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Fatty deposits in arteries (atheroma) account for the most deaths in America, as well as in the rest of the western world. The most common manifestation of atheroma is coronary artery disease (CAD), the cause of heart attacks and angina. But when such deposits occur in the main neck arteries, the carotids, the result is all too often a stroke. Strokes can be transient or minor but they also commonly cripple, disable, or kill. In fact, stroke is the 4th leading cause of death in the U.S., accounting for 130,000 in 2010.

It s common knowledge that obesity has become an important part of American health care costs, as well as impairing the quality of life for up to a third of the population. And experts have been concerned that obesity rates have increased all age groups in the last few decades. Both energy intake and expenditure are key aspects of body weight changes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoMuq4V3EkQ
Negative messages about children s vaccines are more likely to be spread on Twitter than positive messages, according to research led by Marcel Salathé, an assistant professor of biology at Penn State University.

Sometimes you don t know whether to laugh or cry. From thinking aliens landed at Roswell to believing President Obama is the anti-Christ, Americans believe in some pretty weird conspiracy theories, a new poll from Public Policy Polling has found.

A report from the CDC last week that lead poisoning affects 1 in 38 children ages 1- 5, generated alarming media headlines reporting that more than half a million young children in the US have lead poisoning. But were these headlines that created angst among parents about the health of their children more false alarm than fire?

In 2010, there were 11,000 pedestrians and 3500 bicyclists injured by motor vehicles in New York City. Although Mayor Michael Bloomberg may be known for increasing street safety traffic fatality rates have drastically decreased during his term there is still more that needs to be done to decrease collisions in New York.

About one third of adults in the United States have high blood pressure, a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. And although research has been done analyzing the differences in prevalence among racial/ethnic populations, less is known about variations between states.

Pharmaceutical companies have long argued that the incentive for creating new drugs is that they retain exclusive rights to sell their inventions for a period of time that s long enough to recover the cost of their investment, and then make a profit off the venture.

Adding a cash incentive and a bit of peer pressure may make it easier for people to lose weight, according to a paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine which found that companies that offer employees a monetary award based on a group's -- not an individual's -- weight loss performance may be the most successful at getting people to shed pounds.

Earlier this week we reported on a study that found individuals who were offered monetary incentives to lose weight were more likely to ditch the excess pounds than those spurred on solely by motivation or education.

Newlyweds may be gaining more than wedded bliss when they exchange their vows, according to a new study.

A federal judge today blasted the Food and Drug Administration s refusal to allow emergency contraception to be sold over-the-counter without any limit on age, and gave the agency 30 days to lift its restrictions.
Judge Edward Korman ruled that the government s insistence on age restrictions on the pill requiring a prescription for girls 16 and younger was arbitrary, capricious, and unreasonable.

Many assume that vigorous exercise is a more effective means of reducing risk factors for coronary heart disease (CHD) than is more moderate activity. New research however, suggests that this assumption isn t necessarily true.

In a recent op-ed in the UK's Guardian, a Tom Riddington ostensibly a physician condemns in no uncertain terms the increasing uptake of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) by hundreds of thousands of desperate, addicted UK smokers (soon to be millions in all likelihood). A similar trend in the e-cigarette market has been documented in both Europe and here in the U.S.

A new study published in journalBMC Medicine found that gaining weight increases ones risk of coronary heart disease just as much as getting older.
Researchers followed 1.2 million women for about 10 years. They found that every 5-unit increase in BMI increased incidence of CHD by 23 percent. This is equivalent to the risk incurred from aging 2.5 years. For obese women BMI = 34 risk increased to one in six.

There s bad news for bald guys losing hair at the top of your head may indicate you re at risk for heart disease, new research finds.
Researchers in Japan analyzed six previous studies involving just under 40,000 men and found that guys who had lost most of their hair were a third more likely to develop coronary artery disease than those who retained a full head of hair.

The current issue of the New England Journal of Medicine contains two commentaries examining the recent judicial rejection of New York Mayor Bloomberg's proposed partial ban on sugar-sweetened drinks larger than 16 ounces. The Bloomberg proposal was purportedly presented as a means of combating obesity among City residents.

It would be impossible to follow pharmaceutical news and miss the recent developments in India, where a court denied a patent for Novartis Gleevec (Glivec) a very important cancer drug that has been in use since 2001.
While the ruling was touted as both an unmitigated disaster for the pharmaceutical industry, as well as a model of how the US should provide drugs to poorer countries, it is really neither.

A third of all American children are overweight or obese, and this proportion is even greater among children from low-income households and minority ethnic groups. For example, 40 percent of Mexican-American children living in poverty are overweight or obese. But new research indicates that consuming ready-to-eat cereal (RTEC) can help fight this tendency.

Children may already have one of the tools necessary to combat obesity technology. A Pew Internet study found that 78 percent of teens have cell phones and 47 percent of those are smartphones. Researchers around the country have started to develop programs using these resources to encourage teens to make healthier choices.

Is organic food really better than the conventional variety? Apparently many people think so at least that s what a recent study from Cornell University demonstrates.
Researchers asked 115 volunteers to taste and rate 3 pairs of foods yogurt, cookies, and chips. Each member of a pair was labeled either organic or conventional . After the tasting, the participants rated the taste and calorie content of each food, and how much they d be willing to pay for them.

Teen birth rates have been falling for two decades, but still, more than 365,000 girls aged 15 to 19 gave birth in 2010 and nearly one in five of those had previously given birth, new CDC statistics show.
There were 66,800 repeat teen births, so a little math shows that just over 18 percent of teens who gave birth in 2010 already had a child. More concerning still, for 9,600 girls it was their third child (and some had had even more).

Women who have suffered a stillbirth or have pre-existing medical conditions including inflammatory bowel disease, diabetes, or varicose veins are at greater risk of developing dangerous blood clots after giving birth, a new study has revealed.

Statins are among the most widely prescribed drugs, but discontinuation rates are relatively high. A new study in The Annals of Internal Medicine shows that in the large majority of cases where statins were stopped due to perceived adverse effects, the drug once re-started provoked no recurrent problems.

Financial incentives are used by about 67 percent of employers in order to encourage employees to adopt healthier habits. According to a new study, financial incentives may result in greater weight loss in obese employees. Further, group-based incentives had a larger impact on weight loss than individual incentives.