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News from the world of medicine:

Researchers have demonstrated that listening to loud music through earphones for extended periods in noisy surroundings can cause neurophysiological changes related to clear discrimination of sounds, even if the hearing threshold is normal. This auditory abnormality concerns "the vividness of sounds" and cannot be recognized by the usual hearing test.

Closely contested major sporting events are followed by a significant increase in traffic fatalities for fans of the winning team, according to new research from North Carolina State University.

In a major breakthrough in the battle against Parkinson's disease, researchers at the University of Colorado School of Medicine have discovered a drug that stops the progression of the degenerative illness in mice and is now being tested in humans.

Higher levels of HDL “good” cholesterol just may protect against colon cancer, findings from a large European study suggest.

The Mediterranean diet is known to help prevent heart disease. Now new research extends these benefits to metabolic syndrome, a cluster of risk factors that includes high blood pressure, abdominal obesity, high cholesterol levels, and insulin resistance that increase risk for diabetes and heart disease.

Fever may be beneficial when it comes to fighting infection, according to new advice from pediatricians. New guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics urge parents to recognize fever as a sign that the body is working to fight infection and not something to be feared.

A research team from J Thomas Jefferson University has been able to quantify a relationship between physicians' empathy and their patients' positive clinical outcomes, suggesting that a physician's empathy is an important factor associated with clinical competence.