Vaccine for Cancer

FDA panel supports using Gardasil to prevent anal cancer in males, females between 9 and 26.
The AP (11/18) reports, "A federal health panel says evidence supports expanding use of Merck's Gardasil (Recombinant Human Papillomavirus Quadrivalent) vaccine to prevent anal cancer in young men and women." An FDA panel said "a 4,000-patient study conducted by Merck & Co. Inc. shows the vaccine lowers the risk of anal cancer in men. They said these results can also be applied to women." WebMD (11/18, McMillen) and MedPage Today (11/18) also report the story.

PTSD and Early Mortality.

PTSD may damage blood vessels, increase risk of dying early.
CNN /Health.com (11/18, Harding) reports that post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) "may damage blood vessels and increase the risk of dying early, according to new research presented...at an annual meeting of the American Heart Association." The research "included about 286,000 mostly male veterans between the ages of 45 and 81 who served in Iraq, Afghanistan, and conflicts dating back to the Korean War." Investigators found that "the vets with PTSD -- who accounted for roughly 10 percent of the study participants -- had more than double the risk of dying during the 10-year study compared to their peers who didn't have disorder."
HealthDay (11/17, Gardner) reported that approximately "three-quarters of those diagnosed with PTSD had some calcium build-up, versus 59 percent of the veterans without the disorder. As a group, the veterans with PTSD had more severe disease of their arteries, with an average coronary artery calcification score of 448, compared to a score of 332 in the veterans without PTSD -- a significantly higher reading."

New Cholesterol Drug

Anacetrapib appears to lower LDL cholesterol while raising HDL cholesterol.
ABC World News (11/17, story 8, 1:40, Stephanopoulos) reported, "There's a potentially huge advance in the fight against America's number one killer, a drug that could turn back the clock on heart disease."
The New York Times (11/18, B4, Singer) reports that, according to a study published Nov. 17 in the New England Journal of Medicine and presented at the American Heart Association meeting, Merck's experimental drug anacetrapib appears to increase "HDL or 'good' cholesterol even as it lowers LDL, the 'bad' cholesterol." The drug, which "works by inhibiting an enzyme called CETP, which is involved in transforming particles of good cholesterol into bad cholesterol," was tested in "1,623 patients who were already taking statins to control their cholesterol." Researchers at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital found that patients taking the drug saw a 39.8% reduction in LDL beyond what was seen in patients who got a placebo.
USA Today (11/18, Sternberg) reports, "Doctors caution that anacetrapib is experimental and must be tested in a bigger trial designed to show whether it actually prevents heart attacks and saves lives. If the drug succeeds, it will be at least five years before it can be sold in the US." Nevertheless, the drug holds promise, and some cardiologists are cautiously optimistic.
The AP (11/18, Marchione) reports that so far, there have been "no signs of the blood pressure problems that led Pfizer Inc. to walk away from an $800 million investment in torcetrapib, a similar drug it was developing four years ago."

Otitis Media and Antibiotics

Majority of children with acute otitis media may not need antibiotics.
USA Today (11/17, Szabo) reports, "Ear infections are the No. 1 reason kids get antibiotics, costing the country $2.8 billion a year." Now, a paper appearing in the Journal of the American Medical Association indicates that "most of the eight million kids who see a doctor for ear infections each year don't need antibiotics." In fact, the "benefits of antibiotics seem even smaller in light of their side effects," and previous research has suggested that their overuse can spur the "growth of hardier, drug-resistant bacteria."
Before reaching those conclusions, researchers "from Mattel Children's Hospital UCLA and the RAND Corporation were asked to update guidelines issued by the American Academy of Pediatrics," the Boston Globe (11/16, Cooney) "White Coat Notes" blog reported. According to CNN (11/17, Falco), the "pediatricians' group and the American Academy of Family Physicians have suggested since 2004 that 'observation' -- avoiding antibiotics -- is an option for treating ear infections in otherwise healthy children between the ages of two and 12." Aiming to evaluate the soundness of that recommendation, investigators reviewed "existing research on the topic."
"Based on their review of more than 100 studies published over the last decade, the researchers were able to quantify the risks and benefits of treatment with antibiotics," WebMD (11/17, Boyles) reported. "They estimated that for every 100 otherwise healthy children with uncomplicated middle ear infections, about 80 could be expected to improve without antibiotics within about three days. An additional 12 children could be expected to improve during this time if all were treated with antibiotics, but three to 10 would develop a treatment-related rash and five to 10 would get diarrhea."

Massachusetts Uninsured

Study: Access to healthcare tight in Massachusetts despite 97% insured.
The Boston Herald /AP (11/17) reports that according to an annual report from the Massachusetts Health Council access "to health care in Massachusetts remains tight, with hospital emergency rooms increasingly picking up the slack, even as the state has experienced a surge in the number of insured residents." Notably, the "report found that while 97 percent of the state's residents were insured...finding a doctor wasn't always easy" because only "44 percent of primary care doctors are accepting new patients, and primary health services are increasingly being provided by hospital emergency departments." The report also makes "policy recommendations for lawmakers."

Women and Work Related Illness

Women with demanding jobs 40% more likely to have heart attack, stroke.
The CBS Evening News (11/14, story 11, 0:20, Mitchell) reported, "Findings of the longest major study on stress in women are in this evening. The 10-year study found women with demanding jobs were 40% more likely to have a heart attack or stroke as women with less stressful jobs."
The AP (11/14) reported that the study presented at the American Heart Association conference on Nov. 14 followed "17,415 participants in the Women's Health Study" for 10 years. The investigators then discovered that "women with demanding jobs and little control over how to do them were nearly twice as likely to have suffered a heart attack as women with less demanding jobs and more control."
"Women with high-stress jobs face about 88 percent more risk of a heart attack than if they had low workplace strain," Bloomberg News (11/14, Lopatto) reported. The study authors "defined the stressful positions as those with demanding tasks and little authority or creativity," Bloomberg News noted.
CNN /Health.com (11/14, Harding) quoted researcher Peter Kaufmann, PhD, of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, as saying, "This new data is among the most important to emerge in recent years concerning the relationship between job strain and cardiovascular health." Kaufmann, who is not involved with the study, added that the "finding 'emphasize that progress is needed urgently in this arena.'"

Endometrial Cancer Prevention

Exercising 150 minutes or more every week may reduce risk for endometrial cancer.
The Los Angeles Times (11/9, Stein, Times) "Booster Shots" blog reported that the majority of adults are urged to get at least "150 minutes" of exercise each week. Now, Yale researchers suggest that level of physical activity "or more may decrease a woman's risk of endometrial cancer."
Before reaching that conclusion, investigators "looked at data on 1,333 women -- 668 with endometrial cancer from the population-based Rapid Case Ascertainment Shared Resource at the Yale Cancer Center and 665 age-matched controls," MedPage Today (11/9, Neale) reported. "After controlling for potential confounders, including BMI and age, active women (those who participated in more than the equivalent of 7.5 MET hours/week) had a 34% reduced likelihood of endometrial cancer compared with those who were inactive." And, even though the "odds reduction occurred in both normal-weight and overweight women, it was greatest in normal-weight women who were active compared with overweight women who were inactive (OR 0.27, 95% CI 0.19 to 0.38)."