April 11 to 17 is AVMA's Dog Bite Prevention Week, co-sponsored by the AVMA and State Farm Insurance. Most dog bites can be prevented by paying attention to dogs' body language and health and by desensitizing dogs to certain external stimuli, says AVMA President Dr. Douglas Kratt. Any dog can bite, Dr. Kratt says, and Heather Paul, a State Farm spokesperson, says reducing dog bites is good for people and pets, but refusing to offer homeowner's insurance coverage based on the breed of dog in the home is not the way to reduce dog bites.

Bird feeders and baths should be cleaned regularly with soapy water and a 10% bleach solution to kill salmonella, says Louisiana state wildlife veterinarian Jim LaCour. Wild birds can pick up and spread the bacteria when they congregate at feeders and baths, so Dr. LaCour recommends storing clean feeders and baths for two months and discarding potentially contaminated feed to break the cycle.

Thirty-five percent of pet-owning households in the US adopted a pet in the 12 months ending in February, according to market research firm Packaged Facts, and many of those newly adopted pets are unaccustomed to being left alone. AVMA President Dr. Douglas Kratt advises introducing pets to alone-time gradually, and other experts suggest hiring a pet-sitter or dog-walker, giving pets mentally stimulating toys and puzzle feeders, and reinforcing human-animal bonds.

Patients with type 1 diabetes who used the i-Port Advance injection port for 12 weeks not only increased their satisfaction levels, but also experienced improvements in A1C levels, fasting blood glucose and postprandial glucose, according to a study in Diabetes & Metabolic Syndrome: Clinical Research & Reviews. The number of hypoglycemic episodes also significantly decreased with use of the i-Port Advance system.

A study published in the Journal of Endocrinology involving 121 women found a weak association between an increase in body mass index and an increase in blood loss during menstruation, but the association became more significant after considering factors that may impact menstrual blood loss. A companion study in mice revealed that excessive weight could trigger more inflammation and slow down the uterine repair process during menstruation.

Not all primary care providers are adept at applying theories of probability in diagnosis and clinical practice, and they may be prone to overestimating risks both before and after testing, according to a study in JAMA Internal Medicine. Discomfort with estimating probability could lead to overtreatment, and the researchers are developing a website to help guide primary care professionals in understanding and ordering diagnostic tests.

Nine hospitals in Alberta, Canada, are reducing acute care capacity for two weeks while a centralized digital record-keeping system is installed at 24 health care sites throughout the province. The shift to a single digital record system will replace more than 1,300 independent systems in use now and is expected to be completed at all Alberta Health Services hospitals, clinics, pharmacies and laboratories by 2023.

Patients who received care for an acute respiratory infection were similarly unlikely to seek follow-up care within a week at an emergency department regardless of whether the initial visit was by direct-to-consumer telehealth or in person, researchers reported in Health Affairs. However, about 10% of the telehealth group sought follow-up care in an office or urgent care clinic or by telehealth, compared with about 6% of the in-person group, and first author Kathleen Li said the difference may be because direct-to-consumer telehealth providers often lack access to the patient's health records.

Predictive algorithms can not only suggest music or movies of interest but also crack the code of Alzheimer's disease, cancer and other illnesses by learning how proteins behave, researchers reported in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Researchers said their findings could enable scientists to "correct the grammatical mistakes inside cells that cause disease."

More than 100 CEOs and corporate leaders met online over the weekend to discuss ways to fight restrictive voting measures and bills, led at times by Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier and Kenneth Chenault, former chief executive of American Express, who last month released a letter from 72 Black business executives that made a similar call to action. Mike Ward of the Civic Alliance said the upshot was that executives on the Saturday call wanted to "lean into this, not lean away from this."