Month: May 2014

Most women with breast cancer who also have the second breast removed don’t need to take that precaution, a new study finds. The study looked at information on 1,447 women treated for newly diagnosed cancer in a single breast. The women reported information to breast cancer registries for 3 to 5 years after treatment. Nearly 19% said they had strongly considered having both breasts removed. About 8% actually had double mastectomies. But researchers concluded that 69% of those who had both breasts removed actually had a low risk of developing cancer in the other breast. They did not have a strong family risk of cancer. They also did not have any gene mutations linked with increased risk of breast cancer. Women who had more detailed imaging of their breasts using MRI were more likely to have a double mastectomy.

A home walking program may help people with poor blood circulation that leads to leg pain, a new study finds. The study focused on 168 people with peripheral artery disease. This condition is caused by narrowed arteries in the legs. The main symptom is pain or cramping in the legs while walking. People in the study were randomly divided into 2 groups. The first group took part in a program that trained them to increase their walking at home. After 6 months, they continued on their own, with phone calls for encouragement. They were told to try to walk at least 5 days a week and build up to 50 minutes a day. If their legs hurt, they were told to rest until the pain went away, and then start again. The second group received general health information only. After a year, people in the first group had increased their average distance for a 6-minute walk by about 87 feet, or 7.5%.

Antibiotics don’t help infections, such as bronchitis, that are caused by viruses. But new research suggests that the public and doctors still have not embraced that message. In the study, 71% of patient visits for acute bronchitis led to an antibiotic prescription. The study covered the years 1996 through 2010. Bronchitis is an inflammation of the bronchial tubes in the lungs. It is almost always caused by a virus. The main symptom is coughing. “Acute” bronchitis means that symptoms have lasted less than 3 weeks. The study was published as a research letter in the journal JAMA. It was based on a national survey of doctors’ offices and hospital emergency rooms. The sampling was selected to represent the United States as a whole. During the 15 years covered, these facilities reported 3,153 visits for acute bronchitis.

If a particularly deadly flu virus spread worldwide, saving lives would require much faster vaccine development than occurred in the 2009 pandemic, a study finds. The new study used a computer simulation. Researchers looked at how quickly a deadly influenza A outbreak would spread in a metropolitan area similar to New York City. They assumed that 1,000 people would be infected at the start. Without vaccination, they found that about 48,000 people would die. During the 2009 pandemic, a vaccine was ready for use in 9 months. But in the computer model, vaccinating people after 9 months would reduce the death toll by only about 2,300. Deaths would be further reduced if the vaccine were developed much earlier. The 2009 pandemic was caused by a flu strain known as H1N1. That strain spread fast, but was relatively mild compared with past pandemics.