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A. Is Your Health Plan Right for You?
Narrator:
This is Science Today. Selecting a managed care
health plan is no easy task - especially with so
many different types of plans to choose from. One
feature many people may look for in a plan is the
amount of preventive care offered, but Kathryn Phillips,
a health services researcher at the University of
California, San Francisco, says consumers should
first understand what kind of preventive services
are offered.
Phillips: There are some services that may
not be relevant for certain people, so consumers
need to know what's recommended for people in their
category and be familiar with the recommendations
so that they know when to ask their provider about
getting a certain service.
Narrator: Phillips and her colleagues will
be looking into how different types of managed care
plans influence the use of cancer screening.
Phillips: So we'll be able to examine such
things as what types of benefits are provided, what
types of provider networks are available, what types
of systems are in place so that we can get inside
of the black box of managed care to try to figure
out what's really going on care and what characteristics
of plans are most important?
Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa
Branin.
B.
Working to Block Lung Cancer Before it Develops
Narrator:
This is Science Today. It's estimated that there are
at least six or seven mutations involved in the development
of lung cancer. John Wiencke, a professor of epidemiology
at the University of California, San Francisco, says
a mutation known as K-ras, which is found in about
10 percent of all lung cancers, may be the first to
occur in the disease pathway.
Wiencke: So, it could be that a person starts
smoking, develops a K-ras mutation and then not there
could be, I think, decades - you know, literally tens
of years between the induction of the mutation and
the actual cancer.
Narrator: Wiencke says this is actually good
news.
Sessler: We may have time to intervene and
block this effect before cancer actually occurs. This
particular test that we ran to identify K-ras mutations
isn't even used right now in the clinic. It may be
if our findings are confirmed they may decide that
it's useful to actually run this test routinely on
patients.
Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
C.
Balancing Parenting and Employment
Narrator: This is Science Today. A recent study
reported that people in this country work longer hours
than those in other industrial nations. In families
with two working parents, these long hours become
problematic when raising children. Rivka Polatnick,
a research sociologist at the University of California,
Berkeley, says because more than one third of U.S.
preteens are taking care of themselves after school,
there has to be a better way to combine parenting
and employment.
Polatnick: That's not something that's an easy
issue, but we need more flexibility in the workplace,
we need better options for part-time work, we need
better living wages so that parents don't have to
face these impossible equations of time versus money.
Narrator: And it's not just a matter of parents
busily pursuing material possessions.
Polatnick: It's just to provide good housing,
good education - you know, those core things that
parents want to provide for their kids. They need
to work these kind of long hours and they need full-time
incomes. So, we need to find ways to change that reality
if we want to have adults with time for their kids.
Something has to give.
Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
D.
New Hope For Breeding Endangered Species
Narrator:
This is Science Today. A research geneticist at the
University of California, Davis has discovered several
genes are responsible for the unpredictable way a
female responds to fertility drugs. Dr. Jimmy Spearow
says his findings may benefit endangered species.
Spearow: There's a lot of endangered species
that are only being held in reserves and zoos and
many of these do not adapt well to captive breeding.
So if we understood better in terms of the genetic
differences in how the reproduction is controlled,
we could do a much better job of inducing them to
reproduce in captivity, even under less than optimal
conditions.
Narrator: Using the same dose of a fertility
drug, Spearow found some mice ovulated nine eggs per
night while others 54 eggs. The genes linked to these
major differences have been mapped and once identified,
could be one way of controlling reproduction.
Spearow: More and more species are becoming
extinct, so this has applications to understanding
how we can improve the reproduction of some of those
endangered species because if they don't breed, they're
not going to reproduce. We will lose them for sure.
Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
E.
Chronic Disease and The Will to Live
Narrator:
This is Science Today. People with serious illness
have a better chance of coping with their disease
and ultimately improving their chances of survival
if they have a strong will to live. That's what Dr.
Ernest Rosenbaum, a medical oncologist, has discovered
during his years of practice and research at the University
of California, San Francisco.
Rosenbaum:
You have to believe. Will to live is one thing, but
believing it is another. And this is where faith and
hope come in. They're vital ingredients with your
determination that you're going to get well - but
it's up to you.
Narrator: Rosenbaum has written several books
on the subject.
Rosenbaum: The will to live or the will to
survive is an inner feeling which all of us have.
It's almost primitive. Animals have this and everybody,
in some respect, fights for their life. But when you're
confronted with a diagnosis of a serious illness,
there's a fear of death. And the will to live is what
helps you try to overcome all the impediments.
Narrator: For Science Today, I'm Larissa Branin.
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