Medicine

Medicine

Eduardo Vilar-Sanchez has spent more than 10 years pursuing a goal that seemed very distant, but which he now sees as a little closer: to develop a preventive vaccine against cancer. The physician and researcher is leading a study that presented the first promising results of a colon cancer vaccine in a small group of patients suffering from a rare disease that makes them 17 times more likely to develop colon cancer than the general population.

Mucopolysaccharidosis type II (MPS II), or Hunter syndrome, is a rare genetic disorder primarily affecting boys, caused by a deficiency in the enzyme needed to break down sugar molecules. This harmful buildup in cells and tissues impacts multiple body systems, causing frequent infections, organ enlargement and developmental disabilities. Management involves supportive care and enzyme replacement therapy, as there is currently no cure,

The Food and Drug Administration commissioner's effort to drastically shorten the review of drugs favored by President Donald Trump's administration is causing alarm across the agency, stoking worries that the plan may run afoul of legal, ethical, and scientific standards long used to vet the safety and effectiveness of new medicines. Marty Makary's program is causing new anxiety and confusion among staff already rocked by layoffs, buyouts, and leadership upheavals, according to seven current or recently departed staffers.

Try hard enough, we are often told, and eventually you'll get what you want. But sometimes the hardest - and bravest - thing to do, is to stop trying. After years of hoping to start a family, including the painful rollercoaster of fertility treatment and a devastating miscarriage on Christmas day, Caroline Stafford, found the only way to find some kind of peace again was to accept it was not going to happen and to build a different future.

The company just raised its quarterly dividend to $0.63 in January 2026, a 6.8% increase from the prior $0.59 rate. That puts the annual payout at $2.52 per share with a yield around 1.9%. Not eye-popping, but the safety and growth profile more than compensate. Abbott generated $6.35 billion in free cash flow in 2024 against $3.84 billion in dividend payments.

Dementia is linked to changes in the brain. Health professionals used to assume that brain damage and dementia symptoms always went hand in hand. More recent research, however, shows that some people have significant brain damage yet never develop dementia. How can that be? In a previous post, I shared that dementia is defined by the inability to function in everyday life, such as getting lost in familiar places, having difficulty managing finances, forgetting to turn off the stove, or struggling with basic tasks.

After losing both of his parents to cancer, Tom set out to challenge a healthcare system that often waits for symptoms instead of identifying risk early. What began in Deerfield Beach, Florida, has grown into a multi-location preventative imaging company serving communities across the state. Life Imaging Fla focuses on preventative heart and full-body screenings. These services give people access to advanced imaging that is typically only approved once symptoms appear. The goal is straightforward: identify disease earlier, when people still have time, options, and control.

It's a watershed moment in aesthetic medicine, resonating across age groups. "Younger people are coming in with concerns about texture, tone, inflammation, early laxity, and how their skin behaves under stress," observes Dr. David Jack, an aesthetic doctor renowned for his light touch. "While more mature patients - many of whom have already had filler - are increasingly aware that volume alone does not age well if the architecture beneath it continues to degrade."

Antiviral drugs for influenza, the best known of which is Tamiflu, are-let's be honest-not exactly miracle cures. They marginally shorten the course of illness, especially if taken within the first 48 hours. But amid possibly the worst flu season in 25 years, driven by a variant imperfectly matched to the vaccine, these underused drugs can make a bout of flu a little less miserable. So consider an antiviral. And specifically, consider Xofluza, a lesser-known drug that is in fact better than Tamiflu.

My dad was in the emergency room, short of breath, chest tight, upper back aching. He looked pale and confused. An ultrasound showed excess fluid between his lung and chest wall. "We'll drain it," a resident said, as if he were unclogging a sink. For the next five days, thick, red-tinged fluid filled a plastic container beside my dad's hospital bed. Doctors sent his cells for "staining," a way to identify cancer. But no one used that word.

My daughter refused to accept what she was being told and sat by my side, tapping and singing softly. She sang my Hebrew kindergarten songs, one after another, continuously without pause. These were the songs I sang to her when she was small. She sang instinctively, as if her body knew something before her mind did. As if she understood, without explanation, how to bring her mother back to life.

In March I started experiencing excruciating pain in my right arm and shoulder burning, zapping, energy-sapping pain that left me unable to think straight, emanating from a nexus of torment behind my shoulder blade and sometimes stretching all the way up to the base of my skull and all the way down into my fingers. Typing was agony, but everything was painful; even at rest it was horrible.

"I remember sitting in the ultrasound room," Mornhineway, 30, tells TODAY.com. "Our hearts dropped. They said there was nothing to be done. Most people terminate."

Drink responsibly, or you might fall victim to "whiskey dick." There are few men of drinking age who haven't experienced some performance challenges after a night of heavy drinking ― whether they struggle to get an erection or reach climax. In the moment, it feels like your body has cut power to your penis at the worst possible time, said Garrett, a 32-year-old sales executive from Seattle.

Last year, I sat in my office staring at the three monitors on my desk. On the screens were my online bank accounts - all of which were channeling Whoopi Goldberg's character from the movie "Ghost." "You in danger, girl," they seemed to be saying, mocking me. I spent decades building a career, collecting titles, degrees, and glowing reviews. Yet the numbers on my bank statements told a different story.

New therapies for Alzheimer's disease should target a particular gene linked to the condition, according to researchers who said most cases would never arise if its harmful effects were neutralised. The call to action follows the arrival of the first wave of drugs that aim to treat Alzheimer's patients by removing toxic proteins from the brain. While the drugs slow the disease down, the benefits are minor,

One afternoon during her senior year in 2017, my 18-year-old high schooler, Baylie Grogan, spoke to me in a serious tone. "The only thing worse than dying is living in a body that doesn't work," she said. "Promise me you won't ever let me live that way." It was shortly before she left home to start college as a pre-med student. "I promise," I replied, agreeing that such a predicament would be horrifying, and I wouldn't want it either.

During the first weeks of last year's clay-court season, Francesca Jones found herself fighting through a breathless three-set tussle in Bogota that was rapidly falling out of her control. Trailing 5-3 in the final set of her second-round match, an exhausted Jones began her service motion. As she tried to leap into the air and strike the ball, however, she staggered forwards and collapsed to the ground. Two points from defeat, she was steered off the court in a wheelchair.

By attaching near the ear, the device targets the auricular branches of the trigeminal and vagus nerves to regulate menstrual cycle symptoms and help the body return to a rested state. These nerves play an important role throughout the menstrual cycle and release estrogen and progesterone, two essential sex hormones. They also target muscle contraction, blood flow, digestion, and more, a few body functions that change during a period, which explains the increase in cramps and tightening of blood vessels.