Many strong acting pain medications have bothersome side effects. These can include nausea and vomiting with short-term use, and constipation with longer, chronic use. Such symptoms can lead patients to discontinue treatment, adding additional complications to pain management for physicians.

Color Doppler ultrasound, not CT, should be the first imaging examination for adult patients with suspected acute appendicitis, a new study emphasizes.The study of 420 medical records found that sonography correctly denied acute appendicitis in 303 of 312 adult patients, meaning it had a 97% specificity rate, said Diana Gaitini, MD, of Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa, Israel.

Fruits and vegetables that are rich in nitrates protect the stomach from damage. This takes place through conversion of nitrates into nitrites by the bacteria in the oral cavity and subsequent transformation into biologically active nitric oxide in the stomach. The Swedish researcher Joel Petersson has described the process, which also means that antibacterial mouthwashes can be harmful for the stomach.

M. Michael Wolfe, M.D., professor of medicine and research professor of physiology and biophysics at Boston University School of Medicine and chief of the Gastroenterology Section at Boston Medical Center, was awarded an Individual Biomedical Research Award by The Hartwell Foundation.

A review of medical claims from more than 70 managed care plans showed that 6.2 percent of patients prescribed the antiplatelet medicine clopidogrel submitted at least one insurance claim for ulcer or gastrointestinal bleeding, according to data released by Cogentus Pharmaceuticals, Inc. here at the annual meeting of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research.