Premature births are on the rise in the U.S., as my colleague Laura Blue reported recently, and despite all of the health care dollars being spent to usher preemies safely into the world—some $26 billion annually—too often they number among the 30,000 babies under a year old who die every year in this country. It’s a grim figure, …
A product designed to let women fake losing their virginity—an artificial hymen that can be inserted into the vagina before intercourse and releases “just the right amount” of a blood-like substance, according to the distributor—is being denounced by conservative Egyptian politicians and religious scholars, according to the Associated Press.
Tai Chi, the ancient Chinese art that combines slow, controlled stretching with meditation, has long been praised by advocates of alternative medicine for its broad range of health benefits, including improved muscle tone and balance, as well as pain reduction. The National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Complementary and
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Looking back at historical data, more than a few scientists have noticed an interesting trend—during surges in industrialization, there appeared to be corresponding jumps in appendicitis cases. With the growth of industry in North America and Europe during the 1800s and early 1900s came the increased emission of pollutants such as
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Between 1990 and 2006, overall numbers of burn injuries among children dropped by 31%, according to a study published in the November issue of the journal Pediatrics. Yet while that decrease is cause for celebration—for parents and pediatricians alike—authors of the large scale study, which analyzed some two million burn injuries
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A hospital mix-up last January forced would-be mom Carolyn Savage and her husband Sean to make a heartrending decision. Ten days after the Savages went to a fertility clinic to have embryos transferred in hopes of conceiving, they got a devastating phone call. Savage had successfully gotten pregnant, but the baby wasn’t hers—the embryo
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It’s a familiar scenario: after an initial surgery to repair a torn anterior cruciate ligament (ACL)—one of the four major ligaments that connect the shin bone to the thigh bone and hold the knee in place—there is a long period of physical therapy and follow-up with the doctor. Yet, and in some cases, patients find themselves going
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A study published in the October 1 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine finds that, among babies who survive after suffering a severe lack of oxygen at birth, those whose body temperatures are lowered as part of treatment had a greatly reduced risk for brain damage.
The study, which included 325 full-term babies under 6 hours
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Girls who attend single sex schools are more likely to find boys with “feminine” features attractive, according to a story from the BBC. The article refers to a study from St. Andrews University in Scotland, in which researchers asked 240 kids between the ages of 11-15 to rate faces by attractiveness. They found that, girls who attended
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The value of self-breast exams as a cancer screening tool has been debated in the medical community, with some physicians arguing that the stress, worry and unnecessary medical procedures that often result when women identify a mysterious lump may do more harm than good. Yet, on the other hand, there are patients and professionals alike
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An article that ran in the New York Times last week highlighted a growing trend of children—as young as age 3—participating in triathlons. And while it incorporated measured responses from a variety of people—an orthopedic surgeon warning parents to exercise caution with kids under age 7, a coach who specializes in training
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When doling out punishment for crimes or misdeeds, the rules of society tend to focus more on the results of behavior, and not as much on intentions: a person who runs a red light through an empty intersection may get a ticket, but a person who runs a red light, crashes into another car and injures that driver will likely face more
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Constantly worrying about losing your job may be worse for your health than actually getting laid off or being unemployed, according to a study published in the September issue of the journal Social Science and Medicine. By analyzing two large, long-term data sets for some 1,700 U.S. workers, sociologists from the University of Michigan
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