http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. Researchers at the University of Iowa, together with colleagues from the California Institute of Technology and New York University, have discovered how a part of the brain helps predict future events from past experiences. The work sheds light on the function of the front-most part of the frontal lobe, known as the frontopolar cortex, an area of the cortex uniquely well developed in humans in comparison with apes and other primates. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-front-most-cortex-involved-short-term.html Neuroscience Tue, 19 Jun 2012 17:00:13 EST news259341626 (HealthDay) -- Women with multiple sclerosis (MS) who undergo in vitro fertilization (IVF) are at greater risk of relapse after treatment, particularly if they receive gonadotrophin releasing hormone (GnRH) agonists or if IVF fails, according to a study published online June 11 in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery & Psychiatry. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-vitro-fertilization-linked-multiple-sclerosis.html Neuroscience Wed, 13 Jun 2012 14:47:31 EST news258817645 People who are seriously injured in a car accident are more than 30 per cent more likely to survive at least 48 hours if they are taken directly to a trauma centre than those who are taken first to a non-trauma centre, new research has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-06-car-victims-survive-trauma-centre.html Surgery Fri, 08 Jun 2012 10:11:05 EST news258369051 Surgeons at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have restored some hand function in a quadriplegic patient with a spinal cord injury at the C7 vertebra, the lowest bone in the neck. Instead of operating on the spine itself, the surgeons rerouted working nerves in the upper arms. These nerves still "talk" to the brain because they attach to the spine above the injury. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-surgeons-function-quadriplegic-patient.html Surgery Tue, 15 May 2012 10:46:23 EST news256297571 A study on a handful of people with suspected mild Alzheimer's disease (AD) suggests that a device that sends continuous electrical impulses to specific "memory" regions of the brain appears to increase neuronal activity. Results of the study using deep brain stimulation, a therapy already used in some patients with Parkinson's disease and depression, may offer hope for at least some with AD, an intractable disease with no cure. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-05-deep-brain-mild-alzheimer-disease.html Neuroscience Mon, 07 May 2012 16:00:17 EST news255615020 A powerful new imaging technique called High Definition Fiber Tracking (HDFT) will allow doctors to clearly see for the first time neural connections broken by traumatic brain injury (TBI) and other disorders, much like X-rays show a fractured bone, according to researchers from the University of Pittsburgh in a report published online today in the Journal of Neurosurgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-high-definition-fiber-tracking-reveals.html Surgery Fri, 02 Mar 2012 04:50:03 EST news249884660 Researchers at Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University have identified a new function for a gene that normally prevents the development of cancer. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-03-pathway-blood-vessel-growth-cancer.html Cancer Thu, 01 Mar 2012 14:10:35 EST news249833389 Yale University researchers have discovered a key cellular mechanism that may help the brain control how much we eat, what we weigh, and how much energy we have. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-molecular-duo-dictate-weight-energy.html Neuroscience Tue, 28 Feb 2012 17:00:13 EST news249670019 Researchers at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center's VCU Massey Cancer Center and Harold F. Young Neurosurgical Center (Richmond, VA) and Old Dominion University (Norfolk, VA) have discovered that suppression of Wilms tumor 1 protein (WT1) results in downregulation of CD97 gene expression in three glioblastoma cell lines and reduces the characteristic invasiveness exhibited by glial tumor cells. This finding is announced in the article, "Novel report of expression and function of CD97 in malignant gliomas: correlation with Wilms tumor 1 expression and glioma cell invasiveness," by Archana Chidambaram, Ph.D., and colleagues, published online ahead of print today in the Journal of Neurosurgery. Although further studies must be performed, the authors propose that CD97 may prove to be a new target for anti-glioma therapies. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-cd97-gene-function-wt1-protein.html Neuroscience Tue, 07 Feb 2012 10:30:01 EST news247832331 Primates learn from feedback that surprises them, and in a recent investigation of how that happens, neurosurgeons have learned something new. The insight they gleaned from examining the response of specific brain tissues during a learning task may inform future rehabilitative therapies after stroke or traumatic brain injury. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-good-bad-neural-circuits.html Neuroscience Tue, 06 Dec 2011 17:34:21 EST news242415254 In many cases, tumors suppress a patient's immune system in a way that keeps the cancer safe from immune system attack. This is particularly true for patients with glioblastoma, a primary brain tumor that carries a prognosis of only 12-15 months survival after diagnosis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-arginine-t-cell-ability-cancer.html Cancer Tue, 22 Nov 2011 13:29:04 EST news241190914 Brain stimulation, already approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for the treatment of Parkinson's disease and essential tremor, has now been shown to offer significant relief to patients with intractable seizures for whom drugs and other treatments have not worked. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-brain-shown-untreatable-epileptic-seizures.html Neuroscience Tue, 08 Nov 2011 10:13:56 EST news239969629 Around half of patients remain seizure free 10 years after undergoing surgery for epilepsy. However, there is scope for further improvement in presurgical assessment and surgical treatment of people with chronic epilepsy. The findings are reported in an Article published in this week's surgery special issue of The Lancet, written by Jane de Tisi, Dr Gail S Bel, and Professor John Duncan, National Hospital for Neurosurgery, and Imperial College London, and colleagues. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-surgery-epilepsy-patients-seizure-free-years.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:30:01 EST news237733318 (Medical Xpress) -- Two-thirds of people with severe and otherwise untreatable epilepsy were completely cured of their frequent seizures after undergoing neurosurgery at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center, according to a new study that examined 143 of these patients two years after their operations. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-highlights-success-brain-surgery-severe.html Medical research Thu, 21 Jul 2011 07:44:35 EST news230453056 A minimally invasive spine procedure that takes about as much time as a tonsillectomy is an excellent option for some patients who suffer from a painful lower back condition, according to Christopher McPherson, MD, an assistant professor of neurosurgery at the University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Medicine and a neurosurgeon with the Mayfield Clinic.    http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-procedure-simple-painful-condition.html Other Thu, 14 Jul 2011 09:20:01 EST news229853200 A gel that creates a watertight seal to close surgical wounds provides a significant advance in the treatment of patients following spinal procedures, effectively sealing spinal wounds 100 percent of the time, a national multicenter randomized study led by researchers at UC Davis has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-sealant-gel-effective-spinal-wounds.html Medical research Thu, 16 Jun 2011 17:08:37 EST news227462905 A team of scientists at the University of Louisville, UCLA and the California Institute of Technology has achieved a significant breakthrough in its initial work with a paralyzed male volunteer at Louisville's Frazier Rehab Institute. It is the result of 30 years of research to find potential clinical therapies for paralysis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-implant-breakthrough-paraplegic-legs-voluntarily.html Neuroscience Fri, 20 May 2011 02:44:16 EST news225078216 Researchers with UCLA's Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center have discovered a way to amp up the power of killer T-cells, called CD8 cells, making them more functional for longer periods of time and boosting their ability to multiply and expand within the body to fight melanoma, a new study has found. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-scientists-amp-power-killer-cells.html Medical research Tue, 10 May 2011 09:10:57 EST news224237408 The size and shape of the human cerebral cortex, an evolutionary marvel responsible for everything from Shakespeare's poetry to the atomic bomb, are largely influenced by mutations in a single gene, according to a team of researchers led by the Yale School of Medicine and three other universities. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-mutations-gene-human-cerebral-cortex.html Genetics Thu, 28 Apr 2011 12:44:02 EST news223213416 A new surgery for cervical disc disease in the neck may restore range of motion and reduce repeat surgeries in some younger patients, according to a team of neurosurgeons from the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and several other medical centers that analyzed three large, randomized clinical trials comparing two different surgeries. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-04-ucsf-analysis-surgery-neck-pain.html Other Mon, 11 Apr 2011 17:20:03 EST news221758517