http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. (Medical Xpress)—A new Cochrane review led by King's College London has found that providing home palliative care doubles the odds that someone with a terminal illness can die at home if they want to, and leads to better control of their symptoms. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-06-home-palliative-people-chances-dying.html Health Tue, 11 Jun 2013 08:40:04 EST news290157241 Reanalysis of the World Health Organization's Antenatal Care Trial (WHOACT) shows that there is an increased risk of fetal death at between 32 and 36 weeks for women who have a reduced antenatal care package, finds research published in BioMed Central's open access journal Reproductive Health. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-04-antenatal.html Health Thu, 11 Apr 2013 20:00:01 EST news284915380 (Medical Xpress)—According to an updated Cochrane review on vitamin C and the common cold, vitamin C seems to be particularly beneficial for people under heavy physical stress. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-02-vitamin-beneficial-common-cold.html Health Wed, 13 Feb 2013 11:10:01 EST news279973273 Antidepressant prescriptions in the UK have increased by 9.6% in 2011, to 46 million prescriptions. Does this reflect overmedicalisation or appropriate treatment? Two experts debate the issue on BMJ website today. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2013-01-antidepressants-overprescribed.html Psychology & Psychiatry Tue, 22 Jan 2013 18:30:07 EST news278098216 A Cochrane review of studies into manipulative therapies for colic, by the University of Southampton, suggests that the treatment technique may be of some benefit. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-12-therapies-beneficial-treatment-infantile-colic.html Pediatrics Tue, 11 Dec 2012 19:00:09 EST news274465603 (HealthDay)—No conclusions can be drawn with regard to the comparative efficacy of open, microscopic, and tubular discectomy surgical techniques to treat sciatica due to a herniated disc, according to the results of a systematic literature review published in the November issue of the European Spine Journal. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-11-surgeries-sciatica-due-herniated-disc.html Surgery Sat, 10 Nov 2012 07:00:02 EST news271749246 A new Cochrane Review concludes that all countries should consider establishing proper home birth services. They should also provide low-risk pregnant women with information enabling them to make an informed choice. The review has been prepared by senior researcher, statistician Ole Olsen, the Research Unit for General Practice, University of Copenhagen, and midwifery lecturer PhD Jette Aaroe Clausen. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-09-birth-hospital.html Obstetrics & gynaecology Wed, 19 Sep 2012 04:02:45 EST news267246141 The effectiveness of spinal manipulation divides medical opinion. On BMJ today, experts debate whether spinal manipulation for neck pain should be abandoned. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-spinal-neck-pain-abandoned.html Other Thu, 07 Jun 2012 18:30:01 EST news258307149 The full clinical study reports of drugs that have been authorized for use in patients should be made publicly available in order to allow independent re-analysis of the benefits and risks of such drugs, according to leading international experts who base their assertions on their experience with Tamiflu (oseltamivir). http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-tamiflu-full-trials.html Medications Tue, 10 Apr 2012 17:00:01 EST news253287440 Stem cell therapy moderately improves heart function after a heart attack, according to a systematic review published in The Cochrane Library. But the researchers behind the review say larger clinical trials are needed to establish whether this benefit translates to a longer life. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-stem-cell-treatments-heart-function.html Medical research Tue, 14 Feb 2012 19:00:04 EST news248460369 Incomplete availability of data has hampered a thorough assessment of the evidence for using the anti-influenza drug oseltamivir, a Cochrane Review has found. However, after piecing together information from over 16,000 pages of clinical trial data and documents used in the process of licensing oseltamivir (Tamiflu) by national authorities, a team of researchers has raised critical questions about how well the drug works and about its reported safety profile. The new analysis shows inconsistencies with published reports, and describes possible under-reporting of drug-related side-effects in some published trial reports. While the drug did reduce the time to first alleviation of symptoms by an average of 21 hours, it did not reduce the number of people who went on to need hospital treatment. Results from the reanalysis of data also raise questions about how the drug works as an influenza virus inhibitor. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-uncertainties-anti-influenza-drug.html Medications Wed, 18 Jan 2012 04:00:03 EST news246081179 Targeting children aged six to 12 with school-based programmes that encourage healthy eating, physical activity and positive attitudes to body image are among a range of interventions that can help reduce levels of obesity, according to a new review of the evidence. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-evidence-childhood-obesity.html Health Wed, 07 Dec 2011 04:02:38 EST news242452925 Good balance and mobility are essential to help you perform most activities involved in every-day life, as well as many recreational pursuits. Keeping your balance is a complex task, involving the co-ordination between a person's muscles and sensors which detect balance and are part of the nervous system. In older people many factors such as reduced muscle strength, stiff joints, delayed reaction times and changes in the sensory system all add up to reduce a person's ability to keep in balance. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-evidence-base-older-people.html Health Wed, 09 Nov 2011 05:05:04 EST news240037492 A Cochrane Review of data relating to about 45,000 patients involved in approximately 350 individual studies has provided an evaluation of the effect you can expect to get if you take commonly used painkillers at specific doses. The review also identifies pain killers for which there is only poor or no reliable evidence. This review will help doctors and patients to make evidence informed decisions of which pain killers to use, and is published in the latest edition of The Cochrane Library. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-pain-relief-based-solid-evidence.html Medications Wed, 07 Sep 2011 04:16:38 EST news234587774 A new Cochrane review says that oxytocin, a medication often used to quicken slow-paced labor in its early stages, doesn’t boost the prospects for normal births. Riskier births that required cesarean section or the use of forceps didn’t become less common. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-drug-labor-doesnt-c-sections.html Health Fri, 15 Jul 2011 05:43:19 EST news229927388 Moderate reductions in the amount of salt people eat doesn't reduce their likelihood of dying or experiencing cardiovascular disease. This is the main conclusion from a systematic review published in the latest edition of The Cochrane Library. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-salt-doesnt-chance-dying.html Health Wed, 06 Jul 2011 03:12:14 EST news229140725 Two trials presented at the Heart Failure Congress 2011, organized by the Heart Failure Association of the European Society of Cardiology (HFA of the ESC), will help to define the precise populations of patients with chronic heart failure (CHF) in whom telemedical management delivers benefits. Both the TIM-HF and TEHAF studies - presented in Late Breaking Session 1 - revealed that telemonitoring showed significant benefits in defined subgroups of patients. The results, which will be used to help in the design of future trials, come after the overall results from both trials demonstrated no statistical benefit for telemonitoring. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-telemonitoring-survival-hf-patients.html Other Sun, 22 May 2011 12:58:32 EST news225287894