News by Subject Medicine & Health

Chemotherapy is known to have a negative impact on the reproductive potential of young breast cancer patients. Its effects on women's post-treatment fertility, however, are still poorly understood. A study to be presented at the ESMO 2018 Congress in Munich, has confirmed that natural pregnancies are possible after chemotherapy but that survivors' desire to have children decreases greatly after treatment, calling into question the need for systematic recourse to fertility preservation measures.

A single gene of the mother plays such a crucial role in the development of the placenta that its dysfunction leads to miscarriages. Researchers from the Medical Faculty of Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) have observed this in so-called knockout mice that were specifically modified for this purpose. These mice lack the gene for the transcription factor Math6. By conducting further analyses, the research team is now hoping to gain new insights into the role the gene plays in recurrent miscarriage in humans.

Study finds significant changes in how seizure medications are metabolized during the different trimesters of pregnancy.

What happens to those who behave unselfishly and make sacrifices for the sake of others? According to an interdisciplinary study by researchers from Stockholm University, the Institute for Futures Studies and the University of South Carolina, unselfish people tend both to have more children and to receive higher salaries, in comparison to more selfish people. The results have now been published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

An eight-week mindfulness-based program was effective for reducing stress and depressive symptoms while increasing general well-being in a study of infertile women.

In a study of 744 infertile men, prediabetes was found in 114 (15.4 percent) of participants.

A comprehensive new review article presents the most current understanding of the role selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) play in increased risk of multiple diverse gestational malformations and takes aim at the ongoing debate over whether SSRIs as a drug class can cause these malformations.

Mice with epilepsy have altered patterns of neuron activity in the portion of the brain that controls the reproductive endocrine system, University of Illinois researchers report in a new study. Furthermore, the differences in neuron activity in female mice fluctuate across the reproductive cycle, the team found. The study demonstrates that the effects of epilepsy on other areas of the brain may not be as static as researchers have thought.