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Alcohol / Addiction / Illegal Drugs News
Benzodiazepine Abuse Treatment Admissions Have Tripled From 1998 To 2008 A new national study shows that from 1998 to 2008 (the most recent year with available figures) substance abuse treatment admissions among those 12 and older related to the abuse of benzodiazepine drugs rose from 22,400 in 1998 to approximately 60,200 in 2008.	09 June 2011

Alzheimer's / Dementia News
Drugs Being Developed To Tackle CJD Could Also Help Prevent Alzheimer's Scientists funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) and Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) have identified two antibodies which could help block the onset of Alzheimer's disease in the brain.	09 June 2011
Dementia More Common In Older African-Caribbean People, Study Shows A UK-study shows dementia is more common in older African-Caribbean people than in White people - and tends to affect African-Caribbean people at a younger age. The study, published online today by the British Journal of Psychiatry, is the largest study of dementia in the UK African-Caribbean population to date.	09 June 2011

Arthritis / Rheumatology News
Approved Biologic Therapies In Rheumatoid Arthritis Show Further Evidence Of Efficacy And Reduction In Joint Damage One of the major annual rheumatology conferences, the European League Against Rheumatism's Congress (EULAR), was held May 25-28 in London. Citeline, Inc., reviewed the trends and highlights from clinical trial results reported at EULAR, noting that approved biologics in rheumatoid arthritis dominated the program, comprising roughly 25% of clinical trial abstracts presented.	09 June 2011
Patients With Osteoarthritis Supplement Prescription Pain Medication With OTCs, UK New research has revealed a fifth (22%) of people with osteoarthritis (OA) supplement their prescription pain medication with over the counter medicines in an attempt to control their OA pain.	09 June 2011

Autism News
Pitt Study Examines Environmental Risk Factors For Childhood Autism The University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health (GSPH) has launched a multi-year study to help identify environmental and other factors that may put children at risk for developing conditions within the autism spectrum disorders (ASDs).	09 June 2011
The Autistic Mind: New Studies Show Spectrum Of Gene Variants Different people with autism can have very different symptoms. Health care providers think of autism as a "spectrum" disorder (ASD), a group of disorders with similar features. One person may have mild symptoms, while another may have serious symptoms.	09 June 2011
Understanding The Role Of Genetic Variants In Autism With autism affecting close to one percent of children in the U.S., the urgency to find some sort of explanation for the disorder has never been greater. This week, three studies published in the 9 June issue of Neuron offer a definitive vindication of the theory that spontaneous, or de novo, genetic mutations underlie the development of autism in many families with no history of the disorder.	09 June 2011
Genes Provide Landmarks On The Roadmap Of Autism Many roads can lead to the same place, often crossing over one another and sometimes passing the same landmarks.The interactome or protein interaction network for autism spectrum disorders developed by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and the Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children's Hospital in collaboration with scientists at the Center for Cancer Systems Biology (CCSB) at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute demonstrates how protein pathways converge, diverge and interact to arrive at the same devastating condition.	09 June 2011
Many Genetic Keys Needed To Unlock Autism Hundreds of small genetic variations are associated with autism spectrum disorders, including an area of DNA that may be a key to understanding why humans are social animals, according to a multi-site collaborative study led by researchers at Yale University.	09 June 2011
Genetic Causation Of ASD Appears To Be Highly Diverse; Thoughts On Why Fewer Girls Have Autism A clinically extensive and mathematically powerful study of 1000 families with one autistic child and one unaffected sibling has validated a controversial theory of autism's complex genetic causation.	09 June 2011

Flu / Cold / SARS News

Pitt Study Shows Inequitable Access To Flu Vaccinations Could Worsen Flu Epidemic Giving wealthier counties greater access to influenza vaccine than poorer counties could worsen a flu epidemic because poor areas have fairly high population densities with higher levels of interaction among households and communities, enabling the infection to spread faster, according to a University of Pittsburgh study.

09 June 2011

Headache / Migraine News
Pressure To Work When Sick Has Long Term Negative Effects Pressure to work through periods of short term sickness (known as "presenteeism") can have long term negative effects on health and productivity, warns an editorial published on bmj.com today.	09 June 2011

Health Insurance / Medical Insurance News
Gender Disparity In Nuclear Stress Test Referrals More women than men are unnecessarily referred for nuclear stress tests Researchers identify gender disparities in the appropriate use of nuclear stress tests More women than men are unnecessarily referred for nuclear stress tests Majority of inappropriate studies ordered by primary care physicians New research from cardiologists at Rhode Island and The Miriam hospitals suggests a possible gender disparity in how patients are referred for nuclear stress tests, an imaging technique that measures blood flow to the heart muscle both at rest and during periods of stress, such as exercise.	09 June 2011
Families USA's Statement On Health Reform Lawsuit Hearing In Atlanta The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit in Atlanta today heard oral arguments in State of Florida v. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, a legal challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.	09 June 2011
AHRQ News And Numbers: Employees' Share Of Health Plan Premium Costs Up Dramatically Employees of private-sector companies contributed up to 121 percent more in 2009 for their yearly share of their employer-sponsored health insurance coverage than they did in 2001, according to the latest News and Numbers from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.	09 June 2011

Heart Disease News
FDA Announces New Limits On High-Dose Simvastatin (Zocor) The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today announced new limitations to the use of high-dose simvastatin, due to the increased risk of muscle pain and weakness (myopathy) and in rare cases, kidney damage and failure.	09 June 2011

IT / Internet / E-mail News
Which Laws Really Do Reduce Distracted Driving? Cell phone distractions account for more than 300,000 car crashes each year. As a result, most states have put laws in place to limit or prohibit the use of mobile devices while driving. But a new study led by Temple University finds a widening gap between the evidence on distracted driving and the laws being passed to address the problem.	09 June 2011
MyCare -- The 'Card' That Could Save Your Life It looks like a credit card...it slips into a wallet or purse...but it could mean the difference between life and death in a medical emergency.The MyCare Card stores personal medical data (e.	09 June 2011

Mental Health News
Benzodiazepine Abuse Treatment Admissions Have Tripled From 1998 To 2008 A new national study shows that from 1998 to 2008 (the most recent year with available figures) substance abuse treatment admissions among those 12 and older related to the abuse of benzodiazepine drugs rose from 22,400 in 1998 to approximately 60,200 in 2008.	09 June 2011
Link Between Childhood Trauma And Higher Rates Of Mental Health Problems New research has shown that children's risk for learning and behavior problems and obesity rises in correlation to their level of trauma exposure, says the psychiatrist at the Stanford University School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital who oversaw the study.	09 June 2011
College Comments On Attitudes To Mental Illness Survey, UK Commenting on the NHS Information Centre's Attitudes to Mental Illness 2011 survey report, Dr Peter Byrne, Director of Public Education at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: "We welcome this well-conducted survey, the results of which can be compared with surveys from previous years.	09 June 2011

Seniors / Aging News
Exercise May Protect The Older Brain From "Silent Strokes" Encouraging older people to engage in moderate to intense exercise may protect their brains from small lesions also known as "silent strokes", according to a new study that appeared online in the journal Neurology this week.	09 June 2011

Sexual Health / STDs News
Following Abortion, Immediate Use Of An IUD Is More Likely To Prevent Unintended Pregnancies Women who receive a contraceptive known as an intrauterine device or IUD immediately following a first trimester abortion experience few complications and are less likely to have an unintended pregnancy than those who delay getting an IUD by several weeks, according to a new study at Oregon Health & Science University.	09 June 2011
Doctors Inquiring About Sexual History Are More Likely To Test Teenage Girls For Infections, Study Finds Teenage girls are almost four times more likely to be tested for sexually transmitted infections (STI) when doctors ask patients with abdominal symptoms about their sexual history during visits to a pediatric emergency department, according to a study by The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.	09 June 2011

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