Category Archives: Health Care

Biologists Solve B-12 Vitamin Puzzle

B12, the most chemically complex of all vitamins, is essential for human health. Four Nobel Prizes have been awarded for research related to B12, but one fragment of the molecule remained an enigma–until now. The researchers report that a single enzyme synthesizes the fragment, and they outline a novel reaction mechanism that requires cannibalization of another vitamin.
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Vitamin B12 is produced by soil microbes that live in symbiotic relationships with plant roots.
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BluB catalyzes the formation of the B12 fragment known as DMB, which joins with another fragment, produced by a separate pathway, to form the vitamin. One of several possible reasons why it took so long to identify BluB is that some bacteria lacking the enzyme can form DMB through an alternate pathway, Walker said.

One of the most unusual aspects of BluB-catalyzed synthesis is its cannibalization of a cofactor derived from another vitamin, B2. During the reaction, the B2 cofactor is split into more than two fragments, one of which becomes DMB. Normally, the B2-derived cofactor would assist in a reaction by temporarily holding electrons and then giving them away. Such cofactors are not consumed in the reaction.

Antibiotics Too Often Prescribed for Sinus Woes

This is not one of the more amazing articles, rather one more in the long line of those reporting on the overuse of anti-biotics: Antibiotics Too Often Prescribed for Sinus Woes:

But it’s hard to preach that wisdom to someone with a drippy, hurting sinus who wants immediate relief, Leopold acknowledged. Because more effective drugs are lacking, “patients are desperate, physicians are desperate, and it is not a happy situation,” he said.

I guess I am just out of touch but why do physicians think it is ok to practice bad medicine because people will whine if they try to practice sensible medicine? These stories often tell of doctors that can’t say no to patients even if it means going against what is the best medical advice. Is it any wonder that helath costs continue to escalate, now totaling 16% of GDP, with such practices accepted? How hard is it to say, yeah great you want x drug, that is not medically advisable and is only available by prescription because it is not advisable for people to decide they need it but rather physicians are suppose to make that decision.

And so the physician often makes the practical choice of giving what the patient wants, with a chance of relief, over the more abstract issue of antibiotic resistance, he said.

I understand this reality. I just find it very sad that that professionals sacrifice the future to today’s ignorance and short sightedness. I wish physicians would not reward those demanding they get what they want today since they are simultaneously condemning others to suffer the consequences of such decisions.

But I also want us to stop spending our grandchildren’s money today. Still the politicians act just like the physicians choosing to give the voters what they want today and let someone else deal with the consequences later. Current USA federal deficit: $8,841,291,672,873 (see live debt clock), $29,349 for every citizen of the USA. It seems pretty obvious the same willingness to sacrifice the future for an easier life today is at the root of the actions by both doctors and politicians. Thankfully some are trying to counter this behavior, by both parties, to varying success.

Attacking Bacterial Walls

Bacterial Walls Come Tumbling Down:

Penicillin and many newer antibiotics work by blocking a piece of the machinery bacteria use to construct their durable outer walls. Without these tough, protective coatings, bacteria die. The enzymatic machinery (known as PBP2) studied by Strynadka’s group has two main parts: One end assembles long sugar fibers; the other end stitches them together with bits of protein to form a sturdy interlocking mesh shell.
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“This enzyme is an awesome target for antibiotics,” said Strynadka. “We have a totally new understanding of how the enzyme works and how a very good animal antibiotic inhibits the enzyme.” Although moenomycin is poorly absorbed by the human body, the new understanding of exactly how it interferes with bacterial enzyme function should help scientists design modified versions that are more suitable for use in people.

Understanding the structure of this enzyme should also speed up screening and design of new antibiotics, which are in constant demand as microbes continually evolve new ways to evade the drugs that researchers design to thwart them. The time it takes for bacteria to develop resistance to new antibiotics has been as short as one year for penicillin V and as long as 30 years for vancomycin.

FDA May Make Decision That Will Speed Antibiotic Drug Resistance

FDA Rules Override Warnings About Drug:

The government is on track to approve a new antibiotic to treat a pneumonia-like disease in cattle, despite warnings from health groups and a majority of the agency’s own expert advisers that the decision will be dangerous for people. The drug, called cefquinome, belongs to a class of highly potent antibiotics that are among medicine’s last defenses against several serious human infections. No drug from that class has been approved in the United States for use in animals.

This is why it is so important for government decisions that require scientific knowledge be made by knowledgeable scientists.

But Sundlof said that under FDA rules, those decisions must be left up to veterinarians unless there is clear evidence that wider use is causing harm.

“That is our policy” is not a good excuse for endangering public health. The dangers of anti-biotic resistance are obvious, well known, we see the results of bad decisions in the past creating havoc today and still government wants to act as though the inevitable consequences of their actions are somehow out of their hands. A policy that will lead to the deaths of many people should be fought. If you want to claim this policy will not do that, then make that argument. Don’t claim some policy prohibits you from saving lives.

Democratic/Republican forms of government give politicians oversight over bureaucracy to guide decisions for the public good. When politicians don’t understand basic science (in this day and age – when decisions require that understanding) that can lead to very dangerous policies. You would think that adults would be able to understand that just because consequences will be delayed a few years that doesn’t mean you should allow special interests to get what they want today. But the deficit (nearly $8,800,000,000,000 for the federal government now) provides a visible sign how much they care about future consequences of their actions. Combine that with little scientific understanding and that is not a prescription for good decisions.
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Correlation is Not Causation

Why so much medical research is rot:

People born under the astrological sign of Leo are 15% more likely to be admitted to hospital with gastric bleeding than those born under the other 11 signs. Sagittarians are 38% more likely than others to land up there because of a broken arm. Those are the conclusions that many medical researchers would be forced to make from a set of data presented to the American Association for the Advancement of Science by Peter Austin of the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences in Toronto. At least, they would be forced to draw them if they applied the lax statistical methods of their own work to the records of hospital admissions in Ontario, Canada, used by Dr Austin.

Dr Austin, of course, does not draw those conclusions. His point was to shock medical researchers into using better statistics, because the ones they routinely employ today run the risk of identifying relationships when, in fact, there are none. He also wanted to explain why so many health claims that look important when they are first made are not substantiated in later studies.

As I said in, Seeing Patterns Where None Exists: “Page 8 of Statistics for Experimenters by George Box, William Hunter (my father) and Stu Hunter (no relation) shows a graph of the population (of people) versus the number of storks which shows a high correlation. “Although in this example few would be led to hypothesize that the increase in the number of storks caused the observed increase in population, investigators are sometimes guilty of this kind of mistake in other contexts.'”

Nanoparticles to Battle Cancer

photo of Todd Harris, Sangeeta Bhatia and Geoffrey von Maltzahn

Team develops nanoparticles to battle cancer:

One solution already under way involves using nanoparticles for cancer imaging. By slipping through tiny gaps that exist in fast-growing tumor blood vessels and then sticking together, the particles create masses with enough of a magnetic signal to be detectable by a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machine. “This might allow for noninvasive imaging of fast-growing cancer ‘hot spots’ in tumors,” said Bhatia. The team will continue this research by testing the imaging capabilities in animal models.

Another solution, described in the Jan. 16 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is a novel “homing” nanoparticle that mimics blood platelets. Platelets flow freely in the blood and act only when needed, by keying in on injured blood vessels and accumulating there to form clots. Similarly, these new nanoparticles key in on a unique feature of tumor blood vessels.

Ruoslahti had identified that the lining of tumor vessels contains a meshwork of clotted plasma proteins not found in other tissues. He also identified a peptide that binds to this meshwork. By attaching this peptide to nanoparticles, the team created a particle that targets tumors but not other tissues. When injected into the bloodstream of mice with tumors, the peptide sticks to the tumor’s clotted mesh.

Photo by Donna Coveney, from related press release: MIT nanoparticles may help detect, treat tumors

Leading Causes of Death

The leading causes of death, Chart showing the odd of death in the USA:

Heart Disease – 20% then Cancer – 14% then Stroke – 4%
also (Motor Vehicle accident – 1% Suicide – 1% Falling – .5% Gun shot – .3%)

CDC’s report on the leading causes of death in the USA in 2004: Heart Disease 27%, Cancer 23%, Strokes 6%, Chronic lower respiratory diseases (emphysema…) 5%, accidents 4.5%, Diabetes 3%, Alzheimer’s 2.7%, Influenza and pneumonia 2.5%… (FYI, homicide is .7% the 16th leading cause, or very close to it)

What are the odds of dying? provides details on deaths due to injuries and includes a sensible disclaimer:

The odds given below are statistical averages over the whole U.S. population and do not necessarily reflect the chances of death for a particular person from a particular external cause. Any individual’s odds of dying from various external causes are affected by the activities in which they participate, where they live and drive, what kind of work they do, and other factors.

Catnap Benefits

The health benefits of 40 winks

A six-year Greek study has just concluded that people who took a 30-minute siesta at least three times a week had a 37% lower risk of heart-related death.

Too tired to work? Then have a snooze:

The state-backed siesta is part of a â‚¬7 million (Â£4.7 million) campaign begun yesterday by the Health Ministry to encourage the French to sleep more and better. A third of the population does not sleep enough, experts say. Tiredness is blamed for 20 per cent of road and domestic accidents, and for low efficiency at work and school, obesity, depression and many other ills.

A nap a day keeps lost productivity at bay

According to a Cornell University study, sleep-deprived workers cost U.S. industry $150 billion a year in reduced job productivity and fatigue-related accidents.

Chinese Stem Cell Therapies

Stem-Cell Refugees

Good or bad, China’s clinical work is already cutting-edge. More than 100 Chinese hospitals are currently performing stem cell procedures, according to Jon Hakim, a Minnesota native who has been appointed director of the foreign patient services department at Beike, helping Nanshan Hospital recruit patients. Since opening up to foreigners about a year ago, Beike has treated 170 of them from 29 countries. Like Melton, most of them find out about Beike from the Internet, and many write their own blogs in China and after they return home. In addition to spinal cord injuries, doctors treat multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy, and ataxia, a genetic disease that leads to deterioration of muscle function. While undergoing stem cell treatment, patients may also receive physical therapy, acupuncture, massage, drugs, and electrical stimulation. The average price tag: $17,000, plus airfare.

Cancer Cure – Not so Fast

Follow up on Cheap, Safe Cancer Drug?: In which my words will be misinterpreted as “proof” that I am a “pharma shill”:

This drug has only been tested in cell culture and rats. Yes, the results were promising there, but that does not–I repeat, does not– mean the results will translate to humans. In fact, most likely, they will not. Those of us who’ve been in the cancer field a while know that all too common are drugs that kill tumors in the Petrie dish and in mice or rats but fail to be nearly as impressive when tested in humans.

Perhaps the blog post I quote above just resonates with me (see: confirmation bias). To me,it supports my contention in my “Cheap, Safe Cancer Drug?” post, though much more effectively and with supporting evidence. But this is my blog so I get to quote whoever I want, and it isn’t surprising I find those that share my thoughts to be the most compelling 🙂 Anyway the post I quote is definitely worth reading.