epidemiology
We Know the Least About the Largest Growing Group of Diabetics
At least 50% of people 65 years old and over have diabetes or pre-diabetes, and the situation is expected to get worse. Not only are obesity rates rising, but the problem is compounded by the increasing insulin resistance and decrease in pancreatic islet function that develop as someone ages. Older adults with type 2 diabetes […]
LabBook July 20, 2012
Welcome to LabBook, our weekly roundup of University of Chicago Medicine & Biological Sciences research news from around campus and the world wide web. Each Friday, LabBook will recap the week on the blog, link to news stories about our faculty and studies, and briefly summarize a handful of recent publications by our researchers. THE […]
Mercy, Mercy, MRSA
In her 2010 book, Superbug: The Fatal Menace of MRSA, author and self-proclaimed “disease geek” Maryn McKenna charted the steady advance of a treatment-resistant organism which she referred to as a “crisis in many dimensions.” MRSA illustrates “failures of science, failures of the marketplace, and failures of support for research and innovation,” McKenna wrote. Since […]
The Western Diet’s Immune Impact
Inflammatory bowel disease is an ailment on the rise. A European study found that the incidence of IBD roughly doubled from 1990 to 2001, and even larger surges in IBD cases have been observed in areas of the United States and Europe studied since 1965. But intriguingly, this epidemic of IBD appears to be localized […]
A Warning for Childhood Cancer Survivors
As the hundreds of people at last weekend’s Cancer Survivors Day event could attest, overcoming cancer is a hard-earned victory. Unfortunately, double jeopardy laws don’t apply to cancer, and a patient who has beaten the disease once must remain vigilant about its potential return. A new study of people who survived cancer during their childhood […]
Crunching the Numbers on the Rate of Suicide Among Veterans
By Matt Wood In a recent column in the New York Times, Nick Kristof pointed out a startling statistic: for every American soldier killed in combat this year, 25 will commit suicide. A report from the Center for a New American Security says that from 2005 to 2010, service members took their own lives at […]
GW-As: The Toxicity Risk in the Genes
By Rob Mitchum Arsenic is a deadly toxin, but it’s not one dose fits all. Two people exposed to the same level of the chemical can have entirely different responses, with Patient A developing the skin lesions, cancers, and respiratory conditions that are a hallmark of arsenic toxicity, while Patient B is entirely unaffected. Currently, […]
Thinking Outside the Black Box on Antidepressants
By Rob Mitchum In 2004, the Food and Drug Administration placed their equivalent of a scarlet letter on the antidepressant fluoxetine. Acting on the compiled results of several clinical trials, the FDA affixed its foreboding “black box warning” on to the drug best known as Prozac, preaching caution about increased suicide risk in children and […]
Year in Review: UChicago Research 2011
As another year comes to a close we’d like to look back at the fascinating research breakthroughs and inspiring patient stories from 2011. ScienceLife ran 168 posts this year, and while we wish we could highlight all of them, here are a handful of our favorites from each month. January Patrick Wilson found out that […]
The Gut’s Tenants and Food Allergies
If you are an avid reader of food packaging materials or a parent of an elementary school student, you might get the feeling that food allergies are on the rise. Statistics back up this notion, with the CDC reporting an 18 percent increase [pdf] in child food allergies between 1997 or 2007. That puts current […]
