Referral management schemes pose a serious threat to patients' interests, argues Peter Lapsley, Chief Executive of the Skin Care Campaign, in this week's BMJ.

Trichomonas vaginalis colonises the urogenital tract and causes the infection also known as "trick", the most common non-viral STI.

Demonstration by St. Jude researchers that special niches made of capillaries protect and stimulate cancer stem cells in the brain explains the origin of these cancers and their reappearance following treatment

A tablet designed to emulate the healing power of the sun could be available for the treatment of advanced prostate cancer as early as 2009. But it remains to be seen whether the drug will be the revolution in prostate cancer care that its makers claim.

Northwestern University researchers have discovered a genetic cause of a mysterious neurological disease in which people have trouble recalling and using words. The illness, Primary Progressive Aphasia, differs from Alzheimer's Disease in which a person's memory becomes impaired. In PPA, a little known form of dementia, people lose the ability to express themselves and understand speech.

A hormone found naturally in the gut is the basis of a new drug to tackle obesity, one of three inaugural awards under the Wellcome Trust's Seeding Drug Discovery initiative. The drug is being developed by one of the world's leading obesity experts, Professor Steve Bloom at Imperial College London's Hammersmith Hospital campus.

Researchers have linked a structural protein called nestin to a particularly deadly form of breast cancer, identifying a new biomarker that could lead to earlier detection and better treatment.

An international team of researchers, led by Columbia University Medical Center, Boston University School of Medicine and the University of Toronto, has uncovered a major new gene - SORL1 - implicated in late-onset Alzheimer's disease.

Oral chemotherapy safety practices at US cancer centers: questionnaire survey BMJ Online First

A pattern of micro molecules can distinguish pancreatic cancer from normal and benign pancreatic tissue, new research suggests.

A new study on risk factors of new-onset diabetes mellitus (NODM) following liver transplant found that a history of obesity, impaired fasting glucose and hepatitis C infection (HCV) paired with the use of a particular immunosuppressant are associated with an increased risk of NODM. Since all of these factors can be detected prior to undergoing a transplant, treatment should be tailored to the patient's risk.

Researchers have confirmed a significant interaction between alcohol-problem severity and ethnicity.
Hispanics and blacks with higher-severity alcohol problems appear to utilize services at lower rates than whites with similar problems.
For Hispanics especially, this may be due in part to financial and logistical barriers to obtaining care.