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Proteins do the heavy lifting of performing biochemical functions in our bodies by binding to metabolites or other proteins to complete tasks. To do this successfully, protein molecules often shape-shift to allow specific binding interactions that are needed to perform complex, precise chemical processes.
A better understanding of the shapes proteins take on would give researchers important insight into stopping or treating diseases, but current methods for revealing these dynamic, three-dimensional forms offer scientists limited information. To address this knowledge gap, a team from the Advanced Science Research Center at the CUNY Graduate Center (CUNY ASRC) designed an experiment to test whether performing X-ray crystallography imaging using elevated temperature versus elevated pressure would reveal distinct shapes. The results of the team’s work appear in the journal Communications Biology.
“Protein structures don’t sit still; they shift between several similar shapes much like a dancer,” said the study’s principal investigator Daniel Keedy, Ph.D., a professor with the CUNY ASRC’s Structural Biology Initiative and a chemistry and biochemistry professor at The City College of New York and the CUNY Graduate Center. “Unfortunately, existing approaches for viewing proteins only reveal one shape, or suggest the presence of multiple shapes without providing specific details. We wanted to see if different ways of poking at a protein could give a us a more detailed view of how it shape-shifts.”
For their experiment, the team obtained crystals of STEP, also known as PTPN5 — a drug target protein for the treatment of several diseases, including Alzheimer’s — and agitated them using either high pressure (2,000 times the Earth’s atmospheric pressure) or high temperature (body temperature), both of which are very different from typical crystallography experiments at atmospheric pressure and cryogenic temperature (-280 F, -173 C). The researchers viewed the samples using X-ray crystallography and observed that high temperature and high pressure had different effects on the protein, revealing distinct shapes.
While high pressure isn’t a condition that proteins experience inside the body, Keedy said the agitation method exposed different structural states of the protein that may be relevant to its activity in human cells.
“Having the ability to use perturbations such as heat and pressure to elucidate these different states could give drug developers tools for determining how they can trap a protein in a particular shape using a small-molecule drug to diminish its function,” Keedy added.

Scientists from Yale and the University of Cologne were able to show that statistical models created by artificial intelligence (AI) predict very accurately whether a medication responds in people with schizophrenia. However, the models are highly context-dependent and cannot be generalized.
In a recent study, scientists have been investigating the accuracy of AI models that predict whether people with schizophrenia will respond to antipsychotic medication.
Statistical models from the field of artificial intelligence (AI) have great potential to improve decision-making related to medical treatment. However, data from medical treatment that can be used for training these models are not only rare, but also expensive. Therefore, the predictive accuracy of statistical models has so far only been demonstrated in a few data sets of limited size. In the current work, the scientists are investigating the potential of AI models and testing the accuracy of the prediction of treatment response to antipsychotic medication for schizophrenia in several independent clinical trials.
The results of the new study, in which researchers from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Cologne and Yale were involved, show that the models were able to predict patient outcomes with high accuracy within the trial in which they were developed. However, when used outside the original trial, they did not show better performance than random predictions. Pooling data across trials did not improve predictions either.The study ‘Illusory generalizability of clinical prediction models’ was published in Science.
The study was led by leading scientists from the field of precision psychiatry. This is an area of psychiatry in which data-related models, targeted therapies and suitable medications for individuals or patient groups are supposed to be determined.
“Our goal is to use novel models from the field of AI to treat patients with mental health problems in a more targeted manner,” says Dr Joseph Kambeitz, Professor of Biological Psychiatry at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Cologne and the University Hospital Cologne. “Although numerous initial studies prove the success of such AI models, a demonstration of the robustness of these models has not yet been made.”
And this safety is of great importance for everyday clinical use.
“We have strict quality requirements for clinical models and we also have to ensure that models in different contexts provide good predictions,” says Kambeitz. The models should provide equally good predictions, whether they are used in a hospital in the USA, Germany or Chile.
The results of the study show that a generalization of predictions of AI models across different study centres cannot be ensured at the moment. This is an important signal for clinical practice and shows that further research is needed to actually improve psychiatric care. In ongoing studies, the researchers hope to overcome these obstacles. In cooperation with partners from the USA, England and Australia, they are working on the one hand to examine large patient groups and data sets in order to improve the accuracy of AI models and on the use of other data modalities such as biological samples or new digital markers such as language, motion profiles and smartphone usage.

Lifestyle and genetics, and a range of other factors within and outside our control, are known to contribute to development of metabolic syndrome, a cluster of conditions that add up to increased risk for serious health problems.
A new study has found that stress, through its propensity to drive up inflammation in the body, is also linked to metabolic syndrome — leading researchers to suggest that cheap and relatively easy stress-management techniques may be one way to help improve biological health outcomes.
“We were specifically examining people in midlife — a time that is critical to determine those who will experience accelerated aging. Stress is an important contributor to several negative health outcomes as we age,” said senior author Jasmeet Hayes, associate professor of psychology at The Ohio State University.
“There are many variables that influence metabolic syndrome, some we can’t modify, but others that we can. Everybody experiences stress,” Hayes said. “And stress management is one modifiable factor that’s cost-effective as well as something people can do in their daily lives without having to get medical professionals involved.”
The research was published recently in Brain, Behavior, & Immunity — Health.
Links between stress and biological health are established, but few previous studies had looked specifically at the involvement of inflammation in stress’s connection to metabolic syndrome.
People with metabolic syndrome are diagnosed with at least three of five factors that increase the risk for heart disease, diabetes and other health issues — excess belly fat, high blood pressure, low HDL (good) cholesterol, and high levels of fasting blood glucose and triglycerides, a type of fat in the blood. The condition is also referred to as insulin resistance syndrome.

Using data from a sample of 648 participants (average age 52) in a national survey titled Midlife in the United States, first author Savana Jurgens built a statistical model to gauge how inflammation may fit into the relationship between stress and metabolic syndrome. Information from respondents’ reported perceived stress, blood biomarkers for inflammation, and physical exam results indicating risk factors for metabolic syndrome was used for the analysis.
“There’s not much research that has looked at all three variables at one time,” said Jurgens, a psychology graduate student in Hayes’ lab. “There’s a lot of work that suggests stress is associated with inflammation, inflammation is associated with metabolic syndrome, and stress is associated with metabolic syndrome. But putting all those pieces together is rare.”
Inflammation composite scores were calculated using biomarkers that included the better-known IL-6 and C-reactive protein as well as E-selectin and ICAM-1, which help recruit white blood cells during inflammation, and fibrinogen, a protein essential to blood clot formation.
The statistical modeling showed that stress does indeed have a relationship with metabolic syndrome, and inflammation explained over half of that connection — 61.5%, to be exact.
“There is a small effect of perceived stress on metabolic syndrome, but inflammation explained a large proportion of that,” Jurgens said.
The results made sense — stress is just one of many factors that can launch health markers into a state of disarray. Other factors include a range of behaviors including inactivity, unhealthy eating habits, smoking and poor sleep, as well as low socioeconomic status, advanced age and being female.

But considering that an estimated 1 in 3 American adults has metabolic syndrome, knowing how to lower risk or prevent it altogether is important, Hayes said. The findings also add to evidence that stress, and its connection to inflammation, can have a big impact on biological health in general.
“People think of stress as mental health, that it’s all psychological. It is not. There are real physical effects to having chronic stress,” Hayes said. “It could be inflammation, it could be metabolic syndrome, or a number of things. This is another reminder of that.”
Future work will include a closer look at whether stress has a causal effect on metabolic syndrome and assessing stress management techniques that may be best for helping reduce inflammation.
This research was supported by the National Institute on Aging and Ohio State’s Discovery Themes Chronic Brain Injury Program, where Hayes is an investigator. Co-author Sarah Prieto of Ohio State also contributed to the study.

Physicians who are notified that a patient has died of a drug overdose are more judicious in issuing controlled substances if the notification includes a plan for what to do during subsequent patient visits, according to a study published today in Nature Communications.
Compared to a letter with demonstrated effectiveness at improving prescribing safety, physicians who received notifications with additional planning guidance reduced prescriptions of opioids by nearly 13%. They also reduced prescriptions of the anxiety medications benzodiazepines and by more than 8%. Together these drugs constitute the bulk of prescription drug overdoses.
The results suggest that the guidance, known as if/when planning prompts, may lower risks to patients by reducing the intensity and frequency of these prescriptions. The findings also indicate that letters notifying a physician that a patient has fatally overdosed are more effective when they include the guidance prompts.
The letter with planning prompts asked the doctor to carry out a specific plan: “When your next patient presents with pain, keep… [these] … recommendations close at hand to assist with their safe care. Also, be comfortable voicing your concern about prescribing safety with them so that they are also aware of the dangers associated with scheduled drugs.”
“Providing physicians a simple plan that will guide them at a patient visit appears to help temper their use of these drugs,” said Jason Doctor, lead author of the study and co-director of the Behavioral Sciences Program at the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics. “This represents a promising approach to reducing fatal drug overdoses, one that is both affordable and scalable.”
The study builds on two previous ones conducted by Doctor and his colleagues. The first one found that physicians reduced opioid prescriptions by 10% in the three months following notification of a fatal overdose. A second study found that physicians reduced opioid prescriptions by 7% one year after receiving notification. The letter used in these previous studies served as the control in this study.
“This latest study is part of an evolution toward better understanding how to enact behavior change among physicians whose patients have suffered negative consequences from care by the medical community,” said Doctor, who is also chair of the Department of Health Policy and Management at the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy.

The latest randomized study involved sending letters to 541 clinicians in Los Angeles County: 284 received a standard letter notifying them that a patient had died of an overdose; 257 received a letter with the additional guidance.
About the Study
In addition to Doctor, the study’s authors included Emily Stewart, staff at the USC Price School; Marcella A. Kelley of Edwards Lifesciences; Noah J. Goldstein of the UCLA Anderson School of Management and UCLA Geffen School of Medicine; and Jonathan Lucas of the Los Angeles County’s Department of Medical Examiner-Coroner.
The study was supported by the National Institutes on Aging (P30AG024968).

Tuberculosis (TB) is the leading infectious killer worldwide, with 10.6 million cases and 1.6 million deaths in 2021 alone. One in five incident TB cases were attributable to malnutrition, more than double the number attributed to HIV/AIDS. Like HIV/AIDS, malnutrition is a cause of secondary immunodeficiency, known as nutritionally acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (N-AIDS). However, N-AIDS remains the neglected cousin of HIV/AIDS in global TB elimination efforts.
In a review paper led by Madolyn Dauphinais, MPH, researchers at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicinealong with collaborators from Cornell University, University of Virginia, and the International Union Against Tuberculosis & Lung Disease, and Jawaharlal Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research, reviewed decades of data and make the case that N-AIDS, just like HIV/AIDS, also deserves special consideration in the effort to eliminate TB.
“While there have been important technological advancements to detect and treat TB, our interpretation of the existing literature is that we won’t be able to make substantive changes in TB incidence and mortality rates without action on malnutrition,” explains corresponding author Pranay Sinha, MD, assistant professor of medicine at the school.
After reading more than 75 papers on nutrition and TB, the researchers briefly recount the impact that actions on HIV had on the global TB pandemic. They point out that malnutrition is the leading cause of immunodeficiency worldwide. “People with severe malnutrition, like people with HIV, are at increased risk of TB. We can leverage what we already know about malnutrition to aid us in detecting, treating and preventing TB,” says Sinha, who also is an infectious disease physician at Boston Medical Center.
While the researchers believe it is urgent to continue to develop newer tools, approaches should not be limited to the biomedical realm. For example, a study included in their review found that TB incidence among household contacts of persons with tuberculosis was reduced by 40% by providing them with an inexpensive food basket. “It is important for the lay audience to understand that TB is not simply a medical disease, it’s a social one and our elimination efforts must recognize that,” he adds.
According to the researchers, action on malnutrition will have several benefits beyond TB as well. Throughout their paper, they explore the idea of leveraging nutritional interventions to detect, prevent, and treat TB more effectively. They believe this paper will help advocates, clinicians, policymakers and voters think differently about the management of persons with TB as well as the needed global health investments to eradicate it.
This paper appears online in BMC Global & Public Health.

Did smokers do better than non-smokers in a clinical trial for an experimental cancer treatment? That was the intriguing question that led University of Iowa researchers and their colleagues to develop a drinkable, carbon monoxide-infused foam that boosted the effectiveness of the therapy, known as autophagy inhibition, in mice and human cells. The findings were recently published in the journal Advanced Science.
Looking for ways to exploit biological differences between cancer cells and healthy cells is a standard approach for devising new cancer treatments. But it is a painstaking process that requires a deep understanding of complex cancer biology and often a dose of unexpected insight.
The potential of autophagy inhibitors
Researchers have known for several decades that autophagy, which is the cell’s natural recycling system, is increased in cancer cells relative to healthy cells, suggesting that inhibiting autophagy might be a way to target cancer cells. However, results from almost 20 clinical trials testing autophagy inhibitors have been inconclusive.
“Within those clinical trials they found mixed results; there was some benefit, but for many patients there was no benefit, which really pushed researchers back to the drawing board,” says James Byrne, MD, PhD, UI assistant professor of radiation oncology and biomedical engineering and senior author on the new study.
Searching for insight into why autophagy inhibition only seems to work some of the time, the researchers made the surprising discovery that smokers in two of the previous trials of autophagy inhibitors seemed to do better than non-smokers.
“When we looked at how the smokers did in those trials, we saw an increase in overall response in smokers that received the autophagy inhibitors, compared to (non-smoker) patients, and we also saw a pretty robust decrease in the target lesion size,” Byrne says.

This was an exciting finding for Byrne and his team because smoking is also associated with increased levels of carbon monoxide, a gas molecule that can increase autophagy in cells in a way that researchers think might enhance the anti-cancer effect of autophagy inhibitors.
“We know also that smokers have higher carbon monoxide levels and while we definitely don’t recommend smoking, this suggested that elevated carbon monoxide might improve the effectiveness of autophagy inhibitors. We want to be able to harness that benefit and take it into a therapeutic platform,” says Byrne, who also is a member of University of Iowa Holden Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Carbon monoxide boosts anti-cancer activity of autophagy inhibition
The team already had just such a “platform” to test their ideas. Byrne specializes in crafting gas-entrapping materials (GEMs) — foams, gels, and solids made from safe, edible substances that can be infused with different gas molecules. For this study, the researchers created a drinkable foam infused with carbon monoxide.
When mice with pancreatic and prostate cancers were fed the carbon monoxide foam and simultaneously treated with an autophagy inhibitor, tumor growth and progression was significantly reduced in the animals. The team also showed that combining carbon monoxide with autophagy inhibitors had a significant anti-cancer effect in human prostate, lung, and pancreatic cancer cells in petri dishes.
Ultimately, Byrne hopes to test this approach in human clinical trials.
“The results from this study support the idea that safe, therapeutic levels of CO, which we can deliver using GEMs, can increase the anti-cancer activity of autophagy inhibitors, opening a promising new approach that might improve therapies for many different cancers,” he says.
In addition to Byrne, the research team included UI researchers Jianling Bi, Emily Witt, Megan McGovern, Arielle Cafi, Lauren Rosenstock, Lucas Absler, Srija Machkanti, Kellie Bodeker, Scott Shaw, Vitor Lira, and Michael Henry.
The research team also included scientists from MIT, Harvard Medical School, University of Pennsylvania, Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, University of North Carolina Wilmington, and Oregon Health and Science University.

Published1 hour agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingThis video can not be playedTo play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser.By Hayley JarvisBBC Scotland reporterWhen Natashja Wilson first noticed she had symptoms of pelvic organ prolapse she had no idea what was happening and was too embarrassed to ask for help. Aged just 18 and living away from home at university, she had never heard of the condition which could affect up to 50% of women during their lifetime.”I noticed when I went to the toilet a bulge was coming out of my vagina,” she said. “I was also experiencing incontinence and pain during intercourse and a bulging feeling.”I didn’t really know what to think because I honestly knew nothing about my body at that time.”Natashja, now 24, says she did not know what her pelvic floor or her cervix were at the time.”So I asked my friends ‘Is this bulging lump sensation normal?’,” she said.”They said, ‘Maybe it’s your G-spot. Maybe it’s just a spot’.” Natashja, from Greenwich in London, didn’t know what to think so she left it and hoped it would go away with time.But her symptoms got worse and after 18 months she finally confided in her mum who persuaded her to see a doctor. It was later confirmed she had uterine prolapse.Pelvic organ prolapse occurs when the group of muscles and tissues that normally support the pelvic organs, called the pelvic floor, becomes weakened and cannot hold the organs firmly in place.It causes one or more of the organs to move down from their normal position, leading to a bulge that can be felt inside or outside the vagina. This can be the womb, bowel, bladder or top of the vagina.Many women are unaware they have a prolapse or only have mild symptoms, but for some it can have a real impact on their quality of life. Symptoms can include a heavy dragging sensation or feeling of something coming down the vagina – which is sometimes described like a feeling of ‘sitting on a tennis ball’ as well as bladder and bowel issues and discomfort during sex.Pelvic floor exercises and lifestyle changes can help to improve symptoms, but sometimes medical treatment is needed such as vaginal pessaries or surgery.Causes of prolapse include genetics, heavy lifting, constipation or a persistent cough. Pregnancy and childbirth increase the risk of prolapse, particularly after a difficult labour. Women are also more likely to develop prolapse as they get older, especially after the menopause. But Natashja is keen to make people aware it can affect younger people too.She is trying to lift the stigma around pelvic organ prolapse through social media and her blog ‘Living With Prolapse’.”There’s still so much stigma around prolapse, around discussing your genitalia and that doesn’t allow for people to go see a doctor,” she said. “I know that if there was less stigma I would’ve gone to a doctor much earlier.”My Prolapse and MeThe stories of women hoping to left the stigma around pelvic organ prolapse.Watch now on BBC iPlayerBarriers to careAccording to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) one in 12 women report symptoms of pelvic organ prolapse but on examination it is present in up to 50% of all women.Research yet to be published by Stirling University indicates that embarrassment, lack of awareness and a fear that symptoms won’t be taken seriously, all act as barriers to women seeking help for pelvic health problems.The study looked at papers from 24 countries including the UK over the past 20 years, taking in the views of more than 20,000 women. Researchers Clare Jouanny and Dr Purva Abhyankar said: “There is a large body of evidence from the UK and similar countries across the world that women still face many barriers when it comes to seeking help for women’s health issues like prolapse. “We need to focus not only on increasing awareness and education among women and clinicians, but more importantly we need to work with clinicians to change women’s perception that clinicians don’t take them seriously with pelvic health symptoms.”Pelvic health physiotherapist Suzanne Vernazza is on a mission to educate women about their pelvic health. She is the founder of the not-for-profit company Know Your Floors and her daily ‘SqueezeAlong’ pelvic floor exercise tutorials have more than 600,000 followers on TikTok. She says it is important for people to raise pelvic health concerns with their GP.”If you’ve been feeling something that at any point doesn’t feel quite right, whether you’re pregnant or postnatal, raise it and ask the question because more than likely, you’re right that it’s not right – and you can have support for you to be able to manage that,” she said.The Royal College of GPs said its doctors are well trained to diagnose and care for people affected by prolapse. RCGP Scotland deputy chairman Dr Chris Williams said: “GPs are aware of the embarrassment or stigma that can be associated with this condition and strive to ensure women feel comfortable and empowered to seek support if experiencing symptoms.”Sam Hindle experienced bladder prolapse after the birth of her son 24 years ago and has been incontinent ever since. “It was that bad that my two-year-old son was having to go and fetch mummy clean pants, clean trousers,” she said. “It was embarrassing to have your two-year-old run about and say ‘ Oh Mummy’s had an accident, I need to help’.'”The 47-year-old, from Edinburgh, was one of tens of thousands of women in the UK to have transvaginal mesh surgery to treat prolapse and incontinence. Its use was halted in the UK in 2018 due to the life-changing side-effects many women suffered. Sam said she had been left in constant pain and suffers from PTSD as a result of the procedure. She hopes to have her mesh removed by a specialist in the United States and is currently on a waiting list for assessment in Glasgow. She said it was important for people to talk about pelvic health.”Just like menopause, it’s a subject that we need to remove the stigma of and talk about and let people not feel embarrassed about this so they will go and seek help,” she said.”You look at other females in the family who are having children and you think, ‘Oh I’d better warn them, I better make sure they know about pelvic floor exercises and they know how to avoid possibly getting into the mess I did with bladder prolapse.”Image source, Natashja WilsonNatashja said prolapse affects women of all ages and it does not discriminate.”I noticed my symptoms when I was 18 and when I went on Google it was only telling me that elderly women were impacted,” she said. “The doctors were so shocked that someone of my age had prolapse and it made me feel very isolated.”Natashja said she is now feeling positive about the future. She has been working with a pelvic health physiotherapist and uses a vaginal pessary, a device that helps to support the vaginal walls and pelvic organs, which means she feels more confident doing exercise.She said the support and advice of the online community had also helped her to cope.”If you have just been diagnosed with prolapse, it’s important to know you do not have to go through this alone,” she said. “There is an army of women out there willing to support you and help you through your journey and they can understand what you’re going through and help you through it.”More on this storyMenstrual cup misuse ‘can cause prolapse’Published11 March 2020Mum in ‘survival mode’ amid painful hysterectomy waitPublished4 January

Arena BioWorks is promising big paydays to nearly 100 researchers from Harvard, M.I.T. and other prestigious institutions.In an unmarked laboratory stationed between the campuses of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a splinter group of scientists is hunting for the next billion-dollar drug.Listen to This ArticleOpen this article in the New York Times Audio app on iOS.The group, bankrolled with $500 million from some of the wealthiest families in American business, has created a stir in the world of academia by dangling seven-figure paydays to lure highly credentialed university professors to a for-profit bounty hunt. Its self-described goal: to avoid the blockages and paperwork that slow down the traditional paths of scientific research at universities and pharmaceutical companies, and discover scores of new drugs (at first, for cancer and brain disease) that can be produced and sold quickly.Braggadocio from start-ups is de rigueur, and plenty of ex-academics have started biotechnology companies, hoping to strike it rich on their one big discovery. This group, rather boastfully named Arena BioWorks, borrowing from a Teddy Roosevelt quote, doesn’t have one singular idea, but it does have a big checkbook.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? 

Published2 hours agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingBy Ben Moore, Alex Bish & Lauren WoodheadBBC South East Investigation TeamSurgeons at a plastic surgery unit in West Sussex say they are treating double the number of dog-attack victims since before the pandemic.The number of admissions at Queen Victoria Hospital in East Grinstead rose from 116 in 2019 to 237 in 2022.Siva Kumar, a consultant surgeon, said he had seen an increase in the number of bites as dog ownership rose during the pandemic. The government says it is working with police to prevent attacks. This article contains pictures and descriptions of dogs bites that some readers may find upsetting.Mr Kumar, whose trauma clinics treat patients from Kent, Surrey and Sussex, told BBC South East the specialist centre would often see the most severe cases.He said: “We would get at least one, if not two patients that are dog bites every day. We have seen a doubling in the number of patients that have come through and in the last year we’ve seen double the number of children that have had dog bites.”Children are probably the ones that affect you the most. Ones with multiple dog bites with scarring that they will carry through the rest of their lives.”

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National data from NHS Digital also shows there has been a steady increase in the number of hospital admissions for dog bites over the last 10 years. There were 9,277 in 2022-23, up 47% from 6,317 in 2012-13.There has been a much smaller increase in admissions for under-18s for dog bites, up by 8% to 1,740 in the same time period.Although these figures show a rise in admissions for dog bites, one bite can result in multiple admissions and it may not include all dog bites that resulted in hospital admission.’It happened so fast’Darren Davies, 53, suffered serious hand injuries in December after intervening when a dog he was walking was attacked by another, near to his home in Staplehurst. “I didn’t even see it,” he said. “I had the dog by the back of the neck with two hands, the dog managed to spin round so quickly, and bite me, that I didn’t even see him do it, it was just so fast, and he bit me.”I knew something was really bad. It goes right across the top of my hand.” He was treated at the Queen Victoria Hospital for his injuries.”It’s the worst injury I think I have ever had in my life,” he added. Kerry Stevens from Eastbourne needed several operations at the Queen Victoria Hospital.She said she was still scarred psychologically after she was attacked by a cross between a pit bull and an American bulldog in 2014.”I was delivering a package to a property when the dog came running out, knocked me to the floor and locked its jaw on me,” she said.”There were bits of my flesh on the floor, it was terrifying, I feared I could have died.”Kerry said that while the scars may heal, she still remembered the attack “every so often”.”There should be more muzzling brought into place for dogs that could be like that,” she added.Last year a BBC investigation found the number of dog attacks recorded by police in England and Wales had risen by more than a third in the previous five years.The government says there have been 23 deaths caused by dog attacks since the start of 2021, with the bully XL breed “being disproportionately involved in this rise”.The new rules for owning bully XL dogs are being introduced in England and Wales.They must now be kept on a lead and muzzled in public and from 1 February it will be illegal to own one without an exemption certificate.Charities are calling for a complete overhaul of the Dangerous Dogs Act, including tougher penalties for owners who fail to control their dogs.Dogs ‘not socialised’Dog behaviourist and trainer Pippa Apps from Kent suggested some dogs bought during the pandemic had not been properly socialised and that could be a factor in the number of dog bites.She said: “The critical period of socialisation is up to four months of age and without socialising with dogs, and experiencing other dogs in a really positive way in that time, they are much less able to cope as well in a social setting as they get older.”A government spokesperson said: “We are focused on ensuring that the full range of existing powers to tackle dog control issues are effectively applied across all breeds of dog. “We have also taken quick and decisive action to protect the public from devastating dog attacks by adding the bully XL type to the list of dogs prohibited under the Dangerous Dogs Act to reduce the risks to the public posed by this type.” Follow BBC South East on Facebook, on X, and on Instagram. Send your story ideas to southeasttoday@bbc.co.uk. More on this storyWhat is an American XL bully and why are they being banned?Published4 JanuaryAmerican bully XL dogs must now be kept on a leadPublished31 December 2023Concern as pandemic puppies reach difficult agePublished8 September 2023Dog attacks increase by a third in five yearsPublished8 March 2023

Published3 hours agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingImage source, Ashley HallBy Katharine Da CostaBBC NewsA man with chronic health conditions said he is in limbo after being turned down for a disability benefit.Ashley Hall, 36, from Witney, Oxfordshire, suffers from Type 1 Diabetes and was recently diagnosed with bile acid malabsorption.It causes severe diarrhoea and prevents the body from absorbing nutrients, leaving him fatigued and in pain.Mr Hall was signed off work last May but was turned down for Personal Independence Payments (PIP) in August.His mandatory reconsideration [challenge to the benefits decision] was refused two months later. He now faces a seven-month wait for a tribunal in order to appeal the decision by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). The government said it has made millions of PIP decisions and 3% have been overturned.Disability benefits cost could rocket, report saysWelfare cuts worth billions planned by ministers”It’s got massive impacts, I constantly need to go to the toilet,” Mr Hall said.”I’m constantly in pain and tired all the time because I get about two hours sleep a night with it.”I can spend six hours a day on the toilet. I wouldn’t employ me on that and the doctors have said I’m not able to work.”He said that because his body cannot absorb nutrients his sugar levels are “so up and down and sporadic that I’m not able to commit myself to a job”.Image source, Ashley HallThe father-of-three gave up his maintenance job at a water company two years ago when he started suffering from ongoing bouts of stomach pain. He then took on a job as a delivery driver, which offered more routine shifts and shorter working hours but, when the pain started to get worse, he was signed off by his GP in May 2023. He was diagnosed with Bile Acid Malabsorption on 1 December.His wife is a full-time carer to one of their children who also suffers from Type 1 Diabetes and the couple receive universal credit, which Mr Hall says covers the rent and bills but leaves little else for family life.”I’ve always been strong mentally but this is grinding me down now,” he said, adding: “We don’t get to go out and do things as a family, it’s horrible.”PIPs are awarded based on how conditions affect the claimant and are meant to cover the additional living costs incurred as a result.In total, 3.2 million adults in England and Wales now receive PIP to help with the extra cost of living with a health condition or disability.The number has increased by about one million over the last decade and is forecast by the DWP to rise by another million over the next three years.According to DWP, in the five years to June 2023, 2.9 million initial decisions following a PIP assessment were made and, by October 2023, 8% were appealed and 3% were overturned at tribunal.Mr Hall said he found the assessment process for PIP stressful and that DWP’s questions made him feel “worthless”.The DWP said: “We support millions of people every year and our priority is they receive a supportive service and get the benefits they are entitled to as soon as possible.”Our disability assessors are qualified health professionals and decisions are made using all the available information. If someone disagrees with a decision, they can ask for this to be reconsidered and appeal to an independent tribunal, as Mr Hall has done in this case.”Follow BBC South on Facebook, X, or Instagram. Send your story ideas to south.newsonline@bbc.co.uk.More on this storyDisability benefits cost could rocket, report saysPublished18 September 2023Seven out of 10 win benefits challenges in courtPublished24 September 2021Related Internet LinksDepartment for Work and PensionsThe BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.