Medical Technology News

Breast Cancer Risk and Ethnicity

2011-06-22T12:54:00.000-07:00

Young Asian and Pacific Islander women born in California have increased risk of breast cancer than young white women including Filipinos, might have higher risks than African-Americans, according to a new study.

Overall breast cancer incidence rates published from national cancer surveillance data might mask important pockets of elevated risk, said study co-author Susan Hurley, a research associate at the Cancer Prevention Institute of California.

"Historically, rates that suggest a low breast cancer risk among Asian and Pacific Islander women do not usually focus on young women," Hurley said. "They also do not take into account factors such as birthplace, migration status and ethnic ancestry, all of which may determine risk."

For the study appearing in the latest issue of the journal Ethnicity & Disease, Hurley and colleagues used data from a previous study, which found a link between breast cancer cases in California birth records from 1988 to 2004.

The authors looked at data from 3,799 women born in California in the 1960s who eventually developed breast cancer and 17,461 women born in California during the same period who did not develop the disease. Study participants ranged in age from 20 to 44 years, with an average age at diagnosis of 36 years. Findings showed that young California-born Asian and Pacific Islander women had about a 62 percent higher risk of breast cancer than young white women.

iPhone Blood Pressure Monitor Released by Withings

2011-06-22T12:37:00.000-07:00

(Medical Technology)French company Withings has made a name for itself with its Wi-Fi body scale. Now it's announced the U.S. availability of its Blood Pressure Monitor, which it touts as the only "BP cuff in the world to connect directly into any iOS device."

While the extra hardware will run you a somewhat steep $129.99, needless to say, there's a free app in the mix that shows BP measurements and keeps track of user stats.

Withings is calling the Blood Pressure Monitor truly plug-and-play. Wrap the cuff around your arm, then plug the cable into your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad, and the Withings app automatically launches.

You can access your stats from your iOS device or your personal Withings Web page. The company says results are saved denoting dates and time of day for each reading, to help when comparing morning, afternoon and evening readings. You can share results with your doctor via an integrated email link or sync with personal health record sites like Google Health and Microsoft HealthVault that your doctor can access.

If you happen to have a Withings Body Scale, your weight and blood pressure are tracked on the same graph of the application. No word yet on whether you'll be able to tweet your daily blood pressure as you can tweet your weight with the body scale app, but we certainly hope it's an option.

Here are the tech specs for the Withings Blood Pressure Monitor:

Measurement: Oscillometric method
Measurement range: 0 to 285mmHg
Pulse: from 40 to 180 beats per minute
Cuff fits arm circumferences from 9 to 17 inches
Pump: automatic inflation with air pump, controlled pressure release
FDA: device has received FDA clearance
Works in direct conjunction with an iPhone/iPad/iPod touch (sorry, no Android yet)
Price: $129.99

Electromedicine for Parkinson's Disease: Deep Brain Stimulation Works Better Than Medicine

2011-06-22T12:23:00.000-07:00

(Medical Technology)According to a study scheduled for publication in today's New England Journal of Medicine, a surgical procedure designed to reduce symptoms of Parkinson's disease -- deep brain stimulation -- can be more effective on patients with advanced cases, and have fewer side effects, than prescription drugs.

"Deep brain stimulation improves the quality of life in patients with advanced Parkinson's disease at a stage when medical treatment is no longer able to improve quality of life," said lead author Dr. Guenther Deuschl, professor of neurology and chairman of the department of neurology at Christian-Albrechts University in Kiel, Germany. "It is important that the time during which these (deep brain stimulation) patients were immobile decreased highly significantly, the time with good mobility increased, and the sleep time also increased."

In the German study, 156 patients with advanced Parkinson's, all under the age of 75, were assessed using standard Parkinson's assessment tools at the beginning of the study, and again at the end. According to the study, two of the tools, the Parkinson's Disease Questionnaire (PDQ) and the Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale (UPDRS), assign a score between 0 and 100 and 0 and 108 respectively, with higher scores identifying more severe symptoms.

Each participant was then randomly assigned to receive either deep brain stimulation or medication. Deep brain stimulation is usually reserved for people with severe symptoms or who no longer get much help from drugs, and is performed by placing a thin, electrically conductive wire deep into the brain. While this doesn't cure Parkinson's disease, it does temporarily block the abnormal brain signals that cause some of the symptoms.

After six months, the patients were reevaluated using the assessment tools, and the patients who underwent deep brain stimulation lowered their PDQ score by 9.5 points and their UPDRS scores by 19.6. The scores of the medication group showed little or no change after the six month interval.

While the medication group showed fewer serious adverse events -- 4 percent versus 13 percent for the deep brain stimulation group -- and one of the patients who underwent the brain stimulation procedure died from a brain hemorrhage, the frequency of the side effects was lower in the deep brain stimulation group; only 50 percent to the medication group's 64 percent.

"While there were certain complications for surgery, overall there seemed to be more complications in the medicine group," noted Dr. Michael Kaplitt, director of movement disorder surgery at Weill Cornell/New York Presbyterian Hospital in New York City. "This raises an interesting question: Should we consider surgery in earlier stages because of the fact that ongoing medical therapy might not be benign?" Kaplitt said, and added that studies of deep brain stimulation in earlier stages of Parkinson's disease are already underway.

"While surgery can be frightening to many people -- understandably -- with a disease such as Parkinson's, it can be extraordinarily beneficial in the proper patient," Kaplitt said.

Light-Emitting Bandage As Skin Cancer Treatment

2011-06-22T12:17:00.000-07:00

(Medical Technology)Scottish scientists have developed a light-emitting, portable bandage that has been shown to fight skin cancer in a quicker, less painful way than conventional treatments.

The metallic, adhesive bandage was created by physicist Ifor Samuel of the University of St. Andrews and dermatologist James Ferguson of Ninewells Hospital Dundee, and contains its own light source connected to a small, portable battery.

The patch uses an organic diode that emits lights when a low-voltage electric current passes through it, and is portable enough that patients can move around during their daily treatment.

"It can be worn by the patient in a similar way to a sticking plaster (bandage), while the battery is carried like an iPod," Samuel said.

The device builds on an existing conventional treatment method called photodynamic therapy treatment (PDT), which uses intense light to help a topical pharmaceutical cream be absorbed into the skin. Traditional PDT treatments tend to be painful and require patients to lie beneath a light for several hours.

"This new device will have a major impact on the treatment of skin cancers," said Ferguson. "The light-emitting patch is a low-cost, portable and convenient method of treatment. Our initial pilot trials have already shown its effectiveness and we find patients requesting this treatment over conventional methods."

Consumer health advocate Mike Adams, author of "The Healing Power of Sunlight and Vitamin D," says many consumers are unaware that light can be used to treat skin cancer.

"Some people are amazed by this technology, but others already know about treating cancer with light," Adams said. "It's called sunlight, and it's the best cancer prevention technology in the universe.

"The only reason sunlight isn't promoted is because drug companies and hospitals can't charge people for exposure to it," Adams said.

Omega-3 Fatty Acids Can Save a Life Of Heart Attack

2011-06-22T12:13:00.000-07:00

(Medical Technology)New research published in the October issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine indicates that consuming omega-3 fatty acids may be more effective at preventing sudden cardiac deaths than automated external defibrillators or implanted defibrillators.

Researchers from the Heart Center at Regions Hospital in St. Paul, Minn., used a computer-simulated study of 100,000 residents in Olmsted County, Minn., to determine that the residents consuming the highest levels of omega-3 fatty acids experienced a 6.4 percent lower overall death rate. The researchers found that automated external defibrillators (AEDs) reduced the death rate by only 0.8 percent, and implanted defibrillators lowered death rates by 3.3 percent.

In the population of 100,000 -- which was simulated to allow researchers to examine patient data under unrealistic conditions, such as full patient compliance with prescriptions -- the researchers found that increasing consumption of omega-3s could save 58 lives per year, while AEDs would only save seven lives, and implanted defibrillators would save 30.

"Once again, nutrition triumphs over complicated medical technology," explained Mike Adams, a holistic nutritionist and author of The Seven Laws of Nutrition. "When it comes to saving lives from heart attacks, simple, low-cost omega-3 oils are outperforming complex, expensive technology devices that have to be surgically implanted," he said. "As a bonus, these oils also reduce inflammation and joint pain, help regulate blood sugar, eliminate ADHD symptoms, protect the brain and nervous system from oxidative damage, boost skin elasticity and even help prevent cancer. No defibrillator can do that."

Adams recommends that everyone make a habit to boost their consumption of omega-3 oils. Good sources include oily fish, flax seeds and chia seeds. Omega-3s are also available in quality nutritional supplements from trusted sources like the Life Extension Foundation and Nordic Naturals.

The three main types of omega-3s are ALA (alpha-linolenic acid), EPA (eicosapentaenoic acid) and DHA (docosahenaenoic acid). ALA is found in canola and soybean oils, flaxseeds, pumpkin seeds and walnuts, and can be converted into EPA and DHA once ingested. EPA and DHA are found in oily fish such as salmon, halibut, mackerel, sardines and herring.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/020296_automated_external_defibrillators.html#ixzz1Q29H69vk

Tablet PC For Doctors May Save Healthcare Workers

2011-06-22T12:04:00.000-07:00

If you enjoyed the movie, "What the Bleep Do We Know?" or you're interested in the new science of healing with energy, you're going to enjoy this review and tour of a unique energy product called the Violet Ray Crystal Resonator (VRCR) made by Pillar of Light Enterprises at PillarOfLight.net. The inventor is a man named Jack Derby. This device is a vibrational medicine / experimental energy medicine. I have found it to be very effective at helping move stagnant energy through your body or even through a physical space (such as a home, office or healing practice space). In this review, I'll explain what the VRCR is and what I experienced after purchasing and using this technology over the last several months.

To begin with, the primary uses and applications of this energy technology are to:

Reduce or eliminate chronic stress caused by the frequencies broadcast by household electrical wiring.
Clear or "restructure" the physical space in a home, office or healing environment.
Tune the mind and body to a higher vibration as part of a treatment protocol for degenerative disease, emotional imbalance or mental disorders.
Amplify the power of intention through meditation or prayer.
Enhance any spiritual practice through greater connection to self and spirit.
Tune specific body energy centers (or "chakras") to clear stagnation and encourage the flow of energy (or "chi").
Enhance and multiply the effectiveness of acupuncture or accupressure therapies.
Cleanse and "zap" the blood to eliminate viruses, bacteria and other pathogens. (Lots of safety notes on this particular application, see below.)

Note: These are my own personal explanations of the uses of the technology, based entirely on personal opinion and experience. I do not sell any products mentioned here, nor do I earn any revenues from their sale. Neither I nor this publisher has been paid anything to write about this product or technology. I do this solely for the benefit of readers.

When it comes to energy devices, the field of available products is quite diverse, and it's very difficult for the consumer to know what works and what doesn't. Some devices in the market don't have any power source and they don't use any electricity to generate an energy field, so it's difficult to know if they're really doing anything. But the VRCR does use a power source and produces quite evident effects; you can feel, hear and see the results of the energy it produces.

The health benefits of vibrational medicine

To begin to understand what vibrational medicine can really do for you, it helps to realize that the human body is really a magnificent quantum physics machine. We are made up of literally nothing more than vibrating energy. Humans are made of cells, which are made of atoms, which are made of particles, and those so-called particles are actually just vibrating energy. Every atom is just a probability wave, and most of the stuff we call physical matter is really made up of completely empty space. We are more empty space than physical stuff; more vibration than mass. Thus, we can be strongly impacted -- either positively or negatively -- by vibrational energy.

Ultraviolet radiation from the sun, for example, helps support healthy moods, brain function, endocrine system function and sleep cycles. Sunlight photons also help us generate vitamin D, which prevents cancer, diabetes, depression and bone loss. Infrared radiation has been proven to speed recovery of wounds and injuries, and infrared LED devices are being tested by NASA to speed the growth of plants in space.

Electromagnetic energy affects every living system, and light is only one narrow band of the electromagnetic spectrum. In the last hundred years or so, many open-minded medical pioneers have looked for other healing applications of vibrational energy. This includes people like John Sarno, an expert in mind-body health, and Richard Gerber, the author of "Vibrational Medicine." There is a lot of experimentation being done today in healing with light, sound, heat and electricity. We already know for example, that electrical impulses and sound waves rapidly accelerate the healing of bones. We know that infrared light in the 600 and 700 nanometer range accelerates the healing of flesh wounds. We also know that environmental stress caused by noise (living near airports) or electrical interference (living near high-voltage power lines) is detrimental to health. A recent study, for example, showed that men who frequently use cell phones show radically reduces sperm counts due to the side effects of cell phone radiation.

The "Earth" frequency as a basis for healing

With modern society bombarding us with so much electromagnetic energy, it seems increasingly obvious that getting more in tune with the "Earth energy" is universally healing. People who leave big, noisy cities and move out to the country enjoy spectacular health improvements. People who contact the earth through gardening, outdoors activities or consuming natural foods are far healthier than those who don't. And almost everyone agrees that a lush, green forest, humming with life, is calming and healing to both the mind and body.

One explanation behind all this is that the Earth itself hums at a specific frequency, well below the audible detection range of human beings, called the Schumann frequency or Schumann resonance, which you can read about on Wikipedia. If you multiply this Shumann resonance by multiples of two, you get higher harmonics of the same frequency, sort of like a higher octave on the piano. You can have a low level C note or a high level C note, and if you play them together, they are in harmony even though one is an octave higher than the other.

If you want to help people get in touch with the frequency of the Earth, the obvious thing to do is get them vibrating at multiples of the Earth frequency. Through a process called entrainment, physical objects absorb the vibrational frequencies of their immediate surroundings. If you have two tuning forks and you knock one of them to get it vibrating, you only have to hold it near the other tuning fork for it to start vibrating, too. The vibration frequency radiates from the source to all objects around it, causing those objects to vibrate in harmony with the source. This is essentially what the VRCR machine does, too: it broadcasts a high energy healing frequency (a multiple of the Schumann resonance), entraining your mind, body and even the physical space around you to a frequency that's more in tune with the Earth.

This entrainment phenomenon, by the way, is happening all around us. In fact, the computer you're reading this one wouldn't work if it wasn't for the resonance of the CPU timing crystal, and the subsequent "entrainment" of the CPU cycles. This is a straight physics phenomenon, not some theoretical woo woo stuff. I observe this happening all the time. When my dog barks in my house, for example, she sets off a rather wonderful ringing of my crystal bowl collection, which tones in response to the sound energy broadcast by my dog. That's entrainment, too.

The VRCR machine from Pillar of Light is able to broadcast electromagnetic energy at a high multiple of the Schuman frequency, or at other tunable frequencies that you choose with a dial. You can tune it almost any frequency you want, and that's what makes this machine so interesting (and also so expensive), because it has unique circuitry. It uses rather large genuine quartz crystals, and a unique circuit -- developed by Jack Derby -- which has an origin that is both beyond the scope of this article and perhaps even the scope of modern scientific understanding. You can click here to view a video explanation of the VRCR machine.

My experience with the VRCR machine

Several months ago, I set up the VRCR in my house and began broadcasting the Violet Ray resonance throughout my home. If at first you think that's strange, consider this: you are already being subject to a broadcast of electromagnetic energy at the 60 cycles a second frequency, because 60 hertz is the frequency of all the electrical wiring that exists in our homes in the United States (it's a higher frequency in the U.K.). If you actually connect a frequency detection machine to your hand when you are inside a house that has electrical wiring, you will find that you are also vibrating at about 60 cycles per second. Your body comes into resonance with the frequency of the electrical wiring.

Well, what if we don't want to vibrate at only 60 cycles a second? What if we want to vibrate at a higher frequency, and in doing so, perhaps experience the benefits of higher states of perception or increased awareness? That's what the Violet Ray Crystal Resonator machine can do for you.

My experience was very interesting and developed rapidly. I found that I experienced greater clarity within about four days of turning it on. I began to learn more quickly and I was remembering facts and details more easily. Things were just "making sense" more easily to me, and in the months since then, I've created all the CounterThink cartoons, started the new Consumer Wellness Center non-profit, and launched a whole new technology platform that will soon be announced in the software industry. I give at least partial credit for this to the CRVR machine, and I keep it running in my household 24/7.

The VRCR machine also seems to help me work through personal challenges. If you find yourself stuck with some issue -- whether it's an emotional issue, a creative issue, or even a relationship issue -- this machine seems to be able to put those energies into motion, freeing them up in a way that can allow you to deal with them and ultimately overcome them. It's not a device that magically makes these issues go away or solves them for you; it simply imparts movement to this energy so that you can do your part in resolving them in a positive way. That can be slightly dramatic if you're dealing with a difficult situation, emotional baggage, or challenging memories. It can also be extremely joyful if you have underlying energies of joy, abundance, and you are really enjoying your life.

Multiplying the effects of acupuncture

As an acupuncture device, this unit presents some very interesting possibilities. You can attach a wand to the VRCR and use the generated frequencies on your body, on specific acupuncture points or chakras for example, or on areas that simply need additional stimulation. I've used them on injured areas to help accelerate healing, and I'm willing to guess from an experimental sense that these can be used to help accelerate the healing of broken bones, but that's just a theory. If I suffered a broken bone, I would absolutely, without question, use the VRCR wand on a regular basis to help accelerate healing and blood flow to the injury region, but that's just my own personal decision, not advice that I'm recommending for everyone.

We've been using it in some acupuncture applications with a trained acupuncturist and finding the device to be quite effective, either as a replacement for the needles or as something to be used in conjunction with the needles. If you wonder why it appears to work for acupuncture, think about what acupuncture actually does: The needles themselves are not any kind of treatment, they simply stimulate the body to reorganize the way it uses energy. Only a trained acupuncturist can decide which points need to be stimulated based on the patient's specific symptoms and diagnosis, but in some acupuncture clinics now, this device is being used as a replacement for the needles, and it works in ways that needles cannot.

Cleansing the blood

Over the years, I have experimented with several electromagnetic devices that broadcast an electrical frequency to your blood. You simply hold the device next to your carotid artery, and the blood gets electrified as it passes through.

In alternative cancer clinics around the world, this is one of the many treatment protocols used as part of a cancer cure. I have personally used it to overcome viral infections acquired during air travel. It is also believed by many that this electrification of the blood is useful during any kind of cleansing treatment such as a juice cleanse or a liver detox.

However, there are serious safety implications in using any device to electrically treat your blood. So I strongly recommend that you only pursue this application under the direct supervision of a licensed naturopathic physician. Do NOT electrify your own blood unless you are medically trained and fully understand what you're doing. Seek professional medical guidance for this particular application of the technology.

Multiple use technology

Beyond all that, I believe this VRCR device has application in terms of stimulating blood flow and accelerating the healing of wounds, whether they involve skin, tendons, ligaments, or even bones. It is well known in the scientific community that electromagnetic energy can help accelerate the healing of bone injuries, it's also known as mentioned previously, that infrared light can help accelerate the healing of flesh wounds. This device emits energy in a frequency that you can tune and apply directly to wounds or any kind of injury as a healing therapy, so it may indeed help accelerate the healing process. (See safety notes, below.)

I must emphasize that this is still very much experimental technology and it should never be used for a replacement for any urgent care. If you break a bone, you need to go to the emergency room and get the bone set correctly. Or if you are seriously injured in some other way requiring urgent care, seek out that care and do not attempt to replace urgent care with VRCR treatments in any way. The VRCR device is for use during the healing process, after acute medical conditions have been addressed and stabilized.

In that application, my personal opinion is that this device is both safe and effective, although as a disclaimer I have to mention again that this is undoubtedly an experimental device, and the principles upon which it operates are not understood -- nor even acknowledged -- by the conventional medical community. It is highly unlikely that any doctor would recommend using this device, except those who are on the cutting edge of vibrational medicine -- who understand the energetic nature of the human body, and who are open to the possibility that technologies such as this electromagnetic field generating machine can indeed help augment the body's natural healing process.

If your doctor sees you using this device, he will no doubt think you're a complete nut. But that's sort of expected from the medical experts these days who still haven't acknowledged the healing power of vitamin C after almost a hundred years of mounting scientific evidence in favor of the nutrient. So don't expect traditional doctors to offer any help whatsoever on issues of vibrational medicine. Heck, they still think sunlight is dangerous!

Other uses of the VRCR machine

There are many other applications of this technology as well -- one of those is enhancing the preparation of your food. The unit actually comes with a plate upon which you can place a cup of water, fresh produce, or even an entire meal, and then tune that food to the vibrational frequencies emitted by the machine. We know that food has a vibration, and we also know there is a big difference in the healing qualities of low-vibration food and high-vibration food.

Low-vibration food is created with the intent of profit rather than love -- like food from greedy corporations and processed factory foods -- whereas high-vibration food is food from sources that are interested in helping humanity, have respect for the Earth, and respect for animals and plants. Although there's no replacement for the real thing, it is possible that this device, through electromagnetic vibration, can help raise the vibration of food so that it has either less of a detrimental effect, or even a positive effect on human health.

Those are some of the base uses of the Violet Ray Crystal Resonator. It's definitely in the category of experimental medicine, and not something that is yet widely recognized or used. I call it cutting-edge medicine, and if you're interested in experiencing a taste of what medicine will likely be in a few generations, check out this VRCR machine today. It's expensive, but you only have to buy it once. From there, it uses a tiny amount of electricity (about the same as a light bulb) to broadcast healing frequencies for as long as you want to keep the unit running.

Learn more at Pillar of Light Enterprises.

By the way, Jack Derby has also invented a Structured Water Filter / Vortex Water Machine that I call the ultimate water energizer. It filters, charges and restructures your water using everything from carbon block filtration to high-energy light frequencies. I'll be covering that in a later review.

Also, if you enjoyed this topic, I strongly recommend books by Bruce Lipton.

New Technique Stem Cell Can Growth Cancer Tumors

2011-06-22T07:50:00.000-07:00

A newly medical technology discovered techniques to produce stem cells that is a breakthrough indeed did produce stem cells that can cause cancer in organisms that grow from them.

Two different teams of scientists menmberikan announcements about new techniques to develop stem cells in the same month. In an article published online edition of the journal Cell, Dr. Shinya Yamanaka and his colleagues argue that they have transformed human skin cells into stem cells using a virus by injecting skin cells with four specific genes.

Yamanaka and colleagues at Kyoto University, Japan used to using mouse skin cells into stem cells via the same technique. Yamanaka and his colleagues are now setting up a laboratory at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease, which is associated with the University of California at San Francisco.

At about the same time, a team of researchers from the University of Wisconsin at Madison announced in the online edition of the journal Science that they have transformed human skin cells into stem cells via the same technique, but using four different genes.

Stem cells are cells that retain the ability to transform into another cell type. This ability makes them focus on one of the many studies in the hope they will be able to use it to grow tissue for victims of severe injury or degenerative disease. Because many stem cells derived from human embryos were destroyed. However, many stem cell research gained a lot of controversy from anti-abortion activists, and women's rights advocates who objected because the invasive procedure required to harvest the eggs to keep them alive for the next process.

While still experiencing controversial, stem cells generated by the new technique appears to be carcinogenic. When the team into the cell mouse embryos implant Yamanaka, their embryos developed as expected - with DNA from the original stem cells, rather than from embryos. But mice that were cloned with this model eventually experienced neck tumors.

"It seems everyone in the mainstream media are very excited to know about the new stem cell technique that they forget to realize the fact that it led to the growth of cancerous tumors," said consumer health advocate Mike Adams.