Month: November 2012

Using a testosterone gel in addition to Viagra doesn’t make the little blue pill work any better, according to a new study.

The report’s lead researcher said testosterone is typically prescribed to men who have both low testosterone levels and symptoms such as little interest in sex or low bone and muscle mass. But, “there’s a tremendous amount of clinical judgment” that goes into that, said Dr. Matthew Spitzer, from the Boston University School of Medicine. “People are certainly being prescribed and using these medications at increasing amounts.”

According to Spitzer, studies have suggested that about one-quarter to one-third of men with erectile dysfunction, or ED, also have low testosterone. There’s a range in part because doctors and researchers don’t all agree on where the cutoff should be for low levels of the male sex hormone. Read full article.

Genetic Screening Can Uncover Risky Matches at the Sperm Bank

Within the next year, women choosing a sperm donor may be able to use a genetic-analysis service that identifies those with DNA that could cause disease if combined with their own.

Sperm donors are already screened for a handful of genetic conditions, and recipients can choose between donors based on qualities such as height, athleticism, and education. A more detailed analysis of how donor DNA would combine with the recipient’s DNA would be the next step.

A company called GenePeeks will use DNA-scanning microarrays, which are cheaper to use than whole-genome sequencing, to examine the roughly 250,000 DNA bases in the genomes of sperm-bank clients and donors. The company will then use what’s known about how DNA is mixed and divided during egg and sperm formation to compute thousands of virtual child genomes. Each of these virtual genomes will then be analyzed for disease risks. Donors that produced virtual babies that inherited a genetic disease can then be excluded. Read full article.

Strong Action Needed to Combat Toxic Policies

{WOMENSENEWS}–Over bagels and coffee last month, Drs. Linda Giudice and Tracey Woodruff flashed graphs and charts for female activists and philanthropists assembled at an upscale San Francisco hotel.

The meeting was hosted by a nonprofit that was commemorating the 50th anniversary of “Silent Spring,” Rachel Carson’s groundbreaking book on how pollution can affect human health.

Giudice and Woodruff had plenty to say about that. Using research they have compiled through their work at the Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment at the University of California in San Francisco, they discussed how bisphenol A in plastic, phthalates in makeup and other common chemicals can trigger health problems, including cancer in women and reproductive troubles in the children they bear. Read full article.

Our Infertile Years

My husband flicked the syringe to remove the air bubbles. Aside from hipsters lounging at candlelit tables across the street, the sidewalks were clear. If we worked together, I could shoot up before anyone walked by. By the glow of the dome light, I pulled up my shirt, unbuttoned my pants and swiped an alcohol pad across my stomach while he prepared the injection.

I held my breath, and he plunged the needle in my belly, ringed with the bruises that marked his love for me. For an upcoming fertility treatment, I had to inject myself that evening, during the hours I attended a book reading in Los Feliz. By the time my husband and I left the reception — where the two of us going into the house’s sole bathroom would have perplexed guests – it was too late to wait until we returned home. Read full article.

An Ethics Debate Over Embryos on the Cheap

Dr. Ernest Zeringue was looking for a niche in the cutthroat industry of fertility treatments. He seized on price, a huge obstacle for many patients, and in late 2010 began advertising a deal at his Davis, Calif., clinic unheard of anywhere else: Pregnancy for $9,800 or your money back.

That’s about half the price for in vitro fertilization at many other clinics, which do not include money-back guarantees. Typically, insurance coverage is limited and patients pay again and again until they give birth — or give up.

Those patients use their own eggs and sperm — or carefully select donors when necessary — and the two are combined in a petri dish to create a batch of embryos. Usually one or two are then transferred to the womb. Any embryos left over are the property of the customers. Read full article.

Adoption Can Boost Quality of Life for Infertile Couples Study Finds

MONDAY, Nov. 19 (HealthDay News) — Couples who adopt children after unsuccessful treatment for fertility problems typically have a high quality of life, a new study finds.

Swedish researchers compared outcomes for a variety of types of couples: those whose in-vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment failed; those whose IVF treatment resulted in children; couples who decided to adopt after unsuccessful IVF treatment; and couples with no fertility problems.

The couples who underwent IVF treatment were assessed five years after their treatment. Quality of life among the more than 970 men and women was measured as psychological well-being and a feeling of connection.

Quality of life was highest among couples who adopted children after unsuccessful IVF treatment and lowest among couples who remained childless after their IVF treatment had failed, the investigators found. Read full article.

Judge Sides with Christian Publisher on Contraceptive Coverage

WASHINGTON: A federal judge on Friday temporarily prevented the Obama administration from forcing a Christian publishing company to provide its employees with certain contraceptives under the new health care law.

U.S. District Judge Reggie Walton granted a preliminary injunction sought by Tyndale House Publishers, which doesn’t want to provide employees with contraceptives that it equates with abortion.

At issue are contraceptives such as Plan B and IUDs. If a woman already is pregnant, the Plan B pill has no effect. It prevents ovulation or fertilization of an egg, and according to the medical definition, pregnancy doesn’t begin until a fertilized egg implants itself into the wall of the uterus. The Plan B pill may also be able to prevent a fertilized egg from attaching to the uterus. IUDs mainly work by blocking sperm but may also have the same uterus effect. To Tyndale, these methods are not morally different than abortion. Read full article.

Should Doctors Add a Birth Control Vital Sign?

(Reuters Health) – An effort to develop a birth control “vital sign” measure gets doctors to document women’s use of contraception, but it doesn’t make them any more likely to include family planning counseling during visits, according to a new study.

The proposed “vital sign” consists of questions about contraception and pregnancy. “We were hoping that this would be a prompt for much more provision of counseling by clinicians and what we saw was it only minimally affected the type of counseling that women were given,” said Dr. Eleanor Schwarz, the lead author of the study and the director of the Women’s Health Services Research Unit at the University of Pittsburgh.

“We got better documentation (by doctors), but we can’t say that women were better informed,” she added.

Unlike blood pressure, heart rate and other vital signs, use of birth control is not often addressed during doctor visits, Schwarz said, but it should be for women of childbearing age.

According to Schwarz’s study, published in the Annals of Family Medicine, six percent of pregnancies are exposed to prescription medications that can cause a birth defect, because a large proportion of pregnancies are unplanned and birth control counseling rarely happens during physician visits. Read full article.

Michigan Has Huge Hopes for Tiny Stem Cells