http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (AP) -- When Connie Culp heard a little kid call her a monster because of the shotgun blast that left her face horribly disfigured, she pulled out her driver's license to show the child what she used to look like. Years later, sporting the nation's first surgically attached face, she's stepped forward to show the rest of the world what she looks like now. http://www.physorg.com/news160805144.html Medicine & Health Wed, 06 May 2009 05:06:16 EST news160805144 (AP) -- Five years ago, a shotgun blast left a ghastly hole where the middle of her face had been. Five months ago, she received a new face from a dead woman. http://www.physorg.com/news160766124.html Medicine & Health Tue, 05 May 2009 18:15:53 EST news160766124 (AP) -- The first U.S. double hand transplant is taking place at a Pittsburgh hospital. http://www.physorg.com/news160719520.html Medicine & Health Tue, 05 May 2009 05:40:40 EST news160719520 Moderate kidney disease increases an older man's risk of developing certain cancers, according to an upcoming study in the Journal of the American Society Nephrology (JASN). Given that chronic kidney disease (CKD) affects about a third of older men, maintaining kidney function could help prevent cancer in the general population. http://www.physorg.com/news160381478.html Medicine & Health Fri, 01 May 2009 07:27:18 EST news160381478 A 58-year-old Singaporean pastor is recovering well after undergoing Asia's first simultaneous heart and liver transplant, his medical team said Friday. http://www.physorg.com/news159778452.html Medicine & Health Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:54:53 EST news159778452 The globalization of health care and the growth of "transplant tourism" (traveling abroad to purchase donor organs and undergo organ transplantation) have outpaced the implementation of internationally accepted ethical standards for procurement of organs for transplantation. A new article appearing in Clinical Transplantation finds that both U.S. and foreign transplant physicians expressed serious concern about organ procurement practices in China, and that this concern influenced their patient care decisions. The study is the first to assess how the perceptions of healthcare providers on transplant tourism may influence domestic patient care decisions. http://www.physorg.com/news159695328.html Medicine & Health Thu, 23 Apr 2009 08:49:32 EST news159695328 The implications of a new study could improve the outcomes, and potentially survival rates, for some of the thousands of individuals who undergo kidney transplants each year. The study concluded that donor-related risk factors, yet to be identified, make a measurable contribution to the ultimate success or failure of a kidney transplant. http://www.physorg.com/news159599666.html Medicine & Health Wed, 22 Apr 2009 06:14:54 EST news159599666 It started as something of a medical mystery that, at first, doctors couldn't figure out. http://www.physorg.com/news158941890.html Medicine & Health Tue, 14 Apr 2009 15:32:55 EST news158941890 (AP) -- Five years ago, it was the stuff of science fiction: Replace someone's face with one from a dead donor. But on Thursday, Boston doctors performed the world's seventh such transplant - less than a week after one in France - and plans are in the works for more. http://www.physorg.com/news158685901.html Medicine & Health Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:25:35 EST news158685901 Surgeons in Boston have performed the second-ever partial face transplant in the United States, replacing some 80 percent of a disfigured man's face. http://www.physorg.com/news158586870.html Medicine & Health Fri, 10 Apr 2009 12:55:07 EST news158586870 Researchers have identified a gene that controls the rapid production and differentiation of the stem cells that produce all blood cell types -- a discovery that could eventually open the door to more streamlined treatments for leukemia and other blood cancers, in which blood cells proliferate out of control. http://www.physorg.com/news158418900.html Medicine & Health Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:15:18 EST news158418900 (AP) -- When patients had both hands transplanted, their brains re-established connections much more quickly with the left hand than the right, a team of researchers in France reports. http://www.physorg.com/news158300806.html Medicine & Health Tue, 07 Apr 2009 05:27:14 EST news158300806 (AP) -- Paris' Public Hospital authority says a team of doctors has performed the world's first simultaneous partial-face and double-hand transplant. http://www.physorg.com/news158235976.html Medicine & Health Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:26:41 EST news158235976 Patients with severe heart failure can be bridged to eventual transplant by a new, smaller and lighter implantable heart pump, according to a just-completed study of the device. Results of this third-generation heart assist device were reported at the 58th annual meeting of the American College of Cardiology on March 30. http://www.physorg.com/news157896944.html Medicine & Health Thu, 02 Apr 2009 13:16:18 EST news157896944 You might expect that living close to a clinic that specializes in transplanting organs would put you at an advantage if you needed a new kidney. According to an upcoming study in the Journal of the American Society Nephrology (JASN), you would be wrong. The study found that distance from a patient's home to the nearest transplant facility has no bearing on whether an individual is placed on the transplant waiting list. However, the research identified other factors associated with disparities in waitlisting, including neighborhood poverty. http://www.physorg.com/news157827007.html Medicine & Health Wed, 01 Apr 2009 17:50:32 EST news157827007 More than 100,000 people in the U.S. are waiting for an organ transplant, and an average of 17 die waiting each day, according to University of Illinois communication professor Brian Quick. http://www.physorg.com/news157738265.html Medicine & Health Tue, 31 Mar 2009 17:11:30 EST news157738265 Researchers at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC) have identified a signaling pathway that helps regulate the movement of blood-forming stem cells in the body -a finding that provides important new insight into how stem cells move around the body and which may lead to improvements in the efficiency of bone marrow transplants. http://www.physorg.com/news157211633.html Medicine & Health Wed, 25 Mar 2009 14:54:27 EST news157211633 Chemists in Taiwan are reporting that an ingredient in licorice - widely used in various foods and herbal medicines - appears to block the absorption of cyclosporine, a drug used by transplant patients to prevent organ rejection. This drug interaction could potentially result in transplant rejection, causing illness and even death among patients worldwide who take cyclosporine and licorice together, the researchers caution. http://www.physorg.com/news157132439.html Chemistry Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:54:23 EST news157132439 (AP) -- Surgeons have transplanted a hand onto a Marine who was hurt in a training accident, and he has some movement in his fingers, according to the hospital where the operation occurred. http://www.physorg.com/news157052378.html Medicine & Health Mon, 23 Mar 2009 18:39:55 EST news157052378 Researchers have identified a set of criteria that, when combined with a measure of kidney function, could help identify patients who are likely to receive a survival benefit from a combined heart and kidney transplant, according to a report in the March issue of Archives of Surgery, one of the JAMA/Archives journals. http://www.physorg.com/news156440121.html Medicine & Health Mon, 16 Mar 2009 16:48:48 EST news156440121 (AP) -- When Matthew Jones decided to donate a kidney to a stranger, the Michigan father of five had no idea he'd be starting a lifesaving, "pay it forward" chain. His kidney donation to a Phoenix woman in 2007 set off a long-running organ swap that resulted in 10 sick people getting new kidneys over a year. It hasn't ended yet. http://www.physorg.com/news156013318.html Medicine & Health Wed, 11 Mar 2009 18:02:49 EST news156013318 New computer models can now link strangers in a life-saving chain of kidney transplants, promising to increase the number of transplants and overcome obstacles posed by logistics or donors who renege, a team of researchers report in the current edition of the New England Journal of Medicine. http://www.physorg.com/news156011789.html Medicine & Health Wed, 11 Mar 2009 17:37:02 EST news156011789 The new medical subspecialty of Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology will lead the way in providing technically advanced yet cost-effective care for patients with heart failure, says a perspective article in the March issue of the Journal of Cardiac Failure, official publication of the Heart Failure Society of America (HFSA) and the Japanese Heart Failure Society, published by Elsevier. http://www.physorg.com/news155473096.html Medicine & Health Thu, 05 Mar 2009 10:59:36 EST news155473096 A mutation of the influenza A(H1N1) virus that is resistant to the drug oseltamivir may pose a serious health threat to hospitalized patients who have a weakened immune system, according to a study to be published in the March 11 issue of JAMA, and being released early online because of its public health importance. http://www.physorg.com/news155223597.html Medicine & Health Mon, 02 Mar 2009 13:41:06 EST news155223597 Patients who undergo liver transplantation for hepatitis B-related liver damage should receive lifelong antiviral treatment to keep the disease from coming back. A new study shows that they lack cellular immunity against the disease, making recurrence likely if antiviral treatment is withdrawn. These findings are in the March issue of Liver Transplantation. http://www.physorg.com/news154875581.html Medicine & Health Thu, 26 Feb 2009 13:03:46 EST news154875581 Screening for mutations in a gene that helps the body metabolize a kidney transplant anti-rejection drug may predict which children are at higher risk for side effects, including compromised white blood cell count or organ rejection, according to new research. http://www.physorg.com/news154171383.html Medicine & Health Wed, 18 Feb 2009 09:23:36 EST news154171383 Surgical teams at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis and Integris Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City successfully completed Saturday the first six-way, multihospital, domino kidney transplant. All six donors - one man and five women, and six organ recipients - four men and two woman - are in good condition, according to Robert Montgomery, M.D., Ph.D., chief transplant surgeon at Johns Hopkins. http://www.physorg.com/news154114285.html Medicine & Health Tue, 17 Feb 2009 17:36:18 EST news154114285 To prevent the rejection of newly transplanted organs and cells, patients must take medicines that weaken their entire immune systems. Such potentially life-saving treatments can, paradoxically, leave those receiving them susceptible to life-threatening infections. http://www.physorg.com/news153572957.html Medicine & Health Wed, 11 Feb 2009 11:10:16 EST news153572957 A new study describes the psychological profile of adolescents who have received kidney transplants and compares them to those of healthy peers. The findings reveal a significantly higher prevalence of psychiatric conditions (depression, phobia, ADHD), educational impairment and social isolation among adolescents who had undergone a transplant. The study appears in Pediatric Transplantation. http://www.physorg.com/news153058676.html Medicine & Health Thu, 05 Feb 2009 12:18:32 EST news153058676 Blocking off the splenic artery, either through surgical ligation or radiological coiling, helped six out of seven patients suffering from small-for-size syndrome after a partial liver transplant. This finding is in the February issue of Liver Transplantation. http://www.physorg.com/news152902116.html Medicine & Health Tue, 03 Feb 2009 16:49:00 EST news152902116