Health and Wellness- | News Tribune

$25M Texas cancer trial network shuts down

A fledgling Texas cancer trials network announced Tuesday that it had shut down after auditors found more than $300,000 in expenses deemed inappropriate in the latest blow to the state's troubled $3 billion cancer-fighting agency.

Do penalties for smokers and the obese make sense?

Faced with the high cost of caring for smokers and overeaters, experts say society must grapple with a blunt question: Instead of trying to penalize them and change their ways, why not just let these health sinners die prematurely from their unhealthy habits?

Researchers hone cancer identification method

Researchers at the University of Alabama Birmingham are honing a method to improve cancer surgery by using a fluorescent dye to make cancerous cells glow.

Lawyer: Mass. firm tied to outbreak paid out $70M

An attorney for creditors of a pharmacy blamed for a nationwide meningitis outbreak said Thursday that the firm paid out $70 million to company insiders over the last six years.

Conn. panel begins task of responding to Newtown

A panel charged by Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy with recommending a broad range of state policy changes after the deadly Newtown school shooting began its work Thursday, urged to focus on the issue of mental health and how it can intersect with gun violence.

Missouri bill seeks lower limit for cold medicine

Recently proposed Missouri legislation seeks to combat the state’s methamphetamine problem by further limiting the amount of cold and allergy medicine people can buy while allowing most consumers to continue purchasing it without a doctor’s prescription.

Food allergies may be disability under law

Allergic to gluten? What about peanuts? Federal disabilities law may be able to help.

Elks sponsoring mobile dental program

Jefferson City Elks Lodge 513 is cosponsoring a mobile dental program in the Mid-Missouri area. Click on TMC Lakewood, then Dental Services Elks Mobile at www.trumed.org

Hospitals crack down on workers refusing flu shots

Patients can refuse a flu shot. Should doctors and nurses have that right, too? That is the thorny question surfacing as U.S. hospitals increasingly crack down on employees who won't get flu shots, with some workers losing their jobs over their refusal.

Flu hits Missouri earlier this year

The flu is hitting the U.S. earlier than usual this year, and Missouri is no exception.

Flu season strikes early in some areas

What seems like influenza may be other viruses

From the Rocky Mountains to New England, hospitals are swamped with people with flu symptoms. Some medical centers are turning away visitors or making them wear face masks, and one Pennsylvania hospital set up a tent outside its ER to deal with the feverish patients.

Miss America contestant pursuing double mastectomy

Win or lose Saturday, Miss America contestant Allyn Rose will have conveyed a message about breast cancer prevention using her primary tool as a beauty queen: her body.

Israeli law aims to make ultrathin models obsolete

When Margaux Stelman began modeling a few months ago, she always had her sister Simone in mind. Simone was an ex-model who died three years ago after a long battle with anorexia, a common affliction of models trying to look thinner and thinner — and girls trying to look like them.

FDA staff: J&J diabetes drug may pose heart risk

Johnson & Johnson’s experimental diabetes drug might bring minor heart risks because it raised cholesterol levels in patient testing, according to federal drug reviewers.

Mass. Gov. proposes new compounding pharmacy rules

Gov. Deval Patrick on Friday proposed tighter regulations on sterile compounding pharmacies following a deadly nationwide meningitis outbreak linked to a Massachusetts company.

Flu? Malaria? Disease forecasters look to the sky

In one recent study, two scientists reported they could predict — more than seven weeks in advance — when flu season was going to peak in New York City. Theirs was just the latest in a growing wave of computer models that factor in rainfall, temperature or other weather conditions to forecast disease.

Budget battle sends mixed signals on health care

Confused about the federal budget struggle? So are doctors, hospital administrators and other medical professionals who serve the 100 million Americans covered by Medicare and Medicaid. Rarely has the government sent so many conflicting signals in so short a time about the bottom line for the health care industry.

FDA clears anticlotting drug Eliquis

The Food and Drug Administration said Friday that it approved an anticlotting drug called Eliquis, developed by Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. and Pfizer Inc. It's a potential blockbuster in a new category of medicines to prevent strokes.

Big Pharma cashes in on HGH abuse

A federal crackdown on illicit foreign supplies of human growth hormone has failed to stop rampant misuse, and instead has driven record sales of the drug by some of the world's biggest pharmaceutical companies, an Associated Press investigation shows.

Help at hand when elderly relative's health fails

Marnie Schwartz was in California, a lawyer raising two toddlers. She was in no position to move across the country to care for her mother, who was living alone in New York and whose health was beginning to decline. Schwartz's dilemma was similar to that faced by more and more Americans as the population spreads out, people live longer and giving up a job is out of the question.

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