In This Issue

Key findings

The ups and downs of blood pressure measurement

A recent study at the Durham VA Medical Center and Duke University confirms that people's blood pressure tends to be higher at the doctor's office than when they check it themselves at home...

In Purple Heart medal, researchers seek clues to resilience

War-wounded Veterans who survive into later life—especially those who do not develop posttraumatic stress disorder—may provide valuable clues as to the factors that confer resilience to combat stress...

Gene discovery sheds light on mystery nerve pain

An international team of scientists headed by researchers from Yale University, the VA Medical Center in West Haven, and the University Maastricht in the Netherlands found that mutations of a single gene are linked to 30 percent of cases of unexplained neuropathy...

Can the omega-3 fatty acid DHA ward off dementia?

An animal study being presented at the International Conference on Alzheimer's Disease suggests that DHA-a type of omega-3 fatty acid linked to cardiovascular as well as brain health-may have value against Alzheimer's disease...

Human Protection

Program that boosts safeguards for VA research volunteers gets new accreditation

VA's Central Office Human Research Protection Program, which helps ensure high ethical and scientific standards for research projects that involve Veterans or their health information, has been accredited by the nonprofit Association for the Accreditation of Human Research Protection Programs (AAHRPP)...

Journal Scan

Study tracks drug, alcohol use in OEF/OIF Veterans using VA

Reviewing data on more than 456,000 Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans who enrolled in VA health care between 2002 and 2009, a team with VA and the University of California, San Francisco, found that around 11 percent of the patients had received a diagnosis of an alcohol or drug use disorder...

In cancer care, VA compares favorably with private sector

A team with VA, Harvard Medical School, Mount Sinai Medical Center, and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute compared the quality of cancer care for older men who were diagnosed in VA or at a Medicare fee-for-service facility between 2001 and 2004 and followed through 2005. The two health systems came up about equal on nine measures of care...

Gastric bypass surgery may not prolong life for high-risk patients

A VA database study that tracked outcomes for more than 42,000 mostly older, male, severely obese Veterans found that those who underwent a common form of bariatric surgery did not live more years, on average, than similar patients who did not opt for surgery...

Doctors doing research are happier with jobs

A survey of more than 7,000 physicians at 135 VA medical centers found that those who conduct research in addition to carrying out their clinical duties have higher job satisfaction than those with no research involvement....