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5 ways to share files that are too big to email – Komando

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

We have file-size problems. Our cameras now take fabulous photos and crisp videos. Our computers can tackle monstrous spreadsheets. We can create detailed graphics that look stunning when blown up. But all of that comes with a drawback: honking huge files.

So what do you do when you want to send that slick video or pile of digital photos of your vacation adventure to grandma, but the file is too big to attach to an email? Here are five ways to handle it:

Gmail users have it easy when it to comes to sending files that are over the limit. Google Drive will come to your rescue when you try to attach a file thats over the 25 MB size restriction. Gmail will pop up with a message reading, Large files must be shared with Google Drive. Attachments larger than 25MB will be automatically uploaded to Google Drive. A download link will be included in your emails.

This is a no-sweat way to send those large files. You get a workaround for the attachment limit and the recipient can download the file at her leisure. You can also upload files directly to Google Drive and then share them from there. Keep in mind that these files can count against your Drive storage space. Drive can hold files up to a massive 5 terabytes in size, but you will need an upgraded, paid storage plan to accommodate that much data.

Psst! Did you know Google Drive recently added new features? Click here for details on Team Drives, Google Vault, Drive File Stream and Quick Access.

DropBox is a popular online storage service that lets you keep important files backed up in the cloud. It also makes it easy to share those files with other people, who can download them through a sharing link or add them to their own DropBox accounts.

DropBox offers a free 2 GB of room to anyone. If your cloud storage needs are more demanding than the free account can accommodate, then you can check into paid tiers that offer more space. Services like Box.com and Microsofts OneDrive offer similar features to DropBox. You can always sign up for more than one free storage service if youre getting low on space.

WeTransfersbasic free service lets you share files up to 2 GB in size. WeTransfer isnt for online storage. Its just for sending files. Its very simple to use. Just go to the site, choose the free option, add your file (or files) from your computer and then put in your email, your recipients email, and a message. Hit the Transfer button and wait while WeTransfer uploads the file and sends a notice to the receiver. The files will remain available to download for seven days.

Its easy for Amazons Drive service to get overlooked in the crush of Prime perks, but it offers an easy file storage and sharing option for people who are already hooked on the Amazon ecosystem.

Any Amazon user can get 5 GB of space for free, but Prime members get the extra perk of unlimited photo storage, which is a compelling carrot for shutterbugs. Much like DropBox, you can share those photos and other files by generating a link and emailing it to your recipient.

Note: Amazon Drive is just one of the perks that come with your Prime membership. Click here for a full list of included benefits.

You can make a large file a little smaller by compressing it into a zipped folder. In Windows, right-click the file or folder, go down to send to, and choose Compressed (zipped) folder. This will create a new folder thats smaller than the original. For Mac systems, control-click a file (or tap it with two fingers) to bring up the shortcut menu. Choose Compress to make a daintier zipped version.

Compressing isnt a magic bullet. For example, compressing a 90 MB image file in Windows may only result in a 60 MB zipped file, but it can be useful if you just need to slim a file down a little to get under your email sending limit.

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5 ways to share files that are too big to email - Komando

A cut above: the rise of the luxury brosectomy – Telegraph.co.uk

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Though they are technically reversible, vasectomies should be considered permanent birth control for menand thiscan be a daunting prospect.

Shane Geib M.D,the urologist who operated on Lopez and Ferretti at his Obsidian Men's Health clinic just outside of Washington D.C, told The Telegraph that men often view the procedure as a major one.

"One thing thatMark [Richman, co-founder of the clinic]and I realised is that if you get a 35 to 40-year-old guy, this is a big deal to him", he explained."If you brush over it andsay oh, suck it up, youre being a wimp, the guys dont like that,they take real offence.

"Particularly compared with the age equivalent in women, most men arent really used to going to the doctor. Even if they dont come in groups,a lot of guys will send one guy, kind of as a sacrificial lamb,to check out the office. 'Is this a nice place? Do you like the doctors? How are the staff?' Then thatguy can report back."

Theseus Review: Exploring The Minotaur’s Labyrinth In VR – UploadVR

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Theseus, along with Perseus, Heracles, and several others, is often regarded as one of the greatest heroes in the entire lineage of Greek mythology. When youre given your very own boss fight in the God of War series of video games, that alone is usually enough to mean youre a pretty big deal.

One of the most well-known and repeated stories of Theseus youll find mention of though is his battle with the Minotaur. Typically he fights the beast after navigating a deadly labyrinth. In the appropriately titled new game from Forge Reply, Theseus, that comes to PlayStation VR (PSVR) this week, youre tasked with being the star of this tale.

When I previewed Theseus a couple of months ago the build I tried was on the HTC Vive, but the first commercially available version of the game (which is being reviewed here) is launching on the PSVR. Ever since the game was first revealed back in February its drawn frequent comparisons to God of War for obvious reasons. Its a third-person action game presumably, utilizes direct references to Greek mythology, and has you doing battle with multiple, often large, monsters. But other than those surface level similarities the games couldnt really be much different.

God of War is all about action. You get new weapons, unlock flashy combos, and are constantly fighting hordes of enemies. Theseus is about slow-paced, quiet, sometimes tedious, exploration with a scattering of occasional fights along the way. The majority of puzzles consist of climbing on ledges and hiding from the Minotaur itself. In some ways, its more of a stealth game than an action game.

The first weapon I found was a torch, which I could use to scare spider-like beasts away when walking around in the dark, but you do eventually get a sword as well. Unfortunately combat never really evolves beyond mashing buttons and trying to dodge enemy attacks. While you could say similar things about games such as Chronos, another third-person action adventure game in VR, that title is much, much longer, with more varied enemies and environments, as well as an actual progression system. Theseus sort of felt like the first act of a larger game that was intended to open up more eventually and never does.

I spent somewhere between three and four hours playing Theseus before it was over. During that time I often found myself stopping to stare at the nice looking backdrop designs in the distance and can confirm that chills very often shot down my spine when the Minotaur was nearby.Speaking of which, the Minotaur itself may be the best part of the whole game. Hes massive and extremely intimidating. The sense of scale is powerful and I honestly felt scared when I sensed his presence.

The sound design was excellent throughout and did a great job of making me feel like I was actually tip-toeing through a creepy labyrinth with a twisted, evil, and relentless Minotaur trying to hunt me down.

The atmosphere and world building is so strong it feels like a missed opportunity that the actual game itself isnt better. Walking around environments that all pretty much look the same as a female wisp spirit guides me along was novel at first, but loses its luster quickly.

Just like Chronos, the entire game is played from third-person with mostly fixed camera angles. This means that each time you turn a corner or enter a new room the camera jumps to a new spot somewhere on the wall. It feels like youre spying on your character and telling him where to go more than it does youre actually controlling your character. Its a style of gameplay Ive never been a fan of with VR titles and vastly prefer an always-following camera in third-person such as in Luckys Tale or Edge of Nowhere.

One major reason is because Theseus doesnt feel like a VR game. Wherein the other mentioned titles feel like they were designed from the ground up with VR mind for the most part, Theseus does not. Several segments have me walking in a straight line, with the camera deciding to suddenly hover behind me, but my characters body is blocking my view while things are happening in front of him. Its a bizarre feeling where I cannot see what my character sees even though he is facing straight ahead and it happened frequently.

Many of the textures and areas of the labyrinth appeared as noticeably blurry and jagged to me. Granted, the PSVR isnt as powerful as the Vive or Rift, but I noticed similar issues on my Vive preview build as well. The art direction is wonderful and looks great in high-resolution screenshots, but those visuals lose their edge and luster when filtered through a VR headset. Its just another way the game feels under cooked.

Theseus is a game that had a lot of promise. The dark and creepy setting comes through with a strong, foreboding atmosphere thats often difficult to capture in VR games. But unfortunately the actual gameplay itself feels like more of a chore than anything else. Its over far too soon and doesnt feel properly designed for VR from the ground up. The Minotaur is terrifying and intimidating, but getting through everything else just to face him isnt going to be worth it for most people.

Theseus releases today on PSVR with PC VR versions (presumably both Rift and Vive) coming soon. Read ourGame Review Guidelinesfor more information on how we arrived at this score.

Tagged with: forge reply, Theseus

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Theseus Review: Exploring The Minotaur's Labyrinth In VR - UploadVR

Giphy now lets you create ridiculous GIFs on mobile without an app – The Verge

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Giphy is launching another GIF-creation tool today, and the big hook is that theres nothing to install. Its latest tool is on the web and designed for mobile, so you can just visit the site and start creating a weird GIF. I uploaded a photo of my cat, and Im sorry to say that Ive turned it into the GIF you see above.

The mobile GIF Maker site offers the same kind of irreverent experience that Giphys other GIF-making tools do. You can take or upload a photo or video and then add text, stickers, and other animations on top of them, so youre basically putting GIFs on top of a GIF. New to the mobile website is a drawing tool that lets you create wiggly lines. Theres also a feature called Dog/Cat Draw, which is where you draw... but your ink is an increasingly long dog / cat.

As stupidly fun as Giphys other GIF-making tools

The site is also supposed to let you make GIFs out of photos and videos youve found elsewhere, like a YouTube video, but I couldnt get that feature to work. I only tried the site on my Android phone, and I got the impression that the site was probably designed more with iOS in mind. For instance, I had to use the Files app (which presents everything on your phone in an endless list) to browse through my photos, rather than being able to look through Google Photos.

Still, the site works once youve picked out or taken your photo, its simple to use, and Giphy pretty much makes it impossible to not make something thats stupidly fun. It offers a somewhat different experience than the Giphy Cam app, too, though the real benefit here is that more people will be able to access it, since its just a matter of visiting a website and not installing a 178MB app first.

Giphy now lets you create ridiculous GIFs on mobile without an app - The Verge

FLOW TC Country Manager makes history at Caribbean’s leading ICT Conference – Magnetic Media (press release)

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Dominican Republic, July 19, 2017 Punta Cana Last Wednesday saw a vibrant and far reaching conversation on Women in ICT, this as the 33rd Annual Conference and Trade Exhibition continued at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Punta Cana Dominican Republic.

The panel entertained questions from the audience and as such was able to address a wide range of issues. The panel included: Karen Bevans, Director, Belize Tourism Bureau; Janice Sutherland, CEO, Antigua and Barbuda and Montserrat, Digicel; Delleriece Hall, Country Manager, FLOW Turks and Caicos; Anuskha Sonia, CEO, Spang Makandra; and was chaired by the Secretary General of CANTO Teresa Wankin.

Karen Bevans led the panel with a presentation which looked at the relevance and functionality ofICTs to everyday life as they improve business performance productivity, profitability; access to services from any location, allow real-time communication, and provide more opportunities for everyone, especially for girls/women. She noted this against the background that ICT was still very male dominated.

Ms. Bevans used her presentation to highlight practical examples in Belize of the positive effects of ICTs in Belize in creating opportunities for women inclusive of tourism, trade, entrepreneurship and online services. She cautioned that the use of ICT canalso have negative impacts and that young girls should be carefulof what they upload as it can make them vulnerable. In concluding, she stated that: Women in ICT are still battling gender inequality.

Delleriece Hall made the timely and potent statement that Once you put your mind to it, go for it. Sky is the limit! I didnt have a background in engineering despite managing others who did. Were all super stars in the Turks and Caicos. Im the first female CEO of T&C and CWC is 120 years old in T&C.

Anuskha Sonai also offered words of wisdom stating Its not automatic. You have to speak up for the roles you want in the organization. Support of my family was integral in my nontraditional choice.

Questions which engaged the forum included what are the top three qualities that made you right for the CEO role? Do you see women at the fore of Caribbean ICT or a long way still? Women leading with empathy is seen as chaotic. Thoughts? And Female mentorship is lacking. What are you prepared to do about it? To the last question,the Secretary General excitedly responded: This forum speaks for itself. Next year expect to see tangible evidence of what weve seen here.

Minister Catherine Hughes, Minister of Public Telecommunications with responsibility for Tourism, Guyana who was in the audience,delivered a vote of thanks to the panel. She underscored the importance of mentorship: Within CANTO structure, we should create a program to encourage more women to participate in all year round. We are graduating more women in our universities yet women are not being prepared to sit at the table. I compliment all the men that are of great support to their women.

Hall is the first local female Country Manager in the companys 119 years of operation and the first local female in the TCI to speak at this level at the Caribbeans leading ICT Conference.

Hall was supported by her husband, Mr. Lynden Hall, who she highlighted in her presentation as her biggest supporter throughout her career.

Also, in attendance were Kevin Carmichael, Finance Lead, FLOW TC, Audley Gibbs, Network Operations Lead, FLOW TC, Minister of Communications, Hon. Vaden D. Williams, PS of Border Control & Labor, Mrs. Clara Gardiner, and members of the Turks and Caicos Telecommunications Commission.

CANTO is the Caribbeans premier telecommunications event for industry professionals, academics and regional governments. The Conference ran from the 16th -19th July, 2017.

Press Release: Flow

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FLOW TC Country Manager makes history at Caribbean's leading ICT Conference - Magnetic Media (press release)

Biologics: The Pricey Drugs Transforming Medicine – Scientific American

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.

In a factory just outside San Francisco, theres an upright stainless steel vat the size of a small car, and its got something swirling inside.

The vat is studded with gauges, hoses and pipes. Inside, its hot just under 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Sugar and other nutrients are being pumped in because, inside this formidable container, there is life.

Scientists are growing cells in there. Those cells, in turn, are growing medicine. Every two weeks or so, the hot, soupy liquid inside gets strained and processed. The purified molecules that result will eventually be injected into patients with Stage IV cancer.

Drugs that are made this way inside living cells are called biologics. And theyre taking medicine by storm. By 2016, biologics had surged to make up 25 percent of the total pharmaceutical market, bringing in US$232 billion, with few signs their upward trend will slow.

Common medicines such as aspirin, antacids and statins are chemical in nature. Though many were initially discovered in the wild (aspirin is a cousin of a compound in willow bark, the first statin was found in a fungus), these drugs are now made nonbiologically.

Conventional medicines are stitched together by chemists in large factories using other chemicals as building blocks. Their molecular structures are well defined and relatively simple. Aspirin, for example, contains just 21 atoms (nine carbons, eight hydrogens and four oxygens) bonded together to form a particular shape. A single aspirin tablet even kid-sized contains trillions of copies of the drug molecule.

Biologic drugs are a different story. This class of medication is not synthesized chemically instead they are harvested directly from biology, as their name suggests. Most modern biologics are assembled inside vats or bioreactors that house genetically engineered microbes or mammalian cell cultures. Efforts are underway to make them in plants.

Biologic drugs can be whole cells, alive or dead. They can be the biomolecules produced by cells, like antibodies, which are normally secreted by our immune systems B cells. Or they can be some of the internal components of cells, like enzymes.

Biologics are typically much larger molecules than those found in conventional pharmaceuticals, and in many cases their exact composition is unknown (or even unknowable). Youre unlikely to find biologic drugs in tablet form they tend to be delicate molecules that are happiest in liquid solution.

While biologics are one of the fastest-growing drug categories in the U.S., they arent exactly new. The Biologics Control Act, passed in 1902, was the first law aimed at ensuring the safety of some of the earliest biologics vaccines. Congress was moved to pass the law after a contaminated batch of diphtheria shots left 13 children dead. Jim, the horse from which the diphtheria antitoxin had been extracted, had contracted tetanus.

Fortunately, scientists have dramatically improved the way they manufacture biologic drugs since then. For starters, the recombinant DNA revolution of the 1970s means that drug makers no longer have to extract many of the most important biologics from whole animals.

The gene that codes for human insulin, for example, can be pasted into a microbe which will happily churn out the drug in bulk. After a multi-million dollar purification process, the injectable insulin that results is indistinguishable from the version a healthy human body would produce. This is how some forms of insulin are made today.

Both conventional and biologic drugs work by interacting with our own biology. Most conventional drugs function as inhibitors theyre just the right size and shape to jam themselves into some molecular cog in our cells. Aspirins pain-reducing power comes from its ability to disrupt an enzyme in the body called cyclooxygenase, an important player in pain signaling.

Conventional drug discovery largely consists of finding new compounds that specifically disrupt only disease-associated processes. Because these drugs are quite small, and because the inside of any cell is a sea of other molecular components, finding a new small drug that blocks only problematic processes is tricky. Off-target interactions can produce side effects of all types.

The large size of biologic drugs can be an asset here. An antibody, for example, has lots of specific points of contact with its target. This enables therapeutic antibody drugs to bind with extreme precision only their target molecule should be an exact match. This binding can lead to inhibitory effects, much like a conventional drug might. In some cases, therapeutic antibodies can also stimulate the immune system in a problem area, like at a tumor, prompting the body to take it out.

Many biologics target molecular processes that no conventional drug can, and they can treat a growing list of diseases. Cancer treatments dominate the list, but since 2011 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved new protein-based biologics for the treatment of Lupus, Crohns disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, kidney failure, asthma and high cholesterol.

New types of biologic drugs continue to emerge as well. In late 2015, the FDA approved a first-of-its-kind treatment for patients with advanced melanoma: an engineered herpes virus. Researchers genetically programmed the virus, called T-VEC, to target only cancerous cells, and it can also prompt the immune system to start wiping out cancer. Additional virus-based therapies are currently working their way through the lengthy U.S. drug approval process.

Amgen, the company that produces T-VEC, estimates it will cost an average of $65,000 per patient and that doesnt come close to topping the list of priciest biologic medications. The most expensive drug ever made recently won approval by the FDA. Brineura, a biweekly enzyme replacement therapy produced by BioMarin Pharmaceutical, delays the loss of walking in individuals with a rare genetic disorder. Its price tag? $27,000 per injection, or more than $700,000 for a full years treatment.

The steep prices of biologic drugs are alarming to many patients, physicians and researchers. In an effort to drive costs down, provisions of the Obama administrations Affordable Care Act accelerated the approval process for new biologics intended to compete with already approved medicines. Like generic drugs, so-called biosimilars are designed to be interchangeable with the biologic they seek to replace.

Unlike generic versions of conventional drugs, however, biosimilar drugs are often only similar to not identical with their competition. This means these complex drugs still require lengthy and expensive trials of their own to make sure theyre effective and safe. Because of this, the Federal Trade Commission estimates that biosimilars may only produce an overall 10 to 30 percent discount for patients.

Cost-cutting innovations in the biologic production pipeline are desperately needed. The FDA has called on scientists and drug developers to invent biosimilars that resemble FDA-approved medicines and to develop the tools needed to quickly demonstrate their safety.

As this promising class of drugs continues to grow in number and popularity, their lifesaving power will be limited if costs make them inaccessible to patients who need them.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Biologics: The Pricey Drugs Transforming Medicine - Scientific American

With new ventures to show, MIT Hacking Medicine shares its model for success – Medical Xpress

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

July 26, 2017 Prize winners at a healthcare hackathon. Credit: MIT Hacking Medicine

Since 2010, MIT Hacking Medicine has grown from a one-time event to a global brand, with more than 80 healthcare hackathons being hosted this year, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Quito, Ecuador. The programs are open to everyone, but are particularly popular with 20- to 30-something engineers, doctors, researchers, and entrepreneurs who form teams under mentorship and identify healthcare issues to solve. At least 15 groups have started companies and raised more than $100 million in venture funding after meeting at a Hacking Medicine event. In a commentary published July 26 in the journal Cell Systems, the organizers describe how their model stands apart from typical hackathons.

"The short- and medium-term gains in healthcare are not going to be from one-off Thomas Edisons doing their own thing to invent the light bulb," says senior author Christopher Lee, a former engineer-turned-scientist at the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. "Everything is so multi-disciplinary now that you need to know where you run short of expertise and complement your skill sets through collaboration."

A healthcare hackathon follows a four-phase approach: identification, description, alteration, and implementation. At the start of the weekend, each group chooses to work on a pain point that one of the participants brings up from their day-to-day experience working in healthcare (e.g., patients are waiting over an hour to see their doctors, children are accidently pulling out wires next to their hospital bed). Once selected, the team interviews relevant people who are affected by the problem and researches existing solutions. They develop prototypes that solve problems they've identified and then compete for endorsement from mentors and judges.

Some of the ventures that have so far evolved from these meetings include PillPack(prescription adherence), CAKE (end-of-life care), Augmented Infant Resuscitator (improved bag-valve-mask for neonates), Perfect Latch (breast pump design), Arsenal Health (patient scheduling), and Podimetrics (diabetic foot ulcers). Other former participants go on to work on research or non-profit projects such as mobile diagnostics applications, ultrasound probes, and electronic health record automation tools.

Lee emphasizes the social and academic values of the hackathons, which help participants meet like-minded individuals and learn how to innovate. "Our goal isn't for our event to launch companies, it's to teach people to incorporate design thinking and user feedbackor how to conduct an interview so that you know what you're designing is hitting the right levers," he says. "We see ourselves as an education program that all the MIT Hacking Medicine community members have put a lot of love into."

MIT Hacking Medicine, which mostly covers the New England area, has been involved in about a quarter of the healthcare hackathon events that now take place around the world. In addition to university- and academic-sponsored events, the group also helps healthcare technology groups and institutions design accelerators and incubators and helps hospitals and pharmaceutical companies host internal hackathons.

MIT Hacking Medicine recently published a free handbook that serves as a resource for anyone looking to host these events in their community. Lee recommends hackathon planners raise money for space, prizes, food, and of course, coffee. Due to the popularity of the events, it sometimes is necessary to use an application system to screen for participants.

"Research is all about being out there and being totally new, and that's great, but at the same time, we have such a wealth of problems to solve today, right now," Lee says. "We are showing scientists and physicians that no matter what they are working on, they can be an entrepreneur and incorporate the design process without getting an MBA or being a consultant in a previous life. People come to our events and feel like they can do this."

Explore further: New collaboration platform to optimise antibiotic use

More information: Cell Systems, Gubin et al.: "A Systems Approach to Healthcare Innovation using The MIT Hacking Medicine Model" http://www.cell.com/cell-systems/fulltext/S2405-4712(17)30084-4 , DOI: 10.1016/j.cels.2017.02.012

Journal reference: Cell Systems

Provided by: Cell Press

Healthcare needs access to many different antibiotics, but some sorts are no longer profitable for pharmaceutical companies. PLATINEA, the new platform for collaboration, will help identify the gap between needs and available ...

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With new ventures to show, MIT Hacking Medicine shares its model for success - Medical Xpress

Celtics consolidating sports medicine and performance staff – CelticsBlog (blog)

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

The Boston Celtics made some major changes to their sports medicine department by letting go of Ed Lacerte, their trainer of 30 years, and Bryan Doo, the strength and conditioning coach of 14 years. They also released Vladimir Shulman, who has served as the teams massage therapist since the early 1980s.

Boston has named Art Horne the director of performance along with Johann Bilsborough as the director of sports science. Horne was with the Atlanta Hawks for the past two seasons before taking the head trainer job with the Celtics. Bilsborough has been with Boston since 2015.

For a team that consistently turns their roster over every year, the Celtics dont make a lot of changes outside of the players. Along with Lacerte and Doo being with the Celtics for a combined 44 years, Danny Ainge has had the same role with the team since 2003, Brad Stevens is just the second head coach for Boston in 13 years. It was a curious move by the Celtics, and there wasnt information regarding why the team decided to move in this direction.

Adam Himmelsbach of the Boston Globe released a story on Tuesday that shed some light on the organizations decision to make a change to the sports medicine department.

According to a league source, there was some uneasiness about the hierarchy of the Celtics sports medicine and performance staff, and the Celtics believed a fresh start was the best option.

In the article, Ainge was very thankful for the work that Lacerte, Doo, and Shulman did during their time with the Celtics. He also said that Horne and Bilsborough will oversee a staff of six that will be hired soon.

Horne was widely viewed as an industry pioneer at Northeastern when he worked to blend sports performance and sports medicine departments into one.

It sounds like the teams restructuring and streamlining plans center around combining sports performance and sports training teams together. A model that worked well for Horne at Northeastern.

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Celtics consolidating sports medicine and performance staff - CelticsBlog (blog)

Prescription video games may be the future of medicine – The Verge – The Verge

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Brain-training games have been a controversial topic in recent years, especially after a group of scientists and researchers published an open letter in 2014 saying there is very little evidence that training your brain in one area or on one task offers improvement in other areas of cognitive function. Shortly afterward, another group of scientists wrote a rebuttal to that, claiming that a substantial and growing body of evidence shows that certain cognitive-training regimens can significantly improve cognitive function, including in ways that generalize to everyday life.

Which is what makes the efforts of a company called Akili along with the University of California, San Fransiscos Neuroscape lab so interesting. Akili is a Boston-based tech company that has used Neuroscapes core technology to develop a mobile game called Project: EVO. The goal is make Project: EVO so powerful, that it could potentially help treat children with ADHD as a prescription-based video game.

In order to validate the game in a way that other brain-training companies havent, Akili has to go through all of the trials and processes that are required by the FDA for any kind of drug or medical device. The game is currently in phase III clinical trials, which means this isnt a done deal yet. But if Akili is successful, it will have created the first prescription-based video game in the US, and in doing so, would essentially create a new category of digital medicine.

So for this episode of Next Level, we first went behind the scenes into the Neuroscape lab at UCSF. Lead by neuroscientist Adam Gazzaley (pictured above), the team at Neuroscape has spent the past 12 years incubating and testing video game technology that could be used to support treatment of brain disorders such as ADHD, autism, depression, Alzheimers disease, and more. We then visited Akilis Northern California offices and spoke with co-founder and chief creative officer Matt Omernick, who, prior to Akili, was executive art director at LucasArts. I was curious to find out exactly how Akili plans to turn Project: EVO into a prescription-based game.

Akili has licensed technology from the Neuroscape lab to develop a game that the company hopes will become a prescription video game

And yes, I had the chance to play all of these games, including Akilis Project: EVO, Neuroscapes Body Brain Trainer, and a still-in-development game called Labyrinth, which involved an HTC Vive and a Virtuix Omni platform. (I cant report feeling any smarter afterward; I only used them for brief periods of time.)

Gazzaley, Omernick, and others I spoke to are all very much aware of the controversy surrounding their area of work, but made points to say how their efforts are different. For one, Gazzaley says, Neuroscape tries to reach beyond gamified exercises and create engaging and immersive video game experiences. We are increasingly integrating both cognitive challenges and physical movement, he said, which is something I can attest to, because the physically challenging games I played were certainly different than sitting at a computer screen and trying to switch tasks.

I think its just that the evidence hasnt been clearly shown yet and thats what were trying to do here, Akilis Omernick said, when I questioned him on the efficacy of brain-training games. We all believe strongly that its very true. Its just a matter of showing the data.

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Prescription video games may be the future of medicine - The Verge - The Verge

Our Unfounded Medical Optimism – Slate Magazine

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Chris Gard and Connie Yates, the parents of terminally ill baby Charlie Gard, speak to the media on Monday in London.

Carl Court/Getty Images

The parents of Charlie Gard announced on Monday that theyd given up on treating their 11-month-old child, who suffers from a rare and deadly gene mutation affecting his mitochondrial DNA. The roller-coaster case began in February when physicians at the London hospital treating the infant said it was time to remove Charlies life support. They refused to let the British couple fly him to New York City for a last-ditch, experimental treatment that, according to its inventor, had a small but significant chance of reversing his brain damage. Over the past five months of legal battles, the hospital never wavered from its claims that every reasonable means of saving Charlie had been tried already and that he should be spared any further suffering that might come with a form of therapy that has never been tested on a patient with exactly his condition, and which isnt part of any clinical trial.

Daniel Engberis a columnist for Slate.

Charlies parents now say that its too late for any intervention and that its time to let him go. But for several months now, the #CharlieGard saga has served as the focus for a broader push for patients rights in Washington. Conservative politicians were quick to champion Charlies parents causePresident Trump tweeted his support and the House tried to grant the couple permanent residencyin keeping with the GOPs strong endorsement of so-called right-to-try laws. These measureslately passed in 33 statesare meant to guarantee very sick people access to experimental or nonconventional medical treatments that havent yet passed muster with the Food and Drug Administration. In practice, that means the parents of a dying patient such as Charlie wouldnt need to ask permission from the FDA to move ahead with therapy; they could just request it directly from the manufacturer.

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Its hard to argue with vocal patient-advocates who say their lives were saved by gaining access to experimental treatments. The right to try sounds like common sense: It should be up to patients to decide whether the potential upside of a treatment (surviving a terminal illness) seems worth any risk of painful side effects. Why not let them give it hell and go down swinging? But stepping back from anecdotes, the spread of experimental access laws (like the calls for Charlies puddle-jumping medevac) suggests that critical decisions about the final months of peoples lives are often based on biased judgments of reality. Patients seem to overvalue innovation, as a rule, and assume that newer drugs have a better chance of working than any other treatment, just because theyre new. Not only does this sanguine view of scientific progress fail to fit the facts; it also leads patients to the converse, false impression that nonconventional treatments arent likely to be harmful in themselves. A more sober view suggests that the hope that often moves people to seek out these types of treatmentsand the ever-present pressure to fight until the endis not as useful as we think.

The spread of experimental access laws suggests that critical decisions about the final months of peoples lives are often based on biased judgments of reality.

Unfounded optimism tends to be the rule in medicine. A 2015 review of several dozen studies of peoples expectations from treatment, comprising data from more than 27,000 subjects, found systematic evidence of a Pollyanna Patient problem: We overestimate the value of the care that we receive and underestimate its harm. That work is cited in an excellent article by Liz Szabo of Kaiser Health News, on the surprising ineffectiveness of cancer drugs that have been FDA approved. Its not just that these treatments do little to prolong survival, Szabo says; according to one study, many patients never grasp this fact. In a sample of several thousand adults, 39 percent said they believe the FDA only approves prescription drugs that are extremely effective; 1 in 6 asserted that drugs that have serious side effects cannot be advertised to consumers. Neither statement is even close to being true. According to Vinay Prasad, an oncologist and expert in evidence-based medicine at Oregon Health and Sciences University, we dont have any hard evidence of benefitin terms of patients living longer livesfor the majority of cancer drugs approved in recent years.

If FDA-approved drugs often fail to offer substantive benefits, then experimental onesthose that havent even passed the suspect bar for agency signoffare even less likely to be helpful. In fact, about 90 percent of experimental treatments flunk out during clinical trials, either because they arent shown to be any more effective than the standard treatment or because their side effects are too severe. In some cases, experimental treatments once thought to be miraculouslike the use of bone-marrow transplants as a cure for breast cancer, which started in the 1980shave turned out to be worse than ineffective in clinical trials. In the bone marrow case, the procedure could be deadly on its own. This abysmal failure rate persists in spite of the enormous cost of running trials and researchers clear incentive (read: bias) to produce positive results.

Such dire stats have done little to discourage eager patients, though. When it comes to clinical trials, we seem to harbor a version of the favoritelong shot biasthe tendency of horse-track gamblers to overvalue the underdog at the expense of the odds-on favorite. In medicine, this translates to fixation on the value of experimental treatmentsand the remote possibility that they might turn out to be wonder cures. Indeed, for those who are faced with imminent death, the desire to bet ones health on long-shot drugs (and the right to do so, when all other options have been tried) is so insistent that patients even deride clinical trials as another structure blocking access to potentially life-saving treatments. The trials randomized treatment groups and stringent inclusion criteria mean the majority of patients never get the chance to serve as guinea pigs at all.

In certain casesthink of early AIDS drugs or Ebola vaccinesthis rigidity can indeed have tragic consequences. But how much rigor should be sacrificed, and how many rules should be suspended, on behalf of patients whose expectations may be substantially inflated? In late June, that question served as the backdrop for a two-day symposium of doctors, bioethicists, patient-advocates, and public-health officials on the future of randomized controlled trials. The problems with RCTs are legion, speakers said: Theyre not well-suited to emerging threats; theyre too expensive; theyre too slow.

But it seemed just as clear from the proceedings that patients should think twice before they clamor for inclusion in these trials and for greater flexibility in their administration. The randomized trial is the single greatest medical innovation of the 20th century, said Prasad, who was in New York City for the meeting. But he warned against the use of massive studies of experimental treatments that may have only very tiny benefits in the end. Its unethical, he said, to put so many desperate patients on a drug unless you have good reason to believe in its effectiveness.

Even in this era of informed consent, patients may not understand exactly what they stand to gain (or lose) by entering a trial. Research going back to 1982 has found that many suffer from a therapeutic misconception: They assume theyll benefit personally from being in a clinical trial, though in fact they may not get the tested treatmentand even if they did, chances are it wouldnt help. (In fairness, some researchers now say this problem has been overstated.) My advice is, youre better off in the control group, warned former FDA chief Robert Califf in his keynote lecture at the symposium, speaking to prospective patients in the audience who had been arguing for greater access to experimental drugs. Most things dont work or theyre dangerous.

This creates an intoxicating atmosphere of progressa sense that new and better treatments are always on the verge of coming out.

The fact that an experimental drug is usually a bad bet isnt likely to dull our instinct to gamble on untested treatments, though. The idolatry of experimentation has even spawned a sinister, for-profit industry, lurking in the shadows of the FDA approval process. In a disturbing paper published last week, bioethicist Leigh Turner describes how the government website ClinicalTrials.gova registry established in 1997 to improve the reliability of formal research on potential treatmentsis being used to market sketchy medical practices. Patients who are looking for a way to break into a clinical trial may scan the registry for opportunities to volunteer; now, instead of finding only legitimate, government-sanctioned research trials, they could land on so-called patient-funded or patient-sponsored ones. In these, they have to pay for access to a therapy that isnt necessarily based on any peer-reviewed, preclinical data, and which may lack any evidence of safety or effectiveness. (Already there have been reports of patients suffering severe complications from their participation in these ersatz trials.)

What makes us so gung-ho for things that arent fully tested? It may in part be human nature, but aspects of the bias seem to be conditioned, too. Even honest science coverage tends to focus on putative medical breakthroughs that have either just occurred or may be coming soon; less scrupulous media figures hawk salves or potions with little basis whatsoever. Taken altogether this creates an intoxicating atmosphere of progressa sense that new and better treatments are always on the verge of coming out.

Top Comment

We're also too quick to pretend that a dead child isn't dead; Charlie Gard died months ago. Nothing that was offered would have changed that. I mention this because the other prob with have is an infantile faith in miracles. More...

Yet the excitement in the air rarely matches up to reality: Actual medical advancement tends to be incremental and excruciatingly slow. The discord this createsbetween the feeling of innovation inspired by the media and the real options that were offered in the clinicmay distort our view of experimental treatments. It could make us think there must be some reason why our cancers havent yet been cured; there must be some external factors preventing us from getting access to the new and better drugs weve heard so much about. If only regulators werent so overcautious and uptight, we end up thinking, it would be possible to tap this cache of innovation.

Right-to-try laws indulge the fear that unbending bureaucrats in Washington have kept patients from medical cures with an excess of red tape. In fact, these laws have little real effect. Thats because the FDA already offers access to experimental treatments with very modest oversightand in recent years the agency has done away with a few unnecessary rules that slowed the process down. The problem isnt that patients (or their parents) have insufficient freedom to decide how theyd like to balance out potential risks and benefits from experimental treatments. Its that our bias often makes them victims of false hope.

Bitter medicine at GSK as Emma Walmsley announces cuts – The Guardian

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Emma Walmsley took over as GlaxoSmithKline CEO in April. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

GlaxoSmithKlines new chief executive Emma Walmsley has laid out plans to cut one in three of the pharma groups drug development programmes as part of a shakeup of the business. She also plans to offload 130 non-core brands and possibly sell off the unit that works on treatments for rare diseases.

Walmsley, the former head of the drugmakers consumer healthcare business, who took over from Sir Andrew Witty as CEO in April, said the company would focus more on backing the real winners medicines that generate substantial returns.

Some 33 programmes were to be cancelled, sold or partnered. They included 13 in clinical development, including treatments for hepatitis C, psoriasis, cancer and rheumatoid arthritis, and about 20 in pre-clinical development. There were currently 94 drug development programmes at Britains biggest pharmaceuticals firm. Its rare diseases unit was also under review.

Walmsley stressed the research-and-development budget would not be cut and that the money saved would be spent on other areas. To improve the weak late-stage drug pipeline, research would focus on just four areas respiratory, HIV and infectious diseases, cancer and immuno-inflammation conditions such as arthritis and they would get 80% of the research spending.

We have been much more thinly spread but also our spend per asset has been a bit low, said Walmsley. More and more. we need to make sure we are backing the assets that are winning We should be spending where we believe we have an asset that can be competitive, and reallocating money appropriately.

Walmsleys efficiency drive will see the number of GSKs suppliers cut by a quarter by 2020, the sale of 130 minor brands such as Horlicks and MaxiNutrition in Britain and an old antibiotics business, and the streamlining of administrative processes. She wants 1bn of annual cost savings by 2020, which will be used to fund the development and launch of new products and offset the impact of pressure on drug pricing.

GSK already announced last week that it would sell its Horlicks UK brand, shut the Slough factory where the malt drink is made, ditch plans for a new biopharmaceutical factory in Cumbria and outsource some manufacturing from its Worthing site in West Sussex, with the loss of 320 jobs in Britain.

Walmsley said GSK would make the US its No 1 priority market adding this had nothing to do with Brexit.

GSKs revenues in the second quarter rose 12% to 7.3bn, boosted by the weak pound (they were up 3% at constant exchange rates). The group made a loss before tax of 178m, down from 318m.

See the rest here:

Bitter medicine at GSK as Emma Walmsley announces cuts - The Guardian

Pasadena officer who investigated overdose was skeptical of USC … – Los Angeles Times

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

The police officer who last year questioned the then-dean of USCs medical school about his role in the drug overdose of a young woman expressed skepticism at Dr. Carmen Puliafitos account, according to an audio recording that was made by the officer and released Tuesday.

Puliafito told the officer he was at the Pasadena hotel room where the overdose occurred as a family friend to help the woman, who was later rushed to Huntington Memorial Hospital.

The unidentified officer is asked by a social worker at the hospital what he thought of the account offered by Puliafito.

You buy it? says the social worker on the recording that Pasadena police released in response to a California Public Records Act request by The Times.

No, the officer replies.

The social worker later laughs and says: A friend of the father. Excuse me? Thats funny.

The officer and social worker then speculated about Puliafitos relationship with the woman and discussed the drugs and provocative clothing found at the scene.

Despite the officers doubts, a required report on the overdose at a Pasadena hotel was not filed until three months later, after The Times made repeated requests for information. No arrests were made.

In a statement Tuesday, Pasadena Police Chief Phillip L. Sanchez defended his departments handling of the overdose, saying it lacked evidence to arrest Puliafito in connection with methamphetamine that officers found in the hotel room registered in his name. It remained unclear if the department followed up on its investigation after questioning Puliafito at the hospital.

The woman who overdosed, Sarah Warren, now 22, told The Times the police never interviewed her. About six hours after she overdosed, Warren said, Puliafito picked her up at the hospital and they returned to the hotel to resume using drugs.

Puliafito, 66, resigned as dean of the Keck School of Medicine three weeks after the overdose, saying he wanted to pursue opportunities in the biotech industry. His involvement in the incident was not publicly reported until The Times published an investigation last week that found Puliafito associated with a circle of younger criminals who said he abused drugs with them.

After he stepped down as dean, Puliafito remained on the USC faculty and continued to accept new patients, according to the schools website.

The Pasadena polices handling of Warrens overdose and Puliafitos involvement have been the subject of intense scrutiny and criticism.

Last week, Pasadena City Manager Steve Mermell sent a memo to council members saying that The Times account of the hotel incident reflects poorly on the city and the Pasadena Police Department.

As indicated in the article, initially there was no police report made of the incident, Mermell said. There should have been and that was a failure on the part of our responding officer. Once this came to light, [police] undertook an appropriate investigation and ultimately the involved officer was the subject of disciplinary action.

Its unclear whether the officer in the recording was disciplined.

On Friday, USC administrators announced that Puliafito had been suspended from the faculty and barred from seeing patients, and that the school had begun the process to fire him.

The Medical Board of California has said it is investigating Puliafito, based on The Times report.

An overdose, a young companion, drug-fueled parties: The secret life of USC med school dean

The overdose occurred March 4, 2016, at the Hotel Constance on Colorado Boulevard. A hotel employee called 911 to report an apparent overdose. On the recording, Puliafito is heard identifying himself as a doctor and saying the woman was his girlfriend. He told the 911 dispatcher that the woman had a bunch of drinks and shes sleeping.

Paramedics arrived at the hotel and took Warren to the hospital. The police officer met Puliafito at the hospital, where he interviewed the doctor.

On the police officers recording, Puliafito can be heard telling the officer that hes a friend of Warrens father.

When asked if he has a romantic relationship with Warren, Puliafito responds no.

Puliafito said he thought she was sleeping, and she was breathing and you know, and hadnt thrown up or anything.

You as a doctor, did you notice anything that would have alarmed you? the officer asked.

Puliafito responded that he was an ophthalmologist and eye surgeon.

So not an emergency medicine physician. I mean, I basically looked at her respirations, you know, he said. When I saw her at the beginning, she was responding to me. Later, he said, Warren didnt seem to be waking up.

A witness to the incident told The Times of phoning USC President C.L. Max Nikias office, giving two employees an anonymous account of the overdose and demanding that USC take action against Puliafito.

Phone records reviewed by The Times showed the witness made a six-minute call to Nikias office on March 14, 2016, 10 days after the overdose.

Last week, Puliafitos successor as dean, Dr. Rohit Varma, told a gathering of scores of students that USC had found no evidence, particularly, of that phone call.

But on Tuesday, a crisis management specialist representing USC, Charles Sipkins, said that Nikias office did receive an anonymous call about Puliafitos presence at the hotel overdose. However, the anonymous report did not make it to top university officials, Sipkins said.

ALSO

Steve Lopez: Yet another USC scandal requires blunt talk about money culture and values on campus

Police union examines incident at Pasadena hotel involving a former USC dean after an officer is disciplined

Drug allegations involving former USC medical school dean are probed by Medical Board of California

Former USC medical school dean no longer seeing patients; Pasadena police discipline officer

The rest is here:

Pasadena officer who investigated overdose was skeptical of USC ... - Los Angeles Times

Allegations that medical school dean led drug-fueled secret life … – The Boston Globe

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Alex J. Berliner/Associated Press/file

Dr. Carmen A. Puliafito spoke at an event in 2015.

Dr. Carmen Puliafito was once among Bostons most prominent physicians, building a clinic from scratch before leaving more than a decade ago for prestigious roles in Miami and then in Los Angeles.

Now the Harvard-educated eye surgeon, who became dean of the University of Southern Californias medical school, is in the spotlight after a sensational report in the Los Angeles Times revealed that Puliafito essentially led a double life.

Puliafito was a renowned academic by day, an ophthalmologist who helped raise more than $1 billion for USC. By night, according to the report, he did hard drugs and partied with prostitutes and other drug users sometimes in his university office.

The Times interviewed people who partied with Puliafito and reviewed photos and videos of him taking ecstasy and methamphetamine in 2015 and 2016.

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Following the newspapers report last week, USC officials said they were investigating the matter and were working to fire Puliafito and strip him of his faculty tenure as quickly as possible for his egregious behavior.

The sudden change in fortune for the 66-year-old hotshot doctor stunned many in Boston, where Puliafito got his start and spent the first two decades of his career.

Its difficult to know whether Puliafito had substance-abuse issues when he worked in Boston in the 1980s and 1990s. He has no criminal record, according to the Times report.

A longtime friend who spoke to the Globe said he had never seen Puliafito take hard drugs. A spokeswoman for Tufts Medical Center, where he worked for 10 years until 2001, said there is no indication of any issues during his time at Tufts.

In Boston, Puliafito was known as driven and intense, a physician who relished the business of running a clinic as well as his time in the operating room and who occasionally performed laser eye surgery on cats and dogs.

Paul Parravano said its hard to square the allegations with the man he has called a friend since they were roommates while Harvard undergraduates.

Its difficult for me to comprehend that with the Carmen, the eye surgeon and friend for life, that I know, he said.

Parravano is blind, and according to Puliafitos own telling, inspired him to go into the field of eye medicine. Although they live on different coasts Parravano works in government and community relations for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology they regularly keep in touch. Parravano was best man at Puliafitos wedding and flew to California for his 60th birthday party.

They call each other from time to time to chat about baseball, politics, and their Harvard undergrad days.

Hes always been loyal, Parravano said. He calls, or Ill call him. We have great memories of things we did in college. We went hitchhiking together when we were in college. We did a lot of adventurous things. He was always up for adventure.

Puliafito went on to Harvard Medical School and got his training at Massachusetts Eye and Ear, a specialty hospital. He stayed there as a staff ophthalmologist until 1991.

That year he decamped for Tufts Medical Center, where he launched the New England Eye Center competing for business with his former employer, Mass. Eye and Ear. He stayed at Tufts and taught at the affiliated Tufts University School of Medicine until 2001.

Dr. Puliafito has been an innovator in the field of ophthalmology, and his work has led to many important discoveries, Tufts Medical Center spokeswoman Rhonda Mann said in a statement. He started the New England Eye Center in 1991 to serve the local community with the latest advancements in vision medicine and today, 15 years after he left, the Center is thriving, with more than 100,000 patient visits per year.

Puliafito left Boston to run an eye institute at the University of Miami before becoming dean of USCs Keck School of Medicine in 2007. He stepped down as dean last year but remained on the faculty.

On Friday, four days after the Times investigation was published, USC provost Michael W. Quick told the faculty: Today, we were provided access to information of egregious behavior on the part of the former dean concerning substance abuse activities with people who arent affiliated with USC. This was the first time we saw such information first-hand.

In his memo, Quick noted that substance abuse is a tragic and devastating disease, but he said the university is obligated to take action against Puliafito.

USC has hired a law firm to investigate the matter. Asked when the university became aware of Puliafitos conduct, spokesman Eddie North-Hager said the university was waiting for the inquiry to run its course.

Our priority now is to obtain a clear picture of exactly what happened and to ensure the well-being and trust of our students at USC, the patients at the Keck School and our entire university community, he said in an e-mailed statement.

When the Globe attempted to contact Puliafito, a woman who picked up the phone at a number listed for him said he was not speaking with reporters.

Mass. Eye and Ear declined to comment about Puliafitos tenure there, and a Tufts University spokesman said no one was available to comment. Two high-ranking physicians who worked with Puliafito at Tufts declined to comment.

A 1993 Boston Globe profile of Puliafito called him a world-renowned researcher of lasers in medicine who was simultaneously brilliant, boyish, moody, cheerful, engaging, brutally frank, entertaining, demanding, volatile and hard-nosed.

Puliafito is not grouchy; he is merely semi-volcanic, the Globe story said. Actually ... he is more like one of those Yellowstone Park mud pots: placid on the surface for a few minutes, then erupting for a moment, then calm again.

Allegations that medical school dean led drug-fueled secret life ... - The Boston Globe

UIW’s med school a gem for the community – mySanAntonio.com

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Express-News Editorial Board

Photo: Kin Man Hui /San Antonio Express-News

UIWs med school a gem for the community

San Antonios newest medical school couldnt arrive soon enough.

The University of the Incarnate Word School of Osteopathic Medicine has launched the school with an inaugural class of 150 medical students.

Many of these students will go on to serve the San Antonio region, meaning these future doctors will raise their families here and treat the families of others.

Thats an immeasurable return on investment.

This is San Antonios second medical school, and the Brooks location turned out to be ideal. The original aim was to place UIWs medical school downtown. But plans fell through, and Brooks emerged as the right site.

The 16-acre campus underwent $50 million in renovations, fueled by private donations.

Its presence on the Southeast Side where there are fewer doctors, and health challenges and disparities are high is a potential game changer for the region. It brings geographic balance to health policy, research and service.

Lou Agnese, UIWs former president who carried the medical school vision into reality, predicted this will become the crown jewel of the citys medical community.

We share his enthusiasm. It will be exciting to see San Antonios newest medical school evolve and grow with time.

This is a tremendous addition to the UIW campus, one that will serve this community for generations.

The rest is here:

UIW's med school a gem for the community - mySanAntonio.com

Mini Medical School – Naperville Community Television

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Posted on July 26, 2017

Meet the newest graduates of Mini Medical School.

Its the summer program for high school and early college students interested in healthcare, to learn about the field of medicine and get some hands-on experience.

Dr. Ira Rubin started the program to help kids figure out if this is the field for them.

The fun of it is seeing when the kids are excited and they like it and they actually make it spark, a spark is what I call it, said Dr. Rubin, a pediatrician at Edward Hospital. The kid lights up and you see that they really enjoy and want to do something. And you spark that interest and you spark that motivation. So some parents say youve turned my child into something different and in that short period of time they were not knowing what to do and now its like theyre very focused and theyre driven.

The daylong program includes lectures from Dr. Rubin about medicine and special practices. Then the students go through 16 different medical experiences for ten minutes each.

I really like learning. They were showing us how to do IVs, and we dont learn that in CNA school so I thought that that was super cool, said Jennifer Braun, a nursing student at College of DuPage who participated in Mini Medical School. We learned how to deliver a baby and that was super different because you never know when you could use that. So just little things like that that were super cool.

The pilot of Mini Medical School began in 2005 with just 24 students from Naperville Central. Today the program takes over the lower level of Edwards ER location in Plainfield and has evolved into a 20-hour winter program for 64 hand selected students, and two eight-hour summer sessions for 70 students.

Top graduates of the winter program are selected by Dr. Rubin to be teaching assistants for the summer sessions, like Amey Maley.

I definitely have been leaning toward a career in healthcare after going through this, because Dr. Rubin has been very realistic about what it takes to have a career in healthcare and also what it entails so its made me more interested. So I definitely see myself doing it in the future, said Maley, a junior at Naperville North High School.

And some graduates have done just that taking their training and moving on to the real deal.

Now looking back as a fourth year medical student, I realize that all the skills we learn in the skills lab that Dr. Rubin has been holding, these are all skills that weve been learning on our hospital rotations. So having gone through all these skills once before with Dr. Rubin, I think it was a really valuable experience and gave me a bit of a leg up in that sense. But at the same time I also knew what was coming and I was really excited and I think thats enhanced my medical experience as well, said Aneesh Tyle, a graduate of Mini Medical School.

Students also get a certificate of completion proof of the closer look theyve had into the world of medicine.

Applications for Dr. Rubins Mini Medical Schools winter program will be available on minimedicalschool.com in August.

Naperville news 17s Christine Lena reports.

Originally posted here:

Mini Medical School - Naperville Community Television

Florida Medical Cannabis Provider Liberty Health Sciences Begins Trading Today – New Cannabis Ventures (blog)

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Liberty Health Sciences Commences Trading on the CSE Following Closing of Business Combination

TORONTO, ONTARIO(Marketwired July 26, 2017)

Liberty Health Sciences Inc. (formerly SecureCom Mobile Inc.) (CSE: LHS) (OTC: SCQBF)(Liberty or the Company) is pleased to announce that, following the closing of the business combination (the Transaction) previously announced on July 21, 2017, the Corporations common shares commenced trading on the Canadian Securities Exchange (the CSE) under the trading symbol LHS at the opening of markets on July 26, 2017.

As part of the Transaction, SecureCom Mobile Inc. changed its name to Liberty Health Sciences Inc. and consolidated its shares on a three (3) to one (1) basis.

Liberty was launched to acquire and operate U.S.-based companies in the medical cannabis market, with initial focus of operations in the State of Florida where it entered into an exclusive Management Agreement with Chestnut Hill Tree Farm, LLC (Chestnut) which grants the company all economic risk and rewards associated with the Florida-based operation. Liberty intends to continue to target, for expansion, key U.S. states that have approved medical use of marijuana and meets its stringent investment criteria. Liberty takes a science-based, data driven approach to continuous improvement and holds itself to the highest standards when it comes to the cultivation and production of medical cannabis.

As a result of the closing of the Transaction, the directors and executive officers of the Company are now:

Further details about the Transaction and the Company as the resulting issuer from the Transaction are available in the filing statement of SecureCom Mobile Inc. dated June 19, 2017 filed in respect of the Transaction which has been filed under SecureCom Mobiles profile on SEDAR at http://www.sedar.com. The summary of the Transaction set out herein is qualified in its entirety by reference to the description of the Transaction in the filing statement.

For more information about Liberty please visit http://www.libertyhealthsciences.com.

About Liberty Health Sciences Inc.

Liberty Health Sciences Inc. (Liberty) is an investor and operator in the medical cannabis market, capitalizing on new and existing opportunities in the United States. Libertys stringent investment criteria for expansion maximizes returns to shareholders, while focusing on significant near and mid-term opportunities. Liberty has an extensive background in highly regulated industries, with expertise in becoming a low-cost producer. Liberty leverages commercial greenhouse knowledge to deliver high-quality, clean and safe pharmaceutical grade cannabis to patients.

Original press release:http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/liberty-health-sciences-commences-trading-on-cse-following-closing-business-combination-cse-lhs-2227642.htm

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Florida Medical Cannabis Provider Liberty Health Sciences Begins Trading Today - New Cannabis Ventures (blog)

Thank You, and Farewell – Liberty Ballers

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

My first day at Liberty Ballers was June 27, 2013. It was the day of the 2013 NBA Draft, and I had just been brought on as a staff writer. I was a bright-eyed, 16-year-old kid who tried to use his love for basketball and the Sixers to make up up for his inexperience.

On that night, new Sixers general manager Sam Hinkie traded Jrue Holiday for the draft rights to Nerlens Noel and a future first, and selected Michael Carter-Williams with the 11th overall pick. Those moves clearly signaled a shift in the franchises direction, but little did I know how drastically that night would impact the team, the NBA, and inadvertently, my life.

Since The Process began, the Sixers have lost 253 games. Ive written 773 articles during that time period, more than three stories per loss. Covering a team thats perpetually terrible should be difficult to discuss so frequently, but this Sixers franchise was so different. At times, they were undeniably the most interesting team in basketball. There were prospects, draft picks, trades, broken navicular bones and fifth metatarsals, a Croatian star who was never coming over, a mystifying general manager, an intrusive commissioner, a nepotistic advisor and an unfortunate changing of the guard.

No matter how bad the team was, there was always something to talk about. Admittedly, that didnt always make the job easier. Each season had more than its fair share of low points. Constant blowouts, devastating injuries and defending the honor of The Process against its naysayers were all mentally taxing. But Liberty Ballers gave me the opportunity to vent my frustrations, and share my disappointments as a conduit to the fanbase. Without this platform, Im not sure how I would have made it through the past four years.

Id be remiss if I didnt mention the highs, and there have been plenty of them. There was Carter-Williams debut against the Miami Heat, winning the draft lottery in 2016, trading for the right to draft Markelle Fultz, and watching Joel Embiid finally take the court in a Sixers uniform, because my goodness is he special.

Right now, the Sixers future is brighter than ever. Embiid, Fultz and Ben Simmons are all slated to take the floor together in October. Once the laughingstock of the league, the Sixers are emerging from darkness and into the light.

I joined this website at the beginning of the Sixers arduous rebuilding phase, and in a way its only fitting that I leave at its conclusion. I have decided to step down as co-managing editor of Liberty Ballers, and this will be my final post. While Im disappointed that I will not be at the helm of the website as the team finally begins to reap the benefits of The Process, I feel fortunate to have been around during one of the most unforgettable periods in franchise history.

Most of my favorite moments from these past four years have been less about the team itself, and more about this website. Liberty Ballers has created more opportunities for me than I ever could have imagined, especially at this age. Ive covered NBA games, the NBA Draft and Las Vegas Summer League. Ive interacted with players, coaches, agents and team executives. I became the general manager of my own basketball team, and even tried out for the Delaware 87ers. Ive been given access to an exclusive world I only thought Id be able to view from afar, and for that I am very thankful.

None of this would have ever been possible without the websites loyal readers, who I am forever indebted to. Youve allowed us to help throw some incredibly special (and some of Philadelphias hottest) parties, and have a played an important role in making me who I am today. To anyone who has commented on one of my articles, emailed/tweeted me or interacted with me face to face, I wholeheartedly thank you. Your support has meant more to me than you will ever know.

There are too many people for me to thank in this space, but Id like to publicly acknowledge Mike Levin, Seth Pollack, Spike Eskin, Kyle Neubeck, Derek Bodner, Shamus Clancy, Wesley Share, Jake Fischer, Max Rappaport, Sean OConnor, Brandon Gowton, Roy Burton, Marc Whittington, Sohil Doshi, Matt Carey, Rich Hofmann, Tanner Steidel, WIBR, Jake Hyman, Xylon Dimoff and Justin F. for their support, guidance and assistance during my time at Liberty Ballers.

When I first started writing for Liberty Ballers, I viewed it as a hobby and nothing more. As my role with the website grew, I quickly began to realize that this could be the beginning stages of a rewarding career. But when I started to become more invested in turning my sports writing gig into an eventual full time job, the industry began to crumble, and this past year has been especially ugly. ESPN laid off plenty of its writers and reporters in an attempt to save some extra money, and if the worlds largest sports media entity is forced to scale back, it speaks volumes. Over the past month alone, Fox Sports completely obliterated its writing staff, and now Vice Sports ceases to exist. The changes SB Nations basketball network has decided to make in order to stay competitive during these turbulent times have certainly been a factor in my decision to leave.

Opportunities for fair paying, stable writing jobs are almost unheard of these days. Perhaps it will eventually right itself, but I presently have concerns about staying aboard a ship that appears to be sinking. I love basketball, and its my dream to have a job working in this sport, although it may be time to pursue that goal in a new capacity.

Im hoping to still have a platform to write on going forward (if youre interested in hiring me to write about the Sixers or the NBA, please email me at jake.pavorsky@gmail.com), but I plan on spending my last year of college pursuing new opportunities in the basketball world.

Walking away from Liberty Ballers is one of the hardest things Ive had to do in my life thus far, as this website has become a part of my identity. Ill always remember my time here fondly. The future may be uncertain, but Im looking forward to what it may bring.

I trust the process.

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Thank You, and Farewell - Liberty Ballers

How Tina Charles’ high standards for herself make everyone around her better – ESPN

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

Tina Charles is the Eastern Conference player of the week, an honor she has won three times this season and a WNBA-record 24 times over her career.

Mechelle VoepelespnW.com

Tina Charles still hears the statement in her head.

You're the worst rebounder in the world.

Most former UConn players will say the well-intentioned barbs delivered by coach Geno Auriemma continue to motivate them, even many years after they've left Storrs.

But Charles sometimes thinks she really is the world's worst on the boards. Never mind that on July 14 she became the Liberty's all-time rebounding leader after just 3 seasons with the franchise. She is now at 1,113 in 119 regular-season games for New York, and has 2,523 in 249 games overall in her WNBA career, which started with the Connecticut Sun.

But record or not, Charles never lets herself off the hook. She is well aware of every time she misses a box out, or lets a potential rebound get away from her. In her mind, that's not meeting the basic requirements of her job.

"From the time I entered the WNBA, I wanted it to be my staple," Charles said. "Knowing my guards can leak out because they're trusting me to get [the defensive] rebound, getting [offensive rebounds] to keep a possession going.

"It is about technique and about effort. I take pride in it. It's something I can control when other things aren't going well."

There aren't too many times, though, when Charles' game isn't working. Now in her eighth WNBA season and coming off her fifth All-Star Game appearance, Charles is averaging 20.5 points and 9.9 rebounds for the 10-9 Liberty, who face league-leading Minnesota on Tuesday (ESPN2, 8 p.m. ET). She was named the Eastern Conference player of the week on Monday, her third such honor this season and 24th in her career.

"My first experience at the pro level with an athlete who had that kind of depth was Kareem [Abdul-Jabbar]. I saw some of Kareem in her; she has this thirst for other things in life."

Charles has averaged a career double-double (18.0 PPG, 10.1 RPG) and has two Olympic and two world championship gold medals. She was the 2012 WNBA MVP, and led the league in scoring last season (21.5 PPG).

Of course, there is one thing still left on her to-do list: win a WNBA title. She wants it for the Liberty, for her hometown of New York, for her teammates.

"Tina is one of the strongest-minded players I've been around," said Phoenix's Diana Taurasi, who has played with Charles on the U.S. national team. "Sometimes it comes down to the right pieces and the right team. But there's no way a player like Tina is not going to win a championship, because she's that determined and driven to do it."

But as much as winning is her motivator, Charles also cares about what she is passing on to everyone around her.

"I can't overstate how proud I am of Tina -- just who she's become as a person as well as on the court," said Minnesota's Maya Moore, who played with Charles at UConn and with the national team. "She's done both -- grow as a person and still be an MVP candidate every year.

"She's grown as a leader in being the voice, saying, 'This is what we value, this is how we can be successful every day.' Stepping into that role of being a leader who wants to empower others. I think her teammates respect not just what she says, but what she does. It's hard to do every day at a high level on a big stage at New York."

All-Star Weekend in Seattle seemed like a celebration of 15-year Storm guard Sue Bird. But on Saturday, a trio of electric post players -- Maya Moore, Nneka Ogwumike and Jonquel Jones -- put on the biggest show.

Sue Bird is self-admittedly private. But the WNBA All-Star is finally opening up on her career, her relationship with girlfriend Megan Rapinoe and why it's important to talk now.

Midway through a breakout sophomore season in the WNBA, Jonquel Jones will make her first All-Star Game appearance on Saturday -- and will get motivated for it with songs from J. Cole and Big Sean.

2 Related

Yet as Charles and Liberty coach Bill Laimbeer have said, she knew this was the deal. Charles has had that kind of weight on her shoulders ever since Connecticut drafted her No. 1 overall in 2010. The Sun traded Lindsay Whalen to the Lynx for the chance to select Charles and build the franchise around her.

While there, Charles had a strong relationship with then-Sun coach Mike Thibault. They talked about not just basketball, but politics, music, social issues and Charles' deep commitment to philanthropy.

When Thibault was let go by the Sun after the 2012 season, Charles was upset. She played one more year with the Sun, and then pushed for the trade that sent her to New York. She and Laimbeer have clicked, too. Yet Thibault and Charles still have a connection, even though he is now coach at Washington.

"We're really close. It's hard coaching against her," Thibault said. "My first experience at the pro level with an athlete who had that kind of depth was Kareem [Abdul-Jabbar]. I saw some of Kareem in her; she has this thirst for other things in life.

"She and I had a long talk after her rookie year about being more aware of the people around her and her surroundings. When you're in college, things are done for you; you can take that for granted. Now people do things for you, but it's a different relationship. And she notices that. She's thoughtful about other people."

Charles channels all of this into her leadership with the Liberty, which is as important this season as it has ever been. With Swin Cash retiring after last season and Tanisha Wright resting this year, Charles is the primary voice more than ever for the Liberty.

There are other veterans, such as fellow center Kia Vaughn and guards Epiphanny Prince and Shavonte Zellous, but Charles is the player everyone looks to. Consider what fellow Liberty All-Star Sugar Rodgers said about moving to a reserve role the past two games -- both New York victories -- with Bria Hartley starting instead at guard.

"I've come off the bench to bring energy and scoring and whatever we need," Rodgers said. "Tina thought it was a good idea, and that I was mature enough for that role.

"Not everybody can do it. But she thought it was something I could achieve, and it's working. I'm willing to stick with it and keep going forward."

In other words, Charles' belief in Rodgers in that role meant a great deal to the fifth-year player.

"You have to enter someone's life in order to be a leader for them," Charles said. "I've been able to have a good working relationship with every person in this locker room, so they can trust me, they can tell me when they don't feel as confident.

"They allow me to hold them accountable, and I ask to be held accountable, too. I'm someone who wants to be coached, who wants constructive criticism."

The Liberty have had their ups and downs; they were 4-6 in the 10 games prior to the All-Star Game, although the last two were confidence-building wins against Washington and Connecticut. Wright's absence and the season-ending injury to Brittany Boyd both have taken a toll on the Liberty's perimeter game, and continuing to effectively address that is likely their biggest challenge in making a playoff push.

But Charles sees that as her responsibility, too: helping everybody be at their best, because they're all important.

"I think some teams are able to find their identity early in the season; for others, it takes longer," Charles said. "The more we're able to see what each of us is able to do, the more we can depend on each other. Even if it's someone who's not getting a lot of minutes, you never know what could happen with injuries or something. So you need everybody focused.

"I'm still growing, too, and I know sometimes I'm going to make mistakes. But we have one common goal, and I know they trust me to help us get there."

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How Tina Charles' high standards for herself make everyone around her better - ESPN

Trump’s rhetoric in favor of religious liberty doesn’t sync with how the Justice Department is handling it – Washington Examiner

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

The Trump administration needs to align what they've been saying on the record with what their own Department of Justice attorneys have been doing when it comes to religious freedom issues, particularly the Affordable Care Act's contraception mandate.

As the Daily Caller reported Sunday,

DOJ lawyers have continued to keep alive a slew of cases appealing a 2014 district court ruling that granted an injunction from the mandate to several Catholic organizations. The Supreme Court vacated an appeals court ruling against The Little Sisters of the Poor and similar organizations in 2016, sending the cases back to the lower courts. Many religious freedom advocates expected that the Trump administration, which has vowed to protect The Little Sisters and other organizations burdened by the contraceptive mandate, would drop the legal campaign against the religious organizations. But more than six months into the Trump era, the legal fights are still alive.

In May, Trump signed an executive order telling Health and Human Services bureaucrats to "consider issuing amended regulations, consistent with applicable law, to address conscience-based objections to the preventive-care mandate" related to Obamacare.

Toward the end of the month, HHS leaked an interim draft rule which sounded like it would be much more firm about religious liberty protections: While the administration would still ensure contraception is covered by the new healthcare plan, it wouldn't necessarily mandate folks with religious or conscientious objections to participate.

Monday, a glimmer of hope appeared for people with religious objections to the contraceptive mandate, and who've been stuck in an endless hamster wheel of litigation just to ensure basic First Amendment rights remain intact. Attorneys with the First Liberty Institute, a religious liberty organization based in Texas, held a meeting on the record with officials from the executive agencies tasked with reviewing rules related to the ACA's contraceptive mandate.

According to the press release, First Liberty encouraged the administration that "the draft interim final rule leaked to the press last month and offering broad conscience protections be made final as soon as possible."

Matthew Kacsmaryk, deputy general counsel for First Liberty, said "Our clients have been litigating against the government's effort to punish business owners and ministry leaders for following their religious beliefs and moral convictions since 2013," and offering broad conscience protections once and for all would essentially "reaffirm America's leadership role as a nation that protects religious freedom for everyone."

Time will tell if the Trump administration's desire to protect religious liberty finally matches up with how the Department of Justice has been handling litigation in this arena.

Nicole Russell is a contributor to the Washington Examiner's Beltway Confidential blog. She is a journalist in Washington, D.C., who previously worked in Republican politics in Minnesota. She was the 2010 recipient of the American Spectator's Young Journalist Award.

If you would like to write an op-ed for the Washington Examiner, please read our guidelines on submissions here.

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Trump's rhetoric in favor of religious liberty doesn't sync with how the Justice Department is handling it - Washington Examiner

The real reason the Libertarian gubernatorial candidate was shut out of a debate – Washington Post

Posted on July 26, 2017 by Danzig

July 25 at 5:37 PM

Again, the establishment political parties have used their influence with the bar association to reduce participation in the electoral process, this time in Virginia.The Posts July 22 Metro article Libertarian candidate not invited to debate reported that the Virginia Bar Association found a reason to exclude the Libertarian gubernatorial candidate from debating the Democratic and Republican candidates. Any thoughtful person knows the real reason for making this decision: There are only downsides to the major-party candidates having to debate a person who will clearly demonstrate that they do not and cannot have much to offer the voters.

Given the recent presidential race between major candidates with extremely high unfavorable ratings, I would think the Virginia Bar Association would be interested in supporting all reasonable opportunities to provide alternative information and candidates to the Virginia (and in three years, the national) electorate.

David Griggs, Columbia

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The real reason the Libertarian gubernatorial candidate was shut out of a debate - Washington Post

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