WebMD News from HealthDay By Carina Storrs HealthDay Reporter WEDNESDAY, Jan. 30 (HealthDay News) -- For men with prostate cancer who are trying to decide between surgery or radiation therapy, new research shows that declines in sexual, urinary and bowel function do differ with each treatment in the short-term, but those declines tend to even out in the long run. The study included more than 1,600 men treated for early stage prostate cancer. Researchers asked them about their urinary, sexual and bowel health following either surgery to remove the prostate or radiation therapy. Although the rates of health decline in these areas differed at two and five years after treatment, men reported similar declines regardless of their treatment after 15 years. While men who underwent surgery experienced higher rates of urinary incontinence and erectile dysfunction two and five years later, men who received radiation therapy had higher rates of bowel urgency, or feeling like they had to pass stool but not being able to do so. The study was published in the Jan. 31 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. "Our hope was that measuring patient-reported outcomes at a 15-year time point would provide patients and their physicians … Continue reading →

2/5/2013 TwoLondon legal teams have launched a lawsuit against the maker of a popular acne medication. Legate& Associates and Harrison Pensa will represent a Toronto woman in her legal battle over the devastating side effects the drug 'Accutane' has had on her life. A Toronto woman is seeking well over $5 million dollars in damages that she claims is directly linked to her use of the acne medication. Jennifer Twamley was 17 years old when she was prescribed the popular drug to help her complexion. She says it was after her six month stint with the drug that she began to battle inflammatory bowel disease. "Within about a year or so of taking the drug, I started experiencing some bowel symptoms. In 1999, I was diagnosed with Colitis, and so that lead to much more significant symptoms of blood in diarrhea and bathroom frequency, urgency, that sort of thing." Twamley believes the drug maker Hoffmann-La Roche is solely responsible for her current condition. "At the time, we were not informed at all about the implications of this drug in causing inflammatory bowel disease, and if I had known at 17 when I was looking to treat bad acne that it … Continue reading →

For movie details, please click here. The films ad campaign hinted at something vaguely related to Contagion, playing up the fact that both movies share a director (Soderbergh) and screenwriter (Scott Z. Burns), and that they are structured around a specific modern-day fear. While that pandemic film was more a fully realized, flesh-and-blood fictional story than it was a docudrama, Side Effects is really a sleekly constructed noir where the pharmaceutical topicality is mostly backdrop. Taylor is a 28-year-old graphic designer who looks somewhat adrift in her Manhattan apartment. She is awaiting the return of her husband Martin (Channing Tatum), sentenced to prison four years before for insider trading. The film starts up just before his release, a day shes eagerly awaiting. Once hes out, though, she seems unable to control her depression. The crying at work is one thing; ramming her car head-on into a wall is another. Taken to the hospital, shes examined by a psychiatrist, Dr. Jonathan Banks (Jude Law). Hes concerned about her suicidal tendencies, but takes Emilys word that shell start coming in for therapy and take her medications, so he lets her go. At first, Side Effects looks like its going to be Emilys … Continue reading →