EurekAlert! News by Subject: Medicine & Health - News by Subject: Medicine & Health

Medicine & Health

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 29-Apr-2025 15:08 ET (29-Apr-2025 19:08 GMT/UTC)

Boosting this molecule could help retain muscle while losing fat

Salk Institute
Peer-Reviewed Publication

With the recent surge in popularity of weight loss drugs like Ozempic, altogether called GLP-1s, there has been renewed scientific interest in understanding how our bodies regulate muscle growth. Salk scientists have linked the protein BCL6 to the maintenance of muscle mass and further suggested that BCL6-boosting therapeutics could help GLP-1 users retain muscle while losing fat. Similar therapies could also be used to treat other populations prone to muscle loss, such as older adults and patients with systemic diseases like sepsis or cancer.

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Researchers track sharp increase in diagnoses for sedative, hypnotic and anxiety use disorder in young adults

Rutgers University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

The prevalence of diagnosed disorders from recurrent use of sedative, hypnotic and antianxiety medications in adolescents and young adults has increased sharply since 2001, according to Rutgers Health researchers.

Their study, published in Addiction, examined diagnoses of these disorders in adolescents and young adults between 2001 to 2019.

Journal: Addiction

Communities of color face greater barriers in accessing opioid medications for pain management

Weill Cornell Medicine
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Non-white communities had significantly less access to opioid medications commonly prescribed for moderate to severe pain than white communities over the decade beginning in 2011, according to a study by Weill Cornell Medicine researchers.

Journal: Pain

Smoking cannabis in the home increases odds of detectable levels in children

University of California - San Diego
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers at University of California San Diego analyzed cannabis smoking practices in San Diego County to assess whether in-home smoking was associated with cannabis detection in children.

Journal: JAMA Network Open

Stroke procedural numbers are an unreliable predictor of patient outcomes

University of Missouri-Columbia
Peer-Reviewed Publication

According to new research from the University of Missouri School of Medicine, the number of mechanical thrombectomies performed at hospitals is not an accurate indicator of patient outcomes, which can have implications that affect stroke care certifications.

Journal: Interventional Neuroradiology

Dana Rashid receives $1 million Keck Award to study connections between inflammation and skeletal development

Montana State University
Grant and Award Announcement

The award will support ongoing research into the role of inflammation in animals from birds to mammals, work that has also implications in human medicine.

Funder: W. M. Keck Foundation

Biased language common in birthing people’s electronic health records, Columbia Nursing study says

Columbia University Irving Medical Center
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Language that conveys stigma is common in clinicians’ notes on laboring and birthing people, Columbia University School of Nursing researchers report this month in the Journal of Obstetric, Gynecologic & Neonatal Nursing.

Journal: Journal of Obstetric Gynecologic & Neonatal Nursing