heart disease
dr. dolittle | June 24, 2017 Photo of zebrafish housed at a research institute. By Karol Głąb CC BY-SA 3.0. via Wikimedia Commons
Who would have thought tiny fish could lead to big advances in medicine? Zebrafish (Danio rerio) and mammals have similar anatomy and physiology of the brain, eyes, gut, and cardiovascular systems. Some of the reasons why these fish are good models to understand cardiovascular physiology were recently explored in a new article published in Physiological Reviews.
Animal models are used in research that seeks to understand both normal physiological mechanisms as well as mechanisms related to…
oracknows | September 29, 2016One of the things that first led me to understand the dangers of quackademic medicine was a trial known as the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy, or TACT. Chelation therapy, as you might recall, is the infusion of a chelating agent, or a chemical that binds heavy metals and makes it easier for the kidney to secrete them, in order to treat acute heavy metal poisoning. Unfortunately, quacks of all stripes have latched on to chelation therapy to treat a number of diseases and conditions. For instance, antivaccine quacks like to use chelation therapies to treat autistic children using the…
dr. dolittle | April 6, 2016
Still going strong...here are the highlights from several sessions held on Day 4:
Drawing of Lake Whitefish by William Converse Kendall - Kendall, William Converse, b. (1909) Fishes of the Connecticut Lakes and Neighboring Waters, with Notes on the Plankton Environment, Report of the Commissioner of Fisheries, 1906-1907, Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, p. 39 Fig.1, Public Domain
John Eme (California State University, San Marcos) presented data testing the effects of varying temperatures mimicking overwintering conditions on embryonic development of Lake whitefish. He found…
dr. dolittle | October 20, 2015 Image of Drosophila from Wikipedia.
A new study published in the American Journal of Physiology - Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology describes how Drosophila melanogaster develop similar heart complications as humans when they become obese. Rather than feeding them a high fat diet to induce obesity, researchers selected flies that were resistant to starvation over 65 generations. The so-called starvation resistant Drosophila had dilated hearts that had an impaired ability to contract. Interestingly, the problem was caused by fat deposits literally shifting the position of…
jhalper | April 13, 2015Dr. Gabriele D'Uva is finishing up his postdoctoral research at the Weizmann Institute. Here is his account of three years of highly successful research on regenerating heart cells after injury. Among other things, it is the story of the way that different ideas from vastly different research areas can, over the dinner table or in casual conversation, provide the inspiration for outstanding research:
Three years ago, when I joined the lab of Prof. Eldad Tzahor, the emerging field of cardiac regeneration was totally obscure to me. My scientific track at that time was mainly focused on normal…
dr. dolittle | August 28, 2014 Image of a naked mole rat from www.animals.sandiegozoo.org
The naked mole rat is the longest lived rodent species (>31 years). Unlike most mammals, they seem resistant to many age-associated ailments until much later in life, making them an exciting model of healthy aging. They are also resistant to the development of cancer as mentioned in this prior post.
According to the CDC, cardiovascular disease is currently the leading cause of death in the United States, claiming the lives of roughly 600,000 people annually (or 1 out of every 4 deaths). In a new study published in the American…
dr. dolittle | May 31, 2012As a follow up to the blog on heart disease in chimpanzees, a reader asked if chimpanzees ever develop congestive heart failure. The answer is yes, this is a common cause of death in these animals. However, the pathology differs from humans. For humans, heart disease usually results from coronary artery atherosclerosis, which blocks the blood supply to the heart muscle resulting in reduced or diminished oxygen and nutrient delivery. In contrast, heart disease in chimpanzees is more commonly attributed to interstitial myocardial fibrosis whose origins are unknown. Moreover, the typical…
oracknows | June 14, 2010I've had the immense good fortune to have trained and ultimately become a physician-scientist during a time when the pace of discovery and the paradigm changes in science have occurred just over the course of my career in medicine and science has been staggering. microRNA, the shift from single gene studies to genomics, the development of targeted therapies, the completion of the Human Genome Project, these are but a few examples. Of course, arguably the Human Genome Project is the granddaddy of all of the huge changes and paradigm shifts that has occurred to revolutionize biomedical research…
tsmith | February 23, 2010Student guest post by Dayna Groskreutz
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in adults in the United States. Acute coronary syndrome (ACS) is a term which includes both heart attacks and unstable angina. ACS occurs, in part, due to atherosclerosis, or plaque accumulation leading to narrowing of the artery. Some known risk factors for atherosclerosis and ACS include smoking, family history, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol. Recently, the role of inflammation in the development of atherosclerosis and ACS has been an area of intense study. Proposed causes of inflammation include…
palmd | February 23, 2009A while back I wrote about a naturopathic "physician" who was specifically preying on the Latino community. This is troubling for a number of reasons, some of which I mentioned. In my zeal to rant about the quackery, I may have not delved deeply enough into some of the other important issues.
For example, Hispanics have rates of diabetes and stroke well above the white Anglo population. These are conditions for which we have very effective science-based treatment. Proper treatment of high blood pressure in diabetics reduces the rate of heart attack and stroke by 35-50%. Proper foot care,…
oracknows | February 11, 2009I have to say, this is getting monotonous.
Let me back up a minute. One of the most common beliefs among users and advocates of "complementary and alternative" medicine (CAM) is that supplementation with vitamins will have all sorts of beneficial health effects. True, this belief is also pervasive among people who wouldn't go to an acupuncturist if you held a gun to their head, but it has become most associated with CAM. That this is so can actually be viewed as evidence of just how successful CAM activists have been in completely yoking all manner of lifestyle interventions to prevent or…