The molecular mechanism behind abdominal aneurysms

When the artery that supplies the stomach and the liver forms a bulge that ruptures, this medical emergency results in the deaths of 50 percent of patients before they reach the hospital. This “silent killer” condition, known as abdominal aortic aneurysm, led to the death of Albert Einstein—and is responsible for nearly 5,000 deaths in the U.S. each year. Now researchers have found new clues that eventually could lead to earlier detection methods to save lives in the future.

Normal result from gastrointestinal biopsy not protective against later IBD, study finds

Individuals with a gastrointestinal (GI) biopsy that comes back normal still have a heightened risk of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in the years following that normal biopsy than their population references, according to a new study publishing February 23 in the open access journal PLOS Medicine by Dr. Jiangwei Sun of Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, and colleagues.