Medicine & Health

A change in the formula of a frequently abused prescription painkiller has many abusers switching to a drug that is potentially more dangerous, according to School of Medicine researchers. Since the formula change makes inhaling or injecting the opioid drug OxyContin more difficult, many users are switching to heroin.

Scientists have assembled the most detailed chronology to date of the human brain’s long, slow slide into full-blown Alzheimer’s disease. Through an international research partnership known as the Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer’s Network (DIAN), scientists at Washington University and elsewhere evaluated pre-symptomatic markers of Alzheimer’s disease in subjects from families genetically predisposed to develop the disorder.

Children with a rare syndrome that includes a form of insulin-dependent diabetes have brain abnormalities that appear to set the stage for cognitive problems later in life, according to new research at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Scientists, including Tamara Hershey, PhD, had assumed those brain changes occurred late in the disease process, but the new findings suggest that some changes occur early in childhood.

Working in mice, surgeons and scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, have captured the first images of a beating heart at a resolution so detailed they can track individual immune cells swarming into the heart muscle, causing the inflammation that is so common after a heart attack or heart surgery.

Washington University Department of Pediatrics and St. Louis Children’s Hospital have been catapulted into the national spotlight by the simultaneous election of five pediatric faculty into the top national leadership roles in large and distinguished medical societies.

​Stem cells that come from a specific part of the developing brain help fuel the growth of brain tumors caused by an inherited condition, researchers, including David H. Gutmann, MD, PhD, at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis report.

Humans have known for centuries that copper is a potent weapon against infection. New research shows that the bacteria that cause serious urinary tract infections “know” this, too, and steal copper to prevent the metal from being used against them. Blocking this thievery with a drug may significantly improve patients’ chances of fighting off infections, according to researchers.

A blood test can predict whether patients are likely to die of a heart attack in the month after surgery, according to an international study involving thousands of patients.

Researchers led by Michael H. Tomasson, MD, at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown how an aggressive form of multiple myeloma resists chemotherapy. Multiple myeloma is a rare cancer of plasma cells in the bone marrow. Though the finding has no immediate benefit for patients, the scientists say it could help guide research into better treatments.

The survival of the Affordable Care Act in the Supreme Court presents a monumental moment to improve the U.S. health care system, says Elizabeth Sepper, JD, health law expert and associate professor of law at Washington University in St. Louis. “It is a uniquely American crisis that 50 million Americans don’t have health insurance and another 29 million are underinsured, meaning getting sick would ruin them financially even though they’ve been paying for insurance,” she says.