News by Subject Medicine & Health

A new study led by researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center reveals that while critical care outcomes in ICUs steadily improved over a decade at hospitals with few minority patients, ICUs with a more diverse patient population did not progress comparably.

The Obamacare program intended to reduce the risk of patients being readmitted after hospitalizations for heart attacks, heart failure, and pneumonia has not caused an increase in mortality risk for patients in emergency departments or observational units, according to a new report.

Drug-related deaths in US are likely twice as many as previously thought, according to research from Samuel Preston of the University of Pennsylvania and Dana Glei of Georgetown University. They also found that drug use decreases life expectancy by 1.4 years for males and 0.7 years for females, figures that more than double for West Virginia, the hardest-hit state and opioid crisis epicenter.

Patients with colorectal cancer have a greater chance of survival if they are operated in hospitals with a high case load. This is because complications that can occur after surgery can be better managed there.

Patients with acutely life-threatening health conditions who were treated in the innovative Critical Care Resuscitation Unit (CCRU) received faster treatment and had better health outcomes, including a 36 percent lower risk of dying than those who were transferred from a hospital's emergency department then evaluated and treated in a traditional intensive care unit, according to a recent study in the Journal of Emergency Medicine conducted by researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.

New research published in CANCER indicates that there is a higher risk of early death among patients with oropharynx cancer when not caused by human papillomavirus (HPV), than those whose tumors are HPV-positive.

A new large study of Chinese adults, published by the scientific journal Addiction, has found that eight percent of men in China are problem drinkers, and that problem drinking is more prevalent among men of lower socioeconomic status and in rural areas. Problem drinking is associated with significantly increased risk of physical and mental health problems and premature death.

Researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine found the main characteristics of loneliness in a senior housing community and the strategies residents use to overcome it.

The expansion of Medicaid coverage for low-income adults permitted by the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was associated with a 6% reduction in total opioid overdose deaths nationally, according to new research from NYU Grossman School of Medicine and University of California, Davis.