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THURSDAY, July 7, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- Could ADHD drugs also treat degenerative brain disorders, such as Alzheimer's disease?British researchers say there is good evidence that some medications used for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) — known as noradrenergic drugs — might also help treat key aspects of Alzheimer's. "Repurposing of established noradrenergic drugs is most likely to offer effective treatment in Alzheimer's disease for general cognition [thinking skills] and apathy," the study authors reported. "There is a strong rationale for further, targeted clinical trials of noradrenergic treatments in Alzheimer's disease."Led by Dr. Michael David of the UK Dementia Research Institute in London, the study team reviewed results of 19 clinical trials conducted...

THURSDAY, July 7, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- Getting a blood cancer diagnosis is devastating for young people, but it is also far more deadly if the patient is Black, new research shows.The new study, which looked at outcomes for patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), highlights an urgent need to understand racial and ethnic differences, as well as the inequities in diagnosis, treatment and care between Black and white patients. It was published July 5 in Blood Advances."We found that among young Black and white patients who received similar intensive therapy on clinical trials, outcomes were dramatically inferior for Black patients compared with white patients -- and this disparity occurred predominantly among patients aged 18 to 29 years," said lead author Dr. Karilyn Larkin, a...

THURSDAY, July 7, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- An array of problems, including overcrowding, led to a surge of COVID-19 cases in California prisons in 2020-2021, a new report details. Preventing outbreaks in the future will require a comprehensive list of fixes, from reducing overcrowding in the state’s 34 adult prisons to improving old buildings. Vaccination drives and methods for rapid detection are also necessary, researchers said."We found that many California prison officials and staff did heroic work under incredibly difficult circumstances," said study co-author Dr. Brie Williams, a professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco. "But in many cases, it still wasn’t enough," Williams said.When the U.S. national COVID-19 emergency was declared in March 2020, the...

WEDNESDAY, July 6, 2022 (HealthDay News) -- Can someone really die of a broken heart?If that person has serious heart disease, new Swedish research suggests the answer may well be yes.After analyzing almost three decades worth of data on nearly half a million heart failure patients, investigators concluded that those who had been struck by the grief that comes with losing a loved one faced a 5% to 20% spike in their risk of dying from heart failure over the following four years.The findings may call for increased attention from family members, friends and doctors for bereaved heart failure patients, especially right after the loss, said study author Krisztina László. She is an associate professor in the department of global public health with the Karolinska Institute in...