FRIDAY, Jan. 17, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Patients taking the blood thinner warfarin have been told that it should be taken at night, but a new study found the time of day doesn't matter. "Whether warfarin is taken in the morning, or the evening, its therapeutic effect is the same," said lead researcher Dr. Scott Garrison, an associate professor of family medicine at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada. "Health care providers should stop telling patients to use their warfarin in the evening; rather, warfarin should be taken whenever regular compliance would be easiest for patients," he added. The drug is used to prevent blood clots that can cause strokes, heart attacks and blockages. It is also used to treat the abnormal heart rhythm called atrial fibrillation....

FRIDAY, Jan. 17, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Are college students choosing marijuana instead of booze when both are legal? New research suggests they are: In states where pot is legal, college kids use it more, but binge-drink less. In states with legal marijuana, college students were 18% more likely to use it in the past month than in states where it's illegal, Oregon State University researchers report. From 2012 to 2018, the rate of pot users rose from 14% to 17% in states where it was illegal and from 21% to 34% in the states where it was legal. Using the National College Health Assessment survey from 2008 to 2018, researchers examined data on more than 850,000 students from 135 colleges in seven states where marijuana was legalized in 2018 and 454 colleges in 41 states where it...

FRIDAY, Jan. 17, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Sepsis kills more than twice as many people worldwide as once believed, and children in poor regions account for an excessive number of such deaths, researchers say. Sepsis is an out-of-control immune response to infection that harms organs. People who survive sepsis can have lifelong disabilities. In 2017, there were 48.9 million cases of sepsis and 11 million sepsis deaths worldwide -- that's one in five deaths that year. "We are alarmed to find sepsis deaths are much higher than previously estimated, especially as the condition is both preventable and treatable," said senior author Dr. Mohsen Naghavi, a professor of health metrics sciences at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle. Low- and middle-income countries...

FRIDAY, Jan. 17, 2020 (HealthDay News) -- Since the 1970s, serious heart disease among childhood cancer survivors had declined remarkably, a new study finds. The decline suggests that efforts to make cancer treatments, including radiation, less toxic are paying off, researchers say. For the study, researchers led by Dr. Daniel Mulrooney, from St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn., collected data on more than 23,000 U.S. adults included in the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study who had survived the most common childhood cancers. Specifically, the team members looked at heart failure, coronary artery disease, heart valve defects, damage to the heart tissue lining and heart rhythm problems. They also took into account risks for heart disease, such as diabetes, high...