Gale Scott

Chicago-based pain specialist Scott Glaser, MD, is on a crusade. He wants his colleagues to stop using an injection technique that paralyzed his own patient.

A novel virus from Peru and the Republic of Congo called enterovirus C105 is now suspected in last year's wave of mysterious cases of sudden childhood paralysis.

Neurologists may need a new ICD-10 code for this one. Australian researchers report on the mysterious case of a woman whose temporary inability to walk was traced to her "skinny jeans."

A new study shows the autism risk is higher not just in older parents but in couples with a big gap in their ages. Teen mothers also have a higher risk.

A flying lacrosse ball weighs more than 5 lbs and goes about 60 mph in the girls' version of the sport. Despite objections that there have been no definitive studies showing wearing headgear protects players, the AMA wants sports authorities to require girls teams to wear helmets.

Empagliflozin, a diabetes drug that controls glucose levels, may also help ameliorate erectile dysfunction in patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus.

The American Medical Association's 538 delegates will convene in Chicago, Il June 6-10. Vaccination policy, the ethics of doctors promoting unproven remedies, transgender military medical care, and are sunglasses sufficiently regulated are just of few of the 250 topics due to come up for discussion.

People who have type 2 diabetes —but not type 1— are statistically less likely to get amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a new study found.

New strains of leishmania, a parasitic disease that starts with skin ulcers, are spreading. The CDC reports on an outbreak in a group of 24 scientists and warns US physicians to be alert for the infection in travelers returning from Latin America and South America. The destruction of the Amazon rain forest may be playing a role.

Fatal drownings happen even in strong, healthy swimmers in lifeguarded pools. A New York City health department investigation points to an under-reported cause: deliberate breath-holding as part of informal contests or self-imposed training regimens.

Transplanting a healthy person's fecal microbiota into the digestive tract of a patient believed to have a recurrent C. difficile infection has gone from obscurity to an accepted treatggggment. But a new study finds it was wrongly proposed for more than 25% of patients referred for treatment.

Holding family meetings when patients are in intensive care can benefit patients, family, and caregivers. A research team reports on the electronic templates it is developing to keep records of what happens in those meetings.

When New York City panicked about the possible spread of Ebola months ago, there were no definitive answers on how long the virus could survive on surfaces outside a living host. A new US Centers for Disease Control report finds the answer is several days.

In a multicenter observational study reported April 29 at the Asian Pacific Society of Cardiology Congress 2015, held in Abu Dhabi, researchers examined the relationship between the severity and presence of coronary artery disease in male patients and the number of wives they have. The more wives, the more heart disease.

Despite the wealth of choices physicians have in finding drugs to treat hepatitis C infection, two challenges remain in eradicating the disease-price and lack of global screening for the virus.

In addition to injection drug use, alcohol consumption puts people at risk of dying from hepatitis C infection by increasing the severity of the disease. A French research study spells out the risks.

A new antiviral combination is showing promise in treating patients with both chronic kidney disease and chronic hepatitis C, Texas researchers reported at the International Liver Congress in Vienna, Austria.

Many studies have looked at the link between vitamin D deficiency and liver disease. A Korean team recently examined whether vitamin D deficiency played a pivotal role in abnormal liver enzymes.

Huntington's Disease (HD) is an autosomal dominant progressive neurodegenerative disorder. In addition to the central nervous system disturbance the ailment causes, there is increasing evidence the genetic abnormality also affects peripheral organs and tissues.

Diagnosing Anti-N-methyl D-aspartate receptor (NMDAR) antibody encephalitis in adults differs from doing so in young children. Gait disturbance is a reliable sign, a Johns Hopkins team reports.

Since physicians are unlikely to see many opsoclonus myoclonus syndrome patients, a team of researchers from Boston, MA, set out to offer clinical features, diagnostic findings, and recommended treatments for this rare condition that is often a sign of cancer.

Gabapentin is used to treat neuropathic pain from several causes, including diabetic neuropathy, post-herpetic neuralgia, and central neuropathic pain. In a study presented at the American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians in Orlando, FL, April 11, Tobore Onojighofia, MD, MPH and colleagues found genetics plays a role in which patients do well on the drug.

Interventional pain management-the field of helping patients with acute or chronic pain without doing major surgery--is a both a growing specialty and one that is under assault. As the annual meeting of the American Society of Interventional Pain Physicians got underway in Orlando, FL today, group leaders outlined the organization's political agenda.

Black tea is popular and often promoted as healthy. But drinking too may be an under-recognized cause of kidney damage, a physician team warns in a case reported in the New England Journal of Medicine. The patient, who drank 16 glasses of iced tea daily, had kidney failure due to oxalate accumulation.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a strong warning on a drug used to treat iron deficiency anemia in patients with chronic kidney disease. Intravenous injections of ferumoxytol (Feraheme/Amag Pharmaceuticals) can cause serious allergic reactions including death in patients who are sensitive to the drug, the FDA cautioned in a new boxed warning. The drug was approved in 2009.

Physicians may think patients over 80 are too old to benefit from agressive care to treat unstable angina or clogged arteries that caused a heart attack. Think again, a Norwegian researcher said at the American College of Cardiology meeting in San Diego, CA. These patients were 47% more likely to survive and healthier after invasive procedures than a group that got non-invasive care.

AstraZeneca researchers report that a new drug call MED12452 is being developed as an antidote for patients who need to reverse the effects of ticagrelor (Brilinta/AstraZeneca) on an emergency basis. That could be important for patients taking ticagrelor who need emergency surgery or are bleeding from an accident.

There is a higher risk of certain types of cancer in patients who survive myocardial infarction, according to researchers in Copenhagen, Denmark.

An estimated 40% of migraine sufferers also have signs of depression and more than 50% of migraine patients have some form of anxiety disorder. Treating these comorbidities is more art than science, says Mia Minen, MD, Director of Headache Services at NYU Langone Medical Center. In a recent interview she discussed the treatment options ranging from standard drugs like triptans, to Botox, to biofeedback.

It's been nearly 3 years since Eduardo Rodriguez, MD, performed the most comprehensive face transplant ever done, a procedure that gave a Virginia man a new face, jaws, teeth, and tongue. Now NYU Langone Medical Center's chair of the Department of Plastic Surgery and Director of the Institute of Plastic Surgery and Helen L. Kimmel professor of reconstructive plastic surgery, Rodriguez is poised to do New York's first face transplant. He's just waiting for the phone to ring with news that a donor has been found.