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Twins born through IVF have quadruple the chance of having a congenital heart problem, according to research emerging from South Australia.

After 50 years of research and the testing of over 1,000 drugs, there is new hope for preserving brain cells for a time after stroke. Treating acute ischemic stroke patients with an experimental neuroprotective drug, combined with a surgical procedure to remove the clot improves outcomes as shown by clinical trial results published in The Lancet. 

The automatic assumption that sexually transmissible infections in young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are a result of sexual abuse further stigmatises them and discourages them from presenting to health services, according to the authors of a Perspective published by the Medical Journal of Australia.

Children of mothers prescribed macrolide antibiotics during early pregnancy are at an increased risk of major birth defects, particularly heart defects, compared with children of mothers prescribed penicillin, finds a study published by The BMJ.

The overall incidence rate of childhood cancer in Australia increased by 1.2% per year between 2005 and 2015, and is expected to rise a further 7% over the next 20 years, according to the authors of research published in the Medical Journal of Australia.

An “obsession with early detection” has created a “public health crisis” of almost 30,000 cancers overdiagnosed in Australia each year, says one expert in response to research published by The MJA.

In late December 2019, the World Health Organization (WHO) in collaboration with public health officials in China, reported a cluster of pneumonia cases of unknown origin in Wuhan City, China. Initial testing for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (SARS-CoV), Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (MERS-CoV), influenza, and other common respiratory pathogens were all negative. While the amount of information gathered about 2019-nCoV in just a few weeks is astonishing, there is much we still do not understand about this virus. You can stay current with the latest data which will be regularly updated in DynaMed's new Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) topic. 

Junior doctors who work more than 55 hours a week are at a greater risk of developing mental health problems and experiencing suicidal ideation, according to Australian-first research led by the Black Dog Institute and the University of NSW.

Nearly half of the thousands of clinical trials conducted each year are for non-drug treatments. And yet effective non-drug methods are less well-known, less well-promoted, and less well-used than their pharmaceutical cousins. For the past six years the RACGP have been committed to developing an evidence-based handbook for non-drug treatments that mirrors the pharmacopoeias used in daily practice - the Handbook of Non-Drug interventions (HANDI).

CKN spoke with the key driver behind the handbook, Bond University’s Professor Paul Glasziou, and asked him to tell us about how HANDI is filling a gap in patient care and making effective non-drug treatments more visible and easier to use.

A Monash Health study investigating inequalities in acute stroke care found Australians in rural areas are not receiving the same timely care as those in cities. Rural Australians will be treated for stroke in an average of just over three hours. This compares with two hours and 20 minutes for their city cousins.