Health & Wellness

OTTAWA — The maker of OneTouch SureStep test strips has issued a voluntary recall of some lots of the product used by diabetics to measure blood-glucose levels.
LifeScan Canada Ltd., in consultation with Health Canada, issued the recall Thursday because specific lots of the test strips may provide low results when blood glucose is greater than 22.2 mmol/L.

TORONTO — The majority of Canadian seniors are taking multiple types of drugs and in some cases the intake is fairly substantial, a new report suggests.

ATLANTA — Key results from a landmark federal study are in, and the results are disappointing for diabetics: Adding drugs to drive blood pressure and blood-fats lower than current targets did not prevent heart problems, and in some cases caused harmful side effects.

ATLANTA — Many Americans with leaky heart valves soon might be able to get them fixed without open-heart surgery. A study showed that a tiny clip implanted through an artery was safer and nearly as effective as surgery, doctors reported Sunday.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. government is preparing a safety warning about baby slings — those popular and fashionable infant carriers that parents can sling around their chests to carry their baby.
The concern: infants can suffocate, and at least a few have.

TORONTO — Um ... OK ... it’s an embarrassing topic for many people. You know, butts and intestines and bowel movements and all that. But when it comes to saving lives by preventing colon cancer, let’s face it, there’s no such thing as too much information.

TORONTO — A Wii bit of therapy using virtual reality game technology provided measurable benefits to stroke patients taking part in a small pilot study, researchers reported Thursday.

VANCOUVER — Doping in Olympic sport is more covert and small scale today than in Ben Johnson’s era of the 1980s and 1990s, the head of the International Olympic Committee’s medical commission says.

OTTAWA — A new study says Canadians are living longer than ever.
The Statistics Canada study says life expectancy at birth reached 80.7 years for the three-year period between 2005 and 2007.
That’s up from the average of 80.5 between 2004 and 2006, and 78.4 a decade earlier.
Gains during the past decade were strongest among men, although women still live the longest.

TORONTO — Alexandre Bilodeau’s Olympic gold medal will forever be enshrined as Canada’s first on home turf. But for people with cerebral palsy, it is the freestyle skier’s tender — and very public — esteem for his brother Frederic that will long glitter in memory.