Free Republic

Multicancer early detection tests are likely to transform cancer screening in the near future, particularly if they receive strong government support, says a researcher.Detecting cancer early before it spreads throughout the body can be lifesaving. This is why doctors recommend regular screening for several common cancer types, using a variety of methods. Colonoscopies, for example, screen for colon cancer, while mammograms screen for breast cancer. While important, getting all these tests done can be logistically challenging, expensive and sometimes uncomfortable for patients. But what if a single blood test could screen for most common cancer types all at once? This...

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is alerting hospitals, laboratories and providers of a Class 1 recall of Beckman Coulter DxH 800, DxH 600 and DxH 900 hematology analyzers—devices that run blood tests to help providers diagnose diseases and conditions such as anemia (low red blood cell or hemoglobin count), infections, blood clotting problems, blood cancers and immune system disorders. This is an update to an urgent medical device correction letter first issued by the company in 2018, after the company received complaints of inaccurate blood platelet counts. Hematology analyzers run diagnostic tests that count the number of different types...

The state will destroy blood samples legally collected from newborns, but kept without parental consent under a federal lawsuit settlement announced today. There were between 4 million and 4.5 million specimens stored between 2002 and this year at Texas A&M University by the Texas Department of Health, said lawyer Jim Harrington of the Texas Civil Rights Project, which sued over the practice on behalf of parents in federal district court in San Antonio. The number of newborns involved was unclear, because there could be multiple samples from each... “There's no financial gain for any of the plaintiffs,” Beleno said. “Basically,...

SAN FRANCISCO — The San Francisco Medical Examiner says a teenager who was killed by an escaped zoo tiger six months ago had marijuana and alcohol in his system. The toxicology report was released Monday. It is included with an autopsy that concluded 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr. was killed by "blunt force injuries of the head and neck." -snip-

You’re in your house with your family.It’s late at night. You just had a baby three weeks earlier. Your husband hears some automobiles pull up and stop directly in front of your house. Cautiously he looks out the window. Armed police officers are getting out of their vehicles and headed to your door. Terrifying thoughts race through your mind. Why are they here? What have we done? Perhaps there is a mistake. Sure, that’s it, a mistake, we haven’t done anything wrong, they must have us confused with someone else. But the ranking officer produces a warrant for your newborn...

Jill Doimer's mother died in 2002 from ovarian cancer, detected too late to be effectively treated. So Ms. Doimer is eagerly awaiting the introduction of a new test that holds the promise of detecting early-stage ovarian cancer far more accurately than any test available now, using only blood from a finger prick. Not only does she plan to be tested, but an advocacy group she helped found, Ovarian Awareness of Kentucky, also intends to spread the word to women and doctors. "If it's going to happen to me or anyone I know, I want it to be caught at an...