The Spanish government is expected to approve the measure as part of a broader draft bill on reproductive health and abortion rights, details of which are expected to be disclosed on Tuesday, according to national media.

The proposed law would introduce at least three sick days each month for women who suffer from severe period pains, according to El Pais newspaper.

The newspaper reports that this “medically supervised leave” could even be extended to five days for women with disabling periods who suffer severe cramps, nausea, dizziness and vomiting. 

Worldwide, menstrual leave is currently offered only in a small number of countries including Japan, Taiwan, Indonesia, South Korea and Zambia.

According to the Spanish Gynaecology and Obstetrics Society, around a third of women who menstruate suffer from severe pain known as dysmenorrhea. 

Symptoms include acute abdominal pain, diarrhoea, headaches and fever.

“When the problem cannot be solved medically, we think it is very sensible that there should be temporary incapacity associated with this issue,” Ángela Rodríguez, Spain’s Secretary of State for Equality and against Gender Violence, told El Periodico newspaper in a recent interview. 

“It is important to clarify what a painful period is, we are not talking about a slight discomfort, but about serious symptoms such as diarrhoea, severe headaches, fever,” she added.

The draft law would also lower VAT on feminine hygiene products in shops and make period products available for free in schools and educational centres.

According to El Pais, it would make menstrual health part of Spaniards’ right to health, and it specifies that “stereotypes and myths about menstruation that still exist and that hinder women’s lives will be combated”.

The health bill would also guarantee the right to seek an abortion for free in the country’s public healthcare system and scrap the requirement for 16 and 17-year-olds to obtain parental consent for the procedure.

The post Spain to become the first in Europe to introduce ‘menstrual leave’ first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

Mysterious cases of acute liver disease mainly affecting young children have been puzzling health experts around the world in recent weeks. They’re now a matter of active investigation, the UN agency said, with its own experts and scientists in affected nation states working to find the cause.

In a news conference on Tuesday (10 May), Professor Philippa Easterbrook of the WHO’s global hepatitis programme told reporters that there were at least 348 probable cases, with 70 more under investigation.

“I think it’s important to highlight that there are only six countries at present that are reporting more than five cases. All the remainder of the countries have less than five cases,” she said.

The majority of the cases have been reported in the UK which has seen “around 163”, and was the first country to raise the alarm, reporting 10 cases of severe hepatitis in Scotland to the WHO on 5 April, in children under 10 years old.

The United States has now also reported more than 100 cases, which were included in the WHO’s total.

What might be causing these hepatitis cases?

Hepatitis, inflammation of the liver, is often contracted through the hepatitis virus, of which there are five main types: A, B, C, D, and E.

These new cases are mysterious because testing has shown no signs of these virus types.

Easterbrook said currently the “leading hypotheses remain those which involve an adenovirus, but I think with also an important consideration about the role of COVID as well, either as a co-infection or as past infection.”

Adenoviruses can cause a range of different illnesses, ranging from mild to more severe, and type 41 has been identified as having a possible link to the hepatitis cases.

More testing is ongoing to determine how many patients are positive for adenovirus, and how many are or have been infected with coronavirus.

“Looking at tissue samples, liver samples, none of these show any of the typical features you might expect with a liver infection due to adenovirus, but we are awaiting further examinations of biopsies,” Easterbrook said.

Out of those tested in the UK cases, she said around 18 percent were positive for COVID-19 on a PCR test, “and a big focus of the next week is really looking at the serological testing for previous exposure and infections with COVID”.

“We are hopeful within the week there will be data from the UK comparing whether detection rate of adeno(virus) in children with liver disease differs from that in other hospitalised children,” she added.

“That will help hone down whether adeno is an incidental infection that has been detected or there is a causal or likely causal link”.

Liver inflammation can affect the liver’s function, and the illness can vary in severity depending on the cause.

Health authorities in the US said on Friday that they were investigating 109 mystery cases, which included five fatalities. Three children have died in Indonesia.

A small number of children have also undergone liver transplants as a result of hepatitis.

The post Mysterious hepatitis cases rise to 348 worldwide. Is COVID a factor? first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

This digital tool promises more efficient care and better diagnostic capacity. It should also boost scientific research, enabling European companies to create more tailored medicine, health devices and services.

In addition, European countries are already exploring ways to harmonise rules and standards across the bloc while also making sure patient health data is kept safe.

To find out more about how this digital transformation is revolutionising healthcare, Smart Health spoke to Luís Filipe Goes Pinheiro, Chairman of SPMS, Portugal’s digital agency at the ministry of health. 

Click above to play the video

The post Dawn of a new healthcare era: “Data is the new oil” first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

There are 17 million worldwide living with CP, according to the Cerebral Palsy Alliance, including 34,000 people currently living in Shah’s home country Australia.

The severity of the disorder varies from one sufferer to another.

Two thirds of people affected by CP find it difficult to move one or both arms and 50 per cent find speech difficult or impossible, according to data provided by the Cerebral Palsy Alliance.

In Shah’s case, the physical impairment is severe. Only his right hand has useful mobility.

“My right hand basically does everything for me because it’s not really as affected and it’s not, my wrist isn’t bent, it doesn’t have as much spasticity and dystonia so I rely on it quite heavily,” he said.

On top of this, Shah can only use one finger to type on a keyboard which, in his own words, is “slow and inefficient”.

The efforts Shah has to make are also very tiring.

Using a computer can be challenging to some, so when they’re limited by physical disabilities as well, it can make it incredibly difficult.

How a new bracelet may help

Two years ago, a team of engineers at the University of Sydney’s School of Computer Science came up with an idea to change the life of Shah and people affected by other CP and motor neuron diseases.

Using simple, cheap and accessible technology, undergraduate honours student Stephen Lin and Dr Anusha Withana designed a bracelet with sensors.

The sensors pick up the tiniest of movements and vibrations made in the carpal tunnel, the part of the wrist that contains the tendons that control the hand.

When fingers are moved, the vibrations they create are transmitted via Bluetooth to a computer programme.

An individual’s specific movement patterns are then instantaneously interpreted by machine learning.

“Everybody can do this: if you touch your carpal tunnel like that and move your fingers a little bit, you’ll see tiny vibrations happening on your wrist and that’s how our body moves our fingers,” Withana, a Senior Lecturer and Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (ARC DECRA) Fellow at the university, explained.

According to Withana, the sensors detect the vibrations and artificial intelligence analyses the vibrations to figure out which finger is moving and by how much.

The whole idea is to make the device really simple to use for people with CP and motor neuron diseases.

“We want to create technology that actually tries to understand the abilities of people with disabilities rather than focusing on the disability and so that technology can actually intervene and be a helpful tool rather than another thing for people to learn,” he explained.

Project is being trialled

Funded by the Cerebral Palsy Alliance and the Neurodisability Assist Trust, Lin and Whithana’s work involved a lot of trials and tweaks especially when it came to finding the right computer programme to interpret and use the device’s data.

The bracelet’s springs can be personalised and become extremely sensitive to a particular user’s needs.

The whole device itself bypasses the need to put lots of sensors on the fingers and hand by only using the subtle carpal tunnel movements. As a result, it is less complicated and cumbersome than other devices.

“So, me and Anusha came up with the idea of using a conical spring so that it’s slanted from top to bottom and that means it’s a lot more stable when you put it on the skin,” said Lin.

And there’s no need for users to wait for the device to be manufactured in a factory. They can do it all themselves from the comfort of their home using a simple 3D printer.

“The sensors have to be incredibly personalised and incredibly sensitive. So, to do this, we found that if you can use things like 3D-printing where we don’t have to depend on a mass manufacturing facility to build the same piece of technology for everybody, we can precisely personalise the technology to fit the individual user’s needs,” said Withana.

“What we found with 3D printing is that we can create individualised sensors that are customised to that person so that the signal quality and the performance can be quite amplified”..

3D printing also allows one to pay attention to the external appearance of the bracelet, its aesthetics, to better fit the needs and the individual preferences of each user.

“We envision that in the future, every household will have a 3D printer like we have a normal printer, and this sort of technology will help people to provide tools that they can create functional things like sensors in a very affordable way,” said Withana.

Impact for those with Cerebral Palsy

Having begun testing the sensor bracelet, Shah hopes it will deliver on all its promises.

“Having something so portable that can do all this stuff is really cool and I’m excited to see the possibilities with it,” he said.

When it’s well calibrated, the device accurately interprets the user’s intentions and can, for example, control a computer.

“I just hope it can make me a bit more functional with my left hand. I guess, especially from a computer’s perspective like studying and using it all day,” added Shah.

The bracelet Shah tested is actually fine-tuned to another user who’s been testing it for a while. But it’s so efficient that it still managed to interpret Shah’s intentions when playing a basic video game that requires cutting virtual fruit in pieces.

“I think it’s pretty cool how you can even do this basic thing with, like, just moving your arm up and down. It’s a lot less movement that you need to use it than I first thought so that’s really promising,” said Shah.

During the trial, Withana is impressed by both Shah and the bracelet.

“You’re really fast, I can tell you, and it’s the very first time you even wore this,” he said.

Right now, the bracelet is being tested in Sri Lanka and Australia.

Ultimately, Lin and Withana want the bracelet to work with a free phone application rather than a computer to make it even more user friendly.

“We want to improve the current device to a more usable and more rugged product. It is a very early prototype at the moment. It’s functional but we want to make sure it’s usable,” said Withana.

“We want to make some studies with people with Cerebral Palsy and possibly with other motor neuron diseases and we want to prepare a pipeline that we can actually give them away,” he added.

“And all the technology that we are talking about here is open source in a sense. We don’t have any proprietary technology”.

For more on this story, watch the video in the media player above.

The post The hi-tech bracelet helping Cerebral Palsy sufferers use a computer first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

The impact on the brain is similar to that experienced between the ages of 50 to 70, scientists said, adding that it is the equivalent of losing 10 IQ points.

There is a growing body of evidence showing that coronavirus infection can have consequences beyond the initial illness, with many people seeking medical advice over “long COVID” symptoms.

Reported long COVID symptoms include fatigue, “brain fog”, problems recalling words, sleep disturbances, anxiety and more, months after infection.

Between a third and three quarters of hospitalised patients report to still be suffering cognitive symptoms three to six months after acute illness, and this can occur even in mild cases.

Loss of 10 IQ points

The findings from the team of scientists at the University of Cambridge and Imperial College London in the UK suggest the effects of infection are still detectable more than six months after the acute illness.

The researchers analysed data from 46 people who were hospitalised with COVID-19 on the ward or intensive care unit at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, between March and July 2020.

Sixteen of these patients were put on mechanical ventilation during their stay in hospital.

They were put through computerised cognitive tests an average of six months after their acute illness, measuring aspects such as memory, attention, and reasoning.

Comparing their results against a control group, the team found the patients were less accurate and slower at responding, with effects strongest for those who were on mechanical ventilation.

They estimate the cognitive loss is similar to that experienced between the ages of 50 to 70, or the loss of 10 IQ points.

Professor David Menon from the Division of Anaesthesia at the University of Cambridge, the study’s senior author, said: “Cognitive impairment is common to a wide range of neurological disorders, including dementia, and even routine ageing, but the patterns we saw – the cognitive ‘fingerprint’ of COVID-19 – was distinct from all of these.”

“We followed some patients up as late as 10 months after their acute infection, so were able to see a very slow improvement,” he added.

“While this was not statistically significant, it is at least heading in the right direction, but it is very possible that some of these individuals will never fully recover.”

Difficulty finding words

One of the tasks patients scored particularly poorly on was verbal reasoning, a finding that supports a commonly-reported issue post-COVID: difficulty finding words.

They also found slower processing speeds, aligning with previous observations post COVID-19 of decreased brain glucose consumption within the frontoparietal network of the brain, responsible for attention, complex problem-solving and working memory, among other functions.

The researchers say several factors could cause the cognitive deficits, such as inadequate oxygen or blood supply to the brain, blockage of blood vessels, microscopic bleeds, or, as backed up by emerging evidence, damage caused by the body’s own inflammatory response.

They added that even people not sick enough to be admitted to hospital may have these signs of mild impairment.

Professor Adam Hampshire from the Department of Brain Sciences at Imperial College London, the study’s first author, said: “Around 40,000 people have been through intensive care with COVID-19 in England alone and many more will have been very sick, but not admitted to hospital. This means there is a large number of people out there still experiencing problems with cognition many months later. We urgently need to look at what can be done to help these people.”

The findings were published in the journal eClinicalMedicine.

The post Severe COVID-19 could affect brain as much as ageing 20 years first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

Researchers in Germany discovered that AI can correctly detect interval breast cancers, which develop in between routine screening rounds (usually 24 months in many countries) and can be missed and diagnosed as a false negative result.

In 2020, there were 2.3 million women diagnosed with breast cancer and 685 000 deaths globally, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

The peer-reviewed study showed approximately 16 per cent of interval cancers are probably visible during a previous screening while one in five may be too subtle to the human eye and can be missed by radiologists, which is known as ‘minimal signs’.

The findings present an opportunity to detect more cancers at screening with AI, which may help detect breast cancer earlier.

German deep-tech start-up Vara conducted the study in partnership with The Mammography Reference Centre North in Oldenburg. The results have been published in the European Journal of Radiology.%20%20%20%20The%20peer-reviewed%20study%20showed%20approximately%2016%20per%20cent%20of%20interval%20cancers%20are%20probably%20visible%20during%20a%20previous%20screening%20while%20one%20in%20five%20may%20be%20too%20subtle%20to%20the%20human%20eye%20and%20can%20be%20missed%20by%20radiologists,%20which%20is%20known%20as%20%E2%80%98minimal%20signs%E2%80%99.%20%20%20The%20findings%20present%20an%20opportunity%20to%20detect%20more%20cancers%20at%20screening%20with%20AI,%20which%20may%20help%20detect%20cancers%20earlier.%20%20%20%20German%20deep-tech%20start-up%20Vara%20conducted%20the%20study%20in%20partnership%20with%20The%20Mammography%20Reference%20Centre%20North%20in%20Oldenburg.%20The%20results%20have%20been%20published%20in%20the%20European%20Journal%20of%20Radiology.%20%20%20%20Vara%20assessed%202,396%20screening%20mammograms%20from%20women%20who%20were%20later%20diagnosed%20with%20an%20interval%20cancer.%20%20%20%20The%20study%20found%20that%20AI%20could%20detect%20and%20correctly%20localise%20on%20the%20mammogram%2027.5%20per%20cent%20of%20false-negative%20cases%20and%20just%20over%2012%20per%20cent%20of%20minimal%20signs%20of%20cancers.%20%20%E2%80%9CInterval%20cancers%20are%20the%20ones%20that%20just%20appear%20spontaneously%20during%20the%20screening%20interval,%E2%80%9D%20said%20Danalyn%20Byng,%20Clinical%20Research%20Lead%20at%20Vara.%20%E2%80%9CWhat%20was%20really%20interesting%20was%20that%20the%20algorithm%20did%20have%20some%20kind%20of%20increased%20suspiciousness%20score%20for%20some%20of%20those,%20despite%20there%20being%20nothing%20on%20the%20image%20at%20screening,%E2%80%9D%20she%20told%20Euronews%20Next.%20%20How%20does%20it%20work? She said in 3 per cent of cases the algorithm could also correctly localise where breast cancer would later appear. The study worked by the algorithm categorising the mammographies into three sections: cancer suspicious, normal and unconfident. The cancer suspicious studies and the unconfident ones were passed on to the radiologist. So as not to bias the radiologist, they were not told which study could have cancer. If the radiologist made a prediction the algorithm disagreed with, only then would the algorithm raise the alarm. But this does not mean that machines will replace radiologists. “It’s a very collaborative approach where we’re not fully replacing a radiologist, but we are complementing their skills because the algorithm, the internal workings of it, it uses this concept of confidence,” said Byng. Earlier diagnosis The technology holds the promise of diagnosing breast cancers earlier, which means better outcomes for women, not only in terms of their survival but also in finding cancers at a stage where they are more easily treatable. Earlier detection can also make breast cancer treatment more affordable in lower-income countries. For the moment, Vara is working in Germany, Greece and Argentina but plans on expanding in Asia and Africa and places where breast cancer screening is limited. “We’re comparing ourselves against our very highly trained German radiologists and when we’re moving into other countries without established breast cancer screening programmes. They do have radiologists, but those radiologists may not be accustomed to doing breast cancer screening tasks,” said Byng. When they get a mammography, it’s from a woman who probably already has symptoms, she added. “So our goal is really to bring our technology and use it to bring breast cancer screening into countries to help them ramp up breast cancer screening programmes because population demographics in those settings are really changing. “And breast cancer maybe has not been in the past such an important public health issue. But that’s changing. And it’s going to be changing even more quickly in the coming years,” Byng said.).

Vara assessed 2,396 screening mammograms from women who were later diagnosed with an interval cancer.

The study found that AI could detect and correctly localise on the mammogram 27.5 per cent of false-negative cases and just over 12 per cent of minimal signs of cancers.

“Interval cancers are the ones that just appear spontaneously during the screening interval,” said Danalyn Byng, Clinical Research Lead at Vara.

“What was really interesting was that the algorithm did have some kind of increased suspiciousness score for some of those, despite there being nothing on the image at screening,” she told Euronews Next.

How does it work?

She said in 3 per cent of cases the algorithm could also correctly localise where breast cancer would later appear.

The technology holds the promise of diagnosing breast cancers earlier.Canva

The study worked by the algorithm categorising the mammographies into three sections: cancer suspicious, normal and unconfident. The cancer suspicious studies and the unconfident ones were passed on to the radiologist.

So as not to bias the radiologist, they were not told which study could have cancer. If the radiologist made a prediction the algorithm disagreed with, only then would the algorithm raise the alarm.

But this does not mean that machines will replace radiologists.

“It’s a very collaborative approach where we’re not fully replacing a radiologist, but we are complementing their skills because the algorithm, the internal workings of it, it uses this concept of confidence,” said Byng.

Why early detection is key

The technology holds the promise of diagnosing breast cancers earlier, which means better outcomes for women, not only in terms of their survival but also in finding cancers at a stage where they are more easily treatable.

Earlier detection can also make breast cancer treatment more affordable in lower-income countries. For the moment, Vara is working in Germany, Greece and Argentina but plans on expanding in Asia and Africa and places where breast cancer screening is limited.

“We’re comparing ourselves against our very highly trained German radiologists and when we’re moving into other countries without established breast cancer screening programmes. They do have radiologists, but those radiologists may not be accustomed to doing breast cancer screening tasks,” said Byng.

When they get a mammography, it’s from a woman who probably already has symptoms, she added.

“So our goal is really to bring our technology and use it to bring breast cancer screening into countries to help them ramp up breast cancer screening programmes because population demographics in those settings are really changing.

“And breast cancer maybe has not been in the past such an important public health issue. But that’s changing. And it’s going to be changing even more quickly in the coming years,” Byng said.

The post How AI may help radiologists detect breast cancer earlier first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.

But is no child’s toy. The doll is a humanoid robot that can mimic critical medical symptoms designed to train dental workers.

Co-developed by Japanese robotics startup Tmsuk and a local dental school, the robot, named the Pedia_Roid, was designed to simulate a child’s response when receiving dental treatment, including changes to its medical condition.

Using a tablet programmed with different medical conditions, the user is able to send signals to air cylinders installed within the robot’s joints that move different parts of its body in order to display physical reactions and facial expressions.

More importantly, the robot is able to simulate medical emergencies such as convulsion and heart failure, allowing trainees to gain experience handling similar critical situations, a Tmsuk engineer said.

Director of Tmsuk’s engineering division Yusuke Ishii said the robot was developed due to the lack of clinical dental training to treat children.

“It is difficult to get experience in paediatric dentistry because there are no opportunities to practise,” he explained.

In addition, there is the risk that children will move wildly because with children, when their medical condition suddenly worsens, it’s hard for them to express that situation. So it is necessary to have the experience and knowledge to monitor and treat the patients,” Ishii told Reuters.

Currently retailing at a hefty price tag of about 25 million Japanese yen (€185,000), Tmsuk hopes to develop the hyper-realistic robot further so that people from other childcare industries can use it to train for different kinds of emergency situations.

For more on this story, watch the video in the media player above.

The post Meet the convulsing child robot helping to train Japan’s dentists first appeared on Magazin Haber Ajansı.