Johns Hopkins Medicine News

In a follow-up to research showing that psilocybin, a substance contained in "sacred mushrooms," produces substantial spiritual effects, a Johns Hopkins team reports that those beneficial effects appear to last more than a year.

A small study in 18 patients assessing the effectiveness of the drug losartan for treating Marfan syndrome in children has yielded encouraging results. Reporting in the June 26 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine, Johns Hopkins researchers showed that losartan-a compound used for years to treat high blood pressure-slowed the enlargement of the aorta, the most life-threatening defect associated with Marfan syndrome.

The state Medical Examiner's Office cited cardiac arrhythmia, or abnormal heart rhythm, as the cause of sudden death of 19 year-old U.S. Naval Academy student Kristen Dickmann.

Johns Hopkins Children’s Center has received a nearly $5 million grant from the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute to establish a basic and translational research center that will consolidate research, treatment and care of adult and pediatric patients under one roof and speed up the translation of scientific discovery from bench to bedside. In addition, the center will offer counseling and education services to patients and their families.

Researchers have long known that type-2 diabetes and depression often go hand in hand. However, it's been unclear which condition develops first in patients who end up with both. Now, a new study led by Johns Hopkins doctors suggests that this chicken-and-egg problem has a dual answer: Patients with depression have an increased risk of developing type-2 diabetes, and patients with type-2 diabetes have an increased risk of developing depression.

Uncertainties about proper use and possible long-term effects of hydroxyurea in the treatment of sickle cell anemia may be wrongly influencing doctors to avoid prescribing it to those in serious need, according to results of a literature review by specialists at Johns Hopkins.

A zebra's stripes, a seashell's spirals, a butterfly's wings: these are all examples of patterns in nature. The formation of patterns is a puzzle for mathematicians and biologists alike. How does the delicate design of a butterfly's wings come from a single fertilized egg? How does pattern emerge out of no pattern?