A new therapy for Parkinson’s cancels out brain signals causing the characteristic tremors.

A new therapy could help suppress tremors in people with Parkinson’s disease, an Oxford University study suggests.
The technique

Tufts University School of Engineering researchers have demonstrated silk-based implantable optics that offer significant improvement in tissue imaging while simultaneously enabling photo thermal therapy, administering drugs and monitoring drug delivery. The devices also lend themselves to a variety of other biomedical functions.
Biodegradable and biocompatible, these tiny mirror-like devices dissolve harmlessly at predetermined rates and require no surgery to remove them.
The technology is the brainchild of a research team led by Fiorenzo Omenetto, Frank C. Doble Professor of Engineering at Tufts. For several years, Omenetto; David L. Kaplan, Stern Family Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering chair, and their colleagues have been exploring ways to leverage silk’s optical capabilities with its capacity as a resilient, biofriendly material that can stabilise materials while maintaining their biochemical functionality.
‘This work showcases the potential of silk to bring together form and function. In this case an implantable optical form — the mirror — can go beyond imaging to serve multiple biomedical functions,’ Omenetto says.
To create the optical devices, the Tufts bioengineers poured a purified silk protein solution into moulds of multiple micro-sized prism reflectors, or microprism arrays (MPAs). They pre-determined the rates at which the devices would dissolve in the body by regulating the water content of the solution during processing. The cast solution was then air dried to form solid silk films in the form of the mould. The resulting silk sheets were much like the reflective tape found on safety garments or on traffic signs.
When implanted, these MPAs reflected back photons that are ordinarily lost with reflection-based imaging technologies, thereby enhancing imaging, even in deep tissue.
The researchers tested the devices using solid and liquid ‘phantoms’ (materials that mimic the scattering that occurs when light passes through human tissue). The tiny mirror-like devices reflected substantially stronger optical signals than implanted silk films that had not been formed as MPAs.
The Tufts researchers also demonstrated the silk mirrors

People who receive primary care from free clinics are less likely to use the emergency department for minor issues, according to a team of medical researchers.

Nationally, the number of emergency departments (EDs) has decreased yet the number of ED visits has gone up, the team reported. Therefore, it is important to figure out how to reduce unnecessary ED visits.

According to the National Association of Free and Charitable Clinics, there are more than 1,200 free clinics nationwide. Many of these clinics work in co-operation with one of their local hospitals.

Wenke Hwang, associate professor of public health sciences at Penn State College of Medicine, and his colleagues analysed records of uninsured patients from five hospitals and four free clinics across neighbouring Virginia communities.

Over three years, 52,010 individual uninsured patients visited at least one of the hospitals’ five emergency departments a total of 99,576 times. The researchers found that approximately 10 percent of those ED visits were by patients who had been treated at free clinics associated with the hospitals in the first two years studied

Hwang compared the diagnoses at the time of admittance to the emergency department between the free clinic patients and the non-free clinic patients. The five most common diagnoses were identical for both groups — sprains and strains, disorders of teeth and jaw, superficial injury or contusion, abdominal pain and back problems. The secondary diagnoses were not as similar for the two groups, but the researchers found mental health and substance abuse to be the most common underlying condition for both groups of uninsured patients.

‘Emergency department visits by free clinic patients were less likely to require the lowest levels of care, suggesting uninsured free clinic users were less likely to use the emergency department as their primary care provider,’ the researchers wrote.

The researchers determined that half of the ED visits in this study were avoidable, using the measurements the hospitals themselves use. By providing primary care for the uninsured, free clinics are able to help reduce non-emergency visits to the ED.

‘The emergency department is an extremely expensive and inefficient way to handle many problems that show up there,’ said Hwang. ‘If hospitals support local free clinics, the ED will be less crowded and therefore have less need for expensive expansions. Free clinics are the cheaper solution.’ Penn State University

Two novel radiolabelled small molecules targeting prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA) have excellent potential for further development as diagnostic and therapeutic radiopharmaceuticals, according to research. The imaging agents