Health Highlights: Jan. 4, 2010
Jan. 5 -- Here are some of the latest health and medical news developments, compiled by the editors of HealthDay:
Leukemia Vaccine Shows Promise
British scientists say they've developed a vaccine that stops leukemia from returning after chemotherapy treatment or a bone marrow transplant.
The vaccine -- created by genetically manipulating cells from the patient's blood -- activates the body's immune system to fight against a recurrence of cancer cells, said the London Telegraph, according to CBS News.
The new treatment prevented relapse in half of mice treated for leukemia. The study results will appear in the Journal of Cancer Immunology, Immunotherapy.
The vaccine is now available for patients in a clinical trial at King's College London. The researchers said they hope the vaccine treatment will prove successful against other forms of cancer, CBS News reported.
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Gene May Be Linked to OCD: Researchers
A gene that causes compulsive behavior in dogs may improve understanding of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) in humans, say U.S. researchers.
A team at the Broad Institute in Cambridge analyzed the DNA of 92 Doberman pinschers with compulsive behavior and found that a common link among the dogs was a gene called Cadherin 2, a gene recently linked to autism in humans, said a story in the The Boston Globe, according to United Press International.
The effect of the Cadherin 2 gene will be studied in more than 300 people with OCD and about 400 of their relatives, said Dr. Dennis Murphy, a researcher at the U.S. National Institutes of Health.
"Identifying a specific gene that could be a candidate gene for a complex disorder like OCD is a gift to have,'' Murphy said. "This might be a quick route in to a meaningful gene that just could be involved in the human disorder, as well,'' UPI reported.
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