HomeQuick diagnoses
Quick diagnoses
Taxing sugar?
Fighting obesity by taxing sugary drinks and restricting junk food advertisements aimed at children has support from a wide majority of residents surveyed in...
Genetics of malaria
The US National Institutes of Health has awarded $25m to the J Craig Venter Institute to back an initiative to study infectious diseases like...
Rise in suicides
The economic crisis in Europe and North America led to more than 10,000 extra suicides, reports BBC News. Some suicides may have been avoidable,...
Tomato pill study heartening
Taking a tomato pill a day could help keep heart disease at bay, say UK scientists who have carried out a ‘small but robust’...
Bedaquiline approval?
A new drug, bedaquiline that will help treat drug-resistant TB, isexpected to be approved for use by the SA Medicines Control Council soon. This...
Cystic fibrosis hopes
A ‘breakthrough’ medication derived from Norwegian seaweed may be an effective treatment for killer genetic disease cystic fibrosis, adding to an armoury of drugs...
MERS reaches Bangladesh
Bangladesh has reported its first case of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus infection in a man returning from the US through Abu Dhabi....
Raw chicken warning
Consumers are being warned to stop washing raw chicken as doing so increases the risk of food poisoning. Campylobacter, the most common form of...
Insurer slates drug makers
The leading US health insurance trade group has hit out at the extremely high cost of new specialty medicines, accusing drug makers of taking...
Ebola hits Sierra Leone
Five people have died in Sierra Leone's first confirmed outbreak of Ebola virus. According to the World Health Organisation, the outbreak in Sierra Leone...
Refugees and cancer
There is a ‘high demand’ for cancer treatment from refugees, which is often difficult to meet. Infectious diseases and malnutrition have understandably been the...
Fifty Shades of STD
A rise in sexually transmitted diseases among older couples could have been caused by the ‘Fifty Shades of Grey effect’, a top doctor has...
Adcock Ingram posts R38m loss
Adcock Ingram, SA's biggest supplier of hospital products, has posted a first-half loss after writing off expenses related to the failed takeover attempt by...
Sun creams tanned
Three UK sun creams, which include some of the most expensive on the market, do not give the protection they claim. According to consumer...
Dis-Chem disses Clicks
Executives at pharmacy chain Clicks might have to start popping happy pills after the Advertising Standards Authority ruled that competitor Dis-Chem could indeed claim...
Pushy patients lead to tests
Most physicians believe that doctors order too many medical tests, yet half admit to doing so in response to pushy patients. Medicinenet report that...
Artificial genetic code
Scientists report a significant step toward altering the fundamental alphabet of life – creating an organism with an expanded artificial genetic code in its...
Black Death ‘necessary’
The medieval Black Death led to better health for future generations, according to an analysis of skeletons in London cemeteries. BBC News reports that...
The quality of death
The UK leads the world in quality of death. The UK has led the way in terms of its hospice care network and statutory...
Urban air pollution rises
An effort by the World Health Organisation to measure pollution in cities around the world has found New Delhi admits to having the dirtiest...
Dye for gall bladder surgery
A green fluorescent dye is helping surgeons at the University of Illinois perform robotic gall bladder surgery more safely. The surgeons used near-infrared light...
Blood clot preventer
US health regulators have approved a blood clot preventer developed by Merck & Co for use by patients who have had a heart attack...
Threats to human nutrition
In the first study of its kind to resolve whether rising carbon dioxide concentrations are a threat to human nutrition, researchers from the Harvard...
Return of syphilis in US
Syphilis, a sexually transmitted venereal disease, is rising among g ay and bisexual men after being nearly eliminated in the US more than a...
New MERS cases
Saudi Arabia has identified new cases of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). The rate of infection in Saudi Arabia has surged in recent weeks...
UK e-cigarette usage soars
The number of people who use electronic cigarettes in the UK has tripled over the past two years to 2.1m. According to health charity,...
Advaxis orphan drug
Advaxis, a leader in developing cancer immunotherapies has announced it has been granted Orphan Drug Designation from the US Food and Drug Administration Office...
Treatment for MS symptoms
The preliminary results of a small US study of patients with relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis suggest a combination of the oestrogen hormone estriol and...
Biggest cognitive study
A third of a million adults in the UK are to be invited to take part in the world's biggest study of cognitive function....
Ration drugs to the aged
Expensive drugs should be rationed for the old and frail in favour of people in their prime. This is according to Professor Karol Sikora,...
MSF staff killed
Sixteen civilians, including three national staff members with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), were killed during an armed robbery on MSF hospital grounds in the...
Hosmed woes
Hosmed medical scheme has been placed under provisional curatorship by the High Court in Pretoria, the Council for Medical Schemes said. ‘The court further...
UK tops EU child deaths
The UK has one of the highest rates of death for children under five in western Europe. News-Medical reports that the findings come from...
Just a ‘funny turn’…
Those who ignore symptoms of a TIA (transient ischaemic attack) or mini-stroke are running the risk of having a major stroke, the Stroke Association...
Brittle bone discovery
A discovery in mice eventually might help to treat people with a form of brittle bone disease. A US study, mice were bred with...
Breakfast protection
Researchers at the University of Missouri found that when women consumed high-protein breakfasts, they maintained better glucose and insulin control than they did with...
Treating child appendicitis
For many years, immediate surgery has been considered the only proper treatment for appendicitis in children. The New York Times reports, however, that...
Celebrity deaths
The deaths of well-known people offer an opportunity to educate the general public about disease detection and prevention, a study suggests. Medicinenet reports that...
HIV health through music
Five determined young men are spreading the word about HIV and tuberculosis through their music, which may be coming to a cell phone near...
AHF to build clinic in SA
The Aids Healthcare Foundation is to build its first clinic in SA. ‘We appreciate the opportunity to assist the government with HIV treatment, particularly...