Category Archives: Preventative Medicine

BASKING RIDGE, N.J., Nov. 26, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- electroCore, Inc. (ECOR), a commercial-stage bioelectronic medicine company, today announced that Dan Goldberger, Chief Executive Officer, will present a corporate overview and host investor meetings at the Evercore ISI HealthCONx Conference 2019, taking place December 2-4, 2019 at Four Seasons Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts, and the LD Micro 12th Annual Main Event conference, taking place December 10-12, 2019 at the Luxe Sunset in Bel-Air, California.

About electroCore, Inc.

electroCore, Inc. is a commercial stage bioelectronic medicine company dedicated to improving patient outcomes through its platform non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation therapy initially focused on the treatment of multiple conditions in neurology and rheumatology. The companys current indications are for the preventative treatment of cluster headache and acute treatment of migraine and episodic cluster headache.

For more information, visit http://www.electrocore.com.

Investors:

Hans VitzthumLifeSci Advisors617-430-7578hans@lifesciadvisors.com

or

Media Contact:

Sara ZelkovicLifeSci Public Relations646-876-4933sara@lifescipublicrelations.com

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electroCore to Present at the Two December Investor Conferences - Yahoo Finance

One night in her Nashville apartment, Bre Banks read a comment from her boyfriend on Facebook. They were in a shaky spell, and his words seemed proof she would lose him. She put her laptop down on the couch and headed to the bedroom to cry. My legs seized up, and I fell, she recalled. With her knees and forehead pressing into the carpet, she heard a voice that said, Slit your wrists, slit your wrists. She saw herself in the bathtub with the blood flowing. She was terrified that if she moved she would die.

Banks, then 25, was a disciplined graduate student with a job and close friends and had no psychiatric history. I had never considered suicide an option, she says. But for the next three days, she couldnt sleep while the voice and disturbing images persisted. After seeing a therapist, she decided to teach herself techniques from dialectical behavior therapy, one of the few treatments shown to reduce suicidality. The voices and images came back over the next few months, but eventually faded. Eight years later, Banks now evaluates suicide prevention programs across Tennessee as a manager at the large mental health provider Centerstones research institute, and she and the same boyfriend just celebrated their 10th anniversary.

In the public imagination, suicide is often understood as the end of a torturous decline caused by depression or another mental illness. But clinicians and researchers know that suicidal crises frequently come on rapidly, escalating from impulse to action within a day, hours, or just minutes. Many also point to the fact that they may strike people like Banks, who are otherwise in good mental health.

That understanding is one reason a movement is building to define suicidality as a condition in its own right. Most recently, researchers from Mount Sinai Beth Israel and Florida State University have agreed to collaborate on a joint proposal for a new diagnosis in the next Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), a handbook published by the American Psychiatric Association. The criteria include familiar symptoms of depression, but these symptoms occur in an acute state that is not currently obvious to clinicians. Proponents say it could spur more research and make it easier for suicidal patients to get the care they need.

Suicide rates have been rising sharply since 1999, figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) show. More than half of those who take their lives do not have a known mental health condition. There is also no established way to pinpoint when a patient is in immediate danger. You cannot rely on people telling you when they are or are not suicidal, said Igor Galynker, a professor of psychiatry at Icahn School of Medicine in New York.Some have expressed skepticism. Far too many diagnoses in psychiatry come and go, said George Makari, a Weill Cornell Medicine psychiatrist and historian of psychiatry. The idea that suicidality may not be a symptom of something else a mood or personality disorder is novel. If theyre making the claim that weve been seeing this upside down for a long time, he said, thats fascinating.

Research backs that up: A 2019meta-analysisof 71 studies conducted around the globe found that about 60 percent of people who died by suicide had denied having suicidal thoughts when asked by a psychiatrist or general practitioner. Here in the U.S., a2016 studyexamined data from four health systems that use standardized questionnaires in primary care and specialty clinics. (The questionnaires ask whether the patient has experienced thoughts that you would be better off dead or of hurting yourself in some way.) Although the answers did predict future suicide attempts to some extent, there were plenty of false negatives. Thirty-nine percent of the suicide attempts and 36 percent of the suicide deaths occurred among patients who had responded not at all to the key question. In another study, about a quarter of the suicide attempts were made by people who reported zero suicidal thoughts.

Its easy to assume they were lying, but thats not quite true. Greg Simon, a psychiatrist and investigator at Kaiser Permanente Washington in Seattle, who led the 2016 study, was involved in a follow-up study based on interviews with 26 people who had made attempts after denying any suicidal thoughts on the standard questionnaire. The interviews revealed that some people had lied, he said. But they also revealed people who had provided aspirational responses they weretryingnot to have suicidal thoughts and people who had experienced no suicidal thinking whatsoever. (Among the latter group, alcohol often factored into their attempts.) None of them woke up that morning with a plan to die that day.

For his part, Galynker determined long ago after he lost a patient who took him by surprise that he couldnt rely on patient reports. In 2007, he set out to develop a set of symptoms that would help pinpoint imminent suicide even if the patient didnt report suicidal thinking. We hypothesized that the pre-suicidal state leading to suicidal action was short-lived, kind of like pulling a gun trigger, he said. In 2009, he called it suicide trigger state. Over dozens of research papers, he explored various symptoms as predictors, developing checklists and then testing how well they predicted future behavior. While these checklists are still new, they are being used to screen for suicidal risk among high school students in Moscow, Russia, and among hospital patients in Chicago.

In 2017, Galynker coined the termsuicide crisis syndrome. People with this syndrome feel trapped, though they might not think of death per se. They may be flooded with misery and unable to think clearly. Certain thoughts, like Banks images and voices, return repeatedly, no matter how much they are resisted. They may experience mood swings or overwhelming emotional pain.

At Florida State University, Thomas Joiner, the author of several books on suicide and the editor of a suicide journal, outlined his own criteria for a quick-onset suicide crisis, which he calls acute suicidal affective disturbance. This describes rapidly escalating plans for suicide over hours or days faster than clinicians may expect. The key difference is that Joiner includes reports of suicidal thinking as an essential criterion.

The pair teamed up more than two years ago when the first paper describing both of their diagnoses appeared. Together, the two researchers envision a new DSM suicide diagnosis with two sub-types, one with thoughts of suicide, and one without. Before this diagnosis is approved for the DSM, however, the researchers may need to show more conclusively that the phenomenon they describe isnt a symptom of depression or another mental illness, and that their methods of screening for it are effective.

Psychiatrist Michael First at Columbia University, who presided over earlier revisions of the DSM, sees a suicide-specific diagnosis as an appealing idea. If the melding of Galynkers and Joiners formulations worked well and proved to be accurate, First said, then it would clearly be very useful to have it.

Clinicianscurrently struggle with little guidance on how to identify imminent risk or make sense of suicides that seem to come out of the blue.

Nearly once a week, attending psychiatrist Dmitriy Gekhman at Mount Sinai Beth Israel sees a patient who has attempted suicide and is hard to classify, though he must find a relevant code for each patients chart. You kind of go through the history and everything, and theyre not depressed. They dont meet the criteria for depression, they dont meet criteria for bipolar disorder, and they dont have a personality disorder, he said. We just discharged somebody this week who that happened to, and we still have somebody on the unit now.

If a diagnosis based on Galynkers and Joiners research were put in place, it would put the patients doctors on notice that the patient is a risk for suicide with rapid onset. Over time, its possible that clinicians and even teachers and parents would become better at seeing the signs. The diagnosis, Joiner explained, is a warning sign for the future.

Detroits Henry Ford Health System provides a glimpse of how suicide prevention might evolve. At Henry Ford, suicide is considered its own mental health category, not primarily a symptom of depression. In 2002, the health system began a series of initiatives, and reduced patient suicide rates a dramatic 80 percent over the next seven years.

The staff at Henry Ford discovered that from 2000 to 2010, only half of patients who died by suicide had received a mental health diagnosis, closely matching current national statistics. This could be undiagnosed illness, but I think a lot of people dont meet the criteria, said Brian Ahmedani, who directs the health systems Center for Health Policy & Health Services Research.

Henry Ford screens everyone with questionnaires asking about suicidal thoughts, a practice the Joint Commission, which certifies health care organizations, started recommending in 2016. But in its behavioral health units, the risk assessment focuses on triggers, such as a job loss. Ahmedani says that patients in the highest risk percentile usually have a number of triggers: chronic pain, opioid use, and insomnia, for example. Because assessing the many possible combinations can be difficult, Henry Ford uses artificial intelligence to analyze electronic medical records, helping clinicians who may not have time to catch a perfect storm before its already too late. Veterans are a high-risk group, so the Veterans Affairs (VA) has begun using these algorithms too.

Currently, suicidal people are often prescribed antidepressants. However, other than lithium, most often used to treat people with bipolar disorder, theres little evidence that medication prevents suicide, Ahmedani observed. New VA clinical guidelines alsosupportshort-term infusions of a drug calledketamine.

Henry Ford offers treatments specific to suicide: identifying triggers and coping mechanisms, for example. It also offers cognitive behavioral therapy and dialectical behavior therapy, the treatment that helped Banks. Patients are encouraged to develop a safety plan that includes removing guns or painkillers from the home, and an idea of who they might call under duress.

David Covington, a suicide prevention activist, said, we used to think that if you treat addiction, the mental health will get better, and the other side thought if you treat mental health, the addiction will get better. Now we say you have to treat both. Similarly, a person might need treatment for both suicide and depression.

The new diagnosis, more fundamentally, could change who we think might be driven to the extreme of a suicide attempt. Psychiatrists still refer to suicide attempts with a short buildup as impulsive, but Joiners team disputes that these are impulsive people. Megan Rogers, a Ph.D. candidate who works with Joiner, sees outpatients at the university clinic. She recalls one who within hours would go from no risk to high risk but had what she describes as a conscientious and vigilant, rather than impulsive, personality.

Still, some question whether a new diagnosis would actually benefit patients. For one thing, it isnt clear how such a diagnosis would influence treatment or whether it would save lives. There is simply no value in a prediction that cannot lead to an effective preventative measure, writes psychiatrist Matthew Large in a2018 paperevaluating suicide assessment approaches generally. More people could land in hospital psychiatric care, or be kept longer than they desire, he said. And while it is generally assumed that hospitalization can prevent suicide, this has never been demonstrated empirically. In fact, suicide rates are high among recently discharged patients and some say hospitalization can make things worse.

Galynker agrees that hospitalization is not necessarily the answer and is looking at new treatment methods. In the meantime, the diagnosis might communicate the higher risk to insurance companies, explained Lisa Cohen, a professor of psychiatry at Icahn School of Medicine and co-author with Galynker, giving patients better access to treatment options.

Psychiatrists who make decisions about hospitalization say they would appreciate more science to guide them. It would be incredibly helpful to have a very clear indication that someone is at higher risk, observed Julie Holland, who once presided over a psychiatric emergency room at Bellevue Hospital in New York. A close look at the buildup to a crisis would be invaluable. We do that when somebodys heart stops, or when somebodys heart is imminently stopping, said Chicago psychiatrist Leo Weinstein, who teaches at Northwestern University. Making the unstable state a diagnostic entity in its own right, like ventricular fibrillation or congestive heart failure, he says, is crucially important.

Temma Ehrenfeld is a writer and ghostwriter in New York drawn to philosophy and psychiatry. Her most recent book is Morgan: The Wizard of Kew Gardens. Follow her on Twitter @temmaehrenfeld

A version of this article was originally published on Undarks website as Can a New Diagnosis Help Prevent Suicide? and has been republished here with permission.

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Treating 'suicidality' as its own medical condition could spur research, better treatment options - Genetic Literacy Project

Heritable diseases that are passed down through the generations have been known for quite some time. For most of that time though, people had no idea why it was this way, let alone what to do about it. This all changed with the arrival of DNA sequencing from the completion of the Human Genome Project over a decade ago.

Not only do people recognize that genes can play a factor in the likelihood of contracting certain ailments, but increasingly scientists are able to pinpoint where these genes are, how they are contributing to something, and to formulate a solution.

The Importance of HealthIt is not enough that people are living longer lives if those extra years are spent in a hospital bed. What really matters is not how many years you spend on this Earth, but how many healthy years. This is why the subject of health is so important. Health can be said to be the key to a truly fulfilling life.

As we age, our body accumulates more flaws and as a result we become less vigorous over the years, generally speaking. But if we take care of our health when we are young, we can slow this process down by quite a bit. There are a good number of retirees who have done this and are reaping the benefits.

In the days of old, most knowledge people had of maintaining good health was traditions passed down over the generations. This of course is not always perfect as some traditions might not be rooted in the best of science. Some traditions might be outright harmful to family and societal health.

The health of one person can potentially affect the entire family. If someone falls ill, the whole family is wrought with worry anxiety because a loved one is in distress. If it turns out to be something major, like cancer, not only is the familys emotions dragged down, but potentially their finances as well.

The miracle of modern technology is the gift that does not stop giving. With genealogy and heritage DNA tests available to the public, families might just be able to save a members life just by knowing more of something. Through knowledge and preventative medicine, people are being empowered to take matters of life into their own hands. While this of course means that a greater degree of personal responsibility is needed, this also means that we can make better decisions on what to do with our life simply because we now know more about ourselves.

As with many things, modern technology always has the potential to lend a helping hand. In the past couple centuries, human life expectancy has actually doubled worldwide! Improved sanitation, mass vaccination and germ theory have all contributed to this rise in life expectancy.

Another truly remarkable achievement has been the dramatic drop in infant mortality. Just a few short centuries ago, two in five children did not reach the age of five. In most developed countries, this has dropped to less than one in a hundred. This has resulted in the elimination of suffering for nearly countless families worldwide.

With the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA, scientists were able to confirm that certain gene expressions contributed to the rise of certain ailments and also that some of these expressions were transmitted from parent to child. And through better understanding of these gene expressions, scientists will be able to better combat these diseases.

With the Genome Project completed, the field transformed into an information technology and was able to ride the exponential wave of IT development along with countless other fields that have been swept by the IT fairy. Now, scientists are able to attack the problem of heritable diseases with even more pinpoint precision.

DNA Kit testing has exploded in popularity in recent years. With technology making everything cheaper, DNA testing kits are now within financial reach of millions of families. Some people use this technology to satisfy certain curiosities while for others, it could very well be a lifesaver.

DNA testing kits work by sending a testing kit to your address with instructions on what they need from you, usually a large saliva sample, as well as how to get it back to them. After a certain amount of time, some documents will be mailed back to you documenting their findings.

There are some DNA testing kits that specialize in looking for heritable traits with real world consequences such as predispositions to certain heritable diseases and even certain allergies. Many of us go around our daily activities not even slightly aware that we have certain predispositions we have no control over.

This can be very helpful because a DNA test might produce information that can be applied to a real-life medical situation. If you have a high chance of contracting a certain disease than most, it might make sense to take action now that might save your life and spare your family from suffering a loss in the family.

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A New Frontier in Family Health and History - The Nation Newspaper

Why it matters: The latest deep dive by Britains leading political historian examines Theresa Mays time as prime minister and details how her attitude and approach to the NHS changed during her time in Number 10.

Theresa May didnt understand what had gone wrong [on the NHS] or how to put it right when she entered Number 10, according to Sir Anthony Seldon.

She was instinctively anti-reform because she knew previous attempts had backfired, while at the same time hyper-sensitive to the possibility of a winter crisis.

Sir Anthony also claims she did want to see increased funding for the NHS, something that will surprise those senior NHS figures who met with her at this time.

Indeed, her first budget in 2017 only produced a 2.8bn increase for the NHS, despite the PMs own policy unit and NHS England chief executive Simon Stevens arguing for 4bn.

Sir Anthony quotes Mrs May as saying: The problem with conceding to what Simon Stevens is always demanding is that we end up putting the money into short-term solutions like reducing waiting lists rather than systematic improvement, or into preventative medicine or mental health.

Then health secretary Jeremy Hunt apparently agreed with the PM.

The settlement ended up riling the NHS rather than pleasing them recalls special adviser Alex Dawson.

However, towards the end of the year, Mrs Mays attitudes had begun to change.

The PM felt the Conservatives had got into a ridiculous position on the NHS as a result of being banned from discussing it by campaign guru Lynton Crosby during the 2015 and 2017 elections.

NHS performance was continuing to worsen, Mr Stevens was again growing vocal and House of Commons health select committee chair Sarah Wollaston began to call for a Royal Commission, which scared No10 and No11 witless.

On 7 February 2018, Mrs May was shown polling by Mr Dawson which demonstrated that people were prepared to pay extra taxes to fund improvements to the NHS.

Sir Anthony becomes a little too credulous at this point, taking at face value statements like the PM started to think that the NHS leadership needed to be treated in the same way as the police: it needed reform to become much more biddable.

There had been a plan to announce an inquiry into the NHS at the end of 2016, similar to the one conducted into higher education, but this had been overruled by the Treasury, says Sir Anthony.

Now the idea was reheated as a 10-year NHS Plan.

This would apparently enable Number 10 to hold the NHS to account for delivery.

The truth as most HSJ readers will know is that by 2018 the government had little choice but to significantly increase NHS funding or face a total service melt-down and the resulting political backlash. Chancellor Philip Hammond tried to hold out for a three-year settlement, but finally accepted it had to be five.

The NHS plan full of good ideas as it is was still sophisticated window dressing for dragging the NHS out of the traditional public sector spending round to be given a 70th birthday present. A fact instantly recognised by savvy commentators like Spectator editor Fraser Nelson, who was both admiring of the conjuring trick pulled off by Mr Stevens and Mr Hunt and, irritated that the spoilt NHS could get even more cash.

From the start of Mrs Mays premiership, Sir Anthony says mental health was an area in which she was prepared to take risks. He claims Mrs May won an 18-month battle from 2012 with Mr Hunt to get David Camerons government to take mental health more seriously.

Mrs May arranged for Sir Simon Wessely, former president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and Poppy Jaman, founder of Mental Health First Aid, to address Cabinet for 45 minutes.

Most ministers were attentive, apart from foreign secretary Boris Johnson who gave the impression that he thought it was all nanny-state stuff and made sotto voce asides throughout.

No surprise then that, according to Sir Anthony, those working on a subsequent project to improve black, Asian and minority ethnic mental health did their best to make it Boris proof.

Sir Simon is glowing in his praise for Mrs Mays interest in and support for the most intractable aspect of mental health, one in which there were the fewest votes: severe mental illness. Nobody since Stephen Dorrell, Conservative health secretary between 1995 and 1997, had taken such a real interest in the most difficult part of the whole spectrum, the former Royal College of Psychiatristspresident tells Sir Anthony.

Perhaps the most illuminating section of the book is the one on the disaster which befell Mrs Mays proposed social care reforms in 2017.

Here was an issue on which according to Number 10 deputy chief of policy Will Tanner Mrs May believed people felt let down by politicians and that it was her duty to act.

Her senior communications adviser Fiona Hill told the PM it was a mistake, but Sir Anthony quotes Mrs May as saying: I know Ill have to use up some of my political capital, but this is the time to do it.

As Ms Hill rowed with Mrs Mays other chief adviser Nick Timothy, the PM with tears in her eyes banged the desk and said: Were going to do this.

When as Ms Hill predicted the negative media coverage of the social care proposals provoked widespread panic among Tory MPs, Mrs May did nothing to calm the storm.

Sir Anthony notes she simply could have said: Nobody would lose their homes during their lifetime and they would be left with at least 100,000. But she didnt and, as Sir Anthony remarks later in the book, as far as Mrs May was concerned social care was dead in the water.

One intriguing side note was that the first draft of the 2017 Conservative manifesto contained a proposal to introduce social insurance. Mrs May vetoed it, saying over my dead body.

The section on the January 2018s botched reshuffle confirms Mrs May had intended to replace Mr Hunt with the solid Greg Clark to calm things down after the junior doctors strike. However, Sir Anthony has also discovered that Mr Hunt had spoken to No10 before the general election about wanting to be moved, and that rumours swirled in the corridors of power that he wanted the job of deputy prime minister.

As that possibility receded, Mr Hunt began to change his mind, without notifying Number 10. He was, recounts May at 10, increasingly keen on becoming the longest-serving health secretary in history something, of course, he achieved in due course.

If there is any political or influential figure you would likeHSJto interview, please emailalastair.mclellan@wilmingtonhealthcare.com.

The past five Bedpans

Will Hutton

Cardiac Arrest and Bodies writer Jed Mercurio

The Grenfell Tower fire

Margaret Thatcher and the birth of the internal market

Doctors for Extinction Rebellion

You can read all 44 Bedpanshere

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The Bedpan: 'The problem with conceding to Simon Stevens' - Health Service Journal

A heart attack occurs when the flow of blood to the heart is blocked. Blood carries the oxygen and nutrients that the organs need to work properly. Blood also carries carbon dioxide to the lungs and when a blockage occurs it can be fatal. The blockage is most often a buildup of fat, cholesterol and other substances and this is known as atherosclerosis or hardening of the arteries.

Over time, the fatty material can build up inside the walls of the arteries and if it blocks the coronary artery and cuts off the supply of oxygen-rich blood to the heart muscle, the heart may become permanently damaged.

Leading health experts suggest foods that help cleanse the arteries and these include asparagus, avocado, broccoli, fatty fish, nuts and watermelon.

There is also a cooking oil that comes highly suggested for helping reduce the risk of heart attacks and cleanse the arteries.

READ MORE: Heart attack: The biggest signs you could be having a silent heart attack - what are they?

Food is directly involved in many of the risk factors for coronary heart disease and heart attacks.

Paying attention to what one eats is one of the most important preventative measures to take.

Saturated and trans fats in the diet tend to increase LDL cholesterol in the blood.

Common sources of saturated fats include animal products including butter, meat, chicken skin and full cream dairy foods and processed foods like pastries and biscuits.

The oil one cooks with could either help or hinder a persons risk of developing a heart attack.

DONT MISS

Olive oil

Olive oil has long been hailed as one of the best oils one can use for its many health benefits.

It is a staple in the Mediterranean diet and the heart-healthy benefits are well documented.

Olive oil is packed with antioxidants which relieve inflammation and decrease the risk of chronic disease.

Its also rich in monounsaturated fatty acids and many studies have associated it with improvements in heart health.

What the study says

One study in 7,216 adults at high risk for heart disease showed that those who consumed the most olive oil had a 35 percent lower risk of developing heart disease.

In another study with the US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, olive oil intake was linked with a risk of cardiovascular disease.

Another large study also showed that a higher intake of olive oil was associated with lower systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

Medical News Today said: There is a protein in our blood that rises after we eat. Now, new research reveals that it plays an important role in preventing a major cause of heart attack.

"This protein is called apolipoprotein A-IV (ApoA-IV) and evidence already suggest that higher blood levels of it are linked to lower risk of cardiovascular diseases.

"For the first time, scientists at St. Michaels Hospital in Toronto, Canada, have shown that ApoA-IV stops blood platelets forming into blood clots.

"The researchers suggest that the rise in ApoA-IV blood levels following meals containing olive oil and other unsaturated fats reduces "platelet hyperactivity and bonding," which, in turn, reduces inflammation and stroke and heart attack risk.

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Heart attack: This cooking oil has been proven to prevent the life-threatening condition - Express

LONDON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--ViiV Healthcare, the global specialist HIV company majority owned by GSK, with Pfizer Inc. and Shionogi Limited as shareholders, today announced that the company will be developing the investigational broadly neutralising antibody (bNAb) N6LS for the treatment and prevention of HIV-1, as part of an exclusive licensing agreement between GSK and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Broadly neutralising antibodies are antibodies that can recognise and block the entry of different strains of HIV into healthy cells. N6LS is an antiviral bNAb that works by binding to a specific site (gp120) on the surface of HIV that prevents its entry into uninfected immune system cells (CD4+ T-cells). By blocking HIVs entry into human CD4+ cells, HIV replication is halted, and the HIV transmission process may be prevented.1

Kimberly Smith, M.D., Head of Research & Development at ViiV Healthcare, said: We are excited to advance N6LS from its current proof of concept stage to the next step in its development by studying this bNAb as a long-acting medicine that could potentially be used for both treatment and prevention of HIV. By continuing to research new ways that people living with HIV can reach undetectable viral loads, we build on our ten-year history of furthering innovative science in HIV and take another important step forward in ending the epidemic.

ViiV Healthcare looks forward to initiating a phase IIa study with material manufactured by the NIAID Vaccine Research Center that will evaluate the efficacy, safety, tolerability, and pharmacokinetic profile of N6LS in adults living with HIV.

Additional details about N6LSN6LS was originally discovered and developed by scientists at NIAIDs Laboratory of Immunoregulation and VRC. NIH and GSK entered into a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement (CRADA) to jointly identify and further develop new bNAbs such as N6LS that could serve as the next generation of treatment regimens for people living with HIV and preventative options for HIV transmission. This exclusive license outlines a programme for ViiV Healthcares development of N6LS as well as milestone payments and royalties to the NIAID.

About ViiV HealthcareViiV Healthcare is a global specialist HIV company established in November 2009 by GlaxoSmithKline (LSE: GSK) and Pfizer (NYSE: PFE) dedicated to delivering advances in treatment and care for people living with HIV and for people who are at risk of becoming infected with HIV. Shionogi joined in October 2012. The companys aim is to take a deeper and broader interest in HIV/AIDS than any company has done before and take a new approach to deliver effective and innovative medicines for HIV treatment and prevention, as well as support communities affected by HIV.

For more information on the company, its management, portfolio, pipeline and commitment, please visit http://www.viivhealthcare.com.

About GSKGSK is a science-led global healthcare company with a special purpose: to help people do more, feel better, live longer. For further information please visit http://www.gsk.com.

_____________________1 Kumar R, Qureshi H, Deshpande S, Bhattacharya J. Broadly neutralizing antibodies in HIV-1 treatment and prevention. Ther Adv Vaccines Immunother. 2018;6(4):6168.

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ViiV Healthcare announces exclusive licensing agreement with the National Institutes of Health for investigational bNAb with potential for long-acting...

How does a piece of bread cause a migraine?

Migraine is the third most prevalent illness in the world and causes suffering for tens of millions of people. In fact, nearly 1 in 4 U.S. household includes someone with migraines.

Migraine is not just a headache but also includes a collection of associated symptoms that can be debilitating. These include nausea, vomiting, light sensitivity and dizziness. Often people struggle to determine what triggers their migraines. It can be environmental, hormonal, genetic, secondary to an underlying illness, or triggered by certain foods, such as cheese, red wine or chocolate. One food that has received a lot of attention in recent years is gluten - a protein found in wheat, rye and barley.

As a registered dietitian and board-certified neurologist who specializes in headache management, I often will have my patients try a gluten-free diet.

Celiac disease vs. gluten sensitivity

When someone suffers from celiac disease a digestive disorder caused by an allergy to gluten there is a clear link between migraine headaches and gluten. Gluten triggers immune cells to release antibodies to attack substances the body sees as foreign.

When someone without celiac disease eats gluten, it goes into the gastrointestinal tract where food is broken down and the nutrients are absorbed. In the case of celiac disease, that persons immune system sees the gluten as a foreign substance (like a virus or bacteria that shouldnt be there) and attacks it with a specific antibody called transglutaminase (TG) 2 serum autoantibodies to destroy the gluten.

The problem is the persons own healthy tissues gets destroyed in the process. In other words, when people who are sensitive to gluten consume it, the immune system sees this protein as an invader and creates antibodies to capture and destroy the protein. If the protein is sitting in the GI tract or has been absorbed by other organs, the antibodies go looking for it and attack whatever tissue is harboring the gluten protein.

This triggers an inflammatory reaction that puts the body in high alert that injures various healthy organs. Organs then release molecules that cause blood vessels to become leaky and release water, electrolytes and protein into the tissues and cause swelling.

This is an inflammatory response that affects the whole body, not just the brain. In addition to headaches, it can cause broader symptoms including gastrointestinal problems, fatigue and learning difficulties, just to name a few.

Step by step, how gluten leads to migraines

But just looking at a gluten-intolerant persons inflammatory response doesnt provide the whole picture on glutens link to migraine.

In recent years scientists have gained a better understanding of how and why migraines occur. Migraine is now considered a genetic condition that is found commonly within families.

Early theories suggested migraines occurred because of enlargement or dilation of the blood vessels. But now neurologists realize this isnt the whole story. We now know the cascade that leads to a migraine involves the nerves in the trigeminovascular pathway (TVP) the collection of nerves that control sensation in the face as well as biting and chewing.

When TVP is activated by the presence of gluten, for example, it causes the release of many chemicals including histamine, a substance that immune cells produce when responding to injury, allergic and inflammatory events. The TVP nerves also produce a recently discovered trigger for migraines; a protein called calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP).

When CGRP is released it causes the dilation of blood vessels in the meninges the layer of tissue protecting the brain. As the blood vessels dilate they leak water and proteins into the meninges which causes swelling and irritation. The swelling activates the trigenimial nerves which relay messages to other regions of the brain, including the thalamus which creates the perception of pain that is associated with a migraine.

Within the past year a new class of medications has gained FDA approval for migraine prevention. These medications are called CGRP monoclonal antibodies and have proven to be an effective preventative treatment. They stop the protein CGRP from getting into its receptor.

What to do about food triggers

In both gluten sensitivity, or celiac disease, and migraine, there is an inflammatory process occurring within the body. I hypothesize that the inflammatory response to gluten makes it easier to activate the trigeminovascular pathway, thus triggering a migraine. There has never been a large study of how exactly gluten triggers migraines, and this is something I hope to explore in future studies.

Typically, a food trigger will cause a migraine to start within 15 minutes of exposure to that substance.

If someone tests positive for celiac, or wheat allergy, then the answer is simple: remove gluten from the diet. So the question arises when someone tests negative should we still eliminate gluten? It is often worth a try, because there is a condition called non-celiac gluten sensitivity.

If someone does not have celiac disease but suffers from symptoms of gluten sensitivity, an elimination trial of gluten is often helpful for reducing migraine frequency or severity. The reason I suspect is that removing gluten will reduce chances of an inflammatory response that will activate the trigeminal nerves and trigger pain. Gluten elimination for migraines is still experimental.

We need to treat the whole person in medicine. This includes looking at potential triggers for headache and doing an elimination diet can be of benefit. There are so many gluten-free products currently on the market, it makes removing gluten from the diet easier.

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Lauren Green, Clinical Assistant Professor of Neurology, University of Southern California

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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How Gluten Destroys the Human Body - The National Interest Online

Texas A&M Student Health Services offers preventive care to keep traveling students safe from overseas illness, while protecting their classmates from any infectious diseases they could bring back from abroad.

Preventive medicine can immunize a student from a certain disease or infection, and SHS can also provide screenings, examinations and blood work. But it is not only important for students going abroad to keep themselves safe and healthy. Taking these steps can also protect the A&M community at large from any possible diseases that may have been caught overseas and could be brought back to campus.

Claire Kolb, a physician assistant at Beutel Health Center, said SHSs goal is for students to stay well and do well, and preventive medicine does much to keep the campus community safe.

[It] helps to support that mission and increase screening and prevention of disease to keep our students and community healthy, Kolb said. We are able to do that through screening for communicable diseases, providing vaccinations, travel medicine and allergy [immunotherapy] injections.

Holly Hudson, executive director of Education Abroad, said it is not up to the students or the university whether they get any immunizations when studying abroad.

If the [Centers for Disease Control] requires those immunizations, then students actually have to get those in order to obtain a visa or entry into the country where they want to study, Hudson said. In any case where immunizations are required, it is not optional.

For those who study abroad, Hudson said they will be provided with a form of health insurance to be used should they get sick, injured or in any way hurt.

We enroll all our students who are studying abroad in international health insurance, Hudson said. Students are enrolled in insurance that will treat any sort of emergency situation they may have in regards to health. It will cover any medical expenses while abroad and will pay for them to come home should they require additional medical care.

Despite many students going overseas for an extended period of time, Hudson said it is not often that students get severely sick while studying abroad.

Usually, we see injuries the same way that wed see here, like a broken leg, falling or just in the wrong place at the wrong time, Hudson said. Any operational issues we may see, such as a kidney or respiratory infection, are generally treatable wherever they are. Its very rare for a student to get very sick abroad and need to return home as a result of that.

On top of medications and screenings provided for students, Kolb said there are numerous other well-being efforts students can engage in.

[Student Health Services] provides immunizations as needed, Kolb said. We also provide free STI screening at our monthly STI events. We work with our integrated behavioral health providers to assist patients with mental health awareness.

There are also other general health campaigns that SHS holds, Kolb said, which are generally inexpensive and easy to access.

We have a free flu shot campaign in early October to prevent an influenza epidemic on campus, Kolb said. Our immunizations are covered for all students with the TAMU student health insurance, and we offer low cost payment options as well.

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Student Health Services offers preventative medical care for Aggies traveling abroad - Texas A&M The Battalion

Inflammation has become one of the biggest buzzwords in health and wellness circles in recent years. And while all the fuss over inflammation it may seem like yet another fad promulgated by television quacks and bloggers, its really not. Many health professionals now believe that understanding and controlling chronic inflammation is the future of preventative medicine. Thats why Mellowment CBD has specifically developed a specific type of CBD for inflammation. Its called Mellowment High Impact for Inflammation, and it combines CBD and curcumin for maximum inflammation relief, recovery, and comfort.

Inflammation is an essential survival mechanism of the human immune system. As such, its usually a good thing, a sign that the body is working to heal an injury or fight off some pathogen or disease. When cells are in distress, they release chemicals that alerts the immune system. The immune system in turn sends inflammatory cells to capture the pathogens or heal damaged tissues. Meanwhile, blood vessels in the area expand to accommodate the additional immune system traffic and bring fluid to the site of the injury or infection. This is called acute inflammation. And while it is painful and uncomfortable, its also necessary.

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Chronic Inflammation Is a Huge Problem. But This Specialized CBD for Inflammation Can Help. - Futurism

By Andrew Tan and Sophia Nesamoney, The Stanford Daily

After a decade of construction and development, Stanford's new hospital held its official opening on Sunday, marking the transition from the old facility to the new after nearly 60 years of patient service.

The building's first patient crossed the bridge between the two facilities on Sunday morning, relocating to one of the 368 entirely private patient rooms in the new $2 billion hospital.

The old hospital will no longer be used for patient treatment. Stanford Health Care is determining how to use the building, which is no longer in compliance with California earthquake code.

In preparation for the opening, hospital staff conducted three dress rehearsals to assess the flow and spatial arrangement of the hospital, complete with debriefs where doctors and nurses could provide their feedback.

Before the opening ceremony, new signage for the emergency department (ED) on the first floor was unveiled. Above the ED are operating rooms on the second floor and a wellness center including an interfaith chapel, family resource center and a garden on the third floor. The remaining four floors are reserved for patient rooms, each including a personal bathroom.

According to David Entwistle, president and CEO of Stanford Health Care, the redesign of the hospital was sparked by a single question: "What if you could build a hospital where no one could see the technology, but just see a welcoming interface?"

Each room includes wall-to-wall windows, a TV and tablet system that allows patients to order room service and consult with physicians and a family area with a fold-out bed, extra storage space and a table.

"It's so overwhelming to come to the hospital," Entwistle said. "Usually, people are not anticipating that they have to come in. They have to be taken out of other activities in their lives, whether it's work, family or school. So creating a comfortable environment is really important to us."

Though the project began largely in an effort to bring the Stanford medical campus up to state earthquake code, Entwistle also said the patient experience has been overhauled.

Entwistle said that Stanford hopes to lead the country in shifting towards preventative and precision-based medicine, with the eventual goal of moving toward a system in which patients can take more control of their healthcare and spend less time in a hospital bed.

"We want to know what we can do to identify, prevent and cure potential health problems precisely so that we can keep you out of the hospital in the long term," Entwistle said. "That's the next phase in healthcare that I get really excited about."

Contact Andrew Tan at tandrew 'at' stanford.edu and Sophia Nesamoney at nsophia 'at' stanford.edu.

The Stanford Daily is the independent, student-run newspaper of Stanford University. Read more of their stories at StanfordDaily.com.

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10 Years In The Making, New Stanford Hospital Officially Opens - Patch.com