The incidence of thyroid cancer has tripled in the past three decades, yet the reason for this is not clear.

Dr. David Goldenberg, chief of otolaryngology and head and neck surgery at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, notes the diagnostic tools are better, but he can’t get behind recent talk of over-diagnosis as the sole cause for the increase.

“The press that has been given to this is an oversimplification,” Goldenberg said. “What we should be concentrating on is not only why we are discovering more of it, but also which of these newly discovered thyroid cancers are the ones that will kill someone.”

Nice.

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Stem cell treatments involve some serious health risks for the patients and are very expensive. A new alternative developed for patients with health problems may be a game-changer as a team of researchers has developed synthetic stem cells, which prove to be as efficient as the regular ones. ( NC State University )

A team of researchers made a significant breakthrough which will help patients with heart problems all over the world. The scientists managed to create synthetic stem cells, which can help the heart tissue regenerate just as well as normal stem cells, while also avoiding the complications associated with them.

Promising Results

A team of American and Chinese researchers joined efforts in order to provide a better treatment solution for people with heart problems.

(Photo courtesy of Clarius Mobile Health)

The ultrasound market currently stands as a $6 billion global industry.

Contrary to popular perception, the use of ultrasounds for women’s health and pregnancy follow-ups only represents less than 20% of the overall use for healthcare. For example, a diagnostic ultrasound is routinely used to diagnose an assortment of healthcare conditions such as cancer, gall stones, and cardiovascular diseases.

Time to work off that Chritmas Turkey bigsmile

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Making muscles burn more fat and less glucose can increase exercise endurance, but could simultaneously cause diabetes, says a team of scientists from Baylor College of Medicine and other institutions.

Mouse muscles use glucose (carbohydrate) as fuel when the animals are awake and active and switch to fat (lipid) when they are asleep. The team discovered that disrupting this natural cycle may lead to diabetes but, surprisingly, can also enhance exercise endurance. The switch is controlled by a molecule called histone deacetylase 3, or HDAC3. This finding opens the possibility of selecting the right time to exercise for losing body fat but also raises the concern of using HDAC inhibitors as doping drugs for endurance exercise. The study appears in Nature Medicine.

“How the muscle uses glucose is regulated by its internal circadian clock that anticipates the level of its activity during the day and at night,” said senior author Dr. Zheng Sun, assistant professor of medicine—diabetes, endocrinology and metabolism, and of molecular and cellular biology at Baylor. “The circadian clock works by turning certain genes on and off as the 24-hour cycle progresses. HDAC3 is a key connection between the circadian clock and gene expression. Our previous work showed that HDAC3 helps the liver alternate between producing glucose and producing lipid. In this work, we studied how HDAC3 controls the use of different fuels in skeletal muscle.”

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