The long war: A new vaccine will help, but will not defeat malaria

The long war: A new vaccine will help, but will not defeat malaria

Oct 12th 2013 |From the print edition

ON OCTOBER 8th researchers announced progress in developing a vaccine against malaria. GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), a British pharmaceutical firm, said it would seek regulatory approval next year for this vaccine, called RTS,S. GSK and its charitable partner, the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, also revealed new data showing the vaccine’s effect in children. This is good news, but RTS,S will not vanquish malaria by itself. Read more of this post

A Synthetic Heart That Keeps on Ticking; France’s Carmat estimates it will sell the artificial heart for about $218,000

A Synthetic Heart That Keeps on Ticking

By Albertina Torsoli October 10, 2013

France’s Carmat estimates it will sell the artificial heart for about $218,000

More than three decades after doctors successfully implanted a temporary artificial heart, such devices are still used primarily as stopgaps to keep patients alive until they can get a transplant. They can’t save a person whose heart has totally failed. Now French device maker Carmat may be nearing a longer-lasting synthetic heart, the product of an unusual 20-year partnership between a prominent heart surgeon and an arms manufacturer. Read more of this post

High stroke and heart disease link to living close to airports

High stroke and heart disease link to living close to airports

October 11, 2013

Nick Toscano

Aeroplane noise may increase the risk of suffering a stroke or heart attack according to Dr Emma Hansell’s research. 3AW

After 11pm is when they really start to hear it. The recognisable rumble can make for sleepless nights across Keilor and the suburbs near Melbourne Airport, when international planes use the north-south runway to launch and land. ”Even when they’re not flying directly overhead, the noise is noticeably loud,” says Paul Perillo, who has lived in the area for 22 years. ”You know when a plane’s taking off and you know when it’s landing.” Read more of this post

High Bar for Foreign Nurses in Japan

October 10, 2013, 1:45 p.m. ET

High Bar for Foreign Nurses in Japan

ALEXANDER MARTIN

TOKYO—Dewita Tambun wants to become a nurse in Japan, a country with an aging population and a shortage of hospital staff. But the 29-year-old Indonesian first has to battle the country’s tough immigration policy. The biggest obstacle facing Ms. Tambun is a seven-hour, 240-question test in Japanese that only 96 of the 741 nurses brought here from Indonesia and the Philippines in the past five years have passed. Ms. Tambun, who has been in Japan since 2011, has failed the test twice and has one more shot at it in February before being sent home. Read more of this post

Mother Dies Amid Abuses in $110 Billion U.S. Stent Assembly Line; hospitals paid millions in kickbacks to induce doctors to keep up the pace in U.S. medicine’s binge on stents

Mother Dies Amid Abuses in $110 Billion U.S. Stent Assembly Line

Najam Azmat snaked a catheter on a guide wire into Judi Gary’s groin as he tried to insert a stent in an artery supplying blood to her pelvis and right leg. On an X-ray monitor near where Gary lay, nurses saw blood leakages. The wire seemed to be in the wrong place, nurse Evan Gourley told Azmat. Everything was fine, the vascular surgeon replied. It wasn’t. Azmat tore Gary’s aorta during the December 2005 procedure, according to documents filed with a U.S. Justice Department civil complaint. Nurses asked another surgeon to step in. Gourley left in disgust. Later, he went to administrators at Satilla Regional Medical Center in Waycross, Georgia, with a warning about Azmat. “I told them that he will kill a patient if they let him continue to work,” Gourley said. Officials at the Satilla hospital got at least seven similar warnings about Azmat, according to another nurse’s notes. They let him continue. One of his next patients died. Azmat’s tenure at the 231-bed hospital, as described in interviews and more than 1,000 pages of medical records, internal documents and witness statements that were made public last year, shows the extremes one hospital went to in order to keep its catheterization clinic — or “cath lab” — operating and producing revenue. Other hospitals paid millions in kickbacks — using ghost jobs, padded fees, debt forgiveness or discounted office space — to induce doctors to keep up the pace in U.S. medicine’s binge on stents, according to allegations made in five federal cases and three other private whistle-blower lawsuits. Read more of this post

Big Pharma braces for retirement of favorite FDA regulator

Big Pharma braces for retirement of favorite regulator

1:06am EDT

By Toni Clarke

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The retirement of Dr. Janet Woodcock as head of the Food and Drug Administration’s pharmaceutical division is at least a year away, but already the industry she regulates is worrying about who will replace her. Over the past 20 years Woodcock, who is 65, has reshaped the drug approval process, relaxing the criteria needed for certain drugs to reach the market – especially those that represent scientific breakthroughs. Last year, the agency approved 39 new drugs, the most since 1996. Read more of this post

Robot Surgery Damaging Patients Rises With Marketing

Robot Surgery Damaging Patients Rises With Marketing

Porter Adventist Hospital in Denver announced last year that Warren Kortz, a general surgeon on the medical staff, was the first in the Rocky Mountain region to use a technique known as robotic surgery to remove gall bladders through one incision in the belly button. The operation, performed while the doctor sits at a video-game-like console, was “taking advantage of another breakthrough in robotic surgery” and is “easier on the patient,” the hospital said in a press release. Read more of this post

The world’s first malaria vaccine could be available in as little as three years after British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline’s candidate treatment passed a major testing milestone

GSK malaria vaccine could be available in three years

The world’s first malaria vaccine could be available in as little as three years after British drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline’s candidate treatment passed a major testing milestone.

By Denise Roland

12:01AM BST 08 Oct 2013

GSK is ready to take the first step in getting the vaccine to market after promising trial results showing it was effective in protecting children and babies from malaria for up to 18 months. The pharmaceuticals giant plans to submit the vaccine to EU regulators next year, which means, if approved, it could be widely available by 2016. The World Health Organisation has already indicated that a policy recommendation for the vaccine, the most advanced treatment anywhere in the world by at least 10 years, could be made by 2015 if it clears regulatory hurdles. Read more of this post

Why Does Chronic Pain Hurt Some People More? Brain research reveals new clues about the reasons behind different physical reactions among those who suffer injuries.

October 7, 2013, 7:07 p.m. ET

Why Does Chronic Pain Hurt Some People More?

Brain Research Reveals New Clues

SHIRLEY S. WANG

Why does pain from the same type of injury linger in some people but not others? Genetics and brain-based biological factors are the latest frontier of research on chronic pain, along with personality traits, coping strategies and life experiences. The question is a riddle researchers have been trying to solve for decades. Better identifying which injuries may lead to chronic pain, defined as lasting beyond normal healing for at least three months, is hugely important for the 100 million Americans who suffer from it. Lower-back pain is the most common type, with nearly one-third of U.S. adults reporting in 2010 having experienced it within the previous three months, according an Institute of Medicine report on pain. Read more of this post

Scaly Skin as Deadly as Cancer Spurs Psoriasis Treatment

Scaly Skin as Deadly as Cancer Spurs Psoriasis Treatment

Psoriasis, with its patches of itchy, flaky skin, is often nothing more than a benign cosmetic problem. Yet for many people it’s as disabling and life-threatening as rheumatoid arthritis or cancer. These patients often don’t tolerate existing medicines, or see them lose their power over time. Pharmaceutical companies, helped by a new understanding of the biology behind the disease, have developed a new class of drug candidates that may be faster and more effective for the more serious forms of psoriasis. The front runner, Novartis AG (NOVN), said yesterday that its experimental treatment met the main goals of a late-stage study. Read more of this post

Health insurer NIB is set to launch a controversial and long-mooted website that rates and compares health professionals such as dentists, optometrists and chiropractors

NIB to launch healthcare directory

October 4, 2013

Madeleine Heffernan

Health insurer NIB is set to launch a controversial and long-mooted website that rates and compares health professionals such as dentists, optometrists and chiropractors. While previous plans were shouted down by industry bodies, NIB has confirmed that the site – called Whitecoat – will be launched later this year. Whitecoat will provide a directory of healthcare sites, customer service and comparative cost data. It will not cover general practitioners and medical specialists. The Australian Medical Association argues that one person’s bad experience is more likely to be aired than the good experiences of 99 people. Read more of this post

Japanese online store sold drugs whose sell-by date had passed at discounted prices

Online store sold drugs whose sell-by date had passed at discounted prices

KYODO

OCT 4, 2013

An online drugstore was found to have offered for sale in late July through a shopping mall of Yahoo Japan Corp. non-prescription medicines that had passed their expiry dates, and at below market prices, sources familiar with the matter said Thursday. This is the first case of its kind, and came to light as online sales of non-prescription medicines is gaining momentum in the absence of regulations to ensure the safety of drugs sold online. Read more of this post

Critically ill patients who survive a stay in an intensive-care unit, where they are often heavily sedated and ventilated, can find themselves mentally impaired long after release. A new study says the problem is far more common and lasting than previously believed

Updated October 2, 2013, 5:40 p.m. ET

Intensive-Care Units Pose Long-Term Brain Risk, Study Finds

LAURA LANDRO

Critically ill patients who survive a stay in an intensive-care unit, where they are often heavily sedated and ventilated, can find themselves mentally impaired long after release. A new study says the problem is far more common and lasting than previously believed. Nearly 80% of patients with prolonged ICU stays showed cognitive problems a year or more later, and more than half exhibited effects similar to Alzheimer’s disease and traumatic brain injury, according to a report Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine. Read more of this post

ADHD Pill Faces High Hurdle in Europe as Stigma Persists

ADHD Pill Faces High Hurdle in Europe as Stigma Persists

The European debut of a pill to treat children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder faces a major hurdle: convincing people the condition exists. Shire Plc (SHP), the world’s biggest seller of ADHD drugs, has been rolling out the pill, Vyvanse, in eight countries while discussing the prevalence of the illness with doctors at psychiatry conferences around Europe. More than 90 percent of the Dublin-based company’s sales of ADHD drugs come from the U.S., where the illness is diagnosed about 25 times more frequently than in the U.K. Read more of this post

Multiple sclerosis cases hit 2.3 million worldwide

Multiple sclerosis cases hit 2.3 million worldwide

7:03pm EDT

LONDON (Reuters) – The number of people living with multiple sclerosis around the world has increased by 10 percent in the past five years to 2.3 million, according to the most extensive survey of the disease to date. The debilitating neurological condition, which affects twice as many women as men, is found in every region of the world, although prevalence rates vary widely. Read more of this post

Science of Healing the Heart; In a Surprise, a Temporary Device Provides a Long-Term Cure

September 30, 2013, 7:26 p.m. ET

Science of Healing the Heart

In a Surprise, a Temporary Device Provides a Long-Term Cure

RON WINSLOW

Doctors have discovered that a heart pump designed to help keep patients alive until a transplant becomes available may actually help the heart heal itself. WSJ’s Larry Greenberg explains how it could bring new hope to seriously ill patients. (Photo: Getty)

A mechanical pump that was invented as a temporary life support for patients with advanced heart failure is emerging as a potential tool to help hearts heal and function for the long term on their own. The device, called an LVAD, takes over most of the heart’s main pumping function and was designed initially to enable patients to survive until a donor heart became available for transplant. But doctors have discovered to their surprise that the heart can get better on the pump. When they remove it later to perform a transplant, the heart is sometimes dramatically improved. Read more of this post

Stress in Midlife Linked to Higher Risk of Alzheimer’s Disease

Stress in Midlife Linked to Higher Risk of Alzheimer’s Disease

Stress in middle age may contribute to development of Alzheimer’s disease later in life, according to a Swedish study spanning almost 40 years. Psychological stress was associated with a 21 percent greater risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, according to a study of 800 Swedish women born between 1914 and 1930 who underwent neuropsychiatric tests periodically between 1968 and 2005. The research, led by Lena Johansson at the Sahlgrenska Academy at the University of Gothenburg was published today in the journal BMJ Open. Read more of this post

How new cancer drugs can skip randomized trials

How new cancer drugs can skip randomized trials

5:13am EDT

By Julie Steenhuysen and Ben Hirschler

CHICAGO/LONDON (Reuters) – In 2006 when doctors started testing a melanoma treatment made by Roche Holding AG on patients, they were used to facing slim odds – about one in eight – that the tumors would shrink on chemotherapy. This time, they couldn’t believe their eyes. With Zelboraf, a drug that targets specific mutations in cancer cells, eight out of 10 patients in an early-stage trial experienced significant tumor shrinkage. Roche clearly had a remarkable drug, though it only worked for people with a specific genetic makeup. Read more of this post

Roche immunotherapy drug may be ‘game changer’ in lung cancer

Roche immunotherapy drug may be ‘game changer’ in lung cancer

5:34am EDT

By Kate Kelland

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – An experimental Roche drug that seems to work particularly well against lung cancer in smokers may be a “game changer” for these normally difficult-to-treat patients, researchers said on Sunday. Presenting detailed data from an early-stage trial of the drug, called MPDL3280A, in patients with a form of the disease called non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), investigators said what they had found was “great news for lung cancer patients”. Read more of this post

Eating Fish Among Habits to Cut Prostate-Cancer Risk

Eating Fish Among Habits to Cut Prostate-Cancer Risk

A set of six healthy habits, including eating more tomatoes and less processed red meat, helped men reduce their risk of dying from prostate cancer, a study found.

Researchers analyzed information gathered from almost 46,000 men for 25 years and found that those who adopted five or six of the habits had a 39 percent lower risk of developing lethal prostate cancer than those who adopted one or none of the habits, according to the results presented at the European Cancer Congress in Amsterdam yesterday. In another study involving more than 21,000 men, the risk reduction was 47 percent. Read more of this post

The Enigma of Chinese Medicine; If a system of medical treatment practiced for thousands of years can’t meet Western scientific standards, should it be dismissed?

SEPTEMBER 28, 2013, 3:00 PM

The Enigma of Chinese Medicine

By STEPHEN T. ASMA

A few years ago, while visiting Beijing, I caught a cold. My wife, who is Chinese, and wanted me to feel better, took me to a local restaurant. After we sat down, she ordered a live turtle. The proprietors sent it over. I startled as the waiters unceremoniously cut the turtle’s throat, then poured its blood into a glass. To this frightening prospect, they added a shot of baijiu, very strong grain alcohol. The proprietor and waiters, now tableside, gestured with obvious pride for me to drink the potent medicine. I winced, found the courage, and drank up. Read more of this post

Urine Spills Staining Image of Wockhardt’s Generic Drugs

Urine Spills Staining Image of Wockhardt’s Generic Drugs

The Indian factory that makes copies of a popular heart pill sold in the U.S. turns out to be a jumble of dilapidated buildings with blighted windows connected by flaking pipes and capped by a rusty roof. When U.S. Food and Drug Administration inspectors visited the Wockhardt Ltd. (WPL) plant that produces generic copies of the heart tablet Toprol-XL in July, they found urine spilling over open drains, soiled uniforms and mold growing in a raw-material storage area. They summarized their findings in a filing obtained by Bloomberg via a Freedom of Information Act request. Read more of this post

Abbott Labs’ Dissolving Heart Stent Helps Improve Recovery

Abbott Labs’ Dissolving Heart Stent Helps Improve Recovery

By Michelle Fay Cortez September 26, 2013

Innovator: John Capek
Age: 51
Title: Executive vice president, medical devices, Abbott Laboratories (ABT)

Form and function: A stent the size of a ballpoint pen’s spring, delicate enough to hold a cardiac artery open after surgery. It dissolves in the body, enabling more natural recovery without the threat of long-term damage from a standard metal stent.