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Doctors

Aaron Bolds, a former college basketball player, graduated from medical school in 2018. He’s now a doctor at Mount Sinai Health System in New York, specializing in rehabilitation medicine.

To Boost Black Men in Medicine, Advocates Turn to Sports

High-performing athletes possess many of the skills and attributes that physicians need, supporters of the strategy say

The one-of-a-kind dolls were designed to represent frontline heroes who worked tirelessly during the pandemic.

New Barbie Dolls Honor Covid-19 Frontline Medical Workers From Around the World

The series of dolls honor six women who developed Covid-19 vaccines, studied the virus, worked in hospitals, and more

Surgeon Ala Stanford takes a pause from testing while standing near one of her group's signs in North Philadelphia.

Covid-19

Meet the Black Physicians Bringing Covid Vaccines to Hard-Hit Philadelphia Communities

The Black Doctors Covid-19 Consortium is leveraging their medical expertise and connections to provide testing and vaccines where measures are most needed

Artificial Intelligence has been used to help caregivers focus on patients most at-risk, sort threats to patient recovery and foresee spikes in facility needs for things like beds and ventilators.

How Doctors Are Using Artificial Intelligence to Battle Covid-19

Software is helping to shape treatment, but experts worry that some tools are approved too soon and others are biased

Anthony Fauci, age 80, says museum director Anthea Hartig, “defines service at the highest level and exemplifies the true meaning of a great American.”

Covid-19

Anthony Fauci Donates His 3-D SARS-CoV-2 Model to the Smithsonian

The nation’s doctor is awarded the Great Americans Medal by the National Museum of American History in virtual ceremony

Smith, the first black American to earn a medical degree, was also a leading abolitionist and prolific writer. His alma maters included the African Free School #2 (bottom right) and the University of Glasgow (top right).

Race in America

America’s First Black Physician Sought to Heal a Nation’s Persistent Illness

An activist, writer, doctor and intellectual, James McCune Smith, born enslaved, directed his talents to the eradication of slavery

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Covid-19

How Navajo Physicians Are Battling the Covid-19 Pandemic

Combining traditional medicine and modern science, these courageous doctors have risen to the challenge

Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell were the first and third women doctors in the United States.

Women Who Shaped History

The Way Americans Remember the Blackwell Sisters Shortchanges Their Legacy

Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell deserve to have their incredible stories told in full

In addition to the newly discovered pair of glands, the human body has three more large sets and about 1,000 glands scattered throughout the mouth and throat.

Scientists May Have Identified a Previously Unknown Spit-Producing Organ in Our Heads

Uncovering the existence of the glands will help oncologists protect them from radiation, improving the quality of life for cancer patients

Video visits with doctors and other health-care workers saw a sharp uptick as the COVID-19 pandemic took off.

Covid-19

Is COVID-19 the Tipping Point for Telemedicine?

Sheltering in place has pushed virtual health care into the mainstream, making us wonder if we’ll ever go back to waiting rooms

The first physician to definitively distinguish typhus and typhoid was American doctor William Wood Gerhard.

Covid-19

What an 1836 Typhus Outbreak Taught the Medical World About Epidemics

An American doctor operating out of Philadelphia made clinical observations that where patients lived, not how they lived, was at the root of the problem

Health care workers at Stanford and the University of Massachusetts who have placed smiling portraits of themselves on the outside of their protective gear

Covid-19

Portrait Project Reveals the Faces Behind Health Care Workers’ Protective Gear

Doctors and nurses are attaching smiling photos of themselves to the outside of their protective gear to maintain connections with patients

A scholar spotted the long-overlooked image (its horns and face are at left, its legs on the right) while conducting research at a Berlin museum.

Cool Finds

This Demon, Immortalized in 2,700-Year-Old Assyrian Tablet, Was Thought to Cause Epilepsy

The damaged drawing was hidden on the back of a clay cuneiform tablet

By genetically modifying a patient's own immune cells to target and kill cancer cells, CAR-T therapy offers a whole new way to fight cancer.

The Possibilities and Risks of Genetically Altering Immune Cells to Fight Cancer

Of the ten or so patients I’ve treated with CAR-T, over half developed strange neurologic side effects ranging from headaches to seizures

Scientists are starting to get a better idea of how many factors can influence a newborn's gut microbiome.

Babies Born by C-Section Have Different Gut Microbes Than Vaginally Delivered Infants

Method of delivery can influence the bacteria in infants’ guts, according to a new study, but differences were found to disappear within nine months

In groundbreaking clinical trials, researchers are trying to treat patients by editing the genetic makeup of cells with a tool called CRISPR.

Four U.S. CRISPR Trials Editing Human DNA to Research New Treatments

Breaking down how the gene editing technology is being used, for the first time in the United States, to treat patients with severe medical conditions

Scanning electron micrograph of HIV-1 (in green) budding from cultured lymphocyte (a type of white blood cell). Multiple round bumps on cell surface represent sites of assembly and budding of virions.

Scientists Identify Factors That Make People Naturally Resistant to H.I.V.

Studying key points on the H.I.V. virus that are weak to immune system attacks could lead to new treatments or H.I.V. vaccines

An illustration of Crawford Long removing a tumor from the neck of James Venable.

How Ether Went From a Recreational ‘Frolic’ Drug to the First Surgery Anesthetic

Before ether was used as an anesthetic in surgery, doctors relied on less effective techniques for pain relief, such as hypnosis

New Research

Was Alexander the Great Pronounced Dead Prematurely?

A new theory suggests he was only paralyzed when he was declared dead, but it’s impossible to prove he had Guillain-Barré Syndrome with the existing facts

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Ingenious Minds

Jose Gomez-Marquez Wants to Turn Doctors and Nurses into Makers

Kennedy Center president Deborah Rutter interviews the co-founder of MIT’s Little Devices Lab about democratizing health technology

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