Connecting Research and Experts with Journalists

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Physicians give less compassionate nonverbal cues when treating seriously ill black patients compared with their white counterparts, a small University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine trial revealed. It is the first to look at such interactions in a time-pressured, end-of-life situation.

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While the proportion of adults with severe obesity using prescription opioids initially declines in the months after bariatric surgery, it increases within a matter of years, eventually surpassing pre-surgery rates of patients using the potentially addictive pain medications, according to new research from a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded multicenter study led by the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health.

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Researchers have discovered a clue that could unlock the potential of immunotherapy drugs to successfully treat more cancers. The findings, published in Cell, were made in mice and showed that targeting a sub-population of immune cells called regulatory T cells could be an effective approach to treating cancers. The findings also point to what could be an important mechanism by which current immunotherapy drugs work, providing clues to making them more effective.

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Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Toronto have uncovered the first molecular steps that lead to immune system activation and eventual rejection of a transplanted organ.

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The connection between slowed walking speed and declining mental acuity appears to arise in the right hippocampus, a finger-shaped region buried deep in the brain at ear-level, according to a 14-year study conducted by scientists at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health.

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The majority of reproductive-age and pregnant women who use opioids for non-medical purposes also use at least one other substance, ranging from nicotine or alcohol to cocaine, according to a University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health analysis. It was the first to look at use of multiple substances in a nationally representative group of US women age 18 to 44.

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New findings have important clinical implications, suggesting that corticosteroids, the main treatment for asthma, may worsen the disease in this group of patients.

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The scientific textbook depiction of the flu virus is about to get a facelift, due to a University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine team’s discovery that a model of the influenza genome architecture untouched since the 1970s isn’t so perfect after all. The finding could give scientists the opportunity to better predict pandemics and find new ways to disrupt the flu virus.

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A pattern of escalating marijuana use in adolescents is linked to higher rates of depression and lower educational accomplishments in adulthood.

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A woman’s race and where on her body she packs on pounds at midlife could give her doctor valuable clues to her likelihood of having greater volumes of heart fat, a potential risk factor for heart disease, according to new research led by the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health.