Health & Medicine

  1. Health & Medicine

    Diabetes: Coffee and Caffeine Appear Protective

    Most studies over the past decade have painted tea as a therapeutic beverage and coffee as its dastardly counterpart–a brew that challenges weak hearts and joints. However, such black-and-white characterizations appear to have overstated coffee’s dark side. New data now indicate that drinking java–lots of it, and especially the caffeinated form–can curb type II diabetes. […]

    By Janet Raloff
  2. Health & Medicine

    Clear Airways: Quelling a protein stops mucus overload

    By interfering with a protein that earlier research implicated in mucus secretion, scientists have countered overstimulation of mucus secretion in the airways of mice.

    By Nathan Seppa
  3. Health & Medicine

    Could refrigeration explain Crohn’s rise?

    Crohn's disease, marked by inflammation of the small intestine, could be caused by refrigeration of meats, a process that selects for hardy bacteria that handle cold temperatures well, researchers hypothesize.

    By Nathan Seppa
  4. Health & Medicine

    Age-related anemia hastens death

    People who develop low concentrations of iron-containing hemoglobin in their blood as they get older are at elevated risk for serious medical problems and early death.

    By Ben Harder
  5. Health & Medicine

    Thalidomide-like drug treats blood disorder

    A novel drug appears to help people with myelodysplasia, a persistent condition that leaves them short of crucial blood components.

    By Ben Harder
  6. Health & Medicine

    Novel drug fights leukemia

    An experimental drug helps a small but significant fraction of people with acute myeloid leukemia and causes minimal side effects.

    By Ben Harder
  7. Health & Medicine

    Select immune cells help marrow grafts

    By excising certain immune cells from donor bone marrow, physicians have devised a new way of performing marrow transplants.

    By Ben Harder
  8. Health & Medicine

    Going against the Grain: Aspirin use linked to pancreatic cancer

    Scientists have associated aspirin use with cancer of the pancreas.

    By Nathan Seppa
  9. Health & Medicine

    Ephedra Finale

    Last week, Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson announced that the Food and Drug Administration would soon outlaw U.S. sales of diet products containing stimulants derived from the Ephedra sinica plant. He timed the pronouncement to anticipate the start of the perennial diet season: New Year’s Day. Ephedra plant. Univ. of Calif., Davis […]

    By Janet Raloff
  10. Health & Medicine

    SARS vaccine triggers immunity in monkeys

    An experimental vaccine against the SARS virus shows promise in a test on monkeys.

    By Nathan Seppa
  11. Health & Medicine

    Putting Labels on Nutrients

    After all the holiday partying, it’s probably time for most people to get back in the habit of checking the labels on food. Which frozen desert has less fat per serving? Which cereal has the recommended amounts of iron and folic acid? FDA But do those nutrition fact boxes on packaged foods supply the information […]

    By Kate Ramsayer
  12. Health & Medicine

    Pivotal Protein: Inhibiting immune compound slows sepsis

    By restraining the action of an immune system protein that can run amok, scientists experimenting on mice have reversed the course of severe sepsis.

    By Nathan Seppa