A new study by the American Lung Association says that drug-resistant tuberculosis has become so common in urban America that doctors should assume that new TB patients have the drug-resistant strain until proven otherwise.
”The major factor fueling the rise in drug-resistant TB is cessation or interruption of TB treatment,” said Dr. Stephan Kamholz, an author of the study.
”Many hospitals just don`t have the funds to do follow-up.” It can take six to nine months of daily drug treatment to cure TB, but patients often stop taking medication prematurely, thereby helping to breed bacteria that comes back drug-resistant.
The Lung Association study is one of many calling attention to the problem. A report in the journal Science notes that after a century of decline, TB is again increasing.
While homelessness, immigration and AIDS have boosted TB`s resurgence, the Science report argues that failure to follow good public health practices to keep track of patients and assure their compliance with medical advice is the key problem.
The federal Centers for Disease Control is also concerned and is expected soon to issue new guidelines intended to halt the spread of drug-resistant TB. NEW CERAMIC WITHSTANDS HEAT OF MOLTEN METALS Some amazing new materials that flow like wet concrete, then harden into tough ceramics that can withstand superhot temperatures have been developed by Chicago-area scientists.
They hope to commercialize these materials for applications such as lining pipes and other vessels that carry molten metals in steelmaking. When hardened, the ceramics, called refractory materials, resist corrosion and erosion that molten metals usually inflict upon vessels that carry them.
Researchers from Argonne National Laboratory and Magneco/Metrel Inc. of Addison worked together to develop refractory materials that could be pumped by modifying equipment designed to pump cement.
”Our material is thicker than cement,” said Subrata Banerjee of Magneco/Metrel, ”but it still flows, and once in place, it hardens within three or four hours.”
STUDY RAISES QUESTION ABOUT `CRACK BABIES` It could be that the many physical and behavioral ailments seen in so-called ”crack babies” aren`t directly caused by the cocaine their mothers ingested.
Research on young rhesus monkeys whose mothers were given cocaine in amounts comparable to what humans might ingest didn`t suffer low birth weight, excessive irritability or other abnormalities seen in cocaine babies. The research at Emory University was sponsored by the National Institute of Drug Abuse.
The study was suggested by Dr. Anne Patterson, an obstetrician at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta who noted that in real life, few women use cocaine by itself. Most also ingest alcohol, heroin, marijuana, tobacco and other substances that could harm a developing fetus.
In the monkey study, cocaine was the only substance the animals ingested, and after two years of observation, their offspring don`t show abnormalities, suggesting that perhaps it is the overall substance abuse lifestyle that produces ”crack babies,” not a single drug.
SUSPECT LESIONS CAN WAIT, STUDY SHOWS When X-ray mammography finds an abnormality that doctors are almost certain is benign, they usually order surgery anyway to remove a sample for analysis just in case breast cancer is present.
A new study suggests that physicians could skip these expensive, anxiety- producing surgeries without jeopardizing patient health. A study in the August medical journal Radiology suggests that when X-rays show a lesion that looks benign, doctors can just wait and take more X-rays as time passes to see if the suspect lesion grows.
The study, which applied to lesions that were too small to be felt, followed the cases of 426 women whose X-rays showed initial abnormalities and who came back later for follow-up X-rays.
In that group, only 16 had lesions that appeared to grow, and nine of those turned out to be cancer. Among the 410 whose lesions didn`t grow, none developed cancer.
HEART DEFECT MUTATION INVITES EARLY DIAGNOSIS The heart condition that killed college basketball star Hank Gathers two years ago is coming into sharper focus for genetic researchers. Familial hypertrophic cardiomyopathy causes a thickening of the heart muscle that can result in irregular heart rates and heart attacks.
Scientists have discovered the genes and the specific ways they can mutate that lead to this condition. A new study in Circulation, the journal of the American Heart Association, demonstrates that it is possible now to diagnose FHC before symptoms appear.
Dr. Mark Keating of the University of Utah said that doctors may even be able to tell who among people with the condition is at greatest risk. ”In other words,” he said, ”certain genetic mutations are more dangerous than others.”
Researchers at Harvard University announced similar findings this spring in the New England Journal of Medicine. The significance, said Dr. Christine Seidman, affiliated with the Harvard study, is that children with more benign versions of the disease wouldn`t have to suffer the risks associated with drug treatment for the disorder, which is estimated to afflict about one in 2,000 Americans.
