NOVEMBER 13, 2020 — Researchers around the world now have access to an open-access software designed to further characterize cytoskeleton filaments. Most computational neuroscience software centers around neuronal network systems. Marcelo Marucho, an associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, designed a software that focuses on fundamental research of how a single neuron…
Each year, health care practitioners at Brigham and Women’s Hospital place over a million orders through the electronic health records (EHR) system. Even though studies indicate that practitioners place more than 99.9 percent of orders for the correct patients, researchers at the Brigham analyzed that remaining 0.1 percent to determine and address the root causes…
A clinical study involving 601 patients in Italy and Spain suggests that the JAK inhibitor drug baricitinib may enhance survival rates of patients with severe COVID-19, primarily by blunting the runaway immune inflammation known as “cytokine storm.” While the authors are careful to note that their study was not a fully randomized trial with a…
As almost any new parent will attest, the issue of infant sleep can be a nightmare. But the challenges and consequential health effects of infant sleep problems may, like so many other health disparities, disproportionately affect families of different racial/ethnic backgrounds and household socioeconomic statuses. A new study led in part by researchers from Brigham…
The turning point for people with COVID-19 typically comes in the second week of symptoms. As most people begin to recover, a few others find it increasingly difficult to breathe and wind up in the hospital. It has been theorized that those whose lungs begin to fail are victims of their own overactive immune systems.…
BOSTON – A public health strategy that combines contact tracing and community-based screening with isolation and quarantine centers can substantially reduce infections, hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 while being cost-effective in low-and-middle-income countries like South Africa, a study by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) has found. In a paper published in The Lancet Global Health, the…
It’s a decision being made thousands of times over inside hospitals all around the country: is it time to place a patient struggling to breathe on a ventilator? For all of the attention ventilators have received during the COVID-19 pandemic, deciding when to place patients on them–and when to take them off–is complex. Michigan Medicine…
Embargoed until 11:05 a.m. CT/12:05 p.m. ET, Friday, Nov. 13, 2020 DALLAS, Nov. 13, 2020 — Taking omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin D3 supplements does not neither increase nor decrease the risk of developing atrial fibrillation, according to late-breaking research presented today at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2020. The virtual meeting is Friday,…
Politicians and governments are suppressing science, and when good science is suppressed, people die, argues a senior editor at The BMJ today. Executive editor, Dr Kamran Abbasi, argues that covid-19 “has unleashed state corruption on a grand scale, and it is harmful to public health.” Politicians and industry are responsible for this opportunistic embezzlement, he…
De’Broski Herbert has a philosophy that’s guided his career researching helminths, or parasitic worms, and their interaction with their hosts’ immune systems: “Follow the worm.” “The mantra of my lab since its inception has been that parasitic worms manipulate their hosts in very interesting ways to maintain their survival,” says Herbert, an associate professor of…