Month: April 2023

Statins Trial in HIV Patients Ended Early Due to Efficacy

Colourised scanning electron micrograph of HIV (yellow) infecting a human T9 cell (blue). Credit: NIH

A large randomised controlled trial into using statins in people with HIV and low-to-moderate cardiovascular risk was stopped early due to clear benefits, according to an update posted online in JAMA Network. Participants, who were taking 4mg pitavastatin calcium daily, saw a 35% reduction in risk with no significant difference in adverse events compared to placebo, according to the National Institutes of Health.

This recommendation came after a planned interim analysis of data from the Randomized Trial to Prevent Vascular Events in HIV (REPRIEVE) study, which enrolled 7769 participants, across 12 countries across Asia, Europe, North America, South America and Africa. Participants were aged 40–75 years, had 100 cells/mmof blood at enrollment, and had low-to-moderate traditional cardiovascular disease risk that would not typically be considered for statin treatment. 

It was not clear if statins would have the same effect in people living with HIV and who have premature cardiovascular disease despite having low-to-moderate traditional risk. The interim analysis was compelling enough that the study’s independent Data Safety and Monitoring Board recommended at its latest regular meeting that it be halted early given adequate evidence of efficacy.

The study participants are being notified of the findings and will continue to be monitored for several months. Study results from the review are expected to be published in the coming weeks.

Study Reveals Why Cancer Drugs Cause Cardiotoxicity

While being effective at treating cancer, some cancer treatments can cause cardiotoxicity which can lead to heart failure – a phenomenon unexplained until now. An international study, published in the journal Science Advances, has identified proteins present in the blood that are linked to an increased risk of developing cardiac disease, including heart failure, and which are also affected by drugs used in cancer treatment.

The findings can explain how cancer drugs cause their damaging effects on the heart and could help to identify those at increased risk. In the long run, the researchers believe this will help to improve cancer treatments, with new drugs potentially being developed that can shrink tumours without affecting the identified proteins.

In addition, the study reveals new potential drug targets for treating heart diseases including heart failure. These may work by inhibiting proteins linked to higher disease risk, or activating proteins linked to lower risk.

The researchers first performed a genome-wide association study, searching through the DNA of nearly 37,000 people without heart disease enrolled in the UK Biobank study. This identified genetic variants linked to changes to the structure and function of the pumping chambers of the heart – the ventricles.

The researchers then pinpointed 33 proteins using Mendelian randomisation, coded for by these genetic variants, that are present in the blood and associated with the risk of developing several heart diseases. These included different types of heart failure, and atrial fibrillation (a common abnormal heart rhythm which increases the risk of stroke). Crucially, many of these proteins are the targets of drugs currently used to treat cancer.

Lead author Dr Floriaan Schmidt said: “The proteins identified in our study will help to accelerate future drug development, offering scientists a blueprint for new treatments for both cancer and heart diseases. This can help them to be more confident of the effects of the drugs that they design – whether that’s shrinking tumours without causing damage elsewhere or improving the heart’s pumping action.”

Professor Sir Nilesh Samani, Medical Director at the British Heart Foundation, said: “While there have been advances in treating cancer, one of the consequences has been a risk of heart damage from these drugs.

“This research points the way towards developing safer and more refined drugs so that, one day, worries about developing heart problems after cancer treatment might be a thing of the past.”

Source: University College London

Gel Delivery Method Achieves 100% Cure for Glioblastomas in Mice

Photo by Anna Shvets on Pexels

Anticancer drugs delivered by a novel gel cured 100% of mice with glioblastoma, one of the deadliest and most common brain tumours in humans. The results are published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“Despite recent technological advancements, there is a dire need for new treatment strategies,” said chemical and biomolecular engineer Honggang Cui, who led the research. “We think this hydrogel will be the future and will supplement current treatments for brain cancer.”

Cui’s John Hopkins University team combined an anticancer drug and an antibody in a solution that self-assembles into a gel to fill the tiny grooves left after a brain tumour is surgically removed. The gel can reach areas that surgery might miss and current drugs struggle to reach to kill lingering cancer cells and suppress tumour growth.

The gel also seems to trigger an immune response that a mouse’s body struggles to activate on its own when fighting glioblastoma. When the researchers rechallenged surviving mice with a new glioblastoma tumour, their immune systems alone beat the cancer without additional medication. The gel appears to not only fend off cancer but help rewire the immune system to discourage recurrence with immunological memory, researchers said.

Surgery is still necessary; applying the gel directly in the brain without surgical resection resulted in a 50% survival rate.

“The surgery likely alleviates some of that pressure and allows more time for the gel to activate the immune system to fight the cancer cells,” Cui said.

The gel solution consists of nano-sized filaments made with paclitaxel, an FDA-approved drug for breast, lung, and other cancers. The filaments provide a vehicle to deliver an antibody called aCD47. By blanketing the tumour cavity evenly, the gel releases medication steadily over several weeks, and its active ingredients remain close to the injection site.

By using that specific antibody, the team is trying to overcome one of the toughest hurdles in glioblastoma research. It targets macrophages, a type of cell that sometimes supports immunity but other times protects cancer cells, allowing aggressive tumour growth.

One of the go-to therapies for glioblastoma is a wafer developed in the 1990s, with the commercial name Gliadel. This FDA-approved, biodegradable polymer also delivers medication into the brain after surgical tumour removal.

Gliadel showed significant survival rates in laboratory experiments, but the results achieved with the new gel are some of the most impressive the Johns Hopkins team has seen, said Betty Tyler, a co-author and associate professor of neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine who played a pivotal role in the development of Gliadel.

“We don’t usually see 100% survival in mouse models of this disease,” Tyler said. “Thinking that there is potential for this new hydrogel combination to change that survival curve for glioblastoma patients is very exciting.”

The new gel offers hope for future glioblastoma treatment because it integrates anticancer drugs and antibodies, a combination of therapies researchers say is difficult to administer simultaneously because of the molecular composition of the ingredients.

“This hydrogel combines both chemotherapy and immunotherapy intracranially,” Tyler said. “The gel is implanted at the time of tumour resection, which makes it work really well.”

Johns Hopkins co-author Henry Brem, who co-developed Gliadel in addition to other brain tumour therapies currently in clinical trials, emphasised the challenge of translating the gel’s results in the lab into therapies with substantial clinical impacts.

“The challenge to us now is to transfer an exciting laboratory phenomenon to clinical trials,” said Brem, who is neurosurgeon-in-chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Source: John Hopkins University

After COVID, Experts Advise Against Universal Masking in Healthcare

While masking was a critical preventative measure to protect healthcare workers, patients and visitors during the COVID pandemic, infectious disease researchers argue against masking, saying that that as the pandemic dies down, the routine use of masking should be reconsidered. Previous policies over healthcare masking use against SARS-CoV-2 transmission were formulated against a background which assumed no population immunity and no countermeasures.

In editorial published in Annals of Internal Medicine, the authors argue for the discontinuation of universal COVID masking in healthcare settings as infection rates and mortality have fallen and access to testing and therapeutics is widespread, as is immunity. Universal masking is therefore no longer of benefit and its own drawbacks, such as facial irritation and hindering communication, are more of a hinderance.

In addition to difficulties faced by speakers of different languages as well as the hard of hearing, masks have a number of detrimental effects for communication. “The increase in listening effort required when masks are used in clinical encounters is associated with increased cognitive load for patients and clinicians,” the authors wrote. In addition to making clinicians’ jobs harder, they also impact the all-important clinician–patient relationship, as face masks “obscure facial expression; contribute to feelings of isolation; and negatively impact human connection, trust, and perception of empathy.”

Healthcare workers should instead adopt an approach for SARS-CoV-2 similar to that of any other endemic respiratory disease. Drawing on the experience of the COVID pandemic, they suggest a more flexible, responsive approach to masking policies. In response to future epidemics or localised outbreaks “may justify more widespread or targeted masking policies, respectively, as part of a bundled response. High-quality epidemiologic data with frequent updates and regular reevaluation are needed to inform scale-up or scale-down decisions.”

New Mental Health Policy Welcomed, but Experts Concerned over Implementation

South Africa’s long-awaited new National Mental Health Policy Framework and Strategic Plan 2023 – 2030 has been published. The policy framework was presented at the SA mental health conference this week. PHOTO: DOH/Twitter

By Thabo Molelekwa at Spotlight

South Africa’s long-awaited new National Mental Health Policy Framework and Strategic Plan 2023 – 2030 took centre stage this week at the two-day SA Mental Health Conference in Johannesburg. As Spotlight previously reported, the old policy framework technically expired in 2020.

But even though there has been a gap from 2020 to 2023, speaking to Spotlight at the conference, Minister of Health Dr Joe Phaahla said that it doesn’t mean there was a gap in terms of updating. “Every either three or five years, we revise the policy. So, it is not that there has been a gap. There has been a policy, which has been guiding,” he said.

“But as things change, and in each cycle of the strategy and planning, we have a particular timeframe so that we can evaluate. And so now we have evaluated, and that’s why we are adding [additional things], as we learned from the previous implementation.”

Phaahla said that gaps in the country’s mental health services are not because of a lack of policy and plans but due to implementation issues and sometimes the shortage of resources and psychiatrists.

“If you look at the area of psychiatrists, it is just the two-tier system of our health service, which makes it very difficult because what psychiatrists can earn providing the services to more of the insured patients – it is something we can’t really match with the public sector salaries generally,” he said. Phaahla said that psychiatrists, who mostly work in the private sector, were typically trained at public-sector teaching hospitals. “But once they’re qualified, they stay for one year or so, then they are attracted by better income,” he told Spotlight.

According to Phaahla, to deal with the shortage of psychiatrists in provinces such as the Northern Cape where there are only three psychiatrists, the department plans to contract psychiatrists from other provinces. “We can have part-time psychiatrists, maybe take some from Gauteng where the majority are and in Western Cape and contract them to provide services in Northern Cape. Even if it’s on a weekly rotation,” he said.

Concerns over delays

While several mental health experts have welcomed the new policy framework and agree with Phaahla about the importance of implementation, they are not happy about the delays.

“We’re now sitting in 2023, three years late,” said Cassey Chambers of the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG). What that means, she said, is that civil society did not have a working document with which to engage government at provincial or district level.

Bharti Patel of the South African Mental Health Federation expressed similar concerns. “As the Federation for mental health, we are disappointed that it has taken this long for the policy to be reviewed, given the fact that the initial policy was launched in 2013,” said Patel.

“We had a crisis during that period from 2013 to 2020. We have witnessed mental healthcare users losing their lives during Life Esidimeni. The [Health] ombud report, the South African Human Rights Commission Report, have all given recommendations,” Patel said. Patel argues that those recommendations should have informed policy and implementation more quickly.

Implementation problems

Chambers described the previous strategic policy framework as a “very good document”. Then, she said, the problem came in the implementation. “And I think perhaps this is [why there was a] delay in having an updated document that is now running from 2023 to 2030. It is because the document was good, the policy was good. However, how it was implemented was not happening,” she said.

Speaking to Spotlight, Professor Crick Lund, Co-Director, of the Centre for Global Mental Health at King’s College London, explained that there are a number of factors that create implementation challenges. “The one is ignorance on the part of senior decision-makers about mental health, ignorance about the scale of the problem, and ignorance about the fact that something can be done about it,” he said.

According to Lund, the new policy framework has stronger implementation monitoring mechanisms and implementation can be tracked in a much clearer way over time.

For the new policy framework to work better than the previous one, Lund believes there is a need to create greater public awareness about mental health and about the mental health policy. He says, “We need to get all the sectors involved working together – the Department of Health, Education, Social Development, the criminal justice system, and also the NGO sector.”

Along similar lines, Patel stressed the importance of getting more government departments involved. “While the policy is developed at the national level, the National Department of Health is responsible for training the provinces and not only the Department of Health; they need to train all government departments within the province who have bought this policy,” she said. “You can’t have the Department of Health alone implement a policy. This is a policy that requires inter-sectoral collaboration so that different departments can also put budgets towards implementation.”

Lund said that there is a lot of common agreement on what the priorities are and a lot of energy going forward. “So I’m hopeful that we can move things forward.”

Budgets and human resources

While there seems to be consensus on the need for more training and getting wider buy-in, there is also a shared awareness that successful implementation will depend on the availability of sufficient funds and human resources.

“We need to see structured action plans in the provinces with budgets allocated so that we can hold the government departments accountable,” said Patel.

Chambers agrees that in order to get implementation of the new policy framework right, we will have to get the budgets right. “You need to allocate a budget in order to help with the implementation plan, especially knowing that our previous policy framework was not implemented. So, we have to overcompensate for that now, which is concerning because this year, the health budget has been reduced. Therefore, meaning that the national mental health budget has been reduced,” she said.

According to the new policy framework, the case for investing in mental health is strong. It states that at a societal level, lost income associated with mental illness far exceeds public sector expenditure on mental healthcare – in other words, it costs South Africa more to not treat mental illness than to treat it. The impact of mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety has been estimated to cost the economy more than US$3.6 billion (R61.2 billion) in lost earnings per year. Certain conditions such as perinatal depression and anxiety have lifelong cost consequences. For example, it is estimated that the lifetime costs of perinatal depression and anxiety in South Africa amount to US$2.8 billion (R47.6 billion) per annual cohort of births.

Chambers also stressed that we are facing shortages of human resources and appropriate facilities. “We don’t have the human resources or the capacity to fulfil that implementation plan and that’s a worry and a concern,” she said.

NHI and provincial plans

According to the new policy framework, mental health will be financed according to the principles adopted for all health financing in South Africa, and people will be protected from the catastrophic financial consequences of mental ill-health.

According to the policy framework, in the financing of the National Health Insurance (NHI) system, mental health services will be given parity with other health conditions, in proportion to the burden of disease and evidence for cost-effective interventions. NHI will specifically include packages of care for mental health, in line with the evidence for the most cost-effective interventions. The policy framework states that private medical aid schemes should be required to provide similar parity between mental health and other health conditions.

“Budget will be allocated to meet targets set for the implementation of the policy and regular discussions will be held with provinces to discuss strategies and monitor progress with implementation. At provincial level, mental health budgets will be reviewed annually to align mental health with national priorities, for each of the areas for action in 2023 and annually thereafter,” the policy framework reads.

The policy also says that all provinces will develop provincial strategic plans for mental health, in keeping with national policy, which outlines specific strategies, targets, timelines, budgets, and indicators in 2023 and annually thereafter, informed by specific unique local challenges.

Source: Spotlight

Not Your ‘Average’ Gut: Study Reveals Great Variation in Gastrointestinal Systems

Source: CC0

There is a great deal of variation in the anatomy of the gastrointestinal system, with pronounced differences possible between healthy individuals, according to surprising new research published in PeerJ. Differences between males and females were also uncovered.

The finding has implications for understanding the role that the digestive tract’s anatomy can play in affecting human health, as well as providing potential insights into medical diagnoses and the microbial ecosystem of the gut.

“There was research more than a century ago that found variability in the relative lengths of human intestines, but this area has largely been ignored since then,” says Amanda Hale, study co-first author and a PhD candidate at North Carolina State University. “When we began exploring this issue, we were astonished at the extent of the variability we found.”

“If you’re talking to four different people, odds are good that all of them have different guts, in terms of the relative sizes of the organs that make up that system,” says Erin McKenney, corresponding author and an assistant professor of applied ecology at NC State. “For example, the cecum is an organ that’s found at the nexus of the large and small intestine. One person may have a cecum that is only a few centimeters long, while another may have a cecum the size of a coin purse. And we found similar variability for many digestive organs.”

In another striking example, the researchers found that women tend to have longer small intestines than men.

“Because having a longer small intestine helps you extract nutrients from your diet, this finding supports the canalisation hypothesis, which posits that women are better able to survive during periods of stress,” says Hale.

“Given that there is more variation in human gut anatomy than we thought, this could inform our understanding of what is driving a range of health-related issues and how we treat them,” says McKenney. “Basically, now that we know this variability exists, it raises a number of research questions that need to be explored.”

For this study, the researchers measured the digestive organs of 45 people who donated their remains to the Anatomical Gifts Program at the Duke University School of Medicine.

In addition to shedding light on the unexpected variability in human anatomy, this project also led to rediscovering the importance of teaching anatomical variation to medical students.

“It’s particularly important in medical training, because if students are only learning about a ‘normal’ or ‘average’ anatomy, that means they are not going to be familiar with the scope of human variation,” says Roxanne Larsen, co-author of the paper and an associate professor of veterinary and biomedical sciences at the University of Minnesota. “It’s increasingly clear that the medical field is moving toward individualized medicine to improve patient outcomes and overall health and well-being. Garnering experience in understanding anatomical variation can play a critical role in helping future doctors understand the importance of individualised medicine.”

“We’re excited about this discovery and future directions for the work,” McKenney says. “It underscores just how little we know about our own bodies.”

Source: North Carolina State University

The Body’s Safety Valve Against Insulin Shock

Novolog insulin pen. Photo by Dennis Klicker on Unsplash

Insulin is an important treatment for people with type 1 or 2 diabetes, but excessive insulin can cause hypoglycaemia, leading to convulsions, coma and possibly death – a collection of conditions that defines insulin shock.

In a new study published in Cell Metabolism, a team of scientists at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine, with colleagues elsewhere, describe a key component in the mechanism that regulates against excessive insulin.

“Although insulin is one of the most essential hormones, whose insufficiency can result in death, too much insulin can also be deadly,” said senior study author Professor Michael Karin, PhD, at UC San Diego School of Medicine.

In the new study, Karin, first author Li Gu, PhD, a postdoctoral scholar in Karin’s lab, and colleagues describe “the body’s natural defence or safety valve” that reduces the risk of insulin shock.

That valve is a metabolic enzyme called fructose-1,6-bisphosphate phosphatase or FBP1, which acts to control gluconeogenesis, a process in which the liver synthesises glucose, during sleep and secretes it to maintain steady supply of glucose in the bloodstream.

Some antidiabetic drugs, such as metformin, inhibit gluconeogenesis but without apparent ill effect. Children born with a rare, genetic disorder in which they do not produce sufficient FBP1 can also remain healthy and live long lives.

But in other cases, when the body is starved for glucose or carbohydrates, an FBP1 deficiency can result in severe hypoglycaemia, leading to convulsions, coma and possibly death.

Compounding and confounding the problem, FPB1 deficiency combined with glucose starvation produces adverse effects unrelated to gluconeogenesis, such as an enlarged, fatty liver, mild liver damage and elevated blood lipids or fats.

To better understand the roles of FBP1, researchers created a mouse model with liver specific FBP1 deficiency, accurately mimicking the human condition. Like FBP1-deficient children, the mice appeared normal and healthy until fasted, which quickly resulted in the severe hypoglycaemia and the liver abnormalities and hyperlipidaemia described above.

Gu and her colleagues discovered that FBP1 had multiple roles. Beyond playing a part in the conversion of fructose to glucose, FBP1 had a second non-enzymatic but critical function: It inhibited the protein kinase AKT, which is the primary conduit of insulin activity.

“Basically, FBP1 keeps AKT in check and guards against insulin hyper-responsiveness, hypoglycaemic shock and acute fatty liver disease,” said first author Gu.

Working with Yahui Zhu, a vising scientist from Chongqing University in China and second author of the study, Gu developed a peptide (a string of amino acids) derived from FBP1 that disrupted the association of FBP1 with AKT and another protein that inactivates AKT.

“This peptide works like an insulin mimetic, activating AKT,” said Karin. “When injected into mice that have been rendered insulin resistant, a highly common pre-diabetic condition, due to prolonged consumption of high-fat diet, the peptide (nicknamed E7) can reverse insulin resistance and restore normal glycaemic control.”

Karin said the researchers would like to further develop E7 as a clinically useful alternative to insulin “because we have every reason to believe that it is unlikely to cause insulin shock.”

Source: University of California – San Diego

Up to Half of Concussions May Have Long-lasting Effects

Photo by Tom Jur on Unsplash

Even mild concussion can cause long-lasting effects to the brain, according to a University of Cambridge analysis published in Brain. The study researchers showed that for almost a half of all people who receive a concussion, there are changes in how regions of the brain communicate with each other. This could potential cause long term symptoms such as fatigue and cognitive impairment.

Concussion, a mild traumatic brain injury, can occur as a result of a fall, a sports injury or from a cycling accident or car crash, for example. But despite the ‘mild’ label, it is commonly linked with persistent symptoms and incomplete recovery. Such symptoms include depression, cognitive impairment, headaches, and fatigue.

While some clinicians in recent studies predict that 9 out of 10 individuals who experience concussion will have a full recovery after six months, evidence is emerging that only a half achieve a full recovery. This means that a significant proportion of patients may not receive adequate post-injury care.

Predicting which patients will have a fast recovery and who will take longer to recover is challenging, however. At present, patients with suspected concussion will typically receive either a CT or MRI brain scan to look for structural problems, such as inflammation or bruising. Yet even if these scans show no obvious structural damage, a patient’s symptoms may still persist.

Dr Emmanuel Stamatakis from the Department of Clinical Neurosciences and Division of Anaesthesia at the University of Cambridge said: “Worldwide, we’re seeing an increase in the number of cases of mild traumatic brain injury, particularly from falls in our ageing population and rising numbers of road traffic collisions in low- and middle-income countries.

“At present, we have no clear way of working out which of these patients will have a speedy recovery and which will take longer, and the combination of over-optimistic and imprecise prognoses means that some patients risk not receiving adequate care for their symptoms.”

Dr Stamatakis and colleagues studied functional MRI (fMRI) brain scans taken from 108 patients with mild traumatic brain injury and compared them with scans from 76 healthy volunteers. Patients were also assessed for ongoing symptoms.

The patients and volunteers had been recruited to CENTER-TBI, a large European research project which aims to improve the care for patients with traumatic brain injury.

The team found that just under half (45%) were still showing symptoms resulting from their brain injury, with the most common being fatigue, poor concentration and headaches.

The researchers found that these patients had abnormalities in a region of the brain known as the thalamus, which integrates all sensory information and relays this information around the brain. Counter-intuitively, concussion was associated with increased connectivity between the thalamus and the rest of the brain – in other words, the thalamus was trying to communicate more as a result of the injury – and the greater this connectivity, the poorer the prognosis for the patient.

Rebecca Woodrow, a PhD student in the Department of Clinical Neuroscience and Hughes Hall, Cambridge, said: “Despite there being no obvious structural damage to the brain in routine scans, we saw clear evidence that the thalamus – the brain’s relay system – was hyperconnected. We might interpret this as the thalamus trying to over-compensate for any anticipated damage, and this appears to be at the root of some of the long-lasting symptoms that patients experience.”

Using positron emission tomography (PET) scans, the researchers were able to make associations with key neurotransmitters depending on which long-term symptoms a patient displayed. For example, patients experiencing cognitive problems such as memory difficulties showed increased connectivity between the thalamus and areas of the brain rich in the neurotransmitter noradrenaline; patients experiencing emotional symptoms, such as depression or irritability, showed greater connectivity with areas of the brain rich in serotonin.

Dr Stamatakis added: “We know that there already drugs that target these brain chemicals so our findings offer hope that in future, not only might we be able to predict a patient’s prognosis, but we may also be able to offer a treatment targeting their particular symptoms.”

Source: University of Cambridge

Many Pilots Dodge Doctors to Keep Flying

Photo by Daniel Eledut on Unsplash

A survey of military and paid civilian pilots has revealed that they may avoid seeking medical advice out of fear of losing certification to fly. Two-thirds of military and paid civilian pilots answered “yes” to at least one of four survey questions on reluctance to seek formal medical advice about health problems, reported William R. Hoffman, MD, who presented a poster at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting.

Hoffman, a US Air Force employee, noted that both civilian and military pilots can be grounded if they have certain medical symptoms or diagnoses, with a range of negative repercussions for the pilot. As a result, pilots are disinclined to be truthful about their health if their employers or officials might find out.

In a previous survey of pilots led by Hoffman, more than three-quarters reported that they “felt worried about seeking medical care due to concern for their career or hobby.” The new survey probed this reluctance, with respondents asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the following:

  • Sought informal medical advice for fear of certificate loss
  • Flew despite experiencing a new symptom (physical or psychological) that warranted evaluation
  • Did not disclose prescription medication use
  • Misrepresented or withheld information on a written healthcare questionnaire for fear of certificate loss

Respondents to the web-based survey included 2383 nonprofessional civilian pilots, 1097 paid civilian pilots, and 261 military pilots.

Just over half of the unpaid civilian pilots denied ever hiding any of the four types of information. But that was true for only 33.6% of the paid civilian pilots and 32.2% of the military pilots.

Fortunately, among all respondents, only 6.8% said they had not disclosed prescription drug use as required, and just 16.8% acknowledged that they had kept new symptoms secret. But 45.7% acknowledged seeking informal advice in place of seeing a professional, and 26.8% said they had withheld or overtly misrepresented information on written forms. A few (2.2%) admitted to all four types of avoidance.

Female pilots reported slightly more avoidance of disclosure (62.0% of all female respondents vs 55.4% of men; P not reported). Younger pilots were also less open, especially those aged 25–40 (69.1% vs 40.7% in those older than 60). Union membership and active-duty military status were linked to high rates of avoidance (70.1% and 75.8%, respectively, vs 51.8% among non-unionised civilian and military reservist pilots).

Hoffman suggested that neurologists recognise that pilots may be shy about revealing their true health condition. “This might be mitigated through developing rapport with the pilot, asking questions about concerns related to their flying status, and clear communication about documentation and clinic course.”

Additionally, he recommended, “it is good technique to order only the necessary tests for all patients, to include pilots to avoid false positives.”

Despite this, medical professionals have an obligation to communicate a pilot’s health concerns to those responsible for evaluating fitness to fly.

Source: MedPage Today

Introducing The Wits Journal of Neuroscience – Inaugural Issue

Modern Media Publishing is pleased to announce the inaugural issue of the Wits Journal of Neuroscience*, a new academic journal aiming to connect those in the field of neuroscience and broaden its horizons in South Africa.

The journal is available online here, and will also have a print distribution.

The new publication will feature articles from clinician researchers in the fields of neurosurgery, neurology, ophthalmology and ears, nose and throat (ENT). The journal features original research and case reports and MMed articles selected by its distinguished editorial board. It also reports on local neuroscience news and events as well as international research highlights. Readers also get a peek behind the curtain at upcoming research.

Professor John R. Ouma, Head of Department of Neuroscience at Wits said, “The aim of this new journal is to fill a gap that has been existing, wherein there has not hitherto been a common platform for academicians and others interested in neurosciences to come together and share ideas as well as generate new science.

“This journal will be widely circulated within the Neuroscience community of this University and its associated hospitals, and then further afield to sister Universities, hospitals and entities to ensure that the ideas generated and expressed in it achieve the widest exposure and impact.

“We hope you enjoy it, both now, and in future editions.”

*The Wits Journal of Neuroscience is Produced and Distributed on behalf of the Wits Dept of Neuroscience by Modern Media Publishing (Pty) Ltd. They can be contacted on 011-326-4171 or by email on info@modernmedia.co.za