HAVE A HEART: The heart pumps 5.6 liters of blood through the entire body in roughly 20 seconds; each day your blood travels some 12,000 miles, and your heart beats about 100,000 times. This delivers oxygen and other essential nutrients to the body's cells and organs. A heart attack occurs when the blood supply to the heart muscle is cut off, either because part of the heart is damaged (such as the valves to the chambers), or because plaque has built up inside the arteries, narrowing them and severely restricting blood flow. Symptoms of a heart attack include a squeezing discomfort in the center of the chest, pain or tingling in the left arm, shortness of breath, and sometimes a cold sweat, nausea, or dizziness.
OTHER ADVANCEMENTS IN PERSONALIZED MEDICINE: Biomedical researchers at the Moffitt Cancer Center are developing a more personalized approach to treating cancer. Because patients with different cancers -- from melanoma to colon cancer -- receive the same chemotherapies, researchers are attempting to identify the differences between those cancers and the patients, and even between different forms of cancer that can attack an organ like the lungs, for a more focused treatment option. Cancers from more than 20 thousand patients are becoming part of a growing database that includes tissue samples and fluids being examined for possible genetic and molecular signatures of cancer. The resulting evidence-based therapy would create a treatment best for the patient's specific case.
The Biophysical Society contributed to the information contained in the TV portion of this report.