"treatment" news and stories

At Duke University, researchers have been engaged in an experiment that could change the lives of those with severe food allergies. Those allergies trigger approximately 30,000 emergency-room visits each year and are sometimes the result of an exposure to a very tiny amount of allergen. This new study suggests that gradually increasing exposure to even smaller amounts of the allergen can build up a resistance - especially in children - and prevent one mouthful of the wrong food from becoming deadly.

In the study, children were given amounts of defatted peanut flour or an egg powder - very common, but serious, allergens - as small as 1/3,000th of a peanut or about 1/1,000th of an egg (under supervision at the Duke Hospital). Taken in pill form daily, the dosage was increased bi-weekly until the children were consuming the equivalent of 1/10th of an egg or 1 peanut, which became a maintenance dose that they took daily throughout the study, which lasted about 2 years. At that point, 4 of the 7 egg-allergic children could eat two scrambled eggs without any type of reaction (2 more could eat that much before reacting) and many of the peanut-allergic children could eat up to 15 peanuts before starting to experience a reaction.

At this time, researchers strongly recommend that you do not try this type of treatment at home, because it can be dangerous without careful monitoring. To the parents who joined in, however, the success could prove to be a lifesaver for their children and, as a result, researchers are optimistic that there could be a highly effective treatment available to parents and children within five years.

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A spa in San Francisco, CA (where else?) will treat you like a sushi roll. Spa Radiance offers a California Roll body treatment that involves sea salt, sesame seeds, seaweed, cucumbers and avocado oil, according to a post on Daily Candy. Besides rice, the only thing missing, mercifully, is the crab sticks. You'd think they could exfoliate your heels with crab claws or something. The sea salt and sesame seeds are used in a scrub; the cukes and seaweed are part of a body mask; and the avocado oil is used in a final massage. I couldn't find this treatment on Spa Radiance's menu, so perhaps it's only offered on a limited basis. They do offer a coffee and sugar scrub, however.

[Via Food Migration]

A recent USA TODAY article talked to several business executives and found that many use a person's treatment of restaurant staff as a judge of character. Many view the folks serving their food or filling their glasses as "temporary personal employees," the article says. As such, someone's attitude toward their waiter often reflects how that person behaves toward their real employees. Likewise, someone who doesn't lose their cool over a spilled glass of wine is often likely to remain calm when confronted with mistakes or stressful situations on the job. Several of the CEOs interviewed said they based hiring decisions strongly on how a candidate treated waiters as well as personal assistants and other subordinates.

The researchers at the University of Michigan recently announced that they believe ginger may kill cancer cells. Before you rush out to the store, though, you should know how the experiment was done. Powdered ginger root was applied to test samples of ovarian cancer cells - a type of cancer that is notoriously difficult to treat. The ginger caused the cells both to die and to self-digest. The researchers are hopeful that there is a component, a chemical in ginger that may be able to form the base of new cancer-treating drugs in the future and believe that the cancerous cells would be unable to build up a resistance to it, due to they way the ginger effects them. If nothing else, the scientists seem to be confident that ginger might be able to help current chemotherapy treatments become more effective.

While more results are needed to fully corroborate this conclusion, ginger does have other health benefits, in addition to being a wonderful spice, including the abilities to quell nausea and reduce inflammation. Simply increasing your intake of ginger, however, is unlikely to result in significant health benefits, at least in terms of cancer treatment.

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