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THURSDAY, Sept. 8, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- Buckingham Palace on Thursday announced that Britain's Queen Elizabeth II has been placed under medical supervision following "concern" from her doctors over her health. The queen, 96, is still residing at Balmoral Castle, her estate in the Scottish Highlands, and has not been placed under hospital care, the palace said in a statement.Still, on Tuesday the monarch appeared frail in a meeting with newly appointed Prime Minister Liz Truss, and on Wednesday she canceled a virtual meeting with her Privy Council, based on doctors' orders advising rest, the New York Times reported. “Following further evaluation this morning, the queen’s doctors are concerned for Her Majesty’s health and have recommended that she remain under medical...

THURSDAY, Sept. 8, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- While mental health care has become a full-blown crisis in the United States, a new study finds that psychiatric nurse practitioners are helping to fill the gap. The researchers discovered that the mental health system in the United States has become increasingly reliant on this particular category of specialists to meet the needs of Medicare patients as the numbers of psychiatrists accepting Medicare has dropped.“We were surprised by the degree to which PMHNPs [psychiatric mental health nurse practitioners] are the de facto mental health prescribers in parts of the country,” said corresponding study author Michael Barnett. He is an associate professor of health policy and management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, in...

THURSDAY, Sept. 8, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- While vitamin D got some attention early in the pandemic, it does not reduce the risk of either COVID-19 or other respiratory infections, two new clinical trials found. Both studies, one done in the United Kingdom and the other in Norway, found that boosting levels of vitamin D in adults during the pandemic didn’t help protect against respiratory viruses, even though byproducts from the vitamin have long been noted for their support of immune responses to viruses and bacteria.In the British trial, researchers included 6,200 people aged 16 and older who weren't taking vitamin D supplements at the start of the study.About half of the participants were tested for vitamin D levels as the trial began. About 86% of those had low levels and were...

THURSDAY, Sept. 8, 2022 (HealthDay News) – In a rare second review, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration panel on Wednesday recommended approval for an experimental drug for ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis). The FDA is not obligated to follow its advisors' recommendations, though it usually does.Wednesday's vote was 7-2 for approval. The same panel voted 6-4 last March not to approve the drug, called Albrioza (AMX0035), for the deadly neurodegenerative condition that’s also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Getting the drug approved has become a rallying cause for patients, their families and members of Congress, the Associated Press reported. They have contend that enough evidence exists to support Albrioza's safety and effectiveness in patients with a disease that has no...