“Do you want numbing gel?” the dental technician asked me as she prepared to plunge into my mouth. In the entire history of dentistry, from caveman days to now, who has ever said no to more painkiller? Smear that gel around like spackle! She did. And then ground and scraped. And scraped and ground, for… Read More »
You are at your daughter’s recital and you get a call that your elderly patient’s son needs to talk to you urgently. A colleague has a family emergency and the hospital needs you to work a double shift. Your patient’s M.R.I. isn’t covered and the only option is for you to call the insurance company… Read More »
The NHS in England has now missed its flagship cancer target for more than 1,000 days with one in four patients facing delays getting treatment. Hospitals are meant to start treatment within 62 days of a GP referral – and have been set a target of achieving that for 85% of patients. But latest figures,… Read More »
Most of us would find it off-putting to imagine that there are many trillions of bacteria, viruses and fungi living in our body, invisible to the naked eye. But Richard Sprague, a Seattle-based software engineer, has dedicated years of his life — and tested himself hundreds of times — to unravel their mysteries.
ImageCreditGaia Stella You’d think that scientists at an international conference on obesity would know by now which diet is best, and why. As it turns out, even the experts still have widely divergent opinions. At a recent meeting of the Obesity Society, organizers held a symposium during which two leading scientists presented the somewhat contradictory… Read More »
WASHINGTON — The growth of national health spending, which surged as millions of Americans gained coverage under the Affordable Care Act, slowed last year, the Trump administration said on Thursday. Health spending in the United States totaled $ 3.5 trillion last year, up 3.9 percent from 2016, or about $ 10,740 a person. It accounted… Read More »