Feel like you should be drinking less? Start here
When experts talk about the dangers of excessive drinking, we often assume those warnings apply mostly to people with alcohol use disorder, a health issue sometimes referred to as alcoholism. But people who don’t meet formal criteria for this disorder…
Beyond the usual suspects for healthy resolutions
Early in the new year, promises to reboot your health typically focus on diet, exercise, and weight loss. And by now you may have begun making changes — or at least plans — to reach those goals. But consider going…
Could imaging scans replace biopsies during prostate cancer screening?
Abnormal results on a prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening test for cancer are typically followed by a systematic biopsy. During that procedure, doctors use a long needle to extract roughly a dozen samples from the prostate while looking at the gland…
Can probiotics help calm inflammatory bowel disease?
Approximately three million Americans have inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). IBD is an umbrella term for Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, illnesses marked by chronic or repeated bouts of inflammation in the digestive tract. Both types of IBD represent a complex…
Court ruling curbs unfounded claims for memory supplement
I must have seen commercials for Prevagen 50 times: story after story from everyday people who describe improvement in memory once they began taking Prevagen. And perhaps you recall older commercials playing off the idea that many people take supplements…
Sexual violence can cast a long shadow on health
Sexual violence occurs throughout the world. A simple definition is any sexual act for which consent is not obtained or freely given, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Rape, sexual coercion, and unwanted sexual contact are…
Prostate cancer: Short-course radiation as effective as longer-term treatments
It used to be that radiation therapy for prostate cancer involved weeks or months of repeat visits to a clinic for treatment. Today that’s not necessarily true. Instead of giving small doses (called fractions) per session until the full plan…
A liquid biopsy for metastatic prostate cancer
Metastatic prostate cancer can progress in different ways. In some men the disease advances rapidly, while other men have slower-growing cancer and a better prognosis. Researchers are developing various tools for predicting how fast prostate cancer might progress. Among the…