Newsline — Monday, November 12, 2012 9:56
Newborn Neurons Are Critical for Memory, Even in the Adult Aging Brain
Incident Proves Why Concussion Management in Youth Sports Requires Adult Intervention
Friday, November 9, 2012 13:00
New safety rules were in place in central Massachusetts: Any 10-to-12-year-old playing Pop Warner football who was suspected of having a concussion was not allowed to return to play until cleared by a doctor. In addition, a certified EMT would be present during the game, and the league had established concussion education programs for coaches, officials, players and their parents. Yet as the concussions on one outmatched team mounted and the injured players were taken to the sidelines, no one stopped the contest, which ended in a 52-0 blowout and five concussed kids. According to the The Boston Globe, league officials suspended the coaches of both teams for the rest of the season, and barred the referees from the league for not recognizing the increasing danger to players still on the field and stopping the game. “That story again raises the myriad issues related to concussion in sport,” says Chris Hummel, an Ithaca College faculty member who has researched the effects of concussions and served as an athletic trainer for 15 years. “What’s particularly concerning…
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New iPad App Helps Train Neurosurgeons
Friday, November 9, 2012 9:33
Future neurosurgeons can hone necessary skills on their iPads using a new training app called VCath. The free mobile app was developed at Bangor University in the U.K. and helps neurosurgeons-in-training master an appreciation of the ventricular system in the brain. The VCath app is designed to take a neurosurgical trainee through the steps of positioning and inserting a catheter into the brain of a virtual 3-D patient as part of a ventricular catheterisation procedure, which is used to drain fluid that has become obstructed within the ventricles of the brain. For more information, click here to read the full release.
Mayo Clinic, Collaborators Receive Grant to Study Use of Electronic Media in Treating Traumatic Brain Injury
Thursday, November 8, 2012 12:23
Mayo Clinic and collaborators — including the Departments of Health in Minnesota and Iowa, Regional Health in South Dakota and Sanford Health in North Dakota — have received a $2.2 million federal grant to test new ways to offer specialized traumatic brain injury (TBI) care, with a focus on reaching rural areas and underserved urban populations that don’t have access to brain rehabilitation specialists. “We know early intervention and longitudinal care give people the best chance to minimize or prevent lasting effects of TBI, but that’s not always easy or feasible,” says Mayo Clinic physiatrist Allen Brown, MD, director of brain rehabilitation research and principal investigator of the five-year study. “Our goal is to test a model of care that delivers specialized brain rehabilitation resources to patients and providers in underserved locations. We believe this is the first study of this scope — four states, three health systems and two state departments of health — using electronic technology to improve care with no face-to-face contact.” For more information, click here to read the full release.
State of Mississippi Ranks High for Traumatic Brain Injury
Wednesday, November 7, 2012 16:04
There is no long-term, inpatient care facility in Mississippi for those suffering from severe brain injury, says Lee Jenkins, executive director of the Brain Injury Association of Mississippi. As a result, patients such as 34-year-old Neal Sandifer, a former athlete with a passion for the outdoors, is now living in a nursing home following a fall from a deer stand while hunting back in 2008. According to Jenkins, most nursing homes aren’t equipped to handle the anger and outbursts often associated with a patient’s traumatic brain injury (TBI), as well as the rehab that is needed. Some severely brain-injured patients can even be a danger to themselves and others — that’s unless they are in a controlled environment, receiving the proper treatment. For more information, click here to read the full article.
Common Food Preservative May Slow or Stop Tumor Growth
Wednesday, November 7, 2012 10:37
A common food preservative call nisin may slow or stop squamous cell head and neck cancers, according to a University of Michigan study. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the World Health Organization (WHO) approved nisin as safe for human consumption decades ago, says Yvonne Kapila, the study’s principal investigator and professor at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. This means that obtaining FDA approval to test nisin’s suggested cancer-fighting properties on patients in a clinical setting won’t take as long as a new therapy that hasn’t been tried yet on people, she says. For more information, click here to read full release.
Tumor-Causing Cancer Cells Are ‘Squishier,’ Scientists Say
Tuesday, November 6, 2012 13:00
Scientists at The Methodist Hospital in Houston have developed a new tool that separates tumor-causing cancer cells from more benign cells by subjecting the cells to a microscopic game of Plinko — but only the squishiest cells make it through. Study results, which appear in an early online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal that the more flexible, tumor-causing cells navigated a gamut of tiny barriers, whereas the more rigid, more benign cells had trouble squeezing through 7-micrometer holes. Methodist scientists worked with University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center researchers to test the device with different kinds of cancer cells. The work supports the hypothesis that cell squishiness indicates tumor potential. Most normal cells contain a developed cytoskeleton — a network of tiny but strong rod-shaped proteins that give cells their shape and structure. In their drive to divide, cancer cells may be diverting resources away from developing a cytoskeleton in favor of division, resulting in squishiness. For more information, click here to read the full release.
Study Examines the Political Human Brain: Democrat vs. Republican
Tuesday, November 6, 2012 8:00
New research from the University of South Carolina (USC) provides evidence that choosing a candidate may depend more on our biological make-up than on careful analysis of issues. That’s because the brains of self-identified Democrats and Republicans are hard-wired differently and may be naturally inclined to hold varying, if not opposing, perceptions and values. The USC study, which analyzed MRI scans of 24 USC students, builds on existing research in the emerging field of political neuroscience. “The differences are significant and real,” says lead researcher Roger Newman-Norlund, an assistant professor of exercise science in the Arnold School of Public Health and director of USC’s new Brain Stimulation Laboratory. For more information, click here to read the full release.
Math Anxiety Can Prompt Brain to Cause Some People Physical Pain
Monday, November 5, 2012 15:23
Mathematics anxiety can prompt a response in the brain similar to when a person experiences physical pain, according to new research out of the University of Chicago. Using brain scans, scholars have determined that the brain areas that are active when highly math-anxious people prepare to do math overlap with the same brain areas that register the threat of bodily harm — and in some cases, physical pain. “For someone who has math anxiety, the anticipation of doing math prompts a similar brain reaction as when they experience pain — say, burning one’s hand on a hot stove,” says Sian Beilock, professor of psychology at the University of Chicago and a leading expert on math anxiety. For more information, click here to read the full release.
Repeated Surgeries May Extend Life of Patients with Glioblastoma
Monday, November 5, 2012 9:53
New research from Johns Hopkins University reveals that patients who undergo repeated surgeries to remove glioblastomas — the most aggressive and deadliest type of brain tumors — may survive longer than those who have just one operation. Glioblastoma, the form of brain cancer that killed Sen. Edward Kennedy, inevitably returns after tumor-removal surgery, chemotherapy and/or radiation. The median survival time after diagnosis is about 14 months. Experts report that with recurrence a near certainty, the value of performing second, third or even fourth operations has been questioned, especially given the dangers of brain surgery, which include risk of neurological injury or death. “We are reluctant to operate on patients with brain cancer multiple times, as we are afraid to incur new neurological deficits or poor wound healing, and many times we are pessimistic about the survival chances of these patients,” says Alfredo Quinones-Hinojosa, MD, FAANS, a professor of neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and leader of the study that appears in the American Association of Neurological Surgeons’ (AANS’) Journal of Neurosurgery. “But this…
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