Black patients fare worst; Asians, Hispanics survive longest with disease
UCLA researchers have found that minority patients and those of lower socioeconomic status are far more likely to have advanced thyroid cancer when they are diagnosed with the disease than white patients and those in higher economic brackets.
In one of the most comprehensive studies of its kind, the UCLA team looked at nearly 26,000 patients with well-differentiated thyroid cancer and analyzed the impact of race and socioeconomic factors on the stage of presentation, as well as patient survival rates. (more…)
UMD-led study is first to link racism-related factors and cellular age
COLLEGE PARK, Md. – A new University of Maryland-led study reveals that racism may impact aging at the cellular level. Researchers found signs of accelerated aging in African American men who reported high levels of racial discrimination and who had internalized anti-Black attitudes. Findings from the study, which is the first to link racism-related factors and biological aging, are published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
Racial disparities in health are well-documented, with African Americans having shorter life expectancy, and a greater likelihood of suffering from aging-related illnesses at younger ages compared to whites. Accelerated aging at the biological level may be one mechanism linking racism and disease risk. (more…)
Engineering professor co-authors Nature Medicine paper on HIV
Ryan Zurakowski, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Delaware, is co-author of a paper appearing in Nature Medicine on Jan. 12 highlighting the role of T-cells in HIV.(more…)
A Yale study estimates that 8 million lives have been saved in the United States as a result of anti-smoking measures that began 50 years ago this month with the groundbreaking report from the Surgeon General outlining the deadly consequences of tobacco use. The Yale School of Public Health-led analysis is published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study used mathematical models to calculate the long-term effect of the seminal report, and subsequent anti-smoking measures, over the past half-century. These cumulative efforts have significantly reshaped public attitudes and behaviors concerning cigarettes and other forms of tobacco, note the researchers. (more…)
UA researchers have discovered that two separate defects combine to contribute to reduced T cell responses with aging.
Researchers at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Tucson have found a key to understanding the aging immune system’s decreased response to infectious diseases, which remain among the leading causes of death in older adults.(more…)
Green space in towns and cities could lead to significant and sustained improvements in mental health, finds a new study published in the journal of Environmental Science & Technology.
Analysing data that followed people over a five year period, the research has found that moving to a greener area not only improves people’s mental health, but that the effect continues long after they have moved.
The findings add to evidence that suggests increasing green spaces in cities – such as parks and gardens – could deliver substantial benefits to public health. (more…)
Researchers have developed a technique for creating nanoparticles that carry two different cancer-killing drugs into the body and deliver those drugs to separate parts of the cancer cell where they will be most effective. The technique was developed by researchers at North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
“In testing on laboratory mice, our technique resulted in significant improvement in breast cancer tumor reduction as compared to conventional treatment techniques,” says Dr. Zhen Gu, senior author of a paper on the research and an assistant professor in the joint biomedical engineering program at NC State and UNC-Chapel Hill. (more…)
As mice age, cells in tissues such as the liver and skeletal muscle lose control over rogue sequences of DNA called “retrotransposable elements,” according to new research in the journal Aging. The elements, which may undermine health, could proliferate in old mice and were also abundant in cancerous tissue. A low-calorie diet, however, restrained their advance.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — The genomes of organisms from humans to corn are replete with “parasitic” strands of DNA that, when not suppressed, copy themselves and spread throughout the genome, potentially affecting health. Earlier this year Brown University researchers found that these “retrotransposable elements” (RTE’s) were increasingly able to break free of the genome’s control in cultures of human cells. Now in a new paper in the journal Aging, they show that RTEs were increasingly able to break free and copy themselves in the tissues of mice as the animals aged. In further experiments the biologists showed that this activity was readily apparent in cancerous tumors, but that it also could be reduced by restricting calories. (more…)
