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In Focus

Betrayal Within

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Researchers are narrowing in on a compelling explanation for narcolepsy: the body at war with itself.

IN THE SUMMER OF 2010, Ben Blackwell, a five-year-old living near Dublin, Ireland, began complaining of headaches and a squealing noise in his head. And even though he’d stopped taking naps t...

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In Depth

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Dr. Darwin

Can a refresher course in the laws of natural selection help doctors better understand human health and illness?

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Long Last Moments

Dementia care has an end-of-life problem. The author explores the system’s shortfalls through her mother’s last days.

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Doctors in the Machine

The next generation of medical software offers extraordinary support. But how can such tools be used to the best effect?

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Betrayal Within

Researchers are narrowing in on a compelling explanation for narcolepsy: the body at war with itself.

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From the Black Death to SARS

A brief history of quarantine in policy and popular prose.

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Deconstructing Happiness

Exploring 75 years of data, researchers trace the emotional highs and lows in the lives of hundreds of men and their descendants.

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From the Bottom Up

Infusing colons with donated feces has led to remarkable cures and big questions about what's safe and what's next.

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After the Cure

The success of pediatric cancer therapies has a downside: adults with lingering health problems caused by their treatments.

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(Out of) Office Visit

Telehealth technology takes primary and specialty care to distant patients. But will nagging issues slow its rapid growth?

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Printing a New You

Using 3-D printers to create skull implants or replacement joints is exciting; running off living organs would be revolutionary.

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Comprehension Test

For patients to be effective partners in their own care requires a basic grasp of medical terms that, shockingly, many don't have.

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Tangled Up in Tau

Trouble with the protein may underlie most kinds of dementia, potentially including Alzheimer's. New drugs could help.

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Calming the Explosive Child

When troubled kids erupt, the traditional view calls for tougher parenting. A new approach substitutes skill building for punishment.

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Dispatches

A Race to Resilience

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Stephen Friend is looking for new cures in the genes of a million volunteers.

Feeling Nature’s Pull

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Researchers have harnessed the power of the immune system to remove foreign pathogens from the blood.

Kidneys Wanted

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A shortfall has repercussions in policy and an international black market.

X-Ray Vision

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Wilhelm Röntgen stumbled upon one of medicine’s first imaging techniques 120 years ago.

Checklist Item 31

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What is empathy, and how can it be taught to young doctors?

Of Elephants and Evolution

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Animals may hold a key to cancer’s origins and treatment.

The Right to Try

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Five state legislatures now allow terminal patients to circumvent the FDA. Will this new path to experimental drugs help or hurt?

My Father's House

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An immigrant physician’s daughter defines her American dream.

Fixing Medicare's Hospice Problem

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New approaches can combat the steep costs of caring for dementia patients.

The Brain Extended

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A wounded World War II veteran transformed thinking about artificial limbs.

Are Hospitals Shrinking?

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In one metric — inpatient stays — hospitals are seeing a steady decline.

Do Ebola Quarantines Make Sense?

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Treating the epidemic means re-evaluating a public health tool with a storied past.

Tech Meets Quarantine

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New digital systems can help keep infectious agents at arm’s length — or further away.

A Tragedy of Rural Proportions

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A new documentary explores health care inequality in rural America, and why the Affordable Care Act isn’t enough.

The Value of Good Feelings

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New research suggests that having a positive outlook may improve health and longevity.

Where Have All the Microbes Gone?

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Internist and researcher Martin Blaser believes that disturbances in the gut may underlie several modern maladies.

Acting Out

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Reflections on being a minor character in a disaster drill.

The Lost Ward

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Beds for psychiatric care are steadily declining. What can be done?

Gut Feelings

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The mysteries of celiac disease prove to be more intricate than expected.

Making Trials Multitask

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A funding shift may encourage more fundamental brain research.

Drawing From Experience

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Cartoonist Ben Schwartz discusses the visual side of learning medicine.

Going the Distance

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Longitudinal studies have provided both puzzles and insights about human health and well being.

Carolyn Greene: The Data Miner

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Epidemiologist Carolyn Greene aims to use electronic health records to track chronic disease trends.

PTSD Timeline: Centuries of Trauma

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A brief history of the observation and study of PTSD

Søren Sørenson: The Pioneer of pH

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A century ago, chemist Søren Sørensen invented what would become a crucial diagnostic tool: the pH scale.

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From Mass General

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What the Pill Sees

A new micro-imaging “pill” lets doctors peer inside the esophagus and beyond.

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Foreign Wars, Domestic Tragedies

Families of returning veterans sometimes develop mental health problems of their own. An MGH team studies the problem and looks for solutions.

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New Allies in the HIV Fight

An MGH program in South Africa partners with young women to research the earliest phase of HIV infection.

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The Warren Triennial Prize Goes to…

The storied award from MGH goes to a molecular biologist breaking new ground in cancer genetics.

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Cancer: Take Two Aspirin

The connection between aspirin use and a reduced risk for certain cancers is becoming clearer. MGH researcher Andrew Chan outlines who stands to benefit most.

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On the Origin of Life

Nobel Laureate Jack Szostak discusses how research on chromosomes led to current investigations into Earth's first organisms.

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The Same As Being There

MGH’s pioneering telestroke network brings virtual consultations to outlying hospitals

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A Call for Replication

Peter L. Slavin and David F. Torchiana on the value of reproducing research.

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The Legacy of Ward 4

MGH’s clinical research center, opened in 1925, created a model for the NIH to open similar facilities across the country.

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Charts & Data

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20 Years After Apartheid

In the 1980s physician Miguel Ribeiro took stunning photographs of his South African patients. How has the nation’s health care fared in the years since?

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Grand Theft Medical

The move to electronic medical records may be helping identity thieves.

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Living Anatomy

Artist Danny Quirk paints the living structures of the body on live models.

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From MRI to Bronze Sculpture

Artists use medical scans of tumors to make stunning, informative sculptures

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A New Epidemic Model

SARS led to the discovery of "super-spreaders," who can infect dozens of people. They also exist, it appears, in other infectious diseases.

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A Brief History of Staph

Charting the progression of today’s hospital terror.

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