BOSTON (September 12, 2016)--A new analysis of 100 million Medicare records from U.S. adults aged 65 and older reveals rising healthcare costs for infections associated with opportunistic premise plumbing pathogens--disease-causing bacteria, such as Legionella--which can live inside drinking water distribution systems, including household and hospital water pipes.

Every day, millions of people - including senators, doctors, and teachers -- make consequential decisions that depend on predicting how other people will feel when they experience gains or setbacks. New research looking at events ranging from college football games to US elections shows that our predictions about others are less accurate when we have information about the groups they belong to, such as which political party or sports team they're rooting for. This research suggests that our reliance on stereotypes about social groups interferes with accurately predicting how others will feel.

The findings are published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.

Philadelphia, PA, September 9, 2016 - Many acute and chronic liver diseases, including alcoholic hepatitis, result from apoptotic (programmed) cell death mediated by the enzyme caspase. Caspase inhibitors have therapeutic potential to treat and prevent apoptosis-mediated liver injury, and some are currently in clinical trials. However, a new study published in The American Journal of Pathology raises serious safety concerns regarding the clinical use of caspase inhibitors by demonstrating the occurrence of delayed-onset necrotic, non-caspase-dependent liver cell injury.

PHILADELPHIA-- For patients with advanced lung cancer, a non-invasive liquid biopsy may be a more effective and suitable alternative to the gold standard tissue biopsy to detect clinically relevant mutations and help guide their course of treatment, suggests a new study published this week in the journal Clinical Cancer Research from researchers at the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania (ACC).

Here is one more reason American taxpayers should not continue to spend over $100 million a year on complementary, alternative and integrative techniques; after a six-day Ayurvedic-based well-being program that featured a vegetarian diet, meditation, yoga and massages they determined that their program led to measurable decreases in a set of blood-based metabolites associated with inflammation, cardiovascular disease risk and cholesterol regulation. 

Six days.

Community characteristics play an important role in perpetuating teen suicide clusters and thwarting prevention efforts, according to a new study by sociologists at the University of Chicago and University of Memphis who examined clusters in a single town.

The study, published in the American Sociological Review, illustrates how the homogeneous culture and high degree of social connectedness of a community can increase suicide risk, particularly among teenagers. Such conditions contribute to clusters in which a series of suicides happen around the same time and in close proximity.