Washington - A new study showing an increased risk of blood clots among women using a contraceptive skin patch prompted the Food and Drug Administration on Friday to add that finding to the drug's label.
A federal health agency on Wednesday launched a study into an unexplained skin disorder that causes a crawling sensation and lesions that won't heal, the first attempt to determine whether Morgellons is a legitimate illness or caused by the patient's imagination.
The makers of antidepressants like Prozac and Paxil never published the results of about a third of the drug trials that they conducted to win government approval, misleading doctors and consumers about the drugs' true effectiveness, a new analysis has found.
Rita Rubin
USA Today Wed, 24 Nov 2004 08:25 UTC
Scientist, father, husband and scoutmaster David Graham recently added another job to his résumé. Unlike the others, though, it's one he never sought.
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©Gerald Herbert/AP
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Graham: "FDA made me into a whistle-blower. It wasn't my intention to be a whistle-blower."
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Washington - Parents may be left with only love and lots of liquid to give their sniffling babies and toddlers now that the government is declaring over-the-counter cough and cold medicines too risky for tots. The Food and Drug Administration was issuing that warning Thursday to parents of children under 2.
Calcium supplements may increase the risk of a heart attack in older women, New Zealand research suggests.
Regulators have given scientists the green light to create human-animal embryos for research.
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority granted permission after a consultation showed the public were "at ease" with the idea.
A University of British Columbia and Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute study has found that a popular class of osteoporosis drugs nearly triples the risk of developing bone necrosis, a condition that can lead to disfigurement and incapacitating pain.
The research is the largest study of bone necrosis and bisphosphonates, a class of drugs used by millions of women worldwide to help prevent bone fractures due to osteoporosis. It is also the first study to explore the link between bone necrosis and specific brands of bisphosphonates, such as Actonel, Didrocal and Fosamax. Researchers found that all three brands had similar outcomes.
Children whose mothers are chronically stressed during their early years have a higher asthma rate than their peers, regardless of their income, gender or other known asthma risk factors.
"It is increasingly clear that traditional environmental risk factors do not fully explain the origins of asthma," said lead investigator, Anita Kozyrskyj, Ph.D., Associate Professor in the Faculty of Pharmacy at the University of Manitoba, Canada. "Evidence is emerging that exposure to maternal distress in early life plays a causal role in the development of childhood asthma. In a cohort of children born in 1995, we found that maternal distress which persists beyond the postpartum period is associated with an increased risk of asthma at school-age."
Depression is one of the most common forms of psychopathology. According to diathesis "stress theories of depression, genetic liability interacts with negative life experiences to cause depression. Traditionally, most studies testing these theories have focused on only one component of the diathesis "stress model: either genetics or environment, but not their interaction.
However, because of recent advances in genetics and genomics, researchers have begun using a new design that allows them to test the interaction of genetic and environmental liabilities -- the G x E design.