Take THAT b-thalassemia!

Back to work today!
I always get more done when I have a time crunch. I guess that's what makes me such a procrastinator.

I had a great few days off. Didn't really do much on my "list" I read a lot of books though. I'm currently in the midst of "Hitler's Scientists" it's a quick overview of the crazy and unethical things that surrounded WWII, plus all the things we learned from it. *Whistles* Review once I'm done with it.

I got a book on cat training, but SOMEONE wasn't the the mood to be trained. Sigh. Spock is pretty good about coming when he's called, but... I'd like to teach him a few more things. You know, sit, fetch, things like that. He'll do them occasionally, but only if he wants to. So there. I just he's just a cat.
Honestly, that's one of the reasons why I like cats, they don't fall all over themselves to make you love them. They have the attitude that they could really careless. So when they do really want to snuggle, its doubly sweet.

Like last night, John and I were kinda laying in bed, exhausted. Teasingly, we "kicked" Spock off the bed. Next thing we noticed, he was burrowing his way back up under the covers where we couldn't see him and he snuggled up next to us, hidden. So cute!

This morning on my run I listened to last week's Nature Podcast and learned some pretty awesome stuff. Such as THIS article.

That's the medscape btw. SO, using gene therapy they've "cured" someone of b-thalassemia.
b-thalassemia is an anemic blood disorder similar to sickle cell. In this disorder there's a mutation of one of the heme molecules that are on your redblood cells. Heme is used to transport oxygen.

Here's a rough and dirty version. They modified a virus to contain the gene they needed to replace in this guy's DNA and introduced it. The virus did it's "Virus-y" thing of going in and taking over the DNA replicating and replacing etc etc. Through this method they essentially fixed him.

This young man has had blood transfusions since age 3 and subsequent transfusions approx every 3 months to keep his blood levels at a functional level. He underwent this therapy 3 years ago and hasn't required a transfusion since June 2008!
Wow.
That's great.
Of course limitations include small sample size and length of observation.
Awaa??

Sorry. I've been working on a lit review for the past few days. Pointing out limitations has become a bit of a habit. I'm putting together my stuff for the introduction of change of shift huddles in our ER. It's a pretty impressive report. I've got to get my crap together for the pilot study I'm starting in October. Augh, I've got to create a reliable and valid measurement tool in the next few days...
Blerg.

Oop! Off to work!