http://medicalxpress.com/ en-us Medical Xpress internet news portal provides the latest news on Health and Medicine. The American Academy of Neurology is issuing an updated guideline that recommends monitoring the spinal cord during spinal surgery and certain chest surgeries to help prevent paralysis, or loss of muscle function, related to the surgeries. The guideline, which was developed with the American Clinical Neurophysiology Society, is published in the February 21, 2012, print issue of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology and also in the Journal of Clinical Neurophysiology. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-guideline-spinal-cord-surgery-paralysis.html Neuroscience Mon, 20 Feb 2012 16:00:01 EST news248957156 Loss of bone density leads to brittle bones that fracture easily. It is a major complication of spinal cord injury (SCI), which affects about 250,000 Americans every year. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-high-doses-loss-bone-spinal.html Health Thu, 16 Feb 2012 13:31:06 EST news248621456 The World Health Organization called Monday for greater efforts to fight leprosy, warning the disfiguring disease was defying efforts to wipe it out across many countries in the Asia-Pacific region. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-stepped-up-leprosy.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Mon, 13 Feb 2012 07:04:36 EST news248339061 (Medical Xpress) -- A recent large decrease in campylobacter infection from fresh poultry in New Zealand has also resulted in a significant drop in a neurological condition which can result in paralysis or death. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-02-food-safety-poultry-paralysis.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Wed, 08 Feb 2012 08:31:33 EST news247912287 Neuroscientists may one day be able to hear the imagined speech of a patient unable to speak due to stroke or paralysis, according to University of California, Berkeley, researchers. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-scientists-decode-brain-eavesdrop.html Neuroscience Tue, 31 Jan 2012 17:00:07 EST news247247681 Afghan President Hamid Karzai urged insurgents Tuesday to allow health teams to vaccinate children in war-torn parts of the country where cases of polio have risen sharply. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-afghan-polio-cases-govt-appeals.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Tue, 17 Jan 2012 06:53:18 EST news246005589 (Medical Xpress) -- Research from Queen Mary, University of London suggests that omega-3 fatty acids, which are found in fish oil, have the potential to protect nerves from injury and help them to regenerate. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-01-omega-fatty-acids-nerve.html Medical research Wed, 11 Jan 2012 09:05:18 EST news245495111 (Medical Xpress) -- In the event of the spinal cord injury, the long nerve cell filaments, the axons, may become severed. For quite some time now, scientists have been investigating whether these axons can be stimulated to regenerate. Such growth takes place on a scale of only a few millimetres. To date, changes like this could be determined only by cutting the tissue in question into wafer-thin slices and examining these under a microscope. However, the two-dimensional sections provide only an inaccurate picture of the spatial distribution and progression of the cells. Together with an international team, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Neurobiology in Martinsried have now developed a new method by virtue of which single nerve cells can be both examined in intact tissue and portrayed in all three dimensions. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-scientists-spinal-cord-transparent.html Medical research Mon, 26 Dec 2011 06:49:24 EST news244104498 Known for her poetry, letters, love affair and marriage to Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning also left a legacy of unanswered questions about her lifelong chronic illness. Now, a Penn State anthropologist, with the aid of her daughter, may have unraveled the mystery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-elizabeth-barrett-browning-illness-deciphered.html Other Mon, 19 Dec 2011 10:52:37 EST news243514313 Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS; also known as Lou Gehrig's disease) is an incurable adult neurodegenerative disorder that progresses to paralysis and death. Genetic mutations are the cause of disease in 5% of patients with ALS. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-12-disease-halted-rat-lou-gehrig.html Medical research Mon, 12 Dec 2011 12:00:03 EST news242905844 Declaring the eradication of polio will be far more difficult than it was for smallpox, according to a review published in the Journal of General Virology. Further research into the complex virus - host interactions and how the vaccine is used in the final stages of the eradication programme is crucial to its success. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-polio-sight.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Wed, 30 Nov 2011 05:13:12 EST news241852375 Queensland University of Technology (QUT) researchers have developed a promising new treatment for spinal cord injury in animals, which could eventually prevent paralysis in thousands of people worldwide every year. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-spinal-cord-treatment.html Neuroscience Fri, 18 Nov 2011 11:39:10 EST news240838742 (Medical Xpress) -- Stanford University researchers are enrolling participants in a pioneering study investigating the feasibility of people with paralysis using a technology that interfaces directly with the brain to control computer cursors, robotic arms and other assistive devices. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-stanford-braingate-team-brain-computer-interface.html Neuroscience Mon, 14 Nov 2011 09:54:01 EST news240486834 Research work drawn up by specialists from the Department of Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgery at the University of Navarra Hospital has shown that, after surgical treatment for facial paralysis through using muscular transplant and nervous transposition (connection of facial muscle to a nerve different from the injured facial nerve), the brain of a woman – in comparison to that of a male - manages to adapt itself better, recovers the spontaneous smile and has a greater time period available for repairing the paralysis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-brain-function-involved-recovery-facial.html Other Wed, 09 Nov 2011 10:10:02 EST news240055749 University of Maryland School of Medicine researchers have uncovered a previously unknown molecular pathway that is critical to understanding cardiac arrhythmia and other heart muscle problems. Understanding the basic science of heart and muscle function could open the door to new treatments. The study, published recently in the journal Cell, examined the electrical impulses that coordinate contraction in heart and skeletal muscles, controlling heart rate, for example. Unraveling how the body regulates these impulses is key to understanding serious health conditions such as paralysis, muscle relaxation and heart arrhythmia. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-pathway-critical-heart-arrhythmia.html Medical research Wed, 26 Oct 2011 14:40:01 EST news238856780 What do Moby Dick, the Salem witch trials and alien abductions all have in common? They all circle back to sleep paralysis. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-10-psychologists-demons.html Psychology & Psychiatry Mon, 17 Oct 2011 11:01:28 EST news238068076 At least 10 people in northwestern China have contracted a highly infectious strain of polio, in the first outbreak of the disease in the country for 12 years, a United Nations group said Thursday. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-infected-polio-china-outbreak.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Thu, 22 Sep 2011 10:24:41 EST news235905849 Imagine that you are driving home from work today when you are involved in a head on collision with an SUV. Life Lion flies you to the hospital. When you awake in the Emergency Department, you notice that you cannot feel your legs. Your doctor tells you that you may not able to walk. You also eventually realize that you cannot urinate or defecate voluntarily. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-09-spinal-cord-injury-focus.html Medical research Thu, 15 Sep 2011 13:21:19 EST news235311662 During thyroidectomy (surgery to remove the thyroid gland), the technique surgeons use to identify an important nerve appears to make a difference in terms of complications such as impairment of the parathyroid glands (which make a hormone that controls calcium levels), according to a report published Online First today by Archives of Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-08-nerve-identification-technique-thyroid-complications.html Other Mon, 15 Aug 2011 17:37:04 EST news232648598 (AP) -- A health official says a surging outbreak of hand, foot and mouth disease in Vietnam has killed 70 people so far this year and infected more than 23,000, mostly children under 5. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-07-childhood-virus-vietnam.html Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes Fri, 29 Jul 2011 05:00:01 EST news231130760 Researchers at the University of Toronto are the first to indentify a potential cause for a severe sleep disorder that has been closely linked to Parkinson's disease and other neurodegenerative diseases. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-06-potential-severe-disorder-implications-parkinson.html Neuroscience Wed, 15 Jun 2011 10:49:08 EST news227353722 Transferring a segment of muscle from the thigh appears to help restore the ability to smile in children with facial paralysis just as it does in adults, according to a report in the May issue of Archives of Facial Plastic Surgery. The article is part of a theme issue focusing on facial plastic surgery in the pediatric population. http://medicalxpress.com/news/2011-05-surgical-procedure-children-facial-paralysis.html Other Mon, 16 May 2011 17:05:20 EST news224784308