On the horizon: A pill to reverse effects of fat-laden eating

It's not perfected yet, but researchers at Sirtris Pharmaceuticals have discovered a compound that's reversing the effects of fat-rich diet--at least in mice. And they're saying it's 2 to 4 times more effective than the stuff (resveratrol, an SIRT1 activator) in grape skins and red wine--which is credited as one critical factor in the low rates of heart disease among other cultures, especially the French. But work has come far enough along that they're thinking they may be able to start human clinical trials next year. Diet-In-A-Pill May Be Step Closer.

Putting aside the thought of granting the common American wish to "supersize it" and stay skinny and healthy, the implications for treating diabetes are promising. Results so far indicate the substance reduces insulin levels in mice that are genetically prone to become obese--though not in others. Wow. A powerful diet pill that only works on those who need it. What will they think of next?

New Light on Why Some People Can't Handle Success

The idea that people often sabotage their own success gets some scientific backing in this study. Seems what you believe about your ability to improve your intelligence strongly affects how you react to both a) poor performance, and b) success.

People who are convinced they can improve reacted with improved performance after being told they had, in fact, improved their score on what they were told was an IQ test. People who think they are always going to have the same abilities got really nervous when they were told they had improved.

And now the kicker. When the first group, who believe they can get better, were told that their score on a second test had gone down, they got really nervous and actually performed worse on the next round!

This is good news for all those hundreds of life coaches appearing recently whose mission is to get people to change. All they have to do is convince their clients that all they need to do is change their underlying assumptions about their own abilities.

"Doctors Urged to Attack Obesity as a Disease State"

Drugs that can help people lose weight---great! That was my first reaction. But the more I read, the more I started questioning.

The big question on this issue seems to be, who's doing the urging? If doctors are getting pressured to agree to start prescribing expensive drugs to people who are overweight, and even to prescribe bariatric surgery, who has the most to gain? Will the insurance industry have a lower overall total output? Not likely, because much of the cost they might save on treating diseases linked to obesity will now be transferred to treating obesity itself. Will the health care industry's charges go down? Unlikely. Will patients who receive these drugs be able to permanently maintain the weight loss, or if they have relied on the drugs to help them lose weight but haven't learned new eating habits, how many will relapse---with untold further implications for their health?

And although it may appear at the end of every one of the MedPage today reports, I never noticed until now the disclaimer box at the end of the article announcing that the physician members of the panel doing this urging had to disclose possible conflicts of interess. The list of pharmaceutical companies they all mentioned is like a who's-who of the drug world---Accumetrics, AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, Merck & Co., Merck/Schering-Plough, and Schering Plough Pharmaceuticals. Abbott Laboratories, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly, Fournier, GlaxoSmithKline, Kos Pharmaceuticals, Pfizer, Sankyo, and sanofi-aventis.

If all these potential conficts of interest are real, what are the chances doctors might also get pressured to accept something else for following drug company "prescriptions" for how to practice medicine... Yeah, that disclaimer box makes me nervous. Continue to theAmerican Heart Association panel discussion on doctors being urged to attack obesity as a disease state.

Nano promises noninvasive cancer therapy - in Hematology/Oncology, Other Cancers

Some of the first forays into nanomedicine are looking pretty exciting. In an experiment with human liver cells, nanotubes inserted into cancer cells in vitro and heated up by radiofrequency fields have succeeded in eliminating the tumors completely. Progress in developing the therapy depends on targeting the nanotubes to hit just cancer cells within a living organism. Investigators are currently testing monoclonal antibodies, peptides, and other potential delivery vehicles for this purpose.

After decades of having no choice but to deliver treatments like chemotherapy and radiation that can't be targeted specifically at cancer cells, and having patients suffering a raft of unpleasant side effects, doctors must be pretty excited to think the day will soon come that they don't have to punish their patients with the treatment on top of what they're already suffering with the disease.