The Korea Herald

Skin transplant gives patients new lease of life

Nov 10, 2011

DETROIT ― Adil Siddiqui was reluctant to go out in public because he thought everybody was staring at the patches of white skin on his face. Siddiqui suffers from vitiligo, an autoimmune skin disease that affects about 2 million Americans. The white patches appear when pigment cells, called melanocytes, are attacked and destroyed by the body’s immune system. The reason is a mystery. The white p...
Study stirs debate over transplants for alcoholics

Nov 10, 2011

CHICAGO (AP) ― Some gravely ill alcoholics who need a liver transplant shouldn’t have to prove they can stay sober for six months to get one, doctors say in a study that could intensify the debate over whether those who destroy their organs by drinking deserve new ones. In the small French study, the vast majority of the patients who got a liver without the wait stopped drinking after their surg...
Using your lunch break to get in shape

Nov 10, 2011

More office workers use free time during their workdays for exercise If your hectic work schedule is stressing you out and you cannot squeeze in time for exercise, it might be time to consider taking advantage of your lunch break. More people are now investing their lunch time in exercise, from simply taking a walk to weight training. Kim Ji-hye, a 35-year-old office worker at a financial inst...
Depression may be linked to dementia later

Nov 10, 2011

U.S. researchers say a chemical marker that binds to plaque and tangle deposits indicates dementia may be linked to major depressive disorder in older people. "This is the first study using [the marker] FDDNP to assess the abnormal protein levels in brains of older adults with severe depression," Dr. Gary Small, the Parlow-Solomon professor on aging at the University California, Los Angeles, sai...
New drug zaps fat cells in monkeys

Nov 10, 2011

WASHINGTON (AFP) - An experimental drug helped obese monkeys lose 11 percent of their extra weight in a month, a promising sign in the hunt for obesity drugs that could apply to humans, US researchers said Wednesday. The drug, known as Adipotide, works by attacking the blood supply of a certain kind of fat, known as white adipose tissue, that tends to accumulate under the skin and around the bel...
Babies on obesity path? New sign may offer answer

Nov 9, 2011

CHICAGO (AP) — Researchers say there's a new way to tell if infants are likely to become obese later on: Check to see if they've passed two key milestones on doctors' growth charts by age 2. Babies who grew that quickly face double the risk of being obese at age 5, compared with peers who grew more slowly, their study found. Rapid growers were also more likely to be obese at age 10, and infants ...
Cheonggyecheon stream in Seoul polluted with bacteria

Nov 8, 2011

A popular stream running through downtown Seoul, which is visited by millions of people annually, has been severely polluted by bacteria, a report by the city government showed Tuesday. According to the report, submitted to the Seoul council member Jang Hwan-jin of the Democratic Party, parts of the Cheonggyecheon stream contain as many as 53 times the legal limit of colon bacillus. The standard...
Smallpox vaccine extends life in cancer trial

Nov 7, 2011
KFDA warns against ‘smart pill’ abuse

Nov 3, 2011

The Korea Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday issued a warning against so-called “smart pills” that contain narcotics. According to the drug agency, the pills prescribed to treat attention deficit hyperactive disorder are often used by students to ward of sleepiness and enhance concentration. However, the main ingredient of the drug, methylphenidate, can cause anxiety and depression as well...
Seonam to look after N. Korean defectors

Nov 3, 2011

Seonam Hospital will take care of North Korean defectors as part of efforts to help them settle in South Korea and enhance their health, the hospital said Tuesday. The hospital has allied with Hana Center, a state-run institution to assist settlement of North Korean defectors in South Korean society, to provide them with medical care. The hospital will reorganize itself to better treat North Ko...
Cancer’s most isolated patients: Adolescents and young adults

Nov 3, 2011

LOS ANGELES ― She has had four surgeries to remove her thyroid, parathyroid and vocal cord nerve, along with muscle and tissue. Once a year, she goes to a hospital and swallows a radioactive iodine capsule to attack the remaining cancer cells ― and then remains in isolation for four days. During what she calls her quarantine, she can’t touch ― or even be in the same room as ― anyone else. The tr...
Bed-wetting in children

Nov 3, 2011

Bed-wetting (also called nighttime or nocturnal enuresis) is fairly common among children and is often just a stage in their development. Children learn to control daytime urination as they become aware of their bladder filling. Once this occurs, the child learns to consciously control his or her bladder. This generally occurs by age 4. Nighttime bladder control usually takes longer and is not ...
U.S. deaths from painkiller overdoses triple in a decade

Nov 3, 2011

NEW YORK (AP) ― The number of overdose deaths from powerful painkillers more than tripled over a decade, the government reported Tuesday ― a trend that a U.S. health official called an epidemic, but one that can be stopped. Prescription painkillers such as OxyContin, Vicodin and methadone led to the deaths of almost 15,000 people in 2008, including actor Heath Ledger. That’s more than three time...
Beware of carpal tunnel syndrome

Nov 3, 2011

Doctors advise cyclists to rest their wrists occasionally while riding Thirty-five-year-old Park rides a bicycle to work every day. He started to commute by bike in March and his mileage so far tops 10,000 kilometers. In the beginning, things seemed to progress smoothly. He lost weight and felt healthier. But recently, he began experiencing numbness around his wrists. The pain grew so severe an...
FDA approves innovative, non-invasive heart valve

Nov 3, 2011

WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal health officials have approved a first-of-a-kind artificial heart valve that can be implanted without major surgery, offering a new treatment option for patients who are too old or frail for the chest-cracking procedure currently used. The Food and Drug Administration said late Wednesday it approved Edwards Lifesciences' Sapien heart valve, which can be threaded into pl...