Research

Making music videos ‘helps young cancer patients cope’

Music therapy can help teenagers and young people cope better when faced with treatment for cancer, a study in Cancer journal suggests.

American researchers followed the experiences of a group of patients aged 11-24 as they produced a music video over three weeks.

They found the patients gained resilience and improved relationships with family and friends.

All the patients were undergoing high-risk stem-cell transplant treatments.

To produce their music videos, the young patients were asked to write song lyrics, record sounds and collect video images to create their story.

They were guided by a qualified music therapist who helped the patients identify what was important to them and how to communicate their ideas.

When completed, the videos were shared with family and friends through “premieres”.

Positive effect
After the sessions, the researchers found that the group that made music videos reported feeling more resilient and better able to cope with their treatment than another group not offered music therapy.

Also, 100 days after treatment, the same group said they felt communication within their families was better and they were more connected with friends.

These are among several protective factors identified by researchers that they say help teenagers and young adults to cope in the face of cancer treatments.

Lead study author Dr Joan Haase, of Indiana University School of Nursing, said: “These protective factors influence the ways adolescents and young adults cope, gain hope and find meaning in the midst of their cancer journey.

“Adolescents and young people who are resilient have the ability to rise above their illness, gain a sense of mastery and confidence in how they have dealt with their cancer, and demonstrate a desire to reach out and help others.”

When researchers interviewed the patients’ parents, they found that the videos also gave them useful insights into their children’s cancer experiences.

‘Feel connected’
Sheri Robb, a music therapist who worked on the study, explained why music was particularly good at encouraging young people to engage.

She said: “When everything else is so uncertain, songs that are familiar to them are meaningful and make them feel connected.”

Cancer Research UK says music therapy can help people with cancer reduce their anxiety and improve their quality of life. It can also help to reduce some cancer symptoms and side-effects of treatment – but it cannot cure, treat or prevent any type of disease, including cancer.

Previous studies looking at the effects of music therapy on children with cancer found that it could help reduce fear and distress while improving family relationships.

A spokesperson for Teenage Cancer Trust said getting children with cancer to co-operate and communicate was most important.

“Every day in UK, around seven young people aged between 13 and 24 are diagnosed with cancer. We know that being treated alongside others their own age makes a huge difference to their whole experience, especially if it’s in an environment that allows young people with cancer to support each other.”

Source: BBC news

33 new genes behind onset of cancer uncovered

A research team has found many new cancer genes – expanding the list of known genes tied to these cancers by 25 percent.

Moreover, the study shows that many key cancer genes still remain to be discovered. The Broad Institute-led research team’s work, which lays a critical foundation for future cancer drug development, also shows that creating a comprehensive catalog of cancer genes for scores of cancer types is feasible with as few as 100,000 patient samples.

Broad Institute founding director Eric Lander, senior co-author, said that the knowledge of genes and their pathways will highlight new, potential drug targets and help lead the way to effective combination therapy.

Over the past 30 years, scientists had found evidence for about 135 genes that play causal roles in one or more of the 21 tumor types analyzed in the study. The new report not only confirms these genes, but, in one fell swoop, increases the catalog of cancer genes by one-quarter.

It uncovers 33 genes with biological roles in cell death, cell growth, genome stability, immune evasion, as well as other processes.

The result has been published in the journal Nature.

Source: Zee news

Hormone Therapy & Joint Replacement in Women

Women who start hormone replacement therapy after having had hip or knee replacement surgery may cut their risk of needing another procedure in the same joint by nearly 40 percent, a new study suggests.

About 2 percent of those who have a hip or knee replacement need another surgery within three years. Most of these additional procedures are needed because of a complication known as osteolysis, which happens when tiny pieces of the implant seep into the tissue around the implant, causing inflammation that destroys the bone around the implant, the British researchers explained.

“There is evidence that drugs like hormone replacement therapy, used usually to prevent osteoporosis and fractures, might have a beneficial effect on implant survival in patients undergoing knee or hip replacement,” said lead researcher Dr. Nigel Arden, director of musculoskeletal epidemiology at the University of Oxford in England.

“These findings must be confirmed in further studies, but they are consistent with previous reports by our group showing an association between use of other drugs that have similar effects on bone and the risk of implant revision [surgery],” he said.

However, many women are nervous about taking hormone replacement therapy because of previously reported increased risks for heart disease and cancer. Since the risk of a second surgery is small, the question remains whether or not it’s worth starting hormone replacement therapy at all.

“Indeed, this is only a small added benefit of hormone replacement therapy. However, it is a relevant piece of information for women who have received a total knee or hip replacement and are considering hormone replacement therapy for menopausal symptoms,” Arden said.

The report was published online Jan. 22 in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.

For the study, Arden and his colleagues collected data on more than 21,000 women who had not used hormone replacement therapy after a hip or knee replacement. The investigators compared these women with more than 3,500 women who had taken hormone replacement therapy for at least six months after surgery.

The researchers found that women who had taken hormone replacement therapy for six months after surgery were 38 percent less likely to need another surgery than those who had not.

Moreover, women who took hormone replacement therapy for a year or more after surgery were more than 50 percent less likely to need another surgery over three years of follow-up.

Taking hormone replacement therapy before joint replacement, however, didn’t make a difference in the risk for a repeat procedure, the researchers noted.

Dr. Neil Roth, an orthopedic surgeon at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, thinks there may be a role for drugs that help build and strengthen bone after knee and hip replacement surgeries. Based on this study, hormone replacement therapy might also be helpful, he added.

Roth noted, however, that this study only showed an association, and not a cause-and-effect link, between hormone replacement therapy and a lowered risk for another surgery.

“Right now, I wouldn’t make any changes in the way I clinically treat things based on this study, but I think it deserves further investigation,” he added.

Source: web md

Too much ‘love hormone’ can make healthy people oversensitive

Researchers at Concordia’s Centre for Research in Human Development have shown that too much oxytocin or ” love hormone” in healthy young adults can actually result in over sensitivity to the emotions of others.

With the help of psychology professor Mark Ellenbogen, PhD candidates Christopher Cardoso and Anne-Marie Linnen recruited 82 healthy young adults who showed no signs of schizophrenia, autism or related disorders.

Half of the participants were given measured doses of oxytocin, while the rest were offered a placebo.

The participants then completed an emotion identification accuracy test in which they compared different facial expressions showing various emotional states. As expected, the test subjects who had taken oxytocin saw greater emotional intensity in the faces they were rating.

“For some, typical situations like dinner parties or job interviews can be a source of major social anxiety,” Cardoso, the study’s lead author, said.

“Many psychologists initially thought that oxytocin could be an easy fix in overcoming these worries. Our study proves that the hormone ramps up innate social reasoning skills, resulting in an emotional oversensitivity that can be detrimental in those who don’t have any serious social deficiencies,” he said.

Ultimately, however, oxytocin does have the potential to help people with diagnosed disorders like autism to overcome social deficits.

The study is published in Emotion, a journal of the American Psychological Association.

Source: sisat

No More Eye Drops? New Contact Lens Delivers Glaucoma Meds

Like a miniature donut stuffed inside a tiny pita pocket, a common glaucoma medicine is sandwiched inside this specially designed contact lens. In laboratory experiments, the lens, which can also correct vision, releases the eyesight-saving medication at a steady rate for up to a month. Its construction offers numerous potential clinical advantages over the standard glaucoma treatment and may have additional applications, such as delivering anti-inflammatory drugs or antibiotics to the eye.

Glaucoma is a group of conditions that can result in irreversible blindness. This vision loss can be reduced if glaucoma is found and treated early, most commonly with eye drops to lower pressure within the eye. But using eye drops regularly can be a challenge. And while the drops can minimize further vision loss, they don’t repair vision that’s already lost.

People using traditional eye drops for glaucoma “aren’t getting any symptomatic relief, and they’re not seeing better, so there’s not a lot of motivation to be compliant with the medication,” said Joseph Ciolino, an ophthalmologist who, along with his mentor Daniel Kohane, developed the new contact lens at Harvard Medical School.

Source: Daily me

Artificial Bone Marrow Could Be Used to Treat Leukemia

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Artificial bone marrow may be used to reproduce hematopoietic stem cells. A prototype has now been developed by scientists of KIT, the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Stuttgart, and Tübingen University. The porous structure possesses essential properties of natural bone marrow and can be used for the reproduction of stem cells at the laboratory. This might facilitate the treatment of leukemia in a few years.

The researchers are now presenting their work in the journal Biomaterials.
Blood cells, such as erythrocytes or immune cells, are continuously replaced by new ones supplied by hematopoietic stem cells located in a specialized niche of the bone marrow. Hematopoietic stem cells can be used for the treatment of blood diseases, such as leukemia. The affected cells of the patient are replaced by healthy hematopoietic stem cells of an eligible donor.

However, not every leukemia patient can be treated in this way, as the number of appropriate transplants is not sufficient. This problem might be solved by the reproduction of hematopoietic stem cells. So far, this has been impossible, as these cells retain their stem cell properties in their natural environment only, i.e. in their niche of the bone marrow. Outside of this niche, the properties are modified. Stem cell reproduction therefore requires an environment similar to the stem cell niche in the bone marrow.

The stem cell niche is a complex microscopic environment having specific properties. The relevant areas in the bone are highly porous and similar to a sponge. This three-dimensional environment does not only accommodate bone cells and hematopoietic stem cells but also various other cell types with which signal substances are exchanged. Moreover, the space among the cells has a matrix that ensures a certain stability and provides the cells with points to anchor. In the stem cell niche, the cells are also supplied with nutrients and oxygen.

The Young Investigators Group “Stem Cell-Material Interactions” headed by Dr. Cornelia Lee-Thedieck consists of scientists of the KIT Institute of Functional Interfaces (IFG), the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Stuttgart, and Tübingen University. It artificially reproduced major properties of natural bone marrow at the laboratory. With the help of synthetic polymers, the scientists created a porous structure simulating the sponge-like structure of the bone in the area of the blood-forming bone marrow. In addition, they added protein building blocks similar to those existing in the matrix of the bone marrow for the cells to anchor.

The scientists also inserted other cell types from the stem cell niche into the structure in order to ensure substance exchange.
Then, the researchers introduced hematopoietic stem cells isolated from cord blood into this artificial bone marrow. Subsequent breeding of the cells took several days. Analyses with various methods revealed that the cells really reproduce in the newly developed artificial bone marrow. Compared to standard cell cultivation methods, more stem cells retain their specific properties in the artificial bone marrow.

The newly developed artificial bone marrow that possesses major properties of natural bone marrow can now be used by the scientists to study the interactions between materials and stem cells in detail at the laboratory. This will help to find out how the behavior of stem cells can be influenced and controlled by synthetic materials. This knowledge might contribute to producing an artificial stem cell niche for the specific reproduction of stem cells and the treatment of leukemia in ten to fifteen years from now.

Source: Science daily

Fever-reducing meds encourage spread of flu

Taking over-the-counter medications for the aches, pains and fever caused by flu may make people feel somewhat better, but it also could make them more contagious — resulting in increased cases and more deaths among the population, a study suggests.

Researchers at McMaster University say medicines like ibuprofen and acetaminophen can ease some flu symptoms, including bringing down fever.

“People often take — or give their kids — fever-reducing drugs so they can go to work or school,” said David Earn, a professor of mathematics who led the study.

“They may think the risk of infecting others is lower because the fever is lower,” said Earn. “In fact, the opposite may be true: the ill people may give off more virus because fever has been reduced.”

That’s because fever has been shown in a number of studies to lower the amount of some viruses in the body. Suppressing that uptick in temperature — one way the immune system fights infection — appears to leave a person with a greater amount of virus to shed, making them more infectious to others.

“We’ve discovered that this increase has significant effects when we scale up to the level of the whole population,” said Earn, who specializes in mathematical projections of infectious disease transmission.

“I think it’s really something that people should consider,” he said Tuesday from Hamilton. “And all they need to do is remember that they could be more infectious if they take this medication and so should be cautious.”

Using complex mathematical modelling, Earn and his co-authors estimated that fever-reducing medicines could raise the number of flu cases by five per cent, a figure that would account for tens of thousands of cases and an estimated extra 1,000 deaths across North America each year.

In other words, an estimated 1,000 of the roughly 40,000 annual flu deaths might not have occurred, the study suggests.

But the researchers, whose report is published in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, say that doesn’t mean people should stop taking medicines to get relief from flu symptoms.

“That’s not what we’re saying,” stressed Earn. “Our paper isn’t about whether or not you should take medication to reduce your fever. That’s something that ideally you should decide in consultation with a physician — for you, individually, whether it’s good or bad for your health.

“The point that we’re making is that if you take the medication, then there’s an effect on others that people don’t realize. And that’s that you could be more infectious than you were without taking the medication. So you need to be extra cautious about transmitting the infection to others.”

To come up with their estimate, the researchers used data that included experiments on ferrets — considered the best animal model for human influenza — showing increased virus shedding in the absence of fever-reducing drugs, called antipyretics.

They then used the mathematical model to compute how the increase in the amount of virus given off by a single person taking fever-reducing drugs would increase the overall number of cases in a typical year, or in a year when a new strain of influenza caused a pandemic, such as H1N1 did in 2009.

“This research is important because it will help us understand how better to curb the spread of influenza,” said Dr. David Price, chair of family medicine at McMaster.

“As always, Mother Nature knows best,” he said. “Fever is a defence mechanism to protect ourselves and others. Fever-reducing medication should only be taken to take the edge off the discomfort, not to allow people to go out into the community when they should still stay home.”

Dr. Allison McGeer, director of infection control at Toronto’s Mount Sinai Hospital, agreed the study raises important questions that need to be answered.

“I don’t think you can take away from this, though, that antipyretics increase the spread of human influenza or that we can in any way quantitate that,” McGeer said.

“The data, for instance, on increased shedding is in ferrets. And ferrets are not humans. It might well be the same in humans … but it’s not something we know the answer to.”

The study’s conclusions also hinge on the idea that people who take fever-reducing medicines are more likely to interact with others, she said, but that research has not yet been done.

“We know substantially how to prevent seasonal flu — it’s called vaccination,” said McGeer.

“It’s clearly an important question, but I don’t think that should change what we’re telling people to do at the moment: vaccinate, hand-wash and stay home when you’re sick.”

Earn agreed that more research is needed to pin down the magnitude of the fever-reducing effect on flu spread, but he would not be surprised if it is even slightly higher.

He suggests that if parents give children a fever-reducing medicine for flu, they should be discouraged from visiting older people or those with underlying medical conditions, who are more prone to complications if they contract the infection.

“If they feel better, they might go and sit on Granny’s lap,” he said. “There’s no problem if you take the medication if you stay at home. You can’t infect them.”

Source: yahoo news

Device uses heartbeat to create electrical source in body

Imagine if one day, a person’s heart and other organs could be used to power medical devices in their body that they need to survive.

That day may be closer than you think. Researchers have developed a tin, flexible device that generates electricity when moved. Then, they implanted the item directly on animal hearts, lungs and diaphragms to see if the natural processes of the body could create power.

“If you look at the trends these days, you’re seeing more and more electronic implantable devices,” author John Rogers, director of the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory, said to New Scientist. “I think there’s going to be a growing demand for in-body power.”

The researchers relied on the concept of the piezoelectric effect, which is when electricity is created in certain kinds of solid materials when something puts continuous force on it. In this case, they created nanoribbons made from a piezoelectric-able material called lead zirconate titanate. These nanoribbons were placed on a flexible silicone surface that could be put on an organ and move as it moved.
The researchers found that the best place to put these devices without interfering with the body’s natural processes and movements was on one of the heart’s ventricles. At its best, the device created 0.2 microwatts per square centimeter, which was enough to power an average pacemaker.

While this isn’t the first study to look at this kind of technology, it was the first time it was tested in animals that had organs that were comparable in size to humans. This device can also be stacked on top of each other to create more electrical power if necessary. Rogers said it was a good start but further research needs to be done.

“I think the concept of creating electrical power from motions in internal organs is really interesting,”Rogers said. “The key thing is, if you’re going to do this, you need to be able to achieve efficiency and ultimately power output that is of practical use.”

Their research as published Jan. 20 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Michael McAlpine, a professor of mechanical engineering at Princeton University who was not involved in the research, told The Scientist that the technology is important because it could mean less surgery for people who have battery-powered devices like pacemakers, implantable cardioverter-defibrillators, neural devices and cochlear implants.

“A pacemaker runs off a battery and it’s installed in your body. Every time the battery dies, they actually have to open up your chest to replace the pacemaker completely,” he explained. “If there was some way that you could . . . harvest power from (organ) motion, maybe you could prolong the life of the battery or even replace the battery all together.”

Some experts voiced concern that the device was made out of a lead-based material, and even though it is sealed up, it could leak. However, McAlpine said there are other non-lead based piezoelectric materials that are almost as efficient as lead zirconate titanate, and further research in this area may reveal a better alternative.

“The innovation of this paper is taking what has been done on a small scale and integrating it up to a much more significant scale,” McAlpine.

Source: one news page

Scientists’ one step closer to magic bullet against cancer caused by asbestos

Researchers have come closer to finding a cure for Mesothelioma – a very aggressive cancer associated with asbestos exposure – usually diagnosed in an advanced stage.
In December, the research team of Antonio Giordano, an internationally renowned pathologist, Director and Founder of the Sbarro Health Research Organization in Philadelphia, PA and Professor of Pathology and Oncology at the University of Siena, Italy, published two separate studies aiming to address the urgent need to identify possible new methods for mesothelioma treatment.

In the first study, published in the scientific journal Cell Cycle, Giordano’s researchers tested on mesothelioma cells the effect of two drugs designed to reactivate the p53 protein, one of the most important ‘tumor suppressors’, which is turned off in most human cancers.

Lead author Francesca Pentimalli of the National Cancer Institute of Naples “In mesothelioma, although p53 is rarely mutated, it is inactivated by alterations in its pathway. Both of the drugs used in the study target p53, but with different mechanisms of action. One in particular, called RITA, proved to be very toxic. Specifically, RITA caused mesothelioma cells, and not ‘healthy’ cells, to undergo apoptosis – a type of programmed cell death that occurs through the activation of a specific ‘cascade’ of events.

The second study, published online in Cancer Biology and Therapy and led by Paola Indovina of the University of Siena and the Sbarro Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Medicine, Temple University in Philadelphia, was designed along the same lines as the first study.

In the second study, the authors tested, for the first time in mesothelioma, a new drug called MK-1775 in combination with cisplatin. MK-1775 is a selective inhibitor of WEE1, a protein that is crucial in activating a ‘checkpoint’ for the repair of damaged DNA before the cell starts its division process.

Source: Yahoo news

FDA approves post-natal test to help diagnose developmental delays

The US Food and Drug Administration has authorized for marketing the Affymetrix CytoScan Dx Assay, which can detect chromosomal variations that may be responsible for a child’s developmental delay or intellectual disability. Based on a blood sample, the test can analyse the entire genome at one time and detect large and small chromosomal changes.

According to the National Institutes of Health and the American Academy of Paediatrics, two to three per cent of children in the United States have some form of intellectual disability. Many intellectual and developmental disabilities, such as Down syndrome and DiGeorge syndrome, are associated with chromosomal variations.

“This new tool may help in the identification of possible causes of a child’s developmental delay or intellectual disability, allowing healthcare providers and parents to intervene with appropriate care and support for the child,” said Alberto Gutierrez, director of the Office of In Vitro Diagnostics and Radiological Health in the FDA’s Centre for Devices and Radiological Health. “The FDA’s review of the test provides clinical laboratories with information about the expected performance of the device and the quality of the results.”

The FDA reviewed the Affymetrix CytoScan Dx Assay through its de novo classification process, a regulatory pathway for some novel low-moderate-risk medical devices.

For the de novo petition, the FDA’s review of the CytoScan Dx Assay included an analytical evaluation of the test’s ability to accurately detect numerous chromosomal variations of different types, sizes, and genome locations when compared to several analytically validated test methods. The FDA found that the CytoScan Dx Assay could analyse a patient’s entire genome and adequately detect chromosome variations in regions of the genome associated with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Additionally, the agency’s review included a study that compared the performance of the CytoScan Dx Assay to tests that are commonly used for detecting chromosomal variations associated with a developmental delay or intellectual disability. A comparison of test results from 960 blood specimens showed the CytoScan Dx had improved ability over commonly used tests, including karyotyping and FISH chromosomal tests, to detect certain chromosomal abnormalities.

This device should not be used for stand-alone diagnostic purposes, pre-implantation or prenatal testing or screening, population screening, or for the detection of, or screening for acquired or genetic aberrations occurring after birth, such as cancer. The test results should only be used in conjunction with other clinical and diagnostic findings, consistent with professional standards of practice, including confirmation by alternative methods, evaluation of parental samples, clinical genetic evaluation, and counselling as appropriate, according to a statement issued by the FDA.

Interpretation of test results is intended to be performed only by healthcare professionals who are board certified in clinical cytogenetics or molecular genetics, the statement said.

Affymetrix CytoScan Dx Assay is manufactured by Affymetrix, Inc, located in Santa Clara, California.

Source: India Medical Times