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Health - Pharmacology - 25.01.2023

New 3D ultrasound may improve accuracy of liver cancer treatment
Simulated study finds new robotic ultrasound system can optimize liver cancer ablation therapy By Lawson Health Research Institute, Special to Western News, January 25, 2023 By Lawson Health Research Institute, Special to Western News, January 25, 2023 A simulated study by researchers at Western University and Lawson Health Research Institute has found a new system that uses ultrasound to construct 3D-images could make treatment of liver cancer, using thermal ablation, more accurate.

Pharmacology - Computer Science - 11.01.2023

AI to fast-track drug formulation development
In a bid to reduce the time and cost associated with developing promising new medicines, University of Toronto scientists have successfully tested the use of artificial intelligence to guide the design of long-acting injectable drug formulations. The study, published this week in  Nature Communication , was led by Professor  Christine Allen  in the Leslie Dan Faculty of Pharmacy and  Alán Aspuru-Guzik  in the departments of chemistry and computer science in the Faculty of Arts & Science.

Pharmacology - Health - 09.01.2023

’Vaccination deserts’ identified in northern, rural and French-speaking Ontario
Pharmacist-administered vaccination sites unevenly distributed across Ontario New research out of the University of Waterloo has identified "vaccination deserts" in parts of northern and rural Ontario and in locations where French is predominantly spoken. These areas have little to no access to pharmacist-administered vaccination sites for COVID vaccines or the flu shot.

Health - Pharmacology - 06.01.2023

Older cancer patients would benefit from geriatric assessment screening
A new study led by the University of Toronto and its partner institutions has found that older adults - who account for more than 70 per cent of cancer diagnoses - would benefit from undergoing a geriatric assessment screening before they start chemotherapy. The study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology and led by Martine Puts , an associate professor in the Lawrence S. Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing, examines whether the use of the geriatric assessment and management (GAM) model in cancer patients would show an improvement in their quality of life.

Pharmacology - Health - 14.12.2022

Class of diabetes drugs cuts dementia risk in older adults
A class of medication for Type 2 diabetes may help older people with the condition reduce their risk of dementia. The findings are contained in a new study by Walter Swardfager , an assistant professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the Temerty Faculty of Medicine and a scientist in the Sandra Black Centre for Brain Resilience and Recovery at Sunnybrook Research Institute, and graduate student Che-Yuan (Joey) Wu.

Health - Pharmacology - 07.11.2022

National study suggests it’s time to rethink how we treat atrial fibrillation
Science, Health & Technology Brett Goldhawk Early intervention with catheter cryoablation can halt disease progression, reduce risk of serious health impacts A national study led by UBC researchers at the Centre for Cardiovascular Innovation is shedding light on how to more effectively treat atrial fibrillation (AF) - a common heart rhythm problem associated with increased risk of stroke and heart failure.

Pharmacology - Health - 06.07.2022

Rapid antibody test to gauge immune response to SARS-CoV-2 variants
COVID-19 infections are once again on the rise as our immune systems struggle to combat new variants. That's according to a University of Toronto study that found the antibodies generated by people who were vaccinated and/or recovered from COVID-19 prior to 2022 failed to neutralize the variants circulating today.

Pharmacology - Health - 23.06.2022

Cannabis self-medication: a solution that may create problems
Even if the evidence of the effectiveness of cannabis is still very scarce, Quebecers are self-prescribing products from this plant for health problems ranging from pain to shyness Anxiety, depression, insomnia, shyness, migraines, muscle spasms, pain, loss of appetite, loss of libido. These are some of the health problems for which Quebecers self-prescribe cannabis, even though no reliable scientific study has yet demonstrated its effectiveness for these uses.

Health - Pharmacology - 15.06.2022

Opioid use disorder: flexible treatment at home proves effective
A pan-Canadian team announces initial results of the national OPTIMA study comparing the efficacy of two models of care for treating opioid use disorder. Did you know that more than 26,500 Canadians died from opioid intoxication between January 2016 and September 2021? Or that more than 350,000 people who used drugs containing opioids to relieve their pain did so problematically? In Quebec alone, 339 people died from opioid intoxication between January and September 2021, according to the latest data from the Public Health Agency of Canada.

Pharmacology - Health - 14.06.2022

Current hepatitis B prevention and treatment strategies are inadequate to meet Ontario’s targets
HBV vaccination, screening, and treatment strategies are often logistically challenging and expensive By A new University of Waterloo study shows that current Hepatitis B vaccination, screening, and treatment strategies in Ontario will leave the province well short of its goal to reduce preventable infections that afflict 1,000 Ontarians annually.

Health - Pharmacology - 02.06.2022

Decoding the language of immune responses
Researchers from McGill University and the US National Cancer Institute (NCI) have made some surprising discoveries about our immune system. By using mathematical modelling to look at specific aspects of immune responses in mice and humans, their data-driven approach, described in a recent article in Science, reveals that immune responses may exist on a finer spectrum than had previously been believed.

Health - Pharmacology - 25.05.2022

Blood biomarker predicts complicated Crohn’s disease years before diagnosis: Study
An international team led by a University of Toronto researcher has found that an antibody in the blood predicts severe Crohn's disease and is detectable up to seven years prior to disease diagnosis. Crohn's disease is a chronic inflammatory condition of the intestine for which simple and effective biomarkers prior to diagnosis are lacking.

Health - Pharmacology - 18.05.2022

Significant gains from computer-based depression treatment
A new international collaborative study, involving multiple institutions including Western University, has found computer-based cognitive behavioural therapy (CCBT) has significantly greater impact in treating depression among adults than treatment as usual (TAU).

Health - Pharmacology - 11.05.2022

Discovery reveals blocking inflammation may lead to chronic pain
Using anti-inflammatory drugs and steroids to relieve pain could increase the chances of developing chronic pain, according to researchers from McGill University and colleagues in Italy. Their research puts into question conventional practices used to alleviate pain. Normal recovery from a painful injury involves inflammation and blocking that inflammation with drugs could lead to harder-to-treat pain.

Health - Pharmacology - 02.05.2022

Catching COVID-19 during pregnancy increases risk of hospitalization, premature birth: national study
Science, Health & Technology Brett Goldhawk As Canada faces a sixth wave of COVID-19 infections, researchers at the UBC faculty of medicine are urging people who are pregnant to remain vigilant based on data from Canada's first national, peer-reviewed study on COVID-19 in pregnancy. The findings, published today in JAMA , show that pregnant people who catch COVID-19 are at greater risk of being hospitalized, being admitted to intensive care units (ICUs) and experiencing an early birth.

Health - Pharmacology - 28.04.2022

New drug shows promise slowing tumour growth in some hard-to-treat cancers
Scientists at Sinai Health and the University of Toronto say a new drug designed to block an enzyme essential for the survival of certain cancer cells shows promise in curbing tumour growth. The preclinical findings,  published this month in the journal  Nature , describe a new drug designed with CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing technology in the lab of  Daniel Durocher , a senior investigator at Sinai Health's  Lunenfeld-Tanenbaum Research Institute  (LTRI) and a professor of molecular genetics in University of Toronto's Temerty Faculty of Medicine.

Health - Pharmacology - 21.04.2022

Health research overlooks important differences between sexes
Q&As Erik Rolfsen You might be surprised to learn how rarely health research accounts for the fact that male and female bodies are different. Researchers from UBC's women's health research cluster and department of psychology have published an analysis of 3,193 neuroscience and psychiatry studies from 2009 and 2019.

Health - Pharmacology - 07.04.2022

U.S. insurance claims show strong link between ED medications and vision problems
Science, Health & Technology Erik Rolfsen The risk of developing one of three serious eye conditions increases by 85 per cent for regular users of common erectile dysfunction (ED) medications such as Viagra, Cialis, Levitra and Stendra, new UBC research has found. Two of the three conditions had previously been linked to ED medications only by anecdotal case studies.

Pharmacology - Life Sciences - 16.03.2022

Largest ever psychedelics study maps changes of conscious awareness to neurotransmitter systems
Applying machine learning to a database of testimonials uncovers how drug-induced changes in subjective awareness are mechanistically rooted in the human brain Psychedelics are now a rapidly growing area of neuroscience and clinical research, one that may produce much-needed new therapies for disorders such as depression and schizophrenia.

Health - Pharmacology - 10.03.2022

Low COVID vaccine uptake linked to housing insecurity
By the end of September 2021, uptake of COVID-19 vaccines among adults with a recent experience of housing insecurity were 25 per cent lower than the adult population of Ontario for a first dose, and 34 per cent lower for a second dose, according to a new study. Published in The Lancet Public Health , the study is the first in Canada to examine vaccination rates among persons experiencing homelessness.