Coping with ‘fear of missing out’ over the holidays

Have you heard the phrase “Fear of missing out”? It’s commonly known by its acronym, FOMO, and while many say it comes from using social media too much, you don’t have to be online for it to have an effect on your life. The fear of not staying “connected” may cause problems, said Dr. Joe Taravella, a licensed clinical psychologist at New York University Langone Medical Center’s Rusk Rehabilitation. “It can lead to cognitive distortions and that is people thinking… that they’re truly missing out on things,” he said. FOMO…

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Older women with breast cancer still left out of medical trials

Older women are still underrepresented in medical trials evaluating treatments for breast cancer, according to a new study. Of three different types of trials evaluated by researchers, only one had an increase in enrollment of older women with breast cancer between 1985 and 2012. The other two had decreases. Seeing how older people react to cancer therapies “is crucial to inform decision-making and to optimally serve patients’ medical, emotional, and functional needs,” the authors of the study write in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, online December 19. “As physicians and…

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Older women with breast cancer still left out of medical trials

Older women are still underrepresented in medical trials evaluating treatments for breast cancer, according to a new study. Of three different types of trials evaluated by researchers, only one had an increase in enrollment of older women with breast cancer between 1985 and 2012. The other two had decreases. Seeing how older people react to cancer therapies “is crucial to inform decision-making and to optimally serve patients’ medical, emotional, and functional needs,” the authors of the study write in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, online December 19. “As physicians and…

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Laser therapy with deep-sea drug kills prostate cancer cells

A non-surgical treatment for lowrisk prostate cancer, in which doctors inject a light-sensitive drug derived from deep-sea bacteria into a patient’s bloodstream, was shown in a trial to kill cancer cells without destroying healthy tissue. Results of a trial in 413 patients showed that the drug, which is activated with a laser to destroy tumour tissue in the prostate, was so effective that half the patients went into remission, compared with 13.5% in a control group.”These results are excellent news for men with early localised prostate cancer, offering a treatment…

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​Combat anti-microbial resistance soon with smartphones

Combat anti-microbial resistance soon with smartphones (Getty Images) A team of US researchers has developed a diagnostic test for anti-microbial resistance using a smartphone that can help people in remote areas with limited resources conduct routine testing for antimicrobial susceptibility. Antimicrobial-resistant bacteria are responsible for high-mortality diseases such as pneumonia, diarrhea and sepsis. The team from the University of California – Los Angeles (UCLA) built a simple and inexpensive smartphone attachment that can conduct automated anti-microbial susceptibility testing. “This work is important and timely, given that drug-resistant bacteria are increasingly…

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Heal with food

If you remember the previous article – Part 1 of PCOS and diabetes care through nutrition, you may remember that what both diseases had in common was excess fat. Figure out the way to deal with the excess fat, and you’ve figured out a way to deal with both diseases and, in many cases, eliminate impending diabetes entirely. For those who don’t have these health conditions, you’d be nipping these diseases in the bud, should you decide to surface. In order to stave off disease and lose fat, say no…

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