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2006 News Releases from the Office of Public Affairs

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Better Care for Patients in Some Hospitals
Dcember 11, 2006 - Harvard Medical School researchers have found not-for-profit hospitals consistently performed better than for-profit hospitals when treating patients for three common medical conditions -- congestive heart failure, heart attack and pneumonia. In a comprehensive analysis, they also found hospitals with higher registered nurse staffing levels, more advanced technology, and federal or military designation all had high performance.

Fighting Like a Girl or Boy Determined By Gene in Fruit Flies
November 19, 2006 - Fighting like a girl or fighting like a boy is hardwired into fruit fly neurons, according to a research team from Harvard Medical School and the Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna. The findings mark a milestone in a new animal model for understanding the biology of aggression and how the nervous system gives rise to different behaviors. Aggression is a problem with a biological and genetic component, said co-author Edward Kravitz, HMS professor of neurobiology, who developed the fruit fly fighting model used.

Small Molecule Increases Lifespan and "Healthspan" of Obese Mice
November 1, 2006 - Researchers have used a single compound to increase the lifespan of obese mice, and found that the drug reversed nearly all of the changes in gene expression patterns found in mice on high calorie diets--some of which are associated with diabetes, heart disease, and other significant diseases related to obesity. The research, led by investigators at Harvard Medical School and the National Institute on Aging, is the first time that the small molecule resveratrol has been shown to offer survival benefits in a mammal.

Racial Disparities Widespread In Health Plans Serving Medicare Patients
October 25, 2006 - A new study from Harvard Medical School and Brown Medical School shows that disparities in care cannot simply be attributed to low-performing health plans. The research shows that high-performing plans and low-performing health plans, based on four key health measures, have comparable levels of disparities in these measures while serving Medicare patients.

Prostate Cancer Treatment Increases Risk of Diabetes and Heart Disease
September 20, 2006 - A treatment mainstay for prostate cancer puts men at increased risk for diabetes and cardiovascular disease, according to a large observational study.

Discoverers of Telomerase Receive Lasker Awards for Medical Research
September 17, 2006 - The Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research honors Elizabeth H. Blackburn of the University of California, San Francisco, Carol W. Greider of Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and Jack W. Szostak of Harvard Medical School who predicted and discovered telomerase, a remarkable RNA-containing enzyme that synthesizes the ends of chromosomes, protecting them and maintaining the integrity of the genome. Now celebrating its 61st anniversary, the Lasker Awards are the nation's most distinguished honor for outstanding contributions to basic and clinical medical research, as well as for special achievement in the medical research enterprise.

Bipolar Disorder Exacts Twice Depression's Toll in Workplace
September 1, 2006 - Bipolar disorder costs twice as much in lost productivity as major depressive disorder, a Harvard Medical School (HMS) study funded by the National Institutes of Health's (NIH) National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) has found. Each U.S. worker with bipolar disorder averaged 65.5 lost workdays in a year, compared to 27.2 for major depression.

Levels of Serious Mental Illness in Katrina Survivors Doubled Compared to Earlier Pre-Katrina Survey
August 28, 2006 - According to the most comprehensive survey yet completed of mental health among Hurricane Katrina survivors from Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi, the proportion of people with a serious mental illness doubled in the months after the hurricane compared to a survey carried out several years before the hurricane. The study also found that thoughts of suicide did not increase despite the dramatic increase in mental illness. The authors suggest that this low rate of suicide thoughts is due to optimistic beliefs about the success of future recovery efforts. The research, led by investigators from Harvard Medical School (HMS), will be published today in a special online edition of the Bulletin of the World Health Organization

Comprehensive Katrina Survey Shows Those Affected Experienced Extreme Adversity
August 28, 2006 - According to the most comprehensive survey of people affected by Hurricane Katrina, the vast majority of pre-hurricane residents of the affected areas in experienced a significant loss in one or more of the areas of finances, income, and housing. More than one-third experienced extreme physical adversity and nearly one-fourth experienced extreme psychological adversity. At the same time, evidence was found of an enormous amount of strength and personal growth in the sample, with the vast majority of survey respondents saying that their experiences with the hurricane helped them develop a deeper sense of meaning or purpose in life.

Study Provides Insight Into How the Brain Loses Plasticity of Youth
August 17, 2006 - A protein once thought to play a role only in the immune system could hold a clue to one of the great puzzles of neuroscience: how do the highly malleable and plastic brains of youth settle down into a relatively stable adult set of neuronal connections? Harvard Medical School researchers report in the August 17 Science Express that adult mice lacking the immune system protein paired-immunoglobulin like receptor-B (PirB) had brains that retained the plasticity of much younger brains, suggesting that PirB inhibits such plasticity.

Statement Concerning the Outcome of the Review Into Allegations of Research Misconduct Involving Fluoride Research
August 15, 2006 - The Harvard Medical School and School of Dental Medicine (HSDM) review of Chester Douglass, DMD, PhD, professor of oral health policy and epidemiology at HSDM, has concluded that Douglass did not intentionally omit, misrepresent, or suppress research findings of a graduate student surrounding federal grant work looking at potential links between fluoride in drinking water and osteosarcoma, a form of bone cancer.

22-year Study Shows that Young Kids are Now More Likely to Be Overweight
August 9, 2006 - By examining more than 120,000 children under age 6 in Massachusetts over 22 years, a newly published study shows that young children—especially infants—are now more likely to be overweight. This study was based at the Department of Ambulatory Care and Prevention of Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and appears in the July issue of Obesity.

Hunt for DNA Amplified in Cancers Uncovers Important Target Gene
August 7, 2006 - Researchers at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have discovered a new cancer-promoting role for a gene potentially involved in breast, liver, and other kinds of cancers. Their discovery that the gene YAP can transform mammary epithelial cells opens the door to understanding how a novel cell growth controlling pathway first discovered in fruit flies might be important in human cancers. This work is published in the Aug. 8 online early edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and will appear in the Aug. 15 print edition.

Researchers Uncover how a Molecular Switch Regulates Fat and Cholesterol Metabolism Pathway
August 2, 2006 - Researchers at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital have identified how a molecular switch regulates fat and cholesterol production, a step that may help advance treatments for metabolic syndrome, the constellation of diseases that includes high cholesterol, obesity, type II diabetes, and high blood pressure. The study is now published in the online version of the scientific journal Nature and will appear in the August 10th print edition.

Researchers Develop Novel Mouse Model to Witness Immune System Attack on Chlamydia
July 24, 2006 - Using a novel model that allows scientists to study how the immune system's fighter cells respond to invaders in the genital tract, Harvard Medical School (HMS) researchers have found a way to track immunity against Chlamydia trachomatis. Michael Starnbach, HMS associate professor, reports that this could help hasten the development of vaccines for chlamydia -- the most common cause of bacterial sexually transmitted disease (STD) in the United States -- and other STDs.

Leaders From Industry, Academia, Medicine and Government Team Up To Tackle Issues Surrounding Personal Health Records
July 14, 2006 - To tackle the privacy, business, societal, and technical issues surrounding personal health records - an integral part of the national debate on healthcare reform - 100 key leaders from industry, academia, medicine and government will team up October 10-11 for the first meeting on Personally Controlled Health Records Infrastructure (PCHRI 2006), hosted by the Harvard Medical School Center for Biomedical Informatics. "The work done at this meeting will further the development of the right kind of healthcare information infrastructure," said keynote speaker Mitch Kapor, widely known as the founder of Lotus Development Corporation.

A Large-scale Cross-platform Study of Research Microarray Uncovers High Concordance Across Platforms
July 2, 2006 - Winston Patrick Kuo, DDS, MS, DMSc, post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Oral and Developmental Biology at the Harvard School of Dental Medicine, and colleagues tested nearly all the available commercial and "in-house" platforms for cross-platform and cross-laboratory comparisons. They have produced a framework for comparisons across platforms and different laboratories.

Cancer Research Pioneer Judah Folkman, MD, Wins Warren Alpert Foundation Prize
June 26, 2006 -The Warren Alpert Foundation has awarded the 18th annual foundation prize to Judah Folkman, MD, the Julia Dyckman Andrus professor of surgery at Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston (CHB), for discovering that tumors require the formation of new blood vessels, a process known as angiogenesis, and for championing the concept of anti-angiogenic therapies for cancer and other diseases. For nearly 40 years, Folkman, director of CHB's Vascular Biology Program, has pursued his groundbreaking hypothesis that new blood vessel development is central to various disease processes. Folkman and his research colleagues showed that cancer and other diseases are supported by excessive or insufficient blood vessel growth.

Attacking Cancer's Sweet Tooth Is Effective Strategy Against Tumors
June, 2006 - An ancient avenue for producing cellular energy, the glycolytic pathway, could provide a surprisingly rich target for anti-cancer therapies. A team of Harvard Medical School researchers knocked down one of the pathway's enzymes, LDHA, in a variety of fast-growing breast cancer cells, effectively shutting down glycolysis, and implanted the cells in mice. Control animals carrying tumor cells with an intact glycolytic pathway did not survive beyond 10 weeks. In striking contrast, only two of the LDHA-deficient mice died, one at 16 weeks, another at just over 18 weeks. Eighty percent of the mice outlived the four month experiment.

Discovery Could Aid Fight Against Cystic Fibrosis Infection
June 9, 2006 - Harvard Medical School researchers have discovered one way that a hardy disease-causing bacteria could be surviving in the lungs of chronically infected cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. Pathogenic bacteria such as Pseudomonas aeruginosa use protein secretion systems to cause disease in their hosts. The host may be a cancer patient with a weakened immune system, a burn patient, or a person with cystic fibrosis. The discovery of this protein secretion system might lead to finding a new target for treatments.

Under-diagnosed Rage Disorder More Prevalent than Previously Thought
June 5, 2006 - A seldom-studied mental illness called Intermittent Explosive Disorder, characterized by recurrent episodes of angry and potentially violent outbursts--seen in cases of road rage or spousal abuse--has been found to be much more common than previously thought. This disorder affects as many as 7.3 percent of adults, or 16 million Americans, in their lifetimes. People with this disorder overreact to situations with uncontrollable rage, feel a sense of relief during the angry outburst, and then feel remorseful about their actions.

Scientists Identify Cell-killing Molecular Switch Activated by Free Radicals and Oxidative Stress
June 1, 2006 - Just as humans undergo daily stress, so do our individual cells. The cellular variety, called oxidative stress, is caused by the build-up of free radicals, which over time inflict damage linked to aging and age related diseases such as Alzheimer's. Researchers at Harvard Medical School have now defined a molecular signaling pathway by which oxidative stress triggers cell death, a finding that could pave the way for new drug targets and diagnostic strategies for age-related diseases.

HMS Signs Agreement with Merck to Develop Potential Therapy for Macular Degeneration
May 23, 2006 - Harvard Medical School has signed a multimillion-dollar license agreement with Merck & Co., Inc. to develop potential therapies for macular degeneration, an eye disease that affects older people and can lead to blindness. The agreement licenses specific molecules that could ultimately slow the production of toxic by-products that form in the eye and that have been implicated in some forms of age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

Research Shows How Visual Stimulation Turns Up Genes to Shape the Brain
May 1, 2006 - A new study focusing on the molecular roots of brain plasticity has found that visual stimulus turns up the expression of some genes and turns down the expression of others, somewhat like a conductor cueing the members of an orchestra. "This suggests that sensory experience regulates different genes in your brain depending on your age and past experience," said Carla Shatz, Harvard Medical School Nathan Marsh Pusey Professor of Neurobiology and department chair. "Thus, nurture, our experience of the world via our senses, acts through nature, sets of genes, to alter brain circuits."

Attention Shoppers: Researchers Find Neurons That Encode the Value of Different Goods
April 23, 2006 - Researchers at Harvard Medical School (HMS) have identified neurons that encode the values that subjects assign to different items. The activity of these neurons might facilitate the process of decision-making that occurs when someone chooses between different goods. The findings by Camillo Padoa-Schioppa, HMS research fellow in neurobiology in the lab of associate professor John Assad, may also shed light on 'choice deficit' disorders, such as eating disorders, compulsive gambling, and drug abuse.

Largest Study of Third-Party Prayer Suggests Such Prayer Not Effective In Reducing Complications Following Heart Surgery
March 31, 2006 - Researchers in the Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer (STEP), the largest study to examine the effects of prayer provided by others, found prayer had no effect on recovery from heart surgery without complications. The STEP team included investigators from six academic medical centers around the country.

Novel Vaccine Approach Stimulates Protective Immunity Against Listeria
March 20, 2006 - For the first time, an attenuated strain of Listeria that does not replicate in an animal and does not require any manipulation of the bacterium or host prior to immunization still provides protective immunity, according to research by HMS associate professor Darren Higgins and colleagues. "In theory, we could apply this vaccine strategy to other bacterial pathogens like Salmonella," said Higgins.

Researchers Discover How Gold and Other Medicinal Metals Work Against Rheumatoid Arthritis and other Autoimmune Diseases
February 26, 2006 - While searching for a new drug to treat autoimmune diseases, Harvard Medical School researchers have discovered a biochemical mechanism that may help explain how certain old drugs function. With this new understanding of how special forms of gold compounds and other medicinal metals work, it may now be possible to develop a new generation of gold-based drugs that are more effective against autoimmune diseases like rheumatoid arthritis.

Researchers Find Molecule That May Hold Key to Learning and Memory
February 17, 2006 - Independent research teams from Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston have identified a master protein that sheds light on one of neurobiology's biggest mysteries--how neurons change as a result of individual experiences. The research identifies a central protein that regulates the growth and pruning of neurons throughout life in response to environmental stimuli. This protein, and the molecular pathway it guides, could help investigators understand the process of learning and memory, as well as lead to new therapies for diseases in which synapses either fail to form or run rampant, such as autism, neurodegenerative diseases, and psychiatric disorders.

Elderly's Risk of Death Substantially Increased When a Spouse is Hospitalized or Dies
February 16, 2006 - In the largest study ever to quantify caregiver burden and the widower effect, researchers found that for people aged 65 and older, hospitalization of a spouse can harm the wellbeing of his or her partner and significantly contribute to that partner's death. This risk also varies with the ill spouse's diagnosis.

All Placebos Not Created Alike
February 1, 2006 - In a clinical trial examining how the placebo effect varies in specific clinical environments, patients receiving sham acupuncture reported they experienced greater pain reduction than those receiving an inert pill. One aim of the study is to understand how the ritual of healing affects health outcomes.

Hurricane Katrina Community Advisory Group to Inform Policy Makers About the Problems that Affect Survivors
January 10, 2006 - Harvard Medical School, through a $1 million grant by the National Institute of Mental Health, will begin recruiting a statistically representative sample of 2,000 survivors of Hurricane Katrina to serve in the Hurricane Katrina Community Advisory Group. Group members will provide personal health and needs assessment information to help inform public policy. One thousand members of the advisory group will be from the New Orleans area, while the other thousand will be from other affected regions. The recruitment will be national in scope, as many survivors are now in different parts of the country.

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