Category Health/Medical

Cardiologists Dr. James de Lemos (left) and Dr. Amit Khera (right) review a printout from an EKG and a calcium scan, two of five tests they demonstrated could improve risk assessment for heart disease. Credit: UT Southwestern

Five medical tests together provide a broader and more accurate assessment of heart-disease risk than currently used methods, cardiologists at UT Southwestern Medical Center found. Combined, results from the five tests – an EKG, a limited CT scan, and 3 blood tests – better predict who will develop heart disease compared with standard strategies that focus on blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, and smoking history. “This set of tests is really powerful in identifying unexpected risk among individuals with few traditional risk factors...

Rods, cones and nerve layers in the retina. The front (anterior) of the eye is on the left. Light (from the left) passes through several transparent nerve layers to reach the rods and cones (far right). A chemical change in the rods and cones send a signal back to the nerves. The signal goes first to the bipolar and horizontal cells (yellow layer), then to the amacrine cells and ganglion cells (purple layer), then to the optic nerve fibres. The signals are processed in these layers. First, the signals start as raw outputs of points in the rod and cone cells. Then the nerve layers identify simple shapes, such as bright points surrounded by dark points, edges, and movement. (Based on a drawing by Ramón y Cajal.)

A new report gives recommendations for regenerating retinal ganglion cells RGCs...

This guided drug delivery system targets solid tumors. Credit: UAB

These microcarriers may offer an entirely different approach to treating solid human tumors of numerous pathologic subtypes by delivering their encapsulated drug cargo to a tumor and protecting against collateral tissue damage. These multilayer capsules show three traits that have been difficult to achieve in a single entity. They have good imaging contrast that allows detection with low-power ultrasound, they can stably and efficiently encapsulate the cancer drug doxorubicin, and both a low- and higher-power dose of ultrasound can trigger the release of that cargo.

These 3 features create a guided drug delivery system to target solid tumors...

Borna Mehrad, MBBS (left), and Kathryn Michels, both of the University of Virginia School of Medicine, have identified a hormone that helps the body fight off the spread of bacterial pneumonia. The discovery may offer a simple way to help vulnerable patients.

A hormone responsible for controlling iron metabolism helps fight off a severe form of bacterial pneumonia, and that discovery may offer a simple way to help vulnerable patients. Hepcidin, is produced in the liver and limits the spread of the bacteria by hiding the iron in the blood that the bacteria need to survive and grow. Stimulating hepcidin production in patients who do not produce it well, such as people with iron overload or liver disease, may help their bodies effectively starve the bacteria to death...