Nearly one in three students in Germany is suffering from depressive moods. This shows a recent study by the University of Lüneburg were commissioned by the Afrika Korps health insurance, the results presented in Hamburg on Thursday. 24 percent of the study surveyed young people said they “often sit there and nothing to do”. One in ten respondents agreed with the statement “No one understands me”. According to the study are involved in primary and secondary schools as significantly more students in secondary schools.

The proportion of pupils with depressive mood also increased with age. The 18-year-olds, 33 percent expressed accordingly. Many adolescents with depressive moods makes especially to create the school day. Consequently, they suffer significantly more likely than their peers under a strong pressure to perform (43 percent) and school stress (23 percent). They also were twice as often dissatisfied with their services.

For the study, 6000 boys and girls between eleven and 18 years old were interviewed in seven states.

Different biomarkers in the blood plasma can predict the recurrence of the tumor with skin cancer (melanoma). The report U.S. researchers at Yale University in the current issue of the journal Clinical Cancer Research.


Harriet Kluger, and team studied the plasma of 216 persons, of whom 108 had a metastatic melanoma and the other 108, a melanoma disease in stage 1 or 2. The researchers identified seven proteins that were found in patients with metastases in larger amounts than in patients with early stage disease. Accordingly, 83 percent of the subjects had with metastatic skin cancer have elevated levels of at least one of the seven biomarkers. 76 percent of subjects with cancer in stage 1 and stage-2, however, showed no increase.

“The results of our study must still yet to be confirmed in clinical studies, they show that such a test is generally possible,” says Kluger.

With a careful screening may cause skin cancer are detected early and removed surgically. The risk that the cancer has metastasized is in the early stage at about 10 percent at an advanced stage in up to 70 percent. So far, the follow-up is possible only through regular check-imaging. The newly discovered biomarkers could be an effective and cost-effective alternative to monitor the recurrence of skin cancer.

A new PSA test can detect prostate cancer seems more reliable than the currently available PSA test. The so-called Pro-PSA test can be demonstrated especially the aggressive type of tumor. For this result, a large clinical study comes in the United States. “The new test is more specific and accurate than currently available blood tests for early detection of prostate cancer,” says study leader Dr. William Catalona of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. This would enable unnecessary biopsies can be avoided in older men. Catalona is considered the father of the PSA test. In 1991 he succeeded in showing that a simple blood test that measures the amount of prostate-specific antigen (PSA), is suitable for the diagnosis of prostate cancer.
PSA is a protein that is produced by the prostate gland (prostate). An elevated PSA level in the blood can have various causes, including inflammation of the prostate, benign prostate enlargement or even prostate cancer. Current PSA tests to determine the PSA level often deliver false-positive results, that is a suspicion of prostate cancer, which turns out only after a biopsy to be false.

Accurate other hand will be the new Pro-PSA test. It measures not just the total amount of PSA in the blood, but rather defines a specific form of the antigen, the so-called (-2) Pro-PSA. Even more revealing is the result when the measured value of Pro-PSA into a mathematical formula involved. “The logic behind this formula is: the higher the pro-PSA and the total amount of PSA, and the lower the amount of free PSA, the more likely the patient is suffering from an aggressive form of prostate cancer,” said Catalona.

That the new test method actually works, could show the researchers in a study with about 900 participants. Especially useful for the pro-PSA test is therefore in patients has been revealed by the standard PSA test, a result between two and ten. This area is known as a diagnostic gray zone where the assessment of ‘cancer – yes or no’ difficult. Most – but not all – men with readings in the upper region have cancer, most men with lower levels do not.

The FDA is still evaluating the new study data on Pro-PSA test. In Europe, however, he is already approved for commercial use.