Transforming Cancer Care in Bolivia
A delegation from the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, including Northwestern oncology leaders, recently met with health leaders in Bolivia to begin generating cancer treatment recommendations to fit the country’s unique needs.
Genetic Links to Asthma in People of African Ancestry
A team of scientists has identified new genetic regions associated with asthma in people of African ancestry, according to a study published in Nature Communications.
Wong Receives Warren Alpert Fellowship Award
Yvette Wong, PhD, a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Dimitri Krainc, MD, PhD, has received The Warren Alpert Distinguished Scholars Fellowship Award, in support of her exceptional research in the basic neurosciences.
Study Explores How Pneumonia Strains Compete
A recent study has shed light on how different strains of bacteria compete to cause pneumonia, findings that could inform how to best prevent infection.
‘Disabusing Disability’ at Diversity and Inclusion Lecture
Oluwaferanmi Okanlami, MD, MS, shared perspectives on disability in medicine and promoting a more inclusive and accessible health system during the Spring Diversity and Inclusion Lyceum Lecture.
Medical Student Measures Political Engagement at Medical Schools Nationwide
Jordan Rook, a fourth-year student, measured medical students’ views on healthcare reform and political engagement, publishing the findings in the journal Academic Medicine.
Media Coverage
Diabetes drug has heart and kidney benefits, researchers find
This study has the potential to influence medical practice, said Dr. Mark Molitch, professor of endocrinology at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, who was not involved in the new study but often has prescribed canagliflozin for his own patients. Canagliflozin, a medication used to treat type 2 diabetes, belongs to a class of drugs called sodium-glucose cotransporter-2, or SGLT2 inhibitors, which lower blood sugar by causing kidneys to remove sugar
Poverty Could Leave Its Mark on Genes
“First, we have known for a long time that [poverty] is a powerful determinant of health, but the underlying mechanisms through which our bodies ‘remember’ the experiences of poverty are not known,” said study author Thomas McDade. He directs the Laboratory for Human Biology Research at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. The findings also show that life experiences can shape genetic structure and function. “There is no nature vs. nurture,” McDade said in a Northwestern news release.
Prostate Cancer: To Treat or Not to Treat?
Dr. Edward M. Schaeffer, chair of the department of urology at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, agrees. “Active surveillance has proven to be a safe and effective way to manage men with small amounts of minimally aggressive prostate cancer,” he says. “While under careful surveillance, the risk of developing advanced cancer is less than 0.5% over 10 years and the risk of death is effectively zero.”
Is jet lag good for you? Could be — at least it’s great for fruit flies
The study by researchers at Northwestern University found that fruit flies carrying a gene for Huntington’s disease appeared to receive a protective boost against the brain-damaging illness when researchers changed the insects’ sleep cycles in a way similar to jet lag. The team also found that silencing a circadian clock-controlled gene produced a similar benefit. “It seems counterintuitive, but we showed that a little bit of stress is good,” Ravi Allada, a physician who heads the neurobiology department at the university’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and Pathology, said in a statement. “We subtly manipulated the circadian clock, and that stress appears to be neuroprotective.”