Mayo Clinic
Certain cells from a mother persist in their children's bodies and can provoke an immune response in which the child's body attacks itself, according to Mayo Clinic research. The findings are important not only in seeking the cause and treatments of this disease, but also in understanding an entire class of autoimmune disorders. Juvenile dermatomyositis (der-mat-o-my-o-SITE-us), or JDM, is a rare muscle-damaging condition that causes a child's immune system to attack the body, as if it were an invading life form. Muscles deteriorate and the child becomes weak and fragile. There is no cure for JDM. Current treatments include medication, physical therapy and added nutrition.
Researchers have shown that chronic sinusitis is an immune disorder caused by fungus, opening up a promising new avenue for treating this ubiquitous and debilitating condition, for which there is no FDA-approved therapy. Results of their research suggest that common airborne fungi lodge in the mucus lining of the sinuses in most people, but initiate an immune response only in individuals prone to chronic sinusitis. The immune response causes the fungi to be attacked, which leads to damage of the sinus membranes, resulting in full-blown symptoms.
An initial Mayo Clinic study has confirmed the effectiveness and durability over time of a patient-friendly, robot-assisted procedure that corrects a complication that can follow hysterectomy. The study, published in the February issue of Urology, is the first in the United States to examine the feasibility of using this method to repair vaginal vault prolapse, or collapsed vaginal walls. "The benefit to the patient is dramatic," says Daniel Elliott, M.D., Mayo Clinic urologist and one of the lead study authors. "It's fast, markedly less painful and a strong repair, with much quicker recovery."
Cancer researchers have developed a way to biologically fuse living cells through the use of a genetically engineered cell membrane. This process, which the researchers call "biofusion," could speed development of new tumor treatments and cancer vaccines. The researchers report their new process kills cancer tumor cells, based on their successful treatment of mice into which human cancers were implanted.
In the most comprehensive study of how multiple sclerosis (MS) symptoms change over time, Mayo Clinic researchers have found that less than half of patients studied developed worsening disability within 10 years. Knowing how the symptoms of MS change over time provides good news for patients newly diagnosed with MS, who may feel the disease leads to inevitable and uniform decline in physical functioning. It also offers vital information for public health planners charged with meeting future needs of MS patients.
Researchers have identified a new member of the important B7 family of immune system "co-stimulators." Co-stimulators are molecules that are capable of turning the immune system on or off -- and in the process, profoundly affecting human health. Mayo Clinic researchers named this newest molecule B7-H4. It inhibits the action of T cells, the immune system warriors whose basic job is to attack invaders. Turning off T cells helps transplant patients accept foreign organs. But turning off T cells harms cancer patients -- their tumors continue to grow without defensive attacks by T cells. The Mayo Clinic report appears in the June 17 issue of Immunity.
Mayo Clinic researchers have identified a naturally occurring "good guy" for patients infected with HIV. It is a helpful gene mutation that impairs the HIV virus' cell-killing machinery, thus preserving immune system function. Moreover, Mayo's experiments in mice suggest that the presence or absence of this mutation in the gene known as Vpr may play a central role in determining which HIV-infected patients develop full-blown, fatal AIDS.
Mayo Clinic yesterday received broad patent coverage for a new treatment of chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS), commonly called "sinus infection," a disease that annually affects 32 million adults in the United States and currently has no Food and Drug Administration-approved treatment. Studies at Mayo Clinic have found the cause of CRS -- a reaction to certain fungi -- and demonstrated that the delivery of antifungal drugs directly into the nose and sinuses is safe and significantly reduces patients? symptoms. Improvements in asthma symptoms were noted in the same patient group. Past medical treatments for chronic sinus infections have been unsuccessful or produced severe side effects.
A Mayo Clinic study is the first to show that for some patients with early stage multiple myeloma, the drug thalidomide may effectively delay the need for chemotherapy or more aggressive treatment for as much as two years. Multiple myeloma is an incurable cancer of the bone marrow. The final results of the nonrandomized phase II clinical trial were published today in the April issue of the journal Leukemia. Because of the promising indications, preliminary findings were released about a year ago.
A long-term study of patients in Rochester, Minn., with the eating disorder anorexia nervosa found that their survival rates did not differ from the expected survival rates of others of the same age and sex. The results, published in the March issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, add to the knowledge of anorexia nervosa and point to other areas that need greater study from researchers. "Although our data suggest that overall mortality is not increased among community patients with anorexia nervosa in general, these findings should not lead to complacency in clinical practice because deaths do occur," says L. Joseph Melton, III, M.D., Mayo Clinic epidemiologist and an author of the report.
A national study indicates that patients who have had previous colorectal cancer and take 325 milligrams of aspirin each day -- the equivalent of one adult aspirin -- may lower the risk of developing new colon polyps by 35 percent. Polyps appear to be precursors to most colorectal cancers. The double-blind study randomly assigned half of the 635 patients who previously had colorectal cancer to an aspirin treatment group. The other half received a placebo or sugar pill. The results of the study will be published in the March 6, 2003, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.
Over one-half of golfers affected by the "yips" report symptoms that strongly suggest a physical rather than psychological origin of the problem, according to findings of a Mayo Clinic study published in the most recent issue of Sports Medicine. The 'yips' is a condition that involves a tremor, freezing or involuntary jerking of the hands when attempting golf shots, particularly short putts. Previous research has indicated it adds nearly five strokes to an affected golfer's 18-hole score.
A new Mayo Clinic study shows that the fears of many related to living into one's 90s and beyond -- getting lost in your own neighborhood; losing the ability to take care of financial affairs; having a driver's license revoked; ending up in a nursing home -- are in many cases unfounded. This research, to be published in the Feb. 11 issue of Neurology, demonstrates that for many age 90 and above, memory can be strikingly sharp even up to one century of age.
An interruption in normal breathing patterns during sleep which is often seen in heart failure patients may contribute to heart failure rather than just being a result, according to findings of a Mayo Clinic study.
"We are now finding that central sleep apnea, which has been previously understood as a symptom of heart failure, may contribute to the development of heart failure in people at risk," said the study's lead researcher.
Researchers have produced the first laboratory evidence to show that a cell's possession of an abnormal numbers of chromosomes contributes to the development of cancers. Their report on the role of this chromosomal instability, known as aneuploidy, appears in today's online edition of the Feb. 3 Journal of Cell Biology. Because 85 percent of human cancer cells possess an abnormal number of chromosomes, researchers have long been curious about the role of aneuploidy in the multistep cancer process.
