EurekAlert! News by Subject: Medicine & Health - News by Subject: Medicine & Health

Medicine & Health

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 15-Dec-2025 21:11 ET (16-Dec-2025 02:11 GMT/UTC)

10-Dec-2025

Unraveling nitrogen removal in riverine wetlands: key roles of denitrification and anammox across a latitudinal gradient

Maximum Academic Press
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A research team recently conducted an extensive study on nitrogen removal processes in riverine wetlands across China, focusing on the microbial processes of denitrification and anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox).

10-Dec-2025

Dramatic rise in young people using mental health services

University of Edinburgh
Peer-Reviewed Publication

One in five young people in the UK now access specialist mental health care by age 18 – a four-fold increase in under two decades, new research suggests.

Journal: The British Journal of Psychiatry
Funder: Academy of Medical Sciences

10-Dec-2025

SMART launches new research center to develop world’s first wearable ultrasound imaging system for real-time monitoring of chronic conditions

Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology (SMART)
Business Announcement

The Wearable Imaging for Transforming Elderly Care (WITEC) project, led by SMART in collaboration with MIT, NTU, NUS and Tan Tock Seng Hospital, is developing the world’s first wearable ultrasound imaging system for continuous, real-time monitoring of chronic conditions such as hypertension and heart failure. Supported by advanced tools like Southeast Asia’s first sub-micrometre 3D printer and cutting-edge ultrasonic imaging technology, WITEC aims to shift healthcare from hospital-based interventions to proactive, home-based care, enabling earlier detection, personalised diagnosis and improved patient outcomes.

10-Dec-2025

Anxiety and insomnia may lower natural killer cell count, potentially repressing immune function

Frontiers
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Anxiety and insomnia have been shown to weaken the immune system and make us more prone to disease. Now, researchers found that this may be because experiencing symptoms of either can reduce the number of natural killer cells, our bodies’ machinery for defense. Their findings showed that in young women who experience insomnia symptoms, the number of total NK cells was lower. If they experienced anxiety symptoms, the number of NK cells that circulate through the body was lower. These findings could inform the development of novel strategies to raise awareness about the physiological consequences of anxiety and insomnia and help in the prevention of immune-related disorders and cancers, the team said.

Journal: Frontiers in Immunology

9-Dec-2025

New method to accelerate vaccine and drug development for norovirus

The University of Osaka
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Researchers from The University of Osaka have developed a novel reverse genetics system to study norovirus, the leading cause of gastroenteritis. This efficient system can generate infectious viral particles by simply injecting viral genetic material into zebrafish embryos. They were able to alter the genetic material to create modified viruses, enabling the evaluation of antiviral drugs and novel vaccine development. The advances provided by this new system will have a significant effect on public health.

Journal: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Funder: Japan Agency for Medical Research and Development, Japan Science and Technology Agency, Secom Science and Technology Foundation

9-Dec-2025

Sedative choice could improve outcomes for breathing tube patients

Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Doctors treating seriously ill patients in an emergency setting may want to give the sedative etomidate, rather than ketamine, while placing a breathing tube, according to a randomized trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Journal: New England Journal of Medicine
Funder: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, NIH/National Institutes of Health

9-Dec-2025

Predicting who is at risk of developing type 1 diabetes, as new drugs now available

University of Exeter
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A test using genetics to predict who is at the highest risk of developing type 1 diabetes could one day be applied to largescale health studies, to identify adults who could benefit from new drugs, new research shows. Known as a genetic risk score, the test uses all genetic information to predict risk of going on to develop type 1 diabetes.

Journal: The Lancet