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Bipolar patients have high Rx burden

By Guest PostFebruary 14, 2014Healthbipolar disorder treatment, bipolar i disorder, bipolar patients, brandon gaudiano, brown university, complex polypharmacy, epidemiological data, gary epstein lubow, ivan miller, katherine tezanos, lauren weinstock, polypharmacy rate, psychiatric hospital, psychotropic medications, rhode island, rx burden

A new study of patients with bipolar disorder finds that 36 percent of those who were admitted to a Rhode Island psychiatric hospital in 2010 were receiving “complex polypharmacy” — four or more psychotropic medications — from their community providers. The polypharmacy rate was significantly higher for women. Including prescriptions for other conditions the patients may have had, the average patient was on six medications.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — A study of 230 patients with bipolar I disorder whose symptoms were severe enough to warrant admission to a Rhode Island psychiatric hospital in 2010 reveals that more than a third were admitted despite taking four or more psychiatric medications. Including medicines for other conditions, such as cardiometabolic diseases, the average patient came to the hospital taking six different drugs. (more…)

Effort to Enforce HIV ‘Health Threat’ Law Raises Questions

By Guest PostFebruary 1, 2013General, Healthadvocates, blood draw, community, database, diagnose, epidemiological data, health threat law, hiv positive woman, hiv surveillance technologies, hiv-positive, local jurisdictions, medical information, michigan health officials, people, policymakers, public health policy, sex, sexual partners, sexually transmitted diseases, stakeholders, trevor hoppe, university of michigan

ANN ARBOR — Michigan health officials are using HIV surveillance technologies to assist in enforcing a “health threat” law that makes it illegal for HIV-positive people to have sex without disclosing their status.

A new University of Michigan study reveals that health officials employ the state’s names reporting database, alongside partner services referrals, for law enforcement purposes. However, this is bad social policy for a variety of reasons, says Trevor Hoppe, the study’s author and a doctoral candidate in sociology and women’s studies. (more…)

New Take on Impacts of Low Dose Radiation

By Guest PostDecember 24, 2011Health, Scienceatomic bomb blasts, berkeley lab, biological damage, breast cell line, broken dna, cancer risks, christopher pham, dna damage response, dna repair mechanisms, Environment, epidemiological data, extrapolation, gy of radiation, human breast cells, human tissue, ionizing radiation, Japan, joel swenson, lawrence berkeley national laboratory, levels of ionizing radiation, linear no threshold hypothesis, lnt, low dose radiation, mammogram, mathematical modeling, mcf10a, mina bissell, primary breast epithelial cells, radiation induced foci, rafael gomez sjoberg, repair, rif, standard model, survivors, sylvain costes, teresa neumaier, time lapse imaging, world war II, xray microbeam

*Berkeley Lab Researchers Find Evidence Suggesting Risk May Not Be Proportional to Dose at Low Dose Levels*

Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), through a combination of time-lapse live imaging and mathematical modeling of a special line of human breast cells, have found evidence to suggest that for low dose levels of ionizing radiation, cancer risks may not be directly proportional to dose. This contradicts the standard model for predicting biological damage from ionizing radiation – the linear-no-threshold hypothesis or LNT – which holds that risk is directly proportional to dose at all levels of irradiation.

“Our data show that at lower doses of ionizing radiation, DNA repair mechanisms work much better than at higher doses,” says Mina Bissell, a world-renowned breast cancer researcher with Berkeley Lab’s Life Sciences Division. “This non-linear DNA damage response casts doubt on the general assumption that any amount of ionizing radiation is harmful and additive.” (more…)

Tag Archives: epidemiological data

Bipolar patients have high Rx burden

Effort to Enforce HIV ‘Health Threat’ Law Raises Questions

New Take on Impacts of Low Dose Radiation