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Wednesday, August 16, 2017
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Good morning, folks! Megan here with your daily dose of news in health and medicine.
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Lawmakers explore creating panel on Trump’s mental health
Three Congressional Democrats have asked a Yale psychiatrist to consult with them about forming an expert panel that would offer lawmakers advice about analyzing President Trump’s mental health. Dr. Bandy
Lee says she was invited to meet with Congressional legislators or their staffs to discuss how they might be able to convene mental health professionals “to review the president’s mental health, and review it on a periodic basis.” The closed meeting is slated
to take place in September, said Lee, who declined to name the members of Congress who made the request. The news comes on the heels of a bill to establish a “commission on presidential capacity” sponsored by 27 representatives, all of whom are Democrats.
More
here from STAT's Sharon Begley.
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FDA backs food industry in fight over menu labeling
New York City officials and food industry groups are going to head to head in court today over the city’s menu labeling rules — and in a twist, the FDA, which has authority over menu labeling rules rolled
out under the Obama administration, has now thrown its weight behind the food industry’s argument. The Affordable Care Act included a provision mandating calorie labeling nationwide, but the FDA has the final say in how, if at all, that rule is enforced. It
has been delayed several times over the past few years. New York City — which had already passed menu labeling requirements in 2008 — updated its legislation to match the national mandate in 2015, expecting them to go into effect simultaneously.
But when the FDA delayed the rule again in May, local officials moved to start enforcing their own law this month. The National Restaurant Association and other groups brought a lawsuit, and the FDA filed a statement of interest in the case on behalf of the
food industry.
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Scientists test for dental disease using high-tech gum
You might one day be able to blow bubbles with your gum in the name of science. Researchers have
created a diagnostic chewing gum that detects signs of dental disease. This isn't a stick of Juicy Fruit — there's a biosensor embedded into the chewing gum that produces a bitter taste in patients with peri-implant disease,
which is marked by inflammation around a dental implant. The disease increases the production of certain enzymes that cause the biosensor to release a bitter compound. To test the concept, scientists used artificial tongues doused with donated spit from healthy
volunteers or from patients with peri-implant disease. The gum’s creators say if it works in a clinical setting, they could see it being developed as an easy-to-use diagnostic tool.
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The trajectory of teen drug overdose deaths
new data show the trajectory of teen overdose deaths from 1999 to 2015.
A new
report out from the CDC this morning highlights the dramatic shifts in overdose deaths among teens ages 15 to 19. After more than doubling between 1999 and 2007, the overdose death rate among that group dropped 26 percent
between 2008 and 2014. But the rate dramatically rose in 2015. Opioids — and specifically, heroin — were the primary cause of drug overdoses among adolescents in 2015.
Meanwhile, as the opioid epidemic rages on, the lawsuits against drug manufacturers and distributors continue to pile up. South Carolina’s attorney general just filed a lawsuit against OcyContin maker
Purdue Pharma, alleging that the company used shady marketing tactics that contributed to the epidemic. And in Cincinnati, city officials are suing three major prescription drug distributors, alleging that they broke a federal law that requires them to report
suspicious opioid orders.
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NIH hosts meeting of the microbiome hive mind
Scientists who study the millions of microbes thriving on our skin and in our guts are gathering this morning for a meeting on the human microbiome at the NIH as part of the agency’s decade-long Human
Microbiome Project. The effort aims to understand how the microbiome shapes our health — and how it could potentially be manipulated to improve human health or treat disease. You can watch their talks live
here.
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Popular pain med might not work for low back problems
There isn’t enough evidence to support the use of gabapentinoids — a class of drugs designed to treat nerve pain — to ease low back pain, according to a new review of research published in
PLOS Medicine. Researchers dug into the data from randomized, controlled trials and found the drugs didn’t show any significant improvement over placebo in three studies. And in other studies on pregabalin, a gabapentinoid
sold under the brand name Lyrica, the drug didn’t do as well as over-the-counter meds such as acetaminophen and ibuprofen at relieving lower back pain. The study’s authors are calling for larger clinical trials to test whether the drugs, which are commonly
used in patients with low back pain, actually help.
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What to read around the web today
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Inside the country where Down syndrome is disappearing.
CBS News
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Global health gets a checkup from the WHO's new leader.
Foreign Affairs
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In the event of a nuclear blast, don't condition your hair.
NPR
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Thanks for reading! More tomorrow,
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