Dopamine Neuron Discovery Might Revolutionize Parkinson’s Treatments

Northwestern University researchers say they have identified the neurochemical signal likely missing in Parkinson’s disease. They reportedly discovered two distinctly different kinds of neurons that deliver dopamine to an important brain region responsible for both movement and learning/reward behavior.

“It has been dogma for decades that all dopamine neurons are somehow involved in both movement and reward, but this didn’t really make sense,” said Daniel A. Dombeck, Ph.D., the study’s senior author. “Now, it is so obvious in our recordings that there are different kinds of neurons. We can literally see this in behaving animals. Our findings will likely help answer many questions about Parkinson’s disease and other neurological mysteries.”

Read more: Dopamine Neuron Discovery Might Revolutionize Parkinson’s Treatments

Source: genengnews

Could Magnesium Regulate Blood Pressure?

A round one third of adults in the United States have high blood pressure, only half of whom have their high blood pressure under control. New research, published in the American Heart Association's journal Hypertension, identifies magnesium as a potential remedy.

With high blood pressure affecting around 70 million people in the U.S. and increasing the risk of two of the leading causes of death for Americans - heart disease and stroke - preventing or controlling blood pressure is an essential healthcare objective.

Labeled the "silent killer," due to often having no warning signs or symptoms, high blood pressure is a common and often dangerous condition.

A meta-analysis, funded by the Indiana University School of Medicine Strategic Research Initiative, details positive results that show an association between a daily intake of magnesium and a reduction in blood pressure.

Magnesium is already recognized as essential for over 300 biochemical reactions in the body.

Read more: Could Magnesium Regulate Blood Pressure?

A healthy diet rich in green leafy vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, and whole grains could lower
blood pressure.

Source: medicalnewstoday

Are Vitamin Supplements for Pregnant Women a Waste of Money?

It is essential that an expectant mother receives adequate nutrition to promote the healthy development of her unborn child. To this end, the market is awash with maternal vitamin supplements. A new review asks whether these pills are as necessary as they claim to be.

Maternal deficiency of certain nutrients has been linked to a number of negative health consequences for mother and child.

Risks include restricted fetal growth, low birth weight, skeletal deformities, and pre-eclampsia.

These well-known dangers support a huge vitamin, mineral, and micronutrient industry aimed at pregnant women.

Typically, these tablets will contain 20 or more vitamins and minerals, often including a range of B vitamins, C, D, E, K, iodine, folic acid, magnesium, zinc, selenium, and copper.

Read more: Are Vitamin Supplements for Pregnant Women a Waste of Money?

Are pregnancy supplements as essential to maternal health as they claim to be?

Source: medicalnewstoday

Subclinical Hypothyroidism in Childhood — Current Knowledge and Open Issues

Subclinical hypothyroidism is defined as serum levels of TSH above the upper limit of the reference range, in the presence of normal concentrations of total T4 or free T4. This biochemical profile might be an indication of mild hypothyroidism, with a potential increased risk of metabolic abnormalities and cardiovascular disease recorded among adults. Whether subclinical hypothyroidism results in adverse health outcomes among children is a matter of debate and so management of this condition remains challenging. Mild forms of untreated subclinical hypothyroidism do not seem to be associated with impairments in growth, bone health or neurocognitive outcome. However, ongoing scientific investigations have highlighted the presence of subtle proatherogenic abnormalities among children with modest elevations in their TSH levels. Although current findings are insufficient to recommend levothyroxine treatment for all children with mild asymptomatic forms of subclinical hypothyroidism, they highlight the potential need for assessment of cardiovascular risk among children with this condition. Increased understanding of the early metabolic risk factors associated with subclinical hypothyroidism in childhood will help to improve the management of affected individuals.

Key points

• Subclinical hypothyroidism among children is often a benign and remitting condition, for which risk of progression to overt hypothyroidism depends on the underlying cause (for example, autoimmune disease)
• The optimum management of children with subclinical hypothyroidism depends on the aetiology and degree of TSH elevation and should be individually tailored
• The benefits of levothyroxine therapy are clear for the severe forms of subclinical hypothyroidism; however, uncertainty about this approach still exists for the mild forms of the condition
• In the absence of therapeutic intervention, clinical evaluation and thyroid function tests should be regularly performed to ensure early identification of children who might benefit from treatment
• Growth and neurocognitive outcomes do not seem to be affected in mild subclinical hypothyroidism; however, subtle proatherogenic abnormalities have been detected among children with modest elevations of TSH concentration
• Cardiovascular risk assessment among children and adolescents with subclinical hypothyroidism could help to prevent cardiovascular disease in adulthood

Read more: Subclinical Hypothyroidism in Childhood — Current Knowledge and Open Issues

Source: NatureReviewsEndocrinology

What is an Inguinal Hernia?

The abdominal cavity is the large hollow space in the body that contains many important organs such as the stomach and liver. An inguinal hernia occurs when part of the abdominal cavity pushes into an area of the body called the inguinal canal.

There are two inguinal canals in the body, one on either side of the groin. Different structures of the body pass through the inguinal canal depending on the person's gender.

In men, the spermatic cord passes through the canal and connects to the testicles. In women, round ligaments that support the uterus pass through the canal.

An inguinal hernia usually affects either the small intestine or the fatty tissue in the abdomen.

Read more: What is an Inguinal Hernia?

Around a quarter of men will have an inguinal hernia at some point in their lives.
Incarcerated or strangulated hernias can cause extreme pain, nausea, and vomiting. 
The only available treatment for an inguinal hernia is surgery.

Source: medicalnewstoday

How Will You Feel During HIV Treatment?

Current combinations of HIV medications have changed the nature of HIV from a terminal illness to one that allows you to live out a nearly normal life. Yet the powerful antiretroviral drugs that help control the virus are known to cause side effects once you start treatment.

Not everyone is affected the same way by the same drugs. You might find the side effects are mild and go away in a few weeks, once your body adapts to the new chemicals. Nausea, diarrhea, and headaches tend to lessen after a month or so.

Read more: How Will You Feel During HIV Treatment?

Source: healthguides

Funny Picture 14: "I Could Only Pronounce You Cured"

Source: medicalnewstoday

See more funny pics!

The Pathophysiology of Defective Proteostasis in the Hypothalamus — From Obesity to Ageing

Hypothalamic dysfunction has emerged as an important mechanism involved in the development of obesity and its comorbidities, as well as in the process of ageing and age-related diseases, such as type 2 diabetes mellitus, hypertension and Alzheimer disease. In both obesity and ageing, inflammatory signalling is thought to coordinate many of the cellular events that lead to hypothalamic neuronal dysfunction. This process is triggered by the activation of signalling via the toll-like receptor 4 pathway and endoplasmic reticulum stress, which in turn results in intracellular inflammatory signalling. However, the process that connects inflammation with neuronal dysfunction is complex and includes several regulatory mechanisms that ultimately control the homeostasis of intracellular proteins and organelles (also known as 'proteostasis'). This Review discusses the evidence for the key role of proteostasis in the control of hypothalamic neurons and the involvement of this process in regulating whole-body energy homeostasis and lifespan.

Key points

• Specialized neurons of the hypothalamus control caloric intake and energy expenditure in response to hormonal, nutritional and neural signals that reflect the energy stores in the body
• Malfunction of the hypothalamus occurs in obesity and ageing, which leads to an imbalance between caloric intake and energy expenditure resulting in positive energy balance and reduced lifespan
• The excessive consumption of certain nutrients and ageing affect different aspects of proteostasis in selected neurons of the hypothalamus, contributing to neuronal dysfunction in obesity and ageing
• Inflammation is one of the most important outcomes of disturbed proteostasis to occur in the hypothalamus during obesity and ageing
• Several genetic and pharmacological approaches used to correct the defects of proteostasis and reduce inflammation have proven effective in reducing obesity and increasing lifespan in experimental models

Read more: The Pathophysiology of Defective Proteostasis in the Hypothalamus — From Obesity to Ageing

Figure 1: Control of energy balance and lifespan by the hypothalamic network. Neurons of the
medium hypothalamus respond to systemic signals of whole-body energy status. Blood levels of
insulin fluctuate acutely in response to carbohydrates present in food and chronically in response
to increased adiposity.

Source: Nature Reviews Endocrinology

What’s the point of the PhD thesis?

Doctoral courses are slowly being modernized. Now the thesis and viva need to catch up.

On the morning of Tom Marshall's PhD defence, he put on the suit he had bought for the occasion and climbed onto the stage in front of a 50-strong audience, including his parents and 6 examiners. He gave a 15-minute-long presentation, then faced an hour of cross-examination about his past 5 years of neuroscience research at the Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. A lot was at stake: this oral examination would determine whether he passed or failed. “At the one-hour mark someone came in, banged a stick on the floor and said 'hora est',” says Marshall — the ceremonial call that his time was up. “But I couldn't. I had enjoyed the whole experience far too much, and ended up talking for a few extra minutes.”

Marshall's elaborate, public PhD assessment is very different from that faced by Kelsie Long, an Earth-sciences PhD candidate at the Australian National University (ANU) in Canberra. Her PhD will be assessed solely on her written thesis, which will be mailed off to examiners and returned with comments. She will do a public presentation of her work later this year, but it won't affect her final result. “It almost feels like a rite of passage,” she says.

Read more: What’s the point of the PhD thesis?

Source: nature

Viral Hepatitis Has Become a Leading Global Killer

Compared with most other communicable diseases, hepatitis has risen in global importance since the 1990s. It is now a leading cause of death and disability worldwide and kills at least as many people as tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, or malaria.

This is the main finding of an international study - led by Imperial College London in the United Kingdom and the University of Washington in Seattle - published in The Lancet.

The study - which analyzes data from 1990-2013 on 183 countries - is timely, as the World Health Organization (WHO) launch a major new effort to tackle viral hepatitis.

The findings should prove of "crucial importance to global health policy," note the authors.

Read more: Viral Hepatitis Has Become a Leading Global Killer

At 1.45 million deaths a year, viral hepatitis now ranks among the world'sleading
infectious diseases - such as TB, AIDS/HIV, and malaria.

Source: medicalnewstoday