A warning to herbal supplement users: Those store-brand ginkgo biloba tablets you bought may contain mustard, wheat, radish and other substances decidedly non-herbal in nature, but they’re not likely to contain any actual ginkgo biloba. Pieter Cohen, assistant professor of medicine at Cambridge Health Alliance, is quoted.
A leading biologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, with backing from five scientists who are Nobel prize recipients, is wading into the world of dietary supplements with a new antiaging pill that is said to restore muscle tissue, improve brain function, and increase energy levels by improving “metabolic health.” Jack Szostak, professor of genetics at Massachusetts General Hospital, and Pere Puigserver, professor of cell biology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, are quoted.
Alison Galbraith, assistant professor of population medicine at the Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, participated in a radio interview about high-deductible health insurance plans.
The hope of scientists working on diseases like Alzheimer’s, diabetes and cancer is that the so-called precision medicine plan that President Obama proposed last week would speed efforts to understand genetic variations within diseases and to develop treatments for them. Robert Green, associate professor of medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, is quoted.
The National Football League is negotiating a consulting contract with the president of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Professor of Medicine Elizabeth Nabel, to advise the league on sports safety amid rising concerns about concussions and other injuries.
Mental distress is a universal condition. The World Health Organization has made global access to mental health care one of its key goals. But just as words for depression and anxiety get lost in translation, so can treatments. Devon Hinton, associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, is quoted.
Lie detectors are used for background checks and job screenings—and in police investigations when officers want to extract information from a suspect. But lie detectors aren’t allowed inside the courtroom during criminal cases. Judith Edersheim, assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, is quoted.
This weekend was the third MedStart hackathon that Tufts has hosted, but it was the first that focused on ways to innovate the medical school experience. Naren Gupta, assistant professor of surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, is quoted.
