
Flowers, chocolates, organ donation — are you in?

Chair yoga: Benefits of a mind-body practice without the risk of falling

Need a prescription for an ED medication? What to know about BlueChew, hims, Roman, and other online ED medication retailers

Low-carb foods: Nutritious choices for creating a sustainable diet that's lower in carbohydrates

Pilates: A good option for older adults?

A muscle-building obsession in boys: What to know and do

Calcium-rich foods: How to boost your intake of this important mineral

DNR: What is a do-not-resuscitate order?

Sleep hygiene: Simple practices for better rest

Should you be tested for inflammation?
Medical Tests & Procedures Archive
Articles
Recovering from bypass surgery
Recovering from heart bypass surgery usually takes at least six weeks. Common challenges include feeling weak and tired, a loss of appetite, constipation, and depression. Also, heavy lifting and driving should be avoided.
Is your heart healthy enough for surgery?
If you're at risk for heart disease, you may need additional testing before a hip replacement or other major surgery.
Image: photodisc/Thinkstock
All surgery, even minor procedures like cataract removal, involves a certain amount of stress. People facing surgery might experience emotional stress related to their illness or condition, often coupled with concerns about their recovery.
Some of the most common noncardiac surgeries done in older people, such as a hip replacement or gallbladder removal, can also put physical stress on the heart. Anesthesia and the operation itself can causes changes in heart rate and blood pressure as well as unmask previously undiagnosed heart disease.
Your blood work, on the edge of normal
What to do when routine test results are at the high or low end of the acceptable range.
Catching early changes in blood work may help prevent chronic disease, such as diabetes.
Image: Ca-ssis/Thinkstock
As a smart medical consumer, you know it's important to look over the results of your routine blood work, even when the numbers are all within the normal range. But what if you notice that some results are at the high or low end of that range? Should you be concerned about this?
A look at corrective eye surgery
Some procedures may help you escape the need for glasses.
Monovision LASIK and lens replacement surgery may help you see more clearly.
Image: a.collectionRF/Thinkstock
You cannot avoid declining vision. After age 40, everyone begins to experience some form of presbyopia, a condition coined from the Greek words for "old sight."
Does double knee surgery make sense for you?
The idea of having a knee replaced is daunting. But what if both of your knees need repairing? Is one visit to the operating room better than two?
If you are otherwise in good health, it's a conversation worth having with your doctor and rehabilitation team. There are some benefits to replacing both joints during a single surgery (called simultaneous replacement). These include undergoing anesthesia only once, fewer days in the hospital, and only one (albeit prolonged) rehabilitation that lets you resume normal activities sooner than two separate ones.
What's the latest in cataract surgery?
Advances in imaging, measuring, and lenses are making the procedure even better.
Image: Thinkstock
A cataract—clouding of the lens inside the eye—is a common cause of poor vision and blindness among older adults. But cataracts can be removed and replaced with artificial lenses. Sound scary? It's not. "Cataract surgery is something that just about everyone will need if you live long enough. Thankfully, with all of the tools and technologies at our disposal, much of it has become fairly routine. The vast majority of people have excellent outcomes with improvement in their quality of vision," says Dr. Christian Song, a cataract and refractive surgeon at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary.
Typical surgery
Cataract surgery is an outpatient procedure. To remove the cataract, the surgeon makes a circular incision around the eye's lens, and then uses ultrasound technology to break up and remove the cloudy lens. After that, a new lens is slipped into the eye.
Muscle problems caused by statins: Can a genetic test reveal your risk?
A mail-order saliva test marketed to consumers may make some promises it can't deliver.
A new mail-order genetic test called StatinSmart bills itself as the first test to identify a person's risk of experiencing muscle pain from a statin. That sounds like potentially helpful information, given that up to half of people who are prescribed statins quit taking them because of perceived side effects—most often muscle pain. Others avoid statins altogether because of that worry.
But here's the rub: muscle problems can range from mild to serious, and the terms experts use to describe them can be confusing. The StatinSmart website says 29% of people who take a statin develop "statin-induced myopathy," which they define as muscle aches, pains, weakness, or cramps.
Test may diagnose prostate cancer more accurately
A study in the December 2015 issue of The Lancet Oncology found that a new test, called STHLM3, is more helpful at detecting aggressive cancer than traditional tests for prostate-specific antigen (PSA).
The STHLM3 test is a blood test that analyzes a combination of six protein markers, more than 200 genetic markers, and various clinical data, such as age, family history, and previous prostate biopsies.
Ask the doctors: What determines whether a woman needs a cesarean section?
Ask the doctors
Q: I'm expecting and want to have a vaginal delivery, but many of my friends have had cesarean sections lately. Is this a preference, or are there medical reasons to have a cesarean?
A: The health of the mother and baby, the family's personal preferences, and the hospital in which a woman delivers her baby play a role in determining whether she has a cesarean. Common medical reasons for cesareans include fetal malpresentation (when the baby is turned so that its feet or buttocks will come out first), pelvic disproportion (a birth canal that is unusually shaped or too small in relation to the size of the baby), and a past cesarean. A study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in December 2015 suggests that such commonly cited medical issues may account only partly for high cesarean rates.
Taking aim at cancer
Image: Thinkstock
Targeted cancer therapies have limits, but some may offer a better option than standard chemotherapy.
Mention cancer treatment, and most men think of chemotherapy—complete with hair loss and extreme fatigue. But for some men, there is another option. Targeted therapies can sometimes treat certain cancers with fewer side effects and better outcomes.

Flowers, chocolates, organ donation — are you in?

Chair yoga: Benefits of a mind-body practice without the risk of falling

Need a prescription for an ED medication? What to know about BlueChew, hims, Roman, and other online ED medication retailers

Low-carb foods: Nutritious choices for creating a sustainable diet that's lower in carbohydrates

Pilates: A good option for older adults?

A muscle-building obsession in boys: What to know and do

Calcium-rich foods: How to boost your intake of this important mineral

DNR: What is a do-not-resuscitate order?

Sleep hygiene: Simple practices for better rest

Should you be tested for inflammation?
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