Know your enemy
Along with MRSA and ESBL bacteria, Clostridium difficile is causing a growing problem. Epidemics of a new C. difficile strain have already occurred in hospitals in North America, England and the Benelux countries.
Therapy
Tomotherapy system targets cancer more precisely
When tumours are situated in difficult locations, e.g. near the brain, lungs, prostate or abdomen, patients treated with conventional radiation equipment often suffer severe side effects, which include bleeding, chronic infections or organ function limitations.
WMA gains funding to support TB training course
Pharma company Eli Lilly has increased an existing partnership with the World Medical Association (WMA) by granting c. 646,505 euros to expand online training courses for physicians on multi-drug resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB), which they have been developed over the past year.
Trends in image-guided therapy
For the third in his series of articles for European Hospital, Professor Stefan Schönberg of the Institute of Clinical Radiology and Nuclear Medicine (IKRN), University Hospital Mannheim, Medical Faculty of Mannheim, University of Heidelberg, invited colleagues at the Faculty's Cardiology and Radiology and Nuclear Medicine departments for a round-table discussion on:
Diabetes management
During the 2nd European Workshop on Diabetes, hosted by Bayer HealthCare Diabetes Care, experts called for uncompromising management of diabetes.
NHS cancer care gets massively financed by donations
When it comes to children's cancer care, the National Health Service counts on the concern of others, critics say. In their opinion the Britisch NHS tries to compense financial deficits by falling back on charity support. This could lead to large inequalities between different disease treatments and to over-reliances on local donations and social work.
How measles virus spread in its host
Every kindergarten undergoes it several times a year: the German measles. Nobody knew exactly how measles enter the body. But it has been thought they come through the surface of airways and lungs. But that is wrong, as researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota found recently.
The brain in three dimensions
Stroke treatment is a question of time. The faster the cerebral infarct can be diagnosed, the less the brain will be damaged. But unfortunately it is not always easy to get the patient to a brain scanner within the required three-hour window. Real-time 3D ultrasound might bring the solution, according to researchers from the Duke University in Durham, NC.
New medical options by tobacco plants
Bayer and its affiliated firm Icon Genetics developed an own production process which provides the opportunity to make therapeutic proteins from tobacco plants. The pilot plant for biotech drugs opened on June 16 in Halle, Saxony-Anhalt.
Nurses receive award for their work in tuberculosis
By putting the World TB Day slogan 'I am stopping TB' into action, 11 nurses have earned the 2008 ICN/Lilly Award, for their outstanding work in fighting tuberculosis (TB) and multi-drug resistant TB (MDR-TB)[1]. The award recipients come from six TB affected countries: from Kenya (Diana Jelegat Kipsoisoi), Lesotho (Likhapha Ntlamelle ), Malawi (Chrisie Bwazi, Rodwell Gundo and Shouts Simeza),…
Multiple-targeted therapies
The next big development in biological targeted therapies for advanced breast cancer will be drugs acting via multiple mechanisms, experts told delegates attending the 1st Asian Breast Cancer conference, held in New Delhi 9-10 February.
Cardiology 'must be evidence-based' says ACC
Ian Mason reports from Chicago
Alarming TB cases in Austria
A third of the worlds population is infected with the bacterium Myobacterium tuberculosis which infects around nine million people annually.
Myocardial infarction
In his lecture Focus on new therapy strategies for heart attacks, Prof. Hans Michael Piper, President of this year's Congress of the German Cardiac Society, gave some fascinating insights in to therapeutic measures after heart attacks.
Image-guided radiation therapy
Artiste is a linear accelerator and CT scanner combined. At the German Cancer Research Centre, a team of scientists led by Professors Wolfgang Schlegel and Uwe Oelfke of the Medical Physics in Radiation Oncology division, contributed substantially to the technical development of the Artiste platform. They report that users will be able to observe and correct the actual position, extension and…
OPHTHALMOLOGY
Following 12 years of development, German surgeons and technicians have successfully implanted the world's first vision prosthesis in six blind patients.
The Berlin TB Symposium
The WHO-Euro region ranges from Portugal to the East Asian parts of Russia, including Central Asia and the Southern Caucasus. Because of the increasing numbers of tuberculosis and rates of multidrug resistance (MDR TB), tuberculosis was declared a regional emergency in 2004.
German Radiology Congress 2008
Along with paediatric radiology, interventional radiology will have a high profile at the 89th German Radiology Congress and 5th Joint Congress with the Austrian Radiology Society. Congress presidents Professor Dierk Vorwerk and Professor Richard Fotter outlined what's on the agenda for the expected 6,900 visitors. Training, they pointed out, will aim at those preparing to specialise in…
Radiation treatment decisions in patients with prostate cancer and suspected lymph node metastasis based on USPIO-MRI
Prostate cancer is the most frequent cancer in men with about 49,000 newly diagnosed cancers in Germany and 6,000 in the Netherlands, annually.
Improvement to therapeutic effects for seasonal rhinitis
Patients suffering from moderate to severe seasonal allergic rhinitis experience significantly improved therapeutic effects when combining nasal Azelastine spray with Fluticason nasal spray as opposed to using Fluticason nasal spray by itself. Those are the surprising results of a study released by the Annals of Allergy & Asthma Immunology (1) in January 2008. Azelastine is a first-line,…
Fibroid Embolisation: So Promising for Women, So Unavailable in Europe
Uterine fibroids are the most common form of benign pelvic tumor, with about 30-50% of women between the ages of 35-45 years reporting them. Although many women are asymptomatic, those who experience the symptoms of bladder pressure, frequent and very heavy menstrual periods, and uterine pain, have a reduced quality of life.
MR contrast agents: A step up from compartmental to targeted imaging
Andrea Martini and Joerg Larsen, of the Institute for Roentgendiagnostics, Braunschweig Teaching Hospitals, Germany, discuss nanotechnology, hybrid imaging and the quest for a personalised medicine.
A novel PET tracer for early detection of Alzheimers
Amyloidb (Ab) plaque formation is a hallmark of Alzheimers disease (AD) and precedes the onset of dementia. Australian researchers reported the first data on the validity in humans of a new PET tracer binding to Ab. Their data suggest that 18F-BAY94-9172 of Bayer Schering Pharma AG can reliably detect Ab deposition and thereby aid early diagnosis, differential diagnosis, and therapeutic…
The 23rd annual EAU Congress
The Milano Convention Centre (MIC) is the largest of its kind in Italy. Certainly that space will prove valuable this March, when 9,500 urologists from 100 countries attend the 23rd EAU Congress, the second biggest of its kind in the world. Apart from attending the congress and related trade fair, they may also glimpse Milan's many attractions: the cathedral, La Scala, Sforza's Castle, or even…
Mental health and radiology
The Uliazpi Foundation in Spain, which studies and cares for severely mentally retarded patients, carried out an interesting study to identify bone mineral density values in a group of its patients, compare these with the general population and investigate the possible influence on these values on certain clinical variables and therapeutic regimens.
