Posts Tagged ‘Medicare’
Home, it’s more than brick-and-mortar, wood, or even blocks of ice shaped in a dome! Home is your place, your retreat from the world, your sanctuary for the soul. For me, home is all of those things and toilets to clean, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Everyone should have an opportunity to live in a decent, affordable home. No one should have to worry about being able to find a safe place to live.
On July 12, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced that more than $550 million will be made available in housing assistance to very low income elderly and persons with disabilities. The funding will provide interest-free capital advances to non-profit developers so they can produce accessible housing, offer rental assistance, and provide supportive services.
Nine health research centers have received funds to develop ways to reduce the time it takes for clinical research to become treatments for patients. The funds were awarded as part of the Clinical and Translational Science Awards (CTSA) program which is led by the National Center for Research Resources (NCRR), part of the National Institutes of Health.
Investigators have made a major advance in treating people with a severe form of vasculitis, anti-neutrophil cytoplasmic antibody (ANCA)-associated vasculitis, a rare but devastating disease of blood vessels. In a six-month study, a new treatment strategy provided the same benefits as the current standard of care used for more than 40 years but required less frequent treatments. Early results also suggest that patients with disease relapses — typically recurrences of fever, fatigue, kidney damage, or bleeding in the lungs — respond better to the new regimen.
National Institutes of Health researchers and grantees have found that gene variants in APOL1, more common in African Americans, come with both health risk and reward, as reported in the July 15 online issue of Science.
The National Institutes of Health, an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Wellcome Trust, a global charity based in London, today announced a partnership to support population-based genetic studies in Africa of common, non-communicable disorders such as heart disease and cancer, as well as communicable diseases such as malaria. The studies, to be conducted by African researchers, will utilize genetic, clinical and epidemiologic screening tools that identify hereditary and non-hereditary components that contribute to the risk of illnesses.
It’s late at night, the TV’s on and you see a commercial. It tells you that if you just buy this wonderful book, you’ll learn the secrets to get free money from the government to pay your credit card bills, renovate your home, and start a business!
It sounds so wonderful, but is it too good to be true? Yes, it’s too good to be true.
In people with longstanding type 2 diabetes who are at high risk for heart attack and stroke, lowering blood sugar to near-normal levels did not delay the combined risk of diabetic damage to kidneys, eyes, or nerves, but did delay several other signs of diabetic damage, a study has found.
The intensive glucose treatment was compared with standard glucose control. These findings are from the NIH-funded Action to Control Cardiovascular Risk in Diabetes (ACCORD) trial. Although intensive treatment produced some beneficial changes, this approach was reported in 2008 to increase death rates.
Recently the Oprah Winfrey show featured a multiple part series on debt called Debt Diet. The series emphasizes how Americans are drowning in debt and not saving enough. The show offers an action plan to help families get out of debt. The series follows three families as they wrangle with trying to implement the step by step action plan to reduce their debt.
It is critical that you know how much debt you really have and how much you are spending. If you have too much debt, you need to get your spending under control and manage your credit cards better. It may be a matter of teaching yourself to say “NO” to new purchases and to follow a spending plan. Or, you may need to explore new ways to increase your income.
Scientists from across the nation will gather June 3-4 to discuss what is known about sickle cell trait and the potential health implications related to this genetic blood condition. “Framing the Research Agenda for Sickle Cell Trait” will examine the ethical, legal, social, and public health impacts of the blood condition.