Group items tagged

results like "Radiation therapy does not seem to increase the risk of cancer in the opposite breast if the patient is past the age of 45 at the time of treatment. But in women who had radiation therapy before the age of 45, an increased risk is seen 10 years after treatment."

"Medicare had created a national database showing how long it took hospitals across the country to get heart patients' arteries opened. It was a bell curve year after year, and the times were not getting any better. But there were a few hospitals at the tail end of the curve that year after year were treating people in an hour or so. Dr. Krumholz and his colleagues visited the 11 best performing hospitals. They were not famous institutions or major medical centers, said Elizabeth Bradley, a professor of public health at Yale and a leader in the project. Some were community hospitals; others were far from major population centers. The investigators recorded every detail of how the hospitals got things done and ended up with a short list of what the stellar performers had in common - procedures Lourdes later adopted."

"The questions were: Was it anthrax? If so, was it a genetically engineered bioterrorism strain, or a strain that normally lives in the soil? How dangerous was it? And the answers, Dr. Musser realized, could come very quickly from newly available technology that would allow investigators to determine the entire genome sequence of the suspect micro-organism. " Yet the patient in question had died, his lungs weakened from the welding work he did.

"Advances in mammography and other imaging technology over the past 30 years have meant that pathologists must render opinions on ever smaller breast lesions, some the size of a few grains of salt. Discerning the difference between some benign lesions and early stage breast cancer is a particularly challenging area of pathology, according to medical records and interviews with doctors and patients."

"Tests for hereditary predispositions to breast and ovarian cancer have figured among the first medical applications of the new knowledge gleaned from the Human Genome Project. These applications have set off heated debates on general issues such as intellectual property rights. The genetic diagnosis of breast cancer risks, and the management of women "at risk" has nevertheless developed following highly localized paths. There are major differences in the organization of testing, uses of genetic tests, and the follow up of patients. This article studies testing practices and ways of managing breast cancer risk in France and compares them with those in the United States and United Kingdom. It shows how the complex interaction between global and local factors shapes the multiple meanings assumed by the phrase cancer risk."