One of the true pioneers of modern medicine is Dr. Thomas Sarzl, who performed the first liver transplant and who developed many of the procedures that have made transplantation a safe lifesaving treatment for thousands of people. Dr. Sarzl is still active at age 83. He was interviewed recently by another transplant surgeon, Dr. Pauline….
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Better Health Through Close Friendships
Everybody knows that close friendships can be wonderful, and medical researchers are now coming up with tangible evidence that friendship can pay off in longer and healthier lives as well. “Friendship has a bigger impact on our psychological well-being than family relationships,” says sociologist Rebecca Adams of the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. She was….
Continue ReadingInactivity May Lead to Fatty Liver Disease
As if there is not already a multitude of problems awaiting those who lead an inactive lifestyle, researchers recently found yet another inactivity-related condition that threatens human health, a condition called non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), according to Medical News Today. In an article published in The Journal of Physiology, Dr. John Thyfault of the….
Continue ReadingMammogram Benefits Exaggerated?
Widely hailed for saving lives through early detection of breast cancer, mammography may in fact “do more harm than good,” writes Roni Rabin of the New York Times. Rabin reports that British health care advocates and experts complained in a letter to The Times of London that candidates for mammography receive informational fliers that exaggerate….
Continue ReadingEven A Glass of Alcohol A Day Can Increase Women’s Risk for Cancers
A study published in February 2009 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute reports that low levels of alcohol consumption may be responsible for about 5% of cancers in American women (or 30,000 cases a year), Thomas Maugh writes in a Los Angeles Times story. This newfound risk of low or moderate consumption of….
Continue ReadingVitamins Failed to Prevent Diseases in Recent Studies
Do large doses of vitamins really help ward off health problems, including insomnia, fatigue, digestive disorders, and impaired immune system? A number of recent scientific studies challenge the long-held popular belief in the disease-preventing power of vitamin pills, which cost Americans $23 billion a year, Tara Parker-Pope reports in a New York Times article. A….
Continue ReadingBeware of “Natural” Weight-Loss Supplements Tainted with Potent Drugs
In a recent initiative against contaminated weight-loss products, the FDA finds 69 drugs to be contaminated with prescription drugs and chemicals, and expects the list of brands to grow even longer in the next few weeks, reports Natasha Singer of the New York Times. A complete list of the tainted drugs found so far is….
Continue ReadingAnnual Inspection May Reduce Deaths from Oral Cancer
One of the less common forms of cancer, oral cancer was diagnosed in about 35,300 Americans last year and caused the death of 7,600 people. Although oral cancer is one of the easiest to detect and diagnose, the five-year survival rate is only 59%, and more than 60% of cases are diagnosed in the late,….
Continue ReadingCan Diet Beat Surgery in Protecting the Heart?
In 2008 alone, more than a million Americans underwent various coronary procedures, including balloon angioplasty and coronary artery bypass surgery. However, while these expensive measures can be lifesaving for some, they do not necessarily do a better job at protecting most people’s hearts than a heart-healthy lifestyle would, Jane Brody writes in the New York….
Continue ReadingOnline Anonymous Notification of Sex Partners For STDs
An online service called inSPOT allows patients who test positive for STDs to use a website to notify sexual partners, anonymously if they so choose, of the possibility that the partners were infected. A report done by the San Francisco Department of Public Health finds that since 2004, 30,000 people have used the service to….
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