Why medical research keeps changing its mind
Did you ever wonder why medical research seems to flip-flop so often? Eggs used to be terrible for your health; now they’re not so bad. Stomach ulcers were thought to be due to stress and a “type A personality” but that’s been disproven. I was taught that every postmenopausal woman should take hormone replacement therapy to prevent heart disease and bone loss; now it’s considered way too risky. It can make you question every bit of medical news you hear.
But maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Questioning what you read or hear is reasonable. And maybe medical reversals — when new research leads to a complete t...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - January 3, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Health Medical Research Prevention Tests and procedures Source Type: blogs
A Classic Fist Fight Injury
A right-handed man presented with swelling and tenderness at the base of his thumb after an altercation. His range of motion at the metacarpal-carpal joint was limited because of pain. Not unexpectedly, his first metacarpal was broken. What can you tell this patient about his injury?You can say:This fracture has a name: Bennett's fracture.It is the most common fracture of the base of the thumb.His fracture is classic in mechanism; fist fights commonly produce this injury (by having an axial load against a partially flexed first metacarpal).His radiographs are classic in appearance—a two-piece intraarticular fr...
Source: Lions and Tigers and Bears - January 2, 2020 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
A Look Back at 2019: Progress Towards the Treatment of Aging as a Medical Condition
Conclusion
A great deal of progress is being made in the matter of treating aging: in advocacy, in funding, in the research and development. It can never be enough, and it can never be fast enough, given the enormous cost in suffering and lost lives. The longevity industry is really only just getting started in the grand scheme of things: it looks vast to those of us who followed the slow, halting progress in aging research that was the state of things a decade or two ago. But it is still tiny compared to the rest of the medical industry, and it remains the case that there is a great deal of work yet to be done at all...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 31, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Of Interest Source Type: blogs
A new look at steroid injections for knee and hip osteoarthritis
Osteoarthritis is a common and potentially debilitating condition. It’s a degenerative joint disease (often called the “wear-and-tear” type) in which the smooth lining of cartilage becomes thinned and uneven, exposing the bone beneath.
Although osteoarthritis is tightly linked with aging, we now know there is more to it than age alone: genetics, weight, physical activity, and a number of other factors can conspire to make it more likely that someone will develop osteoarthritis while someone else won’t. Osteoarthritis is the primary reason that more than a million joints (mostly hips and knees) are replaced each yea...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - December 23, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Arthritis Osteoarthritis Pain Management Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, December 23rd 2019
In this study, by adenovirus-mediated delivery and inducible transgenic mouse models, we demonstrate the proliferation of both HCs and SCs by combined Notch1 and Myc activation in in vitro and in vivo inner ear adult mouse models. These proliferating mature SCs and HCs maintain their respective identities. Moreover, when presented with HC induction signals, reprogrammed adult SCs transdifferentiate into HC-like cells both in vitro and in vivo. Finally, our data suggest that regenerated HC-like cells likely possess functional transduction channels and are able to form connections with adult auditory neurons.
Epige...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 22, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Declan Doogan of Juvenescence Presenting at Investing in the Age of Longevity
Investing in the Age of Longevity was an event held in London earlier this year as a part of the Longevity Week, a chance for Jim Mellon and the rest of the Juvenescence team to present their thesis on the longevity industry to the investor community - that this is an enormous opportunity to both greatly improve the human condition and generate returns on investment. A number of companies were there to present, as examples of the work on slowing and reversing aging presently taking place, and I was graciously invited to discuss the latest developments at Repair Biotechnologies. The presentations from the event have been po...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 16, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Healthy Life Extension Community Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, December 16th 2019
This study shows that CA are released from periventricular and subpial regions to the cerebrospinal fluid and are present in the cervical lymph nodes, into which cerebrospinal fluid drains through the meningeal lymphatic system. We also show that CA can be phagocytosed by macrophages. We conclude that CA can act as containers that remove waste products from the brain and may be involved in a mechanism that cleans the brain. Moreover, we postulate that CA may contribute in some autoimmune brain diseases, exporting brain substances that interact with the immune system, and hypothesize that CA may contain brain markers that m...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 15, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Ways in Which the Failing Lymphatic System Contributes to Age-Related Disease
The lymphatic system is a parallel circulatory system responsible for moving fluid, immune cells, and a range of vital molecules around the body. It is of particular importance to immune function, allowing components of the immune system to carry messages from place to place in the body, and communicate and coordinate the immune response at the hubs known as lymph nodes. Like all tissues in the body, the lymphatic system is negatively impacted by aging, and this has widespread detrimental effects throughout the body and brain.
For example, lymph nodes become disrupted in structure and function by the presence of sen...
Source: Fight Aging! - December 11, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Medicine, Biotech, Research Source Type: blogs
Macadamian, Radiobotics, and Bispebjerg Hospital Partner on AI Solution for Radiology: Interview
While the number of clinical data points available per patient continues to increase exponentially, the number of providers and specialists available to interpret that data fails to keep pace. As a result, technology-driven automation is becoming more important to quickly assess and triage patients as new information becomes available.
One clinical area where this disparity between available data and providers exists is radiology. Fast, accurate diagnosis is not always available, particularly in remote regions where specialists are not immediately accessible. To address this challenge, software design and development fi...
Source: Medgadget - December 9, 2019 Category: Medical Devices Authors: Medgadget Editors Tags: Exclusive Informatics Radiology Source Type: blogs
On The Pulse - November 2019
‘New short-term treatment option for hand osteoarthritis flare-ups' (Source: OnMedica Blogs)
Source: OnMedica Blogs - November 28, 2019 Category: General Medicine Source Type: blogs
Digital Health Wearables Can Be Used to Detect Gait Disorders, Undiagnosed Diseases
Axial motor symptoms related to speech, swallowing, balance, and gait freezing, particularly in the elderly, can be diagnostic of a number of disorders but most physicians are not sufficiently trained to assess them. The notion that walking is a sensitive indicator of overall health status and that self-selected walking speed correlates with life expectancy in elderly persons was made in a recent medical article (see:Gait disorders in adults and the elderly). Below is an excerpt from it:...[S]low gait in elderly non-demented persons correlates more closely with the future emergence of dementia than subjective cogniti...
Source: Lab Soft News - November 25, 2019 Category: Laboratory Medicine Authors: Bruce Friedman Tags: Diagnostics Health Wearable Healthcare Information Technology Healthcare Innovations Medical Consumerism Medical Research Point-of-Care Testing Preventive Medicine Test Kits and Home Testing Source Type: blogs
Fight Aging! Newsletter, November 25th 2019
This study demonstrates for the first time that senescent cells secrete functional LTs, significantly contributing to the LTs pool known to cause or exacerbate idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
Against Senolytics
https://www.fightaging.org/archives/2019/11/against-senolytics/
There is no consensus in science that is so strong as to have no heretics. So here we have an interview with a naysayer on the matter of senolytic treatments, who argues that the loss of senescent cells in aged tissues will cause more harm to long-term health than the damage they will do by remaining. To be clear, I think this to be a...
Source: Fight Aging! - November 24, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Newsletters Source Type: blogs
Cellular Senescence May Contribute to Rheumatoid Arthritis in Younger Patients
Senescent cells are a cause of aging, and much of the present focus in the study of cellular senescence is thus on targeting and destroying these unwanted cells in order to treat aging. However, a comparatively recent and intriguing finding is that at least some autoimmune diseases, such as type 1 diabetes, involve cellular senescence. The question at present is whether or not this true for all forms of autoimmunity.
An autoimmune condition must have a trigger, something that prompts the immune system to attack healthy tissues, and it is possible that many different triggers converge on the generation of senescent c...
Source: Fight Aging! - November 19, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs
Curcumin for arthritis: Does it really work?
Osteoarthritis is a degenerative joint disease that is the most common type of arthritis. Usually, it occurs among people of advanced age. But it can begin in middle age or even sooner, especially if there’s been an injury to the joint.
While there are treatments available — exercise, braces or canes, loss of excess weight, various pain relievers and anti-inflammatory medicines — these are no cures, and none of the treatments are predictably effective. In fact, often they don’t work at all, or help only a little. Injected steroids or synthetic lubricants can be tried as well. When all else fails, joint replacement ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - November 12, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Arthritis Bones and joints Complementary and alternative medicine Pain Management Source Type: blogs
