Surfing with my surgeon
Getting patients back to doing the things they love after joint replacement surgery is what all UCLA orthopaedic surgeons strive for. Yet it ’s not every physician that makes a commitment to celebrate a patient’s recovery by joining him for dawn patrol. Meet Dr. Adam Sassoon and his patient Robert Lombard. Last year, when Lombard learned he needed two knee replacements, he was determined to find a surgeon who understood that his top priority was to be able to return to the sport that fulfilled him, body and soul — surfing. He found one in Sassoon, an orthopaedic surgeon specializing in knee and hip-replacement ...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - July 14, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
The psychedelic Rx: Hallucinogens and mental health
For more than three decades, UCLA ’s Dr. Charles Grob has engaged in research that is guaranteed to make him a hit at cocktail parties, if not always among gatherings of traditional funders of scientific studies.“This was always an obscure, niche area,” Grob said of his scientific explorations of the therapeutic value of psilocybin, an active chemical in magic mushrooms; MDMA, the party drug better known as ecstasy or molly; and ayahuasca, the Amazonian plant hallucinogen employed as a religious sacrame nt by indigenous cultures for centuries. “For the most part, the field consisted of myself and a few friends. Wha...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - July 14, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Asian, Hispanic and Black Californians saw bigger drops in life expectancy than whites during COVID
This study demonstrates that the reduction in life expectancy continued from 2020 into 2021, despite the availability of vaccines for much of 2021.Life expectancy is not the average life span of individuals in a society but a hypothetical measure based solely on the mortality rates observed in a given year. It estimates how long a cohort of newborns could expect to live if it experienced the mortality rates of that specific year throughout their entire lifetimes. In the current study, life expectancy captures how much life was lost collectively within a population during the pandemic years, and it illustrates the dramatic ...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - July 7, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
After facial feminization surgery, transgender people report better psychosocial health
Key takeaways:A positive step.Gender-affirming surgery is one of the most important procedures for patients with gender dysphoria, researchers say.Quality of life.People who had the surgery reported higher scores in 7 of 11 measures of psychosocial health than those awaiting the procedure.Expanding health coverage.Researchers hope the findings will encourage more U.S. health insurance plans to cover the surgery.A UCLA study offers the first evidence that transgender patients who receive gender-affirming facial feminization surgery reported better mental health after their procedures.Thestudy was published in the journal An...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - July 6, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Roe reactions: Faculty share insights on the ruling and the future of abortion rights
The Supreme Court ’s June 25 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization also overturned Roe v. Wade, putting an end to nearly five decades of constitutional protection for abortion in the U.S.That decision had an immediate and sweeping effect across the country, with 26 states banning or severely restricting abortions or preparing to do so. Meanwhile, millions, including those who no longer have access to the procedure, have been left pondering the future of reproductive rights in America and wondering whether similar constitutional protections may be in jeopardy.Over the past week, faculty members and scho...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 30, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Barriers keep NHPI and LGBTQ smokers from breathing free
Two groups that have high rates of smoking and vaping — the Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander community and the LGBTQ community — have specific hurdles that prevent them from quitting: the cost of cessation therapies and a lack of culturallyspecific care, according to a pair of reports from theUCLA Center for Health Policy Research.“Examining the smoking behaviors of specific communities is essential to understanding their unique needs,” saidSean Tan, a senior public administration analyst at the center and lead author of both reports. “We found that many NHPI and LGBTQ smokers who want to quit and have trie...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 30, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Study shows HIV speeds up body ’s aging processes soon after infection
HIV has an “early and substantial” impact on aging in infected people, accelerating biological changes in the body associated with normal aging within just two to three years of infection, according to a study by UCLA researchers and colleagues.The findings suggest that new HIV infection may rapidly cut nearly five years off an individual ’s life span relative to an uninfected person.“Our work demonstrates that even in the early months and years of living with HIV, the virus has already set into motion an accelerated aging process at the DNA level,” said lead author Elizabeth Crabb Breen, a professor emerita atUC...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 30, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Q & A: What you should know about new COVID vaccines for young kids
Vaccines against COVID-19 are finally available for the youngest Americans.The U.S. Food and Drug Administration voted on June 17 to authorize shots from Moderna and Pfizer for children as young as 6 months. The vaccines are rolling out across the country, including at UCLA Health, making vaccine-induced immunity against coronavirus available for the first time to children younger than 5.“It’s great news as many people are looking forward to summer vacations and getting together with family,” saidDr. Annabelle de St. Maurice, a pediatrician and co-chief infection prevention officer for UCLA Health. “Both vaccines h...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 29, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
UCLA survey quantifies COVID vaccine hesitancy among Californians
Despite the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's full approval of the COVID-19 vaccine, 58.8% of Californians who are not fully vaccinated are still worried about its side effects, according to a new UCLA survey.The finding is among the results of the 2022 California Health Interview Survey Preliminary COVID-19 Estimates Dashboard, published today by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.The survey also found that of Californians who are either unvaccinated or partially vaccinated, 41.0% haven't gotten the vaccine because they believe it was developed too quickly and 30.0% said that they believe the vaccine is unnece...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 29, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
UCLA survey quantifies COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy among Californians
Despite the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's full approval of the COVID-19 vaccine, 58.8% of Californians who are not fully vaccinated are still worried about its side effects, according to a new UCLA survey.The finding is among the results of the 2022 California Health Interview Survey Preliminary COVID-19 Estimates Dashboard, published today by the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research.The survey also found that of Californians who are either unvaccinated or partially vaccinated, 41.0% haven't gotten the vaccine because they believe it was developed too quickly and 30.0% said that they believe the vaccine is unnece...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 29, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
UCLA scholars, policymakers consider post –Roe v. Wade landscape
In the wake of Friday ’s Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that provided a constitutional protection for abortions, scholars from UCLA, policymakers and reproductive health practitioners discussed what the future may hold.During an online panel convened by the UCLA School of Law ’sCenter on Reproductive Health, Law and Policy just hours after the decision was announced, participants agreed that the worst was yet to come in terms of reproductive rights but also trumpeted the role California and Los Angeles could play in ensu...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 25, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Know the signs of heat stroke and exhaustion
Heat can be deadly.As summer temperatures climb — and as climate change contributes to more 100-degree days each year — heat illnesses become a more serious risk, particularly for young children, older adults, outdoor workers, athletes and people with chronic conditions.“On any day with extreme heat, emergency rooms in Los Angeles see an additional 1,500 patients,” said Dr. David Eisenman, a professor at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health and co-leader of aresearch project to address extreme heat in Los Angeles.“We estimate that an additional 16 people die on a single day of heat in Los Angeles County,...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 23, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
UCLA surgeons develop new technique to reduce Adam ’s apple without neck scar
Doctors at theUCLA Gender Health Program have developed a technique to reduce an Adam ’s apple bump without leaving a scar on the patient’s neck.The advance could be an important and welcome one for transgender women and nonbinary people, for whom a neck scar can be a telltale sign of their surgery — often exposing them to discrimination, hate and violence. A study by the surgeons who developed the techniquewas published in the journal Facial Plastic Surgery& Aesthetic Medicine. Reviewing outcomes for 77 people who underwent the surgery at UCLA Health facilities, the authors concluded that the procedure is an e...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 22, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Can computers understand complex words and concepts?
In “Through the Looking Glass,” Humpty Dumpty says scornfully, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” Alice replies, “The question is whether you can make words mean so many different things.”The study of what words really mean is ages old. The human mind must parse a web of detailed, flexible information and use sophisticated common sense to perceive their meaning.Now, a newer problem related to the meaning of words has emerged: Scientists are studying whether artificial intelligence can mimic the human mind to understand words the way people do. A new study ...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 16, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Factors causing low COVID vaccination rates have spilled over to flu vaccine rates in parts of U.S.
A new study by UCLA researchers reveals that adult flu vaccination rates have declined in U.S. states where COVID-19 vaccination rates are also low.The research suggests declining trust in public health, indicating that COVID-19 vaccination behavior has spilled over to flu vaccination behavior. The finding is publishedas a letter to the editor in the New England Journal of Medicine.“It is alarming that controversy surrounding COVID-19 vaccination may be undermining separate public health efforts that save thousands of lives each year,” said Dr.Richard Leuchter, the study ’s lead author, a resident physician at UC...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - June 15, 2022 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
