Medicine & Health

​Restoring function after spinal cord injury, which damages the connections that carry messages from the brain to the body and back, depends on forming new connections between the surviving nerve cells. With a five-year, nearly $1.7-million grant from the National Institutes of Health, Shelly Sakiyama-Elbert, PhD, professor of biomedical engineering in the School of Engineering & Applied Science, is using novel methods to study how these nerve cells grow and make new connections to reroute signals that could restore function and movement in people with these debilitating injuries.

Factors associated with the prevalence of diabetes vary by geographic region in the United States, according to new research from the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis led by J. Aaron Hipp, PhD. The findings suggest that approaches to combating the disease should be localized.

A Washington University drug discovery program, led by Michael Holtzman, MD, has received three grants totaling more than $5 million to develop new medical therapeutics for respiratory diseases. The target illnesses range from the common cold to life-threatening lung disease.

New research shows that the hormonal intrauterine device (IUD) and the contraceptive implant remain highly effective one year beyond their approved duration of use, according to a study at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

Shin-ichiro Imai, MD, PhD, is a professor of developmental biology and of medicine at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Over the past three decades, his research has shed light on the processes of aging and longevity as he has sought to help people maintain better health into later years.

A mosquito-borne virus that has spread to the Caribbean and Central and South America and has caused isolated infections in Florida often causes joint pain and swelling similar to that seen in patients with rheumatoid arthritis, according to new research from the School of Medicine.

Women whose bodies have high levels of chemicals found in plastics, personal-care products, common household items and the environment experience menopause two to four years earlier than women with lower levels of these chemicals, according to a new study.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved for testing in people a nanoparticle-based imaging agent jointly developed at the School of Medicine and collaborating institutions. The imaging agent may illuminate dangerous plaque in arteries, and doctors hope to use it to identify patients at high risk of stroke.

A new tool kit for dissemination and implementation, developed by the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute in Washington, D.C., prominently features the work of several university faculty members, including the groundbreaking 2012 book, “Dissemination and Implementation Research in Health: Translating Science to Practice.”

Analyzing every marijuana-related Twitter message sent during a one-month period in early 2014, researchers at the School of Medicine have found that the “Twitterverse” is a pot-friendly place. In that time, more than 7 million tweets referenced marijuana, with 15 times as many pro-pot tweets sent as anti-pot tweets.