Month: May 2013

Elderly people who played a video game that challenged their brain processing speed showed improvements in executive function compared with those who did crossword puzzles. Amy Kraft reports.

By Dave Warner PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) – The jury in the murder trial of a Philadelphia doctor accused of killing babies and a patient during late-term abortions at a clinic serving low-income women ended its fourth day of deliberations on Friday without reaching verdicts. Dr. Kermit Gosnell, 72, who ran the now-shuttered Women’s Medical Society Clinic, could face the death penalty if convicted by the jury in Common Pleas Court in Philadelphia. The case focuses on whether the infants were born alive and then killed. …

(Reuters) – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved a Merck & Co cholesterol lowering pill that combines a generic version of Pfizer Inc’s Lipitor with its own Zetia, Merck said on Friday. The new combination drug will be sold under the brand name Liptruzet and will begin shipping to wholesalers next week, the company said. Merck already sells a two-drug cholesterol fighter called Vytorin that combines Zetia, known chemically as ezetimibe, with Merck’s older LDL lowering medicine Zocor. Lipitor, known chemically as atorvastatin, is considered to a more powerful statin than Zocor. …

By Andrew M. Seaman NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Mothers who are mildly iodine deficient are more likely to have children who perform poorly in spelling, grammar and literacy, according to a new study from Australia. Severe iodine deficiency during pregnancy is known to cause serious mental disabilities in children, but researchers examined the test scores of nine year olds whose mothers were only slightly iodine deficient during pregnancy and found the kids performed between 6 percent and 10 percent worse than peers born to mothers with sufficient iodine. …

By David Lawder WASHINGTON (Reuters) – As Congress sifts through a growing number of requests for targeted relief from automatic spending cuts in coming weeks, advocates seeking funding shifts likely will need to tell a compelling story with potential life-or-death consequences. Requests without such a strong selling point may find it impossible to gain enough bipartisan support as lawmakers vow not to repeat a swift and controversial action last week to save airline travelers from flight delays caused by automatic "sequestration" spending cuts. …

WASHINGTON (AP) — Thousands of people with serious medical problems are in danger of losing coverage under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul because of cost overruns, state officials say.

Independent Lens filmmaker Debbie Lum explores “yellow fever.”        

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia’s Health Ministry has confirmed three more cases of a new respiratory virus related to SARS, bringing to 10 the number of cases it reported this week, including five deadly ones.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Double-amputee Jason Koger used to fly hundreds of miles to visit a clinician when he wanted to adjust the grips on his bionic hands.

Every 15 seconds, someone is ripping off a home in the United States. Someone like Chris Patterson. Patterson has been convicted four times for breaking into homes. He’s trying to clean up his life, so here are five inside secrets and tips from Patterson on how to avoid getting burglarized. Watch the full story, and get more of Patterson’s secrets, on ’20/20: Confessions’ TONIGHT at 10 ET.        

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Actress Lindsay Lohan has checked herself into a rehabilitation facility, following a day of confusion on Thursday over whether she was complying with court-ordered treatment for a reckless driving charge. "She did check into the rehab (center) and I will still be going through a vetting process," Santa Monica City Deputy Attorney Terry White, the prosecutor in the June 2012 car crash case, told Reuters in an email on Friday. White did not name the rehab center, but celebrity news website site TMZ. …

Over 50,000 new HIV infections occur annually and of those new HIV infections, one in four occur among young people ages 13-24. One in four! As a public health professional, and as a mother of two young people in this age group, this recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) made me gasp.  We have entered the fourth decade of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the U.S., and know more about the disease and how to prevent and treat it than ever before and, yet, the December 2012 CDC report reveals: