Monday, February 1, 2010

Radiologists Develop Asthma Imaging Method

January 1, 2009 — Radiologists developed a new method for viewing the lungs of asthma sufferers. The method uses a polarized helium-3 gas--making it visible during an MRI. The patient inhales the helium-3 and undergoes an MRI, where doctors can see how far the atoms in the gas can travel in the lungs. This gives an image of what airways are blocked and what parts of the lungs ventilate. The black areas of the image indicate portions of the lung where air does not reach--areas where the helium-3 atoms could not travel.

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Immune cells that prevent development of asthma identified

ScienceDaily (2009-11-30) --According to the great paradigms of immunology, asthma, an allergic disease of the respiratory system, should always develop upon exposure to airborne antigens that are constantly being inhaled. However, the fact that 94 % of the Western population does not develop the disease suggests that as yet undefined mechanisms protect the respiratory tract from developing an allergic response.

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New insights into allergy-related disorders in children

ScienceDaily (2010-01-31) -- Allergies and asthma are a continuing health problem in most developed countries, but just how do these ailments develop over the course of a childhood? In a population-based study designed to help answer this question, researchers in Norway found that 40 per cent -- or two of five -- of nearly 5,000 two-year-olds had at least one reported allergy-related disorder.

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