Tag: health

A CT brain scanner in an aircraft or ambulance?

Tamzin on 22 September, 2021

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Saving lives after stroke with a small aircraft or ambulance-mounted CT brain scanner

Adelaide company Micro-X (MX1) has started developing a small CT brain scanner that can be fitted in ambulances and emergency aircraft. If successful, the device will allow paramedics and retrieval teams to diagnose and then start treating stroke patients in the golden hour – the first hour after a stroke.

Detecting asthma in horses

Operations on 11 March, 2020

Using a face mask, Adelaide researchers have a new way to detect a major hidden equine health issue.

Up to 80 percent of horses – including racehorses and showjumpers – suffer from a form of asthma that affects their performance and wellbeing.

Researchers led by veterinarian Surita Du Preez from the University of Adelaide are designing a way to detect the condition – which often produces no obvious symptoms – without adding further stress to the affected animals.

“Currently the methods that are available to diagnose the mild to moderate form of horse asthma are invasive,” says Surita.

Media Release: Melbourne steps up to drive global health

Operations on 14 December, 2018

Images, video overlay, two case studies (rotavirus vaccine and TB in adolescents) and backgrounder available.

Melbourne Children’s Global Health initiative to take action for the:

Two million children dying annually from pneumonia and diarrhoea
8 million new child and youth cases of TB each year
Mental health and wellbeing of youth caught up in global unemployment, civic unrest, conflict, urbanisation and migration
Hospitals and health workers who want training and education to help them save their young patients.

Three of Australia’s child health leaders are joining forces to tackle global child health. Melbourne Children’s Global Health will build on the achievements of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI), the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) and the University of Melbourne. Read More about Media Release: Melbourne steps up to drive global health

Backgrounder: What is Melbourne Children’s Global Health? What will we do?

Operations on 14 December, 2018

Melbourne Children’s Global Health is an initiative to improve the health of children and adolescents in disadvantaged populations globally through partnerships in research, public health, education and advocacy.

The initiative has been created by Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, the University of Melbourne Department of Paediatrics, and the Royal Children’s Hospital under the auspices of the Melbourne Children’s Campus, and with the support of the Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation.

Images: Melbourne Global

Operations on 14 December, 2018

For hi-res versions please click on the photo and then right click to download the file.

The first baby in Indonesia to be vaccinated with the new vaccine. (Credit: Melbourne Children’s Campus)

The midwives and doctor at the Jatinom Primary Health Centre in Klaten District, Central Java, which is connected to the new rotavirus trial. (Credit: Melbourne Children’s Campus)

Videos: Melbourne Global

Operations on 14 December, 2018

High quality videos are available to download via Dropbox.

Click here to download videos.

Case Study: New rotavirus vaccine enters manufacturing

Operations on 14 December, 2018

Bio Farma, Indonesia’s national vaccine company, is completing a phase 1 trial of a new rotavirus vaccine invented in Melbourne and has started pilot manufacture of the vaccine. Licencing trials are next, followed hopefully by release of the new vaccine in 2021.

The project is the culmination of a 42-year partnership between Melbourne and Gadjah Mada University which started after Ruth Bishop and colleagues found a virus, now known as rotavirus, in babies at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne. They showed it was the cause of an acute gastroenteritis that was hospitalising 10,000 Australian children every year and killing more than half a million children worldwide. Read More about Case Study: New rotavirus vaccine enters manufacturing

Case Study: TB in adolescents: Melbourne Children’s Global Health guides new WHO roadmap

Operations on 14 December, 2018

In 2017, almost one million children fell ill and over 200,000 children under 15 died of tuberculosis, according to the latest WHO Roadmap. The report also identifies a previously underreported challenge, TB in adolescents.

University of Melbourne researcher Ms Kathryn Snow has estimated that about 1.8 million young people develop TB every year comprising Read More about Case Study: TB in adolescents: Melbourne Children’s Global Health guides new WHO roadmap

Overcoming knee pain with the help of a digital twin

Operations on 27 August, 2018

Scientists use computer simulations of joint and muscle movements to teach us to exercise smarter

Image: Dr Pizzolato is making digital twins to help improve how people move in real life. Credit: Gold Coast Orthopaedic Research Alliance, Griffith University

Researchers have developed computer simulations of joint and muscle movements that can teach us how to exercise smarter and prevent knee pain and further damage.

One in five Australians over the age of 45 suffer from painful and debilitating osteoarthritis, with the knee being the most commonly affected joint.

Dr Claudio Pizzolato from Griffith University is making computer avatars or ‘digital twins’ of individual patients to see how their muscles and joints work. Read More about Overcoming knee pain with the help of a digital twin

Ageing answers no longer a hard cell

Tamzin on 18 March, 2014

The holy grail of healthy old age may lie in the riddle of cells that stop cancer and hasten age at the same time.

Professor Judith Campisi, the head of research labs at San Francisco’s Buck Institute for Research on Ageing and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, will present this research at the Inflammation in Disease and Ageing conference at Manly, organised by the Centenary Institute.

She has found that senescent cells, which stop cancer in its tracks, also promote the inflammation that drives many age-related problems and chronic diseases.