Free Republic

Using a 3D printer, scientists have made an elastic membrane that closely mimics the outer layer of the heart's wall. The new membrane, which was described Tuesday (Feb. 25) in the journal Nature Communications, contains tiny sensors that can track the heart's temperature, pH and level of strain. The device could one day be used to treat patients with rhythm disorders in the lower chambers of the heart, as well as the rhythm disorder atrial fibrillation, the researchers said. Heart rhythm irregularities are a common problem, with one of the most well-known forms, atrial fibrillation, affecting 3 million to 5...

WASHINGTON (CBS / AP) — Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer asked the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday to initiate a formal investigation into what has caused polio-like paralysis in about 20 children in California over the past 18 months. Boxer said “we need answers” in her letter to CDC Director Thomas Frieden. In particular, she wants the agency to look into whether the illness can be traced to a virus or environmental factors. She also wants to know whether the agency is aware of similar reports of paralysis nationwide...

FULL TITLE: Terminally sick children have been secretly given deadly overdoses by British doctors in illegal mercy killings, claims retired GP British doctors have secretly killed terminally sick children by giving them 'huge' overdoses of painkillers, it was claimed yesterday. Hours after Belgium became the first country in the world to allow the euthanasia of children, a retired GP suggested it was already happening, informally, in Britain. Dr Michael Irwin told an LBC Radio debate: 'It has happened in this country, very quietly. I know of one or two children over the last few years.'

Approximately 18 people die every day waiting for an organ transplant. But that may change someday sooner than you think -- thanks to 3D printing. Advances in the 3D printing of human tissue have moved fast enough that San Diego-based bio-printing company Organovo now expects to unveil the world's first printed organ -- a human liver -- next year. Like other forms of 3D printing, bio-printing lays down layer after layer of material -- in this case, live cells -- to form a solid physical entity -- in this case, human tissue. The major stumbling block in creating tissue continues...

According to the health department, all of the patients have had flu-like and/or pneumonia like symptoms. However, all of them have tested negative for the flu. There have been eight confirmed patients ranging in age from 41 to 68. Four of those patients have died.

U.S. geneticists say a second code hiding within DNA changes how scientists read its instructions and interpret mutations to make sense of health and disease. Since the genetic code was deciphered in the 1960s, scientists have assumed it was used exclusively to write information about proteins, but University of Washington scientists say they've discovered genomes use the genetic code to write two separate "languages." One, long understood, describes how proteins are made, while the other instructs the cell on how genes are controlled. One language is written on top of the other, which is why the second language remained hidden...

By the early 2020s, we will have the means to program our biology away from disease and aging. Up until recently, health and medicine was basically a hit or miss affair. We would discover interventions such as drugs that had benefits, but also many side effects. Until recently, we did not have the means to actually design interventions on computers. All of that has now changed, and will dramatically change clinical practice by the early 2020s. We now have the information code of the genome and are making exponential gains in modeling and simulating the information processes they give rise...

Antibiotic resistance, like climate change, is one of those issues that has been blinking red on the world’s dashboard for decades. Everyone agrees it’s potentially disastrous—in fact, has already reached crisis stage in some areas—but interest group politics and crippling political dysfunction combine to make sure nothing is done about it. The issue got another boomlet of attention over the weekend when the CDC launched a new campaign to limit overuse of antibiotics, and Maryn McKenna published an excellent longform piece about it on Medium. The problem: evolution. A new antibiotic works like magic for awhile. But as it is...

The shockingly disfigured man, whose full-body tumours were lovingly kissed by the Pope, has been revealed as a 53-year-old Italian suffering from a rare genetic disease. Vinicio Riva’s entire body has been ravaged by the growths, a symptom of neorofibramatosis, which is not contagious. Earlier this month his picture shot round the world, when he was emotionally embraced by Pope Francis, at one of the pontiff’s weekly audiences in Rome. The severely disabled man, who is shunned in the street, and has induced horror even in his doctors, has for the first time described the encounter, saying that being caressed...

Sue Hobart, a bridal florist from Massachusetts, couldn't understand why she suddenly developed headaches, ringing in her ears, insomnia and dizziness to the point of falling "flat on my face" in the driveway. "I thought I was just getting older and tired," said the 57-year-old ... Months earlier, in the summer of 2010, three wind turbines had been erected in her town, one of which runs around the clock, 1,600 feet from her home. "I didn't put anything to the turbines -- we heard it and didn't like the thump, thump, thump and didn't like seeing them, but we didn't...

CHICAGO (AP) — Our food was a little less safe, our workplaces a little more dangerous. The risk of getting sick was a bit higher, our kids' homework tougher to complete. The federal government shutdown may have seemed like a frustrating squabble in far-off Washington, but it crept into our lives in small, subtle ways — from missed vegetable inspections to inaccessible federal websites. The "feds" always are there in the background, setting the standards by which we live, providing funds to research cures for our kids' illnesses, watching over our food supply and work environment.

FBI Washington field office just confirmed gunman was NOT armed with AR15. Spokesperson says 1 shotgun and 2 pistols recovered— Pamela Brown (@PamelaBrownCNN) September 17, 2013

IF YOU’RE A FAN OF THE LONG-RUNNING “Glee” or have been swept into the new “Orange istheNew Black” serieson Netflix,you arelikely becoming more intimate with the complex issues and emotions transgender people face.... Coming out Transgender,” penned by Kristin Beck, who transitioned from Chris Beck after earning a Purple Heart and Bronze Star during a 20- year stint as a SEAL that included seven combat deployments... In Southwest Florida, many who are coming out are seeking Laura Streyffeler, PhD., a Fort Myers licensed mental health counselor and trauma and domestic and sexual violence expert. She has been practicing for 25...

The industry of medical tourism is growing quickly all around the world in response to the ever-climbing price of US healthcare bills. Outraged patients have been warming to the idea of overseas provision of surgery and treatment over the past seven years, says the Medical Tourism Association; an operation that works towards helping Americans find suitable healthcare in other countries. Europe is emerging as a key player in the medical tourism industry based on its competitive prices and well-respected medical reputation. Prices there are kept down by strict government regulation that stipulates a national maximum on specific operational cost, full...

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius rebuffed an appeal from Rep. Lou Barletta on behalf of a girl who needs a lung transplant but can’t get one because of a federal regulation that prevents her from qualifying for a transplant. “Please, suspend the rules until we look at this policy,” Barletta, a Pennsylvania Republican, asked Sebelius during a House hearing Tuesday on behalf of Sarah Murnaghan, a 10-year-old girl who needs a lung transplant. She can’t qualify for an adult lung transplant until the age of 12, according to federal regulations, but Sebelius has the authority to waive that...

Advances in cancer treatment are saving lives and cutting health-care costs. But because many health-insurance plans haven’t caught up with the times, nearly half of all cancer patients are forced to choose between the treatment that could save their lives — or one that’s paid for. John Rykert had been battling advanced basal-cell carcinoma for two decades by cutting out the tumors as they appeared. In 2009, after 20 surgeries lasting 10 hours each, Rykert’s doctor said that the cancer had spread so far that the only option left would be to carve out half his face. But then Rykert...

Full title - "'You deserve to rot in hell for what you have done to me': Daughter's twitter outburst about mom who has resurfaced after being missing for ELEVEN years" The teenage daughter of a woman who secretly left her family 11 years ago says she's angry and doesn't want to have a relationship with her. Morgan Heist said Thursday that she's still trying to sort out why Brenda Heist would have decided to abandon her and her brother in Pennsylvania in 2002 and hitchhike with strangers to Florida. Morgan Heist is now a 19-year-old freshman at a community college...

Israeli tourists visiting a shrine in Bangkok were shocked when a child, dressed in an orange Buddhist monk's robe, approached them and began speaking in perfect Hebrew. The 12-year-old Israeli boy has been staying in a monastery in northern Thailand, and has no idea until when he will remain there. When asked whether he wanted to be taken back home, he answered: "I told everyone already, it's fine, I'm used to it." The story was revealed on Tuesday by Israel's Channel 2 TV, which aired the tourists' conversation with the child. According to an inquiry by the Foreign Ministry, the...

A transgender high school student who applied to prestigious, private, all-female Smith College has been rejected because the school only accepts women. Smith returned Calliope Wong’s application — and application fee — earlier this month, reports The Advocate. “As you may remember from our previous correspondence, Smith is a women’s college, which means that undergraduate applicants to Smith must be female at the time of admission,” admissions dean Debra Shaver wrote in a letter to Wong, The Advocate says. Wong has identified as female for several years, according to the Keystone Student Voice. However, on the FAFSA (Free Application for...

FReeper Rogle, former New Mexico State Representative Rory Ogle, will be removed from life support this morning. He is not expected to live.