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Doctors Who Care For Very Sick May Benefit From Pay-For-Performance
Physicians who treat patients with multiple health problems will fare well under pay-for-performance, which bases physician reimbursement on the quality of care provided, said researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Houston in a report in the current issue of the journal Circulation.
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Male Circumcision Does Not Appear To Reduce HIV Transmission Risk To Female Partners
Although several studies have shown that circumcision, removal of the foreskin which contains cells that are particularly susceptible to HIV, appears to reduce a man"s risk of contracting HIV from his female sex partner, it does not reduce the female sex partners" risk of contracting the virus, according to a study in the Lancet, Reuters reports. Maria Wawer of Johns Hopkins University and colleagues in Uganda followed 922 HIV-positive, uncircumcised men ages 15 to 49. Some of the men immediately underwent a circumcision, and some had the procedure two years later. The researchers also followed 163 female partners of the men.The researchers decided to end the study early when they found that male circumcision did not convey the expected benefits to women. The study also found that men"s partners were no less likely to contract other sexually transmitted infections, except for trichomonas.However, based on observational studies, researchers say that circumcision is so effective in protecting men that it will still likely benefit women indirectly by reducing circulation of the virus in general (Fox, Reuters, 7/16).
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Evaluation Of Suicide Prevention Training Supported By Recovery Funds
The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is using funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to provide grant support for the completion of a project under way to evaluate the effectiveness of a new training program for telephone crisis counselors at suicide hotline centers. The rollout of the new training program, which began in winter of 2008, offers an unrepeatable opportunity to assess the benefits of the training. The information could shape telephone-based suicide prevention services across the country.
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Secrets Of Scorpion Venom Revealed By Genetic Analysis

Transcriptomic tests have uncovered the protein composition of venom from the Scorpiops jendeki scorpion. Researchers writing in the open access journal BMC Genomics have carried out the first ever venom analysis in this arachnid, and discovered nine novel poison molecules, never before seen in any scorpion species. Yibao Ma worked with a team of researchers from Wuhan University, China, to study the sting of S. jendeki, a member of the family Euscorpiidae, which covers Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. He said, "Our work greatly expands the current knowledge of scorpion venoms. We found ten known types and nine novel venom peptides and proteins. These molecules provide a rich, hitherto-unexplored re for drug development as well as clues into the evolution of the scorpion venom arsenal". To humans, the sting of scorpions from the Euscorpiidae family tend to be quite mild - about as painful as a mosquito bite. S. jendeki venom has never been studied before. The researchers found that it contains ten known poisons, with markedly diverse modes of action and nine new types of venom peptide, whose biological effects are yet to be determined. The scorpion itself, however, is considered harmless - probably because it cannot deliver enough of the poison to cause any damage to a healthy human. Interestingly, neurotoxins, which are major poisons in the venom of another scorpion species that can kill humans, were not found in the S. jendeki venom. Ma concludes, "Many types of venom peptides and proteins have been obtained from diverse scorpion species. Some are widely distributed among scorpions from different families, while others, like some of those discovered in our study, appear to be restricted to particular scorpion lineages. The presence of these common and uncommon venom molecules among different lineages reflects the dynamic evolutionary process of the scorpion venom arsenal". Notes: Transcriptome analysis of the venom gland of the scorpion Scorpiops jendeki: implication for the evolution of the scorpion venom arsenal Yibao Ma, Ruiming Zhao, Yawen He, Songryong Li, Jun Liu, Yingliang Wu, Zhijian Cao and Wenxin Li. BMC Genomics (in press) http://www.biomedcentral.com/bmcgenomics/ Contact: Graeme Baldwin BioMed Central


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