In keeping with the unimpressive success rate of conventional smoking cessation aids, cytosine, an anti-smoking drug first marketed in 1964, has only an 8.4 percent success rate among smokers, according to the first large modern study of the drug published in the New England Journal of Medicine. Researchers in Poland analyzed data from 740 volunteers who were accustomed to smoking 10 or more cigarettes a day.

A lengthy article in this week s New England Journal of Medicine catalogues a variety of approaches to helping smokers quit within the healthcare setting, including counseling, smoking cessation medications such as bupropion and varenicline, as well as conventional nicotine replacement modalities like gum, inhalers, and patches.

For some women on hormone replacement therapy (HRT), the risk of severe asthma attacks may increase, according to a new study led by Dr. Klaus Bonnelykke from the Danish Paediatric Asthma Centre in Copenhagen. Presented Tuesday at the European Respiratory Society meeting in Amsterdam, the study analyzed data from over 23,000 women and found that, after accounting for factors such as smoking and body mass index, those using HRT were 30 percent more likely to be hospitalized for asthma.

At this week s annual American Dietetic Association conference in San Diego, ACSH advisor Dr. Adam Drewnowski, director of the Center for Public Health Nutrition at the University of Washington in Seattle, presented his latest research on the government s misguided dietary guidelines.

In an effort to streamline drug development while saving time and costs, major pharmaceutical companies have joined and invested in the international Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC), which in return provides drugmakers with open access to three-dimensional protein structures the initial building block of drug discovery.

New research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association finds that saw palmetto, which was widely believed to relieve symptoms of prostate enlargement called benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH), is no more effective than a placebo pill.

At nearly 78 years, the average life expectancy for Americans is higher than ever. Unfortunately, the quality of those extra years is not necessarily better. A study just published in Diabetes Care reports that the incidence of diabetes in this country has risen right along with the average life expectancy.

Washington state has one of the lowest childhood vaccination rates in the US: Currently, 6 percent of kids receive exemptions from a state law requiring that children be vaccinated before attending school. This is an abysmal rate, considering that, when community-level protection falls below a certain rate, the rate of infections will rise.

Household vinegar. Liquified carbon dioxide. Rural clinics. In Thailand, a successful procedure to screen for and treat cervical cancer demonstrates that innovative medicine need not always be at the cutting edge of technology.

In an article in today s New York Times Science Times, Dr. Lawrence K. Altman reminds readers that, to this day, smallpox is still the only disease to have been eradicated from the planet. This, however, was no small feat, and required international cooperation among an array of public health organizations.