Electro-Optical Sciences Announces Positive Top-Line Results From Landmark MelaFind(R) Pivotal Trial
Electro-Optical
Sciences, Inc. (“EOS”) (NASDAQ: MELA) announced positive
top-line results of its pivotal trial of MelaFind, a non-invasive,
point-of-care instrument to assist in the early detection of
melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. The blinded study,
conducted at seven centers across the US, included 1,831 pigmented
skin lesions from 1,383 patients, making this the largest prospective
study ever conducted in melanoma detection. EOS is working to
complete its Pre-Market Approval (PMA) application and expects to
file it with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) shortly.
“MelaFind appears to be an excellent tool to help detect melanoma at
the earliest, most treatable stage,” said Gary D. Monheit, MD,
Associate Clinical Professor of Dermatology at the University of
Alabama in Birmingham and the lead investigator for the MelaFind
pivotal trial. “With no cure for late stage melanoma, early
detection is our best defense against this cancer, which has reached
epidemic proportions.”
Prior to the start of the study, EOS and the FDA entered into a
binding protocol agreement to stipulate the sensitivity and
specificity endpoints that should be used to determine the safety and
effectiveness of MelaFind.
MelaFind detected 112 of 114 (98% sensitivity; lower confidence bound
of 95%) melanomas that were eligible and evaluable for primary
sensitivity endpoint analysis, and 125 of 127 (98% sensitivity; lower
confidence bound greater than 95%) melanomas overall. The protocol
agreement calls for sensitivity endpoints of greater than 95% lower
confidence bound(footnote 1).
MelaFind’s specificity, the ability to accurately rule out disease,
was significantly superior (9.5%) to that of the study dermatologists
(3.7%), who are skin cancer experts (p-value less than 0.02). The
protocol agreement calls for MelaFind to be more specific than the
study physicians at a p-value(footnote 2) of less than 0.05.
Almost half of the melanomas in the study were melanoma in situ, the
most curable yet most difficult form of melanoma to detect.
“These clinically compelling data suggest that MelaFind may help
detect melanoma earlier, and more accurately differentiate many of the
non-malignant lesions that mimic melanoma,” said Darrell Rigel, MD,
Clinical Professor of Dermatology at New York University Medical
School. “This should lead to improved biopsy efficiency and help
reduce the number of unnecessary biopsies, which can be painful and
scarring.”
The skin cancer experts who participated in this study had previously
made the decision to biopsy all 1,831 pigmented skin lesions prior to
enrolling the patients in the MelaFind clinical trial.
In order to generate a comparison with dermatologists’ ability to
accurately detect melanoma, EOS conducted a parallel pilot readers’
study with a different group of 39 dermatologists. Using images and
clinical histories of 23 randomly-selected melanomas from the pivotal
study, this group of dermatologists, on average, would have decided
to biopsy only approximately 18 (80%) of the melanomas, whereas the
MelaFind result would have led to a biopsy of 22 of the melanomas
(biopsy sensitivity of 96%). A larger readers’ study to provide
additional data regarding the sensitivity of MelaFind relative to
physicians will commence shortly. Data from these studies will be
submitted to the FDA.
“We are extremely pleased with the outcome of the pivotal study and
are now focused on completing our PMA to submit to the FDA as quickly
as possible,” said Joseph V. Gulfo, MD, President and CEO of EOS.
“Our mission with MelaFind has always been to provide a useful tool
to aid in detecting melanoma at its earliest, most curable stage. We
look forward to discussing these data with the agency.”
The company chose the final classification algorithm based on its
success at identifying melanomas in a series of large, blinded and
sequential internal classifier selection studies conducted immediately
prior to the analysis of the pivotal trial data. Including the
pivotal trial, the MelaFind classifier successfully detected 430 of
the 432 melanomas against which it was tested.
There were no adverse events associated with the use of MelaFind.
The FDA has notified EOS that the MelaFind PMA will receive Expedited
Review once the application is submitted. EOS plans to submit the
findings from the pivotal study and the readers’ studies to
peer-reviewed journals for publication.
MelaFind uses 10 different wavelengths of light to see where a
clinician cannot — up to 2.5 millimeters below the skin’s surface.
Using advanced algorithms, trained and developed on a database of
9,000 pigmented skin lesions and over 600 melanomas, including those
from the pivotal study, the system provides an immediate result that
informs the decision to biopsy.
About Melanoma
Melanoma is the deadliest form of skin cancer, responsible for
approximately 80% of skin cancer fatalities. The melanoma rate has
continued to increase with an estimated 120,000 new cases projected
in 2009. A recent National Cancer Institute report published in the
July 10 online edition of the Journal of Investigative Dermatology
indicates that annual incidence of melanoma among young adult
Caucasian women rose 50% between 1980 and 2004. Melanoma is the most
common cancer in women age 25 to 29 and the number one cancer killer
of women age 30 to 35. Although no cure is currently available for
advanced-stage melanoma, if caught early, melanoma is virtually 100%
curable.
About Electro-Optical Sciences
EOS is a medical device company focused on designing and developing a
non-invasive, point-of-care instrument to assist in the early
detection of melanoma. MelaFind features a hand-held imaging device
that emits light of multiple wavelengths to capture images of
suspicious pigmented skin lesions and extract data. Using
sophisticated algorithms, the data are then analyzed against a
proprietary database of melanomas and benign lesions in order to
provide information to assist in the determination of whether the
lesion should be biopsied.
Safe Harbor
This press release includes “forward-looking statements” within the
meaning of the Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These
statements include but are not limited to our plans, objectives,
expectations and intentions and other statements that contain words
such as “expects,” “contemplates,” “anticipates,” “plans,” “intends,”
“believes” and variations of such words or similar expressions that
predict or indicate future events or trends, or that do not relate to
historical matters. These statements are based on our current beliefs
or expectations and are inherently subject to significant
uncertainties and changes in circumstances, many of which are beyond
our control. There can be no assurance that our beliefs or
expectations will be achieved. Actual results may differ materially
from our beliefs or expectations due to economic, business,
competitive, market and regulatory factors.
Electro-Optical Sciences
Immunohistochemical Basis For Adjuvant Anti-Angiogenic Targeted Therapy For Renal Carcinoid: Initial Case Report
UroToday.com – Although primary renal carcinoids (PRC) are rare tumors, they represent a therapeutic dilemma for urologic oncologists due to tumor heterogeneity and their often unpredictable behavior. While these neuroendocrine tumors have traditionally been classified as low-grade tumors there have been cases associated with progression to metastatic disease and death. The largest clinicopathologic study to date was from Hansel and Epstein (Am J Surg Pathol 2007 Oct; 31(10):1539-44) who documented 21 tumors. Thirteen of the 21 patients had metastatic disease. Of the 15 patients that had extended follow-up, one died of disease 8 months after surgery. Few other series exist and as such no clear adjuvant therapy has been established.
In the current study, we presented a case of a young female with a PRC and with positive lymph nodes at the time of nephrectomy. Because of the intense vascularity of the tumor, we stained it for VEGF and found it to be strongly positive suggesting that targeted therapy with sunitinib (a multikinase inhibitor) might be beneficial. To date, she has been free of disease for 3 years on sunitinib. This information represents the first immunohistochemical evidence to guide a rational choice for adjuvant therapy for PRC. Of note, there have been studies showing activity of sunitinib in patients with other types of advanced neuroendocrine tumors supporting our rationale (Kulke MH, Lenz H-J, Meropol NJ, et al: Activity of sunitinib in patients with advanced neuroendocrine tumors. J Clin Oncol 26:3403-3410, 2008).
Because PRC can have a very protracted course, however, long-term follow-up and additional patients are needed to confirm whether or not sunitinib actually played a role in her favorable outcome.
Written by David S. Finley, MD as part of Beyond the Abstract on UroToday.com
UroToday – the only urology website with original content written by global urology key opinion leaders actively engaged in clinical practice.
To access the latest urology news releases from UroToday, go to:
http://www.urotoday.com
Copyright © 2009 – UroToday
‘On-Off Switches’ In Genomes Pinpointed In Next Gen Sequencing Technology
Scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Joint Genome Institute (JGI), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and the University of California, San Diego have developed a set of molecular tools that provide important insight into the complex genomes of multicellular organisms. The strategy promises to clarify the longstanding mystery of the role played by vast stretches of DNA sequence that do not code for the functional units – genes – that nevertheless may have a powerful regulatory influence. The research is described in the 12 February edition of the journal Nature.
DOE bioenergy researchers have an interest in identifying these regulatory regions in plants, where proteins interact with DNA and exert control over gene expression and development, so that plants used as biomass “feedstocks” can be optimized for biofuels production.
“From the Human Genome Project we have a good idea where in the genome the protein-coding genes are located, but these constitute only about two percent of the human genome, the remaining 98 percent are non-coding sequence whose function is largely unknown,” said Len Pennacchio, the paper’s senior author and DOE JGI Genomic Technologies Department Head.
“Our approach employs next generation sequencing technology to find regulatory regions, the ‘switches’ on a genome-wide scale and much more cost effectively,” said Pennacchio. “It’s the next layer of knowledge that’s been missing.”
The DOE JGI was founded in 1997 to accelerate the completion of the HGP and completed the DOE’s commitment to sequence three (5, 16, 19) of the 23 chromosomes, totaling 11 percent of the human genome, and published the analysis in Nature back in 2004.
In this newly published study, Pennacchio, lead authors DOE scientist Axel Visel and postdoctoral fellow Matthew Blow, and their colleagues, describe a shortcut for identifying gene regulatory regions or the molecular switches that turn on or off gene expression.
Using what’s called ChIP-Sequencing or ChIP-Seq, chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) is combined with massively parallel DNA sequencing to identify binding sites of DNA-associated proteins.
Traditionally researchers have relied on evolution to guide them to non-coding sequences that are likely to have a function – such as enhancing the expression of genes. Via the public genome databases, they would align the entire human genome code with that of other vertebrate species (e.g. other mammals, birds, frogs, fish) and then look for sequences that are conserved in evolution.
“Most protein-coding sequences show signs of conservation between species, but there is also a large number of non-coding sequences that have been surprisingly well conserved for tens or even hundreds of millions of years,” said Visel. “This suggests that these regions, formerly thought to be “junk” DNA, actually have some functional relevance and are under selection because sequence changes reduce fitness of affected individuals. Using such sequence conservation, we have in previous studies identified enhancer candidate regions and shown in transgenic mouse experiments that these conserved non-coding regions are in fact often enhancers that are active during embryonic development. Conservation-based methods are relatively good at finding enhancers in the genome, but an important limitation is that they don’t tell us where and when that particular enhancer would be active and thereby drive the expression of its neighboring target gene(s).
The older methods lacked specificity, Blow said. “For example, if we have a gene that is important both for brain and for limb development, we would not have been able to specifically identify the enhancer sequences near that gene that would drive the expression in the brain or limb, the only way to find out was to test these activities in experiments one-by-one, which is slow and can’t be done on a genomic scale.
“Using this new method, we can directly identify a genome-wide set of enhancers that are active in a particular anatomical region or tissue at a particular time-point, which is an important advantage over conservation-based methods because in addition to telling us where an enhancer is located in the genome, it also provides an initial experimental characterization where we should expect this enhancer to be active.”
The team used ChIP linked with a particular enhancer-associated protein, p300, then directed DOE JGI’s massively parallel next generation sequencing capacity to map several thousand sites in mouse embryonic forebrain, midbrain and limb tissue. Over 80 of these fragments were tested in transgenic mouse experiments indicating an almost perfect success rate of p300-ChIP-Seq for identifying enhancers active in vivo.
“Enhancers are especially important for regulating genes during embryonic development,” said Pennacchio. “They can regulate genes over long distances and switch on their target genes during very specific time-points and in very specific anatomical structures during development. There are several examples of mutations in such enhancers that cause disease in humans because genes are not expressed at the right time or in the right place anymore. A fundamental problem in studying such enhancers is that until recently we did not have effective tools to even find them in the genome on a large scale.
Pennacchio said that this new method will prove useful to the greater genomics and biomedical community for characterizing the role of the vast non-coding regions – dubbed genome “dark matter” – about which little is known.
“These datasets will also help to identify mutations in enhancers that play a role in human disease,” Pennacchio said. “Human genetic studies indicate that in many cases disease is caused by mutations in non-coding sequences, but it has been difficult to study this in detail because the function of most non-coding sequences is poorly understood. Eventually, this will be useful for purposes including disease detection and personalized medicine.”
With the rapidly increasing efficiency and cost-savings of the next generation sequencing technologies, a deluge of data from individual human genomes are being to come to light, to the point where whole-genome sequencing of patients may soon become a standard diagnostic tool.
“While progress is being made towards this goal, it is important to keep in mind that our current understanding of the genome has focused on protein-coding sequences,” said Pennacchio. “Datasets like the one provided through this study will be important to understand the remaining 98 percent of the genome and what its role in health and disease is.”
The published study provides an important proof of principle to establish and validate a new method in three different mouse tissues at a single embryonic time-point, Pennacchio said. “We can now generate genome-wide enhancer datasets directly from human tissues and compare genome-wide sets of enhancer activities between healthy people and people suffering from disease, which may reveal how enhancer activities change on a global scale in these disease states.”
—————————-
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
—————————-
The study’s other authors include DOE JGI Director Eddy Rubin, Tao Zhang, Jennifer Akiyama, Amy Holt, Ingrid Plajzer-Frick, Malak Shoukry, Crystal Wright, Feng Chen, and Veena Afzal, and from the University of California San Diego, Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, Bing Ren and Zirong Li.
The U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, supported by DOE’s Office of Science, is committed to advancing genomics in support of DOE missions related to clean energy generation and environmental characterization and cleanup. DOE JGI, located in Walnut Creek, Calif., provides integrated high-throughput sequencing and computational analysis that enable systems-based scientific approaches to these challenges. Additional information about DOE JGI can be found at: http://www.jgi.doe.gov/.
Source: David Gilbert
DOE/Joint Genome Institute
NHS, UK Sees Financial Benefits From Treating Asthma With NIOX MINO
Aerocrine AB (OMX Nordic Exchange: AERO) has reported the recent publication of a UK study evaluating the effect of routine inflammation measurement in asthma.
The economic study was intended to evaluate the effect on the direct costs of UK asthma care when buying and using Aerocrine’s NIOX MINO product.
By measuring inflammation – the underlying cause of asthma symptoms – doctor and patient gain a better understanding of the symptom profile, and can control treatment more optimally. The patient performs a simple exhaled air test into the NIOX MINO, which returns an inflammation value. The study is based on reimbursement of £23 per test from the NHS to care providers.
Results demonstrate that routine measurement in patients that use cortisone inhaler generates a cost saving of £341 per patient and year. For sufferers of more severe asthma, the saving is £554 per patient and year.
The savings are possible because treatment can be optimised using the results from NIOX MINO tests. This reduces the number of visits to casualty and hospital admissions, and cuts the amount of cortisone inhaler doses needed to keep patients symptom free.
Thus, the introduction of continuous inflammation monitoring not only outweighs the cost of testing with NIOX MINO, but also cuts the total cost of care.
The article was published in the latest issue of Allergy journal.
“The fact that measuring inflammation cuts healthcare costs while dramatically improving control is highly significant for people that live with asthma and for the UK healthcare system,” commented Paul de Potocki, CEO of Aerocrine.
—————————-
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
—————————-
About Aerocrine
Aerocrine AB is a medical technology company focused on the improved management and care of patients with inflammatory airway diseases. As the pioneer and leader in the technology to monitor and manage airway inflammation, Aerocrine markets NIOX® Flex and NIOX MINO®. Both products enable fast and reliable management of airway inflammation and may therefore play a critical role in more effective diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of patients with inflammatory airway diseases such as asthma. Aerocrine is based in Sweden with subsidiaries in the US, Germany and the UK. Aerocrine shares were listed on the Stockholm Stock Exchange on 15 June 2007.
Aerocrine may be required to disclose the information provided herein pursuant to the Securities Markets Act.
Source: Kathy Hodgdon
Aerocrine
New Method To Monitor Disease Status Of Patients With Advanced Prostate Cancer, The Lancet Oncology
Survival and response to treatment in patients with advanced prostate cancer can be predicted by assessing changes in the number of circulating tumour cells (CTCs), according to an Article published Online First and in the March issue of The Lancet Oncology.
Prostate cancer is one of the most common types of cancer to affect men, particularly in the USA and Europe. It is usually associated with individuals over the age of 50 years. When hormonal therapy ceases to be effective, a patient is deemed to have castration-resistant prostate cancer. The progress of such disease is very difficult to track, as is the prediction of how patients will respond to chemotherapy.
Professor Howard Scher (Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York City, USA) and colleagues assessed the association between CTC number (both before and after treatment) and survival, and also evaluated other factors such as changes in the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) and baseline lactate dehydrogenase (LDH), in 164 patients embarking on first-line chemotherapy regimens. CTC number was determined using the US Food and Drug Administration-approved Cell Search™ (Veridex) system.
The researchers found that, before treatment, high values of CTC number and PSA were associated with increased risk of death. However, after treatment, as assessed at 4, 8, and 12 weeks, changes in CTC number were strongly associated with risk, whereas changes in PSA were only marginally associated. The study confirms that pre-treatment CTC number can be used to predict survival of patients starting first-line chemotherapy, and that it can also be used to monitor disease status and response to treatment. It is more predictive than PSA both before and after treatment.
“CTC number … can be used to monitor disease status and might be useful as an intermediate endpoint of survival in clinical trials”, said Scher. “Use as an intermediate or surrogate endpoint for survival could shorten the timeline for drug approval”, although he notes that “several prospective trials are needed to generate evidence to guide the use of biomarkers”. He added that the model that best predicted survival incorporated pre-treatment CTC number and LDH concentration alongside post-treatment changes in CTC number.
– CTCs were isolated by immunomagnetic capture from blood samples drawn at baseline and after the initiation of first-line chemotherapy. Kaplan-Meier analysis was used to estimate survival. The association between biomarkers and survival was tested with Cox proportional hazard models.
– Currently, changes in PSA concentration are used to guide decisions in treating castration-resistant prostate cancer, but this is not effective in predicting the clinical benefit of therapy.
– The US FDA has approved the use of a test involving CTC number-as determined by the Cell Search™ (Veridex) system-to help monitor patients with metastatic prostate cancer. The method works by treating baseline and post-treatment CTC numbers as discrete rather than continuous variables. Cut-off values determine whether patients fall into ‘favourable’ or ‘unfavourable’ groups. Patients who remain in the ‘unfavourable’ range after treatment, regardless of their baseline CTC value, are considered unsuitable for continued therapy. Scher and colleagues’ findings argue against the use of discrete cut-off values, and for the maintenance of treatment in circumstances where the CTC number is stable or falling and there are no other signs of deterioration.
“Circulating tumour cells as prognostic markers in progressive, castration-resistant prostate cancer: a reanalysis of IMMC38 trial data.”
The Lancet Oncology, Early Online Publication, 11 February 2009
doi:10.1016/S1470-2045(08)70340-1
Prof Howard I Scher MD, Xiaoyu Jia MS, Johann S de Bono MD, Martin Fleisher PhD, Prof Kenneth J Pienta MD, Prof Derek Raghavan MD, Glenn Heller PhD
Click here to view abstract online.
The Lancet
Heart Attack Patient Deaths Reduced By Emergency Treatment Strategies, Better Communication
Four western New York hospitals using emergency treatment strategies emphasizing evidence-based therapy and better communication among health care providers reduced heart attack patient deaths by 19 percent for up to one year after patient discharge.
The prospective research study, “Acute Coronary Syndrome Emergency Treatment Strategies: Improved Treatment and Reduced Mortality in Patients with Acute Coronary Syndrome Using Guideline-based Critical Care Pathways,” was published in January in the American Heart Journal.
“The study shows that when you improve communication among departments about patient care, and when you take key information from published medical journals and apply them to every day medicine, you can make a significant difference in patient outcomes and the quality of care they receive,” said study lead author and practicing cardiologist Dr. John Corbelli, who also serves as associate clinical professor of medicine for the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
This is the first study to investigate an acute coronary syndrome critical care pathway approach in a population of patients encompassing the total acute coronary syndrome management spectrum. WellPoint subsidiary, HealthCore Inc., performed the outcomes research for this study based on research funding from Sanofi-Aventis, Bristol-Myers Squibb and the Kaleida Health Foundation.
“ACSETS was derived from the synergy between the cardiologists and emergency department physicians,” said Dr. Dave Janicke, study co-author and clinical associate professor of emergency medicine at State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. “The ACSETS guideline-driving pathway is initiated as soon as the ACS patient arrives in the Emergency Department and is subsequently carried through hospitalization including discharge medications and follow-up.”
The prospective study demonstrated that patients received better care for acute coronary syndrome, including fewer days in the hospital and more medically appropriate use of medication, when the ACSETS critical care pathway was used. The control group was made up of patients who had been treated at the four hospitals before ACSETS was implemented.
“Previous work has established that hospitals adhering to certain performance measures in treating patients with heart attack had lower mortality,” said Corbelli. “We wanted to know if we could improve the mortality rates of these patients by developing a new approach – or a new critical pathway – to better assist medical staff in putting these published guidelines into practice.”
Within the first 24 hours after arrival in the emergency department, at discharge and during 12 months following discharge, more ACSETS patients than pre-ACSETS patients received all eight guideline-based acute coronary syndrome treatment medications studied.
“Post discharge readmission and mortality has been shown to be a major issue in managing patients with ACS,” said Mark Cziraky, study co-author and HealthCore vice president of research development and operations. “The fact that the mortality rate is lower one year after discharge in ACS patients demonstrates that they continued their therapy after leaving the hospital.”
At discharge, ACSETS patients had their medications reviewed so that the appropriate drug therapies were prescribed. Patients were educated to understand the impact of their medications and the importance of compliance with the prescribed regimen. Study authors also met with local managed care groups to ensure that the design of their health plans allowed ACSETS patients easy access to cardiac therapies.
While the study showed no difference in in-patient mortality rates among the two groups, it did show that the ACSETS patients admitted for heart attack had a mortality rate of 19 percent less than the control group for up to one year after discharge.
“After discharge, higher refill rates were seen for the ACSETS group than for the pre-ACSETS group, with that difference showing statistical significance for clopidogrel and statins,” Cziraky said.
ACSETS, based on guidelines established by the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association, uses pre-printed order sheets customized for use in the emergency department, inpatient and discharge that simplify the task of matching intensity of therapy to risk. Rather than follow the normal procedure of creating a new order sheet at every patient stop – from the ER to the floor and then to discharge – the same set of orders stayed with the patients as they made their journeys through the hospital.
Physicians and other medical staff members were trained on the ACSETS order sheets for a period over 26 weeks before the study began. ACSETS educates medical staff members throughout the continuum of patient care regarding key elements of the guidelines and encourages ready adherence to those guidelines at the bedside in a time-efficient manner.
About the study
ACSETS is used for the treatment of acute coronary syndrome patients with unstable angina, non-ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (NSTEMI), or ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI). The study group included 1,709 ACSETS patients and 1,240 pre-ACSETS control patients.
The study compares acute coronary syndrome care pre (Jan. 2, 2002) and post (May 1, 2003 to Aug. 31, 2004) in a four-hospital system in western New York state. Two hospitals were urban with cardiac catherization facilities and two other hospitals were suburban and lacked cardiac catherization facilities.
All patients were admitted to the hospital through the emergency department and discharged with a diagnosis of unstable angina, NSTEMI or STEMI. The intervention group consisted of patients with at least one ACSETS order sheet in their medical chart.
—————————-
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
—————————-
About HealthCore
HealthCore, based in Wilmington, Del., is the clinical outcomes research subsidiary of WellPoint. HealthCore has a team of highly experienced researchers including physicians, biostatisticians, pharmacists, epidemiologists, health economists and other scientists who study the “real world” safety and effectiveness of drugs, medical devices and care management interventions. HealthCore offers insight on how to best use this data and communicates these findings to health care decision-makers to support evidence-based medicine, product development decisions, safety monitoring, coverage decisions, process improvement and overall cost-effective health care. For more information, go to http://www.healthcore.com/.
Source: Lori McLaughlin
HealthCore
Victims Of Child Maltreatment Have Increased Risk For STDs
Researchers have found evidence that child physical and sexual abuse of children increases their risk of acquiring sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) later in life.
Researchers examined the associations between the experience of abuse in childhood and the risk in adulthood of having sexually transmitted diseases. They did this by matching children ages 0 to 11 years, who were victims of child abuse or neglect from 1967 to 1971, with a control group of children who had not been maltreated; both groups were then tracked into adulthood. Medical status examinations were performed when the 754 participants were approximately 41 years old to gather information about lifetime history of sexually transmitted diseases. They discovered that both childhood sexual abuse and childhood physical abuse increased the risk for having more than one type of sexually transmitted disease. In addition, sexual abuse increased risk for more any type of sexually transmitted disease.
“Our findings contribute to a growing body of literature that recognizes child abuse as a risk factor for later health consequences and indicate that gender and race differences should be considered in these relationships,” the study’s authors claim.
Citation:
“Sexually Transmitted Diseases Among Abused and Neglected Children Grown Up: A 30-Year Prospective Study”
Helen W. Wilson, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, North Chicago, I.L. USA.
American Journal of Public Health
$1 Million Project For Improved Sensor Technology Which Could Someday Keep Tabs On Terrorists By Remote Control
Scientists at Rochester Institute of Technology are designing a new kind of optical sensor to fly in unmanned air vehicles, or surveillance drones, tracking suspects on foot or traveling in vehicles identified as a threat.
“The Air Force has clearly recognized the change in the threat that we have,” says John Kerekes, associate professor in RIT’s Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science. “I think we all understand that our military has a paradigm shift. We’re no longer fighting tanks in the open desert; we’re fighting terrorists in small groups, asymmetric threats.”
Kerekes won a $1 million Discovery Challenge Thrust grant from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research to design efficient sensors using multiple imaging techniques to track an individual or a vehicle.
The sensor will collect only the data it needs. It will assess a situation and choose the best sensing mode (black and white imaging, hyperspectral or polarization) for the purpose. Developing two strands of information – one about the target, the other about the background environment – will be key to maintaining a connection and for piercing through camouflage effects.
This is how it will work: The sensor will collect a black and white image of a target, say a car, and will record the shape of the object. A hyperspectral image will plot the object’s color as it appears in multiple wavelengths, from the visible light to the near and short infrared parts of the spectrum beyond what the eye can see. (This mode can tell the difference between two blue cars passing.) The third imagery mode, polarization, cuts through glare and gives information about surface roughness. It provides details that distinguish between objects of similar color and shape. (This mode can lock onto the unique material properties of the blue car in question.)
“These are all complementary pieces of information and the idea is that if the object you are tracking goes into an area where you lose one piece of information, the other information might help,” Kerekes says.
As the lead scientist on the project, Kerekes assembled a comprehensive team with RIT collaborators and other scientists to envision the system from end to end: all the way from the design of the optical and microelectronic devices to the synchronizing algorithms that tie everything together.
Zoran Ninkov, professor of imaging science at RIT, is working on the overall optical system. Ninkov is modifying one of his own astronomical optical sensors for this downward-looking purpose. Alan Raisanen, associate director of RIT’s Semiconductor and Microsystems Fabrication Laboratory, is designing tunable microelectronics devices to collect specific wavelengths. Ohio-based Numerica Inc., a large subcontractor on the project, is creating the advanced algorithms necessary for tracking a target and picking the right imaging mode based on the scenario.
According to Kerekes, motivation for this project came from Paul McManamon, former chief scientist at the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Sensors Directorate in Dayton, Ohio, partly as a means of eliminating data overload.
“The idea is to lead to more efficient sensing both from the point of view of collecting the data necessary and being able to adapt to these different modalities based on the conditions in the scene or the task at hand,” says Kerekes.
The catch phrase is ‘performance-driven sensing,'” he continues. “The idea behind that is you let the task at hand and the desire to optimize the performance drive what information is collected.”
Kerekes and his team are testing their preliminary models using generic scenarios played out in a simulated world akin to Second Life. The computer program, known as Digital Imaging and Remote Sensing Image Generation model (http://dirsig.cis.rit.edu/), is driven by computer graphic codes that predict simulated sensor data and provide a platform for testing scenarios based on imaging problems, such as Kerekes’ new sensor technology.
—————————-
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
—————————-
Source: Susan Gawlowicz
Rochester Institute of Technology
How Omega-3 Fatty Acids Protect Against Liver Damage And Insulin Resistance
According to a recent study published online in The FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org), diets rich in omega-3 fatty acids protect the liver from damage caused by obesity and the insulin resistance it provokes. This research should give doctors and nutritionists valuable information when recommending and formulating weight-loss diets and help explain why some obese patients are more likely to suffer some complications associated with obesity. Omega-3 fatty acids can be found in canola oil and fish.
“Our study shows for the first time that lipids called protectins and resolvins derived from omega-3 fatty acids can actually reduce the instance of liver complications, such as hepatic steatosis and insulin resistance, in obese people,” stated Joan Claria, a professor from the University of Barcelona and one of the researchers involved in the work.
The scientists found that two types of lipids in omega-3 fatty acids – protectins and resolvins – were the cause of the protective effect. To reach this conclusion, they studied four groups of mice with an altered gene making them obese and diabetic. One group was given an omega-3-enriched diet and the second group was given a control diet. The third group was given docosahexaenoic acid, and the fourth received only the lipid resolvin. After five weeks, blood serum and liver samples from the test mice were examined. The mice given the omega-3-rich diet exhibited less hepatic inflammation and improved insulin tolerance. This was due to the formation of protectins and resolvins from omega-3 fatty acids.
“Doctors are always looking for simple and easy ways to counter the harmful effects of obesity, and the great thing about this study is that the information can be used at dinner tonight,” said Gerald Weissmann, M.D., Editor-in-Chief of The FASEB Journal. “It’s not unlikely that eating lots more fish or a simple switch to canola oil will make a difference.”
—————————-
Article adapted by Medical News Today from original press release.
—————————-
Article details: Ana González-Périz, Raquel Horrillo, Natàlia Ferré, Karsten Gronert, Baiyan Dong, Eva Morán-Salvador, Esther Titos, Marcos Martínez-Clemente, Marta López-Parra, Vicente Arroyo, and Joan Clària. Obesity-induced insulin resistance and hepatic steatosis are alleviated by -3 fatty acids: a role for resolvins and protectins. doi:10.1096/fj.08-125674. http://www.fasebj.org/cgi/content/abstract/fj.08-125674v1
The FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org) is published by the Federation of the American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) and is the most cited journal worldwide according to the Institute for Scientific Information. FASEB comprises 22 nonprofit societies with more than 80,000 members, making it the largest coalition of biomedical research associations in the United States. FASEB advances biological science through collaborative advocacy for research policies that promote scientific progress and education and lead to improvements in human health.
Source: Cody Mooneyhan
Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology
Chronic Infection May Add To Developing-world Deaths – MIT Study Points To Hidden Threat Stalking Many Diarrhea Patients
Worldwide, nearly 2 million people per year die from diarrhea, the vast majority of them in poor countries in Africa and Asia. The disease accounts for 18 percent of all deaths among children – and yet is almost always preventable with proper treatment. Now, new research from MIT indicates that underlying, low-level undiagnosed infection may greatly add to the severity of a significant number of these cases. This realization could lead to changes in health-care strategies to address the problem.
The findings, reported by MIT Professor of Biological Engineering and Comparative Medicine David Schauer, show that these undiagnosed gastrointestinal infections increase the severity of and delay recovery from acute diarrhea, and the analysis provides a model that could allow public health officials to evaluate new preventive strategies or therapeutic treatments.
The work grew out of the increasing recognition of the relationship between persistent, chronic infections many people carry and the outcomes of later disease infection.
“It seemed likely that persistent enteric infection with bacterial agents would also elicit immune responses that could have similar effects. However, this had not been previously studied,” Schauer says. “We wanted to provide proof of principle, and begin to define the mechanism for such an interaction.”
To study the possible effects of these chronic infections, Schauer and his team used laboratory mice infected first with a strain of bacteria that causes a chronic condition but produces no symptoms, and then with a second infectious agent that causes acute diarrhea. They found that even though the underlying chronic infection did not cause disease on its own, it did make the acute infection much worse than in a control group that was only exposed to the second agent.
Schauer and his team say as far as they know this is the first time, for any kind of disease, that an underlying “subclinical” infection has been shown to make a later bacterial infection more severe. And in the case of diarrhea, this may play a significant role, since about 50 percent of the world population carries a chronic infection with Helicobacter pylori, which causes stomach-lining inflammation but usually no clinical symptoms, and which is closely related to the initial infectious agent used in the mouse experiments.
“It may be that an individual’s infection status with these or other agents is important in determining outcome of infection, immune-mediated disease or even immunization,” Schauer says.
The work may also be significant in terms of understanding the results of much clinical research using rodent models. Infections similar to the chronic H. pylori “are now known to be widespread in many rodent facilities, and infection with these Helicobacter species does not cause clinical disease except in certain genetically engineered lines of mice,” Schauer says, so “it is important to be aware of infection status with these agents when conducting research with laboratory rodents.”
A report on the research was published last November in the journal Infection and Immunity, and was highlighted in December in Microbe magazine, both from the American Society for Microbiology. The work was carried out by Schauer and his students Megan E. McBee and Patricia Z. Zheng in the Department of Biological Engineering, and Arlin B. Rogers and James G. Fox in the Division of Comparative Medicine, all at MIT. The work was supported by a U.S. Public Health Service grant.
Written by David Chandler, MIT News Office
MIT
Health 
leave a comment