Rates of sexually transmitted infections have doubled among the over 45s in less than a decade, reveals research published ahead of print in the journal Sexually Transmitted Infections.

Women who reported having both a sexually transmitted disease (STD) and urinary tract infection (UTI) just before or during early pregnancy were four times more likely to have babies with gastroschisis—a severe birth defect in which infants are born with their intestines and other internal organs outside the abdomen, University of Utah researchers report in the online British Medical Journal.

Patients treated for locally advanced head and neck cancer may respond better to treatment with the addition of cetuximab to chemotherapy, according to a University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI) phase II study. The results will be presented at the 44th annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) in Chicago as an oral presentation.

At least one in four teens in the U.S.A. has a sexually transmitted disease (STD), shows the study released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

Using a new tool designed to measure a woman’s willingness to use a microbicide (topical gels designed to prevent the sexual transmission of HIV), researchers at The Miriam Hospital and Brown University found that women who have used protective methods in the past, and those with casual sexual partners were more willing to use a microbicide compared to their peers.

Many Australians are using not one but two contraceptive methods to prevent pregnancy and protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases.

Genetically engineered mice may hold the key to helping scientists from Queensland University of Technology and Harvard hasten the development of a vaccine to protect adolescent girls against the most common sexually transmitted disease, Chlamydia.

Health professionals are trying to cope with an explosion in the rate of chlamydia infections in Australia, particularly amongst young people. The sexually-transmitted disease, which can lead to infertility, often has no symptoms and poses a challenge for screening programs.

The Human Papillomavirus (HPV) is considered the cause of one of the most important sexually transmitted diseases nowadays, and affects both men and women. HPV is so common in our society that only people who have never had sexual relations can be sure that they have not been exposed to this disease.

Despite recommendations for annual preventive exams for adolescents, only 10 percent of teens have enough visits within 12 months to receive the recommended three shots needed for HPV vaccine. Ideally the three shots are delivered within six months, and only 1 percent of teens see their physicians that often.

New syphilis cases in the Houston area rose an unprecedented 28 percent in the first half of 2007, an increase the Houston Department of Health and Human Services (HDHHS) considers an outbreak.

New findings that one in 20 North Carolina men who have sex with men (MSM) reported using crystal methamphetamine during the previous month suggests increased risk for spreading HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STD), according to researchers from Wake Forest University School of Medicine and colleagues.