Get Healthy!

While guidelines for cancer screening have begun factoring in life expectancy, a new poll shows a majority of older adults disagree with age cutoffs based on how long a person is expected to live.

The University of Michigan National Poll on Healthy Aging querie...

AI tools may help boost radiologists' confidence in their diagnoses, but they can't be relied on to identify common lung diseases on chest X-rays, a new study says.

Researchers pitted 72 radiologists against four commercially AI tools in an analysis of more than 2,000 X-rays. The human experts won, according to results published Sept. 25 in Radiology.

"Chest radiograp...

Whole-body MRI scans are the latest health fad to be promoted by celebrities, with Kim Kardashian taking to Instagram last month to tout the practice.

But doctors are warning that such whole-body scans, while tempting, are pricey and not all that accurate.

In fact, the average person is more likely to be unnecessarily harmed by having a whole-body MRI than helped by catching a disea...

Many Americans are behind on recommended colon cancer screenings -- and their doctors often fail to remind them, a new study suggests.

The study, by the American Cancer Society, focused on a nationwide sample of more 5,000 Americans who were overdue for colon cancer screening. All had been to a routine checkup in the past year, but only about one-quarter said their provider had advised th...

A new test detects a type of cervical cancer often missed by a standard Pap test, providing an important advance in detection.

The test was developed by scientists at Montefiore Einstein Cancer Center in New York City.

"Our novel test appears sensitive for detecting cervical adenocarcinoma [ADC] -- which now accounts for up to 25% of cervical cancer cases -- as well as its precursor...

It's important for men to be familiar with the warning signs of prostate cancer and get screened because it's the second-leading cause of cancer death in men, an expert says.

While there will be more than 288,000 diagnoses and nearly 35,000 deaths this year, there are also 3.5 million American men who have the disease and are still alive.

Black men have the highest death rate for ...

While new research suggests cancer screenings are not extending lives for the most part, the study's authors stressed that there are still good reasons why people should continue with screenings.

Their review of clinical trials looked at six kinds of common cancer tests -- mammography, colonoscopy, fecal occult blood testing (FOBT) or endoscopy, prostate-specific antigen (PSA) tests and c...

British researchers may have found a way to diagnose Parkinson's disease several years sooner.

Researchers at University College London and Moorfields Eye Hospital say that eye scans may be able to detect signs of Parkinson's up to seven years before diagnosis.

"I continue to be amazed by what we can discover through eye scans. While we are not yet ready to predict whether an indivi...

Do you have COVID-19? With a little training, your dog might be more effective at figuring that out than even at-home antigen or sophisticated hospital tests.

Dogs are so good at it, according to a new research review, that they may be ready for mainstream medical use ...

The risks of screening mammograms to catch breast cancer may outweigh the benefits for certain women aged 70 or older, new research indicates.

The main risk? Overdiagnosis and treatment of a breast cancer that likely wouldn't have caused any symptoms during a woman's lifetime.

"For women who are on the younger end of the age range and who are generally healthy, the risk of overdiagn...

Testing children with a suspected sinus infection for three common bacteria might cut unnecessary antibiotic prescribing, a new study suggests.

Only half of kids with sinusitis -- inflammation or swelling of the sinuses -- show any improvement with antibiotics, which target bacterial infections, not viral infections, the researchers note.

"When a child comes in with a sore thro...

Most older adults think that screening for dementia is a good idea, according to a new poll on aging. But few actually take that step.

Only about 20% of those aged 65 to 80 had a screening test in the past year to see if their memory and thinking abilities have started to decline, according to the University of Michigan's National Poll on Healthy Aging.

"As many as half of Amer...

A definitive diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease now requires a series of complicated and expensive imaging scans that look for abnormal protein plaques and tangles in the brain.

But in the near future, detecting signs of Alzheimer's could be as simple as taking a finger prick blood test.

Researchers detected key Alzheimer's-related biomarkers in dried blood samples drawn from a finger...

Identifying genetic disorders in newborns and infants can help them get the care they need, but one approach -- whole genome sequencing -- appears far superior to another.

In a new study, researchers compared whole genome sequencing with targeted gene-sequencing. They found that whole genome sequencing (WGS) was nearly twice as effective at finding the abnormalities that lead to diso...

For much of the COVID-19 pandemic, doctors have told patients who get a negative result after taking a rapid antigen test at home to test again 48 hours later.

A new study confirms that's the right advice.

Whether you have symptoms or not, repeat testing after 48 hours may be required to rule out COVID infection, researchers from the University of Massachusetts Medical S...

Despite overall national declines in smoking, Americans who live in the South and Midwest are still much more likely to smoke, and smoke more, than those living in other states, a new report shows.

A nonprofit non-smoking advocacy group has identified what it calls "Tobacco Nation,"areas of the South and Midwest where...

Could a grocery cart save lives by preventing possible strokes? It just might.

The notion stems from a new British study in which grocery cart handles were embedded with electrocardiogram (EKG) sensors.

The goal: to screen shoppers for undiagnosed cases of atrial fibrillation (a-fib), the most common heart rhythm disorder.

"Atrial fibrillation is a leading cause of stroke,"ex...

Sarah Ferguson has undergone treatment for breast cancer, she announced on her podcast.

The Duchess of York, 63, had a mastectomy after the diagnosis and the surgery was successful, her rep confirmed Sunday, People magazine reported.

"The Duchess is receiving the best medical care and her doctors have told her that the prognosis is good. She is now recuperating with her f...

Screening newborns for severe combined immunodeficiency -- SCID, sometimes referred to as "bubble boy disease" -- significantly increases survival rates, researchers say.

Infants with SCID appear healthy at birth, but have no immune defenses, making them highly susceptible to severe and often fatal infections. The 1976 TV movie "The Boy in the Plastic Bubble" promoted awareness of th...

For the first time ever, the nation's top panel of preventive health experts has recommended that doctors routinely screen all adult patients under 65 for anxiety disorder.

Evidence now shows that anxiety screening can help those patients find peace of mind, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) said in recommendations that were published online June 20 in the