Invuity Monteris Medical Personnel Moves Second Sight Medical Products Inc. Volcano Corp. Source Type: news
UCLA–Tel Aviv study suggests REM sleep helps the brain capture snapshots of dream images
When we sleep, we experience our most vivid dreams and vigorous brain activity during the rapid eye movement, or REM phase. Although scientists have long suspected that our eyes flicker in response to what our unconscious mind sees in our dreams, no one has been able to prove it.
Now, an international team of researchers led by UCLA’s Dr. Itzhak Fried is the first to demonstrate that during dreams, our eyes and brains respond similarly to how they react to images when we’re awake. Published in the Aug. 11 online edition of Nature Communications, the findings offer a rare glimpse into the working of individual brain...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - August 12, 2015 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Become Who You Are: The World's First Legally Recognized Cyborg May Be Onto Something
Bodies are imperfect. Every combination of flesh, nerves, bones and blood has its particularities and limitations, some of which restrict the experience of its owner more severely than others. For issues that threaten our safety and survival, technology offers a helping hand. Glasses improve vision. Crutches, wheelchairs and prosthetics help with movement. For those with abnormal heart rhythms, there are pacemakers. But what about the less dire limitations, for example, those that affect your aesthetic perception? How would your life be different if you couldn't see color, if the range of your vision was limited to v...
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - July 20, 2015 Category: Science Source Type: news
Second Sight touts 3-year Argus II retinal prosthesis data
Second Sight Medical (NSDQ:EYES) said data from a 3-year study of its Argus II retinal prosthesis system show positive results in previously blind patients.
The study, published in Ophthalmology yesterday, examined 30 patients implanted with the Argus II, designed to restore partial vision by stimulating viable retinal cells in patients with severe to profound retinitis pigmentosa, the Sylmar, Calif.-based company said.
At 3 years, 29 patients remain implanted with the system and 89% of subjects performed better with the system in visual function tasks, the study reports.
Eighty percent of patients benefited from the syst...
Source: Mass Device - June 24, 2015 Category: Medical Equipment Authors: Fink Densford Tags: Clinical Trials Implants Optical/Ophthalmic Second Sight Medical Products Inc. Source Type: news
The Early Bird Gets the Sperm ... to the Egg
This article was originally published on The Conversation.
Read the original article. -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website. (Source: Science - The Huffington Post)
Source: Science - The Huffington Post - June 12, 2015 Category: Science Source Type: news
Cataract Basics and Beyond: Why Treatments Are Now Better Than Ever
Kira Manusis, MD
Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology
Co-Director, Cataract, Cornea and Refractive Surgery
New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai
__________________________
If you are fortunate to live long enough, you will probably develop a cataract, the leading cause of vision loss in the United States.
According to the National Eye Institute, more than half of all Americans develop a cataract by age 80. As our nation's senior population expands, the number of people aged 40 or older with cataracts is expected to double from 24.4 million to about 50 million by 2050.
Cataract Basics
A cataract is a clouding ...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - June 10, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news
I'm Deaf and Gay -- And That's Totally Okay
Ever since I can remember, I have identified as gay.
No internal confusion, no coming-out horror story. My label as a gay male, while it came with understandable insecurities, never greatly interfered with my daily life. I might even call myself lucky in that sense. However, a deep part of me never felt truly comfortable among the large heterosexual population surrounding me. Strike one.
Now, throw another curveball that is widely but falsely seen as a debilitating condition: being Deaf. Strike two.
I grew up with the idea that I had two strikes against me. I have had to face discrimination from all directions: hearin...
Source: Healthy Living - The Huffington Post - June 3, 2015 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news
