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Access to preventive care by immigrant populations
Mark FORT Harris BMC Medicine 2012, 10:55 (31 May 2012)
Abstract | Provisional PDF
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Editor’s summary
Mark Harris comments on a recent study in International Journal for Equity in Health, which reports US immigrants suffer disparities in access to health services such as cholesterol screening, and discusses the importance of changing this situation to benefit the long-term outcomes of immigrant health status.
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Effects of phlebotomy-induced reduction of body iron stores on metabolic syndrome: Results from a randomized clinical trial
Khosrow S Houschyar, Rainer Ludtke, Gustav J Dobos, Ulrich Kalus, Martina Brocker-Preuss, Thomas Rampp, Benno Brinkhaus, Andreas Michalsen BMC Medicine 2012, 10:54 (30 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Iron reduction by phlebotomy lowers blood pressure and increases insulin sensitivity in patients with metabolic syndrome, suggesting that blood donation can benefit these people by reducing the risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
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Back to past leeches: repeated phlebotomies and cardiovascular risk
Melania Manco, Jose MANUEL Fernandez-Real BMC Medicine 2012, 10:53 (30 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Manco and Fernandez-Real comment on a BMC Medicine study showing that phlebotomy reduces cardiovascular risk in patients with metabolic syndrome, and discuss how the findings could benefit obese people, as well as lead to increased blood donations.
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Statistical challenges in the development and evaluation of marker-based clinical tests
Lisa M McShane BMC Medicine 2012, 10:52 (29 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Translation of tissue specific markers into clinically useful marker-based tests for diagnosis and prognosis faces many statistical challenges; Lisa McShane discusses these, noting that statistical evaluation is essential in test development.
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Reporting recommendations for tumor marker prognostic studies (REMARK): explanation and elaboration
Douglas G Altman, Lisa M McShane, Willi Sauerbrei, Sheila E Taube BMC Medicine 2012, 10:51 (29 May 2012)
Abstract | Full text | PDF | PubMed | Cited on BioMed Central
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Editor’s summary
Altman et al. address the lack of consistency and clarity in reporting of prognostic tumor markers by elaborating the Reporting Recommendations for Tumor Marker Prognostic Studies (REMARK) checklist, providing a useful resource for researchers.
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New insights into the health effects of dietary saturated and omega-6 and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids
Michel DE Lorgeril, Patricia Salen BMC Medicine 2012, 10:50 (21 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
de Lorgeril and Salen review recent findings on the effects of different types of dietary fats on cardiovascular disease and cancer, concluding that low intake of omega-6 reduces disease risk due to its link with breast cancer.
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Common variants in mismatch repair genes associated with increased risk of sperm DNA damage and male infertility
Guixiang Ji, Aihua Gu, Yan Long, Yong Zhou, Cong Huang, Xinru Wang BMC Medicine 2012, 10:49 (17 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Single nucleotide polymorphisms in mismatch repair (MMR) genes are associated with sperm deficiency, and patients with MMR variants and normal sperm levels have increased sperm DNA damage, revealing new genetic risk factors for male infertility.
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Novel regulatory therapies for prevention of Graft-versus-host disease
Joseph Leventhal, Yiming Huang, Hong Xu, Idona Goode, Suzanne T Ildstad BMC Medicine 2012, 10:48 (15 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Complications arising during allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation include onset of graft-versus-host disease (GVHD); here Joseph Leventhal et al. review the promising advances made with cell-based therapies which can potentially prevent GVHD and promote engraftment.
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Lifestyle interventions for overweight and obese pregnant women to improve pregnancy outcome: systematic review and meta-analysis
Eugene Oteng-Ntim, Rajesh Varma, Helen Croker, Lucilla Poston, Pat Doyle BMC Medicine 2012, 10:47 (10 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Evidence from a systematic review and meta-analysis suggests that lifestyle intervention during pregnancy can reduce the risk of gestational diabetes and weight gain in obese women, highlighting the importance of intervention at this crucial time.
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The regulation of mobile health applications
Amy J Barton BMC Medicine 2012, 10:46 (8 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Medical applications on mobile phones are increasingly being used, and some are associated with safety concerns; Amy Barton comments on the regulation of mobile heath applications by the FDA, and discusses implications for the future.
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Lifestyle factors affecting gastroesophageal reflux disease symptoms: a cross-sectional study of healthy 19864 adults using FSSG scores
Nobutake Yamamichi, Satoshi Mochizuki, Itsuko Asada-Hirayama, Rie Mikami-Matsuda, Takeshi Shimamoto, Maki Konno-Shimizu, Yu Takahashi, Chihiro Takeuchi, Keiko Niimi, Satoshi Ono, Shinya Kodashima, Chihiro Minatsuki, Mitsuhiro Fujishiro, Toru Mitsushima, Kazuhiko Koike BMC Medicine 2012, 10:45 (3 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
A large scale study finds that lifestyle factors such as sleep and diet correlate with gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) symptoms, which cannot be fully relieved by drugs, so changing daily activities could reduce the severity of GERD.
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Stem cells and other innovative intra-articular therapies for osteoarthritis: what does the future hold?
Jasvinder A Singh BMC Medicine 2012, 10:44 (2 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Jasvinder Singh discusses emerging novel therapies for osteoarthritis (OA), and comments on clinical implications of a recent study in BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, where injected stem cells had reparative effects on damaged cartilage in an animal model of OA.
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A new analysis approach of epidermal growth factor receptor pathway activation patterns provides insights into cetuximab resistance mechanisms in head and neck cancer
Silvia von der Heyde, Tim Beissbarth BMC Medicine 2012, 10:43 (1 May 2012)
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Editor’s summary
A new method published in BMC Genomics identifies gene expression changes downstream of EGFR; von der Heyde and Beissbarth comment on the importance of this method to identify changes associated with cetuximab resistance in head and neck cancer.
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New race and ethnicity standards: elucidating health disparities in diabetes
Peter T Katzmarzyk, Amanda E Staiano BMC Medicine 2012, 10:42 (30 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Katzmarzyk and Staiano comment on the association of race and ethnicity with disease-related mortality rates, and discuss how the updated classifications for race and ethnicity in the U.S. will attempt to address these health disparities in relation to diseases such as diabetes.
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The role of nutrition in integrated programs to control neglected tropical diseases
Andrew Hall, Yaobi Zhang, Chad MacArthur, Shawn Baker BMC Medicine 2012, 10:41 (25 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) are prevalent in malnourished populations and are exacerbated by undernutrition; Andrew Hall and colleagues propose that the efficacy of NTD control programs can be increased by including nutritional interventions.
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Mitochondrial aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH2) protects against streptozotocin-induced diabetic cardiomyopathy: role of GSK3β and mitochondrial function
Yingmei Zhang, Sara A Babcock, Nan Hu, Jacalyn R Maris, Haichang Wang, Jun Ren BMC Medicine 2012, 10:40 (23 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Mitochondrial aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH2) protects against diabetes-induced cardiovascular disease (CVD) by regulating mitochondrial function and GSK3β signaling, providing therapeutic promise in the management of diabetic complications.
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Bioinformatic identification of proteins with tissue-specific expression for biomarker discovery
Ioannis Prassas, Caitlin C Chrystoja, Shalini Makawita, Eleftherios P Diamandis BMC Medicine 2012, 10:39 (19 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
A novel bioinformatics strategy that mines publicly available databases identifies tissue-specific proteins that are candidates for cancer serum biomarkers, overcoming the limitations of current biomarkers, which lack tissue specificity.
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Does the oxytocin receptor (OXTR) polymorphism (rs2254298) confer "vulnerability" for psychopathology or "differential susceptibility"? Insights from evolution
Martin Brune BMC Medicine 2012, 10:38 (17 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Martin Brune discusses gene-environment interactions as applied to psychiatric conditions, and contrasts it with the diathesis-stress perspective on environmental effects, thus exploring these implications with regard to polymorphisms.
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Differential susceptibility to plasticity: a 'missing link' between gene-culture co-evolution and neuropsychiatric spectrum disorders?
Rachel Wurzman, James Giordano BMC Medicine 2012, 10:37 (17 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Rachel Wurzman and James Giordano comment on Brunes concept of how genetic plasticity can be influenced by the environment, and explain how this hypothesis may provide new avenues for psychiatric research.
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Evidence that an APOE ε4 'double whammy' increases risk for Alzheimer's disease
Ina Caesar, Sam Gandy BMC Medicine 2012, 10:36 (13 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
The role of APOE alleles, associated with varying risks of Alzheimer's Disease (AD), have been recently evaluated, and the genotype epsilon4,4 seems to be a particular burden; Caesar and Gandy discuss how this study may inform AD pathogenesis.
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Apolipoprotein epsilon 3 alleles are associated with indicators of neuronal resilience
Orwa Aboud, Robert E Mrak, Frederick Boop, Sue T Griffin BMC Medicine 2012, 10:35 (13 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
In tissue from epilepsy patients, which is used to avoid confounding factors of studying Alzheimer's disease (AD) tissue, expression of APOE epsilon3,3 genotype provides neuronal protection compared with 4,4 genotype, reducing the risk of AD.
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Novel therapeutic strategies targeting HIV integrase
Peter K Quashie, Richard D Sloan, Mark A Wainberg BMC Medicine 2012, 10:34 (12 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Replication of HIV can be inhibited by viral integrase enzyme inhibitors, and the therapeutic potential of these compounds, as well as the development of novel antiviral drugs are reviewed here by Mark A Wainberg and colleagues.
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Comparative effectiveness of antihypertensive medication for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease: systematic review and multiple treatments meta-analysis
Atle Fretheim, Jan Odgaard-Jensen, Odd Brørs, Steinar Madsen, Inger Njølstad, Ole F Norheim, Arne Svilaas, Ivar S Kristiansen, Hanne Thürmer, Signe Flottorp BMC Medicine 2012, 10:33 (5 April 2012)
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Editor’s summary
In the primary prevention of cardiovascular disease (CVD), there is little difference between the effectiveness of various commonly used antihypertensive drugs in people at risk of CVD, according to a recent systematic review and meta-analysis.
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Crosstalk between HIV and hepatitis C virus during co-infection
Paul J Rider, Fenyong Liu BMC Medicine 2012, 10:32 (3 April 2012)
Abstract | Full text | PDF | PubMed
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Editor’s summary
Rider and Liu comment on research in BMC Immunology about enhanced replication of hepatitis C virus (HCV) by the tat protein of HIV-1, and discuss how these findings can lead to better treatment strategies in co-infected patients, and so prevent progress of HCV-related liver disease.
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Viral hemorrhagic fevers: advancing the level of treatment
Giuseppe Ippolito, Heinz Feldmann, Simone Lanini, Francesco Vairo, Antonino Di Caro, Maria Capobianchi, Emanuele Nicastri BMC Medicine 2012, 10:31 (29 March 2012)
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Editor’s summary
Giuseppe Ippolito et al. propose clinical management of viral hemorrhagic fevers (VHFs) should develop beyond simple infection control, and focus on early diagnosis and intervention to improve outcome of patients suffering from this life-threatening disease.
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