After examining decades of data, researchers from the University of Colorado Denver have found that a lack of education may be as deadly as smoking.

The study, which included researchers from New York University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, examined population data going back to 1925 to determine how education levels affected mortality over time.

They found a direct link between education levels and death, noting that higher education is a strong predictor of longevity due to factors that include higher income, healthier behaviors and improved social and psychological well-being.

The error-free distribution of genetic material during cell division is important for preventing the development of tumor cells. Prof. Erich Nigg’s research group at the Biozentrum, University of Basel, has uncovered a new important function of the human enzyme Plk1. It plays a significant role in monitoring chromosome segregation.

Taking a combination of antidepressants and common painkillers is associated with an increased risk of bleeding soon after starting treatment, finds a study in BMJ.

The researchers say their results may have been affected by other unmeasured or unknown factors and should be interpreted with caution. However, they suggest special attention is needed when patients use both these classes of drugs together.

Depression produces the greatest decrement in health of all common chronic conditions and depression in older people is an important public health problem.

Hundreds of millions of times every year many of us turn to online symptom checkers to try to self-diagnose our symptoms and to get advice on whether we should seek further medical care or just rest at home until we feel better.

But how good is the information we receive?

The first wide-scale study of the accuracy of general-purpose symptom checkers found that while the online programs are often wrong, they are roughly equivalent to telephone triage lines commonly used at primary care practices--and they are better than general Internet-search self-diagnosis and triage. The study, led by researchers at Harvard Medical School, is published in the BMJ.

Outcomes following the arthroscopic repair of rotator cuff tears in older athletes appears to be successful a majority of the time, according to research presented today at the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine's (AOSSM) Annual Meeting in Orlando, Florida.

"Seventy-seven percent of our patients who had an arthroscopic repair of a full thickness rotator cuff tear, were able to return to their sport at a similar level of intensity," said lead author, Peter Millett, MD, MSc, from the Steadman Philippon Research Institute in Vail, Colorado.

Snacking is the new American pastime, acccording to the recent survey by Mintel which found that nearly all Americans (94 percent) report snacking at least once a day and 50 percent of adults snack two to three times per day.