California provides schools with free emergency asthma medication

Ten thousand public, charter and transitional kindergarten through grade 12 schools in California can receive emergency asthma medication for free through a 3-year initiative, according to a press release.
The School Albuterol Access Initiative — funded through the state’s budget — is a partnership between California and Amneal Pharmaceuticals and falls under the CalRx Initiative introduced by California Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2019.
Over the next 3 years, the release highlighted that California public, charter and transitional schools are able to receive two 90 μg per actuation albuterol

Maintaining physical strength can improve cardiometabolic health

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Resistance training improves strength in healthy adults, and an individualized, measured approach for patients with cardiometabolic disease may also improve physical function and quality of life, a speaker reported.
At the American Society for Preventive Cardiology Congress on CVD Prevention, Matthew W. Martinez, MD, FACC, FASE, professor of cardiovascular medicine at Mayo Clinic Foundation, discussed resistance training, how much is recommended for healthy adults and ways it improves cardiometabolic health.
“What is strength?” Martinez said during the presentation. “Dynamic

Hope remains on National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day

On August 21, National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day recognizes the lives lost and loved ones left behind by fentanyl use and addiction while taking steps to ensure these tragedies do not continue.
Healio spoke with Ahmad Hussain, founder of Defense Diagnostics, and Gina Clark, MD, DPhil, medical advisor with DEFENT, to find out how fentanyl has impacted communities, what solutions are available and how clinicians can educate their patients.
Healio: What is National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day, and why is it important?
Hussain: National Fentanyl Prevention and Awareness Day is

Genetic variants tied to healthier form of insulin resistance

People with a milder, lifelong form of insulin resistance linked to a genetic variant may have similar risk for diabetes, cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality as the general population, according to findings from a genetic study.
In research that will be presented at the European Association for the Study of Diabetes annual meeting, researchers assessed cardiometabolic profiles and outcomes among adults who have a rare heterozygous variant of the insulin receptor (INSR) gene. According to Jacques Murray Leech, graduate research assistant in the department of clinical and biomedical

1-year survival higher with lung transplant in stage IV NSCLC

Undergoing lung transplant vs. receiving medical management alone led to greater 1-year survival in adults with medically refractory, lung-limited, stage IV non-small cell lung cancer, according to results published in JAMA.
“We are not saying lung transplant is appropriate for every patient with stage IV lung cancer,” Ankit Bharat, MD, chief of thoracic surgery and director of the Canning Thoracic Institute, said in a press release.
“We are saying that when the cancer is rigorously proven to be confined to the lungs, when standard therapies have been exhausted, and when the lungs themselves

Hair loss videos on social media are often unreliable

Hair loss videos on popular social media platforms commonly promote unreliable treatment recommendations, according to a study published in the International Journal of Dermatology.
Of 156 hair loss videos across YouTube, TikTok and Instagram analyzed by the researchers that received a median of 445,415 views each, quality and reliability of information were low, receiving an average JAMA score of 1.6 out of 4 and a mean DISCERN score of 1.4 out of 5, according to Jeff Donovan, MD, PhD, FRCPC, director of the Donovan Hair Clinic.
“Social media has now become a very important source of medical

Sugar, red meat and MASLD: Rethinking risk beyond dietary fat

When we think about fatty liver, the intuitive culprit is dietary fat. Yet the dominant dietary drivers for metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease are not greasy foods, but rather excess fructose and red and processed meat.
Reframing this risk carries direct clinical implications for a condition estimated to affect roughly 30% of adults worldwide, and one whose largely silent progression makes primary prevention paramount.
Among modifiable exposures, sugar-sweetened beverages — including soda and, importantly, fruit juices with high fructose content — deserve particular

Unlocking cellular senescence may help slow musculoskeletal aging

Patient populations with inflammatory musculoskeletal disorders are aging rapidly, and the research exploring aging processes is not always keeping pace.
According to Michael R. McClung, MD, FACP, FACE, founding director of the Oregon Osteoporosis Center in Portland, cellular senescence represents an important component of aging and a major focus area of this research.
“Cellular senescence is a hallmark of the aging process,” McClung told Healio. “Animal studies suggest that the accumulation of senescent cells in muscle and bone is tightly correlated with sarcopenia and osteoporosis.”
Meanwhile,