Johnson & Johnson have announced a voluntary recall for its Aveeno Baby Calming Comfort Lotion. According to tests performed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the lotion contained an excessive amount of the common bacteria coagulase-negative Staphylococci.
But an independent laboratory, EMSL, tested the samples and did not find any indication that the number of bacteria exceeded specifications. Jason Dobranic Ph.D., National Microbiology Director at EMSL says, “As one of the nation’s leading testing laboratories, EMSL Analytical offers companies advanced microbiology testing services for their consumer products in cases such …

A new study appears to support the idea that blood pressure checks should be done in both arms. Researchers at the University of Exeter Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry (PCMD) in the UK reviewed evidence covering differences in systolic blood pressure between arms and found it could be a useful way to spot elevated risk of vascular disease and even death in cases that might otherwise be “clinically silent”.
Findings of the systematic review and meta-analysis are published online in The Lancet on 30 January.
Dr Christopher Clark, Clinical Academic Fellow …

According to a study published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, people with mild depression may find benefits to taking antidepressants.
Researchers analyzed data form six past studies done at the New York State Psychiatric Institute between 1985 and 2000.
The studies included 825 patients with non-severe, long-lasting depression enrolled in trials that compared symptoms with antidepressant treatment versus a placebo.
In three of the studies, the team found that patients taking an antidepressant improved more on a widely-used scale of depression symptoms and severity than those taking the placebo.
In four of the …

The odds of a major depressive episode are more than double for those working 11 or more hours a day compared to those working seven to eight hours a day, according to a report is published in the Jan. 25 issue of the online journal PLoS ONE.
The authors, led by Marianna Virtanen of the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health and University College London, followed about 2000 middle aged British civil servants and found a robust association between overtime work and depression. This correlation was not affected when the analysis was …

Certain vaccines may not work as well in children who have been exposed to high levels of perfluorinated compounds (PFCs), a family of chemicals used to make everything from microwave popcorn bags and pizza boxes to carpets and nonstick cookware, new research suggests.
In a study published this week in the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers found that the higher the level of PFCs in a child’s blood, the fewer antibodies the child produced after receiving vaccines for diphtheria and tetanus. In addition, kids with higher PFC exposure were …