Antibiotics’ days might be numbered as viruses that kill harmful gut bacteria could represent a real alternative to the traditional medicine. A new clinical study confirmed the safety and tolerability of using bacteria-specific viruses known as bacteriophages to eliminate disease-causing bacteria in the gut. The new treatment could be used in place of antibiotics to rid the gut of harmful Read More

Sometimes you pay Rs 2,000 a month thinking that the money paid will motivate you to get to the gym. And at times, after paying the money, a month goes by and you realise you’ve just visited the gym twice. Maybe you find the gym routine boring or maybe you just aren’t getting enough time to go there. However, it Read More

Performing chest compressions in time with the beats of the international 90s hit song La Macarena can improve the quality of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR), say scientists. Improving the quality of compressions performed during CPR can increase the chance of survival. Researchers from the University of Barcelona and Universitat Autonoma Barcelona in Spain compared the effectiveness of a smartphone metronome application, and a musical mental Read More

‘ Today, more and more women are choosing to get pregnant later in life. The usual age group has moved from 25-30 years to 28-35 years. Advanced medical facilities along with fertility solutions have made it easier for many to consider a late pregnancy. IVF and fertility specialist, Dr Priti Gupta, First Step IVF Clinic, New Delhi, says, “There are Read More

Have you been drinking endless cups of coffee at office in order to stay awake? Or has your boss been telling you to stop yawning in front of him? If the answer is yes, then you need to work to neutralise the problem which can have potentially serious ramifications. But why do you feel sleepy during office hours? “The human body has its own Read More

Smokers are at a risk of losing their teeth almost twice as fast as non-smokers, dental experts have cautioned while underlining that smoking is an impediment to effective treatment of gum disease. On World No Tobacco Day today, the medical fraternity is raising awareness about the perils of smoking and consumption of tobacco in other forms, such as beedi and Read More

The advisory of the Delhi government brought to my mind the ‘firmaans’ that emperors used to issue to the people with “thou shall not…”. These ‘firmaans’ were obeyed as the emperors had absolute power that could also punish instances of deviation.Individual freedoms were also circumscribed at that time by the ‘greater good’ principle. The point that then arises is whether Read More

Scientists have developed a self-tuning brain implant that can help manage symptoms of Parkinson’s patients by delivering stimulation in real time, in response to neural signals. Deep brain stimulation has been used to treat Parkinson’s disease symptoms for 25 years, but limitations have led researchers to look for ways to improve the technique. The first fully implanted DBS system that Read More

Do you suffer from dizzy spells or lose your balance? You may be suffering from vertigo. The usual causes of vertigo could be a tumour or high/low blood pressure, stress or diabetes. But recently, scientists have identified a new type of vertigo with no known cause, that may respond to treatments. “These conditions can be difficult to diagnose and quite Read More

An artificial intelligence system can better detect skin cancer than experienced dermatologists, a study has found. Researchers trained a form of artificial intelligence or machine learning known as a deep learning convolutional neural network (CNN) to identify skin cancer by showing it more than 100,000 images of malignant melanomas (the most lethal form of skin cancer), as well as benign Read More