The updated national colorectal cancer screening guidelines that recommend screening begin at age 45 — rather than 50 — can benefit younger adults, a new Kaiser Permanente study found. The study was published October 22, 2024, in Annals of Internal Medicine. It included 267,732 Kaiser Permanente members in Northern California, Washington, and Colorado ages 45

Breast cancer survivors commonly continue to use opioid pain killers after their cancer treatment is complete. A new Kaiser Permanente study shows that this can increase their risk of falls and bone fractures, lung problems, and cardiovascular conditions. The study was published in October 2024 in The Oncologist. A cancer epidemiologist partnered with a breast

Heidi Brown, MD, MAS, is a urogynecologist and a dissemination and implementation scientist who joined the Department of Research & Evaluation in August 2023. Her research focuses on improving access to effective solutions for pelvic floor disorders such as bladder and bowel incontinence and pelvic organ prolapse. She uses community engagement, user-centered design, and iterative

Monitoring of about 45,000 pregnant people receiving flu vaccines in each of 2 successive pregnancies showed no increased risk of side effects or health issues, according to a Kaiser Permanente study published September 19, 2024, in JAMA Network Open. “Our study’s findings support recommendations to give flu vaccinations to pregnant persons even if they received

A Kaiser Permanente Southern California study showed that 1 heart-failure medication worked best among the 3 most commonly used to prevent illness and disease among patients with chronic kidney disease and heart failure. “Beta blockers save lives in heart failure patients, but we wanted to see how this worked among patients who also had chronic

Gay men had shorter age-adjusted telomere length, which is a biomarker of aging, than straight men, according to a Kaiser Permanente study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology. “While everyone ages at the same rate chronologically, studies have shown that we do not age at the same rate biologically,” said the lead author on

High-dose and adjuvanted influenza (flu) vaccines boosted protection against flu symptoms and hospitalization for people 65 years and older during the 2022-2023 flu season compared to the standard flu vaccine. The study was published on August 21, 2024, in Clinical Infectious Diseases. “Our research showed that there were advantages for older people to receive high-dose

  Robert Sallis MD, FAAFP, FACSM, is a family medicine and sports medicine physician practicing at  the Kaiser Permanente Fontana Medical Center, where he serves as director of the sports medicine fellowship program. He is a clinical professor of Family Medicine at both the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine and the University

  After 4 California cities began taxing sugar-sweetened beverages, young people in those cities had lower body mass index (BMI) compared to young people living in cities without the tax, a new study shows. “The findings of our study demonstrate that SSB (sugar-sweetened beverage) excise taxes may be associated with lower BMI percentile among youth,”

An analysis of Kaiser Permanente patients in California found a 33% reduced risk of dying from colorectal cancer among those completing at least one at-home fecal immunochemical test (FIT) screening. The study was published in JAMA Network Open. In 2007, Kaiser Permanente Southern California began an organized colorectal cancer screening program that includes automated outreach

Dr. Michael Kanter is an associate investigator with the Department of Research & Evaluation and the chair of Clinical Science and a professor for the Kaiser Permanente Bernard J. Tyson School of Medicine. He has been a quality care leader for Kaiser Permanente at both the regional and national levels for many years and was responsible for

Non-muscle invasive bladder cancer patients whose treatment included the immunotherapy Bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) after surgery were less likely to have their cancer recur if their diet included raw cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, a new Kaiser Permanente study found. The research, published in the Journal of Urology, analyzed data from patients enrolled in the Bladder Cancer