John Bedolla has dedicated his career to understanding how people make choices. An expert in diagnosing rare and unpredictable diseases, he develops evidence-based decision-making strategies — what he calls software for the brain — that doctors use to solve difficult problems.
“The most powerful tool in medicine is the clinician’s mind,” said Bedolla, assistant director of research education and assistant professor of emergency medicine at Dell Medical School. “New technologies, tests, and procedures — those might affect clinical outcomes 10 or 20 percent of the time. But if you can change a doctor’s cognitive approach to care, you can improve the outcomes of every patient they see.”
New Hepatitis C Drugs Might Eliminate the Disease
Newer treatments for hepatitis C appear to eliminate the virus in the vast majority of those taking oral antiviral medications, raising the hope that this disease might someday be eradicated in the United States.
The oral medications "work really well in most patients that have hepatitis C," said Dr. Oluwaseun Falade-Nwulia, the study's lead author. She's an assistant professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.
U.S. Vaccine Guidelines for Flu, HPV Updated
Roll up your sleeves, America. A national advisory panel of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has released its 2017 advisory for recommended shots affecting adults.
Time Outdoors May Deliver Better Sleep
Spending time in the outdoors may improve your sleep, a small study suggests.
Researchers found that a week of winter camping reset the body's "clock" to be more in tune with nature's light-and-dark cycle. The result was longer sleep.
Matters of the Heart
As American Heart Month kicks off, doctors at Baylor College of Medicine have answers to some commonly asked questions to help jump starting your path to a healthy heart.
Gestational Diabetes a Risk Factor for Postpartum Depression: Study
Gestational diabetes and a previous bout of depression can increase a first-time mother's risk of postpartum depression, a new study suggests.
Fighting sickle cell disease using a type 2 diabetes medication
Sickle cell disease and the blood disorder beta thalassemia affect more than 180,000 Americans and millions more worldwide. Both diseases can be made milder or even cured by increasing fetal hemoglobin (HbF) levels, but current treatment to ramp up HbF is limited in its effectiveness. Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Cancer and Hematology Centers have discovered a gene, FOXO3, involved in controlling fetal hemoglobin production and were able to target the gene and “turn on” fetal hemoglobin levels in patient samples in the lab using the diabetes drug metformin. This offers promising new treatments – the first new drug treatment for sickle cell disease in 30 years and the first ever for beta thalassemia.
Quick test helps identify frailty in bedbound elderly
Falls and fall-related injuries are a common concern in older adults and can have significant consequences. For older adults who are hospitalized for ground-level falls, their level of frailty can be an important indicator of adverse health outcomes upon discharge. Experts at Baylor College of Medicine and the University of Arizona recently developed a 20-second upper-extremity function test to help identify frailty in this group of adults and found that the test can be used in the trauma setting to predict adverse outcomes in older adults after discharge. Their report appeared in the journal Gerontology.