A cellular signature seen in the blood of multiple sclerosis patients may help determine their likelihood of relapse, potentially influencing which therapy physicians prescribe, a study found. Philip De Jager, HMS associate professor of neurology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, is an author of the study.
A trial of a repurposed experimental cancer drug has given parents, physicians, and scientists their first tantalizing evidence that it is possible to affect the course of a rare, fatal disease that causes children to age prematurely and die before reaching adulthood. Mark Kieran, HMS associate professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital, led the trial. Leslie Gordon, HMS lecturer on anaesthesia at Boston Children’s Hospital, is also quoted.
It wasn’t all that long ago that it took hundreds of scientists years, and billions of dollars, to analyze just one genome. But now, a few lab techs using high-speed sequencers can unravel anyone’s DNA for just thousands of dollars, in weeks. Robert Green, HMS lecturer on medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, is quoted.
Raymond T. Chung, HMS associate professor of medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, recently spoke in Exeter, NH, about a potential cure for hepatitis C, but ethicists said in interviews that Chung’s comments appear to have breached ethics principles by potentially leaving his audience with outsize hope for drugs undergoing testing.
A team from Boston Children’s Hospital is tracking reported cases abroad of a new virus identified this week as being from the same family of viruses that cause common colds and serious acute respiratory syndrome, the infection better known as SARS that killed hundreds around the world in a 2003 outbreak. John Brownstein, HMS associate professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital, is the founder of the technology that tracks the disease.
A class of drugs commonly given to children undergoing tonsillectomy is not likely to increase the risk of serious bleeding after surgery, according to a new U.S. study. Christopher Hartnick, HMS professor of otology and laryngology at Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary, is a co-author of the study.
The first comprehensive genetic analysis of breast cancer is reshaping our understanding of the disease, pointing the way to a cure. Judy Garber, HMS professor of medicine at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, was a guest on NPR’s On Point with Tom Ashbrook, to discuss this analysis.
As states loosen their laws around limited marijuana use, raising concerns that it could cause an increase in use by teenagers, recent studies have found that marijuana dependency among teens can change their brains for the long term. Sion Kim Harris, HMS assistant professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital; John Knight, HMS associate professor of pediatrics at Boston Children’s Hospital; and Lester Grinspoon, HMS associate professor of psychiatry, emeritus, are quoted.
