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Doctors, Patients Embrace Technology in Medicine

By Brenda Goodman, MA

WebMD Health News

Reviewed by Arefa Cassoobhoy, MD, MPH

Sept. 22, 2014 -- Technology is quickly changing many parts of medicine, giving people more power to take charge of their health care. Many patients and doctors are embracing these changes, a new Medscape/WebMD survey finds.

The findings are part of the WebMD/Medscape Digital Technology Survey, which included more than 1,100 patients and 1,400 health professionals, including 827 doctors. Questions focused on issues related to the evolution of medical care -- including using smartphones to assist in the diagnostic process, clearness about what a procedure costs, the right to review medical records, radiation risks from imaging tests, and genetic testing.

Eric Topol, MD, editor-in-chief of Medscape and the chief academic officer of Scripps Health, says the report is unique. There hasn’t been a large survey that’s asked the same questions of doctors and patients. “Technology is really democratizing all aspects of the doctor’s visit,” Topol says. Today, people can use smartphones to track their blood sugar. And soon, apps and accessories may be available that check cholesterol or track the heart’s electrical activity. Instead of the doctor’s office or lab being a place to begin gathering information about their health, people could soon be showing up for checkups with the info already in hand.

In the survey:

- A majority of both groups -- 84% of patients and 69% of doctors -- said they embrace technology to enhance and aid the diagnostic process.

- Both groups -- 64% of patients and 63% of doctors -- agreed that the smartphone can be a useful diagnostic tool in regard to blood tests.

About 40% of patients liked the idea of using technology to identify health concerns without a trip to the doctor, while only 17% of doctors endorsed that method.

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The Biological Basis of Learning and Individuality

Elementary aspects of the neuronal mechanisms important for several different types of learning can now be studied on the cellular and even on the molecular level. Researchers agree that [some] forms of learning and memory require a conscious record. These types of learning are commonly called declarative or explicit. Those forms of learning that do not utilize conscious participation are referred to as non-declarative or implicit.

Explicit learning is fast and may take place after only one training trial. It often involves association of simultaneous stimuli and permits storage of information about a single event that happens in a particular time and place; it therefore affords a sense of familiarity about previous events. In contrast, implicit learning is slow and accumulates through repetition over many trials. It often involves association of sequential stimuli and permits storage of information about predictive relations between events. Implicit learning is expressed primarily by improved performance on certain tasks without the subject being able to describe just what has been learned, and it involves memory systems that do not draw on the contents of the general knowledge of the individual.

The existence of two distinct forms of learning has caused the reductionists among neurobiologists to ask whether there is a representation on the cellular level for each of these two types of learning process. Canadian psychologist Donald O. Hebb boldly suggested that associative learning could be produced by a simple cellular mechanism. He proposed that associations could be formed by coincident neural activity: “When an axon of cell A ... excite[s] cell B and repeatedly or persistently takes part in firing it, some growth process or metabolic change takes place in one or both cells such that A’s efficacy, as one of the cells firing B, is increased.” According to Hebb’s learning rule, coincident activity in the presynaptic and postsynaptic neurons, is critical for strengthening the connection between them (a so-called pre-post associative mechanism).

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Breast-Feeding May Cut Breast Cancer Recurrence Risk

By NICHOLAS BAKALAR

A new report suggests that breast-feeding, which has been associated with a reduced breast cancer risk, may have another benefit. In mothers who later develop breast cancer, breast-feeding may reduce the risk of cancer recurrence.

The study, in the July issue of The Journal of the National Cancer Institute, followed 1,636 breast cancer survivors. Researchers examined medical records and gathered data on whether mothers had ever breast-fed their children. They found 383 recurrences and 290 breast cancer deaths during an average nine years of follow-up after completion of treatment.

After controlling for age, smoking, education, race, type of therapy and other factors, they found that compared with women who had never breast-fed, any breast-feeding was associated with a 30 percent reduced risk of recurrence, and breast-feeding for more than six months was associated with a 37 percent reduced risk. There were similar risk reductions for breast cancer deaths.

“Breast-feeding is a good thing for the baby, and there are additional benefits for the mom that this study suggests,” said the lead author, Marilyn L. Kwan, a research scientist at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland, Calif. “This contributes to information already available in making a personal decision about whether or not to breast-feed.”

The risk reductions were particularly apparent in estrogen-receptor positive cancers, the most common type, but were not significant for women with HER2 positive tumors. Breast-feeding leads to certain molecular changes in breast cells, which may help explain the effect.

Read the passage below to complete the gaps with the relative pronouns (1- 4):

Online friends are people ________________ always post messages and pictures of the places ________________ they are, ________________ they are with and ___________ they are doing.

1. what

2. who

3. whom

4. where

Seven portions of fruit and vegetables are better for you

For many years, the nutrition message has been "five a day" – the recommendation that five portions of fruit and vegetables are enough to keep disease at bay and help us to live longer. That advice has been revised upwards. A new study suggests that people who get seven or more portions a day are healthier. Researchers from University College London studied the dietary habits of 65,000 adults over a seven-year period. They concluded that: "A robust inverse association exists between fruit and vegetable consumption and mortality, with benefits seen in up to 7-plus portions daily." In other words, if you eat more fruit and vegetables, chances are you live longer. The researchers put people into five different groups, depending on how much fruit and veg they ate. They found that those who ate seven or more portions a day had a 42 percent lower risk of death than those who ate just one portion. They recommended that schools serve healthier meals and that supermarkets put more emphasis on prominently displaying cheaper produce. They warned that frozen and canned fruit was linked to higher mortality rates. Some experts say the findings of the study should be taken with a pinch of salt. One dietician said the findings ignored the fact that people who eat more fruit and veg are generally wealthier and thus lead lifestyles that will help them live longer anyway.

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Frequently Asked Questions – Instagram

What is Instagram?

It’s an application for your mobile phone that enables you to edit pictures you have taken with your mobile phone camera using built-in filters and share them with others. If you have an Instagram account you can tag pictures, rate and comment on other people’s pictures and follow other users.

How much is your app?

$0.00.

Where does the name come from?

When we were kids we loved playing around with cameras. We loved how different types of old cameras marketed themselves as “instant” - something we take for granted today. We also felt that the snapshots people were taking were like telegrams in that they got sent over the wire to others - so we figured why not combine the two?

How did the idea come about?

We love taking photos. We always assumed taking interesting photos required a big bulky camera and a couple years of art school. But as mobile phone cameras got better and better, we decided to challenge that assumption. We created Instagram to solve three simple problems:

- Mobile photos always come out looking mediocre. Our awesome looking filters transform your photos into professional-looking snapshots.

- Sharing on multiple platforms is a pain - we help you take a picture once, then share it (instantly) on multiple services.

- Most uploading experiences are clumsy and take forever - we’ve optimized the experience to be fast and efficient.

How does privacy work?

We have adopted a follower model that means if you’re “public” on Instagram, anyone can subscribe to follow your photos. We do, however, have a special private option. In this mode, a user can make sure he/she must approve all follow requests before they go through.

Who can see my photos?

All photos are public by default which means they are visible to anyone who has an account. If you choose to make your account private, then only people who follow you on Instagram will be able to see your photos.

Migrant crisis: Grim find of bodies in Austria lorry

AUGUST 27, 2015 -BBC NEWS

The bodies of between 20 and 50 migrants have been found in a lorry abandoned in a motorway lay-by near the Austrian border with Hungary, authorities say.

Austrian police say they think the people inside were already dead when the truck crossed into Austria. The lorry has been towed away for forensic examination. Police say they should be able to give more information on the number of bodies on Friday morning. The grim find comes as a summit focusing on migration takes place in the Austrian capital, Vienna.

Tens of thousands of migrants from conflict-hit states in the Middle East and Africa have been trying to make their way to Europe.

Austria's Chancellor Werner Faymann said the tragedy showed once again "how necessary it is to save lives by combating criminals and people traffickers".

The vehicle - a refrigerated lorry with Hungarian license plates - was found parked off the A4 motorway between Parndorf and Neusiedl am See, according to Burgenland police chief Hans Peter Doskozil. The vehicle was there from around 06:00 local time (04:00 GMT) on Thursday morning, Mr. Doskozil said. But Hungarian cameras had identified that the truck was on the Hungarian side of the border, very close to Austria, at 09:00 on Wednesday, he said, so it must have been driven across the border in the intervening time.

The decomposing state of the bodies would suggest that they had been dead for one and a half to two days, the police chief added, suggesting that the victims must have already been dead when the lorry crossed into Austria. On Thursday afternoon the truck was towed away to undergo forensic examinations in Nickelsdorf. Police will give a further news conference at 11:00 on Friday, when they should be able to say how many people have died. They do not yet know whether women and children are among the victims, or how they died.