If you were to do a little time traveling, flashing back to when you were 18, how would your weight differ from what it is today? According to research by the American Cancer Society, the amount of weight a woman gains after the age of 18 is a strong indicator as to whether she will get breast cancer later in life.
Weight gain and body mass were identified long ago as risk factors for breast cancer. The Cancer Society estimates between one-third and one-half of all breast cancer deaths among older …

Air travel could raise the risk for experiencing heartbeat irregularities among older individuals with a history of heart disease, a new study suggests.
The finding stems from an assessment of a small group of people — some of whom had a history of heart disease — who were observed in an environment that simulated flight conditions.
“People never think about the fact that getting on an airplane is basically like going from sea level to climbing a mountain of 8,000 feet,” said study author Eileen McNeely, an instructor in the department of …

Building on decades of research into how the body’s electrical field affects skin regeneration, scientists at Johnson & Johnson Consumer Companies, Inc., have discovered how to harness the power of bioelectricity to help improve skin rejuvenation. The new innovation, called CYTOMIMIC™ Technology, is a proprietary, patented technology that combines essential minerals to deliver biological levels of electric signals similar to the skin’s natural bioelectricity. CYTOMIMIC™ Technology will be introduced to the dermatologic community and featured in nine scientific posters at the 68th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Dermatology …

All sectors of industry are being urged to play their part in sharing information to prevent accidents.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has revamped its Safety Bulletin system which warns industry of problems with equipment, process, procedures and substances that may lead to injury, with bulletins now available automatically via email, text message or RSS feed, as well as on the website.
HSE is now calling on industry to commit to sharing such information more effectively when sending out their own alerts.
HSE recently held a workshop, ‘Safety Alerts: Everyone has a …

The frequency of post-operative complications following surgery for liver cancer is associated with a hospital having a low volume of liver surgery. Investigators at The Cancer Institute of New Jersey (CINJ) are presenting that finding at the 63rd Annual Society of Surgical Oncology Symposium taking place this week in St. Louis. CINJ is a Center of Excellence of UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School.
Previous analyses of state and national databases have documented institutional volume-related death rates at low-volume hospitals for this type of surgery; however, a causal relationship has not been …

There’s an epidemic in progress, and it has nothing to do with the flu. A ground-breaking study published in the March 2010 Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and Metabolism found an astonishing 59 per cent of study subjects had too little Vitamin D in their blood.  Nearly a quarter of the group had serious deficiencies (less than 20 ng/ml) of this important vitamin. Since Vitamin D insufficiency is linked to increased body fat, decreased muscle strength and a range of disorders, this is a serious health issue.
“Vitamin D insufficiency is a …

Cells may not have a mouth, but they still need to ingest substances from the external environment. If this process – known as endocytosis – is affected, it can lead to infectious diseases or cardio-vascular diseases, cancer, Huntington’s and diabetes. In cooperation with the Center for Information Services and High Performance Computing (ZIH) at the Dresden University of Technology, scientists from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics therefore applied a new strategy to identify and characterize genes involved in endocytosis. For that a combination of high-resolution …

Imagine a mosquito-borne virus that has already infected millions of people in recent outbreaks in South and Southeast Asia, the islands of the Indian Ocean, Africa and northern Italy. Although seldom fatal, it causes highly painful arthritis-like symptoms that can linger for months or even years. It’s capable of adapting to spread through a mosquito species common in much of North America. And no vaccine or treatment exists to protect humans from its effects.
The scenario may sound like something dreamed up as a training exercise by public health authorities, but …

In a leap toward making stem cell therapy widely available, researchers at the Ansary Stem Cell Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College have discovered that endothelial cells, the most basic building blocks of the vascular system, produce growth factors that can grow copious amounts of adult stem cells and their progeny over the course of weeks. Until now, adult stem cell cultures would die within four or five days despite best efforts to grow them.
“This is groundbreaking research with potential application for regeneration of organs and inhibition of cancer cell …

The Food and Drug Administration announced a voluntary recall on Thursday of food made with a common flavoring after they found it may have become contaminated with salmonella bacteria, although they did not estimate how extensive the recall will be.
Foods including soups, sauces, dips, salad dressings, hot dogs, and many snack foods that contain the flavoring hydrolyzed vegetable protein were on the list to be recalled. The protein is made by Basic Food Flavors Inc of Las Vegas, Nevada.
“At this time there are no known illnesses associated with this contamination …