More than 3 out of 4 caregivers absorb out-of-pocket costs currently averaging nearly $7,000 a year, AARP has found. Those costs consumed the equivalent of a fifth of caregivers' incomes on average — and the burdens were even greater for those with lower incomes, the group reported. The most financially strapped caregivers tap savings or take out loans to meet expenses. Patients with dementia such make the heaviest claims on caregivers' personal resources. Annual expenses are almost $10,700 for someone with dementia — nearly twice what caregivers spend for someone without dementia, AARP reported.

Statin could help reverse heart disease

For the first time, a new drug given along with a cholesterol-lowering statin medicine has proved able to shrink plaque that is clogging arteries, potentially giving a way to undo some of the damage of heart disease. The difference was very small, but doctors hope it will grow with longer treatment. The drug, Repatha, also drove LDL, or bad cholesterol, down to levels rarely if ever seen in people. Heart patients are told to aim for below 70, but some study participants got as low as 15. "There doesn't appear to be any level at which there is harm" from too little LDL, and the lower patients went, the more their plaque shrank, said one study leader, Dr. Steven Nissen.

Smoking more likely in teens who vape

In a study of more than 3,000 students in L.A. County public schools, those using e-cigarettes at the beginning of their sophomore years were more likely to become cigarette smokers over the next six months, compared with their classmates who didn't vape. The vapers were also more likely to become daily smokers and to smoke more cigarettes. The findings, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, suggest that public health officials have some justification for considering e-cigarettes to be a gateway to smoking for teens.

New use for USB – monitoring disease

A team of scientists from the Imperial College London and DNA Electronics has developed a potentially revolutionary gadget to detect the amount of HIV in a patient's blood. The disposable device, which looks similar to the USB memory stick that you use to move files from computer to computer, is based on a mobile phone chip. It takes a drop of blood and determines the viral load. It then creates an electrical signal that can be read by your laptop or other device. The technology, if perfected, could eventually help identify the presence of all sorts of other foreign invaders, from hepatitis virus to the presence of bacterial or fungal sepsis. Researchers are also testing ways that the gadget might detect if you've become resistant to certain antibiotics.

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