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Love Your Heart: New NHLBI Resource Helps Women Reduce Heart Disease Risk - April 27, 2007
4/27/2007
A must read for women who want to show their hearts some love, “The Healthy Heart Handbook for Women” is an invaluable and easy-to-use resource every woman should read from cover to cover. A full-color, 122-page booklet from The Heart Truth campaign, it is packed with the latest information on preventing and controlling the risk factors for heart disease — the No.1 killer of women.

NIDA Experts to Discuss Latest Science on Stimulant Abuse at ASAM Annual Scientific Meeting - April 25, 2007
4/25/2007
The National institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health, will present a full day symposium on the epidemiology of stimulant abuse and treatment as part of the 38th Annual Medical-Scientific Conference of the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM).

NIH Launches We Can! City Program - April 25, 2007
4/25/2007
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has established the We Can! City Program to assist towns and cities across the nation in mobilizing their communities to prevent childhood overweight. We Can! (Ways to Enhance Children’s Activity and Nutrition) is a national education program developed by the NIH, a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, to help youth ages 8-13 maintain a healthy weight.

Cortex Area Thinner in Youth with Alzheimer’s-Related Gene - April 23, 2007
4/24/2007
A part of the brain first affected by Alzheimer’s disease (http://www.nia.nih.gov/Alzheimers/) is thinner in youth with a risk gene for the disorder, a brain imaging study by researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), one of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has found. A thinner entorhinal cortex, a structure in the lower middle part of the brain’s outer mantle, may render these youth more susceptible to degenerative changes and mental decline later in life, propose Drs. Philip Shaw, Judith Rapoport, Jay Giedd, and NIMH and McGill University colleagues.

NIDCD Director to Be Named First Recipient of International Scientific Organization’s Distinguished Service Award - April 24, 2007
4/24/2007
James F. Battey, Jr., M.D., Ph.D., director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), one of the National Institutes of Health, will be the first recipient of the Distinguished Service Award from the Association for Chemoreception Sciences (AChemS), an international body of scientists that advances understanding of the senses of taste and smell.

Salivary Diagnostic Device Shows Promise - April 11, 2007
4/12/2007
Researchers supported by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR), part of the National Institutes of Health, have engineered a portable, phone-sized test that in minutes measures proteins in saliva that may indicate a developing disease in the mouth or possibly elsewhere in the body.

Gleevec Decreases Cancer Recurrence for Patients with Primary Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumor - April 12, 2007
4/12/2007
Preliminary results from a large, randomized, placebo-controlled clinical trial for patients with primary gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST), a type of tumor usually found in the stomach or small intestine, showed that patients who received imatinib mesylate (Gleevec ®) after complete removal of their tumor were significantly less likely to have a recurrence of their cancer compared to those who did not receive imatinib.

Analysis of Rhesus Monkey Genome Uncovers Genetic Differences With Humans, Chimps - April 12, 2007
4/12/2007
An international consortium of researchers has published the genome sequence of the rhesus macaque monkey and aligned it with the chimpanzee and human genomes. Published April 13 in a special section of the journal Science, the analysis reveals that the three primate species share about 93 percent of their DNA, yet have some significant differences among their genes.

Scientists Implicate Gene in Vitiligo and Other Autoimmune Diseases - April 10, 2007
4/11/2007
In a study appearing in the March 22 New England Journal of Medicine, scientists supported by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) have discovered a connection between a specific gene and the inflammatory skin condition vitiligo, as well as a possible host of autoimmune diseases.

NIH Director’s Council of Public Representatives Welcomes Four New Members - April 10, 2007
4/11/2007
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has selected four individuals to serve as members of the Director’s Council of Public Representatives (COPR), an advisory committee to the NIH Director on issues of public importance.

Tai Chi Boosts Immunity to Shingles Virus in Older Adults, NIH-Sponsored Study Reports - April 6, 2007
4/7/2007
Tai Chi, a traditional Chinese form of exercise, may help older adults avoid getting shingles by increasing immunity to varicella-zoster virus (VZV) and boosting the immune response to varicella vaccine in older adults, according to a new study published in print this week in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society. This National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded study is the first rigorous clinical trial to suggest that a behavioral intervention, alone or in combination with a vaccine, can help protect older adults from VZV, which causes both chickenpox and shingles.

Researchers Identify Gene Involved in Dog Size - April 5, 2007
4/6/2007
An international team led by researchers from the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has identified a genetic variant that is a major contributor to small size in dogs. The findings appear in the April 6, 2007 issue of the journal Science.

Computer-Aided Detection Reduces the Accuracy of Mammograms - April 5, 2007
4/6/2007
Computer-Aided Detection (CAD) that uses software designed to improve how radiologists interpret mammograms may instead make readings less accurate, according to new research. Use of CAD did not clearly improve the detection of breast cancer. The research was conducted by investigators at the University of California Davis Health System, Sacramento, Calif., and colleagues in the Breast Cancer Surveillance Consortium, which is sponsored by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health.

Low-dose Steroid Combined with Lenalidomide Prolongs Survival Compared with High-dose Steroid for Multiple Myeloma Treatment - April 4, 2007
4/5/2007
Preliminary results from a large, randomized clinical trial for patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma, a cancer typically found in bone marrow, has shown that the use of a low dose of the steroid dexamethasone (Decadron ®), in combination with lenalidomide (Revlimid ®) is associated with improved survival when compared to a treatment regimen with lenalidomide and a higher, standard dose of dexamethasone. The clinical trial was sponsored by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, and conducted by a network of researchers led by the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG).

NIDA Meeting to Look at Drug-Impaired Decision-Making and HIV Transmission - April 4, 2007
4/5/2007
The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), is holding a two day meeting to explore wide-ranging issues related to drug abuse, impaired decision making, and HIV/AIDS. Drug Abuse and Risky Behaviors: The Evolving Dynamics of HIV/AIDS will provide a broad understanding of the multiple ways that drug abuse and addiction affect the spread of HIV/AIDS and how research can inform public health policy.

Effect of Hormone Therapy on Risk of Heart Disease May Vary by Age and Years Since Menopause - April 3, 2007
4/4/2007
Secondary analyses of findings from the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) suggest that women who begin hormone therapy within 10 years of menopause may have less risk of coronary heart disease (CHD) due to hormone therapy than women farther from menopause. Overall, hormone therapy did not reduce the risk of CHD. However, the farther a woman was from the onset of menopause when she began hormone therapy, the greater her risk of CHD due to hormone therapy appeared to be. Although these findings did not meet statistical significance, they suggest that the health consequences of hormone therapy may vary by time from menopause.

National Cancer Institute Hosts Symposium on Chromosome Biology - April 3, 2007
4/4/2007
Leading researchers from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and around the world will present highlights of recent advances, define novel directions of basic chromosome research, and discuss the use and implications of these advances for clinical applications.

NIDA-Supported Study Shows Significant Association between Smoking, Mental Disorders in Pregnant Women - April 3, 2007
4/4/2007
New research has identified an association between mental disorders and nicotine dependence among pregnant women in the United States, not unlike what has been reported in the general population. The presence of these mental disorders in nicotine addicted pregnant women may make quitting smoking more difficult. Published in the April 2007 issue of Obstetrics and Gynecology, this study was supported in part by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health.

NIH and Institut Pasteur Extend Collaboration Agreement for HIV-1 Diagnostics - April 3, 2007
4/4/2007
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and Institut Pasteur (IP), a private non-profit foundation, announced today an agreement to extend their long-standing collaboration in health research and the management of inventions arising from this research. These two institutions have been leaders and collaborators in the field of HIV/AIDS research for more than 20 years.

Rapid Response was Crucial to Containing the 1918 Flu Pandemic - April 2, 2007
4/4/2007
One of the persistent riddles of the deadly 1918 Spanish influenza pandemic is why it struck different cities with varying severity. Why were some municipalities such as St. Louis spared the fate of the hard-hit cities like Philadelphia when both implemented similar public health measures? What made the difference, according to two independent studies funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), was not only how but also how rapidly different cities responded.

Barbara Alving Named Director of NIH’s National Center for Research Resources - April 2, 2007
4/4/2007
NIH Director Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D. has named Barbara Alving, M.D. to be the director of the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR). As Acting Director of NCRR, Alving has overseen the launch of the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) program—a new national consortium of academic health centers that will transform the conduct of clinical and translational research to ensure that biomedical discoveries are rapidly translated into prevention strategies and clinical treatments for rare and common diseases.

Griffin P. Rodgers, M.D., Named Director of NIH’s National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases - April 2, 2007
4/4/2007
Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D., director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today announced the appointment of Griffin P. Rodgers, M.D., as director of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), effective April 1, 2007.

Intensive Psychotherapy More Effective Than Brief Therapy for Treating Bipolar Depression - April 2, 2007
4/3/2007
Patients taking medications to treat bipolar disorder (http://www.nimh.nih.gov/healthinformation/bipolarmenu.cfm) are more likely to get well faster and stay well if they receive intensive psychotherapy, according to results from the Systematic Treatment Enhancement Program for Bipolar Disorder (STEP-BD), funded by the National Institutes of Health’s (NIH) National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).

NIAID Expands Capability for Influenza Research and Surveillance - April 2, 2007
4/3/2007
The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), today announced it is awarding $23 million per year for seven years to establish six Centers of Excellence for Influenza Research and Surveillance.

NIDA Study Identifies Genes That Might Help Some People Abstain From Smoking - April 2, 2007
4/3/2007
Scientists supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health, have for the first time identified genes that might increase a person’s ability to abstain from smoking. The breakthrough research was conducted by Dr. George Uhl at NIDA’s Intramural Research Program and a team led by Dr. Jed Rose at the Center for Nicotine and Smoking Cessation Research at Duke University Medical Center.

NIDA Survey Shows Lack of Substance Abuse Treatment Options for Offenders - April 2, 2007
4/3/2007
Substance abuse treatment services for offenders are not widely available in all phases of the correctional system, according to the first set of findings from a national survey funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Researchers Discover a Common Variation in a Gene Segment that Increases the Risk for Prostate Cancer - April 1, 2007
4/3/2007
Researchers report that a variation in a portion of DNA strongly predicts prostate cancer risk and that this common variation may be responsible for up to 20 percent of prostate cancer cases in white men in the United States. The research was conducted by investigators from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, and their partners in the Cancer Genetic Markers of Susceptibility (CGEMS) initiative.

Immunosuppressant Drug Prevents Tobacco Induced Lung Cancer in Mice - April 1, 2007
4/3/2007
Rapamycin, an FDA-approved drug normally used to help prevent the body from rejecting organ and bone marrow transplants and also used to coat cardiac stents, was highly effective in preventing the development of tobacco-related lung tumors in mice. In a study published in the April 1, 2007 issue of Clinical Cancer Research, researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), part of the National Institutes of Health, found that mice that were administered rapamycin one week after exposure to a very common tobacco-specific carcinogen showed a 90 percent decrease in the number of tumors, a 74 percent decrease in tumor size, and fewer abnormalities within their cancer cells.

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