The number of U.S. medical students choosing internal medicine residencies inched higher from 2009 but not enough to significantly impact the shortage of primary care physicians. According to the 2010 National Resident Matching Program report, 2,722 U.S. seniors at medical schools enrolled in an internal medicine residency program, a 3.4 percent increase from 2,632 in 2009. The internal medicine enrollment numbers are similar to 2008 (2,660), 2007 (2,680), and 2006 (2,668). In comparison, 3,884 U.S. medical school graduates chose internal medicine residency programs in 1985…

AAMC (Association of American Medical Colleges) President and CEO Darrell G. Kirch, M.D., issued the following statement on Match Day results released this afternoon by the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP) for U.S. medical school graduates and the primary care specialties: “The AAMC is extremely encouraged that more graduating U.S. medical students this year chose primary care for their residency training…

More than two thirds of primary care trusts (PCTs) in England are unable to say if or how they spent money allocated to them under the National Dementia Strategy for England. Only 31 per cent (22) of PCTs who responded to a Freedom of Information (FOI) request by the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Dementia said they had allocated their proportion of the £150million made available by the government last year. The same percentage could not say how dementia strategy funds had been spent as they were inseparable from other funding…

ATLANTA (MedPage Today) — Practice as usual may be the order of the day in the wake of an ACCORD trial finding that there’s no cardiovascular risk reduction from intensified lipid and blood pressure management among diabetic patients.

A drug widely used to treat joint pain improved blood glucose control in patients with type 2 diabetes, researchers said.

Older colon cancer patients tended to undergo milder chemotherapy regimes after surgery than younger patients, with fewer adverse events, but they may not have reaped the full benefits of the treatment, researchers found.

MANCHESTER, England (MedPage Today) — Topical testosterone replacement reduced insulin resistance and glycated hemoglobin in men who were deficient in the hormone and at risk for, or diagnosed with type 2 diabetes, researchers reported here.

ATLANTA (MedPage Today) — Sodium bicarbonate hydration appears no better than the old standard, saline, in preventing kidney damage from use of radiology contrast agents in at-risk diabetes patients, according to one of the first head-to-head comparison trials.

ATLANTA (MedPage Today) — Individualized care is again the message in the wake of lipid and hypertension results from the ACCORD trial presented here at the American College of Cardiology meeting, leading cardiologists suggest in this exclusive InFocus™ report.

ATLANTA (MedPage Today) — Lower is not better for blood pressure control in patients with diabetes and coronary artery disease, a secondary analysis of a randomized trial showed.