StemCell Therapy

LONDON, Aug 8 (Reuters) - Gene therapy, which aims to patch faulty genes with working DNA, has been a long time in development. The following are major milestones:

1972 - Researchers first suggest gene therapy as a treatment for genetic diseases but oppose its use in humans "for the foreseeable future", pending greater understanding of the technology.

1990 - A four-year-old girl with severe immunodeficiency became the first patient to undergo gene therapy in the United States.

1999 - American patient Jesse Gelsinger dies following a gene therapy experiment, setting the field back several years as U.S. regulators put some experiments on hold.

2002-03 - Cases of leukaemia are diagnosed in French children undergoing gene therapy in a further blow to the field.

2003 - The world's first gene therapy is approved in China for the treatment of head and neck cancer.

2007 - Doctors carry out the world's first operation using gene therapy to treat a serious sight disorder caused by a genetic defect.

2012 - Europe approves Glybera, the first gene therapy in a Western market, for an ultra-rare blood disorder.

2016 - Europe approves Strimvelis for a very rare type of immunodeficiency.

2017 or 2018 - The first gene therapy could be approved in United States. (Reporting by Ben Hirschler; editing by David Stamp)

Read this article:
TIMELINE-Gene therapy's long road to market - Reuters - Reuters

Using health insurance claims data from more than 480,000 people in nearly 130,000 families, researchers have created a new classification of common diseases based on how often they occur among genetically-related individuals.

Researchers hope the work, published this week in Nature Genetics, will help physicians make better diagnoses and treat root causes instead of symptoms.

Understanding genetic similarities between diseases may mean that drugs that are effective for one disease may be effective for another one, says senior author Andrey Rzhetsky, professor of medicine and human genetics at the University of Chicago. And for those diseases with a large environmental component, that means we can perhaps prevent them by changing the environment.

The results of the study suggest that standard disease classificationscalled nosologiesbased on symptoms or anatomy may miss connections between diseases with the same underlying causes. For example, the new study showed that migraine, typically classified as a disease of the central nervous system, appeared to be most genetically similar to irritable bowel syndrome, an inflammatory disorder of the intestine.

Rzhetsky and a team of researchers analyzed records from Truven MarketScan, a database of de-identified patient data from more than 40 million families in the United States. They selected a subset of records based on how long parents and their children were covered under the same insurance plan within a time frame most likely to capture when children were living in the same home with their parents. They used this massive data set to estimate genetic and environmental correlations between diseases.

Next, using statistical methods developed to create evolutionary trees of organisms, the team created a disease classification based on two measures. One focused on shared genetic correlations of diseases, or how often diseases occurred among genetically-related individuals, such as parents and children. The other focused on the familial environment, or how often diseases occurred among those sharing a home but who had no or partially matching genetic backgrounds, such as spouses and siblings.

The results focused on 29 diseases that were well represented in both children and parents to build new classification trees. Each branch of the tree is built with pairs of diseases that are highly correlated with each other, meaning they occur frequently together, either between parents and children sharing the same genes, or family members sharing the same living environment.

The large number of families in this study allowed us to obtain precise estimates of genetic and environmental correlations, representing the common causes of multiple different diseases, says Kanix Wang, a graduate student and lead author of the study. Using these shared genetic and environmental causes, we created a new system to classify diseases based on their intrinsic biology.

Genetic similarities between diseases tended to be stronger than their corresponding environmental correlations. For the majority of neuropsychiatric diseases, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and substance abuse, however, environmental correlations are nearly as strong as genetic ones. This suggests there are elements of the shared, family environment that could be changed to help prevent these disorders.

The researchers also compared their results to the widely used International Classification of Diseases Version 9 (ICD-9) and found additional, unexpected groupings of diseases. For example, type 1 diabetes, an autoimmune endocrine disease, has a high genetic correlation with hypertension, a disease of the circulatory system. The researchers also saw high genetic correlations across common, apparently dissimilar diseases such as asthma, allergic rhinitis, osteoarthritis, and dermatitis.

The study received support from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Big Mechanism program, the National Institutes of Health, and a gift from Liz and Kent Dauten. Additional authors are from the University of Chicago, Microsoft Research, and Vanderbilt University.

Source: University of Chicago

Visit link:
Insurance claims reveal new links among diseases - Futurity: Research News

Could shivering in the cold be a way to shed pounds and possibly prevent diabetes?

Exposure to cold is the most well-known and well-studied mechanism for switching on energy-burning brown fat, which seems to protect mice from developing obesity. It remains to be seen whether the same process can help people.

Humans have three kinds of fat. White adipose tissue, or white fat, comprises the majority of fat in our bodies; its purpose is to store energy for future use. Brown fat is different: Its function is to generate heat to maintain body temperature. Until recently, it was thought that adults did not have brown fat, that it only existed in babies to help them stay warm before they could move around and then essentially vanished. But beginning in 2009, studies have found that many adults have brown fat and that people with more of it tend to be leaner and have lower blood sugar levels.

The third kind of fat, beige fat, appears to convert from white to brown when stressed by exposure to cold, and then back to white. This process is encouraging for scientists trying to figure out how to increase brown fat to improve healthy functioning of the body.

[If you want to lose weight, dropping meat may help]

A balanced diet and regular exercise are the cornerstones of healthy metabolism, but sustaining either is difficult for most people. Understanding how brown fat could benefit our health opens up a new direction in obesity research, says Paul Lee, an endocrinologist at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney, where he leads the Brown Fat Physiology Group. It is not a solution to obesity, but it is an opportunity to explore an alternative strategy for curbing the obesity epidemic.

When the body senses cold, Lee says, the brain releases norepinephrine, a chemical that essentially ignites the fat-burning process within brown fat. When there is not enough brown fat, the body has to turn to less-efficient heat-generating models, such as shivering.

Aaron Cypess, a clinical investigator at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, calls brown fat the principal organ responsible for generating heat in laboratory animals.

In mice and rats, Cypess says, chronic activation of brown fat [by exposing them to low temperatures or to drugs that target brown fat] ... is associated with a reduction in liver fat, a resistance to diet-induced obesity and improvement in insulin release. All of these benefits and others may also apply to people, but it will take much longer to prove because studies in humans have to be conducted differently, he says.

He adds, While white fat is easy to spot in humans think abdomen, hips, buttocks and thighs brown fat tends to be located around the neck and above the collarbone, along the spine and near the kidneys. Additionally, Cypess says, humans are genetically more diverse than lab mice, which produces results with much higher variability.

Lee says that when people are cold and begin to shiver, their muscles release irisin, a hormone that turns white fat into brown fat. The more a person shivers, the more irisin is released into the bloodstream.

A 2014 study by Lee dubbed the ICEMAN study found that after a month of sleeping at cool temperatures, five men increased their stores of brown fat by 30 to 40 percent and metabolized sugars more efficiently after a meal, which could be helpful for people with diabetes. When the sleeping temperature was raised, the brown stores dropped.

(Interestingly, another recent study found that brown fat also may be stimulated by taking a drug used to treat overactive bladder.)

Cypess says that this research makes it clear that activating or increasing brown fat stores might prevent weight gain, lead to weight loss and provide a new avenue for treating diabetes and obesity.

Can the average person embark on a shiver diet to lose weight?

Lee says he believes the current evidence does not support the notion that shivering may be a route to losing weight. (Despite the studys name, ICEMAN the Impact of Chronic Cold Exposure in Humans exposed participants to only mild cold, not shiveringly low temperatures.)

Cypess says that shivering to lose weight is an interesting idea, but there are many unknowns.

First, is it safe?

Lee says that shivering causes stress and could harm the body, which explains why the human body has evolved mechanisms to turn on brown fat or to turn white fat into brown fat.

In most people, Cypess says, shivering causes increases in blood pressure that over the years could damage blood vessels in the brain, heart and kidneys.

Additionally, Cypess says, there is no evidence to prove that a low-temperature regimen could be effective long-term. One of the biggest limitations of weight-loss interventions is that the body learns to compensate to maintain itself, and that might be true with a shiver diet. Lee and Cypess agree that no weight-loss regimen should be recommended without a great deal of evidence that it will work for more than a few weeks or months and that the weight loss can be sustained evidence that doesnt exist.

Finally, Cypess says, being cold is extremely uncomfortable. While suggestions exist that long-term activation of brown fat could be beneficial to weight loss and diabetes reduction, this has yet to be proven, he stresses.

Francesco Celi, chair of the division of endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine, said in an email that he expects future research will include conducting studies in humans that will test various interventions (drugs or environmental modifications) to expand and activate brown fat to help scientists determine what kind of metabolic improvements can occur. And by studying the various responses to interventions, researchers will be able to determine which patients respond better to brown-tissue expansion and perhaps why they do.

Cypess says he expects scientists to focus on determining to what extent adult brown fat contributes to getting rid of excess calories, how brown fat could be used to bring down blood sugar levels and how brown fat interacts with other organs to keep people healthy.

But even with all that, he adds, Basically, the issue of losing weight is about controlling the amount of food we put into our mouths.

Read more

Why many people regain weight after going on a diet, and what to do about that

Fitness trackers may not, in fact, help you lose weight

New drug tricks metabolism into burning fat as if youve just finished a meal

A blast of cold jump-starts fat burning and generates body heat

health-science@washpost.com

See original here:
Might a 'shiver diet' help people lose weight and protect against ... - Washington Post

In the 1990s diabetes was seen as a condition that mainly affected rich people in high income countries. Nowadays, its one of the leading contributors to death in all countries in the world, driven by increases in national and personal wealth resulting in people having more disposable income. In addition, urbanization has led to more and more people living sedentary lifestyles. A commission of experts, which was set up in 2014 to tackle the challenge in Africa, have recently released their findings. The Conversations health and medicine editor Candice Bailey spoke to professor Justine Davies about the importance of the commission and what good it can do.

What do we know about diabetes in Africa? Why is there a concern?

About 95% of cases around the world are type 2 diabetes, which is associated with obesity. The impact of diabetes is becoming much greater in poorer countries and regions. Sub-Saharan Africa is home to 34 of the worlds 48 least developed countries. In lower-income countries, even though national and personal wealth is increasing, health systems are not developed enough to cope with the increasing numbers, or the long-term consequences of diabetes such as heart attacks, strokes, blindness, and kidney failure.

The health fraternity has a good idea diabetes rates in Africa are increasing but they dont know enough about the number of people with the disease. The health fraternity has a good idea that diabetes rates on the continent are increasing but they dont know enough about the number of people with the disease. For example, a recent study found that there is no information about people with diabetes in 21 countries. Added to this, the Commission also found that in countries where the burden of diabetes is known only about half of the people with it in populations across Africa are aware that they have the disease. Of these only one in 10or 11%receive the drugs they need.

What are the costs?

There are two costs affiliated with diabetes: treatment costs and economic costs.

Diabetes itself can be treated very cheaply as it only requires medications (usually tablets) to lower glucose. But the long-term consequences, for example, heart attacks, strokes, blindness, and kidney failure, require specialists and specialist equipment to treat. These are very expensive. The consequences are also more likely to lead to people not being able to work.

The Commission calculated that southern African countries accounted for two-thirds of the $12.1billion spent on diabetes in sub-Saharan Africa in 2015. Wealthier countries, particularly South Africa, were spending more because theyre going through more societal changes. Less than a tenth of the costs ($1.7 billion) originated from poorer countries in western Africa.

Diabetes can be treated very cheaply, but the long-term consequences, for example, heart attacks and strokes, are very expensive to treat. And looking ahead, projections show that by 2030 southern Africa is likely to see the greatest increases in annual health care and personal costs: between $17.2 billion and $29.2 billion. In east Africa spending is expected to increase from $3.8 billion in 2015 up to $16.2 billion in 2030.

The Commission report estimates that the total costs to economies and individuals in sub-Saharan Africa in 2015 was US $19.5 billion.

More than half of this economic cost (56%, $10.8 billion) was from treatments, including medication and hospital stays. Other costs included out-of-pocket expenses paid for by the patients and productivity losses, mostly from shortened life expectancy as well as people leaving the workforce early ($0.5 billion), taking sick leave ($0.2 billion) and being less productive at work due to poor health ($0.07 billion).

In which way are health systems ill-prepared to deal with chronic diseases like diabetes? Are there countries that are worse off or better? And why?

The impact of diabetes is greater in countries and regions that are poorer. In lower-income countries, health systems have focused on tackling infectious diseases for the last 15 to 20 years. The increase in diabetes cases hasnt been seen as a priority. This has led to several gaps in care, including a lack of equipment for diagnosing and monitoring diabetes, lack of treatment, and lack of knowledge about the disease among health care providers.

Many infectious diseases can be cured relatively quickly, which means that the systems for treating chronic, lifelong, diseases like diabetes are rare.

But theres a lot we can learn from countries that have developed systems to deal with high burdens of HIV. Lessons are being drawn from them to provide care for other chronic conditions in Africa.

Another reason for health care systems in Africa not being able to cope with diabetesor many other illnessesis that they havent been given the level of investment needed to provide good quality care for all.

How could the challenges around diabetes be tackled effectively?

It is critical that we establish the true burden of diabetes and the burden of other risk factors associated with diabetes, like high blood pressure and abnormal cholesterol.

The Commissions analysis demonstrates a clear need for improvements at all levels of diabetes care. And interventions that have been successfully trialled in sub-Saharan African countries need to be scaled up. This includes community-based care for high blood pressure, patient education, home glucose monitoring, and more education about diabetes for health care professionals.

The Commission also pointed out that the response needs to come from many different levels; from individuals, to society, to health care planners, health care providers and governments.

The researchers note that prevention is critical to improving health and avoiding further economic burden. This is because managing type 2 diabetes and its risk factors (such as obesity and physical inactivity) is much simpler and cheaper than treating complications that develop in the later stages of the disease.

Justine Davies, Professor in Global Health, Kings College London

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

Sign up for the Quartz Africa Weekly Brief the most important and interesting news from across the continent, in your inbox.

Go here to see the original:
Diabetes is on a rapid rise through sub Saharan Africa - Quartz

A form of immunotherapy gaining ground as a way to treat childhood food allergies has shown promise in treating another rising scourge of children and young adults: Type 1 diabetes.

In a small but rigorous clinical trial, British investigators gave patients recently diagnosed with the metabolic disorder a truncated version of the chemical that gives rise to insulin.

After a quarter-century of failed efforts to treat diabetes with an immune therapy, the experimental treatment appeared to quell the immune systems assaults on the bodys insulin-production machinery. The authors of the new study call their experimental treatment an appealing strategy for prevention, both in the earliest stages of Type-1 diabetes and in children who are at high genetic risk of developing the disease.

Over the trials 12-month duration, eight newly diagnosed diabetic subjects who got a placebo treatment required steadily increasing insulin doses to maintain glycemic control. As their immune systems progressively destroyed the pancreatic cells that normally produce the essential hormone, their daily insulin use grew on average 50%.

The 19 subjects who got the experimental immunotherapy, however, continued to produce their own insulin. Among the subjects who got the experimental immunotherapy, the need for added shots of the hormone did not escalate in the year following their diagnosis.

The different metabolic trajectories of subjects in the trials control group and its active arm were evident at three months the earliest point at which a surrogate marker for insulin production was measured.

The report of the early-stage clinical trial, published Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine, offers some preliminary reassurance that immunotherapy could be used safely in this growing population.

Researchers have been wary of pursuing the strategy in diabetes, worried that it could accelerate or strengthen the immune systems attack on insulin-producing pancreatic cells, or cause dangerous allergic reactions. In the current study, injections of an immunotherapeutic agent caused no detectable worrisome response -- not even redness or swelling at the site of injection prompting the authors to declare its safety profile very favorable.

Recent years have seen progress in the bid to develop chemical mimics of allergens that train and reassure the defenders of the immune system rather than inflame and encourage them. The approach, called antigen-specific immunotherapy, has seen growing success in the treatment of allergies to common foods, such as peanuts, eggs and soy.

Similar to food allergies, Type-1 diabetes is an immune disorder a disease in which the immune system misidentifies a harmless or even necessary agent (whether ingested peanuts or insulin-making cells in the pancreas) as a threat. The immune systems assault not only can cause discomfort and danger in the form of itching, swelling or anaphylactic shock. In diabetes, it destroys a function thats essential to the bodys ability to extract fuel from food and to keep freely circulating blood sugar from damaging organs and blood vessels.

Just as lab-produced chemical snippets of peanuts accustom an overactive immune system to the eventual introduction of real peanuts, the researchers hoped that the chemical flag they devised would teach the immune systems of newly diagnosed diabetics to recognize insulin and call off their attack on its source.

By using just a piece of the antigen that typically causes the immune reaction, the approach of such peptide immunotherapy aims to inure the immune system to the object of attack while avoiding a full-on allergic response.

At Cardiff University and Kings College London, researchers led by Dr. Mohammad Alhadj Ali isolated a compound called a proinsulin C19 A3 peptide. A fragment of the chemical that gives rise to insulin, the peptide (known to chemists by the catchy moniker GSLQPLALEGSLQKRGIV) is called an epitope.

Over six months, they gave 19 subjects with early diabetes injections of the epitope in one of two doses: either every two or every four weeks. The subjects glycemic control and insulin use were then tracked for another six months.

The subjects were mostly in their mid- to late-20s, and had all been diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in the previous 100 days. The studys recruits were all at a stage of the disorder when the pancreass insulin-producing cells were still at least partly intact and capable of producing the hormone in response to food intake. But the immune systems CD4 and CD8 T-cells had begun to mount their attacks on the beta-cells of the pancreas.

Each year in the United States, some 40,000 people get a new diagnosis of Type-1 diabetes, a disorder that can upend a life of carefree eating and reduce life expectancy by a decade. Like many auto-immune disorders, including celiac disease and lupus, the incidence of Type-1 diabetes appears to have risen sharply. Diagnoses of Type-1 diabetes have escalated at an annual average of 4% in recent decades.

melissa.healy@latimes.com

@LATMelissaHealy

ALSO

Eclipse-chasing is an expensive pursuit. Here's why some say it's worth it

Immunotherapy succeeds in thwarting Type-1 diabetes in study

Will the Great American Eclipse make animals act strangely? Science says yes

View post:
Immunotherapy succeeds in thwarting Type-1 diabetes in study - Los Angeles Times

500+ riders pedal to get closer to...

LA CROSSE, Wis. (WKBT) - It's a record-breaking year for the annual JDRF Ride to Cure Diabetes in La Crosse.

More than 500 bikers rode Saturday to support the cause, bringing them about $1.5 million closer to finding a cure.

JDRF is an organization that raises money and awareness for Type 1 diabetes, sponsoring five rides nationally this year.

This is the eighth year the JDRF ride is in La Crosse, drawing cyclists from across the country.

Before riders took off at 7 a.m., the day was just breaking at Riverside Park, but there's no time to waste on the journey to finding a cure.

"I'm ready to ride, Iowa resident Steve Graham said.

"JDRF's vision is a world without type one diabetes. Its very simple, said Derek Rapp, president and CEO of JDRF International.

Graham has biked in the JDRF ride in various locations since the company he works for, Hyvee, first challenged him 10 years ago.

"Everyone out here's got your back, Graham said. "I thought it'd be one and done, yeah I'll go do that, then you see how many lives you can change," said.

Graham didn't personally know anyone who has Type 1 diabetes, so he was paired up with a youth ambassador who does named Jade. That introduced him to a family he never would have known otherwise.

"We've been friends ever since, Graham said.

"This guy right here recruited me, said Jades mom, Rhonda Logsdon. This was her third year riding alongside Graham.

"Just building relationships with JDRF and the support of the staff with family has been tremendous for us," she said.

The more people along for the ride, the better.

"The ride keeps getting bigger and bigger, said Jennifer Wickman, executive director of JDRFs Western Wisconsin chapter. We're raising over one and a half million dollars today."

"We're also raising awareness, Rapp said, and again, giving people the spirit to say, 'We're going to keep on going.'"

When the going gets tough on the course, Graham remembers people like Jade.

"Whenever you have a tough time, you know, you think, I'm just pedaling a bike. I don't have to check my blood sugar 15 times a day and take insulin, and so to get through 100 miles, it's easier than the day-to-day that someone with Type 1 diabetes has to battle through."

With each pedal, riders come one step closer to the cure.

"A lot of goosebump moments and tears, Graham said. "It's Jade that keeps me riding."

The course was 100 miles long, but organizers said distance doesn't matter, and cyclists can go as far as they'd like.

To date, the JDRF Ride to Cure Diabetes has raised more than $38 million nationally for Type 1 diabetes research.

Read the original post:
500+ riders pedal to get closer to diabetes cure - News8000.com - WKBT

See more of the story

One in 16 privately insured Minnesotans suffers a loss of good health due to diabetes, according to a new analysis by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota, which adds up to thousands of people who will never reach their full life expectancies or will suffer chronic disabilities.

The analysis, released Tuesday, is based on a new national Blue Cross health index tool that estimates the prevalence and cost of diseases in states and counties based on the private insurance claims of 40 million Americans.

The index was created to show just how widespread and how costly certain conditions have become. Diabetes, for example, costs each member of a private Blue Cross health plan nearly $140 per year, the new analysis showed.

Relative to the rest of the nation, depression and anxiety take a bigger toll on Minnesotans, the data showed. But Blue Cross executives said they wanted to use the data to promote a new Reverse It campaign against diabetes, because it can be prevented if people are diagnosed at the pre-diabetes stage and if they change their diet and exercise habits.

Among the one in three Americans that have [pre-diabetes], 90 percent of them are not even aware of it, said Dr. Glenn Pomerantz, Blue Cross Minnesotas chief medical officer. It really is the best bad news you can get, because you can fix this. Its curable. Its preventable.

Type 2 diabetes is an obesity-related condition in which the body loses the ability to properly convert sugar into energy. Diabetes is diagnosed when someone has a blood sugar level of 126 or higher. Pre-diabetes is diagnosed when a patients blood sugar is between 100 and 125.

While treatable with insulin injections and medication, diabetes can result in heart disease, stroke or kidney damage.

Adopting a Mediterranean diet rich in nuts and fruits, and adding daily brisk walking, can be enough to move people out of the pre-diabetes category, Pomerantz said.

Everyone always thinks its not them, he added. Take myself, for instance. Im borderline for pre-diabetes and it made me change ... my own lifestyle. I used to live on hamburgers and French fries. I think I picked that up in residency ... That habit stayed with me for decades.

County-level data in Minnesota shows a higher rate of diabetes in the northwest corner of the state, and a higher rate of people who suffer a loss of good health. Pomerantz said the lack of access in rural areas to primary care doctors probably plays a role, so Blue Cross is increasing access to an online personal health coaching program.

Coaching makes a difference, said Jon Frank, who was diagnosed with diabetes 12 years ago but didnt change any of his habits until he turned 50 last year and started worrying about seeing his two children grow up.

Being accountable each week to a coach at Life Time fitness helped the Plymouth man manage his calorie intake, take walks, and drink eight bottles of water a day, he said. Frank lost 100 pounds and cut his blood sugar level nearly in half.

I was a walking deathmobile, said Frank, a college football player who started gaining weight after starting his own fundraising business. I just knew I had to do something.

Pomerantz said the physical and monetary costs of diabetes are expected to worsen unless more Minnesotans find out whether they are at risk for the disease and take action. The Blue Cross data showed the health effects of diabetes growing fastest among people aged 18 to 34.

Our children and young adults are going to have reduced life expectancies if this continues, he said. This cannot happen. It cannot be.

Jeremy Olson 612-673-7744

1 in 16

Minnesotans will see their health affected by diabetes.

$140

Annual cost that diabetes adds to every private Blue Cross health plan.

Continued here:
Minnesota pays huge price for diabetes, Blue Cross finds | Star ... - Minneapolis Star Tribune

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., Aug. 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Biovista announced today that it is collaborating with HPE to advance Biovista's Project Prodigy Big Data AI healthcare platform applied in the personalized medicine vertical. Advances from the HPE-Biovista collaboration will be used initially within the context of Biovista's existing collaboration with Sarah Bush Lincoln Health Center (SBL), a hospital and health care organization that is home to more than 300,000 provider office visits per year.

HPE is joining the ongoing effort between Biovista and SBL and will work with Biovista to help advance the capabilities and productization of Project Prodigy as a Big Data AI engine in the personalized medicine vertical as a start.

Biovista develops advanced technologies that use Big Data and next generation analytics to address major needs in data-heavy verticals, with healthcare and personalized medicine as an initial focus. HPE and Biovista's new collaboration will leverage HPE computing and Biovista's Big Data AI engine, Project Prodigy, to identify and validate new therapeutic options for personalized medicine, starting with the community hospital setting.

"It's exciting to see Project Prodigy help advance the practice of healthcare," Aris Persidis, Ph.D. Biovista's president said. "The aim is to help doctors deliver more targeted care with fewer side effects in a way that integrates well with their workflow and is also cost effective. We are happy to be working with HPE within the context of our work at SBL to accelerate the advances of Project Prodigy in personalized medicine."

"Medicine as currently practiced in the United States is hardly sustainable financially," noted James Hildebrandt, MD, VP Medical Affairs at SBL . "We need to deliver better care with fewer side effects at a lower cost, or the system will fail. Efforts like the SBL-Biovista-HPE collaboration in personalized medicine that aim to combine IT efficiencies with sound medical practice promise to move us in the right direction."

"Project Prodigy offers unique prospects to apply AI Deep Learning techniques and Big Data analytics to personalized medicine," said Dr. Stephen Wheat, Director, HPC Vertical Solutions and Apollo Pursuits. "Combining HPE capabilities with Project Prodigy is a powerful and exciting path forward for us in personalized medicine, as well as in other verticals that have emerging AI Deep Learning workflows."

James Hildebrandt further noted, "We are very happy to work with Biovista to advance the practice of personalized medicine using the very best technologies available. SBL continually works to incorporate leading edge capabilities, including those at the forefront of big data healthcare analytics, such as Biovista's Project Prodigy, as we deliver high quality care close to home for our patients and communities. We see the Biovista-HPE link within the context of our SBL-Biovista collaboration as very positive for SBL and our patient community."

About Biovista: Biovista develops advanced technologies that use big data and next generation analytics to address major needs in biomedical R&D and clinical practice. Project Prodigy is a new category of inference generation and validation system. Biovista is using Project Prodigy to advance its own drug repositioning programs, as well as in programs with biopharmaceutical companies, regulators, and patient advocacy groups.

About SBL: Sarah Bush Lincoln provides a full range of acute care services to residents of East Central Illinois' Coles County and the surrounding eight counties. Primary care services are provided through 14 extended campus primary care locations and three walk-in clinics. Post Acute Care services extend to the surrounding 19 counties in East Central and Southern Illinois through active and consulting medical staffs that include approximately 175 providers representing 28 specialties delivered throughout the health center, including its 129 bed hospital, its cancer center, heart center and other centers of excellence.

Employing about 2,300 area residents, the health center promotes a culture of excellence through continuing personal and professional growth. SBL has received the Illinois Performance Excellence Gold Award for Achievement of Excellence in 2011, and is accredited by The Joint Commission, the nation's oldest and largest standards-setting and accrediting body in healthcare.

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/biovista-expands-project-prodigy-collaborations-in-personalized-medicine-300502425.html

SOURCE Biovista

Read this article:
Biovista expands Project Prodigy collaborations in personalized medicine - Markets Insider

Identifying the best care for a patient can be extremely challenging. To support the creation of multifactorial Decision Support Systems (DSSs), we propose an Umbrella Protocol, focusing on prostate cancer.

The PRODIGE project consisted of a workflow for standardizing data, and procedures, to create a consistent dataset useful to elaborate DSSs. Techniques from classical statistics and machine learning will be adopted. The general protocol accepted by our Ethical Committee can be downloaded from cancerdata.org .

A standardized knowledge sharing process has been implemented by using a semi-formal ontology for the representation of relevant clinical variables.

The development of DSSs, based on standardized knowledge, could be a tool to achieve a personalized decision-making.

Future oncology (London, England). 2017 Jul 31 [Epub ahead of print]

A R Alitto, R Gatta, Bgl Vanneste, M Vallati, E Meldolesi, A Damiani, V Lanzotti, G C Mattiucci, V Frascino, C Masciocchi, F Catucci, A Dekker, P Lambin, V Valentini, G Mantini

Radiation Oncology Area, Gemelli-ART, Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Rome, Italy., Department of Radiation Oncology (MAASTRO), GROW - School for Oncology & Developmental Biology, Maastricht University Medical Centre, Maastricht, The Netherlands., School of Computing & Engineering, University of Huddersfield, Huddersfield, UK.

PubMed http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28758431

Read this article:
PRODIGE: PRediction models in prOstate cancer for personalized meDIcine challenGE. - UroToday

As a result, there are more than 1,000 immunotherapy trials underway, and the number keeps growing. Its hard to imagine we can support more than 1,000 studies, said Dr. Daniel Chen, a vice president at Genentech, a biotechnology company.

In a commentary in the journal Nature, he and Ira Mellman, also a vice president at the company, wrote that the proliferating trials have outstripped our progress in understanding the basic underlying science.

I think there is a lot of exuberant rush to market, said Dr. Peter Bach, director of the Center for Health Policy and Outcomes at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. And we are squandering our most precious resource patients.

Take melanoma: There are more than 85,000 cases a year in the United States, according to Dr. Norman Sharpless, director of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of North Carolina, who was recently named director of the National Cancer Institute.

Most melanomas are cured by surgery, leaving about 10,000 patients who have had relapses and could be candidates for an experimental treatment. But nearly all will be treated by doctors outside of academic medical centers, who are not part of the clinical trials network and so do not offer patients experimental treatments.

Companies therefore must compete for the few patients with relapsed melanoma who are at centers offering clinical trials. Many end up struggling to find enough subjects to determine whether a treatment actually works and if so, for whom.

And these drugs often are not so different from one another.

Immunotherapy drugs that attack a protein known as PD-1 are approved for treatment of lung cancer, renal cell cancer, bladder cancer and Hodgkins disease, noted Dr. Richard Pazdur, director of the F.D.A.s Oncology Center of Excellence.

Yet many pharmaceutical companies want their own anti-PD-1. Companies are hoping to combine immunotherapy drugs with other cancer drugs for added effect, and many do not want to have to rely on a competitors anti-PD-1 drug along with their own secondary drugs.

So in new trials, additional anti-PD-1 drugs are being tested all over again against the same cancers a me-too business strategy taken to multibillion-dollar extremes.

How many PD-1 antibodies does Planet Earth need? wondered Dr. Roy Baynes, a senior vice president at Merck, which received approval for its first such drug in 2014.

Immunotherapy trials have proliferated so quickly that major medical centers are declining to furnish patients to them. The Yale Cancer Center participates in fewer than 10 percent of the immunotherapy trials it is asked to join.

The problem is that many of the trials are uninteresting from a scientific view, said Dr. Roy Herbst, the centers chief of medical oncology. The companies sponsoring these trials are not addressing new research questions, he said; they are trying to get proprietary drugs approved.

If the struggle to find patients for immunotherapy trials is challenging, finding patients for another new type of cancer treatment can be next to impossible.

These are drugs that attack mutations that tumors need to grow and thrive so-called targeted therapies. The idea is that tumors can be reliant on certain gene mutations. Block those mutations and the tumors will die.

The problem is that the mutations can be extraordinarily rare. Most patients who have cancers with the mutation in question have no idea; to find them, large groups of cancer patients must have their tumors genetically tested.

Thats expensive: Genetic sequencing costs about $5,000, and insurers rarely pay. Most cancer patients treated outside of academic centers do not have their tumors sequenced.

So what to do if youre a company with a drug that seems to be dramatically effective, but only in a few patients?

You may be forced to undertake a worldwide search for subjects that can last for years.

To test a two-drug combination against lung cancer, GlaxoSmithKline searched the United States, Japan, South Korea and Europe for 13 months just to find 59 patients whose tumors shared a rare mutation.

It took Pfizer three years to locate 50 lung cancer patients who carried a rare aberration called ROS1, found in just 1 percent of patients.

Clinical trials with patient searches like these are not for the faint of heart, said Dr. Mace Rothenberg, a senior vice president at Pfizer.

It helps that the F.D.A. has not insisted on large trials with control groups in instances of targeted therapies with few who qualify.

Instead the agency is looking for drugs with effects so powerful there is no question that they work studies in which patients went into remission, for example, when all evidence suggested they would die.

We used to have trials not long ago that had 700 patients per arm, Dr. Sharpless said, referring to the treatment groups in a study. Thats almost undoable now.

Today, trials can be eight patients.

To test a drug that attacks a tumor with a mutation found in just 1 percent of cancer patients, researchers at Memorial Sloan Kettering fanned out to the nonacademic medical centers where the majority of patients are treated, offering to pay for most of the cost of genetic testing, seeking patients at practices in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania; Hartford, Conn.; and Miami.

That is how Bruce Fenstermacher, 67, a retired long-distance truck driver who lives in Allentown, Pa., discovered he had the rare mutation that the drugs manufacturer, Loxo Oncology, had been looking for.

He had been receiving immunotherapy for his melanoma, but it had stopped working and his cancer was spreading again. Discovering that mutation was like hitting the jackpot for Mr. Fenstermacher, said Dr. Suresh Nair, an oncologist with Lehigh Valley Health Network.

The experimental drug seems to be working for Mr. Fenstermacher. But since so few patients have tumors that might respond, oncologists wonder how they will find them.

Is it worth it? Is it even possible?

If, God forbid, I had a family member with cancer, I would insist on this type of testing, said Dr. David Hyman, chief of the Early Drug Development Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. But I dont know what the rate has to be for society to say, We cant afford to miss these people.

And trials involving limited numbers of patients can be perilous. The smaller the study and the shorter its duration, the more likely that what looks like an effect in a trial might simply be a result of chance, Dr. Bach of Memorial Sloan Kettering said.

That leaves some of us evidence geeks wondering if it works, he said.

Some of the new cancer drugs have had such impressive results that their effectiveness was not in doubt, said Dr. Vinay Prasad, an oncologist at Oregon Health and Sciences University.

But, there also were drugs approved without control groups that did not provide such stunning benefits, and others that markedly slowed the growth of tumors but did not extend life.

In tiny studies, serious side effects can be missed, said Dr. Scott Ramsey, an oncologist at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center.

He worries about the expense of the new drugs, including out-of-pocket costs to patients. They may want the new cancer drugs reaching the market, he said, but you wonder if you are doing them any favors.

Read the original here:
A Cancer Conundrum: Too Many Drug Trials, Too Few Patients - New York Times

Michael Joyce is a multimedia producer at HealthNewsReview.org and tweets as @mlmjoyce

Ten years ago this probably wouldnt even have been a topic of conversation.

If it had, it likely would have been about medical tourism. There wouldve been outrage directed at third world countries who allow unregulated and unproven stem cell therapies to be offered to desperate patients.

Well, that concern is now closer to home.

There are now hundreds of such clinics across the U.S. The number of clinics is growing, more people are being hurt, state and federal oversight is shockingly inadequate, and the question has become urgent: What can we do about it?

Thats precisely why we produced a recent podcast and sought out the perspectives of these people:

Its also why were hosting a Tweet chat about stem cells that will bring together journalists, stem cell researchers, ethicists, and hopefully many patients and family members.

The chat will be held on Wednesday, August 9 from 2 to 3 p.m. EDT under the hashtag #stemcellhype.

Questions well be discussing during the chat include:

Stem cell therapies when properly researched and applied hold great promise. That makes it all the more critical to openly discuss stem cell interventions that are not evidence-based, not regulated, promoted in misleading ways, and have the potential to cause harm.

Please join the conversation!

Only 7 percent of orthopedic surgeons in the United States are women. Dr. Julie Switzer

Paul Knoepfler PhD is "disturbed and concerned." Here's why. Knoepfler is a stem cell researcher

Stem cell clinics are booming. And hurting people. How can patients protect themselves in a

See the rest here:
Stem cell hype: Join the conversation - HealthNewsReview.org

Adam Putnam was the youngest member of Congress when he went to Capitol Hill in 2001 six months shy of his 26th birthday.

Success came quickly to the newcomer from Bartow, whose grasp of policy and skill at messaging made him a protg of House Speaker Dennis Hastert and No. 3 in the House Republican hierarchy.

Along the way, Putnam racked up a record of votes, some of which haunt him as he seeks the Republican nomination for governor next year in a field that is yet to take shape.

Putnam voted for a new Medicare prescription drug benefit; $700 billion for the so-called Wall Street bailout; $187 billion to rescue mortgage lenders Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae; and $2 billion for a Cash for Clunkers car trade-in program.

Lets go back and look at what the world was like, Putnam said in a Herald/Times interview at a Masonic lodge in rural Wausau, recalling the Great Recessions misery in 2008 and 2009 with its double-digit unemployment. Every decision I made then was hard but had working men and women and families in mind.

But for Putnam, who has long dreamed of life in the Governors Mansion, one issue in Congress still stalks him like no other.

On immigration, many conservatives see any attempt to chart a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants as amnesty, a vague but toxic term in a race for governor in which Putnam is sure to face serious challenges from the right.

Amnesty is an elastic word. The dictionary says its the act of an authority [such as a government] by which pardon is granted to a large group of individuals. Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., has called it an unconditional pardon.

Putnam, whose familys citrus and cattle business employs immigrants who are legally eligible to work in Florida, twice pushed for legislation in Congress that would have helped undocumented workers. Both proposals had conditions that had to be met, such as specific work hours and a clean criminal record.

Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam speaks with Bob Swindell, with the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance and Jose Basulto, with Memorial Hospital System, at the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance Luncheon on May 15, 2017.

Emily Michot emichot@miamiherald.com

Eight years ago, he was a co-sponsor of H.R. 2414, a bill known as the Agricultural Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits and Security Act, or the Ag Jobs Act of 2009.

A bipartisan effort in President Barack Obamas first term to repair the nations broken immigration system, it had a guest worker program and was supported by some of the most liberal members of Congress such as Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California.

That state, like Florida, has an agricultural economy that needs immigrant labor, both legal and illegal.

The bill had a pilot program of earned status for immigrants, who after working a specific number of hours in the fields, would get work visas known as blue cards. Then, after three years of lawful labor, they could apply for citizenship an idea labeled amnesty by a prominent conservative group

This would provide amnesty and a direct path to citizenship, the Heritage Foundation said at the time. Reject amnesty.

It died without a vote. Then as now, Putnam rejects the notion that he favors amnesty for immigrants.

Ive never supported amnesty, he said. I worked to find a way to fix a broken immigration system.

After a White House meeting on immigration with President Obama and congressional leaders in 2009, Putnam said: Immigration is a complex issue, so there are any number of reforms possible. But granting amnesty to people who are here illegally must not be one of them.

Six years earlier, in 2003, Putnam was one of a dozen House Republicans who co-sponsored a bill, H.R. 2899, with a guest worker program for undocumented immigrants in all job sectors, patterned after a proposal by Arizona Sen. John McCain. It failed to pass.

Former U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton, who served in Congress from 1996 to 2010, praised Putnams approach to immigration.

He often was about solving problems, Wexler said. He was part of the responsible wing of the Republican Party.

But asked if Putnam still supports those ideas, his campaign said it was unrealistic to take stands on bills that are dead.

Adam Putnam felt then and does now that our national immigration system is broken and Washington needs to fix it, spokeswoman Amanda Bevis said.

Jack Oliver of North Palm Beach, legislative director of an anti-immigration group, Floridians for Immigration Enforcement, said hes disillusioned with Putnams overall record on immigration, including his lack of support for a federal law known as E-Verify to check the legal status of immigrant workers.

Oliver recalled that Putnam, in his first year on Floridas Cabinet in 2011, worked with then-Republican Sen. JD Alexander of Lake Wales to narrow the scope of an E-Verify bill (SB 2040) in the Florida Senate.

Adam Putnam campaigns at the 48th annual Possum Festival in Wausau, Fla., on Saturday, Aug. 5.

Paul Goulding Real Florida Media

Alexander noted that his family citrus businesses in Polk County employed immigrants, and the E-Verify proposal drew flak from contractors and the Florida Chamber of Commerce, which questioned its reliability and accuracy.

The amended bill limited E-Verify to one-stop career centers and state agencies and exempted private employers.

Its the same old thing, Oliver said of Putnam. When they run, they say theyre for something. Then when push comes to shove, they dont follow through. Were just kind of leery. Hes been a disappointment in the past.

Putnams campaign said that he opposes a patchwork of state laws and that immigration is a federal responsibility.

Throughout Putnams decade on Capitol Hill, he compiled a voting record that The Almanac of American Politics called reliably conservative.

Putnam consistently got A-plus grades from the NRA, and his ratings from the American Conservative Union ranged between 92 and 100. Congressional Quarterly said Putnam voted with President George W. Bush about 98 percent of the time.

Numbers USA, an advocacy group that supports lower immigration levels, was not so generous. Putnams record with the group was a 65 a C.

That reflected both his support for guest worker bills and his opposition to other proposals, such as giving legal status to Dreamers, children who came to the U.S. illegally, and a requirement that federal contractors use E-Verify.

On other key issues, Putnam voted for Bushs tax cuts, oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and allowing the parents of Terri Schiavo to intervene in the Pinellas County womans right-to-die case.

He opposed stem cell research, raising the minimum wage and ending a ban on same sex marriages.

Putnam, 43, is a rarity: a candidate for Florida governor with a long voting record in Congress. Democrat Lawton Chiles, also a Polk County native, walked away from a safe U.S. Senate seat and ran for governor in 1990. Jim Davis had served as a Democratic Tampa U.S. representative for 10 years when he ran for governor in 2006. His opponent, Charlie Crist, ran a series of TV ads that lampooned his tenure in Congress.

Putnams track record on Capitol Hill has not yet emerged as an issue because he didnt have announced opponents until Friday.

Sen. Jack Latvala, R-Clearwater, joined the race Friday, filing papers to make his campaign official. He could seek a moderate path to the Republican nomination in a four- or five-person race.

Adam Putnam campaigns at the 48th annual Possum Festival in Wausau, Fla., on Saturday, Aug. 5.

Steve Bousquet Tampa Bay Times

U.S. Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Ponte Vedra Beach, and House Speaker Richard Corcoran, R-Land OLakes, are both poised to run as conservatives, with Corcoran hiring a pollster and political advisers who shaped President Donald J. Trumps message and TV ads in 2016.

Corcoran pollster Tony Fabrizio was among the first to directly attack Putnam over immigration.

Fabrizio posted a tweet July 7 on Putnams lengthy pro-illegal immigration record. On Aug. 1, Fabrizio again tweeted: Adam Putnam is for amnesty for illegals.

PolitiFact rated Fabrizios claims half-true because of Putnams frequent votes to stop illegal immigration, such as a 2010 vote to oppose amnesty for so-called Dreamers.

Putnam won two statewide elections, but they were for the most obscure Cabinet post.

In whats sure to be a brutal primary, Putnams rivals will try to define him before he can do it himself, using those votes in Congress.

His opponents are thinking, We will define who Adam used to be before he has the opportunity to, said a veteran Florida political strategist, J.M. (Mac) Stipanovich, a harsh critic of Trump who says Putnam is pandering to supporters of the president.

Every election cycle is different, but they are clearly fighting the last war 2016. Its dispiriting, Stipanovich said.

Putnam has led a charmed life in Florida politics.

His closest race was his first run for Congress, in 2000, when he got 57 percent of the vote. He has never been seriously tested in a Republican primary.

Anticipating the attacks, Putnam said: Im a consistent conservative. Im a long, strong conservative. Ive been attacked by the media from time to time for being too much of a conservative.

Tampa Bay Times researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report.

As a member of Congress from 2001-10, Adam Putnam cast hundreds of votes and rose to No. 3 in the House GOP hierarchy, which required him to support his partys agenda. Some Putnam votes will be controversial with Republican primary voters if, as expected, he is challenged from the right.

Year

Issue

Position

2003

Create new visa program for undocumented immigrants

Yes*

2003

Add a new prescription drug benefit under Medicare

Yes

2005

Raise members of Congress salaries by $3,100, to $165,200 a year

Yes

2008

Increase the federal debt ceiling

Yes

2008

Override Pres. Bushs veto of farm programs, crop subsidies, food stamps

Yes

2008

Approve $700 billion Wall Street bailout for banks to buy distressed homes

Yes

2009

Grant U.S. citizenship to farm workers who work a certain number of years

Yes*

2009

Approve $187 billion bailout for mortgage lenders Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac

Yes

2009

Spend $2 billion for Cash for Clunkers vehicle trade-in program

Yes

* Neither bill passed, but Putnam was a co-sponsor of both.

Sources: Almanac of American Politics; CQs Politics in America; Congressional Record; votesmart.org; Congress.gov; legistorm.com

More here:
Congressional voting record may make or break Putnam's run for governor - Miami Herald

MIAMI (AP) Ryan Tannehill has decided surgery can no longer be avoided.

The Miami Dolphins quarterback will undergo an operation to repair the torn ACL in his left knee and will miss the entire season, a person familiar with the decision said Friday.

The person confirmed the decision to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the Dolphins hadnt disclosed it publicly. Tannehill will be placed on injured reserve, the person said.

Tannehill, who missed the final four games of last season with two sprained ligaments in his knee, reinjured it a week into training camp on Aug. 3. The Dolphins consulted with specialists before the team and Tannehill decided surgery was the best option.

Tannehill opted not to have surgery after last seasons injury, and instead rehabilitated the partially torn ligaments and underwent stem cell treatments.

Jay Cutler, who parted with the Chicago Bears after eight seasons, agreed to delay his fledgling network TV career and signed a $10 million, one-year contract Monday to replace Tannehill. Cutler, 34, might make his Dolphins debut in their second exhibition game next Thursday.

Tannehill won the No. 1 job for Miamis opener in his rookie season of 2012 and made 77 consecutive starts before his injury last season. Hes expected to be ready for the start of training camp next season.

Original post:
Dolphins QB Ryan Tannehill will reportedly have surgery, miss entire season - FOXSports.com

The list of medical or scientific endeavours mired in controversy is fairly short, but stem cell research and related therapy are some of the most contentious issues in modern science. Simply, stem cell therapy involves the use of stem cells to treat or prevent a disease or condition, a form of this type of treatment involves bone marrow transplant which is a relatively common operation. Whilst this may not strike you as something worthy of debate, it is because it is the further research in stem cell therapy that has become a battleground of ideology and discussion.

There is research and case studies showing that stem cell therapy involving cells from the umbilical cord blood of infants as well embryonic stem cells from human embryos. Although the former is fairly innocuous, is the latter, which requires a human embryo that has caused controversy, as to harvest them, you must destroy the embryo.

Understandably, there is a lot of opposition to the use of human embryonic stem cells in research, often times based on a range of philosophical, moral, or religious objections, with most protesters worried of cloning embryos just to harvest these cells. Theology, philosophy and morality aside, the medical possibilities of embryonic stem cells are almost limitless.

Doctors have explained that due to the nature of these cells, they are more flexible and can be put to a far greater range of uses than other more conventional stem cells. They pertain that these cells could help treat an incredibly high amount of diseases and illnesses including but not limited to neurodegenerative diseases and conditions such as diabetes and heart disease.

Of course, this only adds to the mounting debate surrounding the use of these cells, further driving questions from a moral and philosophical viewpoint as to whether or not it is ethical to be using embryonic stem cells, despite the purported benefits. Although research continues into the use of these specific cells, and governments grapple with potential legal and medical ramifications, it is important to realize that there are several other stem cell opportunities that do not require the same controversial source.

Although there has been blowback on other forms of research in the sector namely the use of umbilical blood the use of bone marrow transplants and other such alternative continue to save lives daily. However, until society catches up with science and medicine, there will be a continued debate as to the ethics and morality of this type of research, its applications, and what it could open the door for.

Content Voting System (Influence future articles): Do you like this topic?

Link:
Stem cell research: the debate continues to rage - CosmicNovo.com (Science and Technology)

August 7 2017, 12:01am,The Times

Matt Ridley

We can uphold our bold but sensitive approach to regulation while seizing opportunities in agriculture and medicine

Britain has an opportunity to seize on the latest breakthroughs in gene editing and pioneer new approaches in agriculture, research and medicine. We are well placed to be bold but responsible gene editors. Bolder than continental countries, looking over their shoulder to the disapproving Roman Catholic church; more responsible than China, where decisions on such matters are taken by officials with little consultation with the public; and without the culture battles over moral and legal issues that so often divide the United States on matters of biology.

This is partly a matter of good regulation. Britains pioneering debate in the 1980s on how to regulate embryo research, allowing such work up to 14 days, drew the sting from subsequent arguments about cloning, stem cells and

Want to read more?

Register with a few details to continue reading this article.

Read more:
Britain can lead the world in gene editing - The Times

While there is a lot of excitement surrounding the total solar eclipse that will cross into North Georgia on Aug. 21, many have expressed concerns about eye safety when looking directly at the sun during this once-in-a-generation event.

So is it really dangerous to look directly at an eclipse? Can it cause blindness? Actually, yes.

Its not going to make the vision go completely black as in black blindness, but it makes it to where it is a severe vision loss permanently, said Dr. Elizabeth Ellison, an optometrist with Gainesville Eye Associates. Blind is vision of 20-200 or worse for the state of Georgia for driving and such. ... Theyll just be able to see light.

Ellison and her husband, Dr. Stephen Ellison, also an optometrist at Gainesville Eye Associates, shared information and tips for those interested in watching the eclipse. The eye condition most associated with people who suffer damage from watching an eclipse is solar retinopathy.

Thats when a high amount of sunlight or UV can damage the retina, Stephen Ellison said. You can get that anytime just looking at the sun, but we see a spike in it around eclipses because everyones looking at the sun. Even just a few seconds can cause permanent damage.

The center part of our retina is called the macula and that is responsible for reading and seeing peoples faces and having 20-20 vision, Elizabeth Ellison said. Thats the part that gets affected in solar retinopathy. When you first look directly at the sun, what happens is it damages the center part. Its permanent. Theres no way we can treat it.

Stephen Ellison added the condition affects the central spot in your vision and can also change your color vision overall.

If thats damaged, your color vision is going to be off, he said. It will definitely alter your color vision.

While Ellisons havent seen cases of solar retinopathy as a result of looking directly in the sun, they said some of their fellow eye doctors have. They have seen cases where welders suffered eye injuries that cause similar effects.

If they arent using their proper eye protection or shield and theyre trying to weld just closing their eyes or using their sunglasses, its the same effect, Stephen Ellison said. They have all that light coming in that can damage the retina.

With solar retinopathy, the effects come 12 to 24 hours after the event. The welders, when they have their eyes injured, its not right after theyre doing the welding; its that night or the next day that they notice it. You dont really know how much damage is being done at that moment, so thats why you have to be very careful.

While he said the safest option is not to look at the sun during an eclipse, Stephen Ellison said using approved eclipse glasses is a way to look at the sun during the event without damaging eyes. He said the glasses should meet the requirements for the ISO 12312-2 safety standard, which is approved by NASA. He said the glasses are darker than sunglasses and provide the needed eye protection.

The approved glasses are being sold both online and in stores, although several local stores said this week they were out of the glasses but may be getting more before Aug. 21. A public event about the eclipse is scheduled for Aug. 20 from 1-4 p.m. at the planetarium at the University of North Georgias Dahlonega campus where approved glasses will be given away until all are gone. In addition, the UNG Gainesville campus and Lanier Technical College will be giving away glasses to students Aug. 21 just before the eclipse starts.

Stephen Ellison said another way to watch is through a pinhole projector made from a two pieces of paper or stiff white cardboard. After cutting a pinhole in the paper or cardboard, he said a person can hold it toward the sun and it projects an image down on the ground. So, you can see the eclipse without actually looking at it, he said.

Both recommended against using a camera or binoculars to photograph or look at the sun during an eclipse.

The rest is here:
Don't eclipse your eyesight; take precautions to view celestial event - Gainesville Times

by: Casey McNerthneyUpdated: Aug 11, 2017 - 9:47 AM

A 59-year-old man is one of two people able to see again thanks to cornea donations from a man who died last month on Mount Rainier.

Michael Naiman was 42 when he died July 16, shortly after summiting Mount Rainier for a second time. Rangers descended approximately 150 feet to retrieve his body, but he died from the fall into a crevasse on the Emmons Glacier.

Naiman was taken to the Pierce County Medical Examiners office, where staff started the organ donation process.

It was comforting, relative Josh Trujillo said of receiving the notification letter Monday from SightLife, a global health organization. We knew that the donation was happening, but we didnt know wed be reached out to.

Naiman, family said, would be so proud to know his final gift was helping others.

The cornea is the clear part of the eye over the iris and pupil, and last year there were more than 82,000 cornea transplants, according to a government site about organ donation.

Corneas can be damaged by eye disease, injury or birth defects. Blood types with donors and recipients dont have to match, and age, eyesight, and eye color also arent factors, according to the site. The white part of the eye, called the sclera, also can be donated for operations to rebuild an eye.

Mike always put himself in places where he was seeing extraordinary things, Trujillo said. Whether he was diving with whales or climbing tall mountains or spending time with his family and friends. Whoever was gifted sight by Mikes donation should know that those eyes have seen many amazing things.

DOWNLOAD OUR FREE NEWS APP

Naiman grew up with his father in the mountains of northern New Mexico, often in a teepee or their sheltered truck. He was a woodsman from an early age, and Naimans father taught him how to fish and find sticks for their wood stove.

He graduated from Albuquerque High School in 1994 and after moving to Seattle lived on a 38-foot wooden yacht on Lake Union.

Naiman graduated from Seattle University in 2012 and worked as a diagnostic sonographer at Northwest Hospital. He also spent years as a professional photographer.

He was happy with little, he was happy with more, friend Michael Dietrich wrote on Facebook shortly after Naimans death. Natural confidence grants you that ability to enjoy life as is. And if you have that you will always shine, as Michael did more abundantly than most anybody I ever knew.

Naiman summited Mount Baker and Mount Adams and went to the crater of Mt. St. Helens. But the climb he loved more than all the others was Mount Rainier a place his parents also loved.

Naiman is survived by a large family including his parents, Mark Naiman and Sheila Bjeletich, and brothers Aryn and Dan Daly. Aryn Daly is planning a trip to summit Mount Rainier next year.

Family asked that in lieu of flowers, friends donate to Mount Rainier search and rescue operations. To sign up as an organ donor in any state, follow this link.

Naiman, family said, would love to see others have that same smile he had on the summit.

Finally realizing the longtime goal of climbing the tallest volcano in the contiguous U.S. was made even sweeter by sharing it with two great friends, Naiman wrote to his climbing partners after their first summit.

Thank you both for helping me realize a major dream.

2017 Cox Media Group.

See the original post here:
Eye donations from man who died on Mount Rainier restores vision for 2 people - KIRO Seattle

by: Wendy CoronaUpdated: Aug 10, 2017 - 6:39 PM

CHEROKEE COUNTY, Ga. - Community members in Cherokee County are coming together to help a girl who is losing her eyesight.

Earlier this year, doctors diagnosed 10-year-old Lucie Ray with Stargardtsdisease.

That was pretty crushing, said Lucies father, Beau Ray.

The condition damages the retina and leads to the deterioration of central vision.

Lucie Ray is a sixth-grader at ET Booth Middle School in Woodstock.

TRENDING STORIES:

Shes an avid softball player and a member of the Georgia Trouble traveling team.

At softball, the ball would just not be there, it would just be blacked out to me, said Lucie Ray.

Members of Lucies softball team, Cherokee County businesses and other members of the community now are raising money for a special, high-tech pair of glasses from the company E-Sight.

They can actually move the screens inside the visor so that it projects the image into the peripheral vision around the blind spots, Beau Ray said.

The father of one of Lucies classmates is organizing a fundraiser Thursday evening at Reformation Brewery in Woodstock from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m.

If you would like to donate to Lucies fund, click here.

2017 Cox Media Group.

Read more here:
Community raises money for special glasses for girl losing eyesight - WSB Atlanta

Opening our eyes each morning and seeing the shapes and colours around us is something we often take for granted. We neglect to appreciate good eyesight until those shapes and colours start to get blurry. Even then we tend to ignore the signs which can lead to much bigger problems, especially if were behind the wheel.

In fact, studies show that up to one in five middle-aged drivers are taking to the road knowing their eyesight is not as good as it should be.So, how do you know if youre one of them?

According to British law, you must be able to read the new-style number plate on a car from a distance of 20 metres. This can be done with glasses or contact lenses youre prescribed.

If you cant, youre not only endangering your own life and the lives of others on the road, youre also breaking the law. Driving with untreated vision is an offence and can cost you a fine of up to 1,000, plus penalty points and possible disqualification.

Even if you do pass the number plate test, loss of vision in one eye, loss of peripheral vision and double vision can severely affect your ability to drive. They can cause difficulty in reading road signs, maintaining lane position and driving at night.

To minimise dangers, the Royal National Institute of Blind People and Specsavers suggest everyone should have an eye examination at least once every two years.

As some eye disorders dont show symptoms in the early stages, initial diagnosis is the key to good eye health.

And thats not only to keep you safe on the roads, but also to detect any underlying eye condition such as cataracts or glaucoma.

Glaucoma is currently the leading cause of irreversible blindness across the world. But its more easily managed the earlier it is detected.

In addition, eye tests can also pick up on more serious medical problems including diabetes and high blood pressure, which with early diagnosis can be treated.

Developing an eye condition can occur at any age. However, some groups of people may be at a higher risk, depending on age (those over 60) or family history.

If you notice any changes in your eyesight, dont ignore the signs and have it checked out by an optician. Visit specsavers.co.uk/eye-health to book an appointment today

Read more from the original source:
Keep your eyes on the road and your sight in check - Evening Standard

Shutterstock/meyerandmeyerYoure typing at your desk like any normal work day, and you happen to glance away from the screen. As you do, a cluster of grey-ish dots appears out of nowhere, drifting along wherever you turn your gaze. You clean off your glasses and check for eye boogers, but that doesnt help. Its like the dots are somehow stuck on your eye.

Thats because they are. Those annoying shapes are called eye floaters, and they can look like black or grey spots, squiggles, or cobweb-like strings. They drift around your field of vision and dart away when you try to look at them directly, eventually settling the bottom of your eye and out of your sightline. Floaters appear when the vitreous, the gel-like substance that gives your eye its round shape, shrinks and forms clumps or strands. So what youre seeing is actually the shadow of those clumps on your retina.

Almost everyone experiences eye floaters over their lifetimes, and theyre more annoying than anything. The people most at risk are those who are diabetic, have had cataract surgery, are very nearsighted, or are over 50. (Visiting your eye doctor is only one important health tweak you need to make when you turn 50.) In rare cases, floaters can also be a sign of retinal tear or retinal detachment, which could cause you to lose your eyesight permanently. If you see a lot of new floaters, flashes, or a shadow in your peripheral vision, contact your doctor immediately.

However, a new study published in JAMA Ophthalmology shows that YAG lasers (the same lasers used for cataract surgeries) may be a viable solution for these floating annoyances that dont pose major health risks. In a randomized clinical trial, 52 patients either received the laser treatment or a sham one. Of those who received the real treatment, 54 percent saw their floaters decrease over the next six months.

Researchers say more studies will need to be done before this option becomes available to the public. For now, most people learn to ignore them. These tips can help you be temporarily rid of those nuisances:

Surprised that eye floaters could be such a huge warning sign? We were,too. Check out more serious health problems that cant wait and read up on their subtle symptoms.

Read more:
Those Random Spots in Your Vision Are Eye FloatersHere's What to Do About Them - Reader's Digest