Word: blood
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Every year some 400,000 Americans undergo bypass surgery to shunt the flow of blood around blocked arteries in their heart; 500,000 other patients opt for a different procedure called angioplasty, which clears a channel through the bottlenecks with thin, inflatable balloons. Most people who have these operations get what they so desperately want--a second chance at life. But the results are usually temporary. After a few years the bypass graft or the reopened artery becomes clogged with new deposits, which often require a second round of treatment. For an estimated 1 in 10 patients, the heart becomes...
That grim outlook may be about to change. Scientists have been experimenting with a new way--based on a form of gene therapy--to coax the heart into growing new blood vessels to replace old worn-out ones, and doctors who have been performing the procedure are becoming more and more excited by the results. Reports of their progress have spread through the scientific community for the past year. But not until last week, when the leading researchers gathered in Atlanta at a brainstorming meeting to which TIME was given exclusive access, did it become clear how far they have...
Doctors have long known that the heart can, in response to a drop in the level of oxygen-rich blood it's receiving, grow extra blood vessels. But the process, called angiogenesis, is often too slow and not extensive enough to stave off a heart attack. About 10 years ago, scientists started identifying certain proteins, called growth factors, that the body uses to build new blood vessels. The proteins act like foremen at a construction site, making sure that all the pieces of the project come together smoothly. Animal experiments showed that there were several ways to get growth factors...
Whether genes or proteins are used, the goal is the same, to blanket the heart with lots of little blood vessels. (Surprisingly, you can reach more of the heart muscle with a lot of little blood vessels than with a few big ones.) But that presents another problem. The blood vessels are so small that they are impossible to see even with today's highest-resolution heart scans...
...choose to see it, in all its blood-spattered craftiness and enveloping spookiness, just remember -- it's only a movie; you can rest assured your head isn't going to get chopped off. Although exposure to the shadowy twists and turns of Burton's imagination, inside-John-Malkovich-style, might make it spin...