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Category: biotech/medical – Page 1,643

This tattoo-like sensor measures blood glucose levels non-invasively

Diabetes tracking can be a scary and tedious task, but University of California at San Diego researchers have developed a needless glucose monitor tattoo sensor that measures insulin levels through sweat on the skin.

There are approximately 30.3 million people living with diabetes in the U.S., according to the American Diabetes Association. Monitoring blood sugar levels is an important part of managing their condition. For people like Angela Valdez, that daily task is avoided because of the traditional pricking of the finger.

“I don’t handle monitoring my diabetes as I should,” said Valdez in a press release. “I have the diet down a lot better now and I take my medication as I should, but the finger pricking is a struggle for me. I only test if I feel bad. If I don’t feel my blood sugar level is high, and I’m taking the pill every day, I think I’m alright. Which is really bad thinking, but the pin prick is terrifying.”

Scientists find a better drug for blinding eye disease in older people

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the most common cause of vision loss among people aged 50 and older, affecting an estimated 7.3 million individuals in the United States. Of these patients, 1.75 million have advanced AMD and will lose vision from this condition. This includes patients with the “wet” form of AMD, characterized by the growth of abnormal blood vessels in the retina that can bleed or leak damaging fluids into the central portion of this light-sensing tissue.

Scientists Just Caught Bacteria Using a Never-Before-Seen Trick to Avoid Antibiotics

Researchers have just caught bacteria sidestepping antibiotic treatment with a never-before-seen trick.

Bacteria’s troublesome talent for developing resistance against antibiotics is a rapidly growing health threat. This ability has ancient origins and allows drug-resistant bacterial infections like MRSA and gonorrhea to kill 1.3 million people globally each year.

These superbugs are even finding their way into wild animals, such as dolphins and bears.

Mapping the hidden connections between diseases

A new study led by UCL researchers has identified patterns in how common health conditions occur together in the same individuals, using data from 4 million patients in England.

With advancing age, millions of people live with multiple conditions—sometimes referred to as multimorbidity—and the proportion of people affected in this way is expected to rise over the next decades. However, and training, , clinical guidelines and research have evolved to focus on one disease at a time.

The Academy of Medical Sciences and the UK Chief Medical Officer (CMO) have recognized this problem and set out a challenge of investigating which diseases co-occur in the same individuals and why.

Technology reveals the secrets of ancient Egyptian tattoos

Anne Austin/University of Missouri-St. Louis, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology (2022).

Because the second mummy was still wrapped, researchers analyzed it via infrared photography. It’s worth noting that archaeologists do not unwrap mummies at this point in time. The mummy turned out to be of a middle-aged woman and featured a different tattoo — a wedjat, or eye of Horus, and again an image of the god Bes, but now with a crown of feathers. The scientists also spotted a zigzag line below the other figures that probably depicted a marsh, which was associated with cooling waters used to relieve pain from menstruation or childbirth, as the researchers deduced from ancient medical texts. They propose that the two tattoos were essentially a request by the wearer for protection during childbirth.

Drinking coffee might lengthen life

If your morning never starts without a cup of coffee, you may be intrigued to learn that drinking the wildly popular beverage could significantly lower your risk of dying within the next few years, a new study suggests.

The study, published online May 31, 2022, by Annals of Internal Medicine, analyzed data about coffee consumption from more than 170,000 people (average age 56) from the United Kingdom who did not have cancer or cardiovascular disease at the study’s start. The researchers tracked participants over an average of seven years. They also accounted for such factors as lifestyle, diet, sex, age, and ethnicity.

People who drank 1.5 to 3.5 cups of coffee each day, even with a teaspoon of added sugar per cup, were up to 30% less likely to die during the study period than those who didn’t drink coffee. It didn’t appear to matter if the coffee contained caffeine or not, but the benefit tapered off for those drinking more than 4.5 cups each day.

FDA approved a 1st-of-its-kind treatment made from human poop. What does it do?

The only time might be willing to take shit off someone.

— Cancer patients weren’t responding to therapy. Then they got a poop transplant.

— The same exact foods affect each person’s gut bacteria differently.

But now, Rebyota is available as the first FDA-approved “fecal microbiota product.” In a late-stage clinical trial, the one-dose treatment reduced the rate of C. diff flare-ups by 29.4% in the eight weeks after antibiotic treatment, compared with a placebo, STAT reported. Taking two clinical trials of the treatment into account, the success rate of the treatment “was significantly higher in the Rebyota group (70.6%) than in the placebo group (57.5%),” the FDA noted.

‘Heart in a box’ medical advancement speeds up donor and transplant process to save more lives

On Nov. 16, Mayo Clinic in Arizona was able to celebrate a first in this practice and transplanted a heart into a patient following the natural circulatory death of the donor.

“Mayo Clinic is the only one in Arizona to have used this new ‘heart in a box’ technology,” the hospital said.

With this advancement, donors will be able to give the gift of life much sooner than before. Thousands of people are awaiting heart transplants and sadly, many do die while waiting.

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