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Category: Health

How Exercise Lowers the Risk of Alzheimer’s by Changing Your Brain

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Time

Noted: To find out, for nearly a decade, Ozioma Okonkwo, assistant professor of medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and his colleagues have studied a unique group of middle-aged people at higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s. Through a series of studies, the team has been building knowledge about which biological processes seem to change with exercise. Okonkwo’s latest findings show that improvements in aerobic fitness mitigated one of the physiological brain changes associated with Alzheimer’s: the slowing down of how neurons breakdown glucose. The research, which has not been published yet, was presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association on Aug. 9.

Can Major Surgeries Cause a Long-Term ‘Brain Drain’?

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Health Day

“Our data suggest that, on average, major surgery is associated with only a small cognitive ’hit,’ and while there was a doubling in the risk of substantial cognitive decline, this only affected a small number of patients,” said senior study author Dr. Robert Sanders. He’s an assistant professor in the department of anesthesiology at the University of Wisconsin, in Madison.

‘Time lost is brain lost’: Stroke patients face dangerous delays in receiving critical surgery.

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Quoted: Azam Ahmed, a thrombectomy specialist at the University of WisconsinHospital, said delays in stroke treatment are widespread because hospital systems are not cooperating with each other. If a doctor in one system refers a patient to another system, that system might miss out on revenue that could come from the patient’s care.

“Sometimes the best care isn’t being provided — knowingly,” Ahmed said. “It sounds unpalatable to say hospitals are competing for patients but the fact of the matter is they are.”

UW Hospitals ranks in national top 20 list

Posted on
NBC-15

UW Health officials said the University of Wisconsin Hospitals and Clinics are among the 20 most highly ranked hospitals in the nation, according to the U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals rankings.

Exact Sciences Expanding Through $2.8B Deal

Posted on
Wisconsin Public Radio

Quoted: Dr. Joshua Lang of the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center said he hopes the merger would mean more practical tools for oncologists.

“As we’ve learned more, we’re starting to understand just how many different types of cancers there are,” he said. “We need better tests. And if (I’m) smarter as a clinician, because I have better information, it means I’m going to be able to deliver better care.”

All feelings welcome

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Isthmus

Noted: Barcelos, who relocated to Madison from Massachusetts in January, is a UW-Madison professor of gender and women’s studies. Barcelos — who uses they/their pronouns — researches public health through queer, race and feminist perspectives. A yoga teacher since 2012, Barcelos leads the class with an intentional, yet light, demeanor, inviting yogis to take movements rather than telling them to.

In Milwaukee County, hundreds are hurt every year by reckless drivers. This is one victim’s story.

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Noted: Preliminary data show there were 299 car crash injuries related to speed in Milwaukee County through Monday, compared with 224 through roughly the same period in 2010, according to the Community Maps database, an online tool developed by the state Department of Transportation Bureau of Transportation Safety and the Traffic Operations and Safety Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. That’s a 33% increase.

The Vaccine That Could Prevent Stress, Anxiety, and Depression

Posted on
Vice

Quoted: One single risk factor will never explain the entirety of psychiatric problems, wrote Chuck Raison, a psychiatrist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in a special report on the topic in Psychiatric Times. But “inflammation turned out to be a common denominator and likely risk factor for every manner of psychiatric disturbance, from schizophrenia to obsessive compulsive disorder, from mania to depression,” he wrote.

Three things you should know about a new autism technician program that could be coming to Waukesha County Technical College

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Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Noted: In Wisconsin, the number of children with an ASD continues to increase each year, the agenda notes said. Currently, one in 71 children in Wisconsin has been diagnosed with an ASD, according to data cited in the notes from the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The center also called for planning for ASD services and training.

Scientists use algorithm track deadly pig virus

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Nova Next

Kristen Bernard, a virologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Veterinary Medicine who was not involved in the latest study, says genomic sequencing studies of PEDV suggest it originated in from a viral strain in China in 2012. Experts suggest that PEDV may have spread to the U.S. through animal feed ingredients from China.

To Improve Care, Veterans Affairs Asks Patients Their Life Stories

Posted on
Wall Street Journal

Some Madison VA medical departments, such as the heart-and-lung transplant unit, recommend providers read patients’ stories to develop a bond before major procedures. One primary-care doctor sends his patients a note to let them know he has read their story. And the University of Wisconsin medical school now offers an elective for students to staff the program as part of preparing for their medical careers.

UW-Madison may expand physician assistants program to another UW campus

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Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison is exploring a partnership with another University of Wisconsin System campus to address a shortage of physician assistants in rural areas, the university announced Wednesday.

Under a program offered through UW-Madison’s School of Medicine and Public Health, students would earn a degree through UW-Madison’s physician assistant program by taking classes at UW-Platteville.

Blue-Green Algae Blooms Frequent On Madison’s Lakes This Summer

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Wisconsin Public Radio

Emily Stanley, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Limnology and Department of Integrative Biology, said although they haven’t yet seen large blooms she describes as “epic” in Madison’s lakes, they are seeing frequent blooms. She said people should stay away from water that looks like it has white, blue or green foam floating on the top.

Some Democrats Talk About Cosmetic Surgery Insurance. It Doesn’t Exist.

Posted on
The New York Times

Quoted: “It’s taking people who are basically normal and would like to look better and feel better about themselves, and there’s nothing wrong with that,” said James Grotting, a plastic surgeon on the clinical faculty at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, and the University of Wisconsin, Madison. “But there might be no end of what patients might request if it’s covered by a third party.”

Midwest health system UnityPoint Health launches $100M venture fund

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Milwaukee Business Journal

UnityPoint Health, one of the largest health systems in the Midwest and the 13th-largest nonprofit health system in the U.S., recently launched a $100 million venture fund to invest in startup companies focusing on digital health, medical devices, and therapeutic and healthcare services.

With New Senior Center, Wausau YMCA Seeks to Expand Definition of Health

Posted on
Wisconsin Public Radio

Noted: Dr. Amy Kind is a physician and Ph.D.-trained researcher in geriatrics with the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She studies the way people’s environment affects their well-being. That can mean the ways housing or income-levels in a neighborhood can affect population health. She said another big factor in her aging patients’ health is their ability to maintain social connections.

Trump administration restricts fetal tissue research in win for anti-abortion groups

Posted on
Inside Higher Education

The Trump administration on Wednesday said it would bar scientists at federal agencies from pursuing research using fetal tissue and add new hurdles for researchers on college campuses to renew funding for research using the materials. It also said it would drop a contract with the University of California, San Francisco, to research HIV infection using the tissue.

Pushed by anti-abortion groups, HHS restricts fetal tissue research

Posted on
Politico.com

The Trump administration Wednesday imposed new restrictions on federal use of fetal tissue obtained from abortions, barring government scientists at NIH from doing such research, and canceling an existing HIV research contract with the University of California, San Francisco.

“There is no evidence that the use of donated tissue from fetal remains has any effect on whether women choose abortions, and no evidence that decades of research using donated tissue has ever led to an increase in the number of abortions,” said Alta Charo of the University of Wisconsin.

Trump’s HHS Bans Government Scientists From Fetal Tissue Research

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Buzzfeed News

WASHINGTON — Government scientists must stop research that uses human fetal tissue, the Department of Health and Human Services announced Wednesday in a series of new restrictions.

“It is a clear indication that this administration values symbolic statements over research aimed at saving lives,” Alta Charo, a bioethics professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School, wrote to BuzzFeed News in an email Wednesday. “Indeed, in one of the greatest ironies, this tissue might be used for research on the Zika virus that can cause devastating birth defects, so a policy aimed at symbolically valuing fetal life may end up devaluing the lives of actual children.”

Babies could eat more red meat, says IFT19 speaker

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Food Business News

Quoted: Frank R. Greer, M.D., emeritus professor of pediatrics and nutritional science at the University of Wisconsin – Madison School of Medicine, made the case for consumption of heme iron found in red meat and dark poultry in a June 3 presentation in New Orleans at IFT19, the Institute of Food Technologists’ annual meeting and exposition.

Encountering backyard bloodsuckers? The Tick App tracks that

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Capital Times

The app is part of a behavioral study being carried out by researchers at UW-Madison and Columbia University in New York who are seeking to better understand where and how people encounter ticks. They’re particularly interested in finding out what activities people are doing (and where they’re doing them) when they encounter black-legged (or deer) ticks (Ixodes scapularis), which often carry the bacterium that causes Lyme disease.

Safe, affordable: Precision Veterinary focuses on spay and neuter services

Posted on
Isthmus

Other low-cost spay and neuter services exist in the Madison area, but veterinarian Meghan Schuh has made a specialty of these operations in her new clinic, Precision Veterinary.

Schuh graduated from UW-Madison’s School of Veterinary Medicine in 2016, where she interned with both the UW’s Shelter Medicine program and the Dane County Humane Society, helping to standardize best practices for surgery, care and rehabilitation of animals. Her career inspiration came early on: “I adopted a malnourished kitten from a free box when I was 5 years old and took her straight to the vet. I fell in love and decided I was going to nurse her back to health.”