Latest news with #MountSinai
Daily Mail
3 days ago
- Health
- Daily Mail
Hospital begs for help identifying woman who has been in their care for past 100 days
A Manhattan hospital is begging for the public's help in identifying a woman who was admitted more than 100 days ago. On April 12 around 4:45am, a woman believed to be in her late-fifties was sitting at a Harlem bus stop when a bystander dialed 911. It is unclear why an ambulance was called, but she was taken to Mount Sinai in Morningside Heights - where she has remained ever since. Employees have described the mysterious patient, who may go by the name Pam, as shy. In a photo shared by the hospital, she was seen covering her face with a towel. But these surface-level details are all officials have gathered about Pam during her three months at the hospital, and now hospital workers are trying to fill in the gaps. The hospital is asking anyone with information on who she might be to come forward, NBC reported. Pam is 5'8" tall and weighs 170 pounds. Hospital workers believe she was often in the Harlem area and generally wore black and covered her face. She speaks English and has greying hair. The Daily Mail has reached out to Mount Sinai for comment. Anyone with information regarding Pam's identity should contact the hospital's associate director of social work Kelly LaTerra at 646-901-9309. Last month, a California man was found unconscious and was rushed to St. Mary Medical Center in Long Beach. He was believed to be in his mid-forties, but just as in Pam's case, little else was known about the patient. A chilling photo released by Dignity Health showed the man lying in a hospital bed, hooked up to a ventilator. In October 2024, another California hospital took a similar approach to Mount Sinai in hopes of identifying a seriously ill patient. Staff at the Riverside Community Hospital had done everything they could think of, but could not determine the name of a man who came through the facility's doors a month earlier. They refused to say what was wrong with him or why he was attached to a ventilator, but released a photograph in the hopes that someone can put a name to the face. Identifying John or Jane Doe patients is no easy task, as doctors and other hospital staff members must work to find out who they are without violating their rights. The New York Department of Health has protocols in place specifically for missing children, college students and vulnerable adults. These standards were set in 2018 after 'several instances of a missing adult with Alzheimer's disease who was admitted to a hospital as an unidentified patient and police and family members were unable to locate the individual.' However, the process is not as cut and dry when it is the hospital asking for the public's help instead of the other way around. While hospitals have been known to share images of unknown patients when all else fails, they are not allowed to reveal much about their circumstances.
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Mom of Teen Blames Forgetfulness on Menopause. Then She Saw the Scans: 'All I Could Think About Was Not Being There for Her'
April Tate's tumor was deep inside her brain, and growing slowly A single mom is living with a shocking diagnosis. April Tate was working in childcare in Fife, a coastal community in Scotland, in 2018 when she forgot the name of one of the children in her care. April, who was 52 at the time, chalked the lapse up to hormones; as Harvard Health explains, forgetfulness and brain fog are commonly reported symptoms of menopause. But when she mentioned the memory lapse to her doctor, he asked her to come in for an evaluation immediately, according to Daily Mail. That's when doctors scanned her brain — and April was given the devastating news: She had a brain tumor. And while it wasn't cancerous, it was so deep in her brain that it couldn't be removed. As Mount Sinai explains, the type of tumor April has, a posterior falcine meningioma, is slow-growing, but in the part of the brain that focuses on movement, coordination, and "vital body functions such as breathing.' 'When they said I had a brain tumor, my first thought was that I was going to die. It was a numbing moment. I was a single mom, and my daughter Abby was still a teenager. All I could think about was not being there for her,' she told the outlet. 'When the surgeon explained the tumor was located in a really difficult part of my brain and he'd only attempted surgery in that area once before, it was hard to accept.' April was self-employed, which 'brought financial pressure,' as she had to take time off work for treatment, losing income. It 'just added to the stress.' She was told to 'watch and wait,' she says, with regular scans monitoring the tumor's growth. 'For a while, it didn't change much,' she explains. Still, 'it was terrifying to live with the unknown of whether it would grow or not. Over time, I began to adjust.' In late 2022, April was given the bleak news that the tumor had begun to grow, qualifying her for daily radiation. While she says the treatment itself 'was fairly quick each day … it was exhausting.' She had to wear a custom mask to keep her head completely still, a process that she said felt 'claustrophobic and intense … I just closed my eyes, listened to music and tried to stay calm. The hardest part came afterwards, with having to wait to find out if it had worked.' It did, she shared — and while she still has to undergo scans, she's been able to go back to work and increase her physical activity. She ran a 5K this year, and she's taking part in a fundraising challenge via JustGiving to pay for a single day of research at a Scottish brain tumor center. As she explained, 'What shocks me most is how little funding goes into researching brain tumors. That has to change.' And while she is grateful her tumor isn't cancerous, April explains, 'There's something in my brain that shouldn't be there, and it could change at any time. I even worried about how it might affect new relationships and not wanting to burden someone else with what I was going through. But we still deserve to live fully, and to love and be loved.' Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. Read the original article on People Solve the daily Crossword
Medical News Today
7 days ago
- Health
- Medical News Today
Exposure to PFAS, ‘forever chemicals', linked to increased type 2 diabetes risk
Every one in nine adults around the world lives with diabetes, with more than 90% of those cases being type 2 diabetes. Previous research shows that certain environmental factors, like exposure to certain chemicals, may increase a person's risk of developing type 2 diabetes. A new study found that exposure to a class of synthetic chemicals known as 'forever chemicals' may increase a person's type 2 diabetes estimate that every one in nine adults around the world lives with diabetes, with more than 90% of those cases being type 2 diabetes. Past studies have identified several factors that may increase a person's risk for developing type 2 diabetes, such as obesity, genetics, smoking history, diet, and living a sedentary lifestyle. Additionally, previous research shows that certain environmental factors, like air pollution and exposure to certain chemicals, may also heighten a person's risk for the disease.'Type 2 diabetes is a complex disease, and genetics by itself fails to explain it in totality,' Vishal Midya, PhD, MStat, assistant professor of environmental medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, told Medical News Today. 'Environmental exposures are one of the few potential suspects that can be directly intervened upon. Therefore, studying ways in which environmental exposures can increase the risk of type 2 diabetes may potentially open new avenues for risk assessment and opportunities for interventions,' he is the corresponding author of a new study recently published in the journal eBioMedicine that found exposure to a class of synthetic chemicals called perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) — also known as 'forever chemicals' — may also increase a person's risk of developing type 2 diabetes. PFAS chemicals in everyday productsFor this study, researchers analyzed medical data from 53,790 participants in a large electronic health record-linked research database called BioMe. From these records, scientists selected 180 who had recently been diagnosed with type 2 diabetes to compare with them 180 similar participants without the condition. Using blood samples, researchers measured the amount of PFAS levels in their blood. PFAS chemicals can be found in a variety of everyday products, including: Cleaning productsFirefighting foamFood packagingNon-stick cookwareStain-resistant productsWaterproof clothingPFAS chemicals are known as 'forever chemicals' because they do not naturally break down in a landfill. This means PFAs can leach into the soil and water around it, potentially contaminating drinking water and crops grown in soil with high PFAS content. 'There is enough literature (especially animal models) that illustrates the true causal biological effect of PFAS,' Midya said. 'Moreover, PFAS has been linked to type 2 diabetes before, but mostly in vulnerable populations like pregnant [people] or in children and adolescents. Very few works have investigated the detrimental effect of PFAS in a relatively healthy group of adults, and its potential effect even before any disease was clinically diagnosed. This study is one of the first to look into the effect of PFAS in a relatively healthy group of adults from NYC,' he explained. Higher blood PFAS levels linked to increased diabetes riskAt the study's conclusion, Midya and his team found that study participants with higher levels of PFAS in their blood samples were at a much higher risk of developing type 2 diabetes in the future. Specifically, researchers found that every increase in PFAS exposure correlated with a 31% increase in type 2 diabetes risk. 'Our study highlights the detrimental effects of PFAS exposure, even four to five years before any diagnosis, and provides some biological insights. It is concerning that PFAS can be detected in this relatively healthy group of adults from NYC.' — Vishal Midya, PhD, MStat'PFAS, primarily due to their chemical structure, can interfere with how the body stores and regulates fat, and consequently, how the body controls glucose,' he continued. 'Higher PFAS levels may disrupt fat and glucose regulation in the body, which in turn may increase the risk of type 2 diabetes.' Reducing exposure to PFAS importantAs the study is rather based on a small sample, Midya said that it needs to be replicated in larger samples. 'That is why we are currently working on reproducing these results on a much larger and more representative population of NYC,' he said. 'Our findings provide evidence that higher exposures to PFAS could increase risk for type 2 diabetes. Findings from this study underscore the utmost importance of preventing PFAS exposures to promote public health,' he added.'The government should take steps to educate the general population more about the silent harms that PFAS exposure may cause, and eventually take strides to enact policies that target overall PFAS reduction, starting from food packaging to daily-use products. Our study discusses past PFAS exposures, which we cannot change, but we can certainly take charge of what we are being exposed to today.' — Vishal Midya, PhD, MStatNew avenue to reduce type 2 diabetes riskMNT spoke with Mir Ali, MD, a board certified general surgeon, bariatric surgeon and medical director of MemorialCare Surgical Weight Loss Center at Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, CA, about this study. Ali commented that this was a good study showing how exposure to certain chemicals can adversely affect your health, in this case, increase diabetes risk.'Diabetes is a growing issue, particularly in more industrialized countries,' he explained. 'Though diet and exercise can reduce risk, finding other potential sources of risk, such as environmental exposure, can be another avenue to reduce risk.' 'I would like to see the extent of risk reduction in populations that reduce environmental exposure compared to those that don't decrease exposure,' he added.
Fast Company
7 days ago
- Health
- Fast Company
Medical AI: fixing the bias problem
Tools powered by artificial intelligence (AI) promise to diagnose diseases faster, personalize treatments, and streamline hospital workflows. It's something that's been demonstrated in multiple studies: AI can outperform human doctors in specific tasks, including reading X-rays, predicting patient risk, and providing diagnostics assistance. Beneath the surface of this technological revolution, though, lies a critical flaw: bias. A groundbreaking new study from the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai tested most of the major LLM families and found that leading models exhibit clear bias based on race, sex, and income level, among other attributes. This is the latest example of bias in medicine. Before LLMs became mainstream, numerous clinical diagnostics systems were found to contain biased algorithms derived from skewed data or incorrect assumptions. These included algorithms for pain management, cardiovascular risk, and mortality in intensive care units, among other areas. To provide a comprehensive view of bias in common LLMs, the Icahn researchers conducted an analysis involving nine prominent LLMs, examining over 1.7 million model-generated outputs. They used a dataset of 1,000 emergency department cases, comprising 500 real and 500 synthetic scenarios. Each case was presented to the LLMs in 32 distinct variations: one control version with no sociodemographic identifiers, and 31 versions where labels indicating race, gender identity, income level, housing status, and sexual orientation were added, individually or in combination. The underlying clinical details of the patient presentation were kept identical across all 32 variations of a given case. The LLMs were asked to provide clinical recommendations, which were compared against baseline recommendations from human reviewers and the model's output in response to the control cases. The results were eye-opening. Patients of certain races were six or seven times more likely to be flagged for mental health evaluations than the control group. Patients labeled as lower income were less likely to receive recommendations for advanced care. Sometimes, the LLMs exhibited explicit bias by citing the sociodemographic tag as part of its recommendation. The researchers concluded that the magnitude and consistency of these observed differences strongly suggested model-driven bias inherited from the data used to train the LLMs. The findings held across both proprietary and open-source models underscore a systemic issue and highlight the critical need for robust bias evaluation and mitigation strategies specifically tailored for LLMs in healthcare. If biases like these continue to make their way into deployed AI systems, real-world medical care will be unequal and less effective. The Icahn researcher's findings are not surprising. LLMs, trained on vast swathes of internet text data, inherently encode and can amplify societal biases related to age, gender, race, disability, and other factors. Other studies show that information about patient gender and race is encoded within the internal layers of LLMs and can be manipulated to alter outputs such as clinical vignette generation or downstream predictions like depression risk. That awareness has spurred the development of specific datasets, like BiasMD and DiseaseMatcher, to reduce biases in health-related LLM outputs. Bias can also have legal consequences. Medical bias in technology in the United States, to name one country, was made illegal under the Affordable Care Act. However, bias likely remains common because it is still hard to detect. When bias is alleged, litigation often follows. Major U.S. health insurance providers have faced multiple lawsuits alleging biased algorithms prevented necessary care or discriminated against certain groups. Reputational risk from this litigation can be substantial. ESSENTIAL MITIGATION STRATEGIES Every AI system under consideration for medical care tasks must be tested for evidence of bias. Forward-thinking medical AI companies should be able to demonstrate that they have tested for bias or that they have a specific mechanism for customers to perform such tests on a regular basis. Ongoing testing even after deployment is important because bias can emerge in subsequent training or reinforcement learning. For effective implementation, companies must establish quantitative bias metrics specific to each clinical use case and create diverse validation datasets that deliberately include all patient populations with sufficient numbers to train LLMs. Also, they must develop clear procedures for handling cases where bias is detected, including model retraining protocols and emergency shutdown procedures when necessary. Advances in AI technology provide hope. But for now, empowering humans in the loop to apply their own wisdom and intuition remains mission-critical if we are going to have medical AI that treat us all fairly. The super-early-rate deadline for Fast Company's Most Innovative Companies Awards is this Friday, July 25, at 11:59 p.m. PT. Apply today.
Emirates 24/7
23-07-2025
- Health
- Emirates 24/7
Study links 'forever chemicals' to increased risk of type 2 diabetes
Exposure to a class of synthetic chemicals known as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), commonly referred to as "forever chemicals", may increase the risk of developing type 2 diabetes, according to a new study led by researchers at Mount Sinai. The findings were published in eBioMedicine. The team conducted a nested case-control study within BioMe, a large, electronic health record-linked research database comprising records of more than 70,000 study participants who have sought care at The Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City since 2007. Based on available data, the study analysed 180 people recently diagnosed with type 2 diabetes (T2D) and compared them to 180 similar individuals without diabetes. All participants were matched based on age, sex, and ancestry. Researchers used blood samples to analyse PFAS levels - a group of chemicals used in everything from nonstick cookware to stain-resistant furniture to waterproof clothing -and found that higher levels of PFAS were associated with a significantly greater risk of developing T2D in the future. Specifically, each increase in range of PFAS exposure was linked to a 31 percent increase in risk. The team also found that these associations could be due to metabolic irregularities in amino acid biosynthesis and drug metabolism, which may help explain how PFAS affect the body's ability to regulate blood sugar. Findings from this study underscore the importance of preventing PFAS exposures to promote public health and of advancing knowledge about potential mechanisms underlying the PFAS' impacts on human metabolism. Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.
