People with sleep apnea and hard-to-control high blood pressure may see their blood pressure drop if they treat the sleep disorder, Spanish researchers report. Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) is the standard treatment for sleep ...
Americans with health insurance are more likely than uninsured people to use preventive services such as flu shots and health screenings, according to a new study. They are no more likely, however, to take health risks such as smoking. ...
Tags: health insurance, preventive services, preventive care, uninsured people
Listen up: Being obese, especially if you carry those extra pounds around your waist, might be linked to hearing loss, a new study suggests. Researchers tracked more than 68,000 women participating in the Harvard Nurses' Health Study. ...
Tags: obesity, hearing loss
Expectant mothers who smoke marijuana may triple their risk for a stillbirth, a new study suggests. The risk is also increased by smoking cigarettes, using other legal and illegal drugs and being exposed to secondhand smoke. Stillbirth ...
Tags: expectant mothers, smoke, stillbirth, pregnancy, fetal death
Smokers who have a CT scan to check for lung cancer stand a nearly one-in-five chance that doctors will find and potentially treat a tumor that would not have caused illness or death, researchers report. Despite the finding, major medical ...
Tags: lung cancer, over-diagnosis
Strong state alcohol control policies make a difference in efforts to help prevent binge drinking, a new study finds. Binge drinking -- generally defined as having more than four to five alcoholic drinks in a two-hour period -- is ...
Tags: state alcohol control policies, binge drinking, prevent binge drinking
Private contractors who worked in Afghanistan, Iraq and other conflict zones over the past two years have high rates of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a new study finds. Researchers conducted an anonymous online ...
Better diabetes treatment has slashed rates of complications such as heart attacks, strokes and amputations in older adults, a new study shows. "All the event rates, if you look at them, everything is a lot better than it was in the ...
Tags: diabetes treatment, hypoglycemia, low blood sugar, diabetes
Tooth loss and bleeding gums might be a sign of declining thinking skills among the middle-aged, a new study contends. "We were interested to see if people with poor dental health had relatively poorer cognitive function, which is a ...
Tags: declining thinking skills, middle-aged health, dental health
Young children are falling out of high chairs at alarming rates, according to a new safety study that found high chair accidents increased 22 percent between 2003 and 2010. U.S. emergency rooms now attend to an average of almost 9,500 ...
Tags: young children, high chairs, falling out of high chairs
Preliminary research shows that gene therapy might one day be a powerful weapon against leukemia and other blood cancers. The experimental treatment coaxed certain blood cells into targeting and destroying cancer cells, according to ...
Tags: gene therapy, leukemia, blood cancer
Oxycodone -- the active ingredient in OxyContin -- and hydrocodone are the most popular drugs among Americans who abuse prescription painkillers, a new study finds. OxyContin and Percocet are brand names for drugs containing oxycodone. ...
Tags: oxycodone, abuse prescription painkillers, OxyContin, Percocet
Girls who hit puberty early might be more likely than their peers to get into fights or skip school, a new study suggests. Researchers found that girls who started their menstrual periods early -- before age 11 -- were more likely to ...
Tags: early puberty, bad behavior, girls'behavior
Contact lenses that deliver glaucoma medication over long periods are getting closer to reality, say researchers working with laboratory animals. In their study, the lenses delivered the glaucoma drug latanoprost (brand name Xalatan) ...
Tags: contact lenses, glaucoma medication, glaucoma drug, latanoprost, Xalatan
There's good news for people trying to quit smoking: Aids such as nicotine gums and patches or smoking cessation drugs such as Chantix won't harm the heart. The new findings may ease concerns that some products that help people "butt out" ...
Tags: quit smoking, nicotine gums, smoking cessation drugs and patches, Chantix