A new study has found that the bone fracture protection women get from menopausal hormone therapy (MHT, also known as HRT) disappears within a year of stopping treatment.

In the new study, published in Lancet Healthy Longevity, experts from the School of Medicine at the University of Nottingham, also found that in most cases, stopping treatment is then followed by some years of elevated fracture risk compared to women who have never used MHT. Fracture risks then falls to be similar to, and then lower than women who have never used MHT.

The study was funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) SPCR.

Many self-tests available on the UK high street are unfit-for-purpose and need much greater regulation to ensure they are safe and reliable, conclude two studies published by The BMJ today.

A comprehensive new study analysing data from over 160,000 adults finds that walking approximately 7,000 steps per day is associated with reductions in the risk of several serious health outcomes, including all-cause mortality (47% reduction), cardiovascular disease (25% reduction), cancer (6% reduction), type 2 diabetes (14% reduction), dementia (38% reduction), depression (22% reduction), and falls (28% reduction).* Unlike earlier studies that mainly focused on heart health or overall death rates, this research, published in The Lancet Public Health journal, is the first to comprehensively examine how taking more steps per day can reduce the risk of several different health outcomes.

Infants, toddlers and preschoolers exhibit symptoms of long COVID, but the symptoms can be different and more difficult to identify in these children, according to Rutgers Health research.   

The new study is part of the National Institutes of Health–funded Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery (RECOVER) initiative and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics. 

Computer scientists at the University of Rochester have developed an AI-powered, speech-based screening tool that can help people assess whether they are showing signs of Parkinson’s disease, the fastest growing neurological disability in the world. A study published in the journal npj Parkinson’s Disease introduces a web-based screening test that asks users to recite two pangrams—short sentences using all 26 letters of the alphabet. Within seconds, the AI analyzes the voice recordings for subtle patterns linked to Parkinson’s, with nearly 86 percent accuracy.

A new United Nations-funded study has revealed the lasting psychological and social scars left by a state-sponsored witch hunt in The Gambia, more than a decade after it was carried out by former President Yahya Jammeh.

Led by Professor Mick Finlay of Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) in Cambridge, England, this is the first academic research into the stigma associated with government-led witchcraft accusations and includes interviews with victims and their families.